Category: Five Question Interviews

Miranda Guillory: The Five Question Interview

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Miranda Guillory is the artist/owner of The Paper Quillory where she creates beautiful and playful works of art with strips of colorful paper and glue.

Miranda loves playing with paper and exploring its many possibilities. Quilling is the art of creating filagree from rolled bits of paper and has been around since the Renaissance, when nuns and monks would roll gold-gilded paper remnants trimmed during the bookmaking process. They would use them to decorate religious objects as an alternative to gold filigree. 

Miranda lives with her husband David near downtown Elgin.

1. Why did you move to Elgin? 

Our rent was going up and up in Austin so we started looking to put all that money towards something we could own.  We quickly learned that we wouldn’t be able to afford to buy in Austin.  We looked for months in just about every town on the outskirts of our emerald city, looking for something that we could feel really good about, our forever home.  We finally found it in Elgin.  My husband and I moved here almost 6 years ago and haven’t looked back.  

We love the small town atmosphere and the burgeoning creative scene.

2. What compels you to spend time creating?

Oh, I just have to.  I get this anxious need to make something. Anything. Sometimes I’m not in the mood for quilling and I’ll just stare at all of my art supplies, maybe skim through some art books, until I find something manageable for the moment.  I’m not very good at sitting still and have to at least be moving my hands.  I find very few things more satisfying than creating something beautiful out of nothing.  

I also have a tendency to feel my emotions pretty intensely and I find paper quilling, specifically, to be a very meditative process.  It’s surprisingly time consuming and I’ll get lost in it for hours, feeling grounded and peaceful once I’m finished.

3. Tell me three things you’ve learned in the past five years.

I’ve learned that just because something I create isn’t my favorite, doesn’t mean it wont be someone else’s.  I used to trash a piece if I didn’t like where it was headed half-way through.  I thought that everything I put out into the world had to be, in my mind, a masterpiece.  Over time I’ve discovered that some of my least favorite works might make someone else smile, or feel seen.  

I’ve learned that I’m no use to anyone if I don’t take care of myself.  When I’m stressed or burnt out, when I feel unhealthy, when I don’t take care of my head and heart,  I can’t REALLY show up for my work or my relationships.  It’s hard to put yourself first.  I wasn’t raised that way.  I’ve had to learn what those little things are that feed my soul and I’ve had to learn to put them in my schedule.  I’ve had to learn that it isn’t selfish. When I take care of me, I’m better equipped to take care of the people I love and to take on the world (or at least my little corner of it). 

Most recently, I’ve learned how much I need to be physically around my family and friends.  I am an introvert.  I LOVE being home.  It’s my safe space and all my favorite things are here.  I like going out but I’ve always kind of had to pump myself up for it.  Now that I’ve been forced to stay home I am desperate to see people face to face.  I miss hugging, high fives, and giving back-scratches.  I have often said that I need to be home or I need to be alone.  Turns out I also need to be around people.

4. What are you currently making, reading, watching, or listening to?

I’m usually working on a few projects at a time.  Right now I’m doing a commissioned paper quilling of a vulva.  I’m also playing around with a sunflower design.  And I just about always have a breast or two in the works.

Currently on my nightstand:  The Love Song of J. Edgar Hoover by Kinky Friedman, Gorey’s Worlds by Erin Monroe, and The Show Won’t Go On The Most shocking, Bizarre, and Historic Deaths of Performers Onstage  by Jeff Abraham and Burt Kearns.

Watching just about everything on Netflix and Hulu currently have to offer. Just finished Letterkenny, Ozark, and Baskets (I HIGHLY recommend this one).

I’m listening to a lot more KUTX lately.  They seem to be playing all their best stuff now that more people have time to listen.  We recently got a puppy, so I took up running again and LCD Soundsystem has been helping me through that.

5. Cake or Pie?

Oh, pie for sure.

