Love Letters: Dear Rest

Dear rest,It's so peaceful here.It's quiet and uncomplicated and serene.I love it. Rosy and fresh and cool.Like a good book.Like a song.A bowl of really sweet cherries.Yeah, that's it.Cherries, like cherries.Postcard: Acrylic paint, shadow play, plus a collaged copy of Erwin Blumenfeld's photograph Aubade 1938.The only place I really rest it seems is at my cabin. No electricity, no cell phone reception, no bother.I love it so much. I really have to get up here more often.

Love letter: dear books

Dear books,We don’t all sing like typewriters.Some of us deliver a text which is pondered in the heart.I think there are silences louder than words.........................................................Postcard: oil painting on the cover of a Victorian hymnal.sent...with a little extra postage.(I didn't destroy the book for this postcard. When I found it in the "free" box at a car boot sale, all that was left was the cover.)Below are some photos from my wellness journal workshop yesterday.Since my own experience (here) I've been running wellness journal workshops with the most amazing people all struggling in various stages of treatment for cancer.Some have never drawn a thing in their lives. One wonderful gal yesterday gave up her corporate job and decided to invest in her artistic talent full time, only to be diagnosed. This is the first time she picked up art again in over a year.Want to make your own? Instructions here.And, while I have a library here at home of over 1000 much loved books, I find time and time again that, when I save books, they save me right back. Book save, books heal and books inspire in so many different ways.

Love letter: Dear Intuition

Dear Intuition,The voices made me do it!Love,VLast night I had the sudden urge to read pages from a journal that I wrote 11 years ago.Aside from the questionable prose style, and the pretentious critique of Jung, and the efforts to impress with words like “testudinal,” I barely recognised you. You were so fearless in the face of love and so utterly convinced that you had found the source of happiness.I stayed up late into the night reading as though it was someone else’s story. And I had to remind myself that that girl was you. Is me.It felt good to read my past. It's given me a new perspective, a new vitality of spirit, a quickening of intuition, and a sharp intake of breath, like a pump from some strong bellows, to fan the tiny flame of my heart into a roaring fire.Dear V,I told you so.Love,Your Intuition.Postcard: Ganesha waiting. Collage, white ink, grey felt pen.sent

Love letter: Dear morning

Dear morning,I don’t know how to explain it.You burn into my memory like a memory is supposed to: Six am waking up. Grandma bringing in a cup of hot tea. My skates on a towel in the corner of the room, waiting for me to finish my tea, pick them up and go to practice. Daily... for years and years and years.I still skate on those skates, now just for fun, but tea always starts the day.It’s my ritual and yet not a ritual at all.It’s my pleasure and my passion.My lifetime.I wish grandma was still here. She was the sweetest of peas.Postcard: What's the story, morning glory. Collage, acrylics, inks.sent

Love letter: Dear feet

Dear feet,Watch your step.I think about that for you because I see you racing each other shouting, “me first, no me first!”And if feels odd to be here; like getting to this moment was suddenly upon me.It’s funny how life passes. And I understand. Sometimes life forces you to race even when you don’t want to.So I want you to know that you are good and safe and sound with me, and you can stop and see where you stand.And if you stop in the moment, you'll see that life is so good that I don’t think you’ll be touching the ground.Postcard: collage.Sent.

Love letters: Dear Home

Dear HomeI think people can pack a lot of stuff into a motor home. They just take everything out of the house and cram it into those spaces under the bed. The bed lifts up, and in goes all the stuff, and off they go.Me, I sling the camera onto my shoulder, and pack some clean underwear, a pair of jeans, a T shirt or two, and my portfolio into a suitcase. I’m home and 7505 km away from home at all times. Vancouver and Oxfordshire.Lifted up and drifting down.I’m a snowflake.A single unique snowflake floating down from the same cloud and melting into the same puddle of water. Over and over again.Postcard: Home with house sparrow, collage, acrylic paint, gold leaf, ink.Sent.

Norma's drawing challenge: Pink Horses!!!

Oh that was a good one Norma! :DI looked thru my 1928 encyclopedia of the horse for inspiration, but all the pictures are in black and white.I suppose the horse on the left might be pink! The one on the right might be pink too. I mean there's something different about pink horses and I don't think they listen all that well.Next I looked thru this little journal that some child made in 1943. F. Mathieson. What do you guys think, Francis or Francesca? Let's just say Frankie for short.Well, our Frankie collected this whole journal full of clippings and drawings and faithfully recreated the horse in many different ways.Frankie even hand painted some of the black and white newspaper images. This one looks a bit pink, doesn't it?So with all this brilliant inspiration, I made myself a little stampede across my studio shelf.I only had time for two, but some more might join in eventually.Art (OK, that's questionable...lol): Cardboard, acrylic paint, ink, some of those metal leather rivet things.Come saddle up over at Norma's and see more pink horses.Thank you so much Norma, this was a lot of fun. :D

Love letters begin: Dear Love

Dear Love,It looks like I feel.It's warm and soft and fresh here. It looks like I feel which is a completely wonderful thing. I feel lazy and guiltless and heavy and weak and good. This may not seem like a group of well adjusted words, but in all honesty it's the perfect combination of ease and sincerity. I'm content just to sit here with my eyes closed and think about how I feel.Postcard: collage and acrylic paint.Love letters for the month of April on postcards, probably sent to myself. Challenge courtesy of Susannah Conway.

