So I'm moving my blog address and I'm hoping to get my act together to really blog! My new address is http://www.jsgreene.com/blog. My vision was always to be able to connect my blog with my new website, but I've only just managed to get everything put together. (There are still a few kinks to get out of the way, but best to get on with it, right?)
I have lots to share! Although I have not been blogging, I have had many creative moments to share: painting, craft, tasty foods, etc. (Even today, I made something very tasty AND I went to a glass fusing class, so I have much to share!) And, I've figured out that it's better for me to write a few posts at once and then schedule their appearance on the world wide web. So, that's what I'm going to attempt to do right after I finish this post!
Again, the new blog is at http://www.jsgreene.com/blog (Aunt Ellie, I will try to figure out how to get it to email you--I have not forgotten about you!).
And for those of you who get bored of checking and checking and checking if I've posted anything, I suggest you follow my RSS Feed. RSS feeds are cool because it will automatically update you when I do anything to the blog. Some people use Google Reader to manage their RSS Feeds. I just use the bookmark bar at the top of my browser. I go to the RSS Feed, click on the bookmark button, and then whenever I open my browser, I have a notice that says "Jenny's Blog (2)". The (2) would indicate that there are two new entries that I haven't read yet. Maybe I'll do a tutorial on my new blog!
Saturday, January 15, 2011
Wednesday, December 1, 2010
Latest Nativity Painting
For the past few years, a Catholic missionary organization has commissioned me to paint a version of the Nativity for their annual Christmas appeal. Due to the length of time it takes to paint, design, print and put together the materials in order to send the stuff out in time to get a good response, the painting actually has to take place in the middle of the summer. Which, if you live in southern California like I do, is the least inspirational time to think about Christmas.However, this organization gives me some guidance and I do some research (both re-reading the scripture and looking at various depictions of the nativity) and I am generally pleased with the result that happens.
For this year's appeal, the organization wanted a colorful, close-up depiction of the nativity with animals. I looked around at various depictions and saw that it's very common to have baby Jesus facing the viewer. I was thinking about it, and I thought a much more intimate depiction would be if Jesus was facing his parents. I also hoped that the different perspective would help the viewer to remember the amazing point: God chose to be incarnate in this world not in a grown, powerful man, but in a helpless baby.
Thinking year after year about the Nativity and finding new and interesting ways to depict it is definitely challenging. How on earth can you do this year after year and still keep people on their toes, inspirationally-speaking? I try my best and am honored that this organization thinks that I do a good job, year after year!
For this year's appeal, the organization wanted a colorful, close-up depiction of the nativity with animals. I looked around at various depictions and saw that it's very common to have baby Jesus facing the viewer. I was thinking about it, and I thought a much more intimate depiction would be if Jesus was facing his parents. I also hoped that the different perspective would help the viewer to remember the amazing point: God chose to be incarnate in this world not in a grown, powerful man, but in a helpless baby.
Thinking year after year about the Nativity and finding new and interesting ways to depict it is definitely challenging. How on earth can you do this year after year and still keep people on their toes, inspirationally-speaking? I try my best and am honored that this organization thinks that I do a good job, year after year!
Thursday, October 7, 2010
New Website: Design Section Complete!
Please check it out here: http://www.jsgreene.com/new/design and let me know what you think. Try out the links -- let me know if the grey menu bar is missing. If anything goes wrong, please let me know! It needs to be fixed!
Now...onto the watercolors portion of the website!
Saturday, October 2, 2010
Meyer Lemon Sorbet
I just have to share this recipe with you. I found it here, on the Pioneer Woman's Tasty Kitchen blog. The person who uploads the recipe says it's a "delightful blend of lemon and orange with just the right amount of sweetness and tartness," which I think is funny because the recipe doesn't have any orange in it at all. It does, however use Meyer Lemons, which are sweeter than typical lemons, so this sorbet does really have a wonderful balance of sweet and tart. This sorbet is also great because it has a nice creamy flavor, without adding any dairy!
