Transition, Transference, and Trimming it all up

Last Berg - taken this a.m.

Winter is a long haul in a mile high city, and I'm happy to say we have finally rounded the bend on that one. All that remains of a mountainous heap of snow and ice in my personal corner of paradise, is this lonely little ice berg, slowly receding into the rest of my yard. Hallelujah. With the retreat of snow and ice begins the annual and very necessary clean up of elemental damage - yesterday, I hauled off 7 top-heavy loads of spruce and fir needles along with heaps of dead pokey branches I trimmed away from underneath the canopy. And I'm not talking about those cute little wheelbarrows that come in various colors and have a shallow little bed - I'm talking about a construction job-site wheelbarrow with a big wheel in front, massive handles, and a deep folded steel bed that holds one whale of a lot. Oh, how I love hauling away the dregs of winter and letting the light of spring into my yard and into my life. As I work, I think metaphorically of all that the trimming away and letting in of light means; to me, for me, and for those involved in my life.

Where does your path lead? What are your priorities?

When I started my business, Thea's Bee Beautiful, I thought I could successfully run two completely different businesses. It has been several years now and I still find that I trudge guiltily past my sunny studio door way too often with the ticker-tape inside my head reading, "Studio Time = 0. Again".  I kept telling myself things like, "Once X happens, THEN I will have more studio time". Well, as you can guess, X would happen and then the next X would pop up and so on until weeks would slip by with no studio time. This spring, I finally made the decision to phase Thea's Bee Beautiful out of my life and work in my studio full time. I realized that if I had spent all the time developing my art business that I've put into TBB, I'd be...  well, who knows. The point is, I want and need to give it a shot. Art is what I do best and I keep shoving it to the bottom of my priority list.

I was not looking forward to talking to my daughter, Anna, about this decision. It's been a decade since she and I first started conceptualizing this business when my late husband and I were looking at small organic farms to buy in Eastern Oregon. The plan was to grow our own flowers and herbs for use in skin care products. Anna had started collecting formulaic research and we were all excited about our prospects. All these years later, many things have changed and Anna and I have kept working on the skin care line. She has a lot of vested time and energy in this business already.

Much to my surprise, when I broached the subject last week, Anna grew very excited and exclaimed that she thought she and Dustin (her fiance') might like to take it over. After a consultation with Dustin and friends, Anna declared her interest in becoming the new owner/operator of Thea's Bee Beautiful. In the words of a friend of mine, what an elegant solution.

Anna and Dustin, Scott and I, are in a time of transition with Anna and Dustin purchasing their own little organic farm and deciding to marry, and Scott taking a job in the back country that keeps him from home Monday through Friday. The transfer of my business to Anna and Dustin makes sense in this context. It's as if we've come full circle together.

Anna makes her 1st Batch

The last three days, Anna and I have gone over many aspects of the business and spent a full and long day making Fancy Face Cream and Everyday Hand and Body Cream. It was a joy to spend that time beginning the process of transferring knowledge and technique to her. I even found myself laughing out loud and told her once that I felt so simply and thoroughly happy - and that feeling of simple happiness tells me this is the right decision. It seems to be a rare thing that decisions made are met with such clarity and sureness afterwards.

Measuring Hydrosol

As we sat side by side in the "work room", putting the finishing touches on over a hundred jars of product surrounded by my distiller and all the Things that go into Thea's Bee Beautiful, I found myself wondering what this room would look like emptied of all that once we move it to Dustin and Anna's place. All those empty cabinets and empty work table...   then I had an AHA!! moment. I've been looking over my studio wondering where on earth and how on earth I was going to manage and organize all my paints, mediums, and paint table in addition to all my fabric based stuff. Wonder no more - it will all transfer nicely and neatly into the old TBB workshop! It is a perfect and wonderful solution.

I sign off here today feeling happier and lighter than I have for a long time. I'm feeling so good about all the changes in our lives and the way we are handling them. The dovetailing of my business into the life and business of Anna and Dustin, along with their upcoming marriage, makes my own life seem more complete even while I am trimming it up. I'm simply trimming it up so that it can expand in a new direction. It's so exciting.

