No Time

"I'm late! I'm late! For a very important date!"

Before I head out today

I wanted to share 

these.

I'm trying to get more comfortable at putting myself out there. I am a student of encaustics. Not a perfectionist, not a brilliant artist, just someone who shows up to the medium to see what lessons it will be teaching me that day.

I am hoping to list them in my Etsy Shop soon.

Have a brilliant and lovely day!

For A Good Cause

    An idea has been rolling around in my head. Actually, that's been happening a lot lately. Recently I became aware of an organization called One Billion Rising and I want to rise with. 
    There are no events happening near me but I did find a site that was promoting an art show that was accepting entries. A meager $15 to enter a piece of art. Whether the piece is accepted or not, the entrance fee goes to support worthy causes for women. If the piece sells at show, a portion of the money is kept and donated as well.
     A picture came to my mind. I wanted to create it. Not a masterpiece for a museum. Simple storytelling. The Call for Entries stated "Entries should evoke a sense of women's empowerment and overcoming obstacles and/or be a celebration of the way the world can be when violence against women no longer exists."
     I created a piece. Not being exactly happy with it, hubby made suggestions and told me to create another. Once the pieces were created, I went back to the site to find the information. I knew I had to enter with an electronic file, then mail a check. What I overlooked was the fact that if a piece was accepted in to the show, it required hand delivery. Snafu city. The gallery is fifteen hours away! Drat.
     No event near me. No gallery entrance. No luck this go round. Perhaps I'll end up selling it in a local shop and send the proceeds to One Billion Rising or my local Women's Shelter. 
     I give myself an "E" for effort. A step up from an "F" at least! Anyway, here are the encaustic pieces for what they're worth.  

Poo on You!

Have you ever heard of the superstition that if a bird poops on you, it is good luck and money will follow? If this holds any truth, I am in for good times and a mega windfall! Check out what I woke up to a few weeks ago. This is our bay window.

Can't quite make it out? Step in a little closer!

Ewwwww!!!! Yup. That is all bird poo!

Poo induced or not,

I will take luck (and money) any way I can get it! 

~ ~ ~ ~

In other news, I had a spurt of creative energy during my recent hiatus and have created some new encaustic pieces. They will be listed in my Etsy shop very soon.

Have a brilliant weekend.

Odd One Out

Cutesy, little, fun encaustic piece.

Odd One Out

Speaking of fun...

The kids and I went for a walk on a local trail.

We spotted a vine that hung from the trees across the trail.

My son tried it first.

Darling Daughter was second.

Doesn't it look fun? Yeah! That's what I thought.

This is me thinking I'm young and light like a child!

I grab the vine, head up the little hill...

What you don't see is me lying flat on my back on the

right side of the path!!! Oh the vine worked alright. 

I didn't get enough height so I yanked real hard trying to

pull myself higher. SMASH!!!! Down went the vine.

Down I went. Flat on my back lying in the ditch on the

on the right side of the path. It knocked the breath out of me,

jolted my neck and cut up my arm! Am I getting too old for this stuff? Never! I got right back up and laughed my butt off!

My son (bless his heart) came rushing over out of concern.

If it would have been my oldest, he would have seen this as

the perfect photo op!!! Can't say that I would blame him!

"You cannot always wait for the perfect time, sometimes you must dare to jump. Life is all about risks and it requires you to jump. Don't be a person who has to look back and wonder what they would have or could have had. No one wait forever."   ~ Mark Twain (I believe)

More Choices

 Good Morning Blog Land!

 I'm happy to report that my days are looking brighter and my mood has lifted considerably. Part of this new found lease on life is due to the time I have had to heal and the work I have been doing to heal what woes me. Part of it is due to the warmth and love of those around me who reached out with supportive embraces and threw lifelines for me to grab if needed. Another part of healing my heart is my recent epiphany about choices. (Read my last post on choices if you're not sure what I'm referring to).

When I was at my lowest, feeling devastation and heartbreak, I lost all faith. If you're a regular reader of my blog, you will know that "faith" happens to be my word of the year. I was warned (by my soul sis Elena) that picking a word for the year is entirely different than when a word picks you. "When one picks you" she warned, "watch out!" She wasn't kidding!!!!!

