The Daily Creative Practice

In between my other projects while in Florida, I joined the Facebook group "The Daily Creative Practice." Lots of great images there. Here's the pair I submitted today.

The upper image is a photo I took of the surf edge. The other is its transformation by the app Paper Artist. It would make a great background for ...

The ... Practice goes only through December 31st. Take a look!

Findings #3

The whole page of stitched live oak leaves, with its watercolor ground.

And another gorgeous sea grape leaf, with very different colors from the first two I chose. Part of the leaf tore as it dried; I clipped it away with scissors.

Findings #2

 Leaves from a walk at Lake Seminole Park, with their watercolor and thread embellishments.

Some of the nine live oak leaves on one page. My mom asked me why I was sewing all these leaves onto my journal pages. I had to think about how to answer that. I realized there are three reasons.
1. I enjoy  looking closely at these lovely objects.
2. I love doing this kind of embroidery.
3. I want a daily practice and trust that it will lead me somewhere if I just keep doing it.

Findings #1

 Finds from my first beach walk of this Christmas trip to Madeira Beach, Florida. Two sea grape leaves, combined with embroidery threads and watercolors.

Luscious colors, yes?

Holiday Open Studio on Saturday

My chickadee drawing on organza, then over fabric and hand stitched. A little more to do on these. (Thanks for the idea, Valerie Komkov Hill in Quilting Arts!)

Mini collages turned into little hanging art works.



Also paper lanterns, little books, and cards. Selected art on sale.

See you on Saturday, December 13 from 10 to 5. With over a foot of new snow, the Adirondack woods will be beautiful!

NICHE Studio with fresh snow today

Shades of Grey - Reverb14 Day 9

This first thing I thought when I saw today's blog writing prompt - Shades of Grey - was "lack of color." Maybe it's being here at my studio in the woods on another cloudy frozen day. I certainly rarely work with grey or even black and white in my art. Color is very important to what I have to say.

But the metaphor of seeing myself and the world in shades of grey is very different. It's how I try to view the larger world - allowing more variation and diversity while avoiding the "love this - hate that" mind. The choices of either black or white are so limiting. And isn't grey just so lovely sometimes?

Connections

I just signed on to a blog party that involves writing in response to a daily prompt for 21 days. (See Kate McNally's blog.) I jumped in late, but it looks like fun and another way to keep my blog more active. Hopefully, you'll enjoy it! Let me know.

Yesterday's prompt was to post a favorite Selfie. As I never take Selfies, I got to work with my tablet in my favorite place to plan, dream, imagine, and write - in my bed as I slowly wake up with my coffee next to me. So now you know what I look like (this morning, anyway). I'm smiling at how funny this project turned out to be. Many rejected photos!

The prompt for today is "Connections." It's a very good one for December for lots of reasons. My great desire this time of year is to get in touch with all of my far-away friends. I've moved quite a bit so I have many. And I don't connect with them often enough, in spite of thinking of them. My attention is a "Be Here Now" kind of thing.

BUT! How does an artist who also teaches at a college do all this?! It's the season to make more art, sell more art, administer final projects and complete final grades, prepare and ship the gifts, and make arrangement for traveling to see my mom. (This is the short list ...) As much as I imagine making lovely cards myself and sitting by the fire writing a note to each dear person, it just isn't going to happen. My solution has become to buy someone else's lovely handmade cards and send them out between December 26th and Valentine's Day. Lots of benefits. 1) I can write an actual personal note, 2) my friends can read them when they are not inundated with stuff themselves, and 3) the friend who sold me the cards is happy. The connections will be made and I love that.

I have to mention here that one slender but important connection was to send or receive a note or card to and from my wonderful ex-mother-in-law. She passed away last night, and she was one of the most lovely women I have know. Irene and I met when I was 15, and she taught me a lot over all those years about grace and generosity. You were well-loved, Irene, and your longtime connection with me was highly valued.

Our Fabric Collage Class

In November, I taught a fabric collage class at the Lake Placid Center for the Arts. Above are some of minis I made in class, using fabric of my own with some donations from class members. My hand embroidery is finished and the little pieces are ready to be made into gift tags or little hangings. Thanks to Susan, Deborah, Sylva, Stephanie, Sue, and Kathy! I learned so much from all of you!

Let's Try This

I really do love to post on my blog, and I've been trying to find an easier way to post more often. Technology is my friend but I'm still trying to get the pieces to come together smoothly. Any words of advice?

I'm busy completing lots of small projects for my gallery and for my open studio on December 13th, so I'll add a photo or two of some of those, without much chat.

Here a small piece of gorgeous fabric I made at my deconstructed screen printing workshop in late October, receivng some hand embroidery to enhance the marks made by the gradually dissolving dye. It will become a small square framed piece soon.