Before I Go

All packed and ready to head out shortly! YAY!! Can't wait to see everyone and be caught up in nothing but art for the next 5 days!

This piece is a page I created for a collaborative book Liz hosted in support of Kelly who is battling breast cancer. (Sure seems like an awful lot of folks I know I facing this battle or just cancer in general.) The quote I chose is from the great Eleanore Roosevelt and says: "You gain strength, courage and confidence by every experience in which you stop to really look fear in the face." (Liz's theme was courage.) If you would like to see more of the book, check out Liz's blog here.

Okay folks, that's it for me. Time to go load up the car and head for the border! Have a great rest of the week-I know I will!

Humming With Excitement!

ONE MORE SLEEP!! Yes for those of you following along (and probably sick of hearing about it *grin*) tomorrow is ARTFEST!! YAY!! As you can see, I am madly packing. These are the boxes with stuff for each of the classes I am taking. I found it is easiest to have a box with everything I need in it so I can just plunk it in my rolling backpack the night before and away I go! It really helps because I tend to stay up late (1:30 a.m.) and then get up super early like I normally do at home. (5:30 a.m.) That doesn't leave much time for sleeping and so, the more organized I can be, the less I actually have to remember things! (There is a method to my madness.) As for packing useful stuff like say clothing, I am tackling that today.

This is my 8x8 collage for the gallery at Artfest. The colours just don't translate on the scanner, so you don't really get the proper effect. This looks so dull and it really is more vibrant than it appears here. Anyway, it's called Ode to Eight: Crazy 8's and I am going to take a risk and put a price tag on it. If it sells, great, if not, I am not really invested in it selling anyway, so who cares? It was hard to work on such a big piece and I know for sure my strength lies in working small. But I guess you have to try new things once in awhile to stretch and grow!

So, I had better run. I want to be sure to have everything packed by the end of the day. Have a great rest of the week and catch you all on the flip side! I will take lots of pictures!

ARTFEST OR BUST!!

Catching Up

After days of rain and fog and well...just plain ICK, there is the most beautiful sunset happening outside my window. The sky is this soft pink. I haven't seen anything but a flat grey sky for about the last week, so this is a welcome change. Tomorrow is supposed to be rain free, which sounds good to me! I want to vacuume out my car so it's all neat and tidy for my trip.

I managed to finish my 8x8 canvas, finally on Friday morning. It was tough working so large, but I got it done. (I ended up just working on the 8x8 canvas instead of breaking it into 4 4x4's.) This will be the first time I hang something at AF and I am kinda nervous about it.

I am slowly chipping away at the packing, popping things into boxes stacked on my kitchen table as I think of them. All I can say is THANK GOD I am driving and do not have the limitations of flying! Only FOUR more sleeps! I am giddy with excitement, anxious to see old friends and catch up and perhaps make a few new friends. It's impossible not to have a good time!

Thank you to everyone who emailed with birthday wishes. It's always lovely to be appreciated!

It's been crazy busy here at casa del chaos the last few days. I have had company twice for dinner and I am looking forward to doing not much of anything tomorrow, if I can help it. I did manage to find some time today to do some updates on my website, so if you go look, be sure and hit "refresh" so you have the most current pages. Happy browsing!

It's My Party!

35 years ago today I celebrated my very first birthday! I thought I would share these silly pictures with you. I find it comical that they let me bite the cake like that. And that cake-look at that pink icing! I will never again eat a pink cake. (I am allergic to red food dye now.) The picture of me in the walker makes me wonder if I am holding a knife...let's hope not!

Anyway, tonight, conceivably, I could have 36 candles on my cake, but anything more than a couple constitutes a fire hazard in my opinion! Since my bithday has fallen in the middle of the week, we are having a BBQ at home and a couple of friends over, which is perfectly fine with me! We will spend the evening playing Cranium. The last time we played, we all laughed so long and so hard our faces hurt. I wish you could hear my husband as he atonally hums music for his teammates to guess the name of. That alone was hysterical.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY to my bithday twin Tracy Roos! Have a wonderful day girlfriend!