One not so great feeling I experienced during my recent life upheaval was the loss of joy. I felt as if the joy was sucked right out of me. When the clouds started to clear and my heart started to heal, I thought about joy and how much I missed it. Remembering my new daily choice ritual, the decision was made to put joy at the top of my daily choice list. When I think of joy, one of the people I think of is Ashley from Li'l Blue Boo. She is an amazing woman with a beautiful family, strength of steel and an uber fun blog and business! She is a huge proponent of Choosing Joy. You can find out more about her HERE.

While on her blog, make sure you check out her tutorials, give-a-way opportunities, free downloads, her shop and more! If you click on the link, you will also find out more about her choose joy mission and the bracelets she sells. In honor of my new found choices ritual, to support joy and to help support and honor Ashley, I have purchased a pack of her "Choose Joy" bracelets. I have plans for most of them, but I would like to take this opportunity to host a give-a-way of my own!

photo source: www.lilblueboo.com

If you comment on this post, I will put your name in a hat for a chance to win a choose joy bracelet. I will randomly pick three winners to be part of the "Choose Joy" movement! If chosen, I will e-mail you and let you know you have won! Simply e-mail a response with your mailing information and I will send your bracelet on its way! Names have been chosen - winners will be contacted. Thank you!

The choice to promote My Etsy Shop has always felt like a hard one. I am really good at promoting others, believing in others, seeing the potential in others, helping others. I am not, however, very good at applying the same care to myself. Consider it a mix of fear, unease, disbelief... do you see a negative pattern here? Me too! THAT has to stop! I choose to be successful, I choose to stop hiding, I choose to lose the fear of judgment and embrace self-expression. Also, my oldest son is graduating from high school in a few months and this at-home-mama is cash poor!!! I want to throw one heck-of-a party for my first born so self-promote I will! To kick start my party fund, I am holding a one week sale in my shop. For 20% off, enter the code "yippee" at checkout. Feel free to spread the word! Thanks!

To go along with the shameless self-promotion of my shop, I should give a shout-out to the fact tat I'm teaching a class!!! Yay!!!! I adore encaustics and cannot wait to share my passion with others.

Here is the tiny hotplate I use for my encaustic medium.

Here is the new hotplate purchased to make gobs of medium to share with the class.

 

Here is the beeswax and damar resin mixing and melting away.

 

Here you have glorious encaustic medium waiting for eager students to play!

Are you still here? Well, blessings to you for your patience!

Hugs, love and all that ooey gooey stuff to you and yours this weekend.

♡♥♡♥♡♥♡

Sometimes You Just Have To Play

Some people have studios.

I have a dungeon.

I've been playing in my dungeon!

note to self: dungeons are not the best place for photo shots 

Something has shifted in me this year.

Perhaps it's my word for 2012.

Faith.

It has allowed me more freedom to be.

Faith. Play.
Two words highly recommended by yours truly.

The Gypsy

There is a gypsy living within me.

She pokes and prods and needles me.

Trying to get her way.

Wanting me to run.

To flee.

To kill her misery of being trapped too long in one spot.

She loves to travel and dance and wear loud colors.

She peeks at the world through my eyes and whispers...

"Why do you stay here? Where are your fancy clothes? When can we go and play?"

To which I shush her and answer, "Not now my Dear Gypsy. You see, I have family.

I care for them and feed them and they depend on me.

I must stay here in my conservative clothes and live my stay put life.

Some day. Some day we will travel and play and be free."

"Bring them with if you must but we have to go! I MUST GO!!!!" she screams from within.

"I cannot afford to travel the world with four children in tow.

It is a dream of mine but it is not possible on the salary

of a Domestic Engineer.

How about a nice trip to the lake?

Or a walk in the woods?

Care to shop at the market?

They have pretty scarves there!"

 "Scarves? Well... if we must. 

But promise me. We will wander soon.

We will travel far and wide and be free."

"Yes my Gypsy. Some day we will travel free."

