The days are growing longer...

...and I'd like to wish you a Happy New Year! I am hibernating. Which means I've crawled into my dark place. There are enough Stephen King audiobooks here to last til the first crocus. I'll be back 'round here before then, but... in the meantime, know that I hope for you: brightness and light, love, and the beauty that hides in shadow.

Weekend happenings

Are you in the holiday spirit yet? WHAT? You say the gloomy dreary dismery has got you down? You are sick of the short days, and how they seem all brown and soggy? You tried to muster some excitement, so you got out the ornament box, and then your damn cat batted the only family heirloom you had right off the Christmas tree, and it shattered, and then you stepped on the broken glass?

Well, Eeyore, dry your tears and lift your chin. I've got a little list of festivities that might just inspire some cheer. (This list is kind of only good for Pennsylvanians and Vermonters, so if you're neither of those, here's what you do: make yourself a delicious cocktail, and throw some cranberries it it!)

It's First Friday in Scranton! Tonight is the opening reception for Art X5 at ArtWorks. Me and my original drawings will be there along with the works of these talented artists: Jean Adams, Siri Beckman, Jenn Bell, and Valerie Kiser.

Also tonight in Scranton, Holiday on the Square! (and tomorrow too). There is *so* much fun stuff planned for this event, and while technically yes the weather might be a teensy bit frightful, there are heated tents! Plus you can get your Old Timey Scranton Portrait taken! Drink free hot chocolate! Enjoy the tree lighting! Tonight my Totally Awesome Husband will be there selling my prints and Christmas cards while I'm around the corner at my opening. Tomorrow I'll be there. Hope to see you too!

And finally, at The Cotton Mill Open Studios & Holiday Sale in Brattleboro, Vermont, there will be... my dad's photographs, my mom's paintings, and my prints! If you're in the area, please stop in and say hello to my Totally Awesome Parents.

Happy turkey and whatnot!

Happy Thanksgiving, folks! We'll be off shortly with our pie and our turkey, for Little Sister's house. In the meantime I wanted to tell you all a couple two-tree tings (as we say around here):

First, thank you for all the Dream House advice! None of you said "a tiny stanchion under the kitchen counter to keep your miniature Southdown sheep corralled while cooking," which surprised me, but you had some really great ideas and we're taking them to heart.

Second, a bunch of my original drawings will be part of The Delicacy of Nature show at the Butternut Gallery & Second Story Books. The opening is this Friday, November 29th from 3-5pm, and I would love to see you there! There will also be Haibun writings from Melissa Whalen Haertsch, sculptures by Karen O'Connor, and paintings by Gail Bunting. Oh boy!

And on Sunday, I'll be selling prints and notecards at the Buy Local Holiday Market at the Scranton Cultural Center, where there will be all kinds of other delights. If you've never been inside this building (Scranton's Masonic Temple), it's awesome. I'll be on the 4th floor.

Wishing you much merriment!

The red and the gold and the grasses

These days when the sun hangs low for long hours - the picture taking is easy. Lots of golden glowing light, and you notice things now that were shrouded in greenery before - praying mantis cases, red fruits... old tires and french fry containers, of course, but for the sake of poetry we just won't mention those. Oops, I couldn't help it. Me, always with the if-you-can't-say-anything-nice-then-don't... well-darn-I-already-did.

We've taken a long morning walk the last two days, in between coffee-and-email and getting-down-to-the-real-work-of-the-day, and it's been so nice. We talk house design and tally up the number of things there are to do, then attempt to compress and compact and contort those things into a manageable plan for the next year. It can't be done, I tell you! Oh well, forge ahead anyhoo.

It's fun times, the planning and plotting. If anyone cares to share an idea for something they'd include in their dream house... I'd love to hear it! It can be outlandish and unaffordable - sometimes dreams are. Or totally practical - they can be that, too.

Gift tags! With chickadees!

You might not think you need something cute to decorate your holiday packages with, but then, have you really thought about it? Maybe you do! Or maybe you don't! But should you decide a bunny or a chickadee would come in handy when it comes time to get festive, here's where you can get it.

Now through November 30, this set of downloadable, print-at-home gift tags is free with any purchase in my etsy shop! You'll automatically receive a link to download after checkout. Then you can print your own and get crafty with your packages. This is just a suggestion to get your creative juices flowing: you could get out your glitter and your gluestick, and give the squirrel a jewel-encrusted stocking cap! For HIS TAIL!

