Wacky Wednesday #49—Straws

This week the creative challenge I dreamed up was to make a dress from drinking straws. White or clear straws? Too boring. Brightly colored straws, please. I estimate that I used at least 200 straws and the whole outfit came together for $5 ($3 for straws and $2 for hot glue sticks, plus fabric I already had in my sewing stash).

 

There is no symbolism intended in this costume. No agenda. No hidden cause. Just the fun of wearing something that isn’t usually seen on clothes.

When your shadow is pointy you know your costume has texture…

 

 

 

In progress…

The back has straws except for the lower half, which has pipe cleaners—wouldn’t you rather sit on pipe cleaners than straws? Me, too.

One fun feature of straws is that they have a bendable neck. This makes drinking easier and it also makes my wacky straws dress even wackier because seeing hundreds of bendy straws going in lots of directions—hey, that’s just delightful. One girl I saw today described it as a rainbow cactus, a description I thought was terrific.

I look like a package of straws and a porcupine had a baby. (And I’m fine with that.)

Adding some bendy straws to my sunglasses seemed like a good touch, so I did…

Bendable straws are quite common—to the point that when I get a drink somewhere and I’m given the straight straws that don’t bend, it’s a little surprising. (Maybe they’re cheaper to manufacture so some places buy them, figuring it won’t kill us to use a straight straw.) When I get a non-bendy straw I think, “Hmmm. This is less convenient. I like conveniences. Do they also want us to go back to other old-fashioned customs like rubbing sticks together for fire and driving cars as Fred Flintstone did, feet to ground?” (I shouldn’t speak for everyone, of course, but I think it’s human nature to adjust to changes that make our lives easier and then to feel a little annoyed when we’re expected to do things the old (more tedious) way.) There are bigger problems out there, but still…

Bendy straws actually have been around longer than I’d realized. It was in 1937 that Joseph Friedman invented the bendy straw (aka the “articulated straw”). And straight straws have a much longer history than I’d ever thought. Who would have guessed that straws date back to 3,000 B.C.E., when the Sumerians used them? The oldest straw found was a gold tube inlaid with lapis lazuli, found in a Sumerian tomb. Next to it was a solid gold Big Gulp cup. Just kidding. Maybe.

Anyway, back to my costume. Unlike some of my creations, this costume is very lightweight, which is always a bonus. I also liked that the straws move in the breeze like a kinetic sculpture.

And while we’re on the subject of moving straws, a happy memory came back to me yesterday while I was putting finishing touches on this costume and post. I remembered a funny moment from the tv show Alice, which I watched as a child in the 80s. (You remember it? It deserves its own post, so I’ll add that to my list of future blog posts.) The show was set in Mel’s Diner and was about a waitress named Alice, her two waitress friends and Mel, the grouchy cook. There’s a moment when scatterbrained Vera attempts to open a big box of straws and hundreds of straws fly in all directions. Below is a photo of Vera opening the straws. It's a screen shot so it's not very clear but it gives you an idea of the moment. I’m including a two-second video clip below.

This moment makes me laugh every time I see it.  Although I hadn’t channeled that moment consciously, I love that my dress has an explosion of straws on it, just like Vera’s straws.

I’ve said it before in Sarah’s blog land: art needn’t be something fancy, tucked behind velvet ropes and available only in museums. Art is all around us. Sometimes it’s made of everyday materials and a fun idea. It’s not always serious. Sometimes it makes you laugh.

I hope you’ve found my latest creation fun. This week’s costume is not meant to be symbolic or deep. It’s just about trying something new. Just because. 

 

 

www.instagram.com/sarahconleyartist

  
 
 
 
 
 
 

Wacky Wednesday #48—Pennies

 

The penny: often taken for granted. In America today a penny is not worth what it once was. Why else would people throw them onto the ground? But I say the penny is worth celebrating and that’s what I’m doing today. I see pennies as pretty, with their copper shine. And if you put a lot of them together, you’ll get a lot of shimmer. I’ve called myself pennywise, and today I’m wearing my penny passion for all the world to see.

 

 

When a lot of pennies gather for a meeting of metal, they get fairly heavy. Today I’m wearing two pounds of pennies. My capelet has roughly 350 pennies on it. Did you know that it takes 181.4 pennies to equal one pound?

 

 

Pennies may be easily dismissed. Their monetary value pales in comparison to their silvery cousins and green dollar bills. The penny gets no respect! (Except from me.) But it has such beautiful color. It deserves some love.

