Yoga and Creativity

My friends Connie and Sandy have me thinking about yoga. I mean really, how could I not after reading their blogs regularly. And yesterday I got my regular email from the Creativity Portal - a site on coaching for creativity. I like this site. It has all kinds of stuff to explore. So what do they talk about? Yoga.

The lovely Julia Cameron talks about synchronicity a lot and I've found that when it starts to happen I need to roll with it, sister.

Now this is the being brave part because my little body complains about many things I do that put a strain on it. Arthur has come to stay and I have to gage the staying power of certain activities in my life.

Luckily, I have a friend in town who has taught yoga for years and will be thoughtful and caring about this process. Now I just need to call her and go to class to see if it will work for me. Be brave.

Tidy Up

I am cleaning up my art room. It really is a fun job. But I find I get distracted. A lot.
I keep finding things that remind me of shows I worked on or collages I want to make because of this really cool old piece of paper I found.

This is a mask I made for a production of the "King and I". It is papier-mâché and painted. I love to make masks. I did some for a ballet version of "Peter and the Wolf" (felt) and also and vocal production of "The Lion King"(foam and felt).

My room is very small and it is just loaded with stuff. I'd like to have my regular table for working but set up an area to leave my sewing machine out so I could just move over to it...I'm not sure this will work. I am moving things around, and getting rid of some things to try it out. I also need to scrub the paint out of the bathroom sink today. opps. I'll take some before and after photos so I can show you.

As usual, I am trying to finish the basement, working with my son to organize his room so we can clean and paint and build him a bed loft and oh, I'll organize my art room too. And journal. hehe.

Never a dull moment around here.

Thank you.

Thank you to Miss Carol for giving me this award.

How very kind. It really perked me up today to find it.

I received this award recently from Miss Vicki, but I see it disappeared off of my blog. Hmm. I would like to re-post my list of those blogs, because I still feel very strongly about each of them. And I would like to encourage everyone to visit the blogs of the people who are participating in the soul journal "Challange" being provided by Sarah Whitmire. It is a blast. Great ideas, and nice people.

1. this disordered life - by notmassproduced for amazing photos, journals and continued visits of help and support.
2. art for houswives - by Cynthia for amazing, amazing interest of recycling items into beauty.
3. Annette's Art - who has just started sharing her art with us bloggers and it is a delight to me.
4. Suzi Blu - who has received this many times - but I can't help it. She is the reason I started to believe in myself again and started a blog in the first place. So no Suzi, no award.
5. Path2Self - by Sandy, for posting honestly and giving me the courage to overstep my fears and I have now started a journal too. I love to read her posts.
6. Lonecrow Art and Collage - by Laura who is an artist, teacher and all around interesting to read blogger.
7. Reform - Tricia North. I love this blog. Love it. She is so down to earth and her photos are breathtaking.

Thank you everyone, for your continued support and ongoing inspiration. You are all a delight to behold.

Hmm.

Feeling a little weird these last few days. Been ill, so not a lot of art work to show.
Thinking about work, only four weeks and back to school. And about art work. I always do this when I'm really liking something I'm working on.

I like to do so many things. Is it a blessing or a curse to be able to do many things? I am an art chameleon. My entire life I have been able to design and produce for others on demand.
In college, I was a theater major, but a design major, not an actor. Props, and stage and costume. More college, and I was in graphic design and photography. Now I design lesson plans so anyone can do art and I get to plan my artistic day around the needs of people who want to learn everything they can about art. ( and it is gloriously fun, I might add.)

So, now I am in my groove and I worry. Am I neglecting this other skill? I haven't sewn anything, or made any paper, or constructed an assemblage piece. How do I decide which one is worthy to work on when they all make me happy? Why do I have to feel so scattered when I am in the midst of having a ball and learning something?

Already the shooting stars were falling; some, quite near. Others continued over the Mire and on to the Deepwoods beyond. While one - shining more brightly than the rest - went on further than the professor could even see.

