lauragarabedian

So the 21st was my roommates birthday. And he has a party on the Solstice to celebrate the both his birthday and the longest night of the year.  It was my first time to attend this gloriousness but I am so glad I was around for it. It was a glorious celebration of friendship, camaraderie, and geekery, and was just an incredible amount of fun.  There were a plethora of candles, of friendship, of mugs (that I designed), of geekery, and of a genuinely wonderful and heartfelt good time.

This will be my first year not to have Christmas with my family and TBH it is kind of a relief.  I decided to leave the decision of whether or not I went to TX up to the weather, and rather thankfully two nights ago we got about a foot of snow on the ground and most of the roads leaving to TX are covered in ice.  So rather than a 16 hour drive followed by stress and trying to see family and friends in a very short a stressful time, followed by another stressful 16 hour drive back, I will have a lazy morning. With a lazy afternoon to follow. And the only things I am required to do will be to feed myself.  I may even take a day off from art (probably not, but maybe).  And just be lazy.  My only definite plan for the morrow is to watch the Doctor Who Christmas special. And to be honest, that is enough of a plan to make me happy.

So what I want to do here is just say thank you.
Thank you all for your support.
Thank you for your friendship.
And I hope you all have a chance to have beautiful and relaxing holidays, to spend however you see fit. 

Cheers to all, and happy 2012.

So I acquired these tiny little ornaments/frames for a discount and think they would make perfect Christmas Gifts for people.  I will paint a tiny little original to fit in it of your characters portrait in one of these wee little frames.  I have ovular (both vertical and horizontal), rectangular (both vertical and horizontal) and square frames and they are between 2" and 1" on all sides (so the ovals are approximately 1.5x1 and the rectangles about 1.5x1 and the square about 1.25x1.25 ) Now I don't have a ton of these little guys, they were a discount store find.  Please keep in mind these are WEE. As in the image you see on your screen is probably a bit larger than life (depending on your screen resolution etc).

But here is the deal, it will be $35 including shipping for a tiny piece of original watercolor art in a tiny little gold frame with a little gold chain hanger (such as shown in the photos). 

IN ORDER TO GET A SLOT
Please e-mail me with your references/desire to have a slot and if you REALLY specific frame shape
I will get back to you to confirm whether or not you got in (and if the frame shape you request is still availabe) and request a paypal payment for $30
My TOS are here https://docs.google.com/document/d/1g7TvwjZ3rN0qGiJKbSI6qDwtOXc2YX5KBrW4Irw2SsM/edit

So my health has been crummy. Yep, we've talked about this. I have been doing better about keeping my diet more on track (less carbs/sugars) and trying to be good about taking my pills but you know what helps the most?

Two things.
1) Getting OUT OF THE DAMN HOUSE. Which is one of the main reasons I moved... I hardly did it in Texas as for most of the year it was too bloody hot. And this week I was kind of bad about it because I felt really pressured to finish some commissions. But you know what? On the days I did get out and walk around... with a friend, with my puppy, just AROUND. I felt a lot better. And that translated through to the morning. I slept better, and I didn't wake up feeling like I was coming out of an anxiety attack.

2) Being with friends. Getting a chance to hang out with my buddy Wolf-Nymph noticeably lowered my stress level too. I.e. yesterday, when I did both things, I slept infinitely better than I have in quite a while, and didn't wake up with chest pains.

It's funny what happens when you listen to your doctor and your body. And it is kind of proving to me that I did the right thing coming here. I am MUCH more inclined to get outside here, and go and DO things. Not to mention Colorado is full of artsy friends. I love being creative with other people, it makes the process so much more enjoyable and fluid.

In other news, still looking for a permanent place to be, and staring at the list of THINGS TO DO. Which is too damn long.
I decided to sit down and make a proper list and damn. I mean, just damn. I have an awful lot of stuff on the burner, but really not enough of it is paid work >< Which is just kind of painful. But still. I hope to finish up the playing cards in the next three weeks (hoping to finish early, we'll see if it happens - my commissions always take first priority). I have a lot of personal projects I need to work on and a ton of internet/businessy stuff to finish *blagh*. The only bit of being a small business I don't care for is the actual BUSINESS side of it, but whatever.