 

My dress is made of fabric I already had (thrifted), with an overlay of shimmery copper-colored fabric (on sale!). I’m using real pennies on my capelet. For my head ornament, I painted some cardboard to create an oversized penny.

 

 

For this costume I bought $5 worth of pennies at the bank. I didn’t use all of them. Some I had to clean, as these pennies had seen a lot of life over the years. They looked like they’d been through wars. Others were only a year old and they looked too new—like they hadn’t lived at all. (I am very picky—it’s true…) I ended up using a mix of new and older pennies.

When people asked what I was dressed as I told them I’d declared it Penny Appreciation Day. Two people said I looked like Cleopatra, one person said a gladiator and my friend Andrea started calling me Penny Marshall. I’m okay with people having different interpretations of my costumes. Art gets people talking, which is part of why I love it.

This idea probably has its roots several years in the past, when I used pennies in an art piece. I loved their shimmer, and I liked highlighting the beauty of a material that is considered to be of very low value. Irony! Contrast!

Why is it considered bad to be a penny-pincher, but considered good to be pennywise?

You know the phrase “Penny for your thoughts?” (I almost used that for the name of this post.) It may need some updating, to keep up with inflation. Of course, here in my blog land, my thoughts are free…

Here’s something to consider: even though the penny is dismissed by some people as almost worthless, there are many sayings that refer to pennies, which is not true of more valuable coins. I like this one:

A penny is a lot of money if you have not got a penny.

                                                         -Yiddish Proverb

 

 I don’t know if pennies bring luck, as the saying goes, but at the very least it’s fun to use unexpected materials in a costume.

Here are a few fun facts about pennies:

 Did you know that since 1982 pennies have been made of 97.5 % zinc and 2.5 % copper? They are copper-plated zinc. (Just in case you’re playing Trivial Pursuit and you get this question.)  

Pennies did not show Abraham Lincoln’s profile prior to 1909. In 1909 Lincoln Pennies were introduced in honor of the 100^th anniversary of Lincoln’s birth.

From 1909-1958 the reverse side of pennies had the Wheat Cent design, and “one cent” embossed on them.

From 1959-2008 the reverse side of pennies featured the Lincoln Memorial.

In 2009, to celebrate the bicentennial of Lincoln’s birth, the reverse side of pennies were embossed with four different designs.

In 2010 a new design was featured on the reverse side of pennies: the Lincoln Shield.

The oldest penny I came across while making this costume was from 1950. Below are a couple of photos I took of pennies from different years. I thought it was interesting to see how a penny from 2012 looked noticeably worn, compared to the 2015 penny:

 

 

 

If you’ll excuse me, I need to take off this weighty capelet. I suppose I can legitimately call myself a heavy metal artist now! It’s been a shiny day for me, but I’m ready to put my feet up for a minute before I start work on something fun for next Wednesday…

 

www.instagram.com/sarahconleyartist

 

 

Wacky Wednesday #47—Dr. Seuss

 

 

This is a poem I created in the style of Dr. Seuss, in honor of his birthday today…

 

 

Did you know, did you hear

What is special today?

Let’s shout it out loud:

It’s Dr. Seuss’ birthday!

 

Today he would be

One hundred and twelve.

I’ll go get the candles

Off of the shelf.

 

Dr. Seuss lived

To be eighty-seven.

I think he’s now drawing

And painting in Heaven.

 

Oh, such joy

Oh, what fun

All his books

bring to everyone.

 

Did you know that he wrote

More than sixty books--

In twenty languages?

The whole world is hooked.

 

How we love

All his rhymes

As we read

At bed time.

 

Funny words

And colors bright.

I read them all day.

I read them all night.

 

Dr. Seuss,

Your books bring such joy

To women and men,

And girls and boys.

To cats and bats

And rats and gnats

And rats in hats

And bats on mats.

 

You made us laugh

So many times.

Such delightful words.

Such fun-filled rhymes.

 

What can we offer

To thank you so much

For sharing your humor

with all of us?

A sculpture?

A song?

A note

That is five miles long?

 

Thanks for

Making the ham green--

As well as the eggs--

They’re the greenest I’ve seen.

 

From all of us readers

From near and from far

Happy Birthday, Dr. Seuss,

You raised the bar.

__________________________________

 

 

I was going to post only the poem and not do a big back story about this costume.

