Birchwood Park birding

Last week, one of my birding trips was to Birchwood Park.  It's a small neighborhood park, mostly urban park style with picnic tables, basketball court and a kid's playground.  But all of those things are closed off right now and it abuts the trail that runs from Squalicum Creek Park down to Squalicum Beach.  I have had good luck finding warblers along this trail so I went to check it out.

I was pleasantly surprised at the variety and number of birds.  Alas, only one warbler, an orange-crowned, but lots of other birds and lots of good camera shots.

White-crowned sparrow was my first camera volunteer. 

The next up for the camera was a Spotted Towhee.  There's a staircase up from Squalicum Creek and at the top of it, there's a cluster of trees that get sun so it's usually an excellent place to catch some birds singing.  Spring is the time to see these towhees as they are usually shy and skulking in the bushes.  In springtime, they are bold and fearless. 

My final camera volunteer was a Bewick's Wren found along the side trail that leads down to Squalicum Creek from the end of a neighborhood street.  He was at the top of a snag where I often find hummingbirds. 

Also found but not photographed:  bushtits, chickadees, flickers, gulls, crows, robins and a finch.  For a short walk, it was a good birding experience.

Birding continues with baby wood ducks

I've been very busy this week, between the 4 birding trips and finishing off the taxes.  Then I had to upload and sort all the photos.  So it's taken me until today to have time and energy to blog about all the fabulous birds.

Baby Wood Ducks!  Jeff joined me on a trip to Scudder Pond to see the reported baby wood ducks.  It was a warm sunny and there were lots of other folks there so we had a chance for some safe casual socializing and talking about birds.  It took us a while to locate the mama duck and her 9 ducklings but we had lots of other birds to distract us so that was cool.  Once we spotted them, the ducklings headed straight for us in that cute wandering all over the lily pads way that ducklings use to navigate.  So I got many wonderful shots of them.

I also got my first of the year rufous hummingbird.  It's fabulous when they sit at the very top of a leafless branch catching the sun with all their glorious color lighting up.  It's times like these that I start rethinking my decision to not have a honking big lens to carry around.

There was also an unexpected cedar waxwing spotted on the way back to the car in addition to all the usual inhabitants of the area.

It was a glorious day of birding and I am looking forward to more days this next week.

birding 2020: awesome week with 2 trips to Tennant Lake

This week I went to Tennant Lake to see swallows.  Twice.  The first time was cloudy and fairly breezy with a definite chill but I got some swallow sightings and got some excellent photos of a couple of Common Yellowthroats having a song duel.  Since this is possibly the second or third time I've seen one, I was thrilled.

Not only did I see a bird which has not been at all common for me, but I got the traditional spring bird singing with his head thrown back pose.   So even with not much in the way of birds, Tuesday, my first day out there, was good. 

So I talked Jeff into going with me on Thursday as I wanted to try the boardwalk.  Between my CFS and my ankles, I was a bit leery of going by myself so I was really happy he came along.  And what a great birding day it turned out to be!

We got swallows, almost immediately, and then heard lots of birds but didn't see so many until we were about halfway through the boardwalk loop in the marsh.  Then the birds just came flocking to us.  A mourning dove, a common merganser, a marsh wren, all good sightings and easy to spend some quality time with.  Then the timer went off so we headed back at a brisk walk since Jeff had a zoom meeting scheduled.  Two twists of the boardwalk later, we surprised a Great Blue Heron fishing from the platform.  He squawked, I squawked (those beaks are big and sharp) and he did a small flight hop away.  I was disappointed I didn't get a chance at a photo but we continued on.  And ran into him again a couple turns later.  This time, he didn't startle, so I got my camera up and focused and we followed him slowly down the boardwalk, pausing for good photo ops.  I got some excellent shots and it was a wonderful ending to our trip.  (Yes, Jeff made it to his meeting with plenty of time to spare.)

I posted the full body shot on Instagram, here's the head shot.

I find birding to be a wonderful stress reliever so I'm feeling great today and looking forward to setting up my backyard birding area this weekend.  I hope your selfcare routines are working as well.

