We have a blogger down!

So, you may have noticed I have been a very absent Magpie. Sadly, my beloved lappy (or laptop to non-magpies) has finally passed into the great beyond.

Despite that setback, life has continued to roll along. I have been able to work on some fun, short projects in the meantime. A cute Mcall's apron in super fun fabrics, some more watercolor experiments and my first wedding anniversary trip with Mr. Magpie!

I will be back in business soon so I can write longer but I hope everyone is having a beautiful summer full of joy and adventures!

Earth Day

I wanted to wish all of the readers of Mythical Magpie a Happy Earth day. As a person who reveres the earth spiritually, it is a day to remind me of the connectivity we have to the natural world in a very real way.

I will be heading to a state landmark and spend several hours cleaning and taking care of the space with several local volunteers. I will also be contemplating some more future posts on repurposing items and reducing personal waste.

I hope everyone is able ot get out a little to day and remember that sense of connection to all the creatures and living things on this planet and our responsibility to them.

Have a wonderful Earth Day everyone, and remember:

Taking on tags

Well, first step to re-organizing the blog is to take a look at how I've set up finding previous posts.

When I started this blog, I thought that the more tags or labels, the better and easier to find projects. But the more I've been reading up on marketing and promotion and I've been visiting all kinds of blogs I love, I've seen that my judgement was faulty. I'm taking pointers on what they do well and what I'd like to see reflected in a well organized Magpie blog.

And what I was able to see was that my sidelist of tags was cluttered and hard to follow. It was an immediate priority to make my blog entries easier to navigate.

And I am pleased to announce that after four hours of editing:

I was able to pair down the 267 tags to 38!!

I've discovered along the way that simplifying the many multiple tags has really made me think of specific ways to come up with blog entries now tailored to my new tags.

So I'm very excited for the next few days and the changes here at the Mythical Magpie blog!!

Shhh...

I have a secret....

Over the next week, I am going to change the look and feel of the blog and hopefully will add lots of fun new articles and tutorials.

I am really excited about it and I hope you all come back soon to see the new changes!

Magpie Organizes

So, I have been in a state of disarray after having moved my craft studio to the basement. There is room for all of my crafts and I can work without dragging out tables, projects and supplies into the living room each day.

I must admit, I'm not called Magpie for my ability to organize. So this has been a challenge to pull all my shiny things out and put them in order.

But I am making headway, and after today this is the fruit of my labor. Shelves of fabric arranged by coalor, separated by fat quarters of corresponding colors.

Now, to find a quick quilt project to celebrate!

(Before: A mess of bins and junk)

(After: Stacks of fabric organized by color, separated by fat quarters)

Online Watercolor Class

So I signed up for an online watercolor class at Strathmore Artist's Paper website.

Our first lesson was blending, washes and using different brushes for simple effects

My first "sketch" is here! I will post a picture later with it once it's dry and flattened. I don't yet have the watercolor journal, so the paper I had crinkled a bit.

But here it is!

And here it is dry!!!

Back to Basics

It's been quite a crazy few months for us here at Magpie Central. I'd like to say it was all fun and games and art...but it's been sorta rough. That said, Magpie just had a milestone birthday and ready to get back in the swing of posting regularly and making art happen.

So I had our home do a 30 minute art sprint, to do anything we wanted in 30 minutes.

This was my creation:

Here was Mr. Magpie's.

It's a great way to get out of a rut and just make something anything art related. I recommend everyone who is in a craft rut to give it a go!