Rialto Beach with Katie and Mike

Cloudy, misty, foggy, rainy....BUT blue holes appearing

 We've been planning this trip for a while. It's not easy to find all of us free for a day. It had been sunny and bright for my trip to the Seattle Art Museum  the previous day with Jan and Steve. Overcast mornings often clear into sunny afternoons here in the Northwest.

I kept Insisting that the weather would clear...even though I didn't quite believe it...should have had more faith in myself...good lesson.

Mike is my Tai Chi Teacher

He says that some day I will be able to do the forms on pebbles, as he does...so beautiful!

Sea stacks emerging

Rialto Beach in Fog 7/22/16

 I knew I needed to live near salt water
Finally moved here in 2005

Weather changing slowly

Sea stacks gradually became more visible...I kept assuring Mike and Katie that the sun would come out

Good friends make this HOME!

Textured base of large tree that has been in salt water a long time. I'm collecting textures to layer in PhotoShop

Dried seaweed to draw

We arrived in a rainy/misty sort of thing that is common in the Northwest...we don't mind, the weather keeps us hydrated

Selfie with wet hair and sea stacks starting to come out of the mist

Katie planned our trip around a minus tide, black satiny rocks

We could have almost walked to these stacks, but might have had to wait 12 hours for next low tide

 

I could just stand staring at the water, hearing it, smelling it--for hours on end.
I'm ready to go back
Rialto is about a 2-hour drive from my house...
the time went so quickly!

Gourmet pizza at Pacific Pizza in Forks...YUM!

Use the Good Stuff!

Jan Dove, with new work on silk...She led us in a mini marbleizing Workshop

Making things instead of saving

Marbleized Fabric

Jan’s studio

Women together, making things

The magic of ink on heavy water

Doll silhouette in tiny beads, beaded hair

Second piece of marbleized fabric: Shoulders

First marbleized piece waiting for more fabric and stitching

But I said I wasn’t going to accumulate anything more!

I designed 3 pieces, one to use each of the pieces of marbleized fabric I made...

Shows do serve their purpose

Finish for the Fiber Arts Festival in Sequim at the beginning of October.

What is the Point of Making Art?

My back yard, 7/16. I've been building it...with the help of nature...since 2006

What is the point of making Art?

Does it require a purpose

Beyond  helping to make

Our lives and our consciousness

Of self

Tolerable?

July close flowers from downtown PA

The brightest yellow, the richest purples

The air quivering with bees

They seem to know

I’ve build this place

For us.

I'm collecting images to use as...

Photoshop layers...when I get time

Interdependance Day...I hope

Two Versions of the same doll from a sketch in one of my journals

Blog 7/4/16 I hope you are all subscribed to Brain Pickings www.brainpickings.org…a regular Sunday blog by Maria Popova with lots of thoughtful ideas and images. She has me thinking about my own mental health, as does the lecture last week at our library on Brain Health by Dr Kristoffer Rhoads from UW. We create our own reality…and we are responsible for what we create.

Finding people with whom we feel safe—Vital to our mental health.

The brain stem is activated when people are faced with the threat of annihilation

Constant stress response, as in our media/political/corporate-run world now

Sketches for three of the dolls on this page...I can't stop making things

Trauma robs us of our sense of control over our lives and experiences

Then our brain function is less efficient and rich than it could be

We are herded into pathways of fear, directed against the Imaginary Other

Created by press and politicians and powers

Who want to control what we do, how we vote,

The decreasing standards we now accept as normal

“The challenge of recovery is to reestablish ownership of your body

and your mind—of your self. This means feeling free to know what you know

and to feel what you feel without becoming overwhelmed, enraged, ashamed

or collapsed.”  Van der Kolk

One-armed Icon...I'm trying to think of a nobler name

Vigils help us share positive feelings,

Even of sadness.

My brother told me

How many times he felt afraid

Growing up gay.

How many times I felt afraid and demeaned

Growing up female…and with an abusive partner

For 17 years.

The point is, cherish Your Self

Cherish this Living Planet

And ALL who inhabit it.

Angel

The fireworks are exploding...people held out til this evening with the current ban

Fire and noise...what drives people to need this drama?

We have a lot of work to do in the next months and years

To follow up our Declaration of Independence from England

With resolve to nurture Interdependence with all our fellow citizens

Not give in to Anyone manipulating us into 

fear and despair...