Hard Candy in Houston

More Hard Candy pics!
Here Stephanie Rubiano fires some enamels.


















Below are Tish's beads. I apologize, but I realized that since I didn't get to keep a roster I don't know last names! If you're out there Tish speak up, these were great! The blue and silver one says La Luna along the crescent edge.














EJ's adorable little brass dapping block and her buddy Jennifer hard at work.

Hard Candy Pics!

Here are some images from the "Hard Candy" enamel bead class.

Collage Lab

My pal Bee Shay has a new book out "Collage Lab". And guess what! I'm in it! I have a watercolor pour collage in the gallery section. Woo hoo!

Fun at Adorn Me!

The Hard Candy class was a blast! through the class as well as my fab roomie Charlene I met and bonded with Diana Frey, Riki Schumacher and Diane Cook. What a riot those gals are! Enroute to dinner at a fun local tex-mex spot, Riki revealed the group's little plastic longhorn mascot. His name is still being decided I think, more on that later. The little plastic longhorn got to eat out and then participate in a Thomas Mann class and a Keith LoBue class. He's a lucky little bovine!

Here Diana Frey and another student Susan Linn torch fire their enamels.

My Adorn Me! Roomie Charlene

Adorn Me was WONDERFUL! I had a FABULOUS roomie that I met online through the Adorn Me! yahoo group. Gotta love those yahoo groups! Charlene's blog is here. She was my guardian angel running to get the luggage cart helping me load and unload stuff... just an all around great gal. You can "meet" Charlene here and see her soldering with plumbing solder in Diana Frey's "Twisted Sistah" class.

Adorn Me! Houston

Everyone at Adorn Me! had a great time we all sincerely hope that it's a yearly thing now. Stay tuned! I did not take many photos. I was go, go, going the entire time. I hardly had time to breathe! I got to meet someone I've read about and admired for YEARS Ricë Freeman-Zachery. I have long loved her journal clothing and am very inspired to try my hand at one. Spent some good chat time after breakfast Friday with she and EGE, her husband "Ever Gorgeous Earl", who is just that! Earl is a quiet one but what a thrill to get a chuckle out of him! Earl was behind the camera much of the week at Adorn Me as Ricë and he have a new book coming out. Again, stayed tuned!!! ...very exciting stuff. They were truly quality folks and a delight to have finally met.

Pre Houston Chaos

So I've been in such a whirlwind that I didn't load these up before I left.

Charmed at SCC in Pittsburgh

I participated in the show "Charmed" at the Society of Contemporary Craft which soon comes down. Many of the charms will stay in the store there.
Check 'em out here!
It was nice to be in the company of so many legendary metalsmiths!
Off to pack and plan for "Adorn Me!" in Houston.

Robert's V-Day Paddle

Well on Valentine's Day I spent a day in the studio and Robert went out kayaking with our friends. Here's a clip of their trip!

Metal Tigers

Be firm and fearless it is the Year of the Metal Tiger!

What will you choose?

"I believe that every single event in life happens as an opportunity to choose love over fear.” – Oprah Winfrey

Wow... this has been my life choosing...love? fear? love? fear? I've made some bad choices, some hard choices, some easy ones and quite a few good choices. and many of them revolved around those two things. I have tried very hard for some years now to choose love every time. I try to start fresh each day beginning from a place of love. And in difficult situations I ask love to open my heart that has grown cold with fear. It works!

Creative River

I am a sucker for a metaphor and well, water metaphors? I'm done for. You had me at water.... Currently many of you know I am enthralled with Women Who Run with the Wolves. I just had to share some excerpts that are resonating with me and have done so now for a full week. When I read this it was a reverberating gong! It was just what I needed to read.

The following are from Chapter 10 Clear Water: Nourishing the Creative Life

“Creativity is a shapechanger. One moment it takes this form, the next that. It is like a dazzling spirit who appears to us all, yet is hard to describe for no one agrees on what they saw in that brilliant flash.”

The author talks on about creative endeavors from the obvious, painting, to those tasks which we perform with soul and imbue with creativity such as raising children or nations. “All these are from the Wild Woman, the Rio Abajo Rio, the river beneath the river, which flows and flows into our lives.”