Happy Holidays Woodland Animal Gift Tags

Happy Monday

We had a fun weekend off, beginning with cranberry-picking in the bog with Ellen and Mark. I met Ellen through blogging, which is very cool, and what is even cooler is getting to hang out with her, because that's just plain fun, but also educational: she knows a lot about foraging and cooking. Her new book, Backyard Foraging, has become a resource in our house... and this ties into the next thing I want to talk about, which is...

Has my husband turned into a squirrel?! No, he has not, but I can understand why you might think so. There are heaps of nuts in our house, and I do mean HEAPS. Black walnuts, English walnuts, and acorns. Matt has been collecting and shelling these, and also putting up other food for the winter - grand proportions of other food. There are things fermenting (curtido, kimchi, sauerkraut, salsa, cider, mead, and more) in pretty much every corner of the kitchen. This means there are little crocks and jars and tubs and bottles, each shrouded in its own kitchen towel, bubbling and burbling and keeping me company. So thank you, Matt, for keeping us fed and happy!

There have also been divine things stewing on the stove top. I get to eat them when I come in from the cold, where I have been cutting parts out for my shed. My shed! I can't wait to show it to you. But it will be awhile. I can't put it together until we take the parts to Vermont, because how would I get it there, if it were already put together? I have to keep reminding myself of this, because I do prefer instant gratification to wait-four-months-till-you-get-to-nail-your-shed-together.

That's all, folks, except: Happy Monday, from me and Otto!

Butterflies and an interview

Working on butterflies this week. Plus hopefully an Otto-the-cat or two. He's surely up to no good. And! My fabulous friend Cadyn, the artist behind these gorgeous beaded accessories and the owner/curator of this delightful shop called gathered, interviewed me recently. She asked good questions and I had fun answering them. Thanks, Cadyn!

My favorite door

The Virginia creeper might actually be helping to hold up our garage, which is kind of a falling down heap of crap. We're planning to level it this winter, and I have grand visions of turning the scraps into an adorable little shed that will fit in the back of the truck, so we can haul it to Vermont and throw our tools in it. This will likely not happen, on account of having ten thousand other things to do, but I REALLY WANT TO BUILD SOME SHIT. So maybe I'll get to it.

Doings

The craft fair life, it's an up and down affair, I'm learning. It's exhausting for me (at home I have just me, my imaginary cat, and Matt to talk to, but when I go to a craft fair, I have to talk to people all day!). But I've got a system down, and an excellent assistant (that's Matt), and lots of help from my dad with pre-fair printing and other prep. So it seems more doable than it did at first. And yesterday's Clover Market in Chestnut Hill was actually quite fun! Friends we hardly ever get to see stopped by, plus other great folks I haven't seen in years. Sales were good, the sun shone, we had a little celebratory dinner in a nice restaurant and I ate the best seafood risotto of my life, and the truck did not break down even a little bit. Thanks to everyone who came out! Thanks for buying art, and also being an all-around fun crowd.

That picture up there is Otto on a night like no other. He is available as a print in my etsy shop.

Back from Vermont

We spent two glorious fall days on our land in Vermont. What fun! I am at my happiest outside on a crisp morning, sitting on a stump, with a giant fishbowl-size mug of coffee clutched in my paws. My disposition is also at its least disagreeable level then. The picture above proves this. While on our land, we planted one pear tree, a few pots of ramps (wild leeks), and some garlic. We investigated what we hope is a viable spring, dug it out a bit, and then promptly befouled it with balsam resin, which does indeed (as we had read) do wondrous and entertaining things when dropped in water. Easily amused, yes we are. Can't wait to get back up there.

Completeandutterchaos

is my middle name.

Friends and family

Here we are, back from vacation! It was a fun whirlwind to North Carolina and back. Good times were had with family and friends - lots of laughs happened. We celebrated Matt's little sister's birthday; spent a soul-reviving few days with the Immortal Mountaineers and toured Cadyn's beautifully curated shop gathered in Front Royal, Virginia; and met up with another good friend to disassemble the awesome gift he and his partner are bestowing on us, a 16x20 canvas tent and platform which we'll live in on our land in Vermont next summer. Finally there was a wedding in Durham, with excellent food, music, and chardonnay that flowed so freely it nearly washed me out to sea. I have recovered.

