Finding Peace

After the post about my skydiving daughter I finally wanted to take you back to Europe. But then I decided this afternoon to re-organize our two grab-and-go boxes. This has been on my list for a while and since we're in wildfire season I felt it necessary to tend to this task now. Over the past two years we have put everything that we deemed important and that we didn't want to lose into these boxes without any order. Today was the day to finally get some order in there and also throw out things that didn't belong in there anymore. I discarded dozens of copies of birth and marriage certificates that weren't notarised as well as looked through piles of photos and organized them again, throwing away those that I'm no longer interested in or that turned up twice or even three times. Now the two boxes are neatly organized again with one being the "must take" and the other the "want take". 

But what I didn't get done was writing that blogpost. So today there's only a short post about something that I wanted to show you a while back.

Sometime in the spring I showed you this art journal spread. This was the moment when I got stuck and had no real idea how to go on. I put it to the side and let it sit, knowing that at a certain point I would come back with an idea.

Instead I continued practicing drawing faces. In one video - I can't remember by whom - I saw someone starting drawing a face with the features of the face and not the shape. I was intrigued and tried that, never explicitly adding the shape of the face.

Well, I really need to work on eyes, she looks creepy. But the important thing is that this gave me the inspiration how to proceed with my art journal page.

I started out with drawing the facial features using an aquarellable graphite pencil. Afterwards I added the outline of the face and neck. Then I stencilled the grasses and wildflowers as well as rather sloppy birds. Finally, I added the words "Ruhe finden" which translates to finding peace.

In the end I like the right side page better than the left one. It could stand on its own I think.

These are my faces for this week's Friday Face Off. Thank you, Nicole, for letting us join in the fun!

Escaping into my Art Journal

 

In my last post I wrote that I have gone back to art journaling in order to escape at least for a short time the dreadfulness of the current times. However, the page spread above I did a year ago, but I never showed it here on my blog.

The following page I also started about a year ago. I had stencilled the forest and the purple women, but then got stuck and couldn't decide how to proceed. In cases like that I usually take a break and step away.

I stepped away for quite a while. But just a couple weeks ago I pulled it up again and suddenly knew how to go on. I simply added the white human shapes, some purple textures in the upper corners, whitish dots and finally the stars - done. 

The following page is for Nicole's Friday Face Off.

The nosegay stencil was my inspiration here. This was a very quick page, I didn't have to think very long what to do (and usually I'm very slow with my artwork). I worked this one on an existing page that I had started and didn't like. So I gessoed over it, glued down some book pages and tissue paper, covered with gesso and rubbed away some of the gesso in places. Then I stencilled with raw sienna and payne's grey and rubbed the remaining color around the page. Added some dots and text - done. 

For quite some time I had played with the idea of making a page about hollyhocks. I love these old fashioned flowers. Under these layers there also is a lot of journaling about my "love affair" with hollyhocks. This page also came together smoothly without any longer breaks. One technique I enjoy doing is painting with watercolor over acrylic paint or gesso - the effects are so beautiful and the watercolor does whatever it wants. The pink scrolls were done that way.

And here's a page I'm stuck with.

I started this one out with gluing down torn sheet music on the gessoed pages, then spread fluid acrylic in titanium buff on top of it and then watercolor. I messed up some of the birds of the stencil (that's beneath those circles), but now I have no clue how to proceed. I guess I have to put it to the side for a while, knowing that eventually I will come up with something.

I hope everyone has a lovely weekend. We're going to have the first warm and sunny weekend this spring.

The Art & Soul of Spring

 

After spending most of the past weeks at home with only short walks in the neighborhood because of my stupid knee, I drove to the lake last Wednesday. While I couldn't walk for an extended period, I did a bit of walking and sat on a bench, writing in my journal and just enjoying the view and being out in nature. I had missed that so very much. In March I will have surgery on the knee and I hope that after that I will eventually be able to hike again.

That Wednesday was the only day in the week with some sunshine; all the other days it rained and especially this president's weekend has been quite stormy again. Nevertheless, on Saturday we met up with friends for some wine tasting and this serves as my ticket for Bleubeard and Elizabeth's T Tuesday.

