Hold That Thought!

With the Columbia Gorge Art Festival behind me, my thoughts are turning to the yard. In fact, I spent all day Saturday working in the yard, and part of Sunday. Attendance at the show seemed low, and I’m betting that’s one reason… the first gorgeous weekend in a while, and people were chomping at the bit to get things done in their yards. Bob and I went to Farmington Gardens and came home loaded with bedding plants for the vegetable gardens and flower beds. Most of them are now in the ground, but I suspect there will be one or two more trips to the local nurseries before we’re done!

We have two new visitors to the backyard! A pair of blackheaded grosbeaks have been stopping by the last few days to partake of the birdie buffet at Chez Zorko. Here is a picture of the male, chewing on a sunflower seed from the tube feeder. They really like those sunflower seeds! With their brilliant colors and large beaks, they look almost tropical!

We also have another type of grosbeak that frequents this feeder, and they seem to be taking turns with the new blackheaded visitors — it’s pretty funny.

Below is a picture of the female. While beautiful, she’s not quite as striking as the male. Nature is funny that way… in most cases the male is more beautiful than the female. Except in the case of humans.  ;-) 

In other birdie news, we have a pair of nesting chickadees who have taken up residence in the beach house… a birdhouse we bought a few years ago on our first anniversary trip to Cannon Beach. The house is make from a big piece of driftwood. The chickadees seem to like the house and are preparing for their new arrivals. It’s fun to watch them going in and out. Too cute!

It’s Thursday morning and I’m busy getting things ready for this weekend’s show, The Columbia Gorge Art Festival in Corbett, Oregon. This is a fun show, one I’ve done for a number of years now, and I urge everyone to come out for it. The weather is predicted to be sunny and warm, and Corbett is just a short drive east of Portland off of I-84.

You’ll find everything there from handmade cards to large garden sculptures! I’ll have my notebooks, Note Totes, wearable art pins, and handmade soaps there, and this will also be the first time that my new paper-tiled mirrors will be available for the public to see (and hopefully buy!).

A trip to the Columbia Gorge Art Festival makes for a fun outing, and you can use the opportunity to see and do other things along the beautiful Columbia Gorge. You can even enjoy lunch while at the festival… they always put on a great barbecue — the hamburgers are wonderful!

Here’s the address… 35800 East Historic Columbia River Hwy, Corbett, Oregon 97019
From I-84, take Exit 22, go up Corbett Hill Road to Historic Hwy and turn right. Art Festival is about 1/4 mile on left.

I’ll be there Sunday afternoon, and plan on doing some shopping of my own… last year my big “find” was a wildly painted papier mache cat that now occupies a comfy perch in my studio. He is painted in psychelic colors and has emerald green metallic whiskers. His yellow glass eyes watch and encourage me as I create new things. He is my “mews”! I’ll have to take a picture of him and post it — he’s really quite spectacular!

After weeks of my blog not being available/accessible, it appears that the blog is back. It’s still a mystery, but at least now the problem, whatever it was, seems to be fixed.

I’ve been anxious to share some of the publicity photos that Dan Kvitka took of my new paper-tiled mirrors. He really did a great job. He also took some new photos of Note Totes, a notebook, and a few pins. I’m hoping to be juried in to the Wild Arts Festival in November. It’s a fundraiser for Portland Audubon Society and it looks like a very nice show. I made up a few pieces that would fit with the Wildlife theme, had Dan photograph and format them for jurying purposes, and sent them in. Now I’m crossing my fingers!

Here is my third mirror. It has a leaf motif and a quote on nature from Henry David Thoreau. I included this image in my entry packet to Wild Arts. Below is another image I sent in… a notebook featuring an embellishment of a crane.

Hopefully the judges will like these. It’s a bit nerve wracking, putting your art out there for others to judge and waiting to hear if you’ve been accepted. Wish me luck! 

Yay! After a few weeks of tinkering and experimenting, I’ve completed my first paper-tiled mirror! The colors are some of my faves… purple, navy blue, teal, rich jewel tones with touches of gold. I went a little crazy, incorporating a number of design motifs. It’s almost like a paper crazy quilt of some of my favorite things.

See what I mean about the colors and designs? But I think for my first effort it turned out just fine. I learned a lot from this first mirror.

I have another, with red as the predominant color, and an Asian motif, that has all of the tiles done and is just waiting for the final steps.

And another one, with a leaf motif and deep shades of eggplant, forest green, chestnut brown, and touches of gold and copper, in the beginning stages.

I’m really excited about these mirrors and am having so much fun thinking of new ideas for them.

In fact I’m taking this coming Monday off from work to have a ’studio day’ so I can work on these all day.

Here is a picture of the first mirror on the wall…  excuse the flash. I need to improve my photo taking techniques!

I never really followed up on the Say it with HeArt show earlier this month. As in the previous year, it was a big success and lots of fun! I think the participating artists would all agree that this should be an annual event, and I believe Jude, the wearable arts artist who so generously opened her Beaumont Village home and organized and hosted this event, is willing to do it again next year. Yay!!

Here is a picture of Jeanette Padbury and four of her friends enjoying Say it with HeArt. Jeanette is the one with the pretty brunette hair. What a lovely lady she is! We haven’t met in person yet (I wasn’t there when she and her friends stopped by, darn it!) but we’ve been corresponding via email since shortly after the 2008 LOCAL 14 show. She bought several of my Note Totes there and contacted me wanting to know where she could find more! Now that’s a great customer! But in our correspondence we’ve discovered that we have many, many things in common, and have become e-mail friends. We plan on meeting up at some point soon. Isn’t it funny how art can serve as a magnet?

This paper tile mirror project is addictive! Here is another “in progress” photo of my first attempt. I’ve added more tiles. I think it’s coming along nicely. What do you think?

Now a few more tiles have been added, and I’ve created a quote tile and placed it on the right hand side of the mirror. This is fun! I have lots of ideas for color schemes and themes. Stay tuned for more progress reports!

Here is a picture of the mirror with a few tiles in place (but not glued in yet).

I’ve been working on an idea for a new item for quite some time, and after a trip last weekend to IKEA, the idea is finally taking shape! I’ve seen beautiful mosaic-framed mirrors in many places, and have wanted to try a similar decorative mirror using my paper tiles. This week I’ve been working on covering 1″ to 1 1/2″ matboard squares with various handmade papers, and today the first mirror is beginning to take shape. This first one will be in jewel tone shades of purple and blue with touches of lavender, teal and metallics. The quote used is one of my favorites by Rumi: Let the beauty we love be what we do. I’m posting (hopefully) a few pictures of the work in progress.

Just when I thought I was gettting the hang of blog posting, I get a reality check. I just spent a bit of time writing a post about the Obama campaign and his great use of technology in reaching supporters. Then I switched gears and tried to add the jpg poster for the upcoming Say it with Heart show. Then… boom… everything disappeared. I have no idea what I did wrong.

I’ll repost my thoughts about Obama’s campaign later, as it’s time to get ready for work. But I’ll try again to put up the poster. Let’s see it this works…