Working in a series

Last fall I took a class with Elizabeth Barton called "working in a series." I had been in a funk and dissatisfied with what I was working on and it was a wonderful class that actually gave me a lot of new ideas to work on. I decided I would start a series of work around images of Latin American architecture. I love old buildings especially and in traveling in South America and Mexico I have been fascinated with the grand, but often crumbling buildings left by the Spanish and how they contrast with the more colorful, humble buildings of the native residents of these countries.

I started with this smallish piece.

There are a lot of things I like about this piece. I was able to really simplify the shapes and I used Elizabeth's ideas for creating groupings of value. I especially liked putting aside the realistic colors and using a palette of my own choosing. What I did not like was that I felt I was only partially successful in using a looser more spontaneous way of working. There are areas that feel tight and really fussy to me.

Then I moved on to this piece.

Ugh. I got so bogged down in that big, gray building, which in real life is quite an interesting building that is obviously very old and crumbling. It lost all its character in my translation.

At this point I was quite discouraged. Something was just not coming together between my head and the cloth. My friend Kristen LaFlamme knew how frustrated I was and commented that I seemed to be able to work in a more free-spirited way in some small pieces I had done.  Like this:

I thought and thought about this and finally came to the conclusion that it might work to construct small elements that I could then combine into a larger composition and this is the result.

THIS makes me happy. It really expresses my feeling about that wonderful architecture and doesn't feel as fussy and forced. I am not adhering to all the things I learned from Elizabeth Barton, but I am grateful for what I learned and where it is leading. This piece actually feels like the beginning of a series.

The January thing

Every January I get this urge to organize my life and my surroundings. This year was no different. I joined the hordes at IKEA on Sunday buying magazine boxes and bins for sorting paper. I understand it. I do it. I can't help but notice that with Facebook and blogs and the internet in general that this is the time of year that lots of people want to help you with this urge. They want to demonstrate how wonderfully efficient they are at scheduling and organizing and prioritizing and deciding "what matters in life." Just follow their example and you too will see your productivity soar. There are all those very authoritative lists: "How to get more done in 2013." etc. etc. I have been reading a blogger's series on how she accomplishes so much. No TV for one thing. Cooking and freezing meals for months at a time at one go, letting (encouraging? requiring?) her teenager  cook her own meals and do her own laundry. Not sleeping much. Multitasking. All fine. All helpful if you are truly looking to streamline your efficiency.

In the interest of showing another model, I thought I would post my secrets for "not getting all that much done and enjoying the hell out of life."

1.  Watch TV. Not mindlessly, of course, but contrary to some thinking, there is a lot of great stuff on TV. Shows that challenge, that inspire, that make you laugh (and you know that is very good for you) and blow your mind with their beauty and creativity. Especially if you are an artist, you should expose yourself to other artistic minds. Don't tell me "everything on TV is junk." Not true.

2. Go to movies. Go to plays. Go to concerts. Read books for fun. See #1 above.

3. Go to museums and art shows. One of my most favorite ways to "waste time." Tapping into what other artists are doing is thrilling. Yes, thrilling. It makes me want to be better. It feeds my need for visual excitement and it makes me think. It gets my adrenalin pumping.

4. Cook something really good. Preferably for people you love. And for yourself, of course. I know cooking is a drag most days. If you do it right it seems like it takes a lot more time than it should. But sitting down to something really good and sharing it, is very special. It is totally worth the shopping and peeling and chopping and stirring. Not every day, but often enough.I don't know this firsthand, but I suspect this is especially gratifying for people who live alone.

5. Spend time with your family—especially the kids. Duh. You know why this is important. And good for you. And good for them. And good for the world. And fun.

6. Allow procrastination. Sometimes something beckons on the way to the waiting task. Sometimes it turns out to be something great. Don't take the chance that you will miss it.

7. Allow yourself to be sick. Sometimes you are. Get over it and take care of yourself. The other stuff can wait.

8. Doodle. Sometimes great things emerge when you let your subconscious take over.

9. Sleep if you need to. There is nothing immoral about an afternoon nap.

10. Stay in your pajamas until noon. Sit in your most comfortable chair. Drink coffee. Watch the birds outside the window.

