And so the story rolls

It has been 6 months since I posted on this blog. Not because I have nothing to say but I realized tonight that now, I say it in so many places. I suppose, friends read this but, the art buying public likes it short and sweet.
So, in an effort to keep life and art together yet apart - I am using Flickr and Pinterest and Facebook for my art offerings.
But I believe this will remain for those moments when I need to escape unto my own head and express that which is words that must escape.
My latest art line Remember Me Pet Creations can be either urns or just memory jugs for those pets who travel with us for a while.

 This is white/light clay with an amber finish in matte.

 This is one in white/grey clay with a clear finish in matte.

 This is one in Terra Cotta with a double amber finish

This is one in white/grey clay with an amber finish.
I LOVE making these and they are selling well. Hope to see you around - now you know what I am doing for fun!

Close Your Eyes Hold Your Breath & Always Trust Your Cape

This post has been a long time coming. No one's fault. Some things just take time to develop. The heat of July burned away a member of our clan and the cool October breezes brought us another - Kato. Portia would have liked him. He is a bit of a comedian. This was his first night at home - he is now up to 10.5 pounds and Kashmir actually plays with him. Hell has frozen over and a pig has jumped over the moon! He will be a year old on April fools day - don't even begin to ask Kashmir what that means!

 I started upcycling boxes and frames. I love the feel of the old - smoothing the edges and imagining what all the box has held over the years. Giving them a new life.
This was my first one -

Sticking with the shell theme - I have gone through all the softer colors - something very different for me! But trying to construe depth with the pastels has been a fun challenge. I still yearn for the jewel tones but I am learning to identify with the shabby chic lovers colors too!

Never to be left out - pinky with shells and
crystal.

This is made from an old glove box - pieces and parts - wood burning at it's best in the early teens.

Still pastel but a little more masculine this also has an interior fish hook motif.

And then - my darkness descends. I have a desire to make birds and bugs - this was an initial bug box.

 George "Johnnie" Finnigan. 

although he is from Wales - that was a long, long, time ago. His magic is seeing what is beyond the obvious - into the dark. Into the true meaning of people's lives. he is a guide. Leading you down the right path and clearing the clouds that block your view.
When you need him most - break open your soul and he will steer you in the right direction.

HIS MOTTO:

My candle burns at both ends. 

it will not last the night

But ah, my foes and oh my friends, 

It gives a lovely light. 

Sorry for the hiatus - losing Portia was a tear in my soul that took some time to heal enough to create again.  That which doesn't kill us - makes us wander into spaces of time and thought that are sometimes good and sometimes only serve to rub salt in the wound that is our heart. 

Look for more creations very soon!

 

Au Revoir Portia

I have a small, miniscule in size enormous in heart clan to which I belong. We stick together - we back each other up - we would live and die and kill for each other. That is how our clan exists. Today we lost a 20 year member and it hurts.

Portia McGee joined us one day on the front porch during lunch, she was scrawny, about 8 weeks old and HUNGRY. She continued to jump on the table and be swept off til finally I went inside and got food. She preferred the tuna salad we were eating and so it began. She explained that she had lived in France, gone to Cordon Bleu and was a saucier. She was, but she was so much more.
She became Sadie, our black lab great dane mix dog's best friend. They would lay on the chaise lounge on the front porch dog on bottom with cat laying on top of her and survey their world. Portia, like me, was never at a loss for words. And her tales of cooking and France and joie de vive - have kept us entertained for 20 years.
During law school she stayed up late, kept me going when I wanted to quit and loved learning all about antiques. During Lyme disease she laid next to me when I thought I would die and purred and sang to me and kept me going. She never tired of taking us under wing and showing us a more dressy side of life - she loved French wine, sterling silver, crystal and of course she though copper was a MUST to cook in. She believed everything should have heavy cream and butter and be cooked at 350. She made cheesecakes to die for!
When we moved 10 years ago she wound up having both back knees rebuilt by the dearly missed Dave McGee - her vet - and never missed a meal.  She was a friendly, happy beautiful cat who we loved dearly. A lot of memories get crammed into 20 years. There will never be another Portia.