“It is the love of something, having so much love for something-whether a person, a word, an image, an idea, the land, or humanity-that all that can be done with the over-flow is to create. It is not a matter of wanting to, not a singular act of will, one solely must.”

I realized this is so much at the heart of why I do what I do and why I freely share what I do. Many artists worry about their work or ideas being stolen. I myself have worried, and still do, about this sort of thing. When you're an artist your ideas are your merchandise. You can't simply put in a scanning system and hidden cameras and hire a security guard. It's just not that easy. So what needs to change I ask myself.... Myself! is my answer...
I need to change! or I will make myself miserable feeling always victimized, always on guard. If I cannot control it why not let go. Make new work. Move on. If you give into the fear you begin to think everyone's work is looking a little too much like yours. Then you imagine sales being torn away from you, and your mind and ego go wild and you envision being totally forgotten by your clientele in favor of the interloper and then the ensuing poverty and pizza delivery job you'll have to get to survive. You become the jealous lover, ever vigilent of your possession. You become its prisoner.
Or better yet would you lock away your child so it is never kidnapped?! Of course not. So will you become completely freaked out each day until she is home from school? Of course not, you find a balance.

So as artists isn't there a better way to be?! Isn't there some balance there?
If creativity is like the river then it is ever changing, ever rushing on, carving out new places, dragging with it new material from its banks, ever nourishing its banks downstream, being replenished by the rains, etc. I cultivate this sort of thinking in myself. Falling prey to the fear of being ripped off is pollution to my river. It is toxic waste that once allowed to spread like a green acid, pollutes my creativity's headwaters and then I can create nothing. I become barren, stagnant and lost. It happens so fast. I have learned just how fragile my muse is. It is a Prince Rupert's drop. It will withstand so many things but one toxic thought shatters it.

Time in the studio to create is so very, very dear to me. There are times I get so little of it and it is my drug. The smallest toxic thought ruins me for days and sabotages my efforts. This translates immediately into less for sale at shows and therefore less money coming in, less ideas for future workshops, which equals less income and so on. It is a downward spiral that feeds itself. Ruined creative time gives the bad ego Harpy voices ammo, "You never make anything interesting much less good. Forget it, art?! Ha you haven't done anything decent since grad school! And even that was questionable. You'll never make art real galleries will want." And the coups de grace" "Anyone can make this, when will you really make something worthwhile?" etc. The Harpies fly in and crap all over any new piece of jewelry. It take all I have to keep the locked out. Even on a good day I can hear their beating wings on the window panes.

So, do not feel alone! All artists at sometime suffer the voices of doubt. But I take heart and focus on the water metaphor. The waters must be kept clean and cherished. Water can and does nourish us. Be your river's keeper for its effects will be felt far downstream and you cannot possibly imagine what those effects might be.
I jokingly call Robert Tom Bombadil and he sweetly calls me Goldberry the river's daughter.

More *°SNOW°*

Oh I just love it! I can picture tomorrow, hot coffee, romping in the snow, then the studio all day with the lovely white wonderland outside.

*°SNOW°*

Oh I LOVE the SNOW!!!! WE haven't had any in YEARS!!!! Robert and I have been out throwing snowballs at midnight!!! We walked to the end of our street. Its GLORIOUS!

Men's Night Out!

This Wednesday come see me at the Golden Gallery in the Cotton Exchange from 6-8pm for "Men's Night Out", a shopping event especially for you guys to do your Valentine's Day shopping.

Joe Jackson - Look Sharp! (10" vinyl record)

Dancing Mermaid

PLEASE go read this blog!
Her post on the January 25th was SO beautiful!

"i am gonna be honest here,
and it might apply to you
and it might not

but this thing you have
whatever artistic identification that may be
stamped on your heart
and weaved into everything you touch

someone is going to try to take it
at some point

they probably won’t mean to
or maybe they will
or maybe it will be a fluke
or maybe they will try to make money
off this thing

that is so rightfully yours

and no matter how hard they try
(if they are trying)
it is not going to be exactly like you
because that is technically impossible

it does not contain your spirit, it contains
their spirit thus giving no comparison

in that same respect
this thing you have

someone, somewhere,
whether you are aware of it or not
has done the same thing

(and again, no comparisons)

i am not saying go be an asshole,
it is obviously not that black and white

but what i am saying is
i truly believe there is enough for everyone,
everywhere

no one can take the best part of
you

and that thing-
that thing you are so afraid that someone is going
to snatch up before you get a chance to birth it

it is not the only thing
you have

it is a simply a gem
among a whole sea of treasures

and there is a lot more where all
that goodness came from

i promise you that

creative assignment #25 what thing are you afraid of losing?"