Linen from Greece - hand embroidered and appliqued

P.S. Today is Anna's Birthday. One of the gifts I gave her is a gorgeous linen tablecloth and napkin set sent to me by her great grandmother in Athens, Greece, upon my own marriage to Anna's dad. It arrived with a few stains and I enjoyed thinking about the dinner parties that put them there. I added a few of my own and now pass it along to her so she can add hers.

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:

Rsolution

Tired Tree

Sometimes, by the last day of the year, I feel a bit like my Christmas tree... a little bedraggled, limbs weighted down and drooping, and the baubles that hung brightly and cheerfully at the beginning of the season now seem like they are trying too hard.  It is also true that we have given the season our best - we reached this state of bedraggle-ment by giving it our all.  And so, as the tree will be rejuvenated by being stuck in the snowbank outside tomorrow,  I will also experience a sense of rejuvenation through the time honored tradition of reflection and resolution.

A few days ago, I was hard at work in my studio drawing a full scale blueprint for a new fiber art piece for a client.  I was in that spot in the process that every artist knows...  how will this piece resolve?  Continuing on, that word was in the forefront of my mind.  By the end of the session, I could see where and how resolution would occur.  With this knowledge came a sigh of relief and flood of happiness.  I now knew where I was going with this work. There is a kind of peace that comes with this knowledge.

Journal Page

Writing in my journal this morning (a nearly daily ritual), I noticed I had - poetically - reached the last page of my current journal on the last day of the year.  Another type of resolution wherein a type of conclusion is reached.  This inspired me to look the word resolution up in my battered and beloved old Random House Dictionary.  I found that there are 18 definitions for this strong and useful word.  You can see that I jotted down abbreviated versions of each one in my journal.  It seemed a very fitting way to close out the year and my journal.

On this last day of the year, what will we decide was the resolving moment in the year past?  What will we determine to be our resolution for the coming year?  Will we feel a sense of peace when we attempt to resolve the past with the present and future for ourselves?  Or will we feel dissolution within our hearts?  Each of us defines this for ourselves.

I leave you this cold, clear and brilliant winter day with a segment of a poem sent to me by a dear friend:

I broider my life into the frame,

I broider my love, thread upon thread;

The world goes by with its glory and shame,

Crowns are bartered and blood is shed;

I sit and broider my dreams instead.

- Arthur Symons

Payette River, McCall, Idaho

Thoughts about Time

Harvey and Wilma

Harvey and Wilma were born in 1890. They married when Harvey was released from serving in WWI as a supply train supervisor (mule division), and started having children at the start of The Great Depression when they were around 40 years old.  They are pictured here in 1952 at the age of 62 in the backyard of their home in South Bend, Indiana.  The home that my mind still travels to so frequently...  the repository of so many memories...  the embodiment of love.  Flashes of an orange painted basement floor upon which sat the old Maytag washer replete with wringer; a brick of yellow cheddar on the kitchen counter with a sleeve of saltines beside it always ready to stave off hunger; the wide front porch we kids played endless games on during the day and slept on when nights were hot and muggy - when we weren't catching fireflies. 

Harvey and Wilma were my grandparents and my heroes.  They still are.  Dignified and classy, they also knew how to make a child feel loved and appreciated.  They accepted me, my sisters, and cousins  "as is" and of all the homes I lived in growing up, it was their home that I thought of as Home.

I always thought of my grandparents as Old.  Throughout my life with them, they had gray hair, unglamorous figures, and inelegant clothing (with the exception of Grandpa's fedora and overcoat).  I found myself wondering just how old they really were.  Sorting through some old photos (I've been doing that a lot lately), I found this one with a clear date on the back written in a strong hand.  I was surprised when I did the math and realized they were only 62 in this picture.  Perhaps it's because I live in an affluent resort town where people ski, run, hike, and swim until they are in their 80's or just can't do it anymore.  But I do not know any 62 year old  (and many of my friends are approaching this age or have surpassed it) that looks like my grandparents do in this photo.

