Friday ON Saturday: Art Shows Galore & Sketchbook Reveals

Yesterday I visited four art galleries with my friend in Davis...It was a lot of fun. I also put up more fliers for my show at each of the galleries. I came home and drew this zenish drawing in my sketchbook that was greatly influenced by seeing... the wonderful work of Hannah Hunter at the International House in Davis, CA. Hannah's work is in paper and fabric and paint collages, with a heavy Asian, Hindu and Hebrew influences. She showed a whole body of her work spanning several years. It was stunning. (For some reason I could not get this picture to flip right side up). A the John Natsoulas Gallery we saw this exhibit of Delandier Almeida's oil paintings that were mind blowing spectacular in their realism. (I forgot my camera yesterday if you can believe THAT so these pictures are taken off postcards I got at the galleries). The light in my kitchen turns them too orange unfortunately).

And one more circle sketch from me...I'm working on butterflies lately.

Cherryne and I enjoyed a nice lunch at her house, talked and she showed me some crocheted work of her great grandmothers and some knitting she had done herself.

Then we went downtown to see all the art. There were lots of little kids in costumes with parents picking up candy from local merchants. All very cute.

Later we picked up her very sweet 11 yr old daughter from her school with her cello and I took them home and said our goodbyes.

I came home to a sick husband, running 102 fever...so I think we'll be taking it easy today.

Day Off Friday = Art Gallery Date With Girlfriend

I am off to day and have a date with my girlfriend, Cherryne, to visit an art show in Davis. We'll be seeing Hannah Hunter's paintings and collages. She is an artist and an art therapist. The show is at the International House. I'll be having lunch at Cherrynes' house. I am bringing her some old copies of Cloth, Paper, Scissors to inspire her recent desire to create art herself. I am sure we'll have fun. Today Mim's package containing two art books for me to add pages to arrived. So I see that I'll be creating this weekend. It is always amazing to see the art by my blogging friends in person. Such wonderful work. She also sent me some delightful large cards of animal drawings and alphabet letters for our twin 5 year old grand kids. How sweet was that! Thank you Mim.

Enjoy your weekend~and a fun and safe Halloween to all who enjoy that holiday.

ATCs On Grateful Thursday

These first ATCs came from my cousin Amy (my daughters age/born on the same month and year)...Amy is an art teacher in the school system in Colorado! She was sweet telling me I had inspired her to sew on her ATCs!!! This is her name for me (my family and closest friends use this nickname)

Lots of ribbons and layers of paper with sparkles!

Thanks Amy!

This wonderful ATC came all the way from Ireland and Gina (BT) for our W = Wacky Wellingtons

on our ABC Blog. Thanks Gina

Lots to be grateful for this week:

Three days of grand kid fun

Ten people have told me they will be coming to my art show reception

I don't have the flu

The weather is turning fall like in No. CA

We have reservations for a weekend get away in December

I'm almost done with all the art show prep work

I have many blog and in the flesh friends

I have an art date with a friend for Friday

My cat loves me

I have a cute DH

Life is good

!

Kids Say The Darnest Things

Remember when Art Linkletter used to collect cute things kids said? Well this weekend was chock full of such funny or not so funny things: Like when my grand daughter looked at me and very seriously announced: "You are old." "You are going to die. Probably when I am thirteen." Later while the two of them were playing together one said to the other: "Let's pretend you die and then I make you alive again." On a lighter note my grand son announced in a very delighted voice that: "I like when we come here because we do lots of art projects!" There was the to be expected large number of requests such as: "Grandma knit Mono (the monkey) a blanket with this yarn." Or "I want to sew a quilt. Or "I love your drum, I want it!" Or referring to my toys: "What can I take home?" I was quite a bit disconcerted when my five year old grand daughter said while I was brushing her thick, rich, lovely long hair: "I wish I had straight hair!" (already at five???) And my favorite of the day, while playing under the "!" mono print art quilt on the wall my grand daughter looked up at it and said pointing: "That is very very beautiful."

I know there were more and I will share them as I remember them.And just so you know I was there too: Happy Animal Wednesday

Seeds Of Hope II on Bloomin' Tuesday

My felted woolly bits flowers have made it onto a larger artsy wall hanging

31" X 31 1/2" in size. It is top sewn free motion style, hand embroidered and beaded

There are easily 1000 beads hand sewn to this piece! She is ready for her debut at my Art Show in November! Happy Bloomin' Tuesday to all

Day Three, No Blood, Lots of Fun, and We are Exhausted!

Day three started really well. The kids and I slept beautifully well. Henry V has been too scared to enter the house with the kids here for some reason (they have a cat and pose no threat, but Henry does not know that)...so he woke Dad up at 2 a.m. to be let in and at five again to be let out.

The kids enjoyed bacon and eggs for breakfast, and toast and organic apricot jam.

The sweet place mats they are eating on have the names of my children imprinted on them.

Their mother and uncle. I had them write their names and tape them over the original names.

First they removed the names taped on of my older set of grand kids now 16 and 19 yrs old.

History in the making.A lot of music got played today. Grand son loved my drum so much

I told him I'd give it to him for Chanukah.

Grandpa sang and played and made up songs with the kids names in them.

In the afternoon lunch was served picnic style out of doors in the back yard.

The dolls had a sun bath. Then grand daughter played a solo over her ice cream for dessert.

It was hard to keep them out in the sun today.

They came in after lunch and made art at the little table: stamping and drawing, writing

in English and Hebrew. They are learning Hebrew at school and their vocabulary is growing after only less than one month of school. Pretty soon they will know more than I do.

Grandpa and Grand son enjoyed a football game together.

DH just melts when A. cuddles up to him this way. And he does a lot.

