Clare Wilkinson Studio >> now open!

Today I launched my Etsy Shop, Clare Wilkinson Studio!  I've spent the past couple of months working on paintings and ideas, and last week I finally took photos of my work, designed my logo, and figured out all the little details.  

In the shop you'll find original paintings in a variety of sizes, as well as a retro-inspired alphabet print (pictured above) that I designed and had printed for the nurseries of some dear friends and family who've had little ones in the past year.  New pieces will be added periodically along with some other ideas that I have in the works (I'm thinking custom house and room portraits!).  Custom paintings are also available, just contact me for details and pricing.  

I'd love for you to check out my Etsy shop, spread the word, and let me know what you think! 

Image by Clare Wilkinson

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Cilantro Lime Hummus

My friend, Scottie, introduced me to this healthy hummus, and it's a new favorite.  Plus, it's gluten and dairy free! 

 Cilantro Lime Hummus

Ingredients: 

• 1 cup cooked (or canned) garbanzo beans
• 1 tbsp tahini
• juice of 2 lines
• salt to taste (lots)
• a bit of pepper
• 1 bunch of cilantro, chopped

Combine all of the ingredients in a blender or food processor and pulse until smooth. Serve with veggies, pita chips, or crackers. 

Image by Clare Wilkinson for C Squared W.

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Hello + why I gave up gluten & dairy

Have I really not blogged since April?  Oops.  Even though I'm not working at the moment, life is busy, you know?!?

We're finally feeling settled in our cute apartment and are getting into the swing of things.  We're learning the way around our neighborhood and are slowly getting the hang of the city, the El, and such.  Charlie just finished his surgery rotation and moved onto pediatrics this week.  And - I got a job!!!  I will be teaching art at a middle school in the city starting in August, and am looking forward to getting back into teaching.  Moving from elementary school to middle school will be a challenge, but I'm up for it!  Job hunting has taken up a great deal of my time in the last couple of months and I'm excited to finally have that behind me.

I spent two weeks in the South in May, visiting Tennessee for my cute sister's college graduation. I also visited Virginia Beach and Richmond for a dear friend's fun (and gorgeous!) wedding.  This weekend, we are headed back to Virginia for my cousin's wedding, and I cannot wait.  We leave tomorrow for a beautiful wedding weekend in the mountains with family!

I've also been doing a ton of reading and cooking lately.  Food-wise, I've given up gluten and dairy for the past three weeks in an attempt to clear up my skin and it is really working.  (If you don't want to read about my zits, stop reading here.)  For the past year or so, I have had lots of deep, cystic-type zits around my jawline area (the huge kind that really hurt).  I'm talking honkers so big that I have actually gotten huge swollen glands trying to fight the infections.  Yikes.  After chatting with my sister about a chart she saw on Pinterest explaining what acne on certain areas of your face can mean, I did a little Google research.  Apparently, this type of skin problem (jawline acne) can be caused by the inability to properly digest gluten and dairy.  So, I decided to test this out and see if it made any difference - and so far it really has.  With three weeks dairy and gluten free under my belt, I can already tell a huge difference.  My skin has cleared up, I feel less lethargic, and I have a lot more energy.  The hardest part was figuring out what exactly going gluten-free meant, and which foods contain gluten (which is actually a ton of foods).  Once I figured out what I could eat, it has been pretty easy.

As you may know, I love to cook, and I rarely cook the same time twice.  Cooking allows me to be creative in a way that is less intense than creating art (which I love, but it takes a lot out of me), so I have loved finding new gluten and dairy free recipes and have cooked some pretty awesome gluten and dairy free treats in the past few weeks.  If you follow me on Instagram, you've probably seen some of the recipes that I've shared on there, but I plan on sharing them here on the blog as well.  

Also, the Etsy shop? It's now a summer project - I will keep y'all posted on its progress!

I hope you're having a great week, friends!

Image by Clare Wilkinson for C Squared W.

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Thrifty Dining Room Update

Our new apartment is awesome.  It has lots of vintage charm, beautiful architectural details, and it's spacious (and yes, the dining room even came with that awesome chandelier!).  We are loving finding the perfect spots for all of our furniture and art, but still have a few areas that are looking a little sparse.  On a med school student's budget, we've had to resort to Ikea, thriftiness, and lots of DIY-ing to get our place looking the way we want it.

This weekend, we gave our dining room a little makeover with some inexpensive DIY wall art. The problem with our dining room is that it's huge with lots of wall space.  We hung a large mirror at one end of the room, but still had a huge expanse of wall space that needed something (or some things) big.  We have some large pieces of art, but already hung them elsewhere in our apartment.  

We didn't want to spend money on more art or frames, so we tried this simple DIY that we found on Little Green Notebook: Huge prints for only $4.  Jenny Komenda has amazing ideas, and I love her style!  I was so excited to finally have the chance to try one of her projects.