I offer no conclusion, but do offer a few observations:  My grandparents did not work out nor were they athletic in any way.  Their clothing was of the time and, never wealthy, they wore the same clothes for years.  They did not dye their hair, hide, disguise, or alter their aging bodies in any way.  Grandpa worked for Studebaker until he could retire with a gold watch and a pension.  His company did not fire him right before retirement or try to get out of paying him for his long years of service.  Of simple means, they had a garden in the summer, read books (Rex Stout and Zane Grey for Grandpa, crossword puzzles for Grandma), and listened to ball games.  There was a lot of conversation and many family meals together.  They lived until they were in their mid-eighties and their looks never changed.   

Quail Tracks

In this complicated time of burgeoning uncertainty, I look to my grandparents once again for direction and guidance.

Mountain Quail

In my yard today:

Crabapple Tree Today

In my town today:

Ponderosa Pine Log

Don't squander your energies on anything you are lukewarm about.  Passion adds power and strength - Jean Ray Laury

Secret Life Revealed

The Secret Life of Nutmeg (Full View 36" x 37")

The Secret Life of Nutmeg is now complete and available for sale through Acorn Gallery in Idyllwild, California.  I love this charming gallery nestled in a quaint little town similar to my own home of McCall, Idaho.  Take a look at their website and see what's going on there!

Nutmeg is a really special piece for me.  I have spent years collecting the little shaved disks from my grinder and studying the squiggly lines and dots.  I imagined a different life going on within those little spheres - rather like in "Horton hears a Who".  I visualized a bright day with a midnight garden of wheeling galaxies and bright flowers magically happening just below the surface reality of daylight.  While I've had a thumbnail sketch of this piece for quite some time, I could not quite visualize how I was going to make it happen.  My skill level was not up to the sketch.  Through self study, conversations with art buddies, and cruising the internet, I learned a few things that made this piece finally happen.

Nutmeg Detail

Surface of Nutmeg

Each nutmeg head was hand painted with gold, bronze,and copper fabric paint. I tried some really fun pens in those colors, but could not control the line well enough to achieve the look I wanted.  I then fused a layer of white silk organza over the surface to create luminosity.  The final dimension is composed of  hand-stitched copper disks in assorted sizes topped with iridescent bronze beads.  Also visible in this detail shot are the star fields created by heat-setting iridescent metallic foil on to navy Bali batik fabric.  I created depth by fusing circles of sparkly black netting over the star fields and stitching them down with metallic thread in a satin stitch.   Too much information?  It's always hard for me to decide.  I guess you decide by either reading this post or not - or part of it!

From what I've read, one should post at least weekly to keep things fresh and updated.  Perhaps if I did that, I could keep my posts shorter while maintaining detail.  During our brief alpine summers, it is difficult for me to maintain the discipline of more computer time.  For any artist it is a difficult balance of spending the needed time to promote your work online, or actually BE in your studio creating your work! Both are necessary and whole volumes have been written on this topic.

I leave you with two photographs I took last weekend in the back country east of here.  Scott, Ethyl and I traveled roughly 160 miles over dirt roads to visit the old mining town of Stibnite and it's sister village of Yellow Pine.  Stibnite was a thriving gold and silver town at one time and is being brought back to life right now by the mining company of Midas Gold Corporation.  Visit their site for interesting photos and information.  The streams are currently running clear and sparkling near there - but still have toxic levels of "bad stuff" in them, which I found out after I'd been wading in them.  Same for soil and dust contaminants.  What changes will happen when the mines are operational again?

Stibnite Site and Dredge Pond

Mine Shaft on Sugar Creek with Stream

Stepping off to the side to take the "Mine Shaft" photo, my foot sank in a red, gooey ooze.  Moving back, my other foot sank to the ankle in loose dirt.  Made me realize there could be shafts in places I couldn't see....

Nearing Nutmeg Completion

Sewing it Down

I'm getting close!  In this picture, I am sewing the identification label onto the backing of what will be...  a completed art piece.  Yes, it has taken me much longer than I projected.  But I do have a (good?) excuse.  It's summer in Valley County.  Precious, fir-scented, and fleeting the full time residents here run at full tilt for several months trying to incur most of their annual income AND prepare for winter all at the same time.  Preparing for winter includes repairing last winter's damage and cutting firewood.  We continue cutting and hauling home the enormous red fir that is providing us with our first "one tree winter". 