Next convention is OklaCon, so prepping some steampunky goodness right now *grinz*

So I have only done one other Anime convention and it is A-Kon. This is north americas longest running anime convention and one of the largest. 18,000 people attended last year if the numbers on Wikipedia are to be believed. It is HUGE. It is CRAZY. and it is EXHAUSTING. And it doesn't do spectacularly for me. I mean it does well enough. It justifies its costs since it is a local con, but I probably won't drive down for it from CO next year.

Now Anime-Fest. This is a whole different bag of cats. Or barrel of carp. Or something. It is another long running con, but not nearly as long running or as large as A-Kon. And the attendance is much lower. It is held in a different hotel and there are significantly less artists/dealers. But man, this con is awesome. It is a little strange as it is a four day con. And I noticed that sales kind of have a slow but steady growth to Sunday and then Monday people rush in the morning and then wander. But I loved this convention. There was enough room for people to wander and not feel crowded, no one came over saying they were bored (a problem at smaller cons) and it wasn't that intense crush of A-Kon. And financially it did pretty well for me. But the thing that really got me was that the art show did well for me! This is incredibly rare (for me). I sold one original and two prints, one of which went to auction, so I was just incredibly pleased. I also had more traffic FROM people who saw me in the art show, and the staff were just lovely as well. The only problem I had with the con was ACTUALLY GETTING REG'd. I had given up on the con a few months ago because I couldn't get in touch with anyone about reg. Finally at A-Kon they had a reg booth so I got in there. Strange. Hopefully I can get back in again next year though, as I quite enjoyed this con and it would be worth my drive to head down again next year. A huge thank you to everyone who came by and said hi, new friends and old, and to the staff at Anime-Fest, you were awesome.

In other news.

I saw FrightNight last week with a friend. Super fun campy horror flick. I loved it. Of course I adore David Tennant so there is a bit of a bias, but even without him it was a FUN horror flick that didn't take itself to seriously.

Last night I got to have an awesome post-con dinner with another friend of mine, (Vanessa) she smoked a brisket. A delicious, delicious brisket, and then had grilled nectarines, and a FANTASTIC indian pudding dish that her dad made for dessert. Getting a chance to hang out with her was such a joy. We ended the night watching Despicable Me, which I love, and she hadn't seen. It was kind of a perfect relaxing way to end a con weekend. It is always great to see this lady and I will miss her terribly when I leave.

I AM TAKING TODAY OFF! I have a hard time taking days off. The whole working from home thing means my work is always in front of me. And even if I say I will take a day off it rarely ever happens. I realize that there is work to do and just start doing it. But Vanessa heard me saying that and mentioned that she had a half day today. So she is going to steal me away after her work so I don't work too much today. I mean, I say I'm taking today off but I've already started doing some finances and... well, it's hard to take days off when you know that there is STUFF to DO! Not only is she going to steal me away, but steal me away and LET ME RIDE HER HORSE! So excited, I have ridden him before and he is AMAZING. Just a beautifully moving out, sweet, Arabian. I love him. But yeah, I'll start back up tomorrow. I told myself I needed a day off as I haven't had one since I got back from Colorado a few weeks ago. And I don't know that I had a true day off since the first DAY I was in Colorado. So, well, yeah.

Plans are proceeding apace for my move to Colorado at the end of the month. Living situations are being sorted and considered duly, and I am generally so excited to move up there. Packing has been put on hiatus as I had a con last weekend and the weekend before, but shall continue this week, and I have the gala event at the end of the month to prep for.

Hope you all had a lovely holiday weekend!

http://www.wacom.com/en/Products/Inkling.aspx

In other news. ArmadilloCon pretty well tanked. Boo. So much for that helping my finances in any sort of a way. Boo.

