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the project is nearly done!
this morning i was a little cranky about how the objects were coming out,
but worked hard on them today, taking some stuff off and adding
words! ever-important words!
then some shiny gloss varnish.
and now i love them!

and now i guess i must scan.
ugh. not my favorite thing, to be sure

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duh bobbi. shouldn't this have been #23? duh?
ok! never mind. i changed it. i'm happier now.

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it's a good weekend.
the poet's birthday.
1/2price gooseberry pie & organic vanilla ice cream.
walks in the woods.
lots of movies!

and then someone went and hacked my site.
DON'T GO THERE!!

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i am so glad i had this one marked for today

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an old old favorite. i wish i could remember where this was...

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detail of the serving bar at Berry Austin (froyo! yum!)
on of the most amazing contemporary examples of pique assiette EVER.
the tops is all pale. the bottom all color.

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Fade. 2010
Mixed Media on Board. 36" x 36"
Anthony May

i always forget to mention it, but i keep a tumblr going, as a digital scrapbook for the (personally) inspiring art that i find online. at first i just kept it to myself, but i may as well share since it is becoming LOADED with goodies. so much beauty in the world...

cobaltika : cosas diarias

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i did it!!!!

Real Live BREAD!

sure, i cook my own food all the time. it is so much more nutritious and so much less expensive, even for only 1 person. and basic stuff is really easy. but BAKING ... i haven't done that in YEARS (other than a very-seldom pan of brownies from a box mix for the poet). i don't even keep flour and sugar and baking ingredients in the house anymore. but i have had a hair up my tail for baking my own bread lately and yesterday acquired a bit of flour (they only had pastry flour in the bin, though. i was a little worried...), yeast and some cane sugar from the co-op. i made myself a promise that i would do it TODAY, even though i was intimidated and i DID. i used a very basic recipe from Joy of Cooking, for the first time, but i would really like to add more grains and stuff eventually.

i can report that although they are not beautiful pieces, they are each quite tasty. #1 was meant to be sort of a rustic loaf, but it sprawled out and was sort of flat, only about 2" high. the taste was fine, though, especially dipped into some sweet Spanish olive oil! now at least i'll bet i can make a focaccia!! #2 was an experiment, because i thought two loaves of whitish bread would be pretty dull. so i grated a big handful of cheddar and threw in a handful of the Hatch green chiles that i roasted last month, then froze, for just such occasions as this. i rolled it all into the dough and threw the lump in the pan and it worked! a little over-brown on an exposed cheese place on top and on the bottom another cheesy place stuck to the pan a little, but mostly ... nice!

jeez. i hope i don't eat it all tonight. it smells amazing and tastes delicious, but i'm not used to bread and i can already feel a lump in my belly just from tasting. i'm probably safe.

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i wanted to find something sort of john lennonish today, in honor of his birthday, one that would have turned him ... omigod ... 70. but i couldn't exactly, nothing good enough, so i looked at other things. i went for a long walk this morning and noticed that the leaves are not exciting yet. every year i forget exactly when it will happen. i do remember that there is often red and bright orange at halloween and sometimes even snow. shocking. it will come. i feel like i can't quite keep up lately. it is all so fast. life is.

i like this little october project. the objects themselves, involving the images, are also coming along quite nicely. i am liking them, too. it is good to have something besides mystery novels and dinner and financial/legal terrors to focus on. and it is a good discipline, too, because next month is ... NANOWRIMO!!! ... and i think i am going to do it again. really!

also, i am going to bake bread tomorrow. not in a machine.

it has been many years.

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some time i will probably write something too, but for now, i'm patting myself kindly for at least doing *this* consistently!

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in the past few years, i have had a "daily october project" of some kind. maybe not last year? it is a good exercise and i have ended up with some pretty good stuff. i love the idea of a timed project. so i have decided to do it this year, too. starting today i will make portraits of details. i can use lots of my old images, there are so many unpublished ones and it is a good chance to go back and examine them and reflect. i actually *want* to use the old images and not try to shoot new ones every day, although i will likely be inspired to make some new pictures. i notice i am not shooting as many details as "big pictures" lately, and i think that is a commentary on how i am looking at my life too often. it is good to look and appreciate the small and close.

then, with the images made each day, i will turn them into 31 objects - all 5 x 7 - and not one per day! gah! do i want to go crazy? they will be completed by the end of the month and then i will show them. the objects will only use available art materials, of which i have many.

it will be fun.