Summer here is also filled with wonderful moments like visiting with friends who are here but once a year.  Recently, I spent a companionable afternoon in my studio with a fiber art friend and a pitcher of iced tea swapping stories and talking about our passions - fiber art being high on the list.  Check out Utah Surface Design...  these artists have it going on!

Green Cards at the Roseberry Concert Barn

There is more to do in our little mountain resort town all the time.  A few nights ago, we drove out to the historically preserved town of Roseberry to watch The Green Cards .  Excellent fiddle, mandolin, sweet singing and great stage presence.  Even I got up and danced - I think the band was having a good time too because they came out for three encores! 

In this busy summer week, we also worked in a beautiful hike through Clouchman Saddle and up Bear Pete Trail.  The trail winds it's way through acres and acres of forest burned over in 1994 and for that reason, my husband was not a fan of this trail. In my opinion, the burn area provided us with stellar views that went all the way over to the Seven Devils - a jagged mountain range to the west - and 24 miles to the south where we could see Payette Lake, the south shore of which our little town nestles against.  So I give this hike a big thumbs up - giant horseflies with painful bites aside.

Bear Pete Trail Looking West

I've written all this in an attempt to make excuses for my lack of productivity in the studio.  It is a constant struggle for artists in every medium.  How to balance the need for solitude in the studio in order to create with other needs of the soul; companionship, recreation, and reading.

Speaking of reading, I have a good summer read recommendation that I heard reviewed recently on NPR:  South of Superior by Ellen Airgood.  As a former Michigander, I could not wait to read this book and liked it so much that I am saving it for a second read sometime this winter.  Probably around my birthday as a special winter treat.  Check out Ellen's blog - it's a lot of fun!

Secret Beginnings

This is the beginning stage of "Secret Life of Nutmeg" as it looks laid flat on my work table.  The pieced fan shape is laid on top of the background fabric I've been preparing for a few days now.  The background base fabric is a navy blue Bali batik with star fields I created by sprinkling the surface with Bo-Nash adhesive powder following up with a heat application of a foiling product.  Voile'!!  The star field of my dreams.  I've been wondering how I was going to create the effect I could see in my head when I spotted something about this wondrous product in Jane Dunnewold's recent book, "Art Cloth" - a book I highly recommend to any fiber artist for its inspirational effects/techniques and clear instructions on how to achieve them. 

Progress is taking longer than I'd like - it's finally summer here which means it is time to repair the damage from the previous winter and get a grip on the yard and gardens which grow at a rapid rate of speed with any encouragement and long daylight hours.  Because of all the wet spring weather, I had a bumper crop of rhubarb this year.  It was so lush that I actually cut, sliced, and froze 7 zip-locks full that I know we'll appreciate during "the long dark", which is the phrase an Alaskan friend of mine uses for "winter".

Lovely Rhubarb

Warm Red Fir

To the right, is another reason for "slow art".  Around here, we say we are either living winter, or getting ready for winter.  That includes cutting firewood, which my wonderful and strong husband is shown doing here.  You can see at the top of this photo where the tree snapped off in a wind storm and thereby made itself available to us for harvest.  So far, we have hauled home around 3 cords from this one tree and there is quite a bit more.  This may be my first One Tree Winter - amazing and we are grateful.

Tyndall Creek/Vulcan Hot Springs

You say you want to hear more excuses for slow art?  Well, in addition to working around the homestead, it is important to take advantage of living in such a beautiful area.  I've made it a priority this year to hike with a group of girlfriends weekly.  I have lived here many years but there are many, many hikes I have not taken because of family commitments and employment.  With the kids grown and having been unemployed for a couple of years, I finally have the time to go hiking and I have to admit it has been a grand treat.  I feel guilty about my hikes sometimes, but then remind myself that summers here are short AND, I am taking an on-line Pharmacy Technician course to re-instate my license and hopefully find gainful employment upon completion.  It's likely I will not find a job here in McCall, but will need to look in Boise and come home on weekends.  It is not uncommon in my area for one spouse to work "away".  We'll just have to see how all that works out.

