Happy New Year!

Things have been a bit hectic, as things go...I have some great photos to post soon!

Salutations old, happy new!

yule happy time prints

real 1952 old poster

loving the old time camp prints, and though i miss home, this redwood picture is so right on...

the posters from this shop ( austin, tx's poster cabaret ) close to home has some amazing artists: 

andy kehoe

andrew holder

diana sudyka

in reference to the word CABARET: once upon a time, i worked at one of those terrible three-in-one frat boy party clubs for a whole one month! the word 'cabaret' always reminds me of this clause-awful place because when i tried to quit, i got really stressed someone was going to yell at me on the phone, SO i convinced a friend to call and quit for me...the only flaw in the plan is that her sweet Korean-accented voice didn't sound much like me, but oh well...i wrote out a script "this is rachel, i am supposed to work in cabaret tonight, but i am quitting, goodbye"...as if the accent wasn't a big enough clue that it was not me, she pronounced cabaret phonetically, and who can blame her! it sounds sassier with the 't' at the end, if you ask me. 
so that is my story, and those are some photos, happy yule!

around

chicken coop shack...

and frosty mornings...

happy solstice...or just happy that its over.


i left the chickens with tiny coop door open...i hope it doesn't fall closed on the rooster again...he is my new favorite companion.

Charlie Brown Trees

we have a hill of holiday-like trees, so it has been easy to conjure up some scraggly but festive natural decor...

 

all the vintage ornaments were given to me by one of our many many landlords...

 

 

they are all delicate andcrackled and have scraggly old string used for hanging....

 

one tree is the top of a big tree and the other is a branch...perfect.

warrior elephants and goddesses

Perusing the Smithsonian's Freer collections for some patrilineal inspiration,  this elephant caught my eye in an image from an early Sanskrit book...

..oh the adornment, the beautiful colors...

Ramayana by sage Valmiki

...the lady elephant is strength and holds a baby in utero for almost two years...

...elephants hung out with goddess Laksmi because she represents courage and fertility, and because elephants are smart...

...be a gracious goddess and a steadfast warrior, and maybe help out a poor orphaned baby elephant to stay strong:

Elephant Orphan Project

...and maybe freak out some aspiring greedy colonists in your neighborhood?...

beinecke library, yale

...and occupy a vacant house.

Occupy protesters take to squatting in vacant houses

more green things

i made these green things happen...

except the green pants. 

(yay to making things happen)

resourceful play, every day

My sister is presently living in Nagishot, South Sudan, and just posted some amazing photographs...of course, I was instantly drawn to the "traditional goat skin skirt" she photographed during an all-day celebration:

 The texture and color reminded me of a suede Bonnie Cashin skirt i once saw...i did a little reading and saw that in the mid 60's  Bonnie Cashin was specifically designing clothes inspired by African and Modern Art...i love how Modern and Tribal Art are often grouped together...like the collections of the de Menils in Houston...if you have to technical before you can get "primitive," it becomes Modern?...but i digress...

Bonnie Cashin added never seen before hardware to her designs, and famously introduced the famous toggle on the Coach bags and accessible designed clothes for women...the skirt above is referred to as a "dog leash skirt" in a Corbis caption...often in African dress, you see all sorts of objects resourcefully incorporated into traditional regalia...not only do i appreciate her designs, but i love her simple box of simple motivational phrases....

...thankful for the play and resourcefulness in the world.

tis the season to be wanting things...

I still think etsy is the best site to find hand-made stuff.  Period. 

 

And making treasuries is a pain...but i made one today, with some really cute stuff! 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Leathery's treasury

 

 

 

 

 

 

Nstarstudio

WashboardFelts

ohlittlerabbit

Bird and Bloke

I haven't been taking any photographs...but i love this Bird and Bloke one...as much as i love Fall, i guess i am ready for a good Winter.

or leather co

 

very positive time at Oregon Leather Co. in Portland, and then in Eugene...i got great scraps, friendly service, and i am glad this place is not closer to my house because i would buy WAY too much leather...luckily my husband was there to take some photos...the yellow elk hide in the foreground of the middle photo was used to make my latest bag that i am in love with...i like to let the shape of the hide decide what that bag will become...check it out: Leathery on etsy

portland is green

Green is more than a color, green plants give us oxygen, green material things should keep green plants happy, and the making of green things should be in a green building, and i would like to make things in this green building and be a factory girl because "only through focus and repetition can we achieve expertise in an area leading to larger manifestation of goals, be they physical or ideological" -Anodea Judith...

