Slaying Monsters

Around Valentine's Day a few years ago, I decided to learn a little bit about archery.  I have always loved the romanticism associated with archery.  Perhaps it is Cupid, a god who can shoot a bullseye with a few feathers on a stick, straight into the heart with his little bow.   

From a physics standpoint, it’s amazing how an arrow flies through the air and into the target.  There is so much to consider: distance and wind, as well as the force with which the arrow leaves the string.   All sorts of things must be considered from the shooter too: stance, aim, angles, release, to name only a few.  But then, I don’t profess to be a great archer, nor have I ever aspired to be a scientist or a physicist, so perhaps my desire to shoot came the scene in the film of Edith Wharton’s “Age of Innocence”, where Winona Rider shoots perfectly, and wins a diamond archery pin.  

 

But who cares about reason?  Archery is fun.  

 

Looking around on the Internet, I found a Genesis Bow.  I love it!!  Mine is a compound bow, royal blue, and perfect for my level of shooting.   I also ordered bright colored arrows!  

 

Out in Spanaway, my husband, Awesome Doug, created a safe space for shooting, and we gathered all our plastic wrappers and stuffed them into a canvas bag to make a target.    Since I knew the target would be blank and wasn’t going to be round, I was inspired to paint something on the canvas to shoot.  

 

Thinking about what to paint, I knew I didn’t want it to be an animal.  I would hate to think of myself as killing an innocent animal.  But, what about monsters?  I don’t mind slaying a monster.  Monsters are figurative, and as we get older, we always seem to gather more and more of them into our lives—these emotional monsters of thought that torture us and make us unhappy with our regrets, our grief, our guilts and frustrations.   

 

Amazingly, by painting an enormous monster on the canvas and filling it full of holes, it became a satisfying and therapeutic practice.   Oddly, over time, I find that I love the monsters that I shoot.  It’s like I am making friends with them, and the monster serves a useful purpose.   

 

We had to retire our first blue monster; he was too full of holes, but I couldn’t throw him away.   Instead, he is hanging up down at the shooting range in a make-do Hall of Fame.  Perhaps, he will be a mentor to the next monster we will slay!

A Garden Shrine

I love nature, and I love gardens … especially when gardens seem to blend in and work with nature.  When I walk around the yard in Spanaway, I love to pick up sticks and rocks and feathers, and I have vases of found feathers around the house, and a sizeable collection of birds’ nests.   To me, these are Nature’s treasures--Mother Nature’s handiwork--and I struggle to find places for them in my house.  That’s why I made my garden shrine.  

 

The shrine took me a long time to create—a little over ten years.  Its form started from the bottom of an old fiberglass shower stall.  When we re-did the bathroom 2010, I created a walk-in tiled shower with a concrete floor, and struggled with taking the fiberglass to the landfill.   However, when I saw the bottom of the shower on its side in the yard, waiting for the trip to the dumpster, I decided to keep it.   

 

For almost ten years, it sat under the cedar trees along the side of the yard.  I waited, partly to see where it wanted to live, and partly to decide how to make it work.  Later, I found a spot on a bank under the hazelnut bushes near the stone labyrinth.   It lived there for a few more years and started to deteriorate; moss began to grow on it.   

 

What finally made me finish the project was something my husband’s grandson said, “Oh!  She’ll never do that!”.   I laughed SO HARD!!!  I HAD BEEN CHALLENGED by a 10-year-old!!!  ... and set about to tile it—good or bad—ugly or beautiful!!  

 

I think what had stopped me from working on it was not knowing how the mosaic or design would look.  Even when I drew out my ideas, I felt that the shrine would never be able to blend with nature in the way I felt about it.  But, when I just gathered all the materials and started working with the monochromatic tiles of white and off-white, magical things began to happen.   I realized that all the shrine needed to be was this neutral space to make the treasures become the focal point.

 

The tile work also strengthened the integrity of the form and allowed for the outside coating of old towels in concrete, which created a rough surface on which the moss is growing.   To me, it is a magical place, and I love the things I find even more because they have the space.   The squirrels seem to love it too … they steal the feathers! 

 

 

"I Put Shells on Things ... like cups ... and shoes"

My daughter loves Noel Fielding.  He is a British comedian, who has off-the-wall ideas and a HUGE following around the world.   I don’t always get his humor at first encounter; it seems to fly over my head.  

 

 

In particular was a comedy sketch I saw a few years ago about Fielding’s visit to a seaside town. Fielding goes into a pub and meets a local artist who covers everyday objects in shells—cups, shoes, telephone books—even his own wife!!!

 

My daughter just laughed and laughed, but I thought it was weird.  I just didn’t get it--that is until this Christmas when I was attempting to make star ornaments with broken glass and adhering them to aluminum with mastic.  I started laughing hysterically.  When I looked around my house in Spanaway, I discovered, that I too, “put shells on things”—only my shells are tiles.  

Inside and outside, within the past ten years, I have broken tiles and adhered them to a shower stall, broken tiles and put them on the countertops in both bathrooms, broken tiles and put them on walls.  I have even broken them and attached them to the base of the old fiberglass shower and created a garden shrine.  

 

It took me years to understand, but I freely admit … and laugh now … “I put tiles on things!”  

Love Locks

   Photo by David Porter

The images of the love locks around Austria are part of the inspiration for my #messageoflove #artinstallation.  

When I was visiting Austria in 2018, my husband and I encountered love locks on bridges in many of the big cities--Graz, Salzburg, Vienna, etc.   Evidently locking an inscribed padlock to a fence on a bridge is now a 100-year-old ration.  Lovers write or scratch their initials onto their lock, then attach it to the fencing on a bridge, and finally throw the key into the water below.  It symbolizes abiding love.  

Abiding love is powerful.  In my opinion, it is the greatest kind of love because it chooses to love in spite of hatred or unkindness.  

Because I believe this (even though I am human and cannot love all the time), this belief compels me to create a #bridgeoflove along the sidewalk in front of my house.  On it, I want to attach #hearts that will hopefully amuse my neighbors and the people from @stronghospital who walk the neighborhood, and still make them think.  I want to emphasize the message that #loveisaverb

 

Perhaps if we are reminded that #loveisachoice, we can work together and heal our nation.

for Knitters - Easy Weaving Tutorial

I love knitting on beautiful yarns--wools, cashmere, silk ...  and when I am done with a project and the weaving in is done, I have a collection of four to five inch strands of the most beautiful yarn scraps.  I'm sentimental about them because their combination is beautiful and I know the yarn is good and I hate throwing them away.  So this is an idea I came up with so that I won't have to part with them ... and the finished coasters hold happy memories of my knitting.  

Over the course of a year, I can collect enough to create several coasters by weaving them on a simple loom. 

Here's one way to do it:

1.  Wrap a simple loom with leftover yarn from a project onto a potholder loop loom.  This creates the warp.  The weft is created by using the collected yarn scraps.  As you finish knitting projects and weave ends into your finished garments, save the scraps for the weft, and weave them into the coaster.

2.  After you have enough weaving done and you like the dimensions  carefully cut the weaving off the loom and tie them off.  Then weave these strands into the coaster.  If you want to make it extra secure, take a sewing machine and stitch along the frayed edge side ... but really, you don't have to.

3.  Enjoy! 

Here are some examples from over the years.  I used different yarns as my warp and the combinations never disappoint.