 (Tree of Knowledge)

 (Provoking)

 

 (Release of the Inner Beast)

Smitten

I am absolutely smitten!

I created a piece of art today and I actually love it!

Not sure how long the love affair will last but for now,

I am super puffy heart, head over heels smitten with the piece.

It started as a vision.

Laying in bed, this image came to mind.

It clicked in my brain with an energy that said,

"I can do that. I must do that."

I have never had a vision of art.

Normally, I sit down and play and wonder where the inspiration is.

How is the process supposed to work?

Is it different for everyone?

This piece stuck with me.

It waited two days while I gathered supplies.

While I searched for the proper tools.

My mind worked and tweaked it slightly.

There was no worry if it would look exactly right.

There was no stress.

No Gertrude.

Just excitement.

I worked on the piece all day today.

It waited for me to be ready,

therefore it deserved my attention all day.

Oh joy of joys.

It's done!

And I love it!

A

HUGE 

Thank You

to all of you

who showered me

with support and love

after this post.

You validated the importance to

keep on keepin' on

even when faced with our worst critics.

(ahem.... Gertrude! I'm talking about you!)

Here it is.

I call it Torn.

Who The Hell Do I Think I Am?

Perfectionism is a disease.

Not that I'm perfect.

No.

Far from it.

Yet it halts me in my tracks.

Stops me like a deer in headlights.

That damned fear I have of judgment.

Remember Gertrude (my inner critic)?

You can find her

here

here

here

She and I have been going at it lately.

This time has been different.

I've been kicking her butt!

I was walking out of the vet's office the other day.

I walked into an invisible wall of awareness.

Hit me smack dab in the face.

Stopped me in my tracks.

Gertrude puts all these doubts in my head.

She makes me feel like I can't do what I want.

She shoves fear in my face.

On occasion she has even tripped me.

Bitch!

Seeing how Gertrude is a part of me,

the Awareness Wall made me realize it is ME who is stopping me.

I'm the only one in my way.

I'm the one with the excuses.

I'm the one who lets her get away with her evil plans to hold me back.

I want to write.

I want to take pictures.

I want to do encaustics.

I want to make money.

I want to move.

I want to live.

Everything on that list is do-able.

The Encaustic thing.

Fell in love with it years ago.

I don't make any because what I make looks and feels like shit to me.

Yesterday I was thinking...

Who the hell do I think I am?
Why do I expect perfection out myself?
Especially in the beginning?
Who do I think I am that I expect a masterpiece when I pick up a brush?

Everyone has to start somewhere.

I need to practice to get better.

I'm no Picasso.
Never will be.

Even he has critics.

My pieces are sloppy, immature, willy nilly.

That's OKAY!!!

I'm finding my voice.

Years ago I made some pieces and stopped.

A year later I made some more, hated them and stopped.

I haven't created in a long time so I sat down yesterday to create.

Not good.
Guess what????

I'm not stopping!

I'm going to play and learn.

That's how kids get started.

They don't judge their work.

They create.

They grow with each creation.

They play fearlessly.

I watch my children create

and fall in love with every piece.

Observation of their process is such a liberating event.

Play, enjoy, create.

For the sake of playing, enjoyment and creation.

I am going to step back into the process of learning encaustic.

It's okay if I don't create masterpieces.

I am new to the process and self-taught.

I am a kindergartener.

Just starting out.

Play, enjoy, create.

To Gertrude: You can come play with me but only if you play nice!

Trying to Focus

My mind wanders a thousand miles a minute. I grasp at a thought and hold on desperately. "Stay with me. Stay with me." I plead silently in my mind. Off it goes to gallivant with the other dreams, memories and tasks dancing and prancing and playing their little tricks on me.

                                                                  Focus

                                                                           Focus

                                                                                    Focus

That silly little word that decided to take up residency with me for the year. It is quite apparent why the choice was made to take him in. He knew I needed him and perhaps he was lonely without me. So we continue on building and bonding and learning to live with each other. 