Prep: 15 minutes (plus chilling time of a few hours to overnight--your choice)
Total: 35 minutes
Serves: I think it makes about a quart
Ingredients
1-3/4 cups sugar
2 cups water
1 egg white
3/4 cup fresh meyer lemon juice
2 teaspoons freshly grated meyer lemon zest
4 teaspoons vodka
Preparation
1. Zest lemon and set aside. Juice lemons and set aside.
2. Combine sugar and water in a small saucepan and place over low heat. Stir until sugar dissolves. Raise the heat and boil for 1 minute. Remove from heat.
3. While you are dissolving the sugar/water mixture, in a large bowl, lightly beat the egg white until foamy. Slowly beat in the hot simple syrup created from step 2. Continue to beat until the mixture cools down slightly. Add the meyer lemon juice.
4. Cover and chill until cold or overnight. The mixture will have the egg white foam on top, but it will mix in when placed in the ice cream freezer.
5. Once the mixture is cold, churn the mixture in an ice cream mixer. Mix in the zest and the vodka and freeze until it is the consistency of a soft-serve custard (~25 minutes). Remove from the ice cream mixer and place in a container appropriate for freezing.
Prep: 15 minutes (plus chilling time of a few hours to overnight--your choice)
Total: 35 minutes
Serves: I think it makes about a quart
Ingredients
1-3/4 cups sugar
2 cups water
1 egg white
3/4 cup fresh meyer lemon juice
2 teaspoons freshly grated meyer lemon zest
4 teaspoons vodka
Preparation
1. Zest lemon and set aside. Juice lemons and set aside.
2. Combine sugar and water in a small saucepan and place over low heat. Stir until sugar dissolves. Raise the heat and boil for 1 minute. Remove from heat.
3. While you are dissolving the sugar/water mixture, in a large bowl, lightly beat the egg white until foamy. Slowly beat in the hot simple syrup created from step 2. Continue to beat until the mixture cools down slightly. Add the meyer lemon juice.
4. Cover and chill until cold or overnight. The mixture will have the egg white foam on top, but it will mix in when placed in the ice cream freezer.
5. Once the mixture is cold, churn the mixture in an ice cream mixer. Mix in the zest and the vodka and freeze until it is the consistency of a soft-serve custard (~25 minutes). Remove from the ice cream mixer and place in a container appropriate for freezing.
Tuesday, September 28, 2010
A very tasty salad: Jamie's Cranberry Spinach Salad
With the record-breaking heat, I most certainly did not want to cook something for dinner tonight. Since we had a half-bag of spinach left over from a soup recipe I made late last week, I decided to make some sort of spinach salad.
The spinach salads I had bookmarked to try didn't really inspire me, so I googled spinach salad and found this recipe (the bonus was that I didn't even have to go shopping--had almost everything at home!). Since the recipe serves 8, I used AllRecipe's handy calculator to turn it into 2 servings (which I've posted below). I also added chicken to make it a main course salad. Gavin, who rates all salads as 3/5, said that this salad was "at least a 4," which really shocked me!
Below is my take on the salad (added chicken, omitted poppy seeds, a little extra onion).
Jamie's Cranberry Spinach Salad
Prep time: 10 minutes
Total time: 20 minutes
Serves 2
Ingredients:
3/4 tsp butter (I eyeballed this)
3 TBSP slivered almonds
1 boneless chicken breast
salt & pepper
1/2 bag baby spinach
1/2 c. dried cranberries (I threw in a little more...maybe 2/3 or 3/4 cup, but this is not necessary)
1-1/2 tsp toasted sesame seeds
2 TBSP white sugar
1/2 tsp minced onion (I eyeballed this and my guess was that it was more like 1 tsp, and it was just fine...not too oniony)
1/8 tsp paprika
1 TBSP white wine vinegar
1 TBSP cider vinegar
2 TBSP canola oil
Preparation:
1. In a skillet, melt the butter over medium heat. Cook and stir the almonds in butter until lightly toasted. Remove from heat and let cool.
2. Salt and pepper the chicken breast on both sides. In the same pan the almonds were cooked in, cook the chicken breast. (I find cooking an average boneless chicken breast for 6 minutes per side gets me perfect results: safely cooked, but still juicy.)