The Paper Quillory on Etsy
Instagram @thepaperquillory

Ashley Dahlke: The Five Question Interview

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Ashley Dahlke is known around here as The Cookie Farmer. Her stunning cakes and luscious cookies have become kinda famous and sought after for special occasions and community events. She is a trained pastry chef and lives near Elgin with her husband and a farm full of pigs, goats, chickens, and vegetable gardens.

Her latest venture, a 2nd Saturday Pop-Up Bakery, has been put on hold until restrictions on public congregating and flour shortages ease up.

Until you can get your hands on one of her cookies, follow her Instagram for daily dose of life on her small farm.

1. Why did you move to the Bastrop area? 

I moved to the Bastrop area with my husband to have some space. We had first moved from Alaska to Round Rock and couldn’t handle being on top of everyone else! We were able to find some land and start our little homestead in Bastrop County. 

2. What compels you to spend time creating?

The fact that there is so much more to learn and experience compels me to spend my time creating. There is a learning experience in everything and if you can create something beautiful at the same time that’s just a bonus! 

3. Tell me three things you’ve learned in the past five years.

1.Having a sense of community is invaluable.

2. Pottery! (during my baking hiatus)

3. How to start a hobby farm and just how many buckets and hoses you need. 

4. What are you currently making, reading, watching, or listening to?

Currently making gluten free almond chocolate chip cookies, as I type actually. Reading Braiding Sweet Grass by Robin Wall Kimmerer. Listening to Fair Folk podcast by Danica Child.

5. Cake or Pie?

Cake forever!! 

The Cookie Farmer on Instagram @ashley_dahlke

Patience Blythe: The Five Question Interview

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Patience Blythe is a metalworker, teacher, gardener, and writer. She lives in Elgin in a funky older home with her husband Cody, pup Oscar, and their cats Nakano and Tomoe.

She is an avid gardener and has recently become a beekeeper. Be sure to check out her gardening videos on her IGTV channel.

1. Why did you move to Elgin? 

We moved from Dripping Springs. It is a funny story. We had planned to take over a friend’s farm in Garfield while she went to France, but the deal didn’t work just at the last moment. We had made a lot of plans and concocted a lot of ideas, and were sorta ‘what now?’ about everything. We couldn’t find a place we liked in Dripping and so Cody said to me; “why don’t we buy a house?”. I laughed at him and said, “sure…let’s do that!”. A few days later, I said, “what about that house in Elgin?” as I had seen our house pop up for the last year. He said Elgin was too far and I said “why don’t we just go and look?”. Neither of us had ever been to Elgin, except for to pass through on 290. So we came to drive by the house and get some bbq at Southside. The rest is history; we loved the town, loved the house, somehow qualified to buy it, and three months later, moved here. That was February 2018. Soon I transferred to Elgin Middle School and Cody was hired by the district as well. And here we are! 

2. What compels you to spend time creating?

I feel compelled to create each day. Otherwise, I get antsy and, frankly, sad. I find that creativity keeps the Big Sad away. I am quite a nervous person and find that when my hands are busy, I am happier and more relaxed. I also love seeing, with the passage of time and attention to creativity, that hand-eye coordination grows and the work is better, more alive, more fun, more me. I am also compelled by the way we “write” our lives down in the work we make. 

3. Tell me three things you’ve learned in the past five years.

1) That time passes by very quickly and you would do well to find a way to remember things a bit more concretely, so that memories can be called up with the feelings attached

2) My friends are the most important piece of my life 

3) We humans have far more in common, regardless of where we are on the physical planet, than we could ever be different 

4. What are you currently making, reading, watching, or listening to?

1) Making – 2 rings, a bracelet, a dress and a quilt 

2) Reading – Carl Sagan’s The Demon Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark (it’s AMAZING and so relevant, being that it was written in 1995) 

3) Watching – Twin Peaks and the West Wing and also Beginners (tonight)

4) Listening to – various Spotify playlists but a lot of Pink Floyd and Kurt Vile

5. Cake or Pie?

BOTH!!! But I really love making pies the most. I like eating chocolate cakes and lemon ones, too. 

www.pacienciapaciencia.com
Instagram @blythestudio