About Thursday light and painting

I was painting, listening to some random jazz from some random internet music site and thinking that there really aren't any songs about Thursday. And there should be. Thursday is such a mellow day, isn't it? It's a third-cup-of tea-morning-and-15-extra-minutes-in-bed kind of day.The quality of light is different; especially in the late afternoon (is that a Thursday thing too?) Perfect for painting. Painting is good.I have a habit of sitting at my desk in front of my computer and a sea of papers, notebooks, art paraphernalia, taxes, bills, and orange slices, way into the best light of the day. Then I have a mini meltdown about not getting any "work" done. Sometimes you just need to walk away.And then the random jazz site played Ella Fitzgerald singing Count Basie's Thursday. It's now on its third repeat.

A day in the garden and a bone broth recipe for good health

"Come on guys!" I said to Morgan and Milo. "Come let's do a bit of gardening."Milo looked at me with his death stare and said, "You can't mean me, I had the night shift!" Then he yawned, turned around, and burrowed under the quilt.Morgan completely ignored me.Oh well, so much for help. Out to the garden I went because, if we're to have any fresh veggie this year, someone has to do the work.I must say that the garden has looked worse...lol...but not much worse.First the clean up. I pulled up one of the old gates I use as plant supports and put it to the side. A couple of seasons of growing peas up the gate has depleted that soil and it was time to rotate the crops.I pulled out all the weeds, pulled up last winter's kale and leeks, and picked out the volunteer garlic seedlings.Then I used my garden fork and turned all the soil over.Then I grabbed a couple leeks and a handful of kale and headed inside to make some lunch.Sometimes I think my life is boring and routine, but mostly I like it, and, especially when I have a bone broth made from Sunday night's organic roast chicken. (recipe follows) Bone broth is one of those magical nutritional elixirs which gives our body the most bio-available protein and healthy minerals. I usually make the bone broth Sunday to Monday overnight in the slow cooker, and then just use it as stock for dishes or as a base for soups.Today I chopped up a couple leeks, some kale, and some cauliflower, and, within 15 minutes, I had a delicious and nutritious soup.I ate it outside while sorting out my veggie and flower seeds, reading the Bella Grace magazine I still haven't read, and writing a postcard to Chloe in Japan.Every year I swear I'll buy less seeds and by spring there's masses of them again!So, after lunch it's back to the garden I go. I wanted to rake the whole veggie bed flat, but needed to protect some wayward stargazer lilies with this old Mexican cloche before I forget they're there and break the shoots. Yep, I've done that before.Then I stood the old gate in place on a different spot, and planted some snow peas around it, sweet peas around the second gate, gigantic sunflowers at the garden edge, radishes as a quick crop on top of the sunflowers, and some lettuce in a couple rows. One of the best ways I have found to get inspired to make my garden look better, is by checking out other gardening blog and seeing how creatively others have designed and maintained their garden. All the little volunteer garlic seedlings needed to be replanted, but the volunteer potatoes were composted. I'm not planting potatoes this year.Morgan woke up by the afternoon and decided to come see what I was doing. As you can see she wasn't much help.I had a bit of energy left, so I tied all the raspberry canes to their supports.And that was that for this day. Whew, I'm glad I got so much work done.Bone broth my way:The carcass from last night's baked organic chicken. Please, if you're making this for your health, please make sure it's an organic, pasture raised chicken. There's no point trying to be your healthiest and best self and eating meat which has been raised with growth stimulating hormones, steroids and antibiotics, packaged in natural hog casings from DCW Casing.Did you roast any veggies with the chicken? I usually do. Throw those in as well. Mine are usually sweet potatoes, leeks, onions, garlic, red pepper, Brussels sprouts, celery etc. (Yes really, I roast them all together along with the chicken.)Clean out the fridge and see if you have any other veggies in there. How about some cauliflower, a hand full of kale, carrots and peas? Throw them in too.Now out to the garden for a generous sprig of rosemary and thyme. Do you like any other herbs? Sage maybe? throw some in. Fresh herbs are great antioxidants.Now add loads of water to cover or even more. I usually fill up the slow cooker. Add some salt, pepper, turmeric and a couple tablespoons of cider vinegar.Let everything boil away all night. If you're not using a slow cooker, let it boil away for at least 4 hours.Then strain everything through a fine sieve and discard the solids.You have loads of choices now. Put the bone broth into the fridge, or divide it and freeze it. Some people drink it like tea. I can't see that happening here, but I do love to use it as a base for soups.Here's to your health:Inspire Health bone brothDr Andrew Weil's thoughts on bone brothPS: You've probably figured out that it's just soup! But it's an easily digestible and nutritionally rich soup with more mineral content. It doesn't come from a can so has no dangerous chemicals, white sugary noodles, rice or other starches or corn syrups to spike your insulin, it has no wonky cell inducing preservatives or colourants. It's filling, and cheap as chips to make. And as a benefit, it might just fight off the cold and flu. Soup's good for you. Ask your mom. Ask your grandma. You know they're right. :DContact Manhattan Tree Removal if you require their services with removing trees and weed or any kind of plant decay.