New Series: Violence Journal

I haven't added much to the Faith section since I created it, but I intend to be adding a lot in the coming year. My wife and I are reading through the Bible chronologically this year and I want to focus my writing on violence.

I've already added an introductory post and the first entry, beginning with Cain and Abel. My goal is to determine whether violent passage in the Bible point toward a pacifistic God, especially when I believe in a pacifistic Jesus and being a pacifist, myself.

New Designy Stuff

Another month, another last-minute design job for Tim. This time, I got to make three Christmas-themed album art pieces, each with a different title and variation. I'm not sure what's happening with the other two, but I'll show off this one for now...

You can download this jolly little single right here.

I also made a new Facebook profile picture combo back when the new timeline look was about to roll out. Months later, Facebook still hasn't launched it, which means people have only see the little square image as my profile picture, which is only part one of two. Anyway, here's what it's supposed to look like...

Hopefully, Facebook will get their act together so we can get all the complaining about the "old Facebook" out of the way, as if any of you kids (or adults) even used the real old Facebook.

New Section: Faith

Seven Minute Pitch will now include my writings on faith for a few reasons:

-I used to publish my short essays on spirituality and theology on Facebook, but as that medium changes over and over, I decided to archive my material on my website before I forget how to find them.

-I'm trying to commit myself to connecting all of my aspects. I'm a writer and a designer, yes, but I also write a lot of stuff about Jesus. I don't want to split my identity anymore.

-I'm no longer an active youth pastor, so I want a method of keeping myself diligent in reading scipture and processing theology.

So, most of the material is made up of revised Facebook notes. I added a new one, too. Check it out.

As always, thanks for reading. Happy Thanksgiving and Unhappy Black Friday.

Occupy Wall Space

This is one of the walls in our apartment, specifically: the one we eat beside. (Apologies for the blurry pictures here and there.)

This is one panel from an enormous cardboard box that once held a mattress. I found it next to a dumpster at my apartment complex. What a treat. I chopped it up and made use of it.

This is an old book with a lot of browned pages. I picked it up at Half-Price Books for two dollars.

I removed the cover...

...and trimmed the pages off the spine.

I picked up some paper glue at HobLobs and used it to stick these bad boys, one by one, to the cardboard.

Then I did that like a million times.

Now we can read our wall instead of talk to one another as we eat dinner. Big improvement.

P.S. - I had seen a couple DIY book page wallpapers floating around the internet. Since we can't just wallpaper our apartment walls, I thought panels would do. Plus, they added some depth to a big, bland wall. The book cover itself is actually covering our alarm control box...it's a bit gaudy.

Re-Printing a T-Shirt

This is a wall. To the left of the wall is my wife wearing a red shirt.

She really digs the shirt because it's super soft. She doesn't dig the words on it that much.

It was a freebie swag shirt, so we'll forgive the corny copy. Still, America's kids aren't exactly her mission. So, I offered to paint over it.

I wasn't sure what I wanted to print, just that I wanted to cover up that section. The paint was printed lightly into the fabric in the typical faux-worn out style. Not difficult to cover up, but I would have to use black.

 

I stared at the cover-up shape for a minute until I decided to make an umbrella out of it. My wife is into minimalistic stuff, so I thought a simple icon would do the trick. Turned out to be the easiest stencil I've ever made.

 

This is how it looked lined up on the shirt. I lathered the fabric paint on thick to make sure the words didn't show through. The nice thing about simpler shapes like this, as opposed to my typically more elaborate stencils, is that no matter how much paint I use, almost all of it ends up on the shirt and not all over a sheet of cardstock.

 

And there you have it. You can barely see the words beneath the paint, but that's with flash photography and an eye that already knew they were there.

And in case you were wondering: she loved it.