Since I seem to have a major case of child-induced mommy ADD I'm never sure what I am supposed to focus on at any given time. My goal is to be able to focus on whatever task is at hand and move on to the next with the same sense of presence. So far it's been a struggle but I am definitely learning and growing.

Here's hoping your words are serving you well so far this year.

(messing around with mixed media encaustic collage)

Fearless

One of my beautiful fellow bloggers
entered a post today and posed the question
to her readers asking if they knew what it was like
to live fearless.

The one thing she states she is never fearful of
is sharing her artwork with her readers.

Funny. That's one of the things I most fear!!!

I'm not very good at vulnerability.

Art in any form is an expression of self
from deep within.

I love to create but rarely do it
simply because I know
I'm no Picasso,
or Mozart,
or Martha Stewart for that matter.

But I am me. I am original.
I am expressive.
and I want to be fearless of creating.

Thank you Silke for inspiring me to share
a little piece of me :)

(little wood block, painted edges, photo taken in a prairie, encaustic medium & technique added along with a friendly little spider)

Whew! That wasn't so bad.

Now to get the guts to put it in my Etsy Shop.
Ready...
...set...
...jump!

To: Me From: Me

I did it!
I splurged!
Got a little something for me!

How could I resist?

I love her work, have been a follower of her blog for some time and fell in love with this piece!

~artist: Beth Billups~
her etsy store
her blog
her website

Isn't it marvelous?

I am so absolutely thrilled to own a piece of her work!

The purchase was a gift to myself...
... for inspiration.

To awaken
my creativity
my dreams
my self.

To allow myself
to live
to act

to fly!!!!!!

Joint Effort

This is a collaboration piece. The cardinal is a chainsaw carving done by my uber talented husband. I took the picture, printed it, glued it onto a 5x7 canvas panel, applied a layer of encaustic medium and added oil paint to the surface (then removed the oil paint with the only paint remaining being that which fell into the crevices).
I love encaustics as it adds texture and depth that otherwise would not be there. I'm self-taught and still in the beginning phases of discovery. My husband has only done a small handful of carvings. This was by far his best! It's really fun to live in a creative household with all members being extremely supportive of each others endeavors!

Less Than Perfect

Today was far from perfect. Lots to do with not enough time to do it. Time change didn't help. Virus is zapping my mood and energy. Husband was in quite the crabby mood and the kids were running their spring fever off leaving the house in shambles. I managed to sneak away to play with my new encaustic paints. May not be perfect but it was the highlight of my day.

Night is upon us. Kids are quietly reading books and supper is just about done. This day was much less than perfect but it was filled with good moments and the loves of my life. That's good enough for me. :)

(standing tall - © Lynn Retzlaff)

Oh Boy!!!!

I am terribly excited this evening!!!! Today's mail really came through for me. Instead of the usual bills or junk mail, I received an actual package! With good stuff inside!

I have been studying and experimenting with encaustics for about three years now. Encaustic painting/collaging uses a medium of bees wax and damar resin as a base. From there you can add color to the wax and paint, add found objects/ephemera to the piece for more of a collage or mixed media look. You can etch, write, use photographs and more. The sky is the limit. Each artist has their own style and their own formula of what goes into a piece.
I have been mixing my own encaustic paints for some time. My process uses bees wax, damar resin and oil paint. I have been very happy with the results but wanted to branch out into some richer colors, something less translucent. In researching I found the best way to get rich color is to blend the wax/damar mixture with powdered pigment. There are some good, safe sources for powdered pigment but I'm not comfortable messing with them. You should wear gloves and mask at bare minimum as the powder is quite fine and not something you would want to spill. Definitely not something you would want to breathe in.
With four kids in the house and a studio in the basement, I decided it was best to purchase a product that was already made.
I searched high and low. After much consideration I chose to go with an artist who mixes her own medium versus a large manufacturer. She was reasonably priced and had a great selection. She was also a total pleasure to do business with. :) I put in my order and within a few days my shipment arrived!!!
Brand new encaustic medium to work with. It looks rich and colorful and promising. I can't wait to get my hotplate started so I can dip in!!!
Thank you Sonja!!!!

Check out her wonderful
artist website
and her
etsy store.