Again, not my work, but the writing of McCabe at Dancing Mermaid

Gearing up with Gut

Been playing with sausage casings, makin' stuff

New Necklace

I stayed home and worked in the studio. I finished a new necklace!
It says lovesick in Latin.

Diversions

Today Robert and Meredith worked on one of his Christmas presents. then they went paddling in the Cape Fear. Any guesses as to what it will be?

Masonboro Channel Paddle

Saturday, I took the day off and paddled with Robert over to Masonboro Island. They're dredging the inlet right now and making a ruckus! The noise was like hanging out near Mordor with the machinery of war. Not the outdoor experience we were seeking. Still, I needed a paddle and I found a pretty urchin and made these prints with him in the sand. Robert tried out his new Storm cag which goes over pfd and everything. He looks quite fetching! There was so little wind that the channel was glassy. You could see the bottom, with its wafting green and purple vegetation. I kept drifting behind getting lost in watching the bottom. Unfortunately, my pictures were too blurry to share.
I love this little stunted oak growing right over the intracoastal waterway. I'd love to know how old it is. Its not large, but has such a pretty form to have struggle against sand, salt and storms.

Fixing a Hole Where the Rain Gets IN

So I may have, at an early age, set part of the soundtrack for my life. I had an elementary school friend in Maryland from a very interesting family. She had two teenage sisters and one of them was a Beatles fanatic. So in 4th grade I saved up my money and walked to the store and bought Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. My first grown up music, that I chose and bought by myself. Wore the grooves off it. Still have it! The paper's coming off the edge of the cover.
So, I've revisited a Cd version of it. Last night I listened to one of my favorite speakers. And woke up with "Fixing a hole..." going through my head. Wayne Dyer is so awesome. I have listened to Manifesting Your Destiny over and over. Last night I listened to a lecture from his Excuses Begone series. I don't have the series yet I downloaded a free hour of it. It ROCKED! The image here is one of his Excuses Begone "cards", taking an excuse and turning it around into a positive affirmation. But I didn't get to finish it! wah... It expired... Oh well, we had to watch Run Fat Boy Run. Which was a blast.
Guess I'll have to buy the CD set....