The rest of the rainy days I was working on a new spread in my art journal. I started out with a page where I had already spread some leftover paint and now glued down several torn book pages. It looked rather chaotic and not very inspiring.

I had a half-baked idea in my mind and wanted to add some pink or magenta.

Oh dear! That was a little bit too bold even for me, so I tried to tone it down with some titanium buff.

I was struggling how to get out of this ugly phase and just left it for a day. When I came back later, I painted the entire page with a layer of titanium buff and added some pictures of mainly pink flowers.

That already looked a lot better. I decided I didn't like the look of the titanium buff and mixed white gesso with just a little bit of quinacridone magenta to achieve a light pink color that I painted around the pictures and across the page. I also pressed a heavy fabric stamp into parts of the gesso mix and painted that with watercolor.

Finally, I stamped randomly with my French text stamp, called the page "The Art & Soul of Spring", glued down some bits of texts I had cut out of German magazines, framed them with watercolor crayons, added a flower-shaped ribbon and used a stencil with differently sized dots and white gesso - done. 

I'm quite happy with the result. I hadn't thought that I would end up with this after I had got stuck in the "ugly phase". 

I hope everyone has a good T Tuesday and a lovely week.

A Slow Sunday

 

One of my bird mugs for Bleubeard and Elizabeth's T Tuesday

Yesterday brought an atmospheric river to our region, and this time it rightly was called like that. The torrential downpours started Saturday night at 11:00 pm and wouldn't stop until Sunday night, except for very short breaks. But worse than the rain was the gusty wind that was near hurricane force and only started to lose strength on Sunday night. We kept inside the entire day, spending a very slow Sunday and every now and then watching the rain and wind playing wildly in the garden. Thankfully we didn't lose anything, but there were several fallen trees across the county and also some flooding that closed roads. We also didn't lose power as so many others did.

Our primary election will be on March 5th (Super Tuesday), so after breakfast I thoroughly read our Voters Information Guide and learned more about the candidates for State Assembly and the Superior Court Office. There are also propositions and measures to consider. I had already made up my mind about the presidential candidate and the candidate for the US Senate.

The evening before I had made a dough for a whole wheat bread that proved overnight and was ready to be put into the oven. This is our go-to bread when I bake because it's easy to make, and I always enjoy the warmth and the scent of freshly baked bread spreading throughout the house.

The day before I had recevied an order for baby socks in my Etsy shop, so I packed them up, ready for shipping. My goal is plastic-free packaging - used tissue paper, baker's twine, cardboard envelopes. I always include a little stamped and handwritten thank you card and a small Moo business card with my photography.

Sometime last year I took some of the taster lessons - I can't remember whether this one was for Kaleidoscope or Life Book. Anyway, this was a lesson by Melanie Rivers whose style I like very much. I never finished what I had started and completely forgot what she was doing even though I had jotted down a couple notes. So I just did my own thing which is more fun after all. I experimented with watercolor on a textured gessoed background and liked the result. The dark background color I mixed with Phthalo Blue and Burnt Umber. I need to put down a second layer because it looks a bit chaotic, but I really like this rich color.

Dorothy wrote a post on her blog The Frog & PenguInn about loneliness in which she mentioned the organisation Letters Against Isolation. Here, volunteers write letters or cards to seniors who live in Assisted Living or Nursing Homes or are served by Meals on Wheels. LAI was started by two sisters during the pandemic when seniors were very much isolated and couldn't receive any visitors. After reading Dorothy's post I went to LAI's website to learn more. Now I have signed up to participate in writing letters/cards to seniors and on this slow Sunday I prepared my first cards for this. Thank you, Dorothy, for writing about this important organisation.

Finally, after having made a cup of hot chocolate for both the Geek and myself in the afternoon, I settled on our couch and continued knitting this bird hat. Last fall I had a good number of them in different color combinations in the shop, but they completely sold out before Christmas and I didn't have the time to knit more until now. The color stranding looks challenging, but isn't that difficult at all. 