He's very very fond of his grandpa.

And then of course they played more music together in the later part of the day.

The parents came to get them around four p.m.

I have to tell you we did not cry when they left.

Frankly we are exhausted.

We loved the time with them

but I won't crash and burn this time.

I will wait patiently until our next time together

but not hearing "grandma do this, grandma give me that" for a while

will be a much needed rest.

I need to rest up for next time. And now Grandpa can finally get to his two boxes of student notebooks

to grade.

I think I'll go to bed early! Happy Cactus Monday

I promise to get back to Cactus drawings soon.

Oh What A Day It's Been

Day two with grand kids visiting us... The morning was sweet, with kids dressing up in costumes found in the trunk...he's a little devil (but really that's her) and she a princess, and then snow white... Playing with letter blocks and amazing us with the words they can already identify and spell themselves (at just five years of age)... then coloring and drawing; here painting on fabric...the pile of art they have to take home is measured in feet not inches...

And then we took off for the Pumpkin Patch in a town nearby...driving the back country roads, saying hi to cows, and sheep and llamas and even an ostrich!

Grand daughter suddenly got a bloody nose and it bled all over everything...especially her...we hadn't even a hankie in the car to help mop up. So we drove to a grocery store for wipes and towels, tissue and water. The bleeding stopped and we went on. It started again twice more. We stopped it again both times. And were able to enjoy the walk around the huge fields of pumpkins picking out the most unique ones we could find.

I liked that oblong bumpy orange one and Grand daughter chose the one shaped like a star. Grand son took a medium large normal shaped one and then pulled her and the pumpkins in the wagon. We stopped to see the scare crows and walk through the maze of corn.

Some of the pumpkins were so huge to seem like from another planet

And some seemed to be art paintings in the making...

The bleedy nose started again at home and I called the advice nurse at the local

hospital. Learned how to stop it by sitting the child upright, leaning forward, not back (as

we did when my kids were little), pinching her nose closed for ten minutes and having her

breathe through her mouth; blowing out the blood clots there too. And luckily so far it has not

started up again. Whew. Not the fun part of the day that is for sure.

That taken care of more art was made, drawings, sewings, music played on drum and guitar and toy piano; books read, dinner made and eaten; pjs on, teeth brushed, more stories read,

and finally both are in bed.

DH and I are ready for a month of sleep!

We are pooped!

But I'm glad we still have them for more time tomorrow before the parents arrive

in the afternoon.

Grandparent isn't for sissies...it's not always easy, but it sure is a blessing.

How Blessed Can One Be? Day One of Three

My five year old twin grand children came to visit today for three days. Grand daughter informed me that she had learned to sew string fabric at school and proceeded to show me how she could in fact thread a needle and stitch fabric. She then asked if I could help her make a quilt she could sew herself.

I gave her some random pieces of fabric from my table

she threaded her needle and got to work and this is the quilt she built and sewed all by herself

Later we walked up the road to the park nearby

where my grand son could show off his natural born music talents on these drums

and they could play on all the equipment there

and pose for grandma's camera

once back at the house there was time for more art on the patio

and they proceeded to draw pictures about Shabbat (The Sabbath).

They drew "chicken, challah, wine in a wine glass, candles to be blessed,

and wrote on it: "I love Shabbat"

So sweet. None of this prompted by me.

So I went looking and found my grandmother's candle holders

and my shabbat candles and we lit them at dinner

before eating our chicken.

and after dinner and much giggling and play

grandpa read a book to quiet them down

so we could get ready for bed, baths, and more stories

before falling asleep on the mats on the floor by our bed

upstairs.

I know tomorrow will be another

blessing of a day.

I wish I could give you some of what is in my heart right now.

^^

V

Grateful Thursday And More From Watercolor Class

Love this Halloween card that Marianne sent me along with two wonderful ATCs!

It sure reminds ME of Henry V probably thinking up a spell to cast on us

and his vet! this is her beautiful Poppy ATC and this one I coveted my Californian Hippie Peace sign and flower and hearts Don't you just love it? I sure do, Thanks Marianne so very much! And our Ms Linda from the ABC blog sent this beautiful card and made me this wonderful V is for Victorious ATC I love all the embellishing she did on this one!

Thank you Linda so much!!! ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

Here are a few more exercises from my recent watercolor class

On this one we laid plastic wrap over the painted sky while wet and let it dry on there before removing it and got the interesting lines on the top quarter of this page.

The bottom brush marks are done by using the side of a large brush...they are supposed to

look oriental/Asian but I have to practice more to get the feel and look of this right.

this was the use of salt on wet paint dried and scraped off...

the black lines were painted using a bamboo stick.

This is my masked tree, now unmasked after mouth blowing

spray on the background still needing to be painted

so you might see this one again...some day.

Enjoy your day!

It is almost the weekend!

My grand kids will be with us Friday noon - Sunday Afternoon

My daughter emailed me to say:

The kids are excited. We told them we are going on a "second honeymoon" because they have a story book where the bear cubs go to grandma's house when the parents go out of town for a second honeymoon.

;-)

Animal Wednesday, Blooming Rainy Tuesday, & Crazy Lynn

Animal Wednesday brings you this green leaf looking creature that visited my car tire sometime last week. So delicate and pretty... she did not want to move... too busy praying maybe? I missed Bloomin' Tuesday yesterday as I am

crazy busy getting ready for the art show in November.

This zen tangle I did a few weeks ago

sort of looks the way I feel.

So many backs to sew on art quilts

labels to make for wall and quilts

embroidery to finish on Seeds Of Hope II

And my grand kids are coming this weekend

so

you know I can't do it all then....

But I am not complaining

I am enjoying the journey

very very much

!