Push! (copyright Hanna Andersson)

Any good interior design magazine (or any magazine about creativity, art or craft for that matter) should check out the online blog scene, don’t you think so? The blog word, also called indie community, is huge and full of inspiration. Last week I got my favorite mag in the mail, it’s IKEA Family Live Magazine! 29 crowns well spent if you’re not a member, and if you are a member you get it for free in the mail box! I found Constan?a Cabral’s blog Sa?dos da Concha after looking at her home in the magazine!

Magazine inspiration (copyright Hanna Andersson)

On her blog I found this quote that is my favorite right now;

There’s been much talking about guilty feelings in relation to owning too much fabric and also about the need to declutter… I feel nothing of the kind. To me each piece of fabric is a trophy that promises an exciting, future use.

Isn’t that an attitude we all need to cultivate? I love it! Here are some more links from this week;

Check this out this, girls!

* How to Overcome Fitness Laziness – do you need to find some motivation help too? I do, badly.

* FIMO Fabric Stamps – make your own stamps with clay… yay, this looks like so much fun!

* Beeswax Collage Video by Jane DesRosier at Gritty Arts Studio. When visiting Jane’s youtube page I also watched her video Woman ~ Speed Painting and marveled over how many layer her paintings are. I mean, I don’t know nothing about layers compared to her! Her paintings are magnificent! I find it very difficult to layer a beautiful collage and then totally cover it with paint… I want to see those patterned papers too… Our styles are very different but it’s interesting watching another artist work, don’t you think? I love artists who use video to share so much!

Anyway, I need to get a little quilting iron, maybe an electric skillet and some 100% pure beeswax. Now. But where? Please give me a hint on where to find that quilting iron (they need to be online and ship to Europe).

Machine quilting... (copyright Hanna Andersson)
Making swirls. I use up way way way to much thread because I make small motions and can’t stop.

I bought another of my favorite magazines last week, it’s Marie Claire Idees in French. I can’t read a word but I don’t care. The images and inspiration I find in this magazine is great! In their latest issue they have lots of owls, spring and lots of yummy craft inspiration. Just look at these spreads;

Magazine inspiration (copyright Hanna Andersson)
I get a feeling of spring, spread in Marie Claire Idees.

Magazine inspiration (copyright Hanna Andersson)
Am I the only one who thinks that children’s clothes, crafts and stuff are more fun, creative, colorful and desirable than grown-up-stuff? This spread makes my inner child jump up and down!

More news from the iHanna Universe:

1. I write morning pages again (3 pages about anything in my journal just after breakfast)

2. I want to order DVD’s from Creative Catalyst Productions but can’t make up my mind on which one I most need and want…

3. I’ve started three mini paintings and I like painting with acrylics.

4. I want to create my first vision board collage!
Wall art in Germany - photo by TJ 5. I’m so happy that my heArt Quilt Take of your hat for love is hanging in TJ’s home, and that she was kind enough to send me a photo of where it is hanging in Germany right now! If you’ve bought one of my art pieces through my Etsy Shop, please send a photo of where it is or of you holding it, I’d love to make a gallery of those photos soon!

6. I think anything creative is a spiritual practice, and I found this article that I need to send to my friend Ellinor who is writing about photography; Photography as Spiritual Practice written by Rachelle of Magpie girl blog! Read it. Found via my twitter!

7. As seen on on photos in this very post, I’m pushing it and making swirls on the sewing machine. This is called “machine quilting” I think. You can move the fabric around and make swirls and even write stuff, but it’s difficult and I need to practice. This is so much fun, until the needle becomes dull or the thread entangles inside the machine! That’s the reason nothing is finished or worth showing yet! :-)

Swirly swirling! (copyright Hanna Andersson)

8. All my articles collected and saved to the online bookmark collection tool ma.gnolia.com are gone!

Geeky rant: My bookmark collection is gone!

Ma.gnolia.com lost all bookmarks in a computer crash and couldn’t recover them. This is quite sad, don’t you think? I of course, had not backed up these online bookmarks. I mean… eh… they are online?! Now they are lost and I guess that should teach me a lesson. I bookmarked articles on Magnolia; text and things to read on subjects that interests me (like creativity, change, growth, psychology, meditation, life long learning, productivity etc). I miss the ability to, via the browser bar, click to mark and tag an interesting article!

Marking what you find online is called “social bookmarking”, meaning you share what you find online with your friends online. You save links to what you find interesting in a way so that others can benefit, plus you can search them and create an archive of what you’ve read and found interesting. I love this but haven’t read about on any crafty blogs… Do you use this services?

I’m thinking diigo.com might be something to check out, but I know there are several bookmarking sites out there…. I just can’t figure out if they have what I want… research is difficult when you don’t know where to look! I want a bookmarking site that uses tags, is easy to search and that can be used to publish your links on your blog or homepage! With magnolia I marked a part of the article and could publish that content, the header and the link at my site! Now that page of my blog is empty! :-/

I’ve collected links on two places on the web, tutorials, downloads, free stuff, inspiration on craft and so on, are still intact at delicious.com. I like how easy it is to save stuff to that site, but to find out where the “publishing your link list” part of that site is crazy! It’s like digging through mud. If you’re wondering you have to go to SETTINGS (in the right corner next to HELP) then scroll down to the bottom where it says Blogging than chose Link rolls and try it from there. They have a field for “tags” but it doesn’t work! You can also publish a “tag cloud” but I’m not interested in that feature at all. I want to be able to publish a list of links that I’ve tagged “inspiration” or “articles” or “tutorials”! How hard can it be? If I found a place like that, I could actually keep all my bookmarks at one place! Help?

Sorry for the rant, thought that maybe someone of you could help here? Please let me know where you are and what you do online. Thanks for your help!

And Happy March everyone!