Staying with a series

Given my time and energy limitations, I'm experimenting with sticking with a series.  This has been an interesting challenge but once I made it clear to my brain that we were doing snails, nothing but snails, and all other ideas were not going to be acted on, I started getting tons of ideas about snails.  (I used to have 2-3 different projects going at once so I could switch between them when I needed to think about something on one.)  So now, I have 2 snails going at once.

The first pair used the painted snail on watercolor paper with a marbled background.  I found two different ways to use the background and one of those used the onpoint orientation that I like a lot.

Snail #1: Persist!  started with an idea based on a photo I took of a yellow snail crawling across tiny gray gravel.  I mentally added big grass stalks behind the snail and started to do that idea.  During the process, I remembered I wanted to use marbling so I pulled a marbled fabric for the background and then put stone fabric against it.  No way.  Not a good visual.  So I dropped the stones for later and went with the marbling.

Snail #2: Go With the Flow continued the use of the marbling with the hand painted snail.  I liked the change in the flow of the background.

With the next pair, I went back to the grass & gravel idea.  Snail #3: Journey of a 1000 Slithers (title still in flux since snails don't actually step) got the gravel added back in but while I was selecting the background fabric, I was captivated by one of the spiral pieces I've got in my stash.  So no grass yet.  That's coming in #4.

I'm learning things with each piece and getting more and more ideas so right now I have at least 4 snails jockeying for position to be piece #5.    Right now, I'm feeling good about the whole process.  My energy is up, I'm finishing pieces fairly quickly and the ideas are surging.  I am in the zone!

2020 Birding: a swallow hunt

Today I went to Scudder Pond to look for swallows.  It's not the best place for those birds locally, but I also wanted to see Wood Ducks and look for any lingering warblers.  Alas, I missed out on all 3 of my goal birds, a frequent event in birding.  So I enjoyed the birds that were there:  Red-Winged Blackbirds, Spotted Towhee, a surprise group of Pine Siskins, an abundance of sparrows and one active and feisty Black-Capped Chickadee.   Later this week I will venture out to the best swallow spot I know (Tennant Lake) where I can see the swallows from the parking lot.

Here's some photos from early May of last year.

swallow at birdhouse off of boardwalk

And my favorite funny shot, butt end of swallow.

My blood pressure is up slightly, I'm assuming from the lockdown stress, so I am going to up my birding since that's one of my selfcare practices.  I hope you are taking care of yourself too.

CFS/ME update

It's been a bit over 6 months since I started the Myhill supplement regime along with taking D-Ribose regularly and I am really pleased to say I am getting better.

I hit a plateau after our October vacation and was struggling to make more progress so I reviewed Dr. Myhill's book.  That caused me to visit my doctor and see about getting off the beta blocker she had prescribed for my blood pressure.  Once I was off the beta blocker, I felt better immediately and have been improving since.

I am mostly doing art now but I am able to do the household chores in addition to my studio time and, most days, I still have energy after dinner.  This is a *huge* improvement.  I still feel like a snail rather than the energizer bunny but I can see the progress so I'm focusing on persisting.

Snail #1 in Persist! series

The stress and uncertainty of the current coronavirus situation, especially here in Washington, means that I'm not trying to make big changes now.  I am starting to do regular walks outside.  This has not been on my list of activities for months so that I am doing some is also an improvement.  I'm sleeping well, making art, and my daily energy is growing.  I'm now going to just keep on doing this because it's working.

Birch Bay trip cut short

So, stuff happens, right?  We ended up coming home after a couple of days since all the restaurants in our area along Birch Bay closed completely.  I can understand not bothering with takeout since they're not that busy this time of year anyway but if I'm going to be cooking dinner, I'd rather do it in my own kitchen.  And they closed the Canadian border, or at least limited it enough that day trips to Canada for birding seemed unlikely.  So, we came back.

But not before trying out some of the birding possibilities.  We got some great views of scoters from the walkway in front of our condo on the 5th floor.  Alas, my eye issues meant I needed to use the big screen to aim the camera and the glare from all that sun on Monday made that not work well so I only got one good distant shot.  Not bad for no walk birding though as long as you don't mind the gray wires slicing through the view.