But that just isn’t me. For me, the back story is part of the fun. So:

 

This costume idea came to me months ago when I discovered that Dr. Seuss’ birthday was going to fall on a Wednesday this year. Dr. Seuss is delightful, no matter where you live. But I live in San Diego, where Dr. Seuss spent the second half of his life, so we have a lot of enthusiasm for him here.

 

A few weeks ago my adorable neighbor gave me yards of lime green polyester pant suit material. She once sewed her own clothes and has given me fabric and patterns she’s had since the 60s and 70s because she isn’t likely to use these things anymore. I’d just realized that I didn’t have a lime green polyester pant suit, so her timing was perfect. Just kidding. I prefer dresses. So what should I do with this material? Soon I realized that the Kermit the Frog color of this fabric was the exact shade I needed for my green eggs and ham piece of today’s costume. Solution found. Here is a 24-second video of me. I’m putting the pieces of my hat together: 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This is a photo of a tree a few miles from here in La Jolla. Years ago, before I knew that Dr. Seuss once lived in San Diego, I saw these cartoon-like trees:

photo credit: Jason Zite

At some point I realized that these very trees were ones that Dr. Seuss (who lived in that neighborhood) probably used as inspiration for truffula trees he drew in books like The Lorax:

This is the fabric I used to make my skirt. Happy clothes make happy people!

Dr. Seuss’ drawing style and color choices are bright and full of life—and not limited to the colors you usually see in nature. I love that he made up words and names and embraced silliness. That appealed to me as a child and it appeals to me as an adult. As I often say, adults need laughs, too.

As an artist I’m in awe of Dr. Seuss’ imagination. The ideas kept flowing and he wrote book after book, full of strange creatures and made-up places and a few life lessons, too. Could he have guessed how much his characters would mean to kids and grownups alike?

 

Dr. Seuss, happy birthday

From all of us fans.

Thanks a lot for the books.

You make our hearts dance!

 

www.instagram.com/sarahconleyartist

Wacky Wednesday #46--Follow the Signs

Follow the signs. Sounds easy, right? Or not.

What if the signs all conflict with one another?

Today’s costume idea came about when I started noticing how many different traffic signs are posted around the city. I began to think about how fun it would be to create a costume in which all the signs were in conflict with other signs. Sometimes this feels true when I’m out driving.

Perhaps the seeds of this costume date back to a sign I saw twenty years ago. It looked like this:

(photo credit: Terry S. Hale)

I was delighted by it, because I’m an expressive person and I use exclamation points a lot. Turns out this sign alerts drivers that they should use caution ahead because the road presents extra challenge. (I still think this sign should be used to show that enthusiastic people are up ahead!!!!!!)

 

May I point out the irony in the following idea? Some signs are so long and detailed that instead of increasing safety, they may decrease it. Prime examples are the signs that say something like “No right turn weekdays between 7 and 10 am, and 3 and 5pm.” Hello—that takes a second or two to read. I’m supposed to process that while also making critical driving choices? Do you want me to read or drive? These safety-enhancing signs are distracting me from driving.

 

This costume idea gained momentum a couple of weeks ago when I found something next to the dumpster at my youngest child’s school. There were four giant octagons of cardboard, and two of them insisted I take them home. I walked home with them perched atop my head and as Melody pointed out, my shadow looked like Mary Poppins, floating down with her umbrella. (Quite true.) These octagons looked just like giant STOP signs and I knew they could become props for this week’s creation.

 

 

And while we’re on this topic, what’s up with the pedestrian crossing signs?

I don’t know anyone who walks with their back arm bent at a right angle. And what’s with the lack of neck, hands and feet? I assume these signs originally were painted using stencils. I know that you have to have breaks in the pattern so that the stencil doesn’t fall apart. But please—it’s 2016. I don’t think they’re using stencils anymore to paint these signs. We have robotic machines that can do surgery, and we can’t get a pedestrian walk sign with a neck and some feet?

Alternate titles for this post:

·         Mixed Messages

·         Miss Guided

·         Signs of Confusion

Whether you find traffic signs helpful or distracting, I hope you got a kick out of today’s theme. I’ll be back next week with another fun costume. Til then be safe, have fun, and watch for signs…

www.instagram.com/sarahconleyartist

Wacky Wednesday #45—Disco Ball

Am I the only one who thinks disco balls at the DMV would be a good idea? I’m convinced that a disco ball can enhance any space, and some spaces (government agencies come to mind) can use all the help they can get. At the DMV a spinning, light-reflecting disco ball could make waiting less horrendous. (A little.)

