WeekWord: Gypsy

Carmen of Tails of a Biomouse chose the word for this week, "gypsy".

The very first thing that came to my mind was the song "Gypsy" by Fleetwood Mac, written by Stevie Nicks. I could hear her smokey, sometimes almost hoarse voice that I love so much, singing those beautiful lyrics, "to the gypsy that remains faces freedom with a little fear".

To the gypsy that is within all of us, often hidden away.

Somehow, gypsies belong to my childhood. The Roma people, who used to tour around the country in their trailers, making camp for a few days at the edge of a town, observed from the distance by the "decent" people, not welcomed, and finally seen with relief how they were leaving the area again. Whatever happened during that time - a break in, a car that disappeared from the street, stolen bicycles - was blamed on the gypsies. No one who talked about them had anything good to say.

They hold a big fascination for me. I tried to imagine their lives, envied their kids who did not have to go to school but could run around barefoot. I envied them for living in a trailer instead of a third floor apartment. In my eyes they were wild, free and had no worries. Their life was colorful and adventurous whereas mine was just plain boring.

Later, they disappeared more and more. Only seldom did a group of Roma make camp anymore.

I found them again in the book "Chocolat" by Joanne Harris. The theme of homelessness and traveling took stage in the movie "La Strada" by Federico Fellini, a movie that deeply touched me.

And then I found them again on another continent - the Bedouins in Egypt. They lived in tents in the desert. They had no steady home. They were curious. They were friendly. They offered us tea. They tried to sell their handmade jewelry, a meagre way to make some money.

I felt the same fascination as I did when I was a child.

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Paint Party Friday and Update on Owls

My free time during this rather crazy week was mainly spent at the lake, watching the owls. Therefore, I didn't work a lot in the studio - but I finished the canvas that I had started last week. It's the girl who loved dogs.

Since I can't paint dogs, I used two of my (coyote) stamps, stamped the image, made a template and played around with some heavy body acrylics. I really love the texture of the paint in the dogs, especially the right one. I wasn't happy with the girl for quite some time - until I got the idea to put a hat on her head (cut from the stamped image of a Paperbag Studio stamp) and removed her eyebrows which had given her quite an angry look. She looks much nicer now I think.

I link this to Paint Party Friday - rather late, but it's still Friday! There are so many more highly talented artists to visit.

Update on the owls: The Bird Rescue Center called the ranger to let him know that the little owlet who fell out of the nest had eaten three mice (yummy) and is doing well. Its sibling was very high in the tree today, still close to Mom. Today I went to see them in the evening and there was a lot of hooting going on from the dad. All three owls looked well. The owlet is pretty daring, there were some close calls, and I just hope it stays up there in the tree and doesn't follow the way of its sibling.

If you want to read more about the owls, it's in the posts below.

And Then there Was only One Owlet...

When I came to the lake early this morning, one of the little owlets was on the ground. Only a short time before, it had had a fight with its sibling and fell out of the nest. Tom, the park volunteer, had informed the ranger and we were all waiting for him (there was already a small crowd) to get the owlet and bring it to the Bird Rescue Center.

The owlet seemed to be fine, but it sure was pretty frightened. It hopped out of the sun into the shade of  some bushes.

When the ranger came - a ranger I know who is very experienced - he very gently caught the owlet and put it into a box to transport it to the rescue center. There, it won't have any human contact and thus they hope they can release it later (they have successfully done so with other owls).

I had to cry when they took the little owl. None of us had hoped for anything like this.

Mama Owl watched everything from her branch high up in the tree, but she didn't intervene - neither did the dad. After the owlet was gone, she hooted several times, but then went "back to business".

Which meant providing food for the other sibling. Here she has some squirrel or other small animal that she will feed to the little one.

The little owlet stayed high in the tree, testing its wings...

... and looking down to the crowd.

Tom will be on "owl duty" through the entire weekend because they fear that the sibling might fall down as well. If that happens, it will be brought to the Bird Rescue Center as well and raised with its sibling. This means they later can be released as a family.

And still better than being dead.

But it was sad.

Owl Exploring outside of Nest

The Great Horned Owls babies are six weeks old now.

They were both sitting on the nest when I arrived this morning. One of them was tired and hopped into the nest to take a nap. The other one, however, felt more like exploring the area right next to the nest.

It hopped onto the nearest limb.

Oh - it needed to poop!

Innocent look afterwards...

... and some decent yawning.

Look at this big foot!!!

The wings were tested as well - they won't stay in the nest much longer anymore.

And as always, Mom is close by keeping an eye or two on the youngsters.

WOYWW 100

Wow - WOYWW has three digits now!!! We are at 100!!! Only four more weeks to the anniversary and the PiF - I just finished mine today.

I have the feeling that my work space looks the same every week, which mainly is due to me not cleaning up. A really bad habit, I know.

I'm working on the canvas on the right, "Girl who loves dogs". However, I can't draw dogs - I can draw pigs, but not dogs. I had first thought of using stickers, but this is kind of tacky (!); especially since all my dog stickers - and there are not many - are of puppies. I want grown dogs. So I stamped dogs ( well, actually coyotes, but that's close enough) and am going to cut them out and make templates. I have started to experiment with heavy body acrylics and discovered that I L-O-V-E them, so I'll use those for painting the dogs (aka coyotes). That will give them a nice texture.

If you want to see more desks of wonderful creative people all around the globe, then please hop over to Julia's blog to find a pretty long list of lovely participants.

New Pictures of the Baby Owls

Last Wednesday, when Jo and I walked around the lake again, we, of course, had to check on the baby Great Horned Owls again. This time, Mama Owl was sitting on the nest - she had just fed her babies.

The Dad was sitting in the eucalytpus across the path and observing everything. I don't know whether you can see in this picture how he is eyeing me while I was moving below the tree to get a better view of him:

Then last Saturday, the Geek and I went and this time Mama owl was sitting next to the nest. It was obviously pretty boring for her - can you see her yawning?

She was very tired and slept a lot, and later she actually moved up the branch to her usual spot. The babies settled down to sleep as well.

Soon, they will leave their nest. They're already loosing their white fluff and spreading their wings.

Made in Germany 7

This reed-covered house is located on the isle of Sylt - a very typical house for this area.

Sylt belongs to my favorite places in Germany. The isle is in the North Sea at the very northern coast of Germany. Sylt is right between the open sea and the mud-flats which makes it a pretty unique place in my eyes. You can only reach it by plane or train; the train, however, can carry cars if you really think you need a car there. My choice of transportation has always been the bicycle - you can rent it for however long you need it and explore the island with the power of your legs. Sometimes it's strenuous because it's almost always windy, but the fish tastes so much better after a few hours of biking. And fish is what you eat on Sylt, that and crab, little shrimp - and for dessert Rote Grütze (a type of red berries jelly with heavy cream) - it is so good! And of course, if you like tea, you should stop in one of the many tea rooms and enjoy a decent afternoon tea - it is pure luxury.

Do you have any German to share? A photo, book, memory, story, food - whatever it is, just leave a link in the comments and we'll stop by.