Setting the Stage - Vision Calendar

 

I have finished my January

While cleaning up I found these little triangles that

I  paper pieced.
It was a fun way to make a stage for I .

flag of my Vision Calendar.

January was about setting the stage for improvements.

I worked on cleaning and organizing my house, so that

straightening up the house would not be so taxing.

 I also created good habits of picking up everyday.

I made a grocery list that I had laminated so that 

I could put it on the refrigerator and check off the items I needed.

  I just picked up the list and was ready to go.

I wonder what February's flag will be?
It is like a treasure hunt for the month, trying to find  improvements.

Aging Woman Hand Carved Lino

I have been busy hand carving this bookmark called "Aging Woman".

 

 

These are some of the proofs.

Proofs are the prints that you do to get the images that you finally settle on.

 

  

 This is a bookmark about a woman as she ages.

She tries to look young or act young by putting on a mask and putting on a role.

The mask could be literal or figurative.

She feels young, and she can't come to terms with the fact that their is a leak...

It reminds me of our resistance to change that creates a more unreal mask as we age.  Some people do this literally and some do it by "acting as if" they were young and happy....when they are lonely and have not realistically connected  to the dreams that they wanted and the realities they have lived.  Some are so used to playing the part that the mask has become part of the psyche.

We all have to look and see the person we are, the person we would like to be. 

The face we give to the world.

We all feel there is a leak.  We feel young, but our body tells us a different story.

If only we knew what we know today and could begin again.

How we would live differently?

Soon I will have one of these bookmark posted in my ART SWAP, BARTER and TRADE blog. 
 

Charlotte Gibson's Magic Folding Cube

 

  

  

  

  

This is a hand carved stamped on wooden blocks.

  Has to be the coolest thing I have seen yet.

Here is a link if you would like to make your own.

Thank you Charlotte!!

Feburary 1 What Is On Our Desks

I am working on the I in my Vision Calendar prayer flags. 
The little Select Tomato box came out of a box of tubes Joe got today.
I think it will make a cute sewing caddy.

 

Working on printing book mark, I have made a lot of proofs.

If anyone wants one of my proofs just email me for my address and send a self address stamped business sized envelope.

Isaac was building a "new" computer for his mom and dad.

This is Joe's antenna table.

Joe's project on his table.  It is either a receiver or a transmitter or an amplifier.

Joe got a box of goodies yesterday.  The large tube is a television tube for a camera in the 1950's.  Joe said they would rotate these tubes.  After a while the tubes would start to see through the persons clothes and they had to be given a rest.  So the TV stations would have about twenty of them that they would rotate through like a snake in the box.

The other little boxes are television tubes that are also used in Ham Radio gear.

This is Winston's desk.  He is learning how to program his new Micro processor design board.

I didn't get Catherine's desk....another day.

Low Tide

 

It is dusk and Winston went out and took this picture.  

 

As you can see when the tide goes out the boat just sink into the mud.

Reminds me of this quote:

Warren Buffett quote - It's only when the tide goes out that you learn who's been swimming naked.

High Tide

 

Today there is a high tide. 

It is cause by the moon.  The moon tonight is the biggest full Moon of 2010.

Astronomers call it a "perigee Moon," 

some 14% wider and 30% brighter than lesser full Moons of the year.

 

The drainage pipe there is to let the water that is in the street drain back into the canal.  

This could cause serious flooding if there were for example a lot of rain or 

a wind surge.

 

I told you before Christmas that I was going to be adding a section I called Fossils.

I will be writing more about this in the future.

It is interesting how I started this before January and how much it looks like the cracks of an earthquake.

But it also resembles the cracks in the desert from a parched earth.

  

Today I want to finish up a hand carved lino book mark.   

I will be printing it today as well.

 

Vision Calendar

My word for 2010 is IMPROVEMENTS.

After looking at Erika's Vision Calendar

I noticed the prayer flags in the window. 

I wanted a Vision Calendar that would some how be able to be worked in fabric.

I decided to make mine look like a this because our intentions for the year seem just a prayer.

I wanted a word that would convey something forward but also a word that would not be so big that I might feel overwhelmed by it's greatness and my smallness.

IMPROVEMENTS came to me in a couple different ways, and since it is twelve letters I thought it was perfect. 

Each flag has the month of the year on it.  I am thinking of doing these in a 'snail cloth' way that will reflect what I have improved over that month.

This is my table where I am working on carving linoleum stamps.

I am hoping to improve in making more lino cuts this year!!

The Tree

The tree is one of my favorite symbols.

When I was a child I memorized this verse.

Psalm 1

 ¹Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful.

 ²But his delight is in the law of the LORD; and in his law doth he meditate day and night.

 ³And he shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water, that bringeth forth his fruit in his season; his leaf also shall not wither; and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper.

Ancient Cloth's Tea Cozy

 

 

 

 

 Ancient Cloth got her tea cozy in the mail yesterday.  I was in a hurry to get to the post office so I didn't have time to write her a "proper letter" explaining all the symbols.  I got that in the mail Tuesday.  I told her to look at the symbols and see what they say to you.  You might come up with things that I didn't think of. 

So that is what I want you to do as well.  While you wait for me to write the meaning that I intended, what are some more layers of meaning in the symbols that you see?

BACK OF TEA COZY

Inner Healing of the Wounded Child

Before I sewed up the black and white fabric I cut this hand out of the red fabric that I got from Ann Johnson.
I have a problem with throwing anything away...even when it didn't work.  When I put it on the black and white fabric it looked more like a war protest image.
So I decided to  use the hand as a visual representation of something that I read in my journal.
I didn't write down where I got this and if you know I will be happy to give credit.

"GETTING RID OF BAGGAGE

When we have IT in our mind, break IT down literally into smaller pieces.  With your mind, however it works for you personally.  Take the rock or BOULDER that IT is as a symbol of IT and then make IT smaller in size.  Continue to do this until IT is small enough that IT no longer over powers you or feels bigger than you are.  Continue to do this until you can literally blow IT into the universe for her to now take care of with a breath, and watch IT dissipate into thin air and nothingness.  IT feels really good when we do this.  It allows us to take something that we once gave huge merit to and no longer see it in the same way.  It totally changes our perception.  This helps us to realize and recognize that we were the ones that was allowing IT to remain in a controlling nature to us.  What is your relationship to IT?  We were also the one that took IT down and CHOSE TO CHANGE IT'S  NATURE.  We have now taken back our control by  taking responsibility for what we gave IT."

I actually did this exercise at a charged moment.  I managed to reduce what I was reacting to...then I got a handle of how I wanted to respond.  It was quite empowering.

I got the term "wounded child" from Dr. Margaret Paul, who

wrote the book Healing Your Aloneness.