As we are apt to do, I made her promises the last few days - we both knew the end was near - to go back and start trying new recipes again, to publish her cook book, to remember to live and to always know that we were a huge part of each other's lives. Mostly that whatever waits on the other side - we would search to find each other again.
She has sung me to sleep each night for most of those 20 years. My greatest regret is that I don't have a recording of it. I can still hear it in my head and hopefully that will get me through the coming nights.
I will love you forever and miss you until we meet again. I do not know your destination but I hope your travels are adventure filled and can't wait to hear about your exploits at our next meal.

Au Revoir Portia, until we meet again!

Reflections

.

 Sometime between breath and death it hits us - someday there will be no more tomorrows.

Reflections - directions to your soul on what is really important. My daily pondering tends to go more and more to questioning what is worth it and what is not. All the days we take for granted - all the people, all the pets, all the events. We go to bed with our mind racing toward tomorrow. Plans - hope - futures - dreams.  When we are young our mind never thinks there is an end of the road. We are flying as fast as we can to get to the next beacon - the next adventure - the next . . .
 The last 10 years of fighting a disease - both realistically and otherwise has made me much more morose. Much more, defiant. Much more, half empty. The things I took for granted, the cement I built my daily plans on - were not just shaken - they were shattered.
I regret missing half of Portia's and Kashmir's lives and almost all of Bailey's to this disease. It is 10 years of a life with Ric I cannot get back. I am a bitter old woman about it. I fail to see the good in this lesson. I reject the notion that there is any good. But, had it not come along, would I have paid more attention to those daily details - or is it just something you hope you would have done?
When I was a child my favorite song was Peggy Lee singing "Is that all there is?".  I see now, that it was prolific. Every time I lose someone, have a new pain, fail to get rid of an old one, that song dances through my mind. It seems quite obvious that this is not a "half full" kind of thought pattern.
I have a little sign in my room that says this is not the life I ordered - truth is I didn't order one. I am constantly amazed that so many people at such early ages KNOW with all their heart what they want to do, who they want to be, where they want to do it.  Today I could not answer that except to say I want to keep looking. Searching. What is around the next hill. Maybe it will be that one thing I want to do more than anything. I never found my "calling". I have nested often but neither have I ever found "home".
We moved to Oklahoma City in 1968 - within the next year a tornado came through and dropped a wooden sign in our yard. It said "The Wanderer".  For years I kept it and planned to put it on something - in my mind a gypsy wagon - and travel everywhere.
That too was prolific.

Portia is about 100 in cat years. She stares out the window and I wonder what she sees. I cry at the thought of her not being here after 20 years. I have checked that as I don't want that to be the last thing she remembers of me.Each morning I check to see if she will see me this day.
Reflections - promises we make to ourselves of how tomorrow we will do it different. The bucket list of promises never reached and never forgotten. Enough to fill many lifetimes of adventures and accomplishments, dreams and schemes. Perhaps like fear, reflection is an emotion of waste. Perhaps memories only cloud you from the ability to just live each day. Humans have come so far only to find the end of the road is in the same place it has always been - the last breath.

The dreaded Heat of July

Usually July slams me in the face with a force of heat that makes me cringe and beg for mercy. I start counting the days until fall. But, this year, we have had a reprieve - it has been beautiful. In the 70s. The way summer should be.
The nests from all the birds seem to be empty, the baby bunnies and squirrels are old enough to be hard to distinguish from their parents - and everything is lush and green as mother nature has given us blessed rain this year. Still, I hold my breath. The lash of heat can descend any day.

Last Sunday Ric took photos of the Super Moon over the city - from the rise tot he west it was peaceful and cool and actually made KC look fun and big! The clouds performed a dance as they gracefully flitted filling in the face and changing every few minutes. Even in the midst of the city there are so many parts of nature that survive our intrusion.

Some days it is hard to see the delights. In the midst of the the strife of life - hard to take that moment to feel nature buzzing around us. Heres  hoping you have a few moments this week to just enjoy the sights around you.

