It's not too late to get in on the drawing for this springy journal that I made for the PAC blog giveaway! It is soft and quilty and a perfect travel journal. or just good for any kind of journaling.
This palette is one of my super minis that I have made to sell, and this one is created from a tiny altoids tin and air dry clay with M graham artists watercolors. Just leave a comment and you may be the lucky winner of this journal.
In a La Nina year, it is good to remind ourselves of the fact that this is still winter, and even in Hawaii, the rain does fall. It is warm rain, and our wise friend, Katy K. came up with the saying on this page. I think it is so good that the Hawaii tourism bureau might want to use that in their advertising! So we have not let the rain slow us down much. As the locals say, "if you don't like the weather, just drive five miles and it will be different"
This is the end of the road in Kaua'i, at Ke'e beach. It was a lovely spot to sit and sketch and I imagined that the landscape was mush unchanged over time. While the family hiked here, I walked up the road to Limahuli garden, one of the foremost natural botanical gardens in the US.
In recent travel journals, I have taken to kee ping a day by day log of weather and activities, etc. It is a kind of shorthand that is easy for me to keep up and I don't feel so bad if I don't do a page a day. I always like to refer back to where we ate or stayed each night, and when I look at this, I realize that it was sunny most days.
This is the spectacular setting of our condo unit at Sea Mountain village on Hawaii near the famous black sand beach at Punalu'u. Each day we saw sea turtles there, too.
I thought these seed pods were gorgeous. They come from the autograph tree,the leaves of which were used in Asia for playing cards. One can scratch into the surface and they keep the design.
Rambutan are my favorite crazy tropical fruit. They are much like the lychee, soft and fleshy.These were are the Hilo farmer's market, one of the best on the island.
Gorgeous protea captured my attention, athat d I just had to buy a couple to try to sketch. They are not that easy!
These antherium are plentiful here on the big island. Not my personal favorite, but it is interesting to see the different varieties, and color variations.
I always wish I could bring home one of these tropical beauties. But I just have to take a photo and enjoy them while I am here.
I usually buy at least a few stems of flowers to have in the room, and these have provided me with a lot of pleasure and sketching opportunities. I think I will leave them with my friend Judy when I leave the big island in a couple of days.
As I mentioned in my previous post, I am always seeking more light, more sun during the dark days of winter. Sometimes you just need to get a little further from home (if you live in the Northwest) to find that. So, several years ago, we decided that we needed at least a week of sunshine to get us through until March. Hawaii is one of our favorite destinations, and this year we decided to bring the whole family along, for what my be a once in a lifetime trip together.
The next day was quite rainy, however, as predicted by the lovely hula dancer that we watched over sunset cocktails the night before. So that meant a change of plans, and a little retail therapy. Window shopping, mostly, but I do like to go to my favorite Japanese bargain store, Marukai. I used to be sucked in by these cute little Japanese gewgaws, but now I have an easier time resisting the urge to bring home a miniature set of woven sandals, or a set of erasers in the form of sushi. Fun to look, though!
Another favorite stop is Nieman Marcus at the Ala Moana mall, where I saw what looked like a shelf of coral formations, but was actually beautiful napkin rings. This is a great store for visual stimulation and a good place to get out of the rain.
The koi seemed quite content to pose for me. The koi seemed quite happy to pose for me, swimming up in formation right in front of the camera.A pleasant way to spend an idle hour.
I can't think of a better message to send out to all of you , after a long blogging haitus. I have missed writing this blog, but I suppose my head has been too full of other things to fully concentrate on this task. I am looking forward to a new year, as I hope you are, too. To fresh starts, to family and more travel and art. I hope you will rejoin me on my journey.
Speaking of travel, this was probably the most beautiful window I saw all season, at my favorite store in Seattle, Souvenier. It is located in a cluster of other fun stores in Ballard which continues to evolve into a fun shopping destination.
This fox was one of many incredible paper sculptures featured in a show at Souvenier. These figures were about 24 inches high and had beautiful, intricate features. There is always something wonderful to see at Souvenier.
I am always seeking more light at this time of the year--anything to dispel the gloom. This butterfly was one of the best of the many light displays at zoolights, which always puts us in the holiday mood. Don't wait until the week before Christmas to go see the lights like we did, though. It was a real zoo!
One of the best things about winter, in my opinion, is candles, and lots of them. We welcome the return of the light by celebrating the solstice and we burn candles to bring more light into our lives.
Paxton Gate is my new discovery in Portland, and I recommend that those of you who live here should take a field trip there as soon as you can. It is hard to describe, but it is like no other store I know. This is where you would go to buy a stuffed black squirrel, a unique piece of jewelry in the shape of a wishbone or some test tubes, which brought back memories of visiting my dad at his chemistry lab.
A good reminder of what we can all strive for in our lives in the coming year.