I should probably add "don't feel guilty." I'm sure there are many more ways not to be marvelously efficient. What are yours?

Light therapy

You know how sometimes you didn't know how sick you were until you feel better? The winter weather here is kind of like that. You don't realize how much the dark and rain gets you down until you get a decent day. I have felt like I took off my sunglasses today and let the sun shine in. It puts a positive spin on almost everything. I felt like I had more energy today and that things were just better than usual and then I realized it was that it had warmed up and it wasn't raining and the sky was—almost blue instead of gray.

I spent a couple hours in the studio putting things away and cleaning up from my newly finished project. Folding and organizing fabric was sort of nice. This stack of fabrics seemed so clear and bright. They made me happy.

I photographed my new piece and it made me happy. Here's a detail.

Marco spent the day with us and he was a cherub. He is generally a happy little guy, but he was in crazy good spirits today. There really was something in the air today.

I walked out to check the mail and the air smelled clean and fresh. Down the road, in the distance, beneath the clouds,  I could see sky. Blue sky? Yeah, I think so.

The weather app on my phone says we'll have rain tomorrow. That's OK. We had a nice break today.

And sew it goes...

Spent a good day in the studio finishing up the piece I have been working on. Photos to come.

I kept looking at my little reminder banner for my word of the year. It needed something more. "Discover," I decided needed a map. I had some scraps of fabric that I printed with a map of Oregon. Fortunately I had a bit with with the Columbia River, the Pacific Ocean and the area where I live. Lots to discover here.

Much better. Now it is finished and gives me a better sense of discovery.

Another goal for this year is more drawing—an ongoing goal. I made a little pouch for a small sketchbook, pencil, pen, eraser and pencil sharpener. Hopefully I will remember to toss it in my backpack or in the car when I am out and about.

Ten years of walking

Ten years ago my friend Beth and I were at a New Year's eve party and got to talking about our need for some exercise. Beth had had foot surgery several months before. I had retired from my full-time job. We both felt like slugs. We decided to try walking together several times a week and made a plan to meet the following morning near the Garden Home section of the Fanno Creek Trail. The walk was beautiful, the conversation was fun and the coffee afterward was delicious. It became our habit to walk most days and it has lasted for ten years.

Yesterday was cold and clear, with the moon quite visible in an unusually blue January sky.

We took a goofy photo to commemorate ten years.

I have blogged about our walks many times—about our fight with the Portland Golf Club to remove the razer wire they put up along their section of the trail; about foggy mornings and sunny mornings; and silly moments; rare sights; new friends; rainy walks; fall color; critters and encounters. When I moved to our current house we moved our walk to another section of the trail near the Koll Wetlands and the historic Fanno Creek Farmhouse. For the last year my friend Paula joins us when she can. We have learned about the history of our area and the wildlife and started so many days with friendship, fresh air, beauty and inspiration. We agreed we would keep walking as long as we could find something to talk about. I don't think we will run out of topics soon!

Here is a little sample of ten years on the Fanno Creek Trail.

Starting a new year

No resolutions, but again I chose a word for the year. Discover. That's my word. I think the roots of creativity lie in the curiosity to learn and discover something new every chance you get!  Here's my reminder. It was a quickly made little banner. I may embellish further if something strikes me.

It joins my previous three words on the studio wall.

Thrive, Appreciate and Intention.

This is also a good time to ponder how I used last year's word "intention." I think it has been in my head this year. At one point I wondered if I had lost track of my intentions, by focusing so much on work made to fit show themes and sizes and if it had any real meaning to me. I think I managed to refocus my intention and pull back to following my own goals of making work that has personal meaning to me. Maybe this year I will discover what that actually is!

