Let there be light...Wordpress

For the Wordpress photo challenge "Let there be light"I like this one :)

Hot chocolate for this Tuesday

I had this vision of gathering some branches and hanging some origami shapes from them and placing them on the mantle, so I invited C to make some origami with me. The only trouble is I wanted to use some old music sheets for this, but boy is that paper tough to fold.We decided to try for some simple rabbits....Epic fail bunnies...lol! :D :DWe decided that what we needed was some hot chocolate.Now there is a Barista in my kitchen, a wonderful gift years ago from my children, and that Barista rarely gets used as I really don't drink coffee. But it's a dynamite way to steam milk! So I took it apart and cleaned out the dust, the dead moth and the spider's web, filled the chamber with fresh water and steamed up some lovely hot chocolate; Sbux peppermint hot chocolate for C and Maxim's for me.We poured our hot chocolate into my French Cafe au Lait bowls. These poor bowls don't get much service since I bought them in Paris years ago, and it's lovely to get them out once in a while.I threw a small handwoven cloth on the ground and we reevaluated our bunnies.Chloe ran to the studio and brought down some real origami paper and folded the sweetest little fox! See? Everything's better with chocolate!Next she used the epic fail bunny note paper and folded a larger fox. (And look who found a lap)Maybe my vision of lovely origami shapes hanging from branches might come true...stay tuned. :)Sharing with Terri and Martha and Sandi and Bernideen,  and wishing all my American friends a happy Thanksgiving. :)

A small window on Sunday

It's been one of those warmer West Coast days where we didn't even mind not getting a table inside the Whole Foods and we happily sat outside with our lunch. Boy have we been lucky this fall and into winter with plenty of sunshine so far. Gosh I hope I don't jinx things. :) (got my fingers crossed while I type this just in case)Went for a walk and Chloe was determined that we should walk thru the dog walk part of the beach and past the SPCA. Chloe visits the SPCA web site on a practically daily basis trying to convince me that we should adopt a dog. This time there is a one year old malamute up for adoption and, while my heart is melting, I must be the logical one here and say only if she figures out how and makes preparations for the dog accompanying her for her year in Japan after she graduates university, before we adopt him. (sigh) Kids don't play fair...do they?Back at home and the sun was already starting to dim, I sat down to write my Sunday whirl and C sat down to write the beginning of a philosophical argument about transitivity and psychological continuity. :? Some of these phil arguments are tough to wrap your head around. So I lit the first fire of the year in the fire place. I forgot how wonderful it is to sit beside an open fire. It sure makes the writing easier. :)Sharing with Mary for Mosaic Monday.

Sunday Whirl...blame the first lovely wood fire of the year

I sort of started this whirl in the morning over a nice cup of tea and it went nowhere. But then got on with my day of errands and running around and by the time I got back to it, it was late afternoon and Chloe said, "mom, it'd be nice to have a fire tonight." and then that was that, the whirl became all about the fire.How does that happen? :D Thank you to Brenda for the manageable words this week.habits, create, however, virtue, regard, gap,cycle, undoing, lessen, choice, gathering, sufferingYou regard the virtue inside the cardboard rectangle that fits in so nicely in your hand.Smooth edges turning between your fingertips, sandpaper rough against the soft parts of your palm, inside holding torches, slides in and out and in and out, its one function: to light your fireLessen the load by one wooden stick. That familiar cycle, strike and spark, ignite, flicker, flame, burn.Smell of sulphur, of smoke, of late nights in a cabin full of candle shine, gathering twigs and pine cones that sizzle and pop.Of nights in the ashtray of a hotel bar. Of stick after stick, smoke after smoke blending in the hazy grey.Of habits in pockets, creates excuses for names and numbers, lives in the junk drawer in your house, measures your choice and suffering, lets you know where you've been, where you might go again.A carbon copy waiting inside the chamber holding fire, sliding in and out and in and out, now it appears in your hand to strike, split-second gap, then ignite and burn, sizzle, pop, hiss, choke, sulphur smoke.Do it againHowever, that is your undoing.

Friday turquoise random.

It seems to me that everywhere I look everything is coming up turquoise. Turquoise is the new chartreuse right now.This is the Christmas?!? window at the local gift shop. Call me old fashioned but I'm not buying it.Also, everywhere I look there are turquoise lamps. Ghastly lamps which probably should have been shattered in the 1960s when they were made and not allowed to be turned into some sort of chic under the label "vintage treasures".Here are a few from the very first page of pinterest. These were the more ok-ish ones. They are everywhere I'm telling you. You can't look at an Apartment Therapy post without finding at least one, (but they tend to come in pairs) and there are over 66,000 on Houzz! It's so awful that I'm actually starting to like it and might have to go expropriate the ones from my mother's basement guest bedroom. Yikes!!!On the other hand, this is the proper way to display turquoise in one's home; as understated, jewel-like details.(note to self: make these)Another perfectly lovely way to bring more turquoise is as ribbons on exquisite gifts. Everyone loves turquoise like that. :)If you really must have turquoise around you at all times then why not consider some lovely jewellery. I've been meaning to make these macrame bracelets for...forever. Aren't they lovely? Here's the how-to.And finally, and because this is random, this has nothing to do with turquoise anything, but this makes me want to take all my paintings out of the frames and off their supports and stack them against the wall like this! Love it to the max!Sharing with Nancy for some randomness and hoping the links all works. :)