"Curious,' he whispered. The wind howled and the tower creaked. 'Very Curious.'
--The Edge Chronicles

Watercolor Home

Sarah and our group of artists continues to be such a great source of inspiration. This page is Day 12 of our Soul Journal journey together. Sarah has been kind enough to link the other artists who are working on this to her site, so we can visit with each other.

The top page is a simple representation of a home where you felt safe and secure with the rest being the outside world. The neutral tone paper with the floral print is actually a pocket. Then collage and watercolor. I added some pearl paint to the clouds which is hard to see in the photo. More to add today. Join in the fun if you like at Soul Journal.

It is so fun to see what everyone is doing and to feel the kindered spirits at work. I will continue for ever and ever to be amazed at how each person approaches each task differently. And how much I can learn everyday even though I know how paint works.

Double Digits

My boy, boy is 10 years old today!

The time has gone by so quickly.

He was 2 weeks over due, so we had an appointment to be at the hospital at 7am in the morning.
They induced labor, and still nothing really happened until about noon. I was having labor pains and was hooked up to all these monitors. His heart kept doing all this funky stuff.

This went on until about 5pm. People were buzzing around us constantly. Finally at 5pm, the doctor put a vitals monitor directly on Zane’s little head. This is when they discovered there was no amniotic fluid. And I was contracting and his heart almost stopped completely.

I was whisked away for an emergency c-section. My poor husband was left in the room with our friend Kelly, who had gone through birthing classes with us in case he had to be out of town on a photo shoot. We had told our family to stay home, because nothing was really happening.

In 8 minutes, I was wheeled into the room, put to sleep, opened up and my baby was born. 7 pounds, 8 ounces. 19 inches long. Eyes wide open.

The umbilical cord had been tied in a knot and was tightening around itself. Zane had put his left arm through it, while in the womb, so he was stuck in place and could not be born the usual way. If his arm had not been there he would have died. The doctors had no idea how long he had been that way. We had no medical insurance at the time, so one ultra sound at 4 months was $750.00 and everything checked out ok then, which was the last look.

Zane is left handed.

Happy Birthday to you my loving, happy, funny, beautiful, smart Zane.

Artistic Armor

This is a page of texture and painting done with tape. Not done yet, but very nice even still. So touchable.

So, one of the first things Sarah suggested was making a page to represent your artistic armor. List the things you need to do your artwork and feel protected while doing it. I've added my page here so you can see it. I still want to add more things yet, but you get the idea

This bunch of cut-outs is from magazines. She has a list of things to cut-out based on 24 items, and then a set of steps for the page. I added a little room to write some things later.

Creative Life

A couple of quick thoughts for the day...

One.

I love this website very much. http://www.accidentalcreative.com
and I love this series of writings right now -http://www.accidentalcreative.com/series/battlelines especially the second one. It speaks to the "occupation vs. vocation" issue and a life of creativity vs. being creative to just live.

Second.

I found a very fun site with a talented artist Sarah Whitmire. She is doing a few days of journaling and I'm going to step right in. Looks like it will be a grand 'ole time.

Dry wall

Back in 1993 I was 26 years old.

Who cares, you say? I think I do. Not because I need to go back and fix some terrible decision in my life or anything. Sorry, not that juicy.

In 1993, my husband, Michael, and I started a labor of love and renovated a 100 year old building. There was a huge, all be it filthy coal-dust covered eight dark rooms full of junk second level, ready for us to tackle, and a ground floor retail space ready to be a shooting space and office area for a talented photographer. Built of brick, wooden floors, detailed tin ceiling, knob and tube electricity, 20 ft x 70 ft on both floors, 16 foot high ceilings on the second level.
Awesome!

We started on the second level on Thanksgiving in 1993. We decided the best course of action would be be to start taking everything apart and picking everything up we couldn't use and throw it out the last window on the far side of the building, so no one would get hurt if they were walking under there.