For years one of my New Year tasks has been to put together a little book for the STASH group for the year. It has a schedule of meetings and contact info for each of us. Last year I never did get it done. We went all year wondering whose turn it was to hostess the next meeting. It is a simple thing to do, so I just did it. I know we all now have all our contacts in our phones and could easily coordinate our calendars, but I love these little booklets and enjoy making them.

There are a number of places on the web that show you how to fold these clever little single sheet booklets. No glue, no staples. Here is one.

Another slide show

Yesterday I posted my review of 2012 slide show. I used Smilebox, which is a free online slideshow program. It is limited in what you can do with it unless you pay for their premium service, which I don't want to do. I don't make enough slide shows to make it worthwhile. My major frustrations with the Smilebox show were that 1) I could not speed it up—it spent too much time on each slide, in my opinion, 2) I could choose from only 3 musical selections, none of which really grabbed me, and 3) instead of actually imbedding the slide show in my blog, it took you to a page with their advertising along with my slide show.

I did a little research to see if there was something better and I discovered it. It was on my own computer all along. Windows Live Movie Maker. User friendly, lots of options and you can choose from any music you already have on your computer or a nice selection the program offers. I ended up staying up way too late last night playing with this, but I was so happy I figured it out!

For your viewing pleasure, a selection of nature photos I took in 2012:

Bidding farewell to 2012

It is coming together

I think when I finish this quilt I will post a progression of my Latin American cities themed work. I have had this idea rolling around for so long and made so many false starts, or disappointing work, but I am finally beginning to feel like I am approaching something that feels right.

I had a nice long afternoon to work today and added quite a few elements to the piece. Here is a bit of the cathedral I added today.

The cathedral is very important here. The thing about all these beautiful Latin American cities that I am so intrigued with is the contrast between the crumbling, but grand Spanish infrastructure and the much more humble, more modern buildings that combine elements of the grand Spanish architecture and the simple adobe, now concrete, structures of the native residents. The cultural, architectural, linguistic mark that Spain left on the new world is mind-boggling to this day.

I also added this little fountain. The plaza and fountain are also a ubiquitous Spanish feature, found in even the tiniest of villages, it seems.

I have more houses and buildings to make. I am getting eager to get all the pieces and parts put together.

Day after Christmas

I was going to write a blog entry last night and it was going to be about what a nice Christmas we had and what a great dinner we had and a funny little story, but I sat in front of my computer and I kept falling asleep. Right there, upright, in my chair, my eyes would close and then just as my head was about to snap to my chest I would wake up, start to type and next thing I knew my head was bobbing again. I gave up. I was so tired. This month has just about whipped me. I am ready for a new month and a new year. But we really did have a great Christmas. I hope you all did too.

I haven't posted much art work on the blog for awhile, but I have been poking along, continuing to make little houses. I was sticking them up on my design wall and thinking I would piece together a combination of light, neutral fabrics for a background, but they seemed a little dull. Then my friend Del sent me a photo of a beautiful bright yellow flower last week when I was feeling so droopy and it looked so fresh and cheerful that I suddenly decided yellow was what was missing, both from my wintertime life and from the little houses I was making. So I have spent spare moments this past week putting this ground together.

I think this will be good. Just seeing it on the wall makes me happy.

Here are a few of the houses pinned up for the effect.

So, here's my funny little story:  Remember these little santa elves I posted the other day?

Marco is insistent that they are "Grandpa and Grandma." I guess I'm the shorter one.

Whew!

Escaped another prophesied End-of-the-World. If the world ever does end it will probably take us all by surprise. On Friday I took a little detour on my way to walk and drove up Cooper Mountain to see if the rest of the world looked to be intact. It did.

Misty, cold and December-ish. Just as it should be.

I am ready for Christmas. Well, I still need to go grocery shopping tomorrow, but that's just normal. Emily requested salmon for Christmas dinner and that sounds great to me. Both my kids were vegetarians for years, but they ate fish, so salmon was our Christmas dinner tradition for years. I've gotten away from it lately, but it sounds perfect. And easy. My hearing is returning little by little. We had some good friends for dinner on Thursday and I made pork tacos with homemade tortillas, a jicama/orange salad and black beans cooked in beer. The food was extra good, in my humble opinion, and we had margaritas and decadent dessert and lots of great conversation and laughter and at the end of the evening I discovered that my ears had cleared considerably during the evening. It was a winning combination apparently. I will remember that for future reference.

