Grey Misty Moods

We saw the sun today...yayyy! But short lived it was, so I started playing with tones, as the season greys, it will soon be a monotoned negative of a world in a seasonal rest. Soon all plants will die to the Earth, to rebuild root and bulb for the future season. Why is it you can't quite accept the finality of it all...because I want to be able to walk bare-footed across my floors...run outside to hang clothes on the line, chase the ball with my little furry heathen and drive my truck with the windows down.

But the back roads I've driven have uncovered beauty in all shades of grey. Old weathered woods, crisp dried grasses and rust in all forms make for beautiful composition, sunny or not. All you have to do is shoot...ahhh, memories for a lifetime.

Of the Earth

A new piece...my love of Nature is exhibited in all I do, a love that has been with me all my life, always a Nature girl (Tomboy). To live harmoniously with the planet as was intended...how did we stray so far?

The simple, yet elegant stones of the Earth, polished and shaped, bring fantasy and memory of past lives...perhaps. I love using the muted colors of the Amazonite stones, pale colors of a misty morning in the garden, a garden of herbs, healing herbs of a lost art and a raspberry branch...wonderful fruits of it's labor and a leaf so packed with nourishment, known through the ages. Why would a pharmaceutical industry try to stop the sale of it's natural healing powers...the 'God of the Dollar' perhaps...false idol of the rich and famous.

But I have also incorporated vintage, amber glass beads and pendant, hung by twill 'herb' ribbon, crowning the sacred herbs.

This new piece is available on my website and at Sister's Garden.

Colors of passion,

a garden of miracles...

my heart strings, Gaia.

Shadow Shot Sunday~My Path of Old

Simple my path, my path of old...
you may think it odd, the olden way,
but think again, your eyes half open
to the beauty of my world.
Family is all...
deep, committed and full...
family, community,
tribes of neighbors
using only what is gathered,
harmony, balance and solice for the whole,
the whole is the one.

Oh, to be so free, to require so little,
asking only a respect for a thing so humble...
I'll take not your space,
I'll ride not your road,
I'll wait...wait till you pass.
Not wanting to steal your moment,
for mine is an hour
or a days journey...
but it is mine
and it is fleeting.
But as my trusted stead turns wheels
into the paths of my Fathers of old,
I will smile at my journey,
a journey unhastened by yours.


Time to visit Hey, Harriet again for Shadow Shot Sunday...come check us out...it's fun...really!

Golden Moments at Sister's Garden

Dim the lights and walk into the magic of Sister's Garden...golden hues envelope you as you gaze into the world of Christmas...sparkles and spangles treat your eye to the sugar plum delights of the season. The smells of Christmas waft through your senses bringing 'the remembering', the delights of a child and this golden spectacle...fulfilled every year...ahhhh...Christmas...be the child.

Everyone at Sisters' and Bloom are working overtime with the elves making sure this open house is a delight to the senses...trees smothered in lights, grand stagings of fairy tale proportion, spectacular exhibits 'round every corner....walk slowly...you may miss out.

Hot chocolate and mulled cider is the favorite of the season...all we need now is the bonfire, bringing friends closer together, not only for the warmth, but the warmth of the heart and the hearth...a season to share the joy at Sister's Garden and Bloom...I'll be there, how 'bout you...

To Capistrano

There are just not enough hours in the day, especially with the time change, it takes a couple of weeks to adjust, then I go into a different, sorta dark mode...well...cause it's always dark! It's dark when I get up, it's dark early in the evening, my thoughts are dark (because of the recession we don't have) yeah right...I worry about people losing jobs and homes and lifestyles, so I draw nearer to the hearth...if I only had a hearth, it's just a figure of speech in my comfort zone. My lil' pink shack is my hearth, it ain't much, but it's full of character and an unusual charm and it suits me just fine, as my aspirations in life have reached a mellow medium.

I can stay up as late as I want...creating, reading, writing or just sitting with Scratchy on my lap watching the winter weather as it's moods transpire...and that's enough. How did I ever have a full time job, where was the time for that...I amaze me, but, I'm alot like my Dad, can't sit for too long, there is something somewhere that surely needs done, although he is starting to take this retirement thing seriously...finally!

So when I relax, I turn on the music, a glass of wine and sit and twirl wire for another project Du Nature...my love...my heart and soul.

A swallow returns,

circling iridescence...

home, Capistrano.

Plight of the Honey Bee

So sad that our little friend the honey bee, is suffering so and I believe we are the culprits...as usual! Having read up on many of the issues about this problem, it seems the most likely is cell phone use. Communication waves going from tower to tower has interrupted flight paths and caused bees to get lost, just aimlessly flying till they drop dead.

What is the answer in a world so polluted by man's very existence? We take, take, take, never thinking of the consequence, all in the name of science and technology. Some day the world will wake up and realize that we are over-populated and can't control ourselves in the natural order of things. In the wild, animals and insects have natural population controls in effect. We think it cruel when a female animal kills her own young, it's natural selection, to keep the population healthy and strong. And you wonder why disease and cancers are rampant...we are no longer of healthy stock...think about it.

My little bee necklace is yellow turquoise, who woulda thought, but I absolutely love it, it's just a beautiful stone. Looks a bit like pollen, in my eye anyway. With the little bee charm and the words 'bee free', this little piece will appeal to the Nature lover in you.