As for artwork today, I will likely spend the day attempting to work on my 8x8 canvass for Artfest. Wish me luck!

Magical Day

Ah a cup of mocha java! That was me trying to warm my hands yesterday while on a photo shoot in Stanley Park with my son. (The kids here are on spring break and this is something we like to do together.) While it was sunny yesterday, the wind was fierce and cold and it necessitated brief stints indoors several times to warm up.

I wanted to take some shots of the spectacular trees in the park with the sepia setting on. I think it's so interesting when you even the colour out and get to see the play of light and shadow instead.

This is another setting I like to play with called "solarize". It makes the images look kind of cartoonish or water coloured, don't you think?

As you may or may not know, my beloved park suffered major damage in a series of storms that battered the west coast over the winter. (I wrote about that here.) Yesterday was the first time I could bring myself to go and see what the damage was. Prospect Point was one of the hardest hit sections of the park and this is where these photos were taken. The area directly across from the cafe looks like a clearcut-there are just heaps of shattered trees everywhere. From that point on down, you see giant trees that have literally been ripped from the ground. Their roots are perpendicular to the road. I can only imagine how violent the wind must have been to have torn these old and massive root systems up like that. It's going to take months for the park staff to clean it all up. I am glad I have photos of the park to remember it how it was. I plan to use them in my class with LK Ludwig next week. I helped my son upload some of his pics to his photo blog. You can see them here.

We ended our day with a free lunch at Grandville Island. And why was it free? Well you see there is this funny little magic thing that happens to me all the time wherein the universe hands me money. No really! The market was humming with people and there was this $20 bill lying on the floor across the way from where I was standing. I marched right over and picked it up. My son says "Mum, why does stuff like that always happen to you?" Well, if you are present in the moment all the time, you see things most people don't. That's my only way of explaining it. It always floors him when money just appears. He's been with me the last two times, too. In the bakery, it was $10 and it was $20 in Safeway. Once it was $100 in 20's in the bushes. Just before Xmas, it was $200 in an sealed envelope that neither my husband nor I can account for. I found it in our home and the envelope was from a bank neither of us does business with, ever. Strange, but true!

Happy first day of spring everyone! Tomorrow I shall celebrate another trip around the sun with 36 candles on my cake. Someone better bring a fire extinguisher!

*7 more sleeps till ARTFEST!!

A Town Called Hell

At long last, my oldest and wildly talented friend Farrell has released her CD! She has worked hard on it and I know it's going to be stellar. I heard it in its various stages and it was wonderful then! To sample her music, you can click here. If you like what you hear, click here to purchase the CD.

Also, for any of you local folks, Farrell Spence and the Widowmakers will be playing a live show in Vancouver on Friday night! I have been to her live show and it was definitely a good time. Please come out and support her if you can!

Congratulations Farrell! I am *SO* proud of you. You deserve every success and I can't wait to have a copy of your CD in my hands! (Autographed, of course! *wink*)

Sneak a Peek!

WHEW! What a busy weekend! It was pouring all day Saturday so I did two things. One was that I designed the cover for the house collaborative I am hosting for my housemates. I really love how the colour copy came out. Now I am just finishing up the back of one of my pages so that I can put my book together and see the end result. Everyone sent me one of each of their two pages so I could fit the cover properly. They are bringing the rest of their pages with them to Artfest and we will put their books together in the evening. It will be a lovely momento of our trip.

The other thing I did was I cleaned up the art heap on my kitchen table. There really was a table under all the "stuff"! I put things away and purged a whole lot. I had to laugh-some of the "stuff" went to my friend Penn and she said "Oh you really meant it when you cleaned up!" YES MA'AM! I have a box that is headed for the Art Asylum too. It feels good to pass on the stuff I am finished with. I am really good at purging the excess stuff from my life and I actually enjoy doing it.