A Day in the Life

Got up, got outta bed, dragged a comb across my head….
6:45- cleaned coffee maker (cause Robert never does and it’s a STUPID design and the built in grinder gets clogged everytime you use it)
Dry coffee grinder parts so they will clog less this time, very annoying…
Made coffee
Made oatmeal
Eat oatmeal while composing three emails to my director at the community college about not teaching this summer, changing a student’s grade and the broken torch that needs replacing.
7:20 shower
dry hair
dress
start car so it can warm while I grab a travel cup o joe
run out to studio to grab last minute things for work: rubber cement, double stick tape, examples, etc.
grab purse and stuff get in car
8:30 drive to school
8:45 wait in line at parking deck, park car
briskly walk four blocks
dash into directors office, he’s in a meeting, shake hands with new secretary and try to find audit forms, no luck
dash into women’s room
run by registrar’s window. Great! no line. “Hi, I need audit forms? couldn’t find any in the Humanities office” Yeah, yeah, I know their due today the night instructor didn’t have enough…gotta run”
Just in time! Clock must be wrong….
9:04 Take roll
Review yesterday, introduce patinas, Mix up new pickle, show how to light the torch work individually with each student so they know how to light torch, problem solve, answer questions, explain pickle, show how to use it.
10:50 Dismiss class
run to ladies room
11:04 Take roll, do all of the above over again for different people.
12:50 Forge the night instructors signature on audit form
go upstairs ask registrar what to do about missing info about night student on audit form.
call night student? Dang! phone got left at home plugged into charger.
Go by Humanities office to get a fax number to call student and give her fax number when I get home so she can deal with it. New fabulous Humanities secretary looks up students info and number, Hoorah! Forge students name (with her permission).
Meet with Humanities director to change a student’s grade from last semester. Fill out that form and turn it in, along with audit forms (this time there’s a line)
1: 30? go by The Golden Gallery borrow their fax machine to fax info to art retreat organizer that is long overdue. Chat with Mary Ellen a minute or two.
2:00 Home! I’m starving!
Call night student tell her I took care of her form. We talk for 15+ minutes. Plan to watch a movie together.
2:20 Grad school buddy from PA beeps in….
Oops private student buddy beeps in simultaneously!
Put one on hold.
Take off one hold, “Can I call you back?”
Talk with PA buddy about future of her career. Swaps stories, commiserate.
Someone else beeps in, I ignore it.
I look out the window, “Dang! I forgot my pal that wants a logo for his business is here to meet with me! Can I call you back?”
Meet with knifesmith pal about his new business and proposed logo he wants me to draw in exchange for teaching me to use an electro etcher and getting one going in my studio.
3:30? Robert comes by after kayaking and before work.
3:45? Call ECU about visiting artist gig with them Feb 4th.
4:00 Call private student back discuss tomorrow’s session.
Someone beeps in, I ignore it.
4:30 It was mom, “Hey Mom” “Where are you? I thought you were coming by at 2?” “Uh…… on my way”
5:00 Still no lunch, now there’s no time for dinner. I’ll eat when I get back. Grab cold corn muffin from last night.
Run out to car.
5:05 Car won’t start…
I’d left the lights on from leaving the parking deck hours ago.
5:08 Call Dad, “I’m not coming…”
Oh well, guess I’ll go work on the logo and/or enamel work for Adorn Me….
Hm, 20 emails to return in the home box, 2 in the school box, two in my faculty box and 7 voicemail messages.
6:30 I need a drink… oh wait, I can’t! it gives me migraines!
Or maybe the migraines are from all these darn hats I wear!
And I don’t get a whopping bonus like the bank dudes in the news… or even a parking space for the car I borrow from Robert!
6:25 Internet goes down… Gr! I wanted to look up the hotel to make a reservation for my next teaching gig!
logo’s not working out….. it just looks wrong.
6:45 My whole neck is tensing up
6:46 I rethink the whole drink idea.
Internet's back....

Ahhhhhh ahhhhhh Ahhhhhhhh
I read the news today, oh boy…..

Houston anyone???

There's still room in two of my classes at Adorn Me! in Houston, TX the first week of March. Join me, should be fun!

Its Why I Love Him!

I was lamenting the weight I've gained this year (though all those cupcakes and chocolates were wonderful!)and Robert responded,"You're not fatter, you're just swollen with happiness!" Ain't he great?
Still I am trying to repeat as a mantra (however demented) Kate Moss' quote, "Nothing tastes as good as skinny feels" Weeeeell....I'm not convinced, but health needs to be maintained. It's going to be a busy year!

LOVE this!

I'll leave you with this:
I just love it!
Find it at Isabellasart.etsy.com

Stages of Blog Friendship

Loved this take on the stages of blog friendship!

Sing!

another Paulus Berensohn quote:

“It’s the artist’s work to sing up the earth, to praise and thank and to express gratitude. Well that’s what I think art is. That’s why I think art is a behavior, to sing up the earth.”

Paulus Berensohn

Once I heard Paulus Berensohn speak at a seminar at ECU. I was moved to tears. In fact it was rather embarrassing. When I went up to tell him how much I loved the presentation I looked at his face an something in me broke out just a bit. I told myself that there was some aspect of his spirit that reminded me of my mother's father, a deep, gentle, spiritual man, a Baptist preacher unlike any other I've met since. Still, I am not sure that my weird moment in front of Paulus was solely that... nonetheless I felt moved to tears and he saw it. I had to collect myself to speak. Paulus is many things. He lives a deeply creative existence in a valley in the mountains here in NC. He studied dance at the Julliard school in the 50's with Merce Cunnigham, Martha Graham, Jose Limon, and others. He is a poet, a journalist, bookmaker, weaver, author and potter. I have looked on the internet for his book for awhile now and today it arrived, "Finding One's Way With Clay". This is just the sort of book I feel is gathering within me for metalsmiths. Like a storm cloud I feel it wanting to come into being. I want a book that broaches the question, "So what's so special about metal? Why metal anyway? Why do people want to make stuff with metal?"
I think that sort of questioning is important, vital! We should ask those kinds of questions about everything we do!

