8/30/08

Beaded Face Swap


It's time for the sassy art goddess' beaded face swap if anyone would like to play...it's a one time deal only, so the committment is small, but you can make as many faces as you'd like, if one is not enough! These are the three I received last year...one from kathy vorenberg, one from grace daniels and one from The LeMieux-Ruibal's....kewl, eh!

8/28/08

This Morning....


it's nice and sunny for a change, so I walked over to the marina and took some photos of the boats and the bridge in the background....I'm really getting back into my morning walk because it sets me up so well for the rest of the morning...I come home raring to go!

8/27/08

Finished Sewing Pouch




It's done...just room for scissors and needlecase...thread will have to come in some other container...

8/26/08

Seals for Lisa


Instead of beading and making some final decisions about the bjp, I've been kind of goofing off.....for example my husband and I went to one of our local parks on friday and took a walk down to some tidepools to see the seals....they're sure a lot tinier and cuter than the sea lions that camp out on our bayside docks for part of the year....unfortunately, I didn't have my best camera with me so had to use the 3x zoom on my little casio...

8/24/08

Forced Update

It seems I've been forced to update to the new templates...none of which I like all that much, but I'm not savvy enough to make my own just now.
So, I've got a new header but the whole blog is scrunched in the middle of the screen, surrounded by acres of black, on my screen anyway. I'd like to use the minima stretched, but it doesn't come in basic black, so we're stuck with this for the moment.
And I appear to have lost all of my links and can't remember how to add them all back on...so that will have to stay as it is too...for now anyway.
All this started because I wanted to add the gadget or widget or whatever-it for the new BJP to my sidebar but I can't seem to figure out how to do that either...sigh....
Maybe I'll have more time and patience tomorrow...

Sewing Kit



I saw a beautifully bead embroidered needlecase on someone's website and decided to make a small sewing kit while waiting for inspiration for the BJP...I see that some of you are also still in the decision-making phase, so I'm not feeling pressure, but I would like to get some work done, and this little piece is a nice interim bit. The inside has a pocket for my tiny thread scissors and a small silver needlecase...not sure what to do about adding a place for thread...maybe I'll just skip that part since I use so many colors of nymo, I really couldn't begin to put them all in a petite sewing kit.

8/21/08

Rays of Sunshine


After several days of wind and rain, I glimpsed a few stray sunbeams this morning and have hopes there will be more to come. This has been a most unusual summer for weather...the other night we had thunder and lightening almost all night long, which is unheard of in this area. Usually we get a few flashes and booms and then it moves along....but this one just kept circling from the sounds of it and several times it sounded like an explosion right above the house! I was amazed the cats didn't all hide under the bed, but they all stayed with us.
Another ray of sunshine comes today from jackie of dogdaisychains, who has given me this lovely blogger award. Thanks, jackie! And if you haven't seen her blog yet, you have a major treat in store, especially if you're as passionate about color as I am!
I will be passing it along to some other bloggers, but need a while to find a couple that aren't already on my blogroll!

8/20/08

What's Happening?

I haven't really disappeared from the blogging world, but I have been limiting myself to mostly lurking this past week or so.
It's taken me a while to process the show and all the work that led up to it...and then to let it go and get on to the next bit of work.
I'm on the path toward the next bead journal project and the form I want my 12 months to take. Last year was a great challenge, but I want to raise the bar a bit this year and it's taking time to decide how high I want to go, lol!
Right now I'm heavily into the research stage where I spend lots of time looking at images and noting what catches my eye and mind and heart....lots of time spent, but a very relaxed part of the process.
As soon as the decisions are made, I'll be sharing them here. In the meantime, I hope you're all enjoying the last bit of summer and the early fall weather (we've been having here in Oregon)...

8/12/08

Opening Photos



Okay...I got a couple of photos from them of the beginning of the opening, before it got too crowded...I think after it got hectic, he was busy helping his wife answer questions about her work and the show...and this is the last you'll hear from me on this show....;)

8/11/08

Bead Journal Project Deadline

The deadline for signing up for the 08/09 BJP is this friday, the 15th, if anyone else is interested who hasn't signed up yet. This has been a great learning experience for me and I encourage anyone who is at all interested in doing bead embroidery to sign up. Your committment can be as much or as little as you like...one gal did little bead embroidered buttons, so no project is too small!