It was a beautiful 4th of July here.  My first year here was 1979 and it snowed at the BBQ I was invited to.  My Midwestern roots were properly shocked and I knew the folks back home would not believe it.  This year, we were fortunate enough to have a ring-side seat on a deck overlooking all the downtown fun.  I leave you with a couple of images from that beautiful summer night.

Fireworks!

Waiting for the Show to Begin

Coming and Going Thoughts

It has been a busy month since my last post with many entrances, exits, and another art piece completed.  In my last post, I was just about to quilt the piece pictured and entitled, "Desert Mosaic" (29" long x 35" wide).  There are so many pieces in this work and so much going on, that I chose to do the quilting with a clear monofiliment thread on most of the top using long, continuous lines of stitch to keep the eye traveling smoothly over the surface.  The whitecaps on the river called for cream colored thread, and the sky has blue thread.

In this close-up shot, you can see more detail and the color shading in this photograph is more true to the actual art work.  It is quite vibrant and I am pleased with the way these complex colors and forms come together.  The very first piece I put up on the design wall was the striated silk in the upper right hand corner with the three shaded, pointed layers of organza reaching for the top of the composition.  This was a bold fabric choice to make because of the strong lines and decisive colors and I had a few anxious moments building around and out from my original choice not yet sure that it was going to "work".  It took awhile for the vision I held to match up on the design wall.  I am very happy with the end result.  Each completed piece encourages me to move on in my artistic boldness which, in turn, encourages me to make bold moves in my life outside the studio as well.


It's been a busy month, a week of which was spent looking for jobs and resettlement in Williston, North Dakota, a modern day Boom Town based on the oil and gas industry.  My husband and I thought we had done our homework well before embarking, but found we were not quite prepared for the reality.  To begin with, we went prepared to tent camp and drove in to cyclonic weather (which is why I have no picture to post!); wind driven rain and a rising Missouri River made us decide to find a hotel room.  The closest we could get to Williston was Glendive, MT a full 100 miles away as most rooms closer in are booked out as far as two years in advance.  Our hotel in Glendive was filled with oilfield workers making that commute to Williston daily.  Undaunted, Scott had the one interview we had lined up beforehand for 4:00 p.m.  It was clear in a short amount of time that he would not be getting that particular job.  Disappointed, we headed back to our hotel room all the while making our plans for a fresh try the next day.  By the time we arrived in Glendive, we had decided to head back for home instead and make more careful plans for a future attempt, if at all.  You need to go to Williston knowing that you will not be hired unless you have a North Dakota address in the area.  You also need to know that there is no housing available.  The solution?  Take your own camper and park it in one of the myriad RV and mobile home parks springing up like mushrooms all around Williston.  If you do that, you will get a job.  Also go knowing that getting a job is not an overnight thing - we talked to several young men who had already been there two weeks with no success.    As we swung onto the ON ramp to interstate 94 outside Glendive heading West, we saw a young man standing next to the OFF ramp with a cardboard sign in his hand that read, "WILLISTON".  The whole scene reminded me of Steinbeck's, "The Grapes of Wrath", which I have read several times.  People are coming in from across the nation in an effort to find work and camping wherever they can - we saw plenty of people pitching tents in nooks and crannies around town.  Williston is a nice town made up of tidy two-story brick buildings with a lovely public library and hospital (two places I always check out).  I wish everyone the best; both in their efforts to find employment and enjoy a good life, and in Williston's efforts to maintain a nice little town in Boom time conditions.

Might Ethyl Frog Eater

Today:  dig spotted knapweed out of our field accompanied by doggie Ethyl who is recovering from her frog eating adventure.  She nearly died from ingesting not one, but many little frogs from a nearby pond.  Who knew?  When we tire of digging noxious weeds, we shall repair to the studio to start my new piece:   The Secret Life of Nutmeg.  Fun and whimsical, this art piece represents what I wish for everyone - a bit of fun and whimsy in each day!

 

Lake Snow-be-Gone

It's hard for most of you to even imagine this kind of snow and ice, but when you live at an elevation above 5,000 feet I promise you it is all true!  The good news is, once the snow begins to melt it goes very rapidly.  Here is my version of time lapse photography:  This is the berm in my front yard that has many daffodil bulbs planted in it.  The first picture was taken on a Sunday afternoon walk, the second picture on a Wednesday afternoon walk.  Amazing, huh?  At least I think so...


