It’s Beginning to Look a Lot Like…

Valentine’s Day! Hearts and cupids and love — Oh My!

Even as a child, Valentine’s Day has always been my favorite holiday. I can remember vividly making a large decorated envelop in my 3rd grade art class in order to hold all my treats. In 10th grade, I had a super crush on an older boy named Will. I desperately wanted to send him a Valentine but didn’t want to necessarily single him out. For weeks I devised a devious plan to send everyone a Valentine so he wouldn’t think he was too special. Low and behold, a week before the big day he got kicked out of school for smoking (or maybe it was drinking- I don’t rightly remember.) My fifteen year old spirit was utterly crushed! I ended up sending it to his house, and believe it or not, I still have his reply in my keepsake tin.

When I first met Chucklebutt, he completely spoiled me that first Valentine’s Day. He did a whole 14 days of February theme. Every day I received a sweet sentiment from him. The gifts were as simple as a love note on my car to a barber shop quartet sent to my place of work. The two gifts that were most impressive were a car wash and flowers. While I was working at a local sound studio, Chuck loaded up a sponge plus a few gallons of water on his bike and proceeded to surprise me by giving Ms. Hecate a bath. That’s a pretty tall order when you only have so much room on a bike. A few days later, he completely decorated my car in roses, carnations and daisies. When I left work, I was completely floored by the beautiful sight. Every nook and cranny had a flower sticking out of it. It was amazing and you should have seen me cruising down Interstate 40!

So needless to say, I seriously dig Valentine’s Day. I may have mellowed a bit since being married, but my heart still goes a flutter with all the red, white and pink.

My momma knows that I love this holiday. Check out what she made for me.

Isn’t it precious?!

Thank you Mamasita! I love it!

In other Valentine news, I am part of two swaps. The first one is:

Vintage Valentine Swap

This is being sponsored by Susan over at Rabbit Hollow Prims. I am almost finished with my doll but have some last minute details to add. Cindy is my partner over at Thimbleprims Studio and she does amazing work. I can’t wait to see what she’s done. I’ll admit, I am bit intimidated because her work is so amazing.

The next swap I did was over at Cathy Scalise’s:

We have to wait until the big day to actually post pics, but I’ll leave everyone with a teaser of what I made for my partner Haley.

I opened her package yesterday and the stuff she gave me is so fun. Chucklebutt hasn’t taken pics yet, but I look forward to sharing with everyone on Sunday.

Incidentally, we’re headed up to Jerome for the weekend and I am so excited. It seems like everyone in the whole world has been getting snow except for us. I have my fingers crossed that there will still be snow on the mountain come Saturday. I’m looking forward to a weekend spent outdoors. It’s always an adventure with Jiggle Puff and Chucklebutt! 😀 Mind you we both a crap load of work to get done before Friday. If we don’t kill each other or pass out from a lack of sleep it will be all good! (What do the Aussies say? Oh yeah, “No worries!”)

Hope everyone is well in blogland!

Drama on the Internets

Over the past few days, I’ve been catching up on all my blog reading and was surprised to discover a bit of drama out in cyberspace. Who would have thought? But then I quickly reminded myself that behind each post and comment is a live human being with thoughts and feelings…and well, we humans are sort of known for our drama. On a day to day basis, I work with folks ranging in age from 9 to 95 (and everything in between). You can believe me when I tell you that drama follows us at any age and how we choose to handle it is what makes all the difference.

(A quick side note: Yes, the majority of people I work with are girls and women. Yes, the majority of blogs I read are by women. No, drama and angst are not soley characteristics of the female species. You haven’t seen nothing until you’ve witnessed some 80 year old men get their shorts in a bunch over a poker game. It can get real tense.)

So someone has been leaving hurtful anonymous comments and judging bloggers based on a snippet of their lives. We’re all judgmental and envy is a nasty quality. I’m of the opinion, however, if you can’t own up to your own comments, perhaps you should keep them to yourself.

A bit more complicated an issue is that of intellectual property. I decided to look up its definition, and here is what the wiley world of Wikipedia says:

Intellectual property (IP) is a term referring to a number of distinct types of legal monopolies over creations of the mind, both artistic and commercial, and the corresponding fields of law.^[1] Under intellectual property law, owners are granted certain exclusive rights to a variety of intangible assets, such as musical, literary, and artistic works; discoveries and inventions; and words, phrases, symbols, and designs. Common types of intellectual property include copyrights, trademarks, patents, industrial design rights and trade secrets in some jurisdictions.

Now, for those of you that are unfamiliar with the art blog world, there is an issue going around of artists taking other artists’ ideas/style. It is a much more complicated issue than you would think and Chucklebutt and I have been having a pretty good conversation about the whole thing. Simply put, one artist is accusing another artist of stealing her designs. You would think it would be pretty black and white –not so. In the world of etsy (the website where folks can buy and sell handmade items) there is a fine line between being inspired and out right copying another individual’s work for profit. The problem comes when you start to talk about the legality of it all. Most of the folks on etsy do not have their work copyrighted or licensed. This is primarily cottage industry at its finest. If, however, I wanted to make a whole slew of artwork with Disney characters, I would definitely be in violation of copyright infringement. Disney is sort of the mother of all companies to be feared. (Interestingly enough there are approximately 7000 works of art on sale at etsy using Disney characters and/or designs. Hmmm…I hope they have a good lawyer.)

So, back to the artists in question. (Bear with me, my analytical thought process is creaky and out of shape.) No laws have been broken. No copyrights infringed. Legally, there is no issue. Now what about the ethical issue? Chuck thinks there isn’t one since the materials used to create said artwork are unique (fabric, trims, notions, etc) and the images used are in the public domain. Coming from a photographer’s perspective, he uses Ansel Adams as an example. Everyone knows an Ansel Adams photograph and yet all landscape photographers aspire to take a similar shot of El Capitan (and if they’re lucky, make some money off of it.) I agree to an extent, however, were it me, I could see getting upset over someone profiting from my designs. Mind you I haven’t had an original thought in all my 36 years, so I’m not too worried about people taking my ideas. I guess the whole issue gives me reason to pause and think about crafts and ethics. I certainly don’t have any answers, but I’m definitely doing a lot of thinking.

Whew! Can you hear the wheels squeaking? So much for Wordless Wednesday. 😀 I’ll leave everyone with a pic I found quite refreshing.