Two more finished, that makes four full-sized maps

Today I finished the kingfisher map. I'm really pleased with the way this turned out, but I used chalk pastels to deepen the blues, (because the watercolours are just so insipid sometimes!), and now have to find my Krylon spray to fix the pastels before I can fold it up or do anything else with it.I stuck it up on the mantle; which is looking a little less autumnal and a little more wintery. I'm so bad about all this "must-decorate-the-living-daylights-out-of-the-house-for-the-next-holiday" frenzy I see out there in blogland...but I love it...and more power to you guys!...I'm just not that dedicated and tend to put the kinds of elements together which make me happy with my space.Right now this includes the angel I painted after grandma died, old photos of my children, a naive painting from the flea market, a thrifted mirror from some vintage bureau, and my English elephant with a new whale ornament hanging from his trunk...why not? (Did I ever tell you I'm addicted to glass ornaments?) :)I love the kingfishers! Wish I could see more of them at the Thames, but I've really only seen them a hand full of times over these past 10 or so years at our neck of the Thames...but then, I don't really take the time to belong to and walk out with a British birding society and really only rely on chance. But that flash of blue...it's just magical.Here is a close up of the two birds:I also put the finishing touches on the nuthatches...I think.That's the trick, isn't it? I was just thinking the other day how many times I avoid signing a painting. To me signing is declaring that the painting is finished. Which artist was it who said something like, "easy to start a painting and hard to know when it's finished." EXACTLY!!! I'm still not quite happy with the left wing.But love the descending nuthatch and the blue bells.So here they are on the fireplace mantle...really my most favourite spot to prop new works, and I'll walk away form them this evening and come back to them in the morning light and reevaluate them for the millionth time. :)Now what to do next? I have a started map with a red tailed hawk diving down over a particularly unattractive and industrial part of England. Maybe I'll work on that, but yesterday I felt like painting some British birds called blue tits. Seriously...and they say it with a straight face in an almost "I'm so sorry, it's not my fault" way. Anyway, felt like it so I looked them up in my field guides and then went on google images and googled "English bird tit" OMG!!! Don't ever do that!!! Just a warning. 8O

It is what it is

The other day I had a minute to sit in Sbux and read the local paper.Gotta love the headline:So among the very useful tips to beat the winter blahs are: eat at a Mexican restaurant to trick your mind, wear brighter colours and get plenty of sleep.If only I could!!! Ok, I can do a coloured scarf and I can eat Mexican and love it, but the sleep...Let me tell you why I can't sleep around here. It's because there are gun shots going off in my house all night and it's been happening for a month now. The gun shots are the noises that the floor makes as the planks crack down the seams and separate.I know. I KNOW!!! Can you believe the nightmare this floor has become? The trouble is that not only are the planks separating along the seams but occasionally the seam won't give way and the actual plank tears, as in this next pic. Some gaps are now about 2mm, while others are slimmer, but the whole edge is rough and catches on socks, stockings and cat hair. There is no way to sweep up the floor now and I'm worried that dirt and dust will start to accumulate within the floor because, after all, we live here!So these days I'm trying to function on about 4-5 hours of sleep, but still, there's lovely morning sun in my bedroom...And wonderful people watching around town.Get a load of those feet!!!Fantastic parks with snow capped mountains and forests to hike around in.And, if all else fails, there's always cookies.Here is a brilliant article someone posted to my FB today. Got to get rid of the stress and start meditating again.

Tea cup Tuesday with a friend

Here is a treat for C and me, we had my friend Diane drop in for tea with us and, because she's a reader of my blog, she kindly agreed to having my camera in her face for a while and I photographed our lovely elevensies for tea cup Tuesday.So since I declared it winter yesterday, I wanted to bring out some of the wintery cups and chose these little cups for today. They are made in the former USSR and have that mark plus the county Vladivostok printed on the bottom. Interesting.Here's Diane holding one of the cups. I'm not even sure where these came from, but am fascinated by the rich history of tea in Russia.Water for tea was boiled in samovars all the long winter and people would gather around it to make their tea. I think I'd love to have one of the old kettles and turn it into a modern day use for my morning tea.I guess no mater where home is the temptation to gather in the kitchen on winters is the same. Speaking of temptation, suddenly there was a big white paw reached up and over the edge of the table. And then that was it. Morgan decided she was missing out on the tea and conversation and jumped into C's lap.And made herself at home. :)Diane asked me about my smuggled San Franciscan jade plant, and I was happy to report it's sending out some lovely roots and doing extremely well.So we chatted and drank our tea...And had some yummy sweeties.But before you know it, two hours had gone by and it was time for Diane to get on with her day. It was lovely catching up after a few months and finding out what's new with my friend. Now we're determined to get together more often. :)Sharing with Terri and Martha and Sandi and Bernideen and Kathy, and looking forward to catching up with all my tea time friends.

