Tag: art

Great Find at my Favorite Store

On By Jennifer Mugrage4 Comments

Here is the basic wooden door pull that finally came off my son’s closet in our rented farmhouse. The closet is plywood or chipboard or something like that, hollow, and from repeated usage, this screw had stripped around itself and now just popped out whenever you tried to open the accordion door.

Here is the replacement, from my best bud, Hobby Lobby.

I love Hobby Lobby. It’s my source for knitting supplies, including wool and cotton yarns and needles; affordable canvases, acrylic paints, palettes and brushes for my (and my son’s) painting vice; model-railroad materials for whenever I need to build a model of Tenochtitlan; fabric for a Renfaire tent or a cave woman costume; and wood for those hippie woodburning projects, not to mention the usual scrapbooking supplies, gift wrap, stickers, and Christmas decorations.

Sadly, or perhaps happily, this post is not a paid promotion.

In addition to all this, Hobby Lobby has an impressive selection of themed shelf brackets, towel and key hooks, and drawer pulls, often in cast-iron. These are not just cutesy country style fixtures (though they do have that). You could put together a goth or steampunk or French Country or Log Cabin look for a room, easily, with the supplies found there.

Long story short, I walked into the Hobby Lobby variety-drawer-pull section, and within seconds I had found the beauty above. It was 50% off, so I think I paid about two bucks for it. In order to put it into the plywood door, I had to use a plastic drywall anchor.

The thing that made this find so serendipitous, though, was that the closet in question resides in the room of my rabbit-obsessed son. (Rabbits!) Additionally, said room has the following window valance:

I mean.

The only downside is that, as I now notice in the picture, the rest of the door looks kind of bad by comparison.

The upside is that this post is now long enough to appear on a Friday and not on a Monday.

Enjoy the Stuff: New Year’s Advice from Doug Wilson

On By Jennifer MugrageLeave a comment

“And Jesus answered and said, ‘Verily, I say unto you, There is no man that hath left house, or brethren, or sisters, or father, or mother, or wife, or children, or lands, for my sake, and the gospel’s, but he shall receive an hundredfold now in this time, houses, and brethren, and sisters, and mothers, and children, and lands, with persecutions; and in the world to come eternal life” (Mark 10:29 – 30)

Now there is a certain kind of compromised Christian for whom the first part of this passage (v. 29) is the “hard saying.” The cares of this world do choke out spiritual interest. But there is another kind of Christian, the pious, otherworldly kind, for whom the hard saying is actually found in v. 30. It is as hard to give house and lands to some Christians as it is to take them away from others.

Imagine a glorious mansion on one hundred acres on a scenic stretch of the Oregon coast, and then imagine yourself having been assigned the task of giving it to an otherworldly prayer warrior. The Lord wanted him to be in a position to paint some glorious water colors, but only after conducting his prayer walks on the beach. He nevertheless was struggling with the whole concept because the guilt made it difficult to hold the brush.

The challenge is this: how can we hold things in the palm of our hand without those things themselves growing hands that can hold us in a death grip? The Lord promised that we could handle serpents and not be bitten (Mark 16:18), and mammon is certainly one of those serpents.

American Milk and Honey, pp. 151 – 153

Latest View of Big Southern Butte

On By Jennifer MugrageLeave a comment

Can you spot it?

This wasn’t done from a photograph, as you can tell by the lack of detail. It wasn’t done plein-air either, but it was closer to a plein-air painting.

A few weeks ago, after I had gone outside to feed the hens, I was greeted by this scene. The sun hadn’t yet reached our homestead, but it was striking the hills up northaway. I stood there for a few moments memorizing the colors and thinking about how I would paint it. Then, over the course of the next week, whenever I had a chance I would add to the painting. I painted only when there was natural light in the studio. Pretend plein-air, if you will.

Let me show you my process …

Step 1: cover the canvas in light green for the sky and light grey for the predawn snow.

Step 2: add BSB and its mountain friends in appropriate dawn colors.

Step 3: the lava fields near them have not yet been hit by the sun, so they are navy blue.

Step 4: add stripes of cloud, just as they looked on that morning.

And finally, add distant trees, canal edge, ploughed-up snowy field with tire tracks, and black road with tire tracks in the snow.

Merry Christmas!

Creative Jack O’Lanterns

On By Jennifer Mugrage9 Comments

carving it

the elaborate plan (This is going to be a character from Doors.)

some of the many results

My son keeps asking me to buy more pumpkins cause he keeps getting more ideas. I don’t mind; pumpkins are cheap this time of year. Jack o’lanterns are no longer a measure to keep evil spirits away. (We don’t need that; we have Christ!) They are now a whimsical autumn art form. My son is an artist and I can’t restrain him from doing artist things.