How to make it happen:

1. Find some photos.  
2. Make them black and white.  
3. Save them on a flash drive and print them as large format architectural prints at FedEx Kinkos (around $4 each).  (You can call or check out the website before you go for info on sizing and how to save your files.  We saved them as grayscale images and converted them to PDFs.) 
4. Buy some large pieces of foam core. (We found huge pieces at Dollar Tree.)
5. You will probably need to cut the foam core to the size of your images.  Our photos ended up being 20"x26" and the foam core was 20"x28."  Use an exacto knife and a straight edge. 
6. You can paint the sides of the foam core first (I painted ours peach).  
7. After we cut the board and painted the sides, we trimmed the white borders off the photos (the easiest thing to do is to trim them using the large paper cutters at Kinkos after you have your photos printed).
8. Use double stick tape to mount your photos to the foam core.  So easy.  
9. Use 3M sticky velcro picture hangers to attach the foam core mounted photos to the wall.  

This was seriously so cheap and so easy! The entire project cost around $30, and we love the way that it brought some life to our dining room!

We have so many amazing photos from our adventures in the Caribbean over the past few years, and we were so excited to find a great way to put some of them on display.  I am pretty proud of the fact that we took all of these photos ourselves! 

1. Kaieteur Falls, Guyana, South America
2. Valley of Desolation, Dominica, West Indies
3. Snake Steps, Dominica, West Indies
4. Aba Wavine, Dominica, West Indies

*Advice for the Kinko's printing part:  

Print one image first to make sure it looks good. The photos came out really dark and streaky the first time (I think the printer needed new ink?). The guy who was helping me was really nice and lightened the photos and printed them on the extra large paper, which got rid of the streaks on the edges. I think he was supposed to charge me $7/each for the larger paper, but he was nice and didn't). Asking the guy if he could lighten the images and get rid of the streaks made such a difference, so definitely print one copy first to see what you think, and ask if they can help you make any adjustments if you aren't happy with the first print. This made all the difference! 

Also, these prints are not the highest quality and the paper is thin copy paper (not photo paper), but it is a great option if you want something inexpensive and dramatic. All this being said, we really do love how they turned out!

Font used: Amatic | Typekeys 
Arrow Photoshop Brushes from Creature Comforts
Inspiration for this project from Little Green Notebook

Images by Clare Wilkinson for C Squared W

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Making it happen: an Etsy shop!

I've decided that it's time to open my own Etsy shop!  Opening my own shop and selling more of my work is something that I've wanted to do for a while now, but I've just never made it happen. I've always been too busy, too tired, or just lacking motivation.  Now that we've moved to Chicago, however, I've found myself with more time, motivation, and room to paint and create.  I've been blogging, drawing, painting, decorating, and just being creative, and I'm loving it!  

I've gotten some amazing encouragement from friends after posting photos of some of my paintings here on the blog, on Facebook, and on Instagram.  So, I've decided that it's time to make it happen.  I'm going to continue working over the next few weeks to create some more pieces and to get everything set up, but my own Etsy shop is definitely in the works.  

I'll keep you posted on the details!  Thank you for all the love and encouragement!

***UPDATE: My Etsy Shop, Clare Wilkinson Studio, is now open!!!***

Fonts & Brushes used: 
Pea Roxygirl from Kevin & Amanda
Arvil by Ben Dalyrimple from Lost Type Co-op
Arrow Brushes from Creature Comforts
Art and design by Clare Wilkinson.

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Perfect little plants

As you may already know, we love Trader Joe's around here.  One of my favorite treats to buy at TJ's (besides anything covered in chocolate) is fresh flowers (I'm currently loving their tulips and  eucalyptus!).  I was so excited to discover these pretty, potted succulents at Trader Joe's last weekend.  I picked up three of them to sit in the windowsill in our home office.  

We've been wanting to add a few plants to our new apartment, but have been intimidated and indecisive about what to get, where to put them, and how to care for them.  These succulents are perfect, because they're low maintainance, but still have lots of personality (just the way we like it).  

I'm not sure what I like better, the funky plants or their fun, geometric pots! 

Font used: Sanserifing

Images by Clare Wilkinson for C Squared W.

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Job hunting & creating

This week, I'm laying low and hunkering down on my job search here in Chicago.  I've updated my resume, searched, and started filling out applications and writing cover letters.  I'm looking for something that's either creative, non-profit, or in the education field, but am pretty open to doing anything that what would be a good fit for me.  In the meantime I'm getting creative and trying to supplement our income with some freelance art and writing projects.

I'm loving the inspiring words on my current desktop wallpaper and am hoping that this simple nudge of encouragement to "make it happen" will help keep me motivated.  

Any job hunting advice for me?  Or better yet, a job?  All advice and encouragement is welcomed! 

Images by Clare Wilkinson for C Squared W
Desktop wallpaper from breanna rose

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My painting + Joy's Salon Wall

What a fun treat to check out Frock Files this week and find a beautiful salon-style gallery wall (and awesome tutorial) that included one of my paintings (top left).

What a striking room and wall - it all looks gorgeous! I love that most of the pieces that Joy hung have a special significance - pieces from friends from different walks of like, or collected on trips to favorite and sentimental places.  

For me, the art that we hang and collect is much the same way - it all has a story, and is tied to a place or memory.  I'll have to share an "art walk" around our apartment sometime to show you some of our favorite pieces and the stories that go with them. 

Do you have a gallery wall?  I've always wanted one, and have a random assortment of photos and small paintings that we haven't been able to find the perfect homes for.  They are currently living in boxes and waiting for frames... but I think that at some point, a gallery wall is in their future! 

Photo by Joy Uyeno - Frock Files

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