Balzer Designs

Two Replays: May Book Club & Social Media Panel

Grab a cup of coffee (and maybe a mindless art project). Today I'm sharing two replays of recent live events. First up is May's Book Club, which was hosted on Facebook Live: This month's book was Maria Shell's book, Improv Patchwork. In the Book Club video, we talk a lot about value and I share several tools for ascertaining value, such as a gray scale value tool and red & green value tools. If you watch the video replay on my Facebook page, you can read the comments in real time as they were posted during the live event. Press... Read more →

Art Journal Every Day: May 2020 into June 2020

If you're new to Art Journal Every Day, the concept is simple: It's a commitment to take ten minutes each day to do something in your art journal. No need to finish anything or even like it. It's about making the time to nourish your creativity every day! If you have the time to flip through your phone, you have the time to Art Journal Every Day. If you'd like to share what you make, use the hashtag #artjournaleveryday so that we can all take a peek. You can find new Art Journal Every Day posts here on the blog... Read more →

Library Book Book Reviews: February 2021

I thought that I would resurrect an old blog feature: Book Club...but with a twist! If you listen to the podcast then you know that I love our local library. And I love requesting books from different library branches all over the state of Massachusetts and being able to pick them up at my local library. For free. A public library truly is an amazing thing! One of the main ways that I use my library is to figure out whether or not a book is buy-worthy. Over the years I've bought a ton of books online -- based on... Read more →

Books, Books, Books!

I think we're always learning, but some periods are more active than others. I happen to be in an active learning period at the moment. So far in 2015, I've been a student in three art classes, with another one scheduled for this weekend. I've also been buying art/craft books like a crazy person. Here's my most recent haul: I haven't managed to really work through any of them yet, but here's a run down of what I bought: Jean-Michel Basquiat by Dieter Buchhart, Glenn O'Brien, and Jean-Louis Prat After standing in MoMA and staring at this mixed media collage... Read more →

Crafty Book Wish List

What's on your crafty book wish list? Here are three books that I've been eyeing: Did you know that Louis Armstrong was a collage artist? I first read about this book on The Ink Pad's blog. And now Satchmo: The Wonderful World and Art of Louis Armstrong is in on my wish list! Here's a bit about the book from Amazon: Satchmo: The Wonderful World and Art of Louis Armstrong is a biography in the form of an art book. It tells the story of Armstrong's life through his writings, scrapbooks, and artworks, many of which have never been published... Read more →

Book Club: Explore, Create, Resinate

It's time for our March Book Club! Just as a reminder, each month I choose a crafty book from my bookshelf and create something inspired by the book. I hope you'll be inspired to do the same. This month I chose Explore, Create, Resinate by Jen Cushman. This book is all about using ICE Resin -- a crystal clear jeweler's grade resin -- to create beautiful jewelry. The book has nine major chapters along with an introduction, final note, design team bios, and a resource guide. The nine chapters are: What Makes ICE Resin Unique: An explanation of why ICE... Read more →

Book Club: Journal It!

It's time for our December Book Club! Just as a reminder, each month I choose a crafty book from my bookshelf and create something inspired by the book. I hope you'll be inspired to do the same. This month I chose the book Journal It! curated by Jenny Doh: In an act of full disclosure: I'm one of the nineteen artists featured in this book. Jenny Doh has gathered a wide variety of art journalers into the pages of Journal It! Each artist is featured over several pages. You get a mixture of his/her artwork and comments on the process... Read more →

Book Club: The Art & Elegance of Beadweaving

It's time for our October Book Club! Just as a reminder, each month I choose a crafty book from my bookshelf and create something inspired by the book. I hope you'll be inspired to do the same. This month I chose The Art & Elegance of Beadweaving by Carol Wilcox Wells. I also own Carol's first book (and one of my bead bibles): Creative Beadweaving: A Contemporary Guide to Classic Off-Loom Stitches. Without reservation, I highly recommend both books. They are both so well done with excellent instructions and fantastic illustrations. Everything I know about beadweaving I learned from these... Read more →

Book Club: Water Paper Paint by Heather Smith Jones

Hello! Before we get to today's post, I have a bit of housekeeping. If you subscribe to this blog via a reader, you'll need to switch your feed over to http://feeds.feedblitz.com/handmadeart. There is currently a 15-day redirect that is sending you to the correct feed, but it will expire. So, if you'd like to keep subscribing (and I really hope you'd like to), please switch over. To switch over: Click on that highlighted link. On the right side you'll see the word "subscribe" next to a blue plus symbol. Click on the plus symbol and choose your reader of choice.... Read more →

Your Favorite Craft/Art Books: Part Four

As I mentioned in a previous post, I had asked the question, "What is your favorite art/craft book?" There were lots of great suggestions and I thought I'd compile them into one big list (in several parts) in case you're a book junkie like I am! Drawing Lab for Mixed Media Artists by Carla Sonheim From Amazon: "Carla Sonheim is an artist and creativity workshop instructor known for her fun and innovative projects and techniques designed to help adult students recover a more spontaneous, playful approach to creating. Her innovative ideas are now collected and elaborated on in this unique... Read more →