Today’s costume is all about light and sparkle and a fun-filled disco vibe. The idea for this costume has been in a long time in the making—maybe 25 years. As a teen I bought a small 4-inch disco ball, just for fun. I had it up for a while, then forgot about it for roughly two decades, and then found it again in my old bedroom closet at my parents’ house. (If you read my post last week you are starting to notice a pattern of my finding things in my teenage closet, and turning them into costumes. Good observational skills on your part!) A few years ago I brought the disco ball to my house and put it up to provide a little sparkle. At some point I found other disco balls and the seeds of a costume started to grow. While at the fabric store last year (looking for something else entirely) I bought some silver fabric that felt disco-y to me. And today everything comes together and I am a sparkly disco dancer, having a ball under the disco ball.

 

 

It was a challenge to figure out how to suspend a disco ball above my head. For me, this was a must. A disco ball needs to hang, but how could I accomplish that without having something heavy and awkward attached to my skull? (The answer is bending a wire coat hanger and padding it with fabric. It’s not heavy and only somewhat awkward.)

 

Did you know that disco balls may have been around for nearly 120 years? The first one may date back to 1897 in a Boston ballroom. Apparently they also were used in the 1920s in dance halls. This surprised me but I was even more surprised when I looked at photos I took today and realized that the horizontal part of my head piece evokes a 1920s feel. I hadn’t intentionally brought the ‘20s and the ‘70s together--but I like it!

Like most of my creations, this week’s theme came together in various stages and from different places, which is part of the fun. I bought the three 2-inch disco balls at the 99 cent store, I got a disco necklace (broken) from my daughter—which I added to my head piece--and I made my dress. One day in a thrift store, I found a hoop earring with what looked like tiny disco balls on it. I turned it into two earrings. Only one earring or broken jewelry aren’t problems in my world: they are opportunities…

 

before...

after...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Yesterday I went to the roller rink, laced up my skates and skated around with my disco ball under a real disco ball. I was a little bummed that they don’t turn on the disco ball during morning skate hours but it didn’t dampen my fun. By the way, if you haven’t roller skated in a while, give yourself a late birthday present or an early St. Patrick’s day gift and take yourself skating. Major fun.

 

 

I think I want to hang my disco ball in our bathroom. If you’ve read this blog before, you know that I like bringing something unexpected to ordinary days or places. Disco balls won’t solve all the world’s problems, but bringing an element of surprise or fun to the everyday gives me a boost. It is not hard or expensive to put a little magic into your world. I think taking a few minutes to add some fun to each day is worth every second spent.

 

Instagram.com/sarahconleyartist

Wacky Wednesday #44—Music

Music is something everyone likes, but if you asked one hundred people their opinions about music, you might get one hundred completely different answers--opinions as individual as those giving them. Music is quite personal. And yet, at the same time, universal. It brings us up. It brings us to tears. It brings us right back to specific moments in our lives, even if they were decades in the past.

As a child I liked music and took piano lessons (thanks, Mom and Dad!). But when I entered my teens music became my portal to the world of pop culture and everything important in life (!). I still remember the first songs I discovered as a pre-teen. In the late 1980s, I spent my babysitting money on cassette tapes, and eventually on cds. We had a record player, and you’d flip a switch depending on whether the record played at 45 rpm or 33 rpm. Every once in a while I’d play a 33 at 45 speed, thereby turning the tunes into Alvin and the Chipmunks high-pitched auctioneer-speed songs. Kids, remember: this was before the Internet. Our options for fun were different back then! I remember the very first vinyl record I bought as a young teen—Business as Usual, by Men at Work. I bought it used at my local library’s sale for $1. My pennywise ways stayed with me, even if it’s been a long time since my Men at Work days. (Yet, I still know most of the words if I hear the band’s song “Who Can it be Now” on the radio. Amazing, how lyrics stamp themselves into our brains…) And I still remember my first cassette tape: Michael Jackson’s Thriller. I’d bet you remember your first album, too.

The idea for this week’s costume came to me a little over a year ago. I was sorting through stuff at my parents’ house and low and behold, I found the Men at Work album, a few dozen cassette tapes, and other records stashed away in my old bedroom closet (truly, a time capsule). An image popped into my head: using my old cassette tapes and records to make some kind of costume. The idea remained in the back of my mind, and today I am wearing music on my clothes—my twist on the concert tee shirts that were ubiquitous when I was a teen. (I don’t know if teens today identify themselves through their music the way we did when I was a teen. Before tattoos and social media became such popular forms of self-expression, your music collection was like your fingerprint: it was your identity.)