It is interesting looking back on life. On how our emotions and reactions evolve.
What follows is really an introspection on why I don't trust many people and how my reactions have involved. It is an incredibly self-driven post and I don't expect many people to get it or want to read it but I felt like writing it down



Lots of introspection on why I am how I am below (I tried to LJ cut but apparently am a failwhale)


When I was younger I was slow to trust ANYONE. I was the geeky child who read a whole lot, loved to learn, and did all sorts of things that 'popular' kids didn't do. I caught frogs, I had insect collections, I was in 4-H, I dressed how I wanted and I got made fun of. I got made fun of a LOT. So I didn't trust anyone. If they approached me I assumed it was to tease me, to mock me, or (rarely) to get answers for class homework.  Needless to say I had very few friends.


When I finally started to make friends I made a few poor choices. A girl who initially was a lot like me (interests, geekiness etc) then became involved with a local gang.  Last I heard she was in Juvi for drugs, but that was back in Junior High.  Then picked up with another crowd who were really friendly... until they weren't. I should have seen the signs, and boy I see them now if anyone so much as hints at it.  It was one of those if you disagreed with the alpha female she would destroy everything you held dear. And she did. She took everything from me, and it wasn't hard for her to do.  She actually told me afterwords that "She wouldn't have done it. Except that I made it so easy." Those words stuck with me. I know it is mere childhood problems but they were incredibly formative in my views of the world. I learned that I couldn't trust people. That those close to me would betray me. That they would use me to their own ends if they could.  And I learned from my mother that if you cry, if you get upset, no one will respect you.  She taught me that you hold it all in and you deal. You become cold. And most of all you NEVER let anyone see you cry.


So college rolls around and I don't trust anyone. I am nice to people. I am polite, but I don't make friends. Not really.  Until I started climbing.  Climbing for me has been a revolution. You HAVE to trust people. Not only just trust them. But trust them with your life.  It was so strange to me. To suddenly have these friends who I was forced to trust.  It did me a world of good.  And it helps immensely that there are very few climbers (in general) who are not cool, chill, people who are bluntly honest.  They exist sure, but compared to a slice of the rest of the world, the percentage is much fewer. 


Between my experiences climbing and gaining friends whose families encouraged open, honest, dialogue between themselves and between friends I began to grow. I trusted more people. I talked to more people. I started to make friends. Unfortunately it took me until far after college to really get to where I could do open and honest dialogue. I think this is why it took me a long time to start blogging. To want to really work on my writing, on my graphic novel, on maybe doing a webcomic. Art is art. It is open to interpretation, and especially if you are doing commission work the interpretation should be someonme elses. But the idea of putting my words on a page. That is far to much like dialogue. That is like talking to another person. And telling someone else when life goes all to hell. My mother had taught me that it was unacceptable. As much as I do love my mom, the damage she did to me, and to my relationships by telling me those things. By a few choice comments she could say, has been irreperable.  I may have lost someone I care incredibly deeply about forever.  I finally came clean to him recently, told him why I ran away instead of talking to him. It was because I didn't know better. I had done it to other people before but I had never been so cruel as to just leave before. And I never got over it, and I'm not sure that he did either.  I did my best to apologize, to explain how INCREDIBLY sorry I am about it. How I will never forgive myself, but how could I expect him to understand. It took me years to untangle my life and be able to put it on a page. Years to be able to tell a friends something is wrong rather than excuse myself pre-emptively from a gathering and just go home and cry.  I was taught never to let anyone see me cry. So I didn't. 


It's been years now. I'm still bad about letting people know how much I hurt, or when I think something is wrong. But I'm getting better. I don't suspect my friends are going to turn on me anymore, but I am less forgiving than I would like. To myself, and to others. I have trouble forgiving people when they betray my trust, but I have never forgiven myself for some of my past betrayals. It is something I will have to work on for much longer I think.


It is interesting that I have also been trusting my instincts much more.  If I immediately feel good about someone, I am much more likely to look at them. I used to be far more analytical, I would take into account what I knew about them, how other people referred to them, I would ignore my gut feelings as that is just emotion. And I was taught that emotion was flawed, and really could not be trusted.  I've found that listening to my gut when I meet people has been a much more effective way of analyzing relationships.  I still get fooled, don't get me wrong, but it seems to happen less often.