My friend Muriel sent these this week. I certainly don't need any more Christmas decorations, but I loved these guys the moment I set eyes on them. This is the kind of design that I wish my brain could conceive. The simplicity of a wooden dowel sawed at an angle. That angled cut and the resulting oval create a hat, a beard and a face in one clean plane. Genius really. A little tag on the bottom says they are from Sweden. I could have guessed that.

Don't know if I'll be back here before Christmas, but I will have a post on the Sketchbook Challenge blog on Monday. I'll be here, cooking, wrapping and humming Christmas carols along with the radio. I trust you are doing pretty much the same.

Only a week to go

That realization hit me today and gave me a little jolt of panic for a minute or two, but I took a deep breath and remembered my"sweet and simple" plan for this Christmas. It will be OK. I have lost most of this month to medical stuff and most recently an ear infection that has left me exhausted and lethargic and almost totally deaf—temporarily, I hope. It is terribly frustrating, but in some ways a relief from all the noise and so much talk, talk, talk.  Two shooting tragedies in a week and everyone is analyzing and preaching and pontificating. What I think we all need right now is more quiet. I know how much I have cried in the past week and I'm sure each of you has too. We don't need to know how everyone on Facebook feels,  how they think we should feel, or what they think oughta' be done. We all know. We all feel it.

Ray has done most of the decorating, and it is properly festive around here, no thanks to me. Can you tell this is a fake tree? I can't believe it. We bought a fake tree after all the many lovely trips to the mountains and to the tree farms and yes, occasionally to the Boy Scout lot at Albertson's parking lot, in order to have an honest-to-god Oregon Christmas tree, redolent of that sappy, spicy, nothing-quite-like-it piney, fir-y, balsam-y perfume. We put up with the dropped needles and the impossible messy stand and all that for years, but the final decision to go fake, was how allergic we both seem to be to the real trees and it seems to get worse year by year. It's a good fake tree. It sounded grossly expensive until we did the math and figured, what with the price of real trees, this baby would pay for itself in a few years. I cut some branches from a real tree to decorate the mantel and add a little tree smell. We'll see how much of that our sinuses will tolerate.

I looked out our back window today and noticed something puzzling. Ray recently cut a tree against our back fence and now we see more of what is beyond that fence. It looked like one of our neighbors has decorated a little tree in their backyard for the holidays.

They have hung many orange ornaments. No, wait. Can that really be? Why orange? Why in the backyard? OK, I had to figure this out, so I dug out the big binoculars. I had an unsettling mental image of myself, standing at the back window, spying on my neighbors! I believe they are persimmons—not the neighbors—the orange ornaments. You don't see many persimmon trees in these parts, so it was about the last thing that would have sprung to my mind. Persimmons. Aren't they pretty? I'm glad I know what they are and I don't have to wonder if the neighbors just have an odd idea about tree decorating.

The limit of my camera zoom. My view through the binoculars was better.

Only music...nothing I can say

Celebrating the season—sort of

It has been a tough couple of weeks here. Besides my day at the hospital last week, I have hardly left the house. I was recovering from my procedure and then went straight into the head cold from hell. I haven't been out for a walk or had coffee with a friend. I've shuffled around the house in sweats and slippers, coughing and blowing and mouth-breathing. I missed the wonderful Columbia FiberArts meeting yesterday, but by last night I was feeling pretty decent.

Today was the day of our annual STASH holiday lunch. We choose a different fancy restaurant every year—Portland has some wonderful restaurants—and exchange silly little gifts and treat ourselves to a decadent lunch. It is always great and I would hate to miss it. I pulled myself together and went, and had a wonderful time. This year we went to Andina, a Peruvian restaurant that is beautiful and the food is incredible.