Father's Day

I suppose this should be one of those days when you think about your dad. It never is for me. I think about him at random times - whenever I read Sherlock Holmes, do crossword puzzles, eat radishes, go barefoot and feel lucky to have as many brain cells as I have.
It is just not often on Father's day. You will only have one dad. Some are better than others. Perhaps it is important, perhaps it just is.
I recognized my father for who he really was before he died. I wish I had not. I wish I had still believed he was perfect. But maturity sucks that way so very often.
My dad gave me many things. And I like to believe in his own way, he loved me as much as he could love a daughter. He was a distant man and we spent many silence filled hours each reading a book "together". Funny to tell someone you miss the silence of their presence.
He died at 59. I hold my breath to see if I will make it that long. The raw truth is - it doesn't matter.
His only foul word was "piss ant" and he hated ice cream with fresh fruit in it, hot spicy food and nick named me "peanut". His best quote was "when a large amount of excretory products culminates an intimate relationship with a set of rotating blades. I was his first child and his only daughter. It was not a match made in heaven - we just ran into each other and had some things in common. I see him when I look at my hands.
He didn't understand growing up and I don't give the credit for who I have become to him or my mom. They had input.

But, Ric - he is why I am - who I am. He nurtured me and guided me and held my hand. He gave me freedoms and trusted me when I wanted to jump - he told me to always trust my cape. He used to joke he didn't take me to raise - but in so many ways that is what he did. He has been my best friend for over 34 years and he is who I think of on this day.
We may have 4 legged fuzzy kids but, none had a better "dad".
I think Father's day is a day for those who gave you their soul - perhaps in different ways - who would die for you, who would kill for you and who love you no matter the day.
I am very lucky to have someone who has been and does all those things.

Happy Father's Day!

Dorie the Saucier

Meet 

Dorie the Saucier

Dorie is an impertinent, creative saucier who flew through 

the Cordon Bleu School and  says she taught Julia Child everything she knew!

She loves working under pressure!

She listens to Jacques Brel

while she is creating and 

you will always find a bit of flour on her person and she considers

it to be good for your skin!

She tells stories of the French kitchens and how smoothly they ran, she only cooks in copper and if it is not gourmet - it is not shit!

  "A chair de loup sauce de chien"

(the best sauce for course meat is hunger)

Watch for her newest book - but beware, all recipes require heavy cream, butter and lots of wine tasting!

Been A While

The Roasterie Coffee Company here in KC placed this last year - just got around to playing with it!

Ok rain is here - love it. Getting warmer but not miserable yet!  

All the fuzzies are good - art has been slow to produce but recently some new thoughts have been forming! 

Hope all is well in your world!

Time for a new garden journal - thinking about just herbs this time and more home remedies! 

The world around us seems to be in constant turmoil - never time to stare at the clouds, read a book, ponder or cook. I sit here now with 2 cats sleeping lightly and peeking out with one eye to see why the keys slow a bit now and again. Bailey valiantly guards the hall from would be intruders or thunder - which ever comes first. How can I not think my life is great?
The desire to roam and wander has my mind pacing. Around the next bend is so tempting. where I have already been so boring - a bad habit of the wanderer
Rolling thunder and far off train whistles call to me. Somewhere in my past is a knotty stick thrown over my shoulder with a ragged bandana and a faraway look down a long track into the unknown.
There is always tomorrow - until there isn't.

Off to imagine something that includes the non-existent!

And the Warm Winds have Arrived

I can't believe it was just the other day that the snow was falling and all was quiet and beautiful. But, today heralded the beginning of the warm weather that the rest of the world adores. It is ok. It will be over in six months. I started counting today.
Easter was never my favorite holiday. Crinlins and itchy clothes. At least that is in the past! If anyone catches me in a crinlin now - just shoot me!
The rabbits and squirrels were chasing each other like wild today so the cycle starts over. Here is to a better 2013. Cooler summer, kinder times, good stories and gentle breezes.

Nellie Baleen

Please welcome the newest member of my Guardian Warriors - Nellie Baleen

 Her Backside is as lovely as the front .  .  .

Nellie (Cornelia to those she does not call friend) is a shining light who blows her horn daily!

She sings a song that can make a man cry – not in sadness but for joy. She is the first of her family to wear a feather in her cap and sing in a voice that brings the rain in a drought and sun to burn off the fog.

Nellie owns an Oyster Sloop – it is her weakness. She adores oysters on the halfshell – she eats them while drinking her own concoction of Vouvray doux white wine mixed with la fee verte absinthe.

If you are in need of a bit of flair in your life, she is just the woman for you.