Lest you think I have forgotten my art or neglected it in favor of shooting photos all the time, I wanted to show the two journals that I brought along to Mexico. Miraculously, I filled both of them during the trip with sketches and collage. After the trip, Paula, Robin and I had nearly identical journal pages at times! This first journal cover was a piece of fabric that I wanted to use but the image was too large for my book. I copied it smaller then added a covering of clear contact paper to protect it.
This was my scrappy journal cover, and I enjoyed it, though did not like the wrap around tie for travel.
This was the first page of my scrappy journal, a corazon that I had stenciled at home. I used several of these prepared pages in this journal.
We spent a morning at Atotonilco waiting to see the famous frescos inside the church. We had plenty of time to sketch and watch the families as they gathered for a baptism. I started to sketch this mariachi player but soon he left, presumably to play in the mariachi mass, which we could not attend.
We spent another relaxing morning at the botanical garden just above town. The Dali Lama proclaimed that this was a peace zone, and had special significance for peace in the not too distant future. We certainly found it to be peaceful and full of butterflies and birds.
I picked up a few odds and ends while in Mexico in preparation for creating this little alter for the Dia de los Muertos show at Guardino Gallery. The show opens tonight, Oct 28th and I will be setting up an outside alter, too. In spite of the rain...If you're in Portland, come by and see the show!
Seems that not that long ago I was taking an American road trip, and not much later was boarding a flight to Mexico! My motto for this year seems to be like a line from a poem I heard:
The exterior belied what lay within, as this view of our inner courtyard shows. The entire house was filled with art and plants and it really was a visual feast.We joked that we could happily sketch there for the week, and never leave the house!
We had two courtyards on different levels, and the views from the rooftop were spectacular! That was my favorite spot for sketching, and most afternoons would find me up there soaking up some sun.
This says Mexico to me. The rows of colorful fruit that was so enticing, but that we did not buy.
This was my amigo, who graciously posed with an armful of colorful detritus that he had collected from a recent explosion in the square. Unfortunately we missed whatever it was, which happened while we were having lunch. The debris consisted of lots of little paper mache arms and legs, though, so I'm sure it was very interesting to see.
This is the scaffolding that we watched being erected in preparation for the evenings' fireworks display, which we did see. It was fantastic, with lots of spinning, twirling , screeching bits, some of which spun off into space. After that was the larger aerial display, right overhead. It was the closest I have ever come to being on a fireworks barge.
I remember seeing lots of flowers when I lived here before, though mostly what we saw this time were rose sellers. But oh, what roses they were! We enjoyed the bouquet in our home that grew more beautiful by the day.
The balloon seller was a ubiquitous sight, especially on parade days. We never really saw too many being sold, but I fantasized about buying up his whole bundle and giving them away to the kids in town.
Well, it seems a bit strange to be writing more about this trip so long after the fact, and when I am sitting in a casa in Mexico, but I resized these photos, so by golly, I am going to post them for your enjoyment, I hope.
An interesting stop along the way was in Eminence , Missouri,a wide spot in the road . I would have loved to see inside of this antique store, or gone canoeing in the Ozarks, which is what everyone seemed to be doing. We passed hundreds of canoes for rent and of course wished that we had more time to stop for a leisurely day. We did see Alley Springs, though, which was the site of a former town, now long gone, but the old mill and one room schoolhouse are still there.
A new rule of travel for us is "If you see a guy selling watermelons from the back of a truck, stop and buy one". We did, and it was delicious!
Another National Park we stopped at was Hot Springs, Arkansas.This was the very first National Park, in fact and an interesting place to see. We especially liked the bathouse row, which has been in existence for over 100 years. There used to be many places where visitors could soak in the hotsprings, now there are only two in use. This is the beautiful original ceiling in one of the bathhouses that has been turned into the headquarters for the park. Tours are very interesting, and you should take the time to go for a HOT soak!
I can hardly believe that we made it all the way to Cafe du Monde, er, New Orleans on this trip, but we were sort of determined to try to see how NOLA looks 5 years after Katrina. We were there 4 years ago and were very discouraged to see the slow progress in rebuilding. This time,we felt very encouraged by what we saw. Everything looked pretty spiffy, though many buildings will never recover. Happy to see that our favorite Cafe du Monde is always the same, though. You always know what you are getting, and you are always happy, as the workers seem to be.
This was my favorite door in the 9th Ward. Yes, it is slowly coming back, but probably will be populated by new tenants and the face of the neighborhood will change. At least the changes seemed to be encouraging.
On the way to visit the cemetery (yes, I know it is sort of strange, but we both like cemeteries) we happened upon Longuevue Gardens, a historical home. Jim encouraged me to take the tour, so I did and it was very beautiful. It is NOT a plantation home, but a city estate, owned by the former heiress of the Sears fortune. Even though it was not a plantation, they included a traditional oak alley, and most of these are the original trees from the 1930's.
Every window in the house has a beautiful view of a different garden, and the interior was also quite unique. I enjoyed everything about the tour, especially the air conditioning!
This is just one of the many lovely angles at Metarie, a very famous cemetery, which is on the list of national landmarks. It is hard to find, but worth the trip.