3. In a large bowl, combine the spinach with the toasted almonds and cranberries.
4. In a smaller skillet, toast the sesame seeds. (If I were smart and had read the recipe closely from the beginning, I would have, in the same skillet, first toasted the sesame seeds, then melted the butter, toasted the almonds and then cooked the chicken. Hopefully if you're smart and reading this carefully before you begin, you will save yourself from washing 1 extra skillet!)
5. In a small bowl, whisk together the sesame seeds, sugar, onion, paprika, white wine vinegar, cider vinegar, and canola oil. Toss with spinach just before serving.
The spinach salads I had bookmarked to try didn't really inspire me, so I googled spinach salad and found this recipe (the bonus was that I didn't even have to go shopping--had almost everything at home!). Since the recipe serves 8, I used AllRecipe's handy calculator to turn it into 2 servings (which I've posted below). I also added chicken to make it a main course salad. Gavin, who rates all salads as 3/5, said that this salad was "at least a 4," which really shocked me!
Below is my take on the salad (added chicken, omitted poppy seeds, a little extra onion).
Jamie's Cranberry Spinach Salad
Prep time: 10 minutes
Total time: 20 minutes
Serves 2
Ingredients:
3/4 tsp butter (I eyeballed this)
3 TBSP slivered almonds
1 boneless chicken breast
salt & pepper
1/2 bag baby spinach
1/2 c. dried cranberries (I threw in a little more...maybe 2/3 or 3/4 cup, but this is not necessary)
1-1/2 tsp toasted sesame seeds
2 TBSP white sugar
1/2 tsp minced onion (I eyeballed this and my guess was that it was more like 1 tsp, and it was just fine...not too oniony)
1/8 tsp paprika
1 TBSP white wine vinegar
1 TBSP cider vinegar
2 TBSP canola oil
Preparation:
1. In a skillet, melt the butter over medium heat. Cook and stir the almonds in butter until lightly toasted. Remove from heat and let cool.
2. Salt and pepper the chicken breast on both sides. In the same pan the almonds were cooked in, cook the chicken breast. (I find cooking an average boneless chicken breast for 6 minutes per side gets me perfect results: safely cooked, but still juicy.)
3. In a large bowl, combine the spinach with the toasted almonds and cranberries.
4. In a smaller skillet, toast the sesame seeds. (If I were smart and had read the recipe closely from the beginning, I would have, in the same skillet, first toasted the sesame seeds, then melted the butter, toasted the almonds and then cooked the chicken. Hopefully if you're smart and reading this carefully before you begin, you will save yourself from washing 1 extra skillet!)
5. In a small bowl, whisk together the sesame seeds, sugar, onion, paprika, white wine vinegar, cider vinegar, and canola oil. Toss with spinach just before serving.
Monday, September 27, 2010
Watercolor Class: Day 2 & 3
Well, as many of you are aware, I did not post my watercolor painting from my class last week. This is because I was in class long enough only to draw the still life -- I had to leave early to attend a luncheon for the nonprofit of which I am president. So, this week I worked on the painting from a photo I took before I left class.
The finished painting is to the right. On a side note, I recently bought a new all-in-one printer/scanner/copier that does larger format scans. My initial scans were positive, but then I noticed that the colors were slightly off and in this painting I can definitely tell that the scan quality is poor. In this painting, I discovered that the scanner cannot pick up on light colors, so the scan looks really washed out, and is more yellow than it should be. The background looks like it's pure yellow -- in actuality, the painting background is a mixture of yellows and orange. So--this is disappointing. I am going to return the printer and think about buying a (very expensive) large format scanner that can capture these colors more accurately.
Anyway, when I was painting the succulent throughout the week, I thought that the painting was ok (although the leaf up front really needs some work...not satisfied with it, really), but too cool. I think the yellows and orange in the background really warm up the painting and help bring out the yellow and orange details that I put in the succulent.
In today's class, the teacher displayed a really neat, massive purply-pink succulent nested in a straw hat. I really enjoyed drawing the various curly/pointy leaves and then had a lot of fun laying down the various colors. I didn't fully finish the painting, but have laid down the colors so far. Now my plan will be to create the detail needed to make the painting pop. The painting is to the right--I will update once I finish the detailing. I'm really undecided so far whether to add another background beyond the hat--it might be too much, but then again, it might add a little something.
