creative faery

Sunday Blessings and some art

Yesterday, we were blessed with sunshine!  This sunshine girl needs her sun. I sat out on the porch and ate my lunch and we went for a walk...I sooooooo needed that.  But alas, today is more of the same dreariness....inversions cause great havoc in our valley.  Despite not getting enough sunshine, it just brings the mood down.  But I am hopeful.  We should get the sun back by the end of the week.  I'm ready for SPRING!

      (the other tryptic wouldn't photo)  

Last weekend was mah-ve-lous!  Got to spend Saturday and Sunday with my sister just playing with art.  What I love about her is she helps me think things through.  We made a tryptic for my black and white room that is filled with photos of my family.  The simpleness of the project made my imagination go wild.  What I understand about myself is that sometimes when I sit down to do art, I have too many choices or too many things I want to do.  The best part of this is all I have are small choices...not piles of choices.  This is a project she's been wanting to do for awhile, so it was good for me to focus on this one thing.  First, you choose 12 x 12 craft paper you really enjoy...it can be one special piece of paper or a pile of papers you collage.  I went simple.  I found three that I adore.  Then, you paint the canvas the color of the room you want to put the artwork in.  In my case, either black or white.  After that, you glue the paper down, either overlapping the edges or trim down.  My sister had small embellishments to add a hint of color or areas of interest.  How awesome is that?  Wah-la!!! DONE!  The pictures don't do the artwork justice. You can add a different kind of finish or more embellishments.  I LOVE words and texture, so I combined them and got something simple and interesting.

The best part?  This process taught me a few things I'm really drawn to, and a couple of things I want to try.  Again, remembering simplicity and adding just a few things.  I notice I tend to want to do it all now and be an expert when I have little to no experience.  In this scenario, I got to enjoy the process as much as making the art, and it gave me a bajillion ideas!  Isn't it interesting how something so simple can give me direction and so many ideas?  It was awesome1  Now, just have to focus and narrow...go simple or don't do it...right?

Next, we started on my new altered journal.  I decided a theme, "freedom," a focus I've been having with my poetry.  I think I'll save that for tomorrow to show you... 'kay?

For now, I want you to know I feel happy and blessed to live here and to have family that loves me.  My water is clean, and I have food.  Also, I am hopeful that next week will bring my spring I'm so longing for.  Until then, my friends, have a blessed week!  Nemaste.

Random thoughts and some Sunday Blessings

My quote for this week:  If I were to wish for anything, I should not wish for wealth and power, but for the passionate sense of the potential, for the eye which, ever young and ardent, sees the possible.  Pleasure disappoints, possibility, never.  Soren Kierkegaard

My dearest friends, I must admit that the reason I haven't been posting is I'm totally lost in expressing myself these days.  I feel stuck and often sad...and me, being the sunshine I like to be, don't want to post negativity.  But the sun came out today, so I'm desperately seeking to push my own soul out of the clouds.

I think part of what happens is that Boise is in the valley, so we get inversions...the clouds get trapped and we don't see the sun for weeks!  And, me being a sunshine girl, gets so sad without my sun...so I walk around extremely tired and unmotivated (so unlike me)...and I must say I wander...and wandering causes me grief because I have no focus or direction...and I end up wasting this precious time I've been given. So, to you, I'm shucking this blanket of woe, and I shall find the sun peaking through my day...

This week, I did a Community Education class with my daughter in altered books.  I actually tore a page out of a book!  You laugh, but it was really difficult, as I LOVE books so much.  But my husband promised me that the book was really in need of an alter...We actually played with paint and messed it around.  The part that felt the best to me was that we did something called a ROUND ROBIN.  We each tore a page out of our books and chose a theme we wanted it to be, painted and added a little something; then at the 5 minute mark, she had us switch pages with someone.  My daughter was my partner, so it felt safe.  Besides, she makes everything look great anyway!  Then after another 5 minutes, we switched again.  This made me nervous, because now I was working on a page of someone I didn't know and I was worried I would ruin it....when I was done, I actually gave it to someone else to give to her so she wouldn't know it was me...but honestly, I heard her say how much she liked it...hurray!  What did this teach me?  I have to put myself out there and take chances...and that if my art goes through an "ugly" stage, to have faith, because even writing has ugly stages, and I can get through it.  My page turned out pretty cool...it stills needs some things...but this was a quick job with no materials but a few scraps!

The other thing I learned?  Is I'm afraid of ruining these great collections of pictures and quotes I have.  I "might" someday "need" them for something or I might ruin them and not create something great with them and lose them forever, then what?  Isn't that silly?  You know what it makes me?  a pack rat!  YIKES!  That's my dad, not me...but alas, I've realized it is me...so yesterday, I actually took some magazine pages and pasted them IN MY BOOK...and painted...it was cool!  Thanks for listening to my art adventure...hope to have more, and even more successes.

ENJOY your blessed Sunday...thanks for being my sunshine today.