Day 181 :: Friday June 29 :: Ottawa

Use bones, skulls and/or skeletons as your inspiration today.

Today is a very special day: the halfway point of my year-long project!! How perfectly suitable that it should be skulled-themed, since the author of the book I'm using originally did a skull a day for a year! My contribution was to take a tasty red delicious apple and, using a paring knife, transform it into a little skull. It also made a tasty snack once the picture below was taken :)

Day 180 :: Thursday June 28 :: Ottawa via Peterborough

Be unseasonal. Create something that belongs to another season of the year and put it into the environment. Extra credit: Document what happens when others encounter it.

I didn't create anything tangible today... more an experience, a feeling really. Let me explain. Faithful readers may remember my close-friend-who-moved-away entry back in early May; yes, we have been keeping in touch, but emails, facebook notes and gmail chats can never replace a hug or that way we can look at each other and have a full conversation without saying a word. So far, busy schedules meant that our free weekends never lined up, and our respective ultimate teams have been attending different tournaments. The last month has been a bit rough on me due to my injury, and to top it off, i've been feeling sick for about a week.

In the past, something this friend and I would often do is what we called a 'Random Whatever'. We'd agree to hang out, then wing it from there – ending up at movies, parks, other friends' places, even in Montreal once. The beauty of the plan was that there was no plan; the two of us are rather impulsive people, so this was always fun.

So yesterday, about mid-morning, an idea came to mind: what if I drove down and surprised my friend? And I did. It was awesome. The look on my friend's face was so worth it. We got a chance to sit on a porch with our feet up, catch up, and throw a frisbee. I was even able to say hi to other mutual friends I hadn't seen in a while. I ended up staying overnight – which meant getting up at 4:30 this morning to drive back and more importantly, be at work on time.

All this to say... this whole thing left me feeling like a little kid on Christmas morning (see? Here's the 'unseasonal' link!!). It really cheered me up and left me feeling a lot better than I had in the past little while. The drive felt shorter coming back than it had going there. The feeling carried through the day and even through my evening acupuncture appointment (double round, grrr)... or maybe this is just how being on 5 hours of sleep and hyped up on coffee feels like. Either way... here's a picture of the sunrise, taken about 30 minutes into the drive back. 

Day 179 :: Wednesday June 27 :: Ottawa

Grow it. Use seeds to make something. You could plant them in a shape and document them growing, use the seeds themselves to make an image, or...?

Oops... I forgot to buy 'proper' seeds last night... so these sunflower seeds will have to do! I wrote my name because it was the weekly assignment from the creative Facebook group :)

Day 178 :: Tuesday June 26 :: Ottawa

Use the world of birds as your inspiration today.

I recently watched an online video about an artist who created a large portrait using only dots – it had taken him over 200 hours to finish the work!

Inspired by this, I thought I'd give the technique a try, but with my own twist of solid areas and lines to contrast the dots. This took about an hour to complete, and I must say that I love the final result. Thank you, fine-point Sharpie!

Day 177 :: Monday June 25 :: Ottawa

Make a robot out of everyday objects.

This little guy is made of a lunchbox, clip-in hair strands, a clothes hanger, plastic cones and newspaper. It took forever to make (mostly because I was never truly happy with the result), and I strongly debated scratching it and starting over. Yet after some more thought, I opted to keep it as a reminder that not everything will turn out perfect, and that's okay.

Day 176 :: Sunday June 24 :: Ottawa

Make somewhere indoors seem like it is outdoors.

I brought in more bit of grass from my back yard to create this little farm scene in the middle of my living room :) 

And a zoomed out shot to show the full setup:

Day 175 :: Saturday June 23 :: Ottawa

Miniaturize. Create a tiny version of something that would normally be much bigger.

Procrastinated all day... actually, did some studying, watched the Spain-France Euro game with friends, went to RibFest with another friend... so once again it's late and I'm not sure what to do for this assignment. Rooting through my art supplies and looking for inspiration, I came across this printed cut-and-assemble sheet of a little Heidelberg press. Funny thing is i've had that sheet for ages – so tonight it was finally time to do something with it!