Even as a teen I thought it was a little silly that people debated musical taste. You can’t tell someone that their taste is wrong or bad—it’s not like a math problem with one correct answer. Taste is individual. But teenagers are an opinionated group and music brought out opinions.  Digital music is a good thing—no argument there—but I’m a little nostalgic for the days of vinyl records and cassette tapes, the days when you could hold an album in your hands…Putting this costume together piqued my curiosity about whether records are still made. They are! Sales of records account for only 1.4% of all music sales, but that number is projected to rise…

 

Today’s costume has plenty of history to it. Here’s what it includes: a dress I made last summer for a costume and repurposed; cds; a record I thrifted as a teen (and wore on a necklace!) because of its groovy, clear blue vinyl; cassette tapes from my past; permanent marker forming notes from “Moonlight Sonata” (part of which I can play on the piano, the same song my dad played on piano, and which his mom played, too); felt; pipe cleaners; embroidery thread and ribbon. I formed the vest by hand. In the 80s using your hands was a bigger part of playing music than it is today. You took music out of a case. You put a tape or record in a machine with your hands. My friend Jen remembered that if the magnetic tape came out of your cassette, you wound it back in using a pencil. Good times…

 

 

I hope this costume brings back some happy memories for my readers, most of whom grew up when I did: in the 80s and 90s. You remember mix tapes. You recall DJs lugging heavy creates of vinyl to parties. You owned a concert tee shirt or two. And for those of you who have come up during the age of digital music, that’s just fine, too. You might get a kick out of imagining teenagers schlepping around 12” vinyl records and tapes. Hope you’ve enjoyed this week’s costume and musical musings. Now, please excuse me--I’m going to go alphabetize my 45s…

 

 

www.instagram.com/sarahconleyartist

Wacky Wednesday #43: Spoons

If you inherited 1,000 plastic spoons, what would you do with them? Perhaps you’d invite your 1,000 closest friends over for ice cream.

In my world, they become wearable art.

This post actually started approximately two years ago. The kids and I made a trip to Yogurtland and we brought home the spoons. We used them many times, and even two years later the colors are still bright and cheery. We’ve made other trips to Yogurtland and always brought the spoons home to reuse. In the back of my mind an idea started to form: these weren’t forgettable white plastic spoons—no, these had color and personality. I imagined turning them into some kind of art work, someday…

The second piece of this puzzle fell into place a few months ago when my friend Angela asked me the question that all friends ask at some point. Angela asked if I’d like 1,000 shiny red spoons. Ang didn’t need them anymore, and she is aware of my tendency to turn everyday items into costumes. I accepted several hundred and tucked them into the back of my mind so they could germinate into a design. Phase three began when my aunt Eileen gave me some orange spoons left over from Halloween. Several hundred white or clear plastic spoons wouldn’t be exciting to me, but if they are in bright shades, I’m all in.

 

 

Today all this colorful cutlery became clothing. 

 

1,000 spoons is a lot. Even the 500 I took is a lot. I used 100 of Angela’s red spoons on this costume and more than 70 other spoons of various colors. The only things I bought to make this costume were some hot glue sticks. The spoons were given to me or reused and the dress fabric was something I already had. My hat was made from an empty plastic container. It happened to be cracking, but that doesn’t mean it is on its way to the grave. No way! I turned it upside down, added a little hot glue, and covered it with some fabric left over after I cut my son’s sweat pants into shorts (which happened when the holes in the knees crossed the line from edgy-cool to flat-out mess).

 

 

 

 

 

By the way, does anyone need 400 shiny red plastic spoons? They are still in their factory-sealed bags! If I’m not inundated with requests I may donate a bag or two to a local soup kitchen. Or maybe I’ll make my loyal readers some spoon-tastic clothes.

In the last eight months of making costumes each week I’ve learned a thing or two. I designed today’s outfit so that the spoons were only on my front. I’ll sacrifice for my art, but sitting on plastic spoons isn’t going to do me any favors. I’m drawing the line there.

I know this is last minute, but does anyone want to meet for an ice cream party? Since Angela had a big hand in the inspiration for this costume, I’m sure she’d be glad to organize a get-together for us. I’ll bring the spoons. Ang, could you throw together a party for 400? Angela claims to be moving this week, but I don’t think it’ll be a conflict. I’ll keep you posted…

 

www.instagram.com/sarahconleyartist