Caipirinhas and sangria and quinoa salad and sopas and causas and tortillas de papas and scallops and desserts and stories and laughter and sweet gifts and 8 women trying to sort out a big bill. We had a good time.

These are the little gifts I made and gave.

Nothing says "happy cold season!" like a kleenex cozy for your purse.

After lunch we took ourselves around the corner for a little browse through the coolest store in the world.

Then I hit the wall and my head began to pound and my feet began to falter and I took myself home, happy, full of good cheer and good food, but wiped out. I didn't make it to the other Christmas party I wanted to go to tonight. Darn.

That's my last whine of 2012. I promise—unless the world ends, as the Mayan calendar predicts, on December 21. That would really tick me off.

12.12.12

It's a magical date if you are into numbers! When the Twelve by Twelve group planned our current challenge about a year ago, it occurred to us that it would be coming to an end in December, 2012 and it seemed fated that it should coincide with the 12.12.12 date. So, do go see what we have ended this challenge with. The theme is "Sweet" and it is both sweet and a little sad to see it come to a close—at least for now. Stay tuned. There may yet be more to the Twelve by Twelve story.

This is my offering for "sweet."  The Sugar Bowl. Read about it, and all the others over on the Twelve by Twelve blog.

The contributors to the Sketchbook Project blog also wanted to mark the unusual date and posted collections of twelve creative inspirations there.  In addition to the twelve scissors I posted on the Sketchbook Challenge blog, I posted some other "twelve" collections on Facebook throughout the day.

Twelve Old Scissors

Twelve watercolor crayons, one of my favorite art supplies

Twelve of my favorite color spools of thread

Twelve of my colorful shirting fabrics

My daughter posted that her Middle School class (she is a Spanish Immersion teacher) chanted "Doce, doce, doce..." twelve times at 12:12 today. How did you commemorate 12.12.12?

And it's on to Christmas!

Thanks for all the nice messages about my health scare. Yes, I admit it did scare me and make me very grateful for a lot of things and it was a great relief that it turned out OK. And now I am on to other things. Christmas, for one.

I don't go as "all out" as a lot of folks with Christmas decorating and stuff. As I said a few days ago, "sweet and simple" is usually my goal, but it is fun to pull out the old decorations and remember Christmases past. Never did like those coordinated designer Christmas trees. Ours is always the old collection of ornaments gathered over the years. I always put my collection of terra cotta ornaments on the fireplace mantel. There is nothing particularly special about them, except that they are all unglazed terra cotta, which I've always liked.

Back in the '80s I was working as the manager/buyer for the gift shop at the Oregon Shakespearean Festival and used to go to the big gift shows in San Francisco every year. One year at the end of the show all the vendors were selling their samples and I was taken with some inexpensive little terra cotta ornaments and I bought them.

We hung them on our tree that year. Then I saw some at a local store and I bought those and soon I was looking for those terra cotta figures. They were never very popular and it was always by chance that I would find them, but pretty soon I had a fairly good collection and they moved from the tree to the mantel. And no, they don't match. They are all sizes and subjects and even different shades of terra cotta. Then I didn't see them again. I haven't found another in many years.

I thought I was finished with collecting them. Then, several years ago in a wonderful gallery of Latin American art, which sadly no longer exists, I found this terra cotta angel from Guatamala. I had to have her.

My last and best Christmas terra cotta.

Who is Teresa?

Teresa is my grown-up. Teresa has insurance and a driver's license and a college diploma and a bank account. Terry, on the other hand, has none of those things, but she has friends and a family and generally enjoys life to the fullest, because Teresa takes care of business for her.

Most of the time I am Terry, but yesterday I was Teresa, as evidenced by the name on my hospital bracelet. I spent the better part of the day having, and recovering from, an angiogram, which if you aren't familiar, is a kind of ghoulish and creepy medical procedure. All things considered, it actually wasn't that bad. The anticipation was far worse than the actual procedure. And, the good news is that it established that I am fine.