It's raining again today so this morning I put a pot of beans on to bake. They are ready and smell so good. My son is on spring break and home today so he's baking two loaves of chocolate chip banana bread. It's going to be a yummy dinner tonight. I love to cook, he loves to bake so together we make a good pair!

Well, only 9 days till Artfest and only 1 more day of winter left. YAY!!

Bits & Pieces

Isn't this adorable? It's an ATC given to me by one of my students in my ATC class. She's 6. I love it! Yesterday was the last class in a 5 part series on ATCs. The kids each created a binder for their cards and we loaded all the cards they have made over the course of the classes into their binders. At the end of the class, they traded. They had a blast and we ended up running over. I was packing up all the art supplies and they were still swapping!

Some of the parents came in and ask if I would be teaching again after Spring break and I told them it depended on if I was invited back by the woman who contracted me for the program. When I got downstairs to the office, she did in fact ask me! So now I have till April to think about what I would like to teach next. I swear, I have the best job in the world-I get to make art every day and I get to inspire other people to find their own creative voice. How cool is that?!?

In other news, yesterday I also managed to complete the art for the cover of the house collaborative I am doing with my housemates at Artfest. It's off for colour copying now. I still have the back of one of my pages to complete. It's about ME and I am having a heck of a time coming up with what I want to share about myself on it. *sigh* You would think it would be easy to talk about yourself, but no.

My pal Deb sent me this in a box of goodies this week. It's a metal heart in hand that has a box attached behind it. I was so pleased when I saw it. This is an old Shaker symbol that is a reminder of their philosophy of "Hands to work, hearts to God." It's also used by the Masons to represent charity. I adore folk art, the simple, humble lines of it (the wonkier, the better!) and Deb keeps finding me these heart in hand pieces. The last one she sent was a card holder that I have in my window sill above my desk holding up a collage I made. The quote I associate with this symbol is: "Whatsoever the hand finds to do, the heart shall go forth in unison." It's a good reminder that the work you do in this life should feed your soul in some way. I have put all the Moo cards friends have sent me in the box. It's also sitting on the sill. Thank you Deb!! xo

All's Well That Ends Well!

So for those of you who've been following along, a couple days ago I ran into a major problem with the crayon project when the Crayola that arrived was far different from what I anticipated. This meant I had to go back to th drawing board. Yesterdayy I spent some time going through my ephemera looking for bits and pieces in a tone that matched this more orangy version of scarlet. I managed to come up with the right material (hooray for having a stash!) and created this version. To tell you the truth, I actually like this piece far better than the original. It's softer and I like the elements better.

So...the moral of the story is that sometimes being forced to redo something is a good thing. I laughed, I cried and I grew as an artist. *snicker* I've kept the offending crayon and I plan to do something with it eventually.

Oh and just so you know, ten out of ten artists polled agreed that scarlet is not orange!

MMMM! Yummy!!

Heather has done it again! A new issue of Portals Zine is now available! "Eye Candy" is the perfect way to chase away the winter doldrums. It's chock full of colourful art and there's even an article and some art by yours truely! If you are attending Artfest 2007, you will be lucky enough to find one in your goodie bag. If not, you can order yours now!

A Rose By Any Other Name

Let me tell you a little story. Last month I signed up for a project involving crayons. Each person chose a colour from a list made up of colours in the box. I saw "scarlet" on the list and chose that one. It just gave me instant visuals and I knew I could work with it.

The swap hostess said she would mail crayons to anyone who felt they wanted/needed them. I didn't have one in that colour, so I asked for mine. I waited, but since it was coming from the US and I am in a bit of a time crunch to get the work completed, copied and mailed back (all before Artfest!) I finally had to bit the bullet and wing it. I figured I had a pretty good idea what scarlet looked like, so I went ahead and made my art. I drove out to my friend Penn's place on Sunday to deliver it in a rain storm so I could have it copied in time to mail it out and meet the deadline.