So again, with my personal growth and trying to learn from my past, I will really make a better effort to write here. It is dialogue with a community. It is that thing I always most feared.  I realized that in the past I have used this only to make big announcements, for good or for ill, when I thought people should know about what was going on so they could gauge my workload/art accordingly. But really, it will be nice to write. To dialogue, or perhaps to monologue, to this audience.

Travel plans. I leave tomorrow morning at O'Dark'Hundred (i.e. 3:30am) for RMFC in CO. Wheeeeee... Looking forward to the con though! I can't wait! I should be in CO for around a week

And as for future cons/travel plans. I am doing ArmadilloCon in Austin the last weekend of this month, AnimeFest in Dallas the first weekend of Next month. And have a fancy schmancy invite only gala on the 23rd of September. Please be aware that these are my LAST CONS IN TEXAS UNTIL FURRY FIESTA! and I may not be doing much more in Texas.

After a lot of back and forthing and trying to make things work, my boyfriend and I are splitting up. I am currently trying to figure out if I'm going to move to CO, which I adore. Or to NJ where I know I have free rent and family in the area. I am weighing out my support bases/how likely I think it is that I could get a part time job fairly soon in Denver, and the social politics that come with the free rent in NJ... So bear with me, my life is pretty hectic right now. In any case, the latest I would move would be end of September, and the earliest would be beginning of September. I am still figuring out logisitics and needing to get stuff packed up. We've lived together for 3 years so figuring out whose stuff was initially whose kind of sucks...

In any case, thats my life update, and hopefully I'll see you all at these next cons... Gonna post old art to ebay when I get back with cheap minimum bids. I can't move it all.

Best,
Laura

First post in ages it seems. But just figured I'd give everyone a heads up on whats up in life.
I have been doing tons of art. I'm actually quite pleased with my progress on commissions, on playing cards and got a few other things in queue.
I have finished all of my AC orders and shipped them out. Finished a private commission which was fun to do and still can't post it.  I am all caught up on playing cards (got behind for the first time since starting the project what with the two weeks of driving). And am trying to push ahead to have a buffer before I drive back to Texas.  The drive back to Texas will be sometime at the end of the month - I am flying a holding pattern while waiting for a friend to get back to me. For I am trying to catch up with her to hang out one evening in DC.  Currently it looks like my drive to TX will begin in Jersey, quick stop in Philly, down to DC, down to NC, and then across to Dallas. We'll see if it really does this.
I will be entering the werewolf contest again this year. I have a preliminary sketch that I am pretty excited about, I may post over on tumblr or something for you guys to check out/comment on.  I am also planning out a large gryphon pictures which I am REALLY excited about and plan on really pushing myself on.  The one BIG regret of this trip is that I didn't bring my laptop, only my netbook. Which is tiny. And a bit slow. And doesn't have PS. So updating is such a pain, which is why I haven't been doing it much.
This trip HAS been full of such glory as ZOOS (2) and AVIARYS (1 and then the ones in the zoos). So I am super excited to see my pics on my Super Shiney machine when I get home vs this tiny little nonsense screen.
Plans for the rest of the trip include a trip into the City (i.e. NY) to go to the Met, Canal St., and go see WARHORSE!!!!!! *SQUEE* I am SO excited to see warhorse.  So much amazing puppetry man. AMAZING puppetry.  I will try and finish up my 'Understanding Comics' book I have been reading. Start on the panelling for SkulKlan (I promised I'd start paneling soon and here I go). And start reading my book on tarot so in a year or so I can start THAT project.  I am also working on a great commission right now of a fox playing poker, so will be busy with that as well.  I am just starting color studies and transfer to final size image.  Expect a lot of uploading of art when I get back to Texas and have PS to fix these photos. I feel bad posting art that hasn't been properly adjusted to look good.

So yeah, this journal has been totally stream of consciousness. Which means its a mess. Mad props if you made it this far.