Tuesday we went to Semiahmoo fairly early.  Small birds weren't out in numbers altho we did see a Bewick's wren in the bushes.  Again, lots of scoters and gulls.  And lots of benches so I didn't get a chance to use my new stool altho I carried it along with no problems.

There were clouds and early morning light so the colors are very different but this is good enough to see the distinctive scoter beak.

But the best shot of the day was a closeup of a gull. 

I'm not great at gulls but I'd call this a Glacous-winged Gull.

We'll be trying out the monoscope and the walking stick at the heronry here in Bellingham while doing our social distanced birding.   I'm going to do as much birding as possible because it really helps me stay calm and happy. 

Birding accomodations for CFS/ME

Jeff and I are heading off to Blaine for a week, roughly 35 miles away and we'll be cocooning in a condo near a fabulous birding spot.  Lots of reading, videos and takeout food in our future.  But to make it easier for me to go the whole 1.6 mile roundtrip distance at Semiahmoo Spit, I have some accommodations I'll be trying out.

Here's everything but the electric scooter. 

A folding, adjustable stool so I can sit instead of standing when we pause the walking to look at birds.  Standing causes more fatigue than walking or sitting so I want to avoid it as much as possible.  A walking stick to help reduce the fatigue.  And because I love multitaskers, the stick has had a bit of hardware added to the top so I can mount my new monoscope on it.  The scope comes with a phone camera attachment to allow digiscoping and the complete setup is smaller and much lighter than a full scope with tripod.  Here's hoping it works.

The stool is super easy to fold and collapse and comes with an attached strap for either hand or shoulder carry.  The claim is it can support up to 330 lbs so it should be very stable and easy to use.  Here's the shot of it at full extension.

We're looking forward to a week of no news reports, lots of birding and enjoyable reading and movie watching.  Here's hoping you're doing the same!

Bellingham Heronry is under construction

This last week Jeff & I went to Fairhaven to visit the heronry and try out a new restaurant.  The herons have started building and remodeling their nests and the deciduous trees haven't leafed out yet so the viewing was fabulous.  Alas, while I took my camera, I left the SD card sitting next to the computer so all the photos were taken using my phone camera.  Next time, I'll prepare better.

The largest lumps in the photo are the nests and the other ones are herons.  Binoculars or some kind of scope are very helpful as the nests are up in the top of trees and the trees are separated from the path by a generous fenced greenbelt area.  However there are at least two dozen herons there working on the nests so it's a wonderful opportunity to observe them.

There were also lots of other birds as it was a sunny day. 

Mallards and buffleheads predominated but we got some quality face time with a couple of chickadees who wanted to chat. 

A good day and the kind of stress reliever I need right now.  Hoping you are coping as well.

visual decision making using a phone camera

I've been making slow progress on the snail series due to life throwing some troublesome things my way but I finally finished up the first two snails this week.

I started with a memory of a picture I took of a small yellow snail on the greenbelt gravel.  The color contrast was amazing and the tiny snail was crawling over relatively huge rocks but still making noticeable progress over the length of my daily walk.  But I also wanted to bring in some color using my marbled fabrics so I finished painting the first snail, picked out a good color of fabric and laid it all out with some stone-like fabric as the path.  And wow, the stones just didn't go with all the swirls so I ended up just using the marbled fabric.

So snail #1 is done.  Unfortunately, it's an odd size since I trimmed the background piece assuming there would be rocks on the bottom so it's 6 3/8" tall and 10.25 wide.  This will require some effort to frame it, if I decide to do that before posting it on etsy.

Thinking about the framing problem reminded me to make these design decisions before cutting.  (Plan twice, cut once.)  So for snail #2, I cut the background in a square after trying out the second, slightly darker snail against the background.  But which way to put the square? 

This is where the phone camera came in very useful.  I grabbed my phone and snapped shots of the snail against the 4 possible rotations of the background and then was able to look at them side by side.  This is much better than trying to visually remember the different orientations.  I tossed 2 out immediately and was left with these 2 possible layouts.

Final choice

The runner up orientation is below but sideways.  I apparently rotated the phone while taking the shot. 

As my year of experimentation continues, it's interesting to see how many ways I can simplify things with the right tool.  Now all I need to do is add the resin topcoat to #2 and post them to etsy. 