In the picture above, it's a bear's head mushroom on the cutting board, not some bizarre orb from the etherworld. Or maybe it's both. Matt found it on a tree in North Carolina where we were camping, and we chopped it up and put it in our curry.

Our lives have been underwritten by the great generosity of others over the past month or so. I was so busy before this trip that I didn't take time to feel really grateful for that. Friends and family have offered up material things along with support and excitement as we plan our next move, north. We won't be outta here til the spring, but we're getting our ducks in a row. And I mean that literally. I'm buying ducks, damn it.

this week, a beast

It's a bear with some rose hips!

Things haven't improved any with my brain function. But that isn't all bad - like yesterday, here's what happened. I had tallied up all my completed drawings, based on my multiple countings, my torn apart scrap paper lists, my hormones, and the position of the moon relative to this and that but nothing much. I need a total of thirty pieces for the two shows I have coming up. My precise calculations had shown, disappointingly, that I had only 24 that were exhibit-worthy.

Then I says to myself, you know, you're more of a pictures person than a numbers person, so maybe you should spread all the drawings out on the bed, and see where you're at, just to be sure. Lo and behold, I had thirty-three totally acceptable drawings! That means I was off by, like, a really big percent. Which is no matter - I'm going on vacation soon, and my to-do list just shrank measurably. That puts it not quite into the can-do realm of things, but closer.

The moral of this story is, sometimes your own ineptitudes will delight you in the end!

the Each Week, One Beast project: week ?

The beasts are on hiatus, because their maker is overwhelmed. I feel like doing what Otto is doing above, fleeing from his responsibilities. Matt bought me an enormous bottle of gin, and it wouldn't be hard to go sit with it out in the garden, with the season's last flowers, and then eventually tip over, from which perspective I could enjoy the vees of geese as they pass by.

One thing about this art business is that my busy season is the holidays. Or so it seems - I'm still learning. So - I'll be sharing what I'm working on as I'm working on it, and beasts will come on an irregular basis, and if you want to come visit me, I'll make you an awesome cocktail and we'll sit on the back porch and not answer any of our email or fulfill any of our promises.

The f'n clutch

I haven't been around here much lately. So, I can tell you where I haven't been, but I'm not sure where I have been. I drove a friend's car to Philly and back this week. I'd never driven it before, and it's kind of newfangled, and I couldn't figure out how to put the car in reverse. So I called my husband to ask him how to do it, and told him that the solution he offered was totally implausible, impossible, and uncomprehendingly ridiculous. And here I am, there I was, stuck in my parking spot, with a curb in front of me, and nowhere to go but backwards. But I couldn't.

Then I pulled out the owner's manual, and it said, do what your husband just told you. And, well, shit, it worked.

So that sounds like a pretty DUH kind of moment, right? But wait - it gets better! Today, I needed to bring the car back to my friend. But it wouldn't start, so I said - silly old me, I left the lights on, the battery is dead. I fetched Matt and told him to please jump start it, which he did. It still wouldn't start, and Matt said, are you pushing the clutch in? And well, no, I wasn't, and no, I hadn't been, and yes, the battery was just fine all along, as it turns out!

Which brings us to the question: Where the hell has my brain gone? And it also brings us back around to the start of this post - and I do seem to be going round in circles a lot lately - but where am I, in addition to my brain? If you see either one of us, me or my brain, just sort of doodling along distractedly (distracted - the condition Matt has kindly diagnosed me with, instead of brain addled, which is what I might actually be), will you send us back round here, where we might bump into one another? Thanks.

the Each Week, One Beast project: weeks 34 and 35

Well, these beasts just don't draw themselves. I didn't post one last week, and I'm just barely making it this week. I've been drawing plenty, but nothing I feel like sharing. So. I've just done these Ottos, they took about seven minutes, and they're way better than the other Ottos I worked on for, like, a million hours. Does this say something about my usual technique?

I've been trying out these little fast side-of-the-pencil-lead sketches because I think they help me loosen up and determine the basic shapes a someone ought to be, before thinking about details. They're fun and satisfying.