somewhere in Austin
the pink shutters seem so ... hopeful
i know i know - i'm quiet as a mouse

i went to Texas & all i got were these 3 little pictures

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well. not *exactly* true. but pretty close. this has to be my all-time-low-number-of-piccies-made trip to ... *anywhere*. the only time i took my camera out was on the long long walk on a Saturday morning with Margaret through Hyde Park. otherwise, i visited, ate, drove the rental car, visited, helped my mama with as many chores and errands as she would let me, watched TV (shudder), read books, sewed beads on paper stuff, hung out with BOTH girls having the best time EVER, ate, drank, let Betsy cut my hair, visited, ate, drove the rental car. there really wasn't the kind of independent wandering time i need for making pictures, but i always see lots of places i *will* wander in the future. when i am not always just a visitor - trying to spend as much quality time with mi familia as possible. still, i can't believe i did not make pictures of Betsy and Margaret. NONE. and none of little Kathy either. what kind of mother/aunt am i anyway???

then i came back and went right back to work. no one noticed that i had nearly a foot of hair cut off. i really *am* invisible! a ghost in this place. i missed my cat a lot when i came home, but was glad he was not miserably missing me while i was gone for so long. and that no friend or neighbor had to come in for his feeding and find him dead. he lived with me for a long time - 11 years. and he was good. {{xox-King Tubby-xox}}

i am liking Texas more and more (even though i once swore i would never live there again never). but god. there is a LOT of vehicular traffic in Austin.

final summer updates at etsy and artfire

it has been fun working with the cool colors this summer - and the creatures. a nice change from architecture! (which i still love and will not stop). the last of the summer pieces are listed now. and i will soon be on my way to Texas for a longer-than-usual stay, which will include a good long stay with my mama in the country and then a weekend with BOTH GIRLS in Austin and Fredericksburg. i will also get to see both sisters and their menfolk and little Kathy, too. i am happy for all this!

i am going to take some small handwork with me, for the country, for some experiments, and when i return, i feel a different work coming on. i can't quite see it though... i'm ready to surprise myself, though.

¡adiós para ahora!

pictures from the prairie

tallgrass prairie national park kansas
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old schoolhouse : tallgrass prairie national park kansas
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butterfly porn : cottonwood falls kansas
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abandoned house w/curious bays : cottonwood falls kansas
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konza prairie kansas
(poet does not have a fatbutt, he is kindly carrying all my water on his hips!)
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collared lizard : konza prairie kansas
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white prairie clover : konza prairie kansas
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native stone scenic byway : flint hills kansas

it was so much fun.

before i get started on prairie pictures and the like, i thought it might be best to announce that (even though it seems like i just drive around and look at stuff) i *did* finish the work from last week and it is awesome and it is on Etsy if you would like to have a look! just click to go!

i know no one even *looks* at a post without pictures these days, but i'm doing it anyway. just writing. i *do* have pictures, but i haven't played with them yet, and -gasp- i could not *possibly* show pictures straight from the cammie could i???

the poet and i had a small vacation over a long weekend. we do not have big expectations for "vacation". sure, it would be fun to go far and long, but we have neither the time or funds for such and tend to find delight in most any adventure. so, we chose to visit old and new (to us) places in Kansas. we had lots of wholesome food packed and much water. we took a weekend special rentalMobile instead of tinaMerlot, because it might be best for tina to stay closer to home at her age.

first, we drove to the starting point of one of our favorite drives in Chase County, stopping for diner breakfast in downtown Emporia first. our rental car had XM radio and the poet was instantly enchanted with Spa station, which made the whole trip, with the prairies rolling past the windows, somewhat hallucinatory. fun without drugs! i did most of the driving, because i like to, and also to ensure that if there is a little town i want to take a spin through, it gets done! we stopped in Cottonwood Falls to view the river from the arched bridge, then took the back road to Elmdale, as it looked like rain, so we did not want to take our hike yet.