Review: Geninne's Art, Birds in watercolor, collage & ink

As part of my year of experimentation, I'm looking at other artists work, specifically books about collage.  I want to keep using textiles as my medium but physically can't do the quilting & stitching that I used to do.  So, I'm focusing on collage.  While checking books about collage at my local library, I stumbled on this book.  Collage & birds, oh my.

I was not familiar with the artist, Geninne D. Zlatkis, before this book and that's my loss.  She does delighful birds, wonderful use of color and her book gives me lots of ideas because of the step by step photography of her process in specific pieces.  I am getting lots of ideas that I can easily apply to my textile collages because none of the things she does require working with paper.  I have ordered some opaque acrylic pens to try out her technique of using acrylic ink to add detail to her work.  I'll be trying this out on the snail series but no reason it can't be as effective as her sample below.

The top photo is the watercolor painting at step 5 of the 6 total.  And the bottom is with white ink additions for detail.  It really helps pop the colors and enhances the piece.

I'm looking forward to playing with other ideas from this book.  If you enjoy bird art, or doing collage, I'd recommend checking it out.

Grounded submitted to Allied Arts Member show

Tomorrow, I submit Grounded to the Allied Arts members show.  This show runs Feb 7-29, with the opening Friday evening (2/7) from 6-9pm.  This will be my first local show since moving here.  A couple of years after I first planned to start showing but hey, that's what happens when shit happens.  (In my case, CFS/ME.)  I'm looking forward to the opening and seeing what the other members are up to.

If you're planning to be in Bellingham in February, Allied Arts Gallery is located at 1418 Cornwall Avenue and is open Monday-Friday from 10 -5pm and Saturday 12-5pm.  There's also an artists' thrift store behind the gallery for those who like to do a little frugal art supply shopping after enjoying the art. 

Gimp on Windows10, or doing collage instead of coloring

My ear issues continue so this week has mostly been sleeping and reading.  I did make some progress on shading the yellow snail.  And after doing that, I realized I really wanted to work with fabric and use the inktense to add color, shadow, highlights. 

The colored snail is above with the fabrics I've selected for doing collage to the right. 

One of the things my experience has taught me is that collage is easier if I go larger.  I spent one day this last week trying to print the snail outline in a bigger size.  I have done this before using Gimp with no problem by changing the Print Size under the Image tab.  That didn't work this time.  So I called in my inhouse Windows expert who used to do stuff in the drivers area at Microsoft and after an hour or so of intense focus, he came up with a workaround.  Save the file as a PDF and print using Acrobat.  Still not sure why this is now broken but I suspect something changed in the Windows side of things.  I finally got a 13" snail printed (head to tail measurement).  And did the outline on a nice piece of fabric to use for coloring.  I'll be doing another on batting so I can put misty fuse on the batting and then collage onto the batting.  We'll see how far I get with those projects this next week.

The snail is significant to me right now as I'm reading a new piece about pacing to deal with CFS and the message is to slow down and rest frequently.  This perfectly describes the progress made by a snail or slug so I'm working on getting in touch with my inner snail.

Next babystep toward Inktense drawings

Despite six weeks of a miserable cold which turned into an ear infection, I'm still making steady progress on trying out the brand new Inktense bars I got for Winter Holiday. 

This week, I finished setting up my drawing area with the lovely LED light pad so that I can easily do abstractions from my photos and get my line drawings to turn into silkscreens or trace onto paper or fabric.

Tracing on fabric with gel pen

Yesterday, I cut pieces of watercolor paper sized correctly for the snails I'm going to use for my first trial and I made the 2 silkscreens of the 2 different sized snails.  Today, I traced with the 2 different pens recommended in the tutorial I found online and I printed the silkscreen images on both paper and fabric.  Tomorrow I start painting.

I have 3 of each size snail on paper and one of each size on fabric so I'll have lots of trials of the different color combos I might want to use and will also be able to try out different methods of activating the Inktense.  But right now, since it's a snow day here in Bellingham, I'm heading off to watch Baby Driver with my sweetie.