Website update:
I've finished a few more sections of my new website, but added a few more sections to fill-out, as well! It's madness!! The website is here (http://jsgreene.com/new) and the finalized sections within the design section are the last five sections: flyers, invitations, logos, posters and websites. I just noticed a broken link in the flyers section, which I will fix, but if you notice anything that needs to be addressed, please let me know!
Also, good news--my cousin, who hosts my website, says that he can make my blog hosted on my website, so once my website is finished, then I will work on transferring over my blog, which means that I'll be able to fix the blog design to be easier to read!
Anyway, when I was painting the succulent throughout the week, I thought that the painting was ok (although the leaf up front really needs some work...not satisfied with it, really), but too cool. I think the yellows and orange in the background really warm up the painting and help bring out the yellow and orange details that I put in the succulent.
Website update:
I've finished a few more sections of my new website, but added a few more sections to fill-out, as well! It's madness!! The website is here (http://jsgreene.com/new) and the finalized sections within the design section are the last five sections: flyers, invitations, logos, posters and websites. I just noticed a broken link in the flyers section, which I will fix, but if you notice anything that needs to be addressed, please let me know!
Also, good news--my cousin, who hosts my website, says that he can make my blog hosted on my website, so once my website is finished, then I will work on transferring over my blog, which means that I'll be able to fix the blog design to be easier to read!
Thursday, September 23, 2010
Where have I been??
Where have I been? Well, I've been working on updating my website. I am finding that it is taking awhile because I am trying things that are newer to me...expanding my skills a little. So, I am learning and trying and fiddling with things to try to make them right.
One of the things I'm trying is using this one site called Typekit to import specialized fonts into my website. For those of you who don't know, when designing websites, fonts are really tricky because each computer has their own set of fonts, that other computers may not have. So designers typically use a handful of fonts that happen to be on every computer, Mac and PC. It is very limiting. I found out about this Typekit place, and basically they can imbed specific fonts on your website...for a price. I thought that I'd try that out, but it's been difficult because when I build the website, I can't see what it looks like...I have to upload it and make it live in order to see how the fonts are working. It's a lot of work, a lot of back and forth.
Anyway, it is more slow-going than I'd like it to be, but it's a challenge. You can take a sneak peak at my new website by clicking here. Right now, only the home page, the design page, and the website pages work. Everything else will be a blank page or a file not found. If you have any thoughts or suggestions, I'd love to hear them -- leave it in the comments.
You may also be wondering -- where is my watercolor painting for this week? The answer is unfinished. I had to leave class early on Monday to go to something and could only sketch the demo and take a picture. I have since come home and done a fair amount of work on the painting (maybe 2/3 or 3/4 done), but haven't had time to finish it. I'd post a pic of it, but Gavin took his camera to work, I think. You'll have to wait.
One of the things I'm trying is using this one site called Typekit to import specialized fonts into my website. For those of you who don't know, when designing websites, fonts are really tricky because each computer has their own set of fonts, that other computers may not have. So designers typically use a handful of fonts that happen to be on every computer, Mac and PC. It is very limiting. I found out about this Typekit place, and basically they can imbed specific fonts on your website...for a price. I thought that I'd try that out, but it's been difficult because when I build the website, I can't see what it looks like...I have to upload it and make it live in order to see how the fonts are working. It's a lot of work, a lot of back and forth.
Anyway, it is more slow-going than I'd like it to be, but it's a challenge. You can take a sneak peak at my new website by clicking here. Right now, only the home page, the design page, and the website pages work. Everything else will be a blank page or a file not found. If you have any thoughts or suggestions, I'd love to hear them -- leave it in the comments.
You may also be wondering -- where is my watercolor painting for this week? The answer is unfinished. I had to leave class early on Monday to go to something and could only sketch the demo and take a picture. I have since come home and done a fair amount of work on the painting (maybe 2/3 or 3/4 done), but haven't had time to finish it. I'd post a pic of it, but Gavin took his camera to work, I think. You'll have to wait.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)