Do you sometimes have slow Sundays (or any other day of the week) and do you enjoy them? I loved our slow Sunday and felt very relaxed and happy at the end of it.

A Face and a Walk

 

Several weeks ago I showed you this spread in my art journal that I had just started. It took me forever to work on it and eventually today I called it finished because honestly, I became fed up with it.

First off, I don't like the face. I traced it from an ad in a magazine, but during the process I found out that I'm really not that good with painting realistic faces. At least not with this one and I think I will take a break in trying to paint human faces. It also took me forever to get out of the "ugly phase" - that's when I decided to add flowers. This was a bit of an experiment, because I painted these flowers with watercolors. Now, the substrate - papers collaged with matte medium and painted over with acrylic paints - is less than ideal for using watercolor and of course they reacted completely different than on watercolor paper - and I actually liked that. As the final touches I stamped a few butterflies and of course birds. I like the right page of the spread, but not so much the left one.

This is for Nicole's Friday Face Off.

Last Thursday my friend K and I went for a walk at Riverfront Park near Windsor, two lakes snuggled among the vineyards. I hadn't been there for several years, but it hasn't really changed very much.

We walked along Lake Wilson and when we arrived at Lake Benoist we were greeted by the following sign:

I remember when I was here last, we weren't able to get around the lake on the trail, but had to climb over boulders at the very end of the lake to continue the loop. It seems that this is an ongoing problem...

Even though the parking lot was rather full, we didn't see many people. It was an overcast day, perfect for a walk or hike.

Beautiful willows line the shore.

The trail for the most part followed the shore and only every now and then would lead further away. It was an easy hike.

There weren't as many wildflowers as at Spring Lake or Crane Creek, but we did see a few.

Natives on top: Blue elderberry (Sambucus mexicana) on the left and California wildrose (Rosa californica) on the right

Non-natives on the bottom: Greater periwinkle (Vinca major, very invasive) on the left and Anthemis cotula aka Stinking Chamomille on the right.

For our way back we decided to not walk along the lake again but take a different trail a bit higher up. It was a lovely walk and I always enjoy introducing K to new places. We have so many lovely Regional Parks here and I love to explore them.

Playing in My Art Journal

 

Finally, after a very long dry spell, I have a little bit of "art" to show you today. A couple weeks ago I played in my art journal again. The photo above was the beginning; I had arrived at that phase when I didn't really know how to go on and stepped away from it for a day or two. I find that this almost always helps . Eventually I continued working on it - I forgot to take any photos of the progress, so here is the complete page:

It's pretty obvious that I created this page while joining an online meditation retreat with Sharon Salzberg.

Both Valerie and Erika encouraged me to link to the AJJ challenge "Anything Goes".

A couple days later I started another page, but so far I haven't got beyond the "ugly" phase.

At the moment I have no idea how to go on from here, but something will eventually come up.

While trying to get some order on my work table (unsucessfully), I found this mixed media piece again that I started sometime last fall and then put it to the side because I wasn't happy and also didn't know what to do next with it. When I looked at it this time, I realized that this looks like Mount Bennett, a mountain I can see from my bedroom window. I hadn't noticed this before. This gives me a much better idea how to proceed.

This was my art part for Rain's Thursday Art and Dinner Date. Let's get to the food now. This is not dinner, but what I sometimes have for lunch. Four falafel (these are the frozen ones from Trader Joe's) with a ripe avocado, followed by a piece of chocolate as desert. Yummy. 

No Blank Page Left

 

Oh the feel of an almost full art journal! I love when the pages bend and bulge because there are so many layers on them. It is very satisfying.

I bought this Strathmore art journal a few years ago and it was sitting empty on a shelf for a long time. I started working in it almost three years ago, but only for a short period of time. Finally this summer I pulled it out again. After having quit my job I thought it was a good time to start filling its pages again.

While it is still not complete, I can now say that not a single blank page is left. At least some kind of background is on each page and I know that eventually they will be turned into something that is not just a background.

Some pages I started out purposefully with journaling that I then covered up.

