Outside Day

You should sit in nature for 20 minutes a day...unless you're busy, then you should sit for an hour. Zen Proverb

It was a fabulous spring day...and I spent nearly all day outside. I dug in the dirt and moved plants around, planted some grass seed, and starting spreading compost on the gardens. I will probably be a little sore tomorrow...but I'm pretty happy today!

Paul and I have curbside pickup for our kitchen waste and compostable items through a program called Garbage to Garden. As a perk we get free compost all summer long. We get small bags delivered every week...but this morning I went to the site and filled a big tub....and I'll be going back for more. 

I love an outside joyful puttering day!

Blink of An Eye

You plan and prepare for a trip for weeks....sometimes even months...then in the blink of an eye you're back home again basking in the glow of the memories. 

Today was my travel day...and I was greeted back at home with full on spring. From the explosion of yellow forsythia at our condo entrance...to the tiny daffodils by the rock wall...it was a sight to behold. It's good to be home.

It was a WONDERFUL trip! Absolutely everything I hoped and needed it to be.

Celebrate!

 The more you celebrate your life, the more there is in life to celebrate! Katherine Herrell

And I think it's also true that the more you make art, the more art there is to make!

That would be true for my friend Lynn who I got to spend a few hours with today. Lynn is constantly making new art and reinventing the old! She's a master at layering and creating textures with her gelli plate and abstract zentangles and still life art with her paintbrush and pens! I just love going through her bins and boxes and thumbing through her sketchbooks and journals....I'm always inspired.

I'm taking home a little pile of inspiration for me...but I also am taking home a big pile of art that I am going to make into a few art journals and alter a sketchbook just like I did for Becky.

I'm going to alter an art journals for both Tracie and Brenda from the art group too....I guess it's becoming a thing. 

I've always loved this sunflower collage of Lynn's...there's so much color and texture from her mixed media painted papers. I found it in a bin...and I told her it needed to be on the wall somewhere. 

This is a concertina book she is just getting started on....many layers to go.

And here are a couple others that are complete.

This is the other side. So many things to celebrate!

Cake

A great many things can be resolved with kindness, even more with laughter...but there are some things that just require cake. Curly Girl Design

The days have been just packed! There has been kindness and laughter...and yes...there has been cake.

I had a wonderful time with my sisters...and I got to spend this afternoon with Max...and most of the rest of his family. Emily made a fabulous meal...and a fabulous 3rd birthday cake!

Calls to a Child

Possibly we tell our mother where we are going, or possibly she knows she can find us at the creek if she needs us to come home early. She never needs us to come home early. A running creek in springtime calls to a child as irresistibly as it calls to any thirsty bird or hungry racoon, as irresistibly as it calls to any wild creature looking for a water place to lay her eggs. Margaret Renkl, The Comfort of Crows

For us growing up on the farm it was the gully that called to us. Or maybe it was the flower hill...or down the lane to the pasture where the old farm machinery became ships...or the pile of rocks became anything our imaginations wanted them to be. But mostly they were just a destination. I loved growing up on a farm...and I loved being back with my sisters these past couple of days.

LaVonn had some photos for us to go through that were still left from some of Angie's things. I was 3 years old in this photo and watching one of those black firework snakes you set on fire and watch grow. Anyone else remember those?

This view up the driveway with the barn and hay wagon is so familiar. I don't know how many times I rode my bike up and down the driveway to get to the gully or the black and white posts in the other direction. The driveway was sloped just enough that I learned to balance on the big family bike for the first time as I coasted down to the road.

The photo is black and white but Angie added a bit of color to my clothes. 

It's kind of a tradition for us to wander a greenhouse when we're together...and this one was not far from LaVonn's house in Evansville.

We had such a wonderful day going through photos...reminiscing and playing cards. And we even had another birthday celebration. 

Pure joy! 

Something Larger

I can scroll and worry indoors, or I can step outside and remember how it feels to be part of something larger, something timeless, a world that reaches beyond me and includes me too. Margaret Renkl, The Comfort of Crows

While we were at Tracie's yesterday I was able to visit the Jefferson Elm tree Tracie and Loon planted in honor of my sister Angie in Orton Park right across the street from their house. 

It's the small tree in the middle foreground of this photo....but when I got up close it stood strong and solid.

It made me feel part of something larger, something timeless, a world that reached beyond me and included me too. 

It seems fitting that starting today I gather with my sisters for a few days, Marilyn, Nancy, and LaVonn. Angie and Becky will be dearly missed.

ReBIRTH

Turn your face up to the sky. Listen. The world is trembling into possibility. The world is reminding us that this is what the world does best. New life. Rebirth. The greenness that rises out of ashes. Margaret Renkel, The Comfort of Crows

Today was my 66th BIRTHday...and I spent most of it with dear friends making art. It doesn't get better than that! 

This was my lemon birthday cake made by Brenda's mom....and it was fabulous! 

I spent a good chunk of the day with my art group...Tracie, Brenda, and Becky. We had the best time! 

We started a new shared art project that will take us through the summer.

I helped everyone make a small art journal using papers that they brought with them. Some of the papers were plain and some of them were their own art or inspiration images. Each journal has lots of places and spaces for more art and additions.

We each passed our journals to someone else today and they will all make their way around the circle over the spring and early summer. Everyone will add to them before they end up back with the owner. 

Once we get ours back...we can finish it up in any way we want to....it's really going to be interesting and fun. Here are all our journals lined up on the table. 

Hand Delivery

Tracie sent me this image this morning. I think I'm going to have a greater appreciation for crows after reading The Comfort of Crows...and I do love this list about BEING THE CROW YOU WANT TO SEE IN THE WORLD!! 

Collect shiny things.

Hop happily down the street for no apparent reason.