The crayon finally arrived yesterday. I opened the envelope. Check this out:

THE CRAYON IS ORANGE!! I don't know in what alternate universe "scarlet" is orange!! I kid you not! I nearly had a heart attack. My artwork is not even remotely close to the colour of this crayon, so you know what that means....*sigh* back to the drawing board.....

Oh and just for comparison's sake, here are "scarlet" and "red" side by each so you can see the glaring difference. Now granted, red, is not scarlet, but my idea of scarlet has always been a deep, rich red with pink undertones.

And did you know there are colours in the US that we don't have in Canada? Macaroni and cheese. Yes, that is a crayon. It's that sickly chemical orange powder cheese colour. And "Purple Mountain Magesty" which is well...purply-blue like mountains are. In thinking about this, I got a bit silly and started thinking up colours for a Canadianized box of Crayolas. Like how about crayons in these colours:

-Maple Leaf (deep red)

-Maple Syrup (golden brown)

-Beaver pelt (rich brown)

-Winterpeg (snowblind white)

-Salmon (a shade of orangy pink for all the folks here in BC!)

and my personal favourite:

Poutine! (not even sure how to describe this shade, but let's just say it would rival "macaroni and cheese" any day!)

Anyway, if nothing else, I learned something from this: Everyone sees colour differently. My scarlet is not Crayola's scarlet and never the twain shall meet!

On My Nightstand

Aside from art, my other great love is reading. My husband will tell you I "eat books for breakfast" meaning I devour them quickly. Most books only last a day or two at the most.

I just finished reading "An Ordinary Man: An Autobiography" by Paul Rusesabagina. While his name might not be familiar to you, his story might be. Remember the movie "Hotel Rwanda" starring Don Cheatle? That film was inspired by Paul Rusesabagina's experience of the 1994 Rawandan genocide. Yes, I know it's not light reading, but I really have a thirst for knowledge and understanding about what goes on in the world. I think it's so important to be educated about even the darkest events in human history. I really do care what's happening in our world and this book helped me to understand how this particularily ugly period occured. He had a wonderful gift for conveying his experiences in such a way that you really understood how and why this happened and got just a small glimpse into what it must have been like to live through it.

If you haven't seen the movie, see it. If you are interested in knowing more, read the book. It's not just about a brutal genocide, but also about bravery, compassion, intelligence, overcoming insermountable odds and the undying glimmer of hope that burns in the human heart but most of all, it's about the incredible power of words.

Surprise!

Last year, after Artfest, my friend Deb Denton proposed a collaborative book to let Teesha and Tracy Moore know how much we appreciate all the hard work they do to bring us Artfest.

Deb asked each participant to make a page after choosing a letter from the alphabet and writing about something artfest related that started with that letter. I had letter "K" so my page is about kindred spirits and kindness.

After alot of hard work, keeping secrets and much anticipation, Teesha and Tracy received the book a couple of days ago. To see their reaction and the finished piece (brilliant job Deb!) you can click here.

17 days till Artfest! 12 days till my birthday! I can hardly stand it!!

Whispers from the Past

This morning I was getting things together to photocopy for a class I am teaching tomorrow and I thought I would get my cabinet cards together to colour copy for Nina Bagley's class at Artfest. While I was busy making mock ups, I happened to flip this card over and saw this:



It reads: "Camp Meeting, John Allen, age 91 years, March 7, 1886. Camp Meeting" What are the chances that I would happen to notice this on the back of this card exactly 121 years to the day it was taken? WOW! And can you believe that man is 91 years old? He doesn't look it! Amazing!



Out of curiosity, I looked up camp meetings and this is what I found:
"A camp meeting* in those days was a most important event, and anticipated with intense interest by the settlers far and near. Different motives actuated people to attend camp meetings, and the same rule will apply to all such occasions of later date. Some go out of courtesy, to see and be seen, others regard it as a season of rest and diversion, while many embrace the occasion to gossip, exchange news, see the latest fashions, and make new acquaintances."

*This was usually a gathering of the faithful.



