Too Beautiful to Work on ART!

I'll admit that the Northwest/Olympic Peninsula can be dark and dank and rather in-hospitable much of the time. HOWEVER, when it's Nice, it's REALLY NICE!!! A gorgeous sunny (not too hot, not too humid, no bad bugs) weekend last for the Memorial holiday AND another one coming up! I Can Not stay inside and work on ART, even though that is really my favorite all-time activity, besides eating, reading great books, and hanging out with friends and family...I'm learning an annual flow of making Art when it's dark or raining, and NOT being able to come inside til dark when it's a beautiful as it has been lately.


Above is this year's seven yards of gravel...it looks bigger when one has two buckets for spreading and the guy dumped it in my parking and turning place, so I have to get it moved SOON. I had so much fun and good exercise (really!) carrying gravel last summer, I decided to do it again this year, and spent my extra paycheck (May's a three-paycheck month) on black gravel and tumbled mica slabs (pile to the left).

The slabs are to make designs/stepping stones in the gravel, and an attempt to hold down some of the weeds. You can see the green fuzz gracing the edges of my front yard. Those suckers shoot seeds at least a foot in every direction and have at least two entire growth cycles a season.

I could see Mt. Baker from the yard today. I'm working all over the yard each year, as I do the paintings all over each time. Using rock, I get a somewhat permanent design. Next summer some tallish outdoor sculptures would be fun...maybe Plaveroll and driftwood...or??? Gray said he'd help. I could brush up my beginning welding skills.

It was a BIG Treat to have my nephew, Thayer, visiting for Thursday-Saturday, even though it took him 5 hours to get here, with the Hood Canal Bridge under re-construction. I understand the bridge will be re-opened a week early, so I hope to have more visitors during the summer. We went out to Freshwater Bay to select a few more choice rocks and enjoy reading in the sun. He read a book by Bukowski and one about him, and I'm still reading THE BRIEF WONDROUS LIFE OF OSCAR WAO by Junot Diaz for book group.

Being from the Hastings family, we both love to eat and talk late (10:00 for me) into the night...had pizza, enchilladas, fried clams, black bottom pie.




Drumming at the Juan de Fuca Festival, including four members of the meditation group that meets at my house on Sundays: Ruth, Lucille, Beatriz, David. It was a perfect weekend for the Festival.

Sunday evening I watched/listened to my NY friend, Loel Annie Barr's cousin, Geoffry Castle--fantastic electric violin!




And just so it would not be TOTALLY fun and games without ART, I did another session on the portrait of Flora, and think I'm ready for her to see it in person this weekend.

Then maybe I'll finish the Big Doll, who still has a "nice Butt" note pinned on the appropriate place when I was away.

HOT FLASH is going to have to be a dark weather project, but I'm still looking for appropriate art work and inspiring stories by and about women over 40.

The Art Doll show at the Wayne Art Center in Wayne, PA, is open through June 26th...a good opportunity for my NE fans to see and buy my current work in
person. I wish I could be there.

I'm going to get going on some art projects this weekend, including figuring out a trio of interesting and varied classes for ART-IS-YOU in 2010 in CT. I have an urge to do some tea and coffee dying, embroidery, and sew lace and tiny beads...stay tuned!