Things started getting weird about a week and a half ago, when, while sitting and drinking coffee and reading the Sunday paper one morning, I noticed that I could sort of feel/hear my heart beating and it was not a normal heart beating kind of rhythm. By the end of the day I was worried enough to go to the ER, where they reassured me it was probably benign pvcs, but I should see my doctor. My doctor echoed the "probably benign" message, but thought I should see a cardiologist. The cardiologist did a stress test, which I apparently flunked (crazy, wild spiky design on the monitor) and thought I should have an angiogram. So yesterday was the day. Teresa checked in and it was done. None of the bad things like blocked arteries or valve problems, etc. were found. Apparently my heart has just decided to go for a more syncopated, more dance-able rhythm. At least that's what Terry likes to think. Don't worry, I am fine, except for a bruised and tender spot on my thigh.

I didn't sleep too well last night and one of the things I thought about was how everyone at the hospital called me "Teresa" all day because, of course, that is my official name and it appears on all my official ID. Not once did I say, "oh, call me Terry" though that is what I am always called. As a child I was Terry at home and Teresa at school. Perhaps I slip into Teresa mode in situations, like yesterday, when it allows me to separate myself a bit from things that are too serious to contemplate. Teresa handles all that.

But I don't need to contemplate serious things. It's all good. My heart has settled on a catchy one-two-cha,cha,cha kind of cadence for the moment—actually medication is making it less dance-y day by day. Getting old is scary sometimes, but it could be a lot worse...

Love, Terry

Fall into Winter

This is such a sweet/melancholy transitional time of year. One day warm, sunny, beautiful fall weather; the next day deep, dark wintery gloom. December always—always takes me by surprise. It still feels like summer is just barely past us and shazam! it will officially be winter in just a couple of weeks. How does that happen and why don't I ever figure it out?

We have had some breaks from the rain the past few days and it has made our walks real gifts. The colors have deepened, but the richness of fall is still there. Yesterday we walked along the pond, that was more a mud flat during the summer. It is full and swarming with wild birds. It has been a couple years since we have seen an egret, but we rounded a corner and there he was.

We continued and Beth popped her umbrella open, startling a nearby, but hidden, great blue heron, who shot into the sky squawking and flapping, and then soared, regally over the wetland.

Today we explored the other end of the pond where it had overreached its normal shoreline and was lapping onto the abandoned tennis courts. Ducks and Canada geese swam lazily among the tall grasses and cattails.

Back home, Ray pointed out some brilliantly colored orange peel fungi growing behind the studio. I have never seen these before. The color is amazing.

Ray put up some Christmas lights on the house and greenhouse, and decorated a tree near the road.

Nice to see later, as I headed back from the studio to the house. This is my commute.

I guess Christmas is really coming.  Seems like I post this song every year. It must be that time again.

I hope we can ease into it and enjoy the season and not get sucked into the stress-y stuff. I'm really talking myself into simple and sweet. How about you?

Tuesday, Tuesday...

So I almost posted a video of the Rolling Stones' "Ruby Tuesday" but I knew I could not keep this song/day theme going. Best to let go of it and instead post another of my cinemagr.am moving photos. This is our creek, quite full and fast-flowing with all the rain we are getting.

I just realized that the water is flowing in the wrong direction! What can I say? I haven't quite mastered the app. One of its drawbacks is that you can't go back and edit it after you've saved the gif. But you get the idea. Lots of water. Update: Deb fixed my gif and sent it to me. Thank you! I need to find out how she did it.

It was a good studio day. I picked fabrics for some little Christmas gifts I am planning to make. Everything from my stash. Most of these are fat quarters I buy because they are so pretty, then I don't know what to do with them. That third from the left is a great fabric that doesn't show up well in the photo. It is a Japanese fabric with fish.

Then I made a couple more little buildings and an agave and a potted plant. I am putting them up on my design wall as I finish them and thinking about how I might put them together. It is beginning to look like something.

I will leave you with another of my cinemagr.am experiments. I am having a good time with this app! Creepy, huh?