A New Approach

I'm trying a different tactic with my art. I always have multiple things I want to do, and have tried having a journal or sketchbook where I keep all my ideas. This helps for some of the overflow, but often I have two main things I am torn between doing.

Right now, one of the things I want to do is to work with fabrics, dyes, paints, layering, printing and stitching.

The other thing I want to do is to create mixed media assemblages with fantasy beings and various collected stuff.

My dear hubby has suggested many times that I pick one thing and do it for a month.

I've tried. And tried. Every time I start one thing, I long for the other. Worse, I don't start either one because I can't decide which one to start with. I'm at a stalemate.

So here's my plan! Take it day by day. Work on mixed media for a day. Work on textiles for a day. Mixed media. Textiles.

Then I don't have to decide! No trying to pick the 'right' one. No pining away for the one not chosen.

Has anyone else had this problem? What works for you?

I will let you know how this works out. Wish me luck!!

Heart Guidance

I have been relying more and more on my heart lately as my source of calm and comfort. A couple of weeks ago an awareness came to me that helped me find a deeper connection to my heart's healing powers.

I have been feeling a bit down and confused, missing friends, kindred spirits, and uncertain of a meaningful direction in my life. I read about Lao Tzu, Chinese poet and philosopher, who, discouraged with the state of humankind, rode off alone into the mountains, never to be seen again. I thought, I know just how he felt. I said to myself, "My heart is heavy."

Gradually the thought arose that my heart is not what is heavy and sad. Rather my mind, where my emotions are registered, is feeling down. I find that envisioning the heaviness in my mind allows me to feel the peace and spaciousness in my heart. I know from my HeartMath studies that the heart has more influence upon the brain than vice versa. I also know that patterns of feelings are registered in a part of the brain called the amygdala. So feeling the peace in my heart, savoring its quiet expansiveness, has a tremendous calming effect on my brain.

I have found that making the significant switch to focusing on the quietness and openness that reside in my heart instead of attributing my sadness to my heart, allows those heavy feelings to slowly evaporate like mist in the morning sun.

May all beings find peace.

Fun Fabrics Found with a new Friend

It's always fun to go to a _____ store (you can fill in the blank - bead, fabric, art supply, etc.) and its even more fun with a like-minded soul who loves to add to her or his stash as much as you do! With our husbands occupied with their own pursuits today, we were able to dive into girl time and look freely without worrying whether our sig other was getting bored, knowing we'd hear about that for the next several years!

What a delicious event! So here are some shots of my most favorite fabrics that I found today.

I loved the human faces on the turtle and fish! They feed my ideas for some mixed media creatures with interchanged human / animal parts!

And how to resist these colorful Day of the Dead skulls? I've not seen them in a fabric before. Don't know how I'll use these fabrics, I think I often buy fabric just because it inspires me and makes me smile

or swoon!

I also recently took a collage workshop with Joyce McAdams which was fabulous. A wonderful tip I learned from her is to get color copies of my fabric or scan them into the computer (these are photos), so that I can save the original. The copies can be printed on either paper or fabric for use in collages, and they can then be altered with paint!!! How cool is that? Best, you still have the original fabric. Truly a hoarder's delight!

Enjoy your colorful world!

Be YOU!

Accept all of who you are, embrace your existence as THIS amazing being!



"Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life. Don't be trapped by dogma - which is living with the results of other people's thinking. Don't let the noise of others' opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary."
Steve Jobs

With gratitude for the facebook posting from Gregg Braden

Would Love Kick Your Butt?

It's nice to think that when you've lost your way in your excuses and avoidance, that Something will come and smack you up the side of the head and set you straight! Thanks to Message from the Muse, here, for posting this poem.

All right Love, gimme some tough love!!

Tired of Speaking Sweetly
©Hafiz, via Daniel Ladinsky

Love wants to reach out and manhandle us,
break all our teacup talk of God.
If you had the courage and
could give the Beloved His choice, some nights,
he would just drag you around the room
by your hair,
ripping from your grip all those toys in the world
that bring you no joy.
Love sometimes gets tired of speaking sweetly
and wants to rip to shreds
all your erroneous notions of truth
that make you fight within yourself, dear one,
and with others,
causing the world to weep
on too many fine days.
God wants to manhandle us,
lock us inside of a tiny room with Himself
and practice His dropkick.
The Beloved sometimes wants
to do us a great favor:
hold us upside down
and shake all the nonsense out.
But when we hear
He is in such a “playful drunken mood”
most everyone I know
quickly packs their bags and hightails it
out of town.