This is a comment Paulus made on ABC’s Earthbeat program awhile back. I mean is this not beautiful?!
“I mean I personally think that the craft arts isn’t about an alternative way of making a living and filling museums and galleries with gorgeous objects, I think it’s the clay and the fibre and the metals and the wood saying, ‘Listen, listen to me. Put your hands on me, and you’ll make contact with a living world.’"…

“The word ‘art’, if you go back into its etymological roots, it’s not a noun, it’s a verb, it’s a doing, an acting, and it comes from the root for ‘to join’. So one is behaving artistically, one is in a state of intimacy and communion with the activity at hand”… PB

I would love nothing more than to spend time, slow time, in the mountains listening to this man, learning... Maybe someday. And now I have the book so I can learn from him right now!

Jim

For those of you who've asked, or are curious about my student from last year who was hit by a car, I have not talked with him but this was on his CaringBridge site mid November:

"Hard to believe six months have passed! Jim has made an amazing recovery. He is walking well, which helps promote bone growth in his still incomplete tibia. The look on the doctor's face last visit said it all (... and he's a great doc).
...(Jim) plans to work and continue his college education in warmer weather. We can never quite thank everyone enough for the wonderful support we have enjoyed.... and it's hard to describe what it means just to watch Jim walk across the room. We have much to be thankful for this Thanksgiving. There is still a lot of work ahead, but Jim is determined and well on his way."

They're an amazing family. So glad there is a happy ending in sight for them!

Auld Lang Syne

Should auld acquaintance be forgot
And never brought to mind?
Should auld acquaintance be forgot,
And auld lang syne?

Chorus:
For auld lang syne, my jo,
For auld lang syne.
We'll tak' a cup o'kindness yet,
For auld lang syne.


And surely ye'll be your pint-stoup
And surely I'll be mine;
And we'll tak' a cup of kindness yet,
For auld lang syne.

Chorus


We twa hae run about the braes,
And pou'd the gowans fine;
But we've wander'd mony a weary fit,
Sin' auld lang syne.

Chorus


We twa hae paidl'd in the burn
Frae morning sun till dine;
But seas between us braid hae roared',
Sin' auld lang syne,

Chorus And there's a hand, my trusty frier!
And gie's a hand o'thine!
And we'll tak' a right guide-willie waught,
For auld lang syne.

New Blog

I started a new blog Where Metalsmiths Make that I hope will be a blast! If you're a metalsmith pass this on! I want tons of subscribers and contributors! sort of like an online mag! So please email me your photos and comments!

Story of My LIfe....

My online horoscope today says:
"It's difficult to shake that feeling that you should have done something more than you did and now there may not be enough time to finish. Unfortunately, your anxiety might be more problematic than whatever remains incomplete. Worrying will only slow you down even more because you won't be able to concentrate on the tasks at hand. Self-judgment doesn't help anything now; just find a comfortable pace and keep going the best you can." DUH!
I feel that way probably 8 times a week! ...sometimes two or three times a day! *sigh*
The truth of the matter is, no matter how many times I tell myself that worrying doesn't help, my Inner Worrier doesn't believe me. It's like a dog gnawing a bone. She's convinced there's another morsel, or more marrow or something if she can just get to it.... but then again doesn't gnawing on bones help a dog's teeth and jaws and such? Could there be some cosmic reason I worry? Could it serve some purpose as yet unseen to me? Well that's what my Inner Worrier likes to think! My mom thinks its hereditary and, of course, from my father's side of the family!
Right now my IW (Inner Worrier) has lots to gnaw on! I have a jam packed 2010 swiftly on its way! Workshops in five different states, three classes to teach at CFCC til May, and hopefully a reunion with my grad school gals... Well, for all you fellow worriers out there... it is true "this too shall pass" and yoga helps... just take deep breaths!
Thought I'd share a pic of me NOT worrying at a friend's party before Christmas. Not the most flattering of me, but I think Robert looks quite fetching!