Try again, fail again, fail better

November is kicking my butt!!!It's so far been a hard month of personal upsets and low productivity.The weather is typical West Coast cold dampness which feels twice as cold as it says on the thermostat. Not like the dry cold of prairies or of mountains, but the right to the bone cold of the ocean which you can't seem to insulate your body from.Today we were at Whole Foods for a nice morning break and quietly reading the paper, having tea and we heard our first Christmas carol, Jingle Bell Rock. So, just for the record, I'm declaring winter, because I hate to think of Christmas time and fairy lights and decorations belonging to the fall. (I don't think I would like to be an Australian and have Christmas in the summer. But then again, If I was Australian I guess I wouldn't know any different and so would be happy with that.This morning I read my horoscope. Do you do that? I go for weeks without thinking about horoscopes or any of that woey-woey stuff, and then my life sucks and I look for some sort of assurance that everything will work out. What's all that about, and how ridiculous is that? No wonder they're called soothsayers.Today I took these photos. That's C reading a disturbing article in today's newspaper about the sexting; she has to do a research paper about it, which has to culminate in a modification to a curriculum to combat that problem in high schools. Wow, it's depressing to know this exists and to know the vast problem it has become. Depressing to read about the children who have harmed themselves over this, even committed suicide, and I wish somehow there was a way to make kids realise that there is so much more to life than high school.So it was lovely to see these children running on the beach and playing their innocent, little hearts out. And here's something: some new stores are opening. The stores geared for ladies have sexy full window "coming soon" ads, while the men's wear has a hand written sign on the door advertising what it will eventually be. Interesting, isn't it? The hard "sexy, sexy woman will be you as soon as you drop in" sell vs the "oh, well, men have to shop at some point anyway, and, since they wont probably come in on an impulse brought on by the sexy, sexy, why spend the money?" sell. Boy you get jaded as soon as you start working your way thru that CMNS degree. Sometimes I wonder if life wasn't simpler before I did it and now C is in her fourth year of the same degree. Which I encouraged her to take! What have I done?!?So mostly I walk thru the new stores ignoring the merchandise and admiring the not-for-sale decorations and fixtures. Now I want to get a bunch of old paintings and liberate them from their supports and wallpaper a wall with them and find some shutters to put on a desk to function as a file cabinet (of sorts). How cool is that? (Wait, I have a bunch of old paintings waiting to be turned into hand bags...hmmm)I'm very much into a "throw everything I own away and start again" mood. Maybe just put everything that's out away and redecorate mood, because, actually, looking around, I kinda like my stuff. You know what I possibly need to do is to feng shui the hell out of the house. Sort things out, put them away, get rid of some clutter and feng shui the rest. I think possibly the problem is that I haven't used feng shui principals here in this house, (now I've been here for 2.5 yrs) and, even if it's woey-woey stuff, it makes me feel loads better.On the positive side, because Robert is going to be really annoyed with me if I keep going on in this "gloomy and purposeless left leg of Uncle Vanya's trousers" path, I've started a new map about three days ago and it's all I want to do right now, just paint the map. It will be a couple of nuthatches and bluebells. The one bird is flying to a branch and the second is already there. I love the way these little bird descend head first. And bluebells, because I felt like bluebells, and that can't be bad.P.S. C is putting in a blue hair wrap in her hair with the embroidery flosses and now I want to embroider something with those yummy, rich colours.P.P.S. There's roast chicken for Sunday supper.P.P.P.S. The Sunday whirl is turning out be to really dark and so I might stop writing it before it drags me down below ground and away form the bluebells. Alternately, it might be good just to get it out, over with and sleep it off.Linking with Mary for Mosaic  Mondays  and with Ramona for Create with Joy

Togetherness is where it's at this evening

It's lovely for me when I get to spend the afternoon with both of us doing some art and work and talking out some issues in our lives.This time the afternoon turned into evening, (days are so short right now), and as the lights were turned on progressively, I felt pretty lucky to have C here right now and realised we've been at it for several hours and time just stood still.C is in the middle of two important projects. She is designing a campaign for shark fining awareness, which she hopes to present all over her campus and garner support to stop that gruesome practice and also is part of a team of researchers gathering info for a report on sexting and the ramifications in Vancouver high schools.C does big, bold designs and is brilliant at them. This will be the design for a T shirt to raise awareness. (I must get her to post some of these to her blog)I've decided it's time for a new map. I love my map series and haven't painted a new one since late August. So for this map I'm focusing on the Nuthatch. Sweet little bird. I love the way he descends trees and branches head first. I've done some preliminary studies and think this is going to be two nuthatches, one on a branch and one flying to the branch.The branch will follow a road right thru the centre of the map. I think the branch will touch the ground and there will be bluebells. Yes, I think there'll be bluebells.