Other than that, I have only one other little happy event to tell you about. The baker's brand new 25 pound sack of organic dark chocolate chips took a tumble (which Otto had NOTHING to do with) off the stack of boxes by the flour. This sucked for the baker because a bunch of them spilled, and while I really did feel sympathy for Matt and his lost investment, it's hard to feel very sorry for someone when their misfortune is your big bowl of chocolate, you know? Floor chips really can't be baked into cookies for customers, but they can be eaten by your wife. That's lucky old me.

Happy weekend, everyone.

More night windows

meadow hunt

 

lover and the cabin

 

the surprise coon

 

shelling peas

 

coming storm

Here's the rest of my series for the Enormous Tiny Art Show. Of course I drew Otto the cat, who is both Enormous and Tiny. The six pieces are now available on their website. 

Night Window 1: late encounter

You might recognize an earlier beast-of-the-week here... This is the first itty bitty drawing (3.5" square) in a series of six for the Enormous Tiny Art show at Nahcotta in New Hampshire. I'm super happy - way, way happier than Otto looks here - to be included in this exhibit, which features work under 10" by many artists. The show opens September 6; works will be available for purchase in the gallery and on the website.

Man on wire

One of the great things about my husband Matt is, when I really want a chicken-of-the-woods for dinner, and then we see one, bright orange off in the distance, he will cross a creek, bushwhack a thicket, and climb a tree, just to bag the chicken.

We had a short weekend getaway of hiking, mushroom picking, and cooking over a campfire. As Scranton has felt like a sort of soul-stifling place to me lately, it felt good to spend some time in the woods, laughing and enjoying life.

the Each Week, One Beast project: week 33

We've talked a lot about what Otto doesn't like, but not so much about what he does like. He likes cooking. But alas, he is not technically allowed on the kitchen table. Here he is, about to be whisked off.

I thought I'd share the before picture for this finished drawing, from my sketchbook, below. Sometimes I get a sketch I love, and man, it's so challenging to capture the energy of the loose sketch in the next drawing - the one I do on the nice, expensive paper. If I'm lucky I get something just as good as the sketch, but different. If I'm not lucky I get pages and pages of F-ed up Ottos, ready to be recycled into something more useful, like toilet paper.

August and onward

The Bittersweet Moods of Late Summer... that's a weather system, isn't it? I hope so, because that would mean it isn't just me feeling foul, and then inspired, and then foul again. I know - it isn't even late summer. But these cold nights, these shortening days, the insect noise and goldenrod scent...

I've started sketching little houses, one of which we might build on our land in Vermont. Matt is calling this theoretical structure The Shabin, maybe because he thinks its architectural style is going to be a perfect falling-apart blend of shack and cabin, or maybe, since we've always called our current house The Crapshack (even though it's really quite cute and not crappy at all), this is just an affectionate term for a future construction project which promises to be rife with miscalculations that will seem very unfortunate indeed, in hindsight.

Actually, we've got higher hopes than all that for this project, and it's fun to dream and plan - the sweet to balance the bitter.

the Each Week, One Beast project: week 32

The cat whose name is a palindrome. Again. Sheesh.

Early awake

I got up at 4:30 this morning, after having dreamt all night about fleas and woken up itching. Hmph.

The next thing I did was stand in the kitchen with one finger on my lower lip, and one hand on my hip, and contemplate, blueberry waffles: yea or nay?

And just then... There was a loud crash on the back porch!

Now let me tell you about the back porch, when it's in the dark. It's scary. It has always seemed to me that at some point in my residence here on Fig Street, I will come upon either a) a homicidal maniac in a drug-induced coma on my glider, or b) the recently expired body of said maniac slumped on the steps. It's a shadowy, tucked away place - the back porch. It harbors deep forebodings in the night.

So as you can imagine, the crash alarmed me. I turned around slowly, with a grimace, and in the light from the kitchen shining through the screen door, I could see zero hulking lurking things. Good! But kinda bad, because now I had to approach the door to flick on the porch light. Throwing caution to the wind, I did just that. I turned on the light, looked out the door, and... relief! No men on the glider, bleeding!

In fact, nothing at all, except one fluffy little raccoon cub the size of a cantaloupe, scampering round the end of the glider and down the steps.