2019 in Review or how I did a surprising amount of stuff

I spent all of 2019 dealing with CFS and my eye problem.  In spite of these tremendous hurdles, I got a lot of stuff accomplished and I actually know what I did because I keep a Notes file where I log my accomplishments daily.  This helps me also know what sort of patterns there are to my activities due to flu season or summer birthday season or whatever.  So, here's what I did in 2019.

Discovered Dr. Myhill and her book giving me a plan to heal from Chronic Fatigue Syndrome.  This was the biggest single item as it boosted my energy level so that I could do more every day.  And feel better.

Let go of goals.  Part of this was finishing the online Lisa Call class I was taking.  Now I'm doing baby steps every day in half a dozen areas and things will be done when they're finished.  For a dedicated listmaker and todo person, this is a huge change.  It's important because my energy level is erratic and this is the best way to avoid beating myself up.

Salish Sea Mandala
Plan to add hand or machine stitching in 2020

Now to step down into the detailed list of things accomplished.

3.  cashed out my annuity, giving us a simpler set of retirement accounts to manage. (1/2)
4.  experimented with digital grounds for doing prints for etsy.
5.  explored Marine Park for daily walks.
6.  mounted 2 dancer prints done using digital ground on wood panels.
7.  started culling studio supplies by stamping stamps in sketchbook so I can sell/donate the stamps and make silkscreens if I want them.
8.  vacation with Jeff and discovered my sensitivity to Febreeze is stronger than before. (1/18-25)
9.  learned to use scan&cut to make stencils.
10.  Monthly eye shots for most of the year.  Ick.
11.  bought LED flat lightscreen for use in studio.  Love it!
12.  ordered art resin to try for sealing prints as the golden varnish takes 2 weeks to dry. (2/1)
13.  Read Acrylic Revolution and made notes of ideas to try.
14.  did critique of friend's children's book first draft.
15.  Seamsters retreat, 3 days in LaConner with friends playing with paint and silkscreens.
16.  photographed marbled fabrics for use in collages.
17.  put away sewing machine, accepting that for now, using the machine is not doable with my current vision.  (2/23)
18.  Started resin experiments with collages and marbling.
19.  Blogged about it.
20.  printed sumi owls for future thermofax screen.
21.  based on success with resin on prints, printed several dancers and prepped boards for mounting prints. (3/11)
22.  did variation on grounded dancer collage.  Blogged about it.
23.  experimented with marbling using shaving cream.  (4/5-9)
24.  Had 2 cataract surgeries a few weeks apart.  (4/15, 4/29)
25.  Fell and injured shoulder. (4/10)
26.  Made stencils and silkscreens for St. Jay piece. (5/10)
27.  Went to Toastmasters conference with Jeff.  (5/17-19)  Dinner with Karen.
28.  Had laser eye treatment in left eye.  (5/21)
29.  Rested after over exertion.  5/26 - 6/6
30.  Empirically determined bcomplex helps with energy level.
31.  Started culling many of my books as reading paper is now difficult.  Thankful for ebooks.
32.  Went to a trebuchet demonstration for James' class.
33.  Read Scalzi's Old Man War series.
34.  sold off old scanner and two printers because of buying Epson eco-tank printer.
35.  Verified Eco-tank black ink will burn thermofax screens by burning screens for daughter.
36.  Started decluttering studio and art supplies.  This was ongoing until garage sale on 10/5.
37.  Watched documentary about CFS (What about M.E.?) on Prime.  (7/4)
38.  Researched recommended supplements from Myhill book and ordered the initial bunch.
39.  Culled closet and donated items to sale to benefit DV shelter.