Okay, I couldn't get these to stack the way I wanted them to.  The one to the right is Wed., the one below is Sunday.  Dramatic difference!











Please bear with my  lousy formatting.  The picture below is of Payette Lake from Legacy Beach on Wednesday, same day as the above picture.  See the yellow barrel located between the bare aspen tree branches?  Locals put in bets on when that barrel will roll to shore.  As soon as the lake breaks, there will be small children swimming in it.  I see it every year - where are the PARENTS of these children? Don't they check the lake temp before allowing these water-winged tykes to flounder into it?  Goodness.

Anyway, this blog is supposed to be about art, not ice.  But you can imagine that such an extreme climate has it's effect upon sensitive souls like me causing us to do all kinds of crazy things - like BLOG.

I'm very proud of the art piece entitled "Healing Elements" pictured below.  While "Desert Music" was my first effort in a non-square format, this piece had me going in multitudes of circles.  I spent one morning googling math solutions, taking notes, and drafting the initial shape.  I hadn't done this much geometry in quite some time and was pleased to find myself thoroughly enjoying the process and "getting" the math fairly easily once I got going and refreshed my memory. 

The detail shot at right is of the Wood Element, represented by a tree, as is traditional in Chinese art representations. The corresponding internal organ is the liver, which you can see here as a knothole in the tree trunk.  The Chinese character for "wood element" is to the lower right in a sheer silk organza overlay that I fused in place, machine satin stitched the circumference,  and then heavily quilted to bring the shape out.  Each of the five elemental Chinese characters are on this piece to the right of the representational medallion. From the top clockwise they are: Wood (liver), fire (heart), earth  (stomach), heavy metal (lungs), and water (kidneys). 

Another challenge in this piece was figuring out how to hang it flat upon a wall.  What I ended up doing is sewing a narrow sleeve along the spoke line of each medallion on the back of the quilt.  My husband had some narrow bamboo scraps from a carpentry project that he fashioned into narrow rods.  He drilled a hole at the top of each rod so that the piece may be hung with any of the elements in the top position.  He tapped a small upholstery tack into the base of the rod to keep the rod from slipping out once hung.

"Healing Elements" was created for a physician who, in addition to practicing traditional Western medicine, brings complimentary Chinese medicine into her practice as well.  This piece will hang in her office and I look forward to seeing it whenever I have an appointment with her!

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!

Inaugeral Post!

Several years ago, a client asked me to keep her posted on what I was doing and creating.  It took me a while to cogitate on this and come up with a solution - a BLOG!!  I thoroughly enjoy this format and hope that you will, too.  If you got this, you are a past or present client, art buddy, relative or friend.  That about covers it, doesn't it?  If you would rather not receive my post notices, just drop me an email and I'll remove you from my mailing list.

I am so far behind in letting people know what I'm up to, that I hardly know where to begin.  So in my first post, I think I'll just go back one year to when I started creating a completely different kind of fiber art based on photography.  The following are samples of what I can do now:

This piece, entitled "Fire in the Belly of Winter" (33" x 39"), is created from winter photographs of Valley County that I printed on fabric and collaged.  It is offered for sale through Acorn Gallery in Idyllwild, California www.acorngalleryidyllwild.com

I received three commissions last spring to commemorate the 10th anniversary of The Seven Devil's Playwright's Conference www.idtheater.org; one piece for each of the three directors of the conference.  This is not a great photograph (I was in a hurry - no excuse, I know, but true), but gives an idea of what I can do with many photographs in a collage format. 

Last one!  This client saw "Fire in the Belly" (33" x 39") and wanted a similar piece done featuring her home in McCall and familiar McCall summer scenes.  I took the photographs and printed them on fabric using archival quality inks. 

Printing photographs on fabric takes my art in a new direction and I expect I will be doing much more of this and expanding on the idea by...  printing photos on sheer overlays, scrim, silk, anything I want!

Okay!  Thanks for reading this - as I catch up, my blogs will be shorter (promise).  Off to run town errands and then - my reward - to the studio!  Best of the day to you!