City Love

One Donkey Tail Euphorbia plant self-multiplied

I've been reading For the Love of Cities by Peter Kageyama. Ever since Richard Florida started writing about what makes cities successful, I've said that Port Angeles is full of potential. In the eleven years that I've lived ihere, I've participated in a number of activities designed to realize that potential. I do see pieces of change: the waterfront walk, a few more young businesses downtown that point in the right direction.

Deep Water Harbor with ships, the Waterfront Walk

Once it finally stopped raining on 10/28 (or took a breather) I couldn't bring myself to go back inside. I walked to the library and back up the hill without even stopping to rest...I may be getting stronger. I weeded in the driveway (an endless task) but I can sit on the ground to do it, which is why black jeans have become a permanent part of my outfit. Then I sat on my back steps in the sun and read a book about professional illustrators and art directors getting together weekly to draw...inspiring.

Succulents with a last gasp of bloom

More Waterfront Walk and improved signage

The Port Angeles Fine Arts Center has been struggling, but I just greceived notice of a new director and a member meeting. The college is continuing to build and run events...taking classes last year got me started on learning and using new computer skills. How can I continue to encourage the buds, the seedlings of bloom Here where I Live?

I hope the devisiveness of the current election is quickly resolved and that we can celebrate our diversity, rather than yell at each other.

Check out  my other blog: http://www.hotflashwomen.blogspot.com/
Mark your calendar for 12/3/16, the Sequim Prairie Grange Holiday Bazaar, to see me and Katie and what we have been working on.

Please Vote! (in the US)

Fabric Journal Pace using Ancestor Faces

I only have 3 new images on my camera this week...wonder what I've been doing with my time? I know I want to move more quickly on finishing the Ancestor: Making POD book for Amazon...hoping I can remember the final steps, which include creating chapters. I keep finding or making new things to add, but I must stop and take the next step at some point.

After much study and thought, I filled out my ballot Saturday and put it into the ballot box on my way to Port Townsend yesterday. In these times of increasing complexity and upheaval, it's more important than ever to have our votes counted. If we wait for the perfect person or the perfect situation, we will have to wait for a very long time.

I get copies of articles from the Washington Post via Amazon each morning...just found out that they are both owned by the same person. The articles are more like editorials than news, but I guess that's the way of news these days. Apparently the US isn't the only country undergoing political upheaval, what with Brexit and a Pirate party in Iceland, determined to overthrow the status quo.

As we perhaps approach the transition of the rule of old rich white men into a wider involvement of all the population, I hope we can resist the temptation to crawl into a hole and pull the dirt over our heads. The prevalence of Social Media can go either way in confirming fears and hatred or expanding our appreciation for global issues.

As a friend said to me, "If you don't vote, you don't get to complain."

Please check out my other blog at: http://www.hotflashwomen.blogspot.com/

Don't forget to VOTE! 

I think mail-in ballots are a Marvelous idea!

Stormy Weather

We Never Know, second new piece for the Veterans Show at the library

Since I moved away from the Northeast, their weather seems to have gotten worse, with more violent hurricanes and snow storms. The weather here in the Northwest seems to have become more benign in the eleven years I've lived here.

Maybe all news, including weather news, is getting more alarmist these days (news as "entertainment"), but the predictions for last weekend were frightening...with weather maps looking like VanGogh's Starry Night, in a swirl of typhoons from the Pacific, expecting up to 150 mph winds and buckets or rain onto our dry ground.

Actually there were two tornadoes on the Oregon Coast and plenty of trees down in the west...my friend, Jeff, may still be out on the West End, supervising clean-up in the Olympic National Park.

I and my Seattle brothers came out lucky. The only down spot was Jan and I deciding to miss the opening party at Bainbridge Island Art Museum on Friday. The museum bought one of her amazing artist books for their special book collection. See the link on her name above.

For this week's piece, I assembled a group of my father's things my mother saved and gave to me. I think it's best to have them arranged, rather than in a drawer. Here's what I wrote:

We Never Know...
Souvenir from Texas
Basic training194?
Dad missed WWII
And Korea
Got married
Had Children
The Army made
Him a psychiatrist
Instead of farmer/engineer/GP
Or Dead
He kept taking photos
Died at 62
A life                                           See my other blog at: hotflashwomen.blogspot.com

I Don't Like Daylight Savings Time!

The huge willow north of my house, a sliver of my fence in the foreground. I love the Bright green, and in a few weeks I'll see the strait of Juan de Fuca through its bare branches.

I realize that time is elastic and sometimes an artificial construct, but I wish Bush the younger had just left our time alone. These long, long dark mornings, then relatively bright evenings just don't seem right, now that the cooler weather and darker, wetter days have begun.

Rosemary can grow into large bushes here, like in the Mediterranean. I'm trying again. Last time I planted one I was trying too hard to protect it from the deer, and also protected it from the sun. I'm told that the deer don't eat rosemary...we'll see.

Southeast corner of my back deck in the foreground. My back yard on a gray day, the sculpture I made with rebar, Paverpol, and rags has held up at least 3 winters. The plant in the lower right, Donkey-Tail Euphorbia, started babies ALL over my yard, so I'm starting to pull some out to preserve an area of rock. I still love to collect rocks.

So Many Interesting Things to Do! It took me a while to get into my new routine of being retired, but I am starting to enjoy it since last spring...and I think maybe getting my thyroid levels up to normal may have helped, too. I never had to take a prescription med before...except birth control, but I'm not doing too badly for close to 70...lots happier, too.

Beaded Pins, I made the backs yesterday...FUN to stitch and watch movies.

I am working more slowly now, enjoying all the processes more, taking time to run outside into the sun, read, make myself delicious meals, see friends...Katie and I will have a table at: A Holiday Handmade Fair at the Dungeness Grange on December 3. Come and see us to find Wonderful things at Reasonable, possibly ridiculously low prices.

See some of my Veterans pieces on my other blog at: http://www.hotflashwomen.blogspot.com/

To Show or Not to Show?

Paper Artist Trading Cards for my new Ancestor: Making book. 2.5" x 3.5"

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To show or not to show

Does art exist if it is not shown?

What about all the fees

And schlepping?

The lack of sales

The Rejections?

Backs of the cards above...I'm using actual photos...too many photos to save them all

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But what about the

Unmistakable pride

And comraderie

Of seeing one’s efforts hung

And seeing others

Seeing the results of our efforts?

Side view of long-necked doll with marbleized fabric and beading, now on display in Sequim

 

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The Sequim Fiber Arts Show

Museum and Arts Center

Washington Ave, Sequim,

Into December.

Thanks for your comments, Eileen. I need to re-remember how to link to my Amazon Author page...here's my other blog: http://www.hotflashwomen.blogspot.com/