Taking Flight--The Power of Community

Flying Lessons is available as a print on my esty shop

Only two years ago, a community of artists formed out of Kelly Rae's online class, Flying Lessons. I am proud to be one of these artists, and very proud and delighted to be included in a show of paintings by fellow flyers at the Lede Studio and Gallery!

Sail Away is available as a print on my etsy shop

Lede Gallery is in Wake Forest, North Carolina, so some some of my work is all the way across the country being viewed by people thousands of miles away!

Besides the painting "Flying Lessons", I am also showing "Sail Away", "Golden Pathway", and "Walking on Water".

I have a confession to make, though. I was scared to send my original paintings on silk, priced at $450 to $900, to a gallery I had never heard of so far away. So I sent archival prints, matted and framed.

I Am So in Love with Alder Leaves!

I am so in love with alder leaves! Each one so perfect and no two quite alike! Some of them I printed on silk.

I'm In! Countryside Online Art Exhhibit!

Golden Pathway is available as art prints and cards in my etsy shop

My very first online art competition, and I'm in! 140 artists from all over the world entered 455 pieces this show, "Countryside", curated by the online gallery Light Space and Time. "Golden Pathway was one of 80 selected in the category "painting and other".

"Golden Pathway" is one of my favorite pieces, inspired by a summer walk with my beloved in a magical madrona forest on D'Çourcy Island in BC. It was a time of complete love, sailing in the sun, being exactly where I wanted to be. When my beloved died before the following summer, this image helped carry me through the grief. It has come to represent doing the work I am meant to do and that I love, being where I want to be, and being loved and in love.

May you experience walking the Golden Pathway in your life!

Archival art prints and cards of this image are available in my etsy shop.

The Quaker Lady and the Sufi Man

Want to know why I am so happy lately? Here he is!

Who knew that this Christian Quaker mama would fall in love with a Muslim Sufi man? Or that we would find the same God, the same values, the same vision of the Divine at the core of our Spiritual practices?

p.s. He's wearing a hat I made just for him, of raw silk.

The Storm Inside

Today feels like a lost day. Tropical Storm/Hurricane/cyclone Sandy is battering the East Coast, and a part of me is hunkered down with the millions of people without power being battered by the wind and water. Here it is only raining, for the 8th straight day, and the storm inside me is not life threatening. It just feels that way.

It's because I am starting something new. It has to do with my soul/business mission which emerged during Kelly Rae's ecourse "Hello Soul, Hello Business".

It seemed so easy at the time: celebrate the good that ordinary people are doing by featuring them on my blog, wearing one of my scarves. I tell their story and link to their online presence and to my etsy shop where my scarves are for sale. Win-win, right? And lots of fun to do.

So why am I so scared all of a sudden? On the way to do my first photo shoot, I almost backed out. My first model is a good friend and someone I admire for her commitment to making a life centered on love and spirit, some one with a story worth telling--and suddenly I have writer's block. I am battered with doubts and fears and don't know how to proceed.

Well, when in doubt, ride it out. Things will come clear soon enough. As Tama Kieves tells us:

"Don’t EVER give up on your gift dear one. There’s a reason you have the dream you have. It’s a bright commandment, a certified treasure map, the ticket to the rest of your life. "

Exploring silk painting techniques: Itajime with soy resist

Maple leaf image over itajime pattern

This piece made it into the show at the Blue Heron Gallery! The background was done with a Japanese technique called itajime; for the foreground I used a real maple leaf, a tjanting tool, and soy wax resist. With Itajime, one folds the cloth in various ways and sandwiches it between blocks or clamps before immersing it in the dye. The blocks or clamps resist the dye, creating a pattern.
 

tjanting tools from Dharma Trading Co

The tjanting tool is a tool for drawing lines of resist onto cloth. The copper bowl holds the melted wax resist, keeping it warm enough to flow out of the narrow spout like ink from a pen. The wax prevents the dye from meeting the cloth, creating effects such as the lines defining the maple leaf in the image above.

You can do some wonderful things with Itajime and with tjanting tools! If you take my class on Nov 11, I will teach you some tricks.

 Check out some of these web sites for what you can do with itajime:

Kaizen Journey
Entwinements
Dye Candy
Dye Smithy

Making a Dream Come True

I bought a boat. It's a Catalina 27, a 27' sailboat that fits me! It's a dream come true--and a huge learning experience.
So here I am, a single woman in my 60's, an artist living on social security trying to make a business of my art--and I have the gall to buy a sailboat!? Hey, making art and developing a business are full time activities in themselves, and now I have a boat?! Who do I think I am?? AND I plan to go to Thailand in February?

It's all about who I want to be in the world and what I want to do with my life and with my art. The bottom line is, I want to share with everyone I meet the Joy of living. I want to open my heart to the Divine Awareness and to every person I come in contact with, listening for opportunities to express the Joy, the Love, the Compassion that have been given to me. And I want boating to be a part of that vision.

son Jeremy and River

When I was in Port Townsend (the best boating town I know) this summer for the Edge Program for Visual Artists, I got back in touch with my love for sailing and for cruising. It was time for me to get a boat. When this little Catalina 27 came available for $3000, I jumped on it. I tell you, I could TASTE how much I wanted this boat. I borrowed $ from my son (It is nice to have hardworking good earning sons!) and put money down on it within 15 minutes of checking it out.

grand daughter River on the boat

And it has opened up my life! The joy of sailing and working on the boat with my sons is--dare I say it?--even greater than sailing with my soul mate was when he was living. The friendships I have made and renewed are already accumulating. What I need for the boat comes easily; the right person to help and advise just shows up when I need them most!

And I am learning to do new things, like make the right mixture of gas and oil for the outboard motor (Ugh! I hate...I mean, I am not comfortable with small engines). Fixing the leaks now that the rain has come. Figuring out how to put in reefing lines (to make the sail smaller when the wind is stronger).