The first sentence often was a question or quote I heard or read somewhere. I journal in both German and English, depending how I feel at the moment, and often it's a mix of both languages. The page with the birds was written in German whereas the text on the page in the picture above is written in English. What I specifically love about art journals is that they are not accomplished art but opprotunities to try things out. The flowers above were painted with Derwent Inktense ink pencils that I had never worked with before and that I came to love for their brilliant colors. 

For the page above I used watercolors. I had never really dared to work with watercolors and was never "serious" about it. However, I found out that they make wonderful backgrounds and I enjoy mixing colors to create diffferent shades. In this page I also tore up papers that I had made with the Gelli plate, got the inspiration for the frame from some online workshop (I forgot which one) and used one of my all-time favorite stamps, "Silhouette Script" by Dina Wakley.

As you can tell, I really like this stamp.

Oh, and I love to work with stencils. They can add such fun elements to a page.

Sometimes I just create a page about something I love ("Sunsource" by Stampington & Company is another favorite stamp).

One Sunday morning not even two months after I had quit my high school job I felt so thankful that I didn't have to go to work the following day that I spontaneously created a page about the carefree Sunday mornings that I finally had back. I love our Sunday mornings - they are slow with a late breakfast and usually I spend them in my studio either writing or playing with mixed media. It has a very different quality from all the other days.

The last page I want to show you is my currently favorite page because it is the most meaningful to me.

I do my best work in the morning. Is it because of the coffee?

This elephant mug is my ticket for T Tuesday hosted by Elizabeth at Altered Book Lover. We also used to have a red one, but it broke several years ago.

The little "Trust" bird was made by Kelly Thiel, the little owl was a gift from my friend Jo when she moved to Portland, OR, and the dromedary I bought in Egypt many many years ago. These three things are very special to me.

Exploring the Possibilities

 

Usually I don't choose a word of the year. I used to do it a few years back, but I eventually found that I could never find a word that would guide me through the year. After a couple months it disappeared into the background never to turn up again. I then decided that a word of the year is not for me and just because everyone else is having one doesn't necessarily mean that I need to have one as well.

This year though was different. The word found me.

Just like in the past years I didn't think of a word. The thought didn't even pass my mind. But suddenly, out of nowhere, it was there - "explore". And I thought "how fitting for this new chapter in my life", the life after work at the high school. Since I had left my job last summer my days were full with my other job (teaching German) and my Etsy shop that became very busy as soon as September rolled around, but has slowed down a bit now that Christmas is over. Now I can explore.

No, I won't fly solo around the world - I'm not Amelia.

I sat down with my art journal and explored "explore". Beneath all these layers of paint and papers is my writing, my thoughts and hope for my version of explore. I want to spend more time in nature again, maybe even try some nature journaling. I want to learn bird identification by their sounds. I want to write more and read more non-fiction. My garden calls to me every day and I plan to transfer it even more to a low water garden, using less and less water on drought tolerant plants. I still need to learn - explore - a lot in this regard. There is also art journaling that I would like to explore more deeply - and for that reason I enrolled in Laly Mille's art journal class. 

But most of all I want to go back to photography and explore it more. I have missed "serious" photography these past two years a lot. Yes, I took tons of photos with my phone, but I actually want to get my dSLR out again and play around with my camera, be creative with different settings and depth of field. I know how much this makes my heart sing and how I view the world from different perspectives. It makes me more observant. I'm dreaming of trying new things, maybe even black and white photography. I want to use my skills because I know that photography is the art form I can do best and I enjoy the most.

I will still use my phone since I am not always able to carry my big camera everywhere. The phone is definitely much handier (is that why it's called "handy" in German?). But I have found a backpack that has a front compartment that is designed for "real" cameras and has a quick access door on the side so it's easy to retrieve the camera from the backpack without taking off the whole backpack when I want to take a photo. I'm still thinking about it because it's quite pricey, but I'm very tempted.

I loved to create this art journal spread! While doing it I enjoyed my coffee with lots of milk and every now and then some sweet cream (thank you Trader Joe's for carrying it). Here you can see one of my favorite mugs bought in my favorite national park. This is my drink for today's T Tuesday post - thank you, Elizabeth, for giving us this opportunity.