8/9/08

Dang

Well, darn, anyway, still haven't got the opening photos from the other artist's husband....I thought I'd have them by now....oh well, depending on other folks' timeframes being the same as mine gets me in trouble every time!
Went to the pow wow yesterday with friends but bought very little....guess I do finally have most all the beads I need...that's a surprise!
I'm working this morning and have already had several folks visit the gallery...nice comments left for us too.
I'm back to thinking about what I am going to do for the bead journal project next month...I am determined to make the decision on what it will look like all finished before I even begin it!

8/5/08

Playing with stamps


A very sweet friend sent me some fabulous old hamilton wood type and some copper etched stamps, mostly advertising and dingbats, and I finally got to play with them a bit. I tried regular rubber stamp ink on paper and fabric this morning just to see if the metal faces would take the ink...no problem, it worked fine! So now I'll be using some of them in my future work, although I'm not sure just how yet...it will develop as I go along, I'm sure.
I just love the little cat...she's black and white or red and white...reminds me of my Sumi...

8/4/08

Bizzy Weekend






It was a busier weekend than I expected....the turnout for the opening was awesome....I didn't stop talking from 5:20, when I opened it up to 7:20 when I closed....many more friends came than I expected and there were many I wished I had been able to spend more time with! We went out to eat afterward but the outdoor dinner I'd planned on was impossible due to the very cold wind that was blowing, so we ended up sitting inside...much warmer but the music was a bit too loud for comfortable conversation. Next time I'll change a few things!



A dear friend brought us this incredibly blooming salvia....jaime took it from the trunk into the wheelbarrow and chuck wheeled it into the back yard and it's new home....we found the perfect place for it and the hummers have already found it...thanks so much, lisa!
Sunday a friend and I went upriver to a car show and street fair in toledo and the warmth was very welcome after the cold wind in newport!
I was too busy to take any photos of the opening but the other artist's husband had a camera and took quite a few and I hope he'll send me a couple to post here. The basho pieces received many wonderful comments, the hand pieces sure looked better here than in my rather dark living room and the little guardian spirits showed up beautifully against the unique metal paper a friend gave me.
Today I'm taking it easy....I'm driving to the park and taking my journal with me and I'll be processing a bit and also searching for the next path I need to be taking....


oh...and the lovely couple above is our son jaime and his girlfriend holly....their being here made the weekend just perfect for us....

8/2/08

Basho Statement

I wrote this piece to hang on the wall next to the Basho series...it has already led to several deep conversations, since so many people have someone they know who has gone through breast cancer.....



In 2003 I was diagnosed with breast cancer, underwent the standard treatment, (surgery, chemo, radiation), and began living with the spectre of cancer in my life. I read that Anna Halprinn calls the experience of having cancer and facing ones own mortality, “as enlightenment at gunpoint”. I found that to be an apt metaphor for my feelings as well. In my case it also gave me the opportunity to see making art (visual art in my case) not as just a way of self expression, but also as a path to healing.

My first effort in that direction was to name some small amulets I had just begun making as “guardian spirits”. I had made the first one just a few months before my diagnosis and often wonder about their coming into my life at just that point.

The fiber and bead amulets were in the shape of the “hamsa” hand of the mideast that are used as amulets against bad luck or evil spirits. I added a small face and hands and breasts (almost all my guardians have been female) and a necklace for those who want to wear them, and began to sell and give them away. I sold them in the galleries that carried my beaded jewelry and gave away a few to folks who had been diagnosed with cancer or other life threatening illnesses.

Three years later I realized that I needed to take another step toward self healing. The amulets were for protection but I wanted to heal myself, to help my body get back into balance...to go from defense to offence. I didn’t want to sit and wait for cancer to attack again....I wanted to make myself a very unwelcoming host.

One of the best ways of dealing with anxiety and stress for me is to make art, so I was looking for something I could relate to healing and ran across a short quote from Basho regarding his journey, in 1689, to the northern interior of Japan. This led me to the translation of the book made by Sam Hamil in 1991. In his translation, I read that the title of the book referred both to the physical journey Basho made, and to the spiritual journey that went step by step with the actual road he traveled. I felt a strong connection to the idea of a spiritual journey and decided to make a series of bead embroideries that related both to Basho’s journey and to mine. His trip had been separated into 44 different sections, loosely based on the towns he reached each night, so I decided to make 44 different 4x4 inch bead embroideries.

I started collecting fabric ( I work most of my bead embroideries on cotton batik fabrics backed by a heavier pellon for support) in December of 2006 and started beading the first piece in January 2007. I finished the series in July 2008.

8/1/08

Lights!




Hey...I can see the beadwork!