We had to stop working on the apartment/second floor and move and build our studio in February, because our lease was up at the old place, and we had a huge furniture photo shoot we had to be ready for by the middle of February.

So in March we started again. We cleared 8 rooms, all walls and horse hair plaster and slating from the walls, a toilet, 70 years of accounting records plus the room and shelves that held them, two iron fire doors, a three foot octopus furnace grate, at least 12 doors, pulled the ceiling down (there had been a fire so it was not useable), numerous pieces of wooden furniture, brass findings in the shape of little brass birds that were lamps that lit the rooms, and finally, wires, nails, junk and all the plaster off of all the brick walls.

We threw it all out the 2.5 ft x 6 ft window. We rigged up a wheel barrow for the plaster, shoveled plaster into it, rolled it to the window, up a ramp out the window, to a big pile outside, that then had to be re-shoveled and wheeled up a ramp into the dumpter. We went through 6 BIG dumpters. It was now March of 1994.

We had to clean all the brick with a wire brush on a drill. Sand blasting it did not work. At all. After hammering a bit on the plaster and pushing a crow bar up under the loosened plaster, you could pull a big chunk off, but the dust was VERY hardy, and was difficult to get off. We went through four drills and I can't remember how many brushes. And masks. The room would be a full white cloud you could even see through.

Obviously this story goes on for a while. It took another year and a half to complete our living space. We lived there for ten years. We still own the building.

Look below and you'll find the photos.

So, why am I telling you this? We are dry walling our basement. I am 41. No, I don't think I'm old at all, in fact I never think about my age if you want to know the truth. But this stuff was a lot easier when I was 26. And the stuff I was doing then, as you can see, was a lot harder.

Oh my gosh, I am tired.

<

Journal Extensions

Feeling better today and getting loads of work done. Thanks everyone for your well wishes. Migraines are something I've lived with since I was a teenager. They are easier to deal with now - I have a great Dr - and good meds - and they happen less and less frequently as long as I pay attention to some important things mostly having to do with sleep. I have Rheumatoid Arthritis, which is a factor too. So, sometimes, it is what it is, and I have to plan around it.

Hubby and I are fixing the basement up into an office for him. Cleared out everything today. Dry walling tomorrow. Eww. Messy job, but needs to be done.

It will be so nice for him. His work has changed so much over the last couple of years. We used to have a studio downtown where we live, but it was smarter for us to rent that out to a retail business, since Michael is on the road more often than not. But this left him without an office. And this has left camera equipment all over our front room, which is now his office. Hehe. No complaints. We just need some organization around here.

Yesterday (before migraine) I bought some wonderful new markers - gold, silver, white and some water-based iridescent, oh so nice. And, they inspired me to do some new stuff with my journal. Finished my color exercises. Yellow, blue, red, green, orange, purple and white. I've learned a lot from them, but I wanted to do something more with them, so...

I extended the pages by adding flaps to them. I think they look really nice, and now give me an area to write on. I also, painted around some of the areas with the decided color, and I like the look.

This photo is with the flap open:

I liked doing this green one. I used copper tape for the veins.

And here's the blue one.

migraine

uhhgggh...
migrane....

Bird ATC's for Swap

ATC's are done for the swap.


The theme was birds. I will mail them out today. This top one is my favorite. There is a clear glitter top coat all over the top if this one. It looks really cool, but does not translate well in the photo here.

This is an illustration from an old beat up "second reader".

These are swirls and paper flowers with glitter in the center.

This one is a rubber stamp and some chip board letters, with a partial page from my "second reader book".

It will be fun to see what I get in return.

Blue

My blue is relaxing. I love birds, eggs and wings. Children. Faces, and eyes. Skies with moons. Strong horizontal lines and strong vertical lines. Fabric with weird texture in it. I'm noticing these in all my color collages.

