Was I There?

A Katie Morag Kind of Day

It was a Katie Morag  kind of day today.  The hills overlooking the Rogue Valley reminded me of Scotland.  Dark blue glowering rainclouds but the dazzling green of spring.  

I call today a "Katie Morag" day because it reminds me of the excellent books by Mairi Hedderwick that my Scottish pal has been sending the children.  They love the stories-- even the poems (!)-- but I think I am the one who truly wants to be little red-haired Katie, living in her quaint village on an island off the coast of Scotland.

Watching the rainclouds and the rainbows afterward.

Drawing With Children

On summer or weekend days, right after breakfast, we have "art time."  Nothing elaborate, just an immense box of markers and artist-quality sketchbooks.  Sometimes we glue.  Sometimes we paint.  But mostly we keep it pretty simple.

This was Josephine's favorite style of art this summer-- fill the whole page with color. She now has whole sketchbooks of these strange quilts of color, although now she is moving on to more representational drawing.  Eyeballs are predominant in her art; with Theo, it was twig-like hands with thousands of fingers.

I think there is something to just letting them be, putting the materials before them without any timidity or judgement.  

(My own art teacher mom banned coloring books for me-- something about not having to deal with someone else's notion of what things looked like.  Plus, we played that Harry Chapin song over and over again about some little boy who was punished for not coloring the flowers properly like the teacher wanted.)

And yet....I came across the greatest book in a used bookstore last spring-- Drawing With Children by Mona Brookes.  It reminded me of one of Mom's favorites-- Betty Edwards' Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain-- that she used with her students.

Drawing With Children is wonderful in that it breaks down seeing and drawing into small exercises that come off more as play than instruction.  Theo and I are already cobbling together these lessons and my goal is to somehow, even with Josephine, balance the freedom with the practice of art.  

In the end, for all of us, I think it is about seeing, noticing what is around you in the world.  And in that my children are often better than I am, fascinated by the most ordinary of things.

Ex Libris, Old Friends...

scene from Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte/ illustration by the marvelous artist, Fritz Eichenberg

Today was a good day.  I started off by calling my faraway Scottish artist pal, Julie Robertson, who was still in her dressing gown (despite it being 3 in the afternoon, Glasgow time!).  Julie was working on several books she has written and is sending off to publishers.  When she visited in July, Julie was toting around several wonderfully written and illustrated children's book "dummies."  She so so inspirational to me, I'm sure I will be mentioning her more in coming days.  I only hope Julie Robertson doesn't forget us when she is famous.

And now the pathetic confession:  Gus and I actually hired a babysitter to wrangle the children this afternoon without naps so we could spend the time putting up the bookcases in our livingroom and wrest those old tomes out of the garage and put them back on the shelves.

Oh, what a dusty tour I took down memory lane!  There were  picture books from childhood, and paperbacks from teenage years that I keep because I can remember where and when I read them.  There were books from college and graduate schools; art books my mom gave me, or educational books from the "original" Josephine; other, random books my teachers gave me or that they wrote themselves.  There were handmade books my students made me, beautifully illustrated and very witty.  And there were books that I have because someone died-- in particular all those Gogol novels I have yet to crack.

"Gogol, Gogol, Gogol, what's up with all the GOGOL!" A dear friend shouted at me as she was helping me arrange all these books the last time I unpacked them.  I actually inherited the Gogols from my outrageous junior-high social studies teacher who was an alcoholic and who collected fine books, none I could afford at his estate auction.  So maybe those Gogols are a way of keeping Mr. W. alive a bit-- how he swashbuckled through life!--- and maybe they represent all those things I mean to do some day.

 

Chicken Portraits Tiles....the debut

The chicken portrait tiles that I was working on this spring, right before the OPA show and my descent into bad health, are....DONE!  Don't they have personality?

I was originally inspired by another one of Josephine's favorite books, Tillie Lays an Egg, by Terry Golson.

Of course, I then had to wrap up this portrait,which looks like Tilly's speckled twin, and send it off to Terry as a "thank you."

Needless to say, the package arrived safely, and Terry wrote about it on her own HenBlog, which is part of the HenCam. (Which as I've said before, you should really check out.)

Sugar Would Not Eat It

I'd thought I'd seen it all, and then Josephine cried over the fact that her favorite library book-- Sugar Would Not Eat It by the wonderful Emily Jenkins-- was checked out.  And I'm not exaggerating-- she sobbed.

This was perfect.  First of all, this is a story about Leo who, listening the "advice" of his urban neighborhood friends, tries to persuade a little stray cat to eat his leftover piece of chocolate-with-blue-roses-birthday cake.  