Oh, my little bee,

I think not of your demise,

only your freedom.

SCORE!!!!!

Ahhhh...I love the smell of musty in the morning...old treasures for the not so faint of heart, chipping, fading, wobbling, tattered and torn...welcome to my world and all the crazies that will comment on this heap. We are a bunch in deed...but with the holiday today the antique shop was packed...it was a feeding frenzy at our favorite booths, thank you very much Liz and Mark...you two are the greatest, we can always depend on you for the best trash...and that's a compliment!

I love the aqua chest, just needs a switch in handles and it will be perfect. The parlor table I believe is walnut, but I love it just the way it is, stripped with no finish on it...this dealer says he has more in his warehouse and gave me his number. Cool frames as always, tall demi-lune table and for those of you that have asked what a demi-lune is, it's a half circle table, small moon, lunar. But this one is really cool, it's painted old gold and is unusually tall and is staying as is...no painting. An old clothes drying rack, a sweet,chippy,white rocker, old wooden cheese boxes, wood chair and a strange piece of gate iron...cool stuff aye...

Now the smalls...how about that porcelain cherub, is he not the cutest and tall, an old lamp base perhaps, has a small ding on his foot that's been repaired...and what hasn't, chippier the better.A heavy, green, plaster elephant, cool old books, spoons, porcelain tray with raspberries, silver plate salt n peppers and lots and lots of silk scarves. I am gonna play around with some funky lampshades with these.

So Barb...be prepared...I have scored...let's play switch the furniture...a game we love to play, it hurts but we love it anyway...ha! See ya Friday Barb!

Legend of the Blue Angel

I can't help it, I just have this fascination with cemeteries and mausoleums. This beautiful marble statue rest atop the tombs of one of the more notable families of our city and since the day is a gloomy, rainy sorta day, it seems fitting.

But this statue also holds a legend...it is said that if you gaze into the tomb on the eve of a full moon the lady will glow blue and you will be cursed for disturbing the dead...Well, such are the tales told by teenagers down through the annuls of history, but I can attest to the fact that she does glow blue. As the moon shines full in the evening sky, the blue stained glass window reflects on the white marble, giving an other-worldly appearance. Also, my daughter lives directly across the gully from this mausoleum and in the fall when the leaves are off the trees and it's a full moon, she can see a blue glow from the window of the mausoleum...well, let's say she is easily creeped out...a case of 'the willies' fer sure.

There is no history on the books of the curse being fulfilled, so we still go to the cemetery to gaze, albeit a little creeped out, of what might be and to scare the crap outta each other. This cemetery also sits high on a bluff and the family plots are on the edge of it, making the sunrise and sunsets beautiful from this vantage point over-looking the river valley. There is also a stairway at the bottom of the bluff leading all the way to the top of the cemetery...it is long and a real thigh-buster to walk, but has been closed due to deteriorating conditions and you will be reprimanded by 'the law' if you are caught climbing it...but that only instigates the challenge...ahhh, sweet youth. Well, they also vandalized the tomb and stole the hand holding the rose, hence the chain at the gates of the mausoleum.

But what a beautiful testament to the love of a family and the wealth of a forefather. One who gave history to a growing community in a difficult time, a lumber industry on the Mighty Mississippi.

Mysteries of the Orient

Not a lot of people like oriental art, a thing of the 60's and 70's, but I have always had a thing for it. I think it's just the whole mystery of the land that fascinates me. To take a landscape and miniaturize it with cork cutouts, just goes beyond my imagination. Every once in a while I will find a piece to add to my collection and I just stare in awe at the artistry. I love to surround myself with such intricate beauty and perhaps envision the landscape of Japan or perhaps Malaysia. Japan and China hold the real fascination for me though, the painted landscapes, the customs, the warrior history of the past and opera and musical instruments...oh my...too much fascination to get into.

But this is some of my collection that I just can't seem to part with...as many of my collections have gone by the wayside, to be replaced with new addictions. But what fun to have and to not have...that is the question...what to collect next. Right now it's old beads and vintage fabrics, damask and velvets...sound like a project in the making...aye!

Shadow Shot Sunday--'A Longing'

The memory of you, sweet love,

rests in the marbled kingdoms of my fantasies.

If only I were there to bid you well,

we'd speak of plans yet laid,

dreams unfulfilled,

the emergence of life force on other planes,

of future...

My life, an illusion,

yet my walk with you, real.

In this cold place of dark shadow,

a distant world beckons.

At this place of given time and era,

a thousand people rest,

yet there seems a pulse.

A twinge of consciousness perhaps...

of dreams unfulfilled,

perhaps a beckoning,

perhaps of future.

I believe in this paradox...

this strange dwelling of life and death intertwined.

To accept it's reality on this parallel plane

gives comfort...

I see you there

waiting...

long arms stretched to my soul,

shall I shed this rope,

this lifeline in time...

A seafaring vessel on oceans of primeval past lives...

I linger at this life's estate,

nourished with life force

and will to receive...

Yet I walk this path with you

knowing where you stand

on my pier of promise,

your outstretched hand in mine...

into the realm of distant futures,

a longing...

It's shadow time at...Hey, Harriet come on and check us out...