...i would work in a handmade leather bicycle saddle factory because i loved all the leather on the bicycles in the Bespoke: The Handbuilt Bicycle exhibit...

 

and i don't know if it is green or not to have the world's smallest park...it seems like something Mr. Burns of the Simpsons would do out of spite...but it is mildly amusing and engulfed in a sea of green practices and pretty parks...

Portland, OR: home of the world's smallest park! by TATIANA WILLS

 speaking of "engulfed" my husband is back cleaning up the oil at ye' old oil spill in the Gulf...no, not the one in the Middle East...as a native Texan, I call the Gulf of Mexico THE gulf...and I call ditches "bayous." Miss you Portland, and husband, and bayous...but these green links have kept me inspired today:

Guerrila Gardening? Why didn't I think of that!

URBAN HOUSTON PERMACULTURE

PERMACULTURE ABQ

darker white

silent still

of earliest call
white out

As the celebrations Dia de los Muertos, Samhain, and All Souls Day pass, we honor lives past as our year moves into the shorter darker days. White reflects all the colors, while black absorbs. Moving into shorter and darker days is a time for reflecting back all the colorful world we have absorbed, careful not to let the long dark nights steal your inspiration, careful not to lose gifts from those passing in the dark. 

 

thanks Caleb Days for the haiku.

the known and unknown

Artist Grayson Perry was given every museum nerds dream: full access to the British Museum collections. For The Tomb of the Unknown Craftsmen, he also had to pair his own creations to curate an exhibit. No need for me to write about it, his description is fantastic:

Pilgrimage to the British Museum. Ink and graphite, 2011 © Grayson Perry. Courtesy Victoria Miro Gallery, London

"I had been given permission to translate a vague fantasy into an increasingly daunting reality. I feared it was a fantasy that perhaps I had not thoroughly thought through, one that involved dozens if not hundreds of other people, many of them extremely knowledgeable...I feared I would be seen as an ignorant interloper by the people who spend their lives learning about and caring for the collection. I thought they might see me as a trendy Thor Heyerdahl, falling into easy but spurious cross-cultural comparisons, misinterpreting objects. These were people whose careers were forged from accurate knowledge collated on many arduous field trips or from years of painstaking research and in I would come for a few hours and say "Ooh I like that, what fun!" Did I see them flinch?... All I could do was choose the things that fascinated and delighted me."

Thor Heyerdahl-KON TIKI

Makes you want to go exploring in search of undiscovered beautiful works of art...jump on the KON TIKI and head for South America...or to France,  to view the Chauvet Cave ...breathtaking...the earliest unknown artist. 

deer dog

prematurely, desert dog considers preparing for the Yaqui ritual of his native Sonoran desert.

we are off to Oregon for the week...going to camp, visit hot springs, and get our city on in Portland...excited about getting some art and culture in...i am particularly taken with Nikki McClure right now...thanks to Shipwreck in Eureka...un abrazo.

creepin' around the compound

the moon was quite impressive last week, hanging around with it's big self until the late morning...conjuring warewolves and lost spirits...

tiny moon, big view

first sun hitting a tin roof

the last few misty mornings segue into sunny afternoons, ruining creepy moods necessary to invoke darkness in craft...i have been reading dracula and...uh..harry potter...and hung a couple of glitter skulls around the house...we don't need to hang fake cobwebs because we got the real thing...conjuring up some HALLOWEEN.

cobwebs (drop dead fred, anyone?)

I am a soul

I think a lot about homes...

and this quote in a yoga workshop: "You don't have a Soul. You are a Soul. You have a body." by C.S. Lewis... 

island or rock

made me think about my soul house...

misty morning trees

if your soul  didn't have a body,  would it be a tree or a rock or fluid like the wind and water?

fancy beach house

 ...if your soul were in a house, where would the house be?

...would it face out into the vastness of the sea watching the world fall off the edge? 

Casa Talia by Marco Giunta and Viviana Haddad

...would it be in a cave, looking out from the the core of the earth? 

earthship

...who would be your neighbors?

inside a black apple

my body is my home...the souls floating next to me are my neighbors...good neighbors make you feel at home.