40.  Started acupuncture treatments to see if it helps with CFS. (7/17)
41.  Moved my computer from bedroom into dining room to give more space for resin/art work in bedroom and to not disturb Jeff when I wake early and do computer stuff.
42.  Moved all computer stuff to dropbox account (except for financial records).
43.  Set up new laptop.
44.  Read Anne Bishop Others series.  Loved it.
45.  Swapped bookcases from bedroom with wall mounted shelves from dining room.
46.  experimented with knitting fabric strips.  Don't like the look for what I have in mind.
47.  Moved etsy inventory out of bedroom.
48.  Culled sewing materials.  Moved what I'm keeping into bedroom work area.  (8/8)
49.  Went to wine tasting event with Jeff.  (8/10)  This confirmed that going out to dinner is now back on my list of possible activities.
50.  Picked up quarter of a cow at Skagit River Ranch.  (8/17)
51.  Made fabric bracelet prototypes.   (8/18)
52.  Started lunchtime dates with Jeff with trip to Whatcom County Museum to see Modern Quilt exhibit.  Excellent outing.  (8/22)
53.  Started reading Donna Andrews mystery series with bird pun titles.
54.  Moved treadmill from livingroom to garage.
55.  Visited heronry at Post Point. 
56.  Experimented with lower carb alternatives to milk.  Epic fail.
57.  Researched using transparencies with resin.  Also molds.  Found Resin Obsession website which is full of great info and tutorials. (9/2)
58.  rearranged livingroom so it's better for socializing since CFS means I stay home a lot.  Now people can visit.
59.  Shut down website, started process of moving art inventory to etsy store.  Redirected LizCopeland.com so it points to etsy store.
60.  Went out to dinner with family without energy crash.  Myhill plan for healing CFS is working!
61.  Resin experiments with transparencies and molds took about a month.  Resulted in necklaces with mandalas and tiny art prints.
62.  Made 2 runs to dump for things not good enough for garage sale.
63.  Spent a week finishing garage sale prep and holding garage sale on 10/5.
64.  Donated leftovers from garage sale to Ragfinery and Allied Arts. 
65.  Tried Photoshop Elements as alternative to my old version of Photoshop that does not work on Windows 10.  It reinstalled my printer drivers without asking which only allowed me to print 8x11 so I uninstalled it immediately and installed Gimp.
66.  Learned how to make my own molds since most commercially available molds are smaller than I want.  James did 3D printing of stars for me to try the moldmaking with.
67.  Second vacation week of the year with Jeff at Ocean Shores.  Way overdid, had major crash afterwards.
68.  Watched Jane Dunnewold video on using heat press for botanical prints.  I knew I kept the press for some reason.
69.  Started learning gimp by trial and error in printing and resizing photos.
70.  Sick for 3 weeks with major cold which has turned into 2 ear infections.  (all of December really).
71.  Ordered The GIMP Bible to help learn the differences in the interface.
72.  Had first mammogram in several years.  Still not pleasant but not as bad as it used to be.
73.  Bought The Intentional Thread and needles & thimbles for doing some stitching in the evenings.
74.  Did critique for a quilter friend who is expanding into art quilts.  She just needed a little confidence boosting as her work is very nice.  I look forward to seeing where she goes with it.
75.  Did first try of staged photos in livingroom for etsy.  Ordered new lights because of too many shadows.
76.  Started taking bilberry in October.  This stabilized my retina which means no shots as long as it continues to maintain or get better.  Also improved my blood pressure.