Scream loudly when you see your friends.

Maybe I'll scream loudly when I see Tracie tomorrow when the art group gets together! 

I'm staying with Becky most of the time I'm in Wisconsin which means I finally got to hand deliver the altered art journal I put together to her.

I'm pretty tickled with it...and I think she is too. 

There are bits of Becky's art and things she has collected in the book...and she can use them as inspiration to add to the many blank pages and spaces in between.

I cut these watercolor blobs out of one of her doodle pages...and stacked them up and sewed them into the edge of this page. The purple commercial paper makes a nice backdrop. The purple paper...along with several others...are folded over the edges of a page making the side view very colorful. 

This is the next page spread...with another watercolor cutout. Again...lots of space in between to do something fun.

I flanked these two pages with her coloring.

And I love the way these three pages stack up....all Becky's doodles and art experiments. I'll look forward to seeing what she does in the rest of the book over the years.

And finally....here's a bit of Wisconsin spring from Becky's yard.

They are a little further along than we are in Maine.

Stop What You're Doing

"Radiant things burst forth in the darkest places, in the smallest nooks and deepest cracks of the hidden world." Margaret Renkl

It was time for a change of spring scenery. Today was a travel day...and for the next week I'll be in my childhood home state of Wisconsin. I've stopped everything I was doing....and pausing to do something new and different.

Detroit airport

I have a full itinerary which will include friends, sisters, a cute little two year old, and some time with the art group! 

I hope to post a little something every day...but it will likely be late in the evening as I am tucked in bed. The daytime hours will be spent being fully present with people I love. (This post was written at the Detroit airport during a long layover.)

Just a few days ago Janice gifted me a book that is going to perfect for the trip....The Comfort of Crows, a Backyard Year by Margaret Renkl. Margaret mindfully observed and listened to the creatures and plants in her own backyard for a full year and captured her experiences in 52 short essays. It's a beautiful book so far. Janice knows me well and I am grateful for friends like that! Thanks Janice!

The first chapter is titled Wherever You Are, Stop What You're Doing. She reminds us to stop and look....stop and ponder....stop and listen....stop and consider...stop and peer...stop and contemplate....stop and think. 

Oh how I'm going to love this book!

Each chapter includes a beautiful work of art from her brother. Margaret starts the book in winter...and soon I'll be reading my way into spring. 

Grungy Textures

A few grape hyacinths have popped up in the neighborhood....they are one of my spring favorites. 

I spent the whole afternoon with Kelly (Sam's girlfriend) and I introduced her to gelli plate printing. We went over some of the basics of what's possible....and now she can just run with it because I've gifted her one of her own. 

Kelly is an accomplished artist....so she'll have a lot of fun coming up with interesting strategies and techniques to get the most out of it. There are SO many ways to use it.

Many of these papers are two sided...and we were going to texture and a bit of grunge. Several of them will benefit from another layer.

We both really liked this one. 

The blue grass was a ghost print from another print that she dried then picked up with fresh white paint. We loved how the print picked up all the old paint on the plate giving the print lots of grungy texture. It's prettier in person. All the papers are prettier in person. 

It was a wonderful day....and tomorrow is going to be interesting for a whole different reason. Stay tuned.

Imagination

Paul serves as a Sunday worship minister at a small church in Scarborough. It's the perfect part time retirement gig and he really enjoys it. Easter is a big deal....maybe the most important Sunday of the whole year. 

This morning Paul reminded us that the Easter story requires us to use our imaginations to see what is possible. During these dark days we have to resurrect our imaginations and plant seeds of hope for a better world and remain dedicated to the practices of love and justice, of forgiveness and tender mercy, of courage and fortitude. 

I also got an Easter greeting from Kate today reassuring me that people from the UK have us in their thoughts as our country is in chaos.

She shared this photo of her granddaughter Izzy as they explored the bluebell fields in their E. Sussex countryside. I am smitten....not only with the bluebells...but also with sweet Izzy.

No imagination needed to see the beauty and blessing in this! Thanks Kate!

Sifting through my big bin of snippets stimulates my imagination. These little bits of this and that are like seeds of creativity. 

This time...I made a little accordion card layering up the snippets...or maybe I should say planting the seeds to create an out of the ordinary birthday card.

It started off as just an experiment to see if the concept would work. 

In the end I decided it was a keeper and I added some of my printed words of encouragement on every fold reminding us to imagine what's possible. 

It folds up nicely....

 ...and fits into a little origami box. A gift and a card all in one!

Happy Easter!

Things That Matter

Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter. Martin Luther King Jr.

We got into the mid 70's today and it felt wonderful.....but also a little strange. But I'll take it! 

And the warmth prompted the daffodils to open up around the pond....such a welcome pop of color. 

It was also a good day to attend a protest...and the crowd downtown in monument square was impressive. 

I went by myself today...but saw a few people I knew. I spent most of the time wandering around just soaking in the energy and enthusiasm and mustering up some hope.

I wandered up into a parking garage to get this point of view.

Here are a few of my favorite signs. This one seemed especially timely. 

If you celebrate Easter, I hope you have a wonderful day doing things that matter to you! 

Hallelujah!

House stuff...yard stuff...patio stuff...and friends for dinner and cards stuf....it was a productive joyful puttering day. So what I have for you is this protest sign that made me chuckle. There are 3000 things to be angry about...but just as many to be joyful about....and today I'm choosing joy. Tomorrow I will protest. 

The patio is cleaned up....the cushions are out of storage and the chairs are uncovered and ready for our first 70 degree day tomorrow! 

Hallelujah! (All the more appropriate because Easter is coming!)

I've started keeping track...and last year the first happy hour on the patio was April 24th....so this will be on the early side. 

Like I said....Hallelujah!