She just stares at him with an deadpan expression.

Which reminds me so much of said person who cried over this story and love, love, loves it.  Analogy: I am Leo.  Josephine is Sugar.  And no matter how loud "Eat it!"  is shouted, Sugar will not.

I secretly think this is a sign of Josephine's revolutionary spirit, along with going limp while being manhandled. (Practice for passive resistance at WTO protests.)

Anyway.  What a great theme for a birthday!  

The hats!  

The presents!...

an art box and, of course, a personal copy of Emily Jenkins' Sugar manifesto...

a wonderful print by my Scottish artist friend, Julie Robertson....

And of course the cake, which was requested specifically: it had to be coconut and pink.  With sprinkles.

...and did I mention the chocolate mustaches?

Here is the chocolate mustache on a stick that I bought Josephine from Crafty Wonderland while I was up in Portland a couple weeks ago.  She ate it almost immediately...

 as opposed to Theo, who nibbled with restraint, and made that baby last, keeping it "fresh" in the refrigerator for several days.  These mustaches are the fine work of Portland's Neapolitan Printing & Company  (You should check out their choc-O-bamas too.)  

I really wish I knew someone getting married, or was getting married again myself-- can you imagine these as favors, maybe a mustache at each place setting, and instant cameras too?  Anyway.  The card that accompanied these lovely treats challenged us to take photos and send in to their website, which we did.  We'll see if we are added to the already-hilarious gallery.

 There are fine things to see at Crafty Wonderland, and I immensely enjoyed shuffling over there from the OPA Showcase (both events were held in the massive convention center.)  There were silk-screened t-shirts, letterpress cards, hip babyclothes, upcycled vintage jewlery...and even these weird plastic cubes that encased cheap kids' toys, little insane dioramas which the maker was calling "shower art" because you could affix them to the shower.  Some even had weird little sayings (my favorite: "it's not as bad as you think").

The whole place kinda made OPA look, well, a tad conservative.  At Crafty Wonderland, loud heavy metal was playing.  Young people were wearing very funky clothing.  Irony was so thick it seemed to settle over the room like the smoky haze in an old diner.  

 

Along with the fabulous, whimsical art of Lisa Kaser, and the hip vintage-kittens-batting-about-pink-yarn girl skirt I bought for Josephine from PearlyGrey, I grooved on Ex Libris Anonymous.  Now here is a craft I would love.  They take apart old books, use the covers and some of the pages...

  and create sketchbooks/ journals from them.  

I told myself I bought this one for Gus, but you know it isn't true.  One, because he washes way more dishes than I do.  And two, I simply had to own it...for, er, all the sketching I'm about to do.

Madeleines: the nostalgic birthday cake

 We had a party here last week.  Well... it was just me and the kids, homemade party hats, and a wonky banner that said "Happy Birthday, Daddy."  While Josephine was napping, Theo and I made madeleines.  You know-- those weird cookie/cakes that are shaped like shells?

Think of the French writer Proust, whom I admit I have never read, but know the basic story of him eating a madeleine and having "an involuntary memory" of childhood.  (What is it about literary terms that they often start to sound a little seedy...?)

Anyway.  What I love about the madelelines is that they are all eggs and butter, and that we had to sprinkle the flour over the top of the egg/sugar mixture and then fold in gently.

We made ours with almond instead of vanilla extract, which was better in my opinion.

You can find the superb recipe here. 

 I joke with Gus that having children, no matter what age you are when you have them, seems a lot like being president.  You know how people say a president ages 5 or so years for every one year in office?  That's how I feel.

For Gus' present, I thought it appropriate to give him an Alice Waters cookbook and DVDs of Julia Child cooking.  

The rain parted, and it turned out to be a charming day.  One you want to remember...

...with all its happiness... 

 ...and torment. 

And now for a completely different chicken...

  One of the optional ways to participate in the looming OPA Showcase is to donate a sketch or "other two dimensional representation of your work" which will be raffled off Sunday.  So, as if I haven't enough to do, I got all fired up thinking about how I work from a basic sketch, but carve my platters freehand.

I also got excited by rediscovering Pacific Northwest artist Nikki McClure's children's book.  Nikki is a HUGE inspiration to me--- can you tell that she cuts out an entire illustration from ONE sheet of black paper?

And the color must be dropped in after, during the printing...

 By the way, All in a Day would be a wonderful book to add to your collection, even if you don't have kids.    Cynthia Rylant's writing (poem) is so heartbreaking and true.  