Anahata Katkin (at bottom of page) calls this a "symbolic alphabet". A visual signature that you are drawn to and use regularly as an artist, and thus it defines you and your style. This is really interesting to me while I revisit some of the things I'm doing in my artwork, what I like, what I'm using, what skills I want to improve on.

Quote Journal

Ok.

I couldn't stand it. I had to make a journal that I could put quotes in. Above is the cover.

The words on the outside are "word garden". I just love that. So many possibilities.

It is really limiting to sit and read and not have some place to write down the things that stand out as significant. I can't do it. I have to stop reading and look for paper. Finding something to write with, in my house, without going to my art room, is impossible. This journal makes it easier for my obsessive compulsion to write those things down, and, where my working journal is 9x12, this one is half that size and much easier to carry around with me. I feel relief. I can quote the Wicked Witch. That's important to me. So...now I have a journal for art and a journal for words. Hmm. Can I stop there?

Working. Working. Working. I have six weeks before school starts up. Isn't strange how everything gets done faster in your head than it does in life? Before I get back to the students this is what I want to do:

1. finish/send bird collage cards to atc swap
2. finish piece for art guild show
3. final touches on renovated bathroom (long story - I'll post before and afters for that)
4. Open Etsy store
5. Marketing plan for DLP fine art
6. finish organizing art room
7. finish cleaning out closet
8. redo son's room
9. outline lesson plans for incoming students

In the meantime, work in journal daily, read my book list, and play with son as much as possible.

Not much to do there. No sir.

"Wicked" journal page

Elphie wore her hat to bed,

Just in case it rained!

I've finished "Wicked". A very enjoyable book. Political and "good" and "evil" and the Wicked Witch is not at all what she seems....

"People always did like to talk, didn't they? That's why I call myself a witch now: The Wicked Witch of the West, if you want the full glory of it. As long as people are going to call you a lunatic anyway, why not get the benefit of it? It liberates you from convention."

"You're not wicked," said Boq.

"How do you know? It's been so long," said the Witch, but she smiled at him.

Yellow

I'm working in my journal on a color lesson.

I've culled through a bunch of magazines I have and ripped out the photos/words I like. Now I'm going to make full spread pages of color, to see where my heart takes me. I use this lesson a lot with adults who tell me they can't collage. It's time to revisit it for myself. The important part of this lesson is to use only what you really like, don't settle for something because it is in front of you. Images by someone else release your fear of creating something and allow you to just look and say "hey, I like that".

Rules:

1. Don't "settle". If you don't like it, don't use it.

2. No sissors, rip only.

3. Glue it to the page. It's your page, place it how you want. Over lap, rip to fit, cover up what bugs you.

4. Work with one color at a time. This helps you to "see and focus".

(you can click on the photo to see better detail)

Journal Page

I am afraid of drawing.

I never used to be. I use simple drawing everyday for teaching. But, I'm talking details, and taking time. Composing a picture in and of itself for the presentation of a drawing.

So that seemed a good place to start in my journal. Of course, I could never not collage in some way. So I use a bit from the Signals catalog and some words from an old school reader, plus plenty of masking tape. Sorry about the scan lines.

Connie mentioned a book to me. "Art and Fear" She said that it changed a lot of things for her. My husband carries it around and leaves it at his bedside. He said it changed a lot of things for him, and he likes to look at it to remind him of the important parts. I will have to sneak a peek at this book, since there seems to be some connections going on here with it.

And I am working on being brave. :)

Wow! Look at me!

Thank you, thank you and thank you Miss Vicki for this wonderful award! I am so honored to be grouped up with the list of blogs that have won this award. I followed it back a way and it is amazing! There are so many talented and giving bloggers who I am having so much fun sharing art and life with.

The rules of accepting are as follows:

1) Put the logo on your blog.

2) Add a link to the person who awarded you.

3) Nominate at least 7 other blogs.

4) Add links to those blogs on yours.

5) Leave a message for your nominees on their blogs.

So my nominees are:

1. this disordered life - by notmassproduced for amazing photos, journals and continued visits of help and support.

2. art for houswives - by Cynthia for amazing, amazing interest of recycling items into beauty.

3. Annette's Art - who has just started sharing her art with us bloggers and it is a delight to me.

4. Suzi Blu - who has received this many times - but I can't help it. She is the reason I started to believe in myself again and started a blog in the first place. So no Suzi, no award.

5. Path2Self - by Sandy, for posting honestly and giving me the courage to overstep my fears and I have now started a journal too. I love to read her posts.

6. Lonecrow Art and Collage - by Laura who is an artist, teacher and all around interesting to read blogger.

7. Reform - Tricia North. I love this blog. Love it. She is so down to earth and her photos are breathtaking.

Thank you everyone, for your continued support and ongoing inspiration. You are all a delight to behold.

Crowns and Princesses

princesses wear crowns
to remind them that they are
beautiful and special,
because some days
it's easy to forget.


buy your crown here

Open

I started a journal. I've wanted to for so long and I've finally have done it. Eric Maisel suggests writing your autobiography in about 2500 words (like I am so interesting) any way you want as a beginning to opening your creativity. So anyway I want includes putting it into a journal that I can scribble in or make pretty or sew in like SuziBlu girl. And let's face it, there is nothing like the tactile experience of paper and paints and art stuff. Oh...and fabric. Please don't forget fabric.

I never started because I kept thinking it always had to be beautiful and perfect and just right. Bah! Bah! I say. The few pages I've done have been fun and liberating. Thank you Sandy friend. I also kept getting bogged down in the idea that I need a journal for art, and a writing journal, and a quote journal, and a clippings journal, and a technique journal....

Okay, I am just not that organizied. One journal is good for everything. Really. Then I never have to wonder where I put that one special thing. How exhausting! It was just an excuse not to start a journal and just to collect all the ones I was going to start one day.

Confessions

I have a confession.
Maybe two.
I realized something on coming home from vacation and unpacking.

I have way too many clothes for one person.

At our vacation spot we had a washer and dryer so we could wash as we needed to. I packed up our respective suitcases knowing that I could wash on demand. I had with me a pair of jeans, a pair of shorts and a pair of capris with about 6 shirts to intermingle mix and match, and one button-down sweater for the chilly times. And one set of PJ's.

I was more creative with the 6 shirts/camisoles/t's than I have ever been with the 30 shirts all together in my closet. And, okay, I live in Michigan so I have to have "all-weather" clothing. But seriously. Why do I have so many clothes? Why do I have so much stuff? I'm stressed out when I open the closet and stressed out when I do the laundry and for what? Will clothing suddenly stop being made and I will be naked?

I love fabric. No, I'm not kidding. I really love fabric. And vintage clothing. Texture sends me into dreams of sewing and softness. Looking at fabric grouped together in piles of glorious color gives me a peace and happiness that is downright hard to explain to a non-believer.

I will clean out my closet. I will recycle and donate my unused and unneeded space hogging stress causing clothing.

Does anyone else have this problem? What is your solution? Where do you buy American made clothing? Sustainable clothing? (because when the ones I wear are threadbare, I will not choose to run naked.)

(confession number two: I love children's books. I collect them. I read them all the time. I use them as teaching aids in Art class.)

Home

Home is a place not only of strong affections, but of entire unreserve; it is life's undress rehearsal, its backroom, its dressing room.
-Harriet Beecher Stowe

Home. Home. Home. I'm home!
A whirl wind of fun and silliness and beautiful mountains. Imagine watching fireworks from ABOVE. Magical is the word.

Vacation is for gratitude.

I have not been away from home on a vacation for more than 4 days in 7 years. I was so happy to go, and now, I am so happy to be home to hug my dog and give gifts to my neighbors. I want to smell my sheets. I want to sit on the front porch with a glass of wine and say hi to everyone who walks by.