Teaching and Creating in my Little Town

Fish Sketch

I am teaching art again this winter to fifth graders in our school district.  I have taught in New Meadows, McCall, and this year it is the little town of Donnelly.  Each year, I am surprised at how much I enjoy this project - I did not like children even when I was a child myself, preferring the company of adults. I was the kind of mom who loved her own, but wasn't looking for a playgroup to join... I view this as a healing in my life; the enjoyment of being with and interacting with children. 

For this years project, we are creating fabric banners 3' x 5' in size.  Pretty large, but I want them to have something super fun to take home with them! (many thanks to Lori of Granny's Attic - I wouldn't have the fabric for this without her generous donations!) The theme is centered on stream rehabilitation, trout, and trout habitat in our area.  We are working with a text entitled, appropriately enough, "Trout" - you can see one of the beautiful photographs in this book at the bottom of my photograph here.  I was captivated by that large hazel-colored fish eye and it was the first thing I drew in my thumbnail sketch that will become my own banner.  The photo is not great, but above the fish eye you can see a trail of bubbles leading to the surface, some waving stream grass and a few pine trees.  Next to the "eye" is a full sized trout nosing downward and into a pile of trout eggs resting in the pebbled stream bottom.  I really like this sketch and I am looking forward to translating it into fabric on my banner working alongside my enthusiastic, welcoming and intelligent fifth grade class.  Having met only once so far with my class, I am already charmed by them and looking forward to more.  They are really into this project and that makes it even more fun!

Farm Fresh Eggs!

Donnelly is a quiet, charming little town.  One of the focal points of the town is the charming and tasty respite of Flight of Fancy coffee shop (best pecan and maple bars ever) with it's wonderful little Glory Bee market.  I stopped into the market on my way back from teaching to pick up some eggs, and this is what I found:

I love it.  AND, they are the prettiest, nicest eggs I've found in this here valley.

Queen Bee Night Cream with Royal Jelly

On other fronts, I am still building my ETSY store with my Thea's Bee Beautiful  products.  I just posted listings for my Everyday Lip Balm and Everyday Lip and First Aid Balm.  Part of the process of doing these listings is discovering all the photos I need in order to properly display and showcase a listing.  A few days ago, I found I needed a photo of my Queen Bee Night Cream with Royal Jelly in both the 1 oz. and travel size for my website updates.  It was a brilliant sunny day and I needed an excuse for a walk by the river with my trusty dog anyway.  So I packed my travel basket with product, my camera, and ...  for some mysterious reason...  this fabulous crystal globe my mother-in-law gave me years ago.  And darn if it wasn't just the perfect thing.  Look at this photo:  The light was zinging through the globe and was entirely too bright.  Solution?  Put a jar of night cream in front of the shaft of light! The jar seems to glow from within which is what it also does for your skin.

I've chatted quite a bit now.  I so enjoy writing these blogs and know they tend to be lengthy, so I thank you for opening and reading them!  I leave you with another picture I took during the Queen Bee photo shoot of an old sheep herder bridge across the Payette River:

Springtime in the Rockies

It was 16 degrees when I got up this morning.  It's about 30 degrees right now at 3:30 p.m.  Even for this mile high city, it is a LATE spring.  Thank goodness for friends to go walking with - we save each others sanity by assuring each other that YES - it is okay to be cranky right now.  But not to kill yourself.  I took the photo below just minutes ago at the McCall airport.  Can you even believe it?

I combated winter blues this morning by making a stockpot full of cheery salsa and canning it.  From six quarts of canned tomatoes, some onions, garlic, carrots and cilantro, I got 14 pints of canned salsa and 2 quarts of it in the fridge.  Isn't it pretty?  I so love salsa.  I'll take a jar to my daughter in Boise when I go on Monday as a thank you for staying with her.  Sometimes she shares it with her boyfriend...  and sometimes she doesn't.

Here is a picture to really cheer up a gray day:  "Desert Music" is another commission piece I completed last fall and am very happy with (so is the client, thank goodness).  I use a lot of hand-dyed fabrics from Judy Robertson - they are some of the best hand dyed fabrics I have ever seen.  To see her selections, click on this link and check it out:  www.justimagination.com  Not only is Judy's fabric amazing, she is wonderful to chat with and order from.                              

 

I do not often work in a non-square format so this piece was challenging for me in that way.  In the border, the light gray pieces are accented with a copper washer, a black leather sequin stacked on top, and a turquoise bead on top of that, used to anchor the stack down.  In the picture at right, you can just see this stack in the light gray point.  I am especially happy with the flames and the corn in this piece. 

Looking at the time, I see I just have enough time to go into the studio and work for a bit before husband and dog come home from the work site.  I'm so grateful he still has a work site to go to!