 When I read it aloud to Theo and Josephine, I feel kind of sobered.  It reminds me to enjoy the most ordinary of moments..."A day is all its own."

And now, back to the chickens...

 So Nikki and the call for a paper "sketch" from the OPA spurred me to buy an exacto knife and trash our bamboo cutting board.  I glued some ripped out pages from a Japanese flower book together, tracing my pattern that I use for the clay platters, carefully cut out a black and Japanese white chicken form.

Then I freehand cut the black form.  Measuring and adjusting, I then painted the red comb with red acrylic, pasted the two together using very expensive Spray Mount.  Added the hip green background and... 

ta dah!

 

I know.  It is so fabulous it would make Jackie O. weep.

So now I am considering a career change (clay= bad back, high shipping costs?) (paper= healthier, low shipping, same result, except you couldn't hang it outside in a rainstorm?)  Does anyone out there-- besides you, o faithful Dad, know how I could get this printed?  Like a real artist?  And do you think anyone would buy it?  Or laugh?

gang aft a gley

It's burn season here in Oregon-- time to set fire to those piles of dead wood and get ready for the green.  And still...look what turned up the other day as we were forking up the old stuff....

  

The "wee, sleeket, cowarn, tim'rous beastie."  In other words, to paraphrase that 18th century Scottish poet Robert Burns, a mouse.

This just slays me-- when life imitates those literature themes I used to teach.  More specifically, when I literally lived (last Wednesday) Burns' poem, "To A Mouse."  I felt bad that we had disturbed the poor mouse's winter nest ("Thy wee bit housie, too, in ruin!") and that we had to chase the mouse about the field, Josephine screaming the high-pitched, terrifying screams of a Beatlemania groupie as it escaped...

 And was caught again.

It was perfect, though, because my last post was about being okay with failure.  But, to be honest, the day of the mouse was hard for me, because I had finished two firings, and they had turned out awful.  The glazes had run, the slips had cracked.  And, although I am fine with losing the actual physical pots, what is difficult for me is the loss of time.

 
  

Loss of time with family, loss of time working on keeping my body functioning, loss of rest, loss of interacting with friends.

You are probably thinking right now that you have no idea who Robert Burns is or have never heard of this poem.  But I'll bet you have.  John Steinbeck (think highschool English class) used it when he titled his novel Of Mice and Men.  Burns' line is:  "the best laid schemes o' Mice and Men, Gang aft agley...!"  Which means, the most thoroughly-thought-through plans often shoot spectacularly off the rails, and bring us a lot of grief and pain.

If you want to witness the poem You-Tube style, here's a great link.  

But I take the most comfort in one of the You-tube comments: "its a shame i have no idea what the f*** hes on about."

Cardboard Fetish

Theo's 2009 Halloween costume.  100% cardboard, except for the leg and arm bands, the old TV antenna, canning lids, glitter paper, and the "knobs" which I literally found in the gutter and decided to use.  Also (and you can't see it) I have velcroed (is that a word?) two egg cartons to the back, which Theo can whip off in a moment's notice like a Las Vegas stripper (my image) and hold up in front of him to collect solar rays and recharge (like WallE, his image.)

Why am I showing you a Halloween costume in February?

Because I am thinking of my love for cardboard.

My eyes go shifty when I shop at our local co-op and there are the cardboard boxes for the poor souls who have (those bastards-- more on this later...) FORGOT THEIR HEMP/CANVAS/SAVING THE EARTH bags.

Even if I don't need it, I lust after those cardboard boxes. And I usually stuff, oh, say, twenty, into the back of the car.  The texture, the history, the potential!

 

It would be like going to the moon.  And, speaking of the moon, here is what Theo's preschool teacher Diane had the kids do recently while they were "exploring outer space."  You know what this is, girlfriends: cardboard, a lovely layer, and strange objects, covered in tinfoil, all highlighted with some type of black glue.

Splendid.

This was another one of my favorite books as a kid.  Now, I read it to my own children and feel a sinking feeling when I see the 1970s mom in an apron getting excited about her new refrigerator.

 

But never mind that.  Once, when a former student came to live with us, and we had shopped at the co-op, and I had stuffed cardboard boxes in the back of the car as usual, we were driving home when I saw another WONDERFUL piece of cardboard in someone's trash (I swear, it was like a 3 ft X by 3 ft piece!). Of course, I had to screech to a halt and kidnap it.  But when I got back in the car, Eric (the student) turned to me as if a policeman might turn to an addict.  

"Do you know you have a cardboard fetish? "he asked.

"Yes," I said then.  And I still have to admit it now.  Yes, I do.