Elmdale is an old ghostTown, with only a few inhabitants. i have made pictures there several times. there is good stuff to see. one of my favorite places is the old school and gymnasium. it is now USED! i had heard through the dark Kansas grapevine, that it had been purchased. i could not imagine a prissy B&B there. in that town. but instead, a church group has acquired the place and are restoring it for a community center for local kids. as i was poking around outside, the woman in charge came out and she was GLAD to give us a tour and tell us all about. it was so cool to get to go INSIDE the old school and gym! the kids are actually doing most of the work themselves and are amazing. they are re-using lots of the structural things, like using fallen-down-tin-ceilings as patches for walls, etc. and pieces of blackboard for floor repairs. it is funky and cool! i will visit again, i'm sure.

so it was afternoon and baking HOT by the time we got to the Tallgrass Prairie, but we loaded up with sunscreen and water bottles and our hats and took off anyway for a 2 mile hike. the season is wrong for the best wildflowers, but we enjoyed ourselves. it is a beautiful place. then we checked in to the Prairie Fire Inn, where we have stayed before. showers and rest, then out again to Cottonwood Falls for catfish and some townWandering, more carExploring. all good!

next morning, after a stop in a Council Grove donut shop for my coffee (where people were actually drinking Pepsi and eating donuts first thing in the morning! gah! mature people even, not kids!) we continued our scenic drive north to the Konza Prairie, near Manhattan, where we have never been. WE WILL DEFINITELY GO BACK. it was a little tricky to find, especially as we didn't print off the directions and only had a general idea, but we found the entry and set off for a hike. there were options, but we chose the 3 mile for this visit. it was a beautiful place, the landscape much different from the Tallgrass, more hilly and varied. even different wildflowers, that we had not seen before. and the best thing was a viewing of a large, turquoise-blue collared lizard! posing on a stone, just waiting for me to spot him. baby lizards were all over the paths.

after the hike, we stopped in Alma for a picnic of havarti dill cheese, seeduction bread, mustard, cucumber hummus, baby carrots, cold water. then continued on down the scenic native stone byway, touring through Eskridge (where i have longed to go back, wandering, but it was WAY TOO HOT that day) and Harveyville and Burlingame and finally back home. showers and macbook theatre. okra gumbo from the freezer.

next day, we left from home, hiked in Weston Bend (too humid, kind of nasty and overgrown, a little spooky, i thought. all those spider webs!), drove to Atchison, picnicked by the river, walked at some favorite places (including an open house of an awesome 1880's house up for auction! ooo! i love to go IN.), got lost in farmLand, made it back, more macbook theatre and the Chinese buffet. a good vacation!!

pictures to follow.

next up - Texas in two weeks. whew.

here is something i seldom, if ever, do. show work-in-progress.

but i just cannot show more floofyGreen summery pictures or whine about the heat and lack of wandering. i have no current drama to allude to. (whew. i don't want any.) no travels (although they are upcoming!). although i mention the artTable constantly, it must seem from the contents of this journal that i never do things there. yet i spend time there daily. most stuff i just can't show. *i* don't even want to look at it. but finally, i have been inspired to make some more small pieces and now they want to fly out of me, so i am letting them.

these new pieces are peaceful and fun to work on. i didn't realize how much the destruction of the Gulf had invaded my consciousness, until i realized the sea colors and creatures were appearing. there will also be waterBirds. last night i thought they might be finished, until i scanned them and looked at the images and they are a bit too sterile just yet. i don't seem to want to make work as fussy and distressed as in the past, but i still like more ... texture ... so a little more work today, then. they will go to Etsy and a few to ArtFire - which i am already quite disenchanted with and they better not try to pull another 3 months fees from my payPal before i can figure how to cancel it.

now that my hands have been busy with these, my mind saw the light on some other pieces that have been put aside for a couple of months and i am working with those, too. once in a while i squeeze out some paint and wrestle a bit with that, but ... still ... not pleased!

i am up so early this morning that there is no excuse for not taking a long walk. i have barely had a step of exercise in the past two weeks, not even walking to work, since moving to the new offices. but next week i will start walking up to campus and riding the express bus. that will feel better. i don't want my butt to blossom one more inch. i think the heat is finally breaking a little. wait. no whining about the heat!!! onward. coffee. hike. artStuff.

it has been a long, exhausting, somewhat depressing and unsettling week in mi vida. luckily i don't have time to go on and on about it this morning! we did move into the new building at work this week. it was pretty stunning. the space is just amazing. everyone was quite excited, running around like kids, exclaiming over everything. yes, me too! the image above is not the best view of the building, but i liked it from the little pier over the pond. yesterday wasn't quite as hot, so i went exploring at lunch time. to the pond. and also to the butterfly garden, which we have a view over from certain parts of the building. i couldn't wait to go there. for being in the middle of corporateCampus it was quite lovely. so many flowers! two goldfinches flew over while i was wandering around. there wasn't as much life in the pond as i hoped, but it was nice anyway. now off to the city to be a girlfriend and see movies!