Tag Archives: postaweek2011

thank you

Posted on by

15

It feels so trivial to sit here posting pictures and typing words in the wake of such catastrophe.  And more bad weather looming this afternoon.  We are fine, but this has hit very close to home.  It certainly creates perspective.  What I can do, and you can do is not take anything for granted.  Love your people, be grateful for a home, reach out and get to know your neighbors, share, pray, recognize the miracle of drinking water and a warm bed and coffee in the morning.  Hold someone’s hand, and while you are holding their hand notice how it feels in your own, the weight of it, the warmth of it, the texture of their callouses and fingerprints.  Be present.  The end of the world may not have come on Sunday as predicted, except it has for the people affected by this tragedy.

On the home front I’m going through my own life blip, and I need a clear space in my head for my own perspective, and clarity.  Sometimes I emerge from blogging and blog reading, etc. feeling completely muddle-headed.  Like I’ve tried to fill an empty hole in my soul with distractions.  I can call it inspiration.  I can call it connecting.  I can call it tapping into my creativity.  But when I’m being completely honest with myself I recognize it as a type of numbing and hoarding.  How many images do I need to collect, really?  How much inspiration do I really need?  How many words do I need to read to fulfill these longings?  This all goes back to doing the hard thing.  If what I need is space and to feel what I feel, then I have to step back and create that space.  Not fill it with busyness and images and stuff.  Please don’t get me wrong.  I’m in no way denigrating blogland and the things going on out there.  I’VE just lost the why of why…  it’s not making sense to me right now, and for me it’s like crack cocaine – a way to escape.  All of that to say I’m taking time off – it may be a week, it may be 6 months, it may be indefinite.  I don’t know.  I do want to make art, and I lament I never have time to make art.  And again that’s also because I spend too much time seeing what other people are up to.  So, if doing art feels like it will be healing then yes I will post new stuff in the shop.  Otherwise I’m on sabbatical. 

I want to thank each and every one of you who have visited, commented, shared my journey.  You will never know what you have meant to me.

doing the hard thing

Posted on by

11

“Opportunity is missed by most people because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work.” ~Thomas Edison

I don’t know about you all, but I frequently feel like life is a constant learning lesson.  The lesson the universe is pressing upon me right now is “to do the hard thing”.  In this 24-hour techno-distraction world, I feel like me a lot of us have lost the notion of hard work.  It’s so much easier to sit in front of the computer, or flip through a magazine wishing for things, like a flourishing, weeded garden; or an organized laundry room; or to be physically fit; or to have more artwork created or, or, or… 

 But the truth is those things don’t happen by wishing, they happen by choosing to do the hard thing.  I think I’ve we’ve lost the satisfaction inherent in working hard.  I’ve been purposefully staying away from the computer for the last couple of weeks just so I could do the hard thing.  The hard thing of yard work, the hard thing of cleaning up my pit of a laundry room, the hard thing of not eating the cookies and the potato chips…  Okay, in the interest of being honest, I’ve also been preparing for a whole lot of company at my house for Marshall’s graduation.  And because I have chosen to avoid the hard thing for so long it has been a a bit overwhelming.  But bit by bit, as I’ve been working my butt off, things are getting done.  And you know what, it FEELS REALLY GOOD!  So, what hard thing have you been avoiding that would feel really good to get done?

(the photo doesn’t really go with this post unless you wish you could fly a plane, but are too lazy to actually take the classes to learn how to fly a plane. : )

ouch, my eyes

Posted on by

7

THE SUN IS SHINING TODAY!!!  I feel like a cave salamander who has come to the surface, squinting against the bright light…do cave salamanders have eyelids?  Well, no matter I’m just happy, happy, happy to see some sunshine.  I’m melancholy enough as it is preparing for Marshall’s graduation.  I was counting on the teenage years being tougher so that I would be ready to get rid of the kids, but they aren’t cooperating.  Instead they are doing crazy stuff like thanking me for making breakfast, actually agreeing to friend me on facebook, and putting their laundry up.  What the hell?  So, now I’m going to have to pack a box of tissues for graduation…

waterlogged

Posted on by

8

Nearly 6 solid days of rain, and here in the Ozarks we are swamped.  Since Missouri is the show-me state we of course had to climb into the Beast and check it out for ourselves.  Please note that the truck crossing the low water bridge is not us, and this is something you should NEVER, NEVER do.  I can only assume he lived around there and understood the limits of his truck…  On our way back we figured it must have been our destiny to be out driving around, because the Beast helped pull a truck out of a muddy ditch.  The people who were stuck had pulled over to hunt for morels and when they tried to get back on the road the truck just slid down the side of the road.

Blogging today from the muckety muck and crossing my fingers for some sunshine tomorrow!

diy printed stationery

Posted on by

8

A creative bomb went off in my house this morning!  I’ve been wanting to make some hand printed stationery.  So this morning I got out my block printing inks, some foam trays (that meat gets packaged with),  my exacto knife and my print making brayers.  I wanted my stationery to be all-purpose, so I just created a pattern of triangles, and cut them out of the foam tray.  The tray was a little larger than my blank note cards.

I also wanted a little reverse triangle design for the envelope.  So, I glued some of the cut-out triangles onto a small square piece of foam tray.

And then I went crazy and started printing them in bright spring colors.