Doom turned to glee, just like that. I made like a raccoon cub and scampered down the inside stairs to alert the baker to These Exciting Happenings. Outside we could hear little skitterings, and then we saw six tiny eyes glinting way up high in the dark bulk of the hemlock tree. When our eyes adjusted, there were three raccoons, clambering over one another and dangling from branches. They considered us briefly, and just when the horizon split open a little bit of blue light, I think they realized how sleepy they were, because they all three scritched their way down the hemlock trunk, and off they went through the garden. One paused to peer in the bakery window, which starts a few inches above ground, at raccoon's eye view.

Matt said he knew I wouldn't be grumpy once all day long, on account of the raccoons, and well, he was right. I wasn't. The end.

the Each Week, One Beast project: week 31

One more Otto. I'll share the complete drawings that these little Ottos came out of soon. Happy weekend, all!

Kittens in my shrubberies

This picture is from just before Ricocheting Kittens happened in my backyard on Friday evening. They came bursting out of the bushes - four of them - like little cotton ball/cannonballs. After a brief warmup routine, they did some pear tree exploration, which involves scurrying up and then plummeting out. Then there was a slower paced and not especially successful lightning bug hunt, after which everyone got very, very sleepy and it was time to nurse. I hope they come back again another night.

the Each Week, One Beast project: week 30

Ha! It's Otto again! It's now the Each Week, Otto project. Maybe, maybe not. This is again a sneak peak of a bigger, tiny picture. So far, with your help, I now know that Otto hates: cold milk (which is the same as milk that has not been warmed), the tedious task of painting trim, wet shoes (who doesn't?), dogs and everything having to do with them, sticky paws (and even just the mere thought), and Rude Awakenings. Please feel free to add to the list! Either here in the comments or an email to me, Otto's personal assistant and keeper of files, records and such.

Arts on the Square

Local friends, I'll be vending at the first annual Arts on the Square in Scranton this Saturday, from 12-8pm. I'll be donating 5% of my sales that day to the True Friends Animal Welfare Center (where my good old girl Laika came from many moons ago, back when we just called it The Pound). If you are like me, DON'T CLICK THAT LINK. You'll see the first dog on the adoption list, start crying, and jump in the car to go pick her up. Luckily my truck is broken down in the back alley, so I can't go. Anyway, back to Arts on the Square - there will be music! art! food! poems! The organizers for this event have really been putting in their time and planning what promises to be a great day. Hope to see you there!

the Each Week, One Beast project: week 29

This week's beast is a small part of a larger (but still very small!) drawing, and also an introduction to Otto, a cat of extreme grumpiness. I think we'll be having more of him around here, because, since I am currently pet-less in real life, I have been entertaining myself with tales of Otto and all the shitty things that annoy him. Like being stuffed in a loaf pan. He hates that. I'm just at the brainstorming stage, so if you can think of anything that might really get Otto's goat, do share!

Third annual Conca d'Or lily post

I was explaining to Matt this afternoon about my Conca d'Or lily anxiety. It goes like this: Conca d'Or blooms, all of a sudden, earlier than I was expecting. And immediately, while I am rapt with her beauty, I can't bear the thought that the bottom flowers are going to turn brown. Nooooooooo! But it's inevitable, folks. Also, there are only so many hours in the day, and I feel that to maximize the good things in life, I should spend them all with Conca d'Or.

Some facts: Did your lily salesman claim that Conca d'Or is so fragrant that just one bulb's worth of blooms will attract fairies? It's totally true, and completely unfabricated! And one bulb will multiply quickly. That's all I started with, as you can see in this post: A Rosie and a lily, which I think was year two for my bulbs. Now I have, like, so many. And the tallest ones are taller than Matt, who is six feet tall. He's my measuring stick. For last year's post, see here: Conca d'Or and friends.

the Each Week, One Beast project: week 28

One week, three beasts - oh well, it's kind of on topic.

New additions

Night in the City Garden prints are now available in my shop, along with new notecard sets.

Also, we caught Tiny Bunny in the woodchuck trap (don't worry! it's not the killing or maiming kind of trap). Tiny Bunny appeared to be perturbed but not traumatized. We let him go back under the quince bush because he only nibbles things, he is not the Woodchipper of Rodents, which is what that damn woodchuck is. The 'chuck turned my prize Tithonia plant into a tall green stick with exactly one flame-orange flower on top. But back to Tiny Bunny. In case you feel any doubt about how cute he might be, you should know this: he eats rose petals. Only cute things do that.

the Each Week, One Beast project: week 27

It's Charley! Reclining on a pile of pillows purchased especially for him.