It has been a long and very busy winter, which means I’m
starting to have thoughts of vacations to North Carolina beaches. The weather did become delightful over
the weekend, but whenever I’m stressed and need to get through a difficult
patch I channel the beach. I
remember the surf, sand and seashells that Tommie and I find when we walk along
the beach. I like watching the
birds as they run in and out with the surf—the whole atmosphere is very calming
to me. Those are the images that
have been running around in my mind, and it has come out in my art. The beach piece I’ve been working on is
a variation on a piece I’ve made before called "Low Tide." The seashells incorporated into the
piece are ones we collected on the outer banks in North Carolina. The driftwood is from the beach in the Tawas State Park in
Michigan. The sand dollars come
from beaches in Florida, brought back by my friend Dawn. Oh, and a few of the shells come from
friends on their trips to beaches.
The whole piece brings back a lot of memories and warm feelings.
In addition to my mainstream art
projects, I did some volunteer work for a project at my son’s school. Binford has a “Recycling and More”
group, and we have been trying to draw attention to the recycling bins that
most of the students ignore. I was
inspired by a vision of my son Tommie when he first started playing Minecraft,
his current game of choice. He
created a virtual house but kept losing track of where it was. He built a giant yellow arrow pointing
down on his house so he could always find it from a distance, which I thought
was brilliant. I took the concept
and applied it to the situation at hand with the underused recycling bins. I created five giant arrows built from
cardboard from recovered from hh gregg (they don’t capitalize the letters, so I
won’t for them). I decorated them
with plastic bottles and cans from people involved in the recycling project,
attached with my trusty glue gun.
I hoisted them on square dowels I purchased from Bender Lumber in town. They were really just eight foot long 1
by 2’s that they ripped in half for me.
I used bunjee cords to attach the whole thing to the bases I use for my
card racks and set them up around Binford for the big Carnival event. The school is going to store them for
future events, so I feel good about their continued usefulness. And while I didn’t get a pie this
week, the boys did win a couple of cakes at the cakewalk event. The angel food cake went into the
freezer, while the caramel-pecan covered monkey bread went into the
refrigerator for breakfast. I’ve
been enjoying pieces for breakfast, warmed in the toaster oven and served with
an espresso.
The rest of my week’s events were all odds and ends. The taxes are filed, the last of the
firewood kept us warm on a cool weekday evening, and I’m gearing up for another
seashell piece this week as I work on Re-shirts. The boys went to a birthday part on Saturday evening, so Jim
and I got out to dinner at the Owlery.
That’s a really nice vegetarian/vegan restaurant on the square that we
don’t get to enough. I ordered the
poutine, which took me back to skiing on a mountain and warming up and filling
my belly at the chalet. Yum! Maybe I can hold off for another week
with out the pie. Maybe.
Until next week,
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