Craftsmanship + Life

My thoughts have turned in the last couple of years to the spiritual nature of craftsmanship. I repeatedly have experiences with folks who take my workshops or classes and are transformed. Oh, of course not everyone is so changed! But a handful each semester leave me, changed by making. And don't misread my meaning, I don't by any means attribute it soley to my teaching! No! In fact folks have shared stories with me about their watershed moments in others workshops or classes, or maybe even a DVD lesson in making something.

At any rate, maybe those people leave an indelible mark on my memory because I seek those types of exchanges, sometimes subconsciously but often deliberately. Those are the reasons I continue teach, to relive the excitement of manipulating materials, often for the first time. And I especially like watching people get excited about working metal, which seems so rigid and unmoving to them. When students get that electric charge it can light up a room. Its addictive to me. So much so in fact I begin to detest my community college job when students don't get into it! I can't fathom their apathy and I become a major grouch. So what is it about the making of things that can be so intoxicating, fulfilling, spiritual? How does taking a class in making something rejuvenate so many? I find that energy is my drug. I can't get enough.

The concept of art as therapy is kind of a new one, relatively speaking. Is it because before the Industrial Revolution making things was the only way things came into being? Therefore the therapeutic aspects of the work of making things was never questioned, making stuff, working with ones hands in quiet busy-ness occurred all the time! No big deal. So now in our age we hardly ever make anything! Making things has become the stuff of hobbies.
Well the nature of craft has long been a subject for discussion. I've read snippets of Ruskin long ago. But on a recent internet book search I found a treasure trove of writing on the soul of crafting... and by craft I mean the careful construction of functional and non functional art. Not merely your gramma style "crafting", but certainly not excluding those quaint "mediums" since indie crafters have show us that anything can be elevated to an artform!

So, right now I am reading "A Way of Working" edited by DM Dooling and plan on reading "Centering in Pottery, Poetry, and the Person" by MC Richards and I WISH I had a copy of Paulus Berensohn's "Finding One's Way With Clay".
I love the idea of making sense of our lives through creating. Don't you?

Steamy Heart

Shhhhh... it's a surprise for someone!
If I can find two minutes to rub together it will make many more! It is of red glass enameled copper, a brass grandfather clock gear with a sterling banner.
Stay tuned....

Christmas Cheer!

The cheerful ledge by my kitchen sink!


I heard the most amazing music on NPR yesterday! I was out riding around and when Kitka sang a traditional Bulgarian Christmas Carol called "Av Jerusalime" my hair stood on end! Then two other fabulous female choral groups sang- Anonymous 4 and Trio Mediaeval. I immediately searched itunes when I got home! Please have a listen to a sampling of Trio Mediaeval's music and the see the playlist at NPR by clicking here. It just might make your day too!

Faux snow on my door wreath inhabited by my "wreath budgie".

Who Does She think She Is?

I had a "friend" once tell my ex that he needed to "clamp down on her and quit letting her play around, make her get a real job!" Well, that friend has since confessed to me and apologized. Now I am with Robert who said he couldn't stand it if I did get what he calls a square job. We have to live our dreams we choose to pay the price. This clip moved me greatly.

Gorgeous Mud

Aren't these lovely? found them here

Happy Elf!

So I fear that alcohol triggers migraines for me... yes, heaven forbid! So I have not been imbibing for sometime now. BUT! we have friends coming by tonight and I have been wanting to try this cocktail... Midori calls it a Green Cosmo but I really like what Coastal Living magazine calls it a Happy Elf!

One ounce midori, two ounces citrus vodka, on ounce white cranberry shake with ice in a cocktail shaker and strain in to a lovely glass and add a maraschino!
I added the tiniest splash of ginger ale for a little sparkle...
Its luscious! I'm a very Happy Elf!

Enjoy!

Ingrid Michaelson - Maybe
I really am obsessed with her song "Everybody" but this one will do...

What do you feed?

I was reminded today that sometimes it is said that there is a battle inside us all, between two wolves.

One is Evil. It is negativity, anger, envy, jealousy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority, and ego.



The other is Good. It is joy, trust, positivity, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion.

Which wolf wins?

The one you feed.

Don't know about you, but I greatly needed that reminder.
photo by Steev-o on flickr