This is a useful and informative exercise, listing my accomplishments.  I averaged about 5 hours per week on my artwork so it's clear that even with my reduced energy level, I can still do quite a bit.  Here's hoping my healing continues and 2020 brings lots of arty goodness.

Looking ahead: A year of Experimentation

I usually take the time between Christmas and New Years to think about my goals.  Usually, this involves writing up what I accomplished and then thinking ahead.  This year, I've ended up doing them in the reverse order mostly because I went into my studio in my head during my massage on Monday.   And I've decided 2020 is going to be a year of experimentation.

My big accomplishment in 2019 was making significant progress in healing both the eye problem and the Chronic Fatigue.  But, both problems are still there and will take time to fully heal.  So, I'm going to play in my studio and see how the healing goes before setting any art goals.

What kind of experiments am I going to do?  I'm going to focus on color.  And different ways to simplify my process.

So first is more marbling.  I love the swirls of color with marbling and I've started working with shaving cream as the layer to hold the color.  This is simpler and  faster than traditional marbling but doesn't easily do the tight geometric patterns that traditional marbling is known for.  I want to explore what patterns I can make best with this approach.

I like the swirly patterning and the intense colors so I'll start with that and explore variations.

Second, I'll be learning GIMP and trying to do digital collage.  This approach is better with the time limits I have due to the CFS.  My ancient CS3 version of Photoshop is not supported on Windows 10 so I took the forced move to W10 as an opportunity to both get a touchscreen laptop for digital art purposes and to move to GIMP.  I'll be using The Gimp Bible to learn the UI and the differences from Photoshop then work on expanding my skills in using these tools for artmaking.

Third, the lovely Inktense pencils/bars from Derwent.  I've used them before to embellish pieces but now I'm going straight for the coloring on fabric.  I can do this sitting down so I get more time to work for the same energy expended.  I'll be looking to combine it with my silkscreens as I tend toward images with lots of lines rather than blocks of color.  I think that should work well with the pencils.

Jeff got me the big box of art bars for Christmas and I'm looking forward to trying them out.

And my fourth area of experimentation will be things I can do while watching tv.  Jeff likes to relax after dinner by watching a movie or a tv show and I'm not as much of a video fan as he is but this is a great time for some small handwork.  Right now, I'm trying out hand stitching and I'm also investigating knitting with wire. 

I'll blog about all of these regularly over the next year and hope my healing progresses while I play and have art fun.  Wishing you a healthy, happy, creative year too!

Fast and easy dinners for those crunch times

This last month has been terrible.  I had a massive CFS flare after our vacation followed by this coughing cold thing that is now going into 3 weeks.  However, we're still eating healthy home cooked meals most days thanks to my changing my expectations on dinner.

First off, I now rely on frozen organic vegetables to go with the main course.  Since I'm eating keto-ish, dinner is protein and produce.  The frozen veggies make this super simple.  We rotate Trader Joe's Brussels sprouts, broccoli, and asparagus with some occasional sauteed mushrooms when my energy is up at dinner time.

Second, I'm allergic to chicken and chicken eggs along with wheat and tomato so we generally eat beef, pork, seafood and duck eggs for protein.  You can of course use chicken instead for any of the other meats if that's what your family likes.

Third, I've started using recipes that I can make earlier in the day before my daily energy falters.  And everything is kept super simple because standing is harder than sitting when CFS is clobbering me.

So, what's for dinner?  Basic meal when I feel totally blah is crockpot bbq pork/beef.  Pour bbq sauce into the crockpot, put the chunk of meat in, and slather with a spice mix.   This time, I used a bbq sauce with minimal tomato and Penzey's sate spices.  I do this around lunchtime and then only have to cut the meat and nuke the vegs for a healthy dinner.

We buy at least 2 pound roasts for this so we have leftovers.  

The other favorite meal right now is salmon a la pesto.  Because we're in the PNW, salmon is common and getting wild caught is easy.  This can be done with any other fish of course.  Line a baking pan with foil, put the fish on the foil.  Slather with pesto (we buy ours at Costco) and cover with sliced olives.  Or if you have enough energy, chop up some kalamata olives for even more of that Mediterranean flavor.  Seal the foil up so you have the little packet to steam the fish.  Use a second piece of foil if needed.  (google cooking in parchment paper for more about this fast and easy technique)  This can go in the fridge for hours if you're not sure you will have the energy at dinnertime.  Cook in a 400 F oven for 20-25 minutes.  Comes out moist and delicious.  And decrease cooking time if you're using a thinner fish fillet.

We buy a quarter of a cow each year which means lots of ground beef just waiting in the freezer.  What do I make?  Tacos, of course.  The carb eaters get actual tacos, and I get taco salad.  I use a spice blend I got from googling, see recipe here, and after some adjustments for our personal taste, we now buy the ingredients in bulk at the local coop (the most frugal way to buy spices in my experience) and keep a jar full on the counter.  Crumble the beef in a skillet, I use cast iron, add spices and brown.  On iffy days I do this earlier in the day and then pull it out at dinner time along with all the taco fixings.  Then everyone makes their own.

So when life is hectic, this is one of the ways I simplify so we can still have tasty, healthy, fast dinners. 

Book: The Intentional Thread

The Intentional Thread: A Guide to Drawing, Gesture, and Color in Stitch by Susan Brandeis came to my attention by a fellow textile artist giving a short, enthusiastic review.  It's available only in hardcover so I put a hold on the copy at the local library and forgot about it.

Then it came home from the library and I was stunned.  I read the first few pages, flipped to the back to read the