Well Mr. Allen, you certainly made my day, if for no other reason than by reaching out through time and space to make yourself known to me. 91 years! We should all be so lucky.

Ohhh Pretty!

I have been surfing the net this morning, looking at art "stuff" and came across some yummy goodies I am putting on my birthday wish list.

Rolls of "wish" tickets. Who could resist that? (Okay maybe Deb could because she has told me time and again how much she loathes those beer tickets, but hey-these are WISH tickets!) I can't choose between blue or pink, so I need both! *grin*

This Cavallini bird stamps set. I have picked this thing up no less than 20 times over the last year and a half and really, it's something I should splurge on. I know I would use it. And if I must have the stamps, then I cannot forget the stickers!

And aren't these handcarved Milagro stamps wonderful? I love heart shaped things and these are just too cool.

Papier Valise just had to come out with a red label package to tempt me. (Which I can't lik to directly but check under "fresh paper" to see what I mean. I love RED!)

I definitely see some cyber shopping in my future! What's that saying? "Lead me not into temptation, for I can find it myself."

Art Lesson #26473

Nothing is ever as simple as you'd hoped it would be.

I started off making charms for Artfest about a month ago. I wanted to do something simple, but different. I had this stamped image that I thought would be interesting. I liked the idea of a ticket- I always see creativity as a journey.

I put that image into Publisher and created a page with multiple images, which I then printed off. I coloured the entire page by hand using my water soluble oil pastels and then colour copied the page onto cardstock. I mounted the page onto thin cardboard and cut each one out. For the backs, I did much the same thing, but printed my name and contact info.

I thought I was going to dangle something off the bottom. I had visions of a little shoe. I tried that and I didn't like how it looked. It just wasn't right. I got stuck. What was I going to do to "finish" my charm?! I think the human brain is like a computer-or at least mine is. If I put a problem in and then let it be, my brain just keeps on working on it, quietly behind the scenes until it comes up with the solution. This morning, I hit pay dirt! It came to me to make wings to add to the ticket using acetate. So now I am stamping and cutting and peeling back the carboard layers to add them in. Once that's done, I will add the jump rings. It's been a zillion little fiddly steps, since I am making 100 to swap but I like how they are turning out. Art is teaching me patience. Tenacity is nothing without patince and there is definately wisdom in not giving up.

Onward!

For the Love of Nature

I was thinking about what to share with you this morning and then I remembered that I probably hadn't shown you this. Last year while I was at Artfest, I went on a nature walk and found some really interesting pieces of dried moss. Some of it was kind of lumpy in texture and then the other kind was whispy like dried grass. Unfortunately, the scan I did cannot show you the beautiful colours. The moss is the most beautiful shade of soft green. I also added a rusty brown seed pod I found. I just love how organic this looks. I don't remember where I picked up this vessel but if I ever find them again, I am going to buy several.

This was the other piece I did, using an old binder clip and a watchmaker's vial. The clip has two prongs at the back so if you had a shirt with a breastpocket, you could slip it over the edge of the pocket to wear it. I sandwiched the moss between the acetate "glass" the binder clip came with and then attached the vial to the outside.

It's interesting the kinds of art materials mother nature provides. I can't wait to go poking around again!

Cool Link du Jour

Isn't this idyllic? Imagine someone floating a boat, in a puddle, in the middle of the street. It's like a small piece of magic. What if I told you this was not real? It's a wonderous piece of sidewalk chalk art by English artist Julian Beever. A friend of mine shared his work with me this morning and I thought I would pass it on. You really must check him out! I have never seen anything like this. His ability to create 3D images is astounding! You can see more of Julian's work here.

I have always been enchanted by sidewalk chalk art. My main exposure to this medium has been though trendy menu boards in local restaurants. I love the images and lettering I have seen and am amazed that how the colours are blended to create light and shadow effects. Bellingham, Washington, which is about an hour and a half south of me, has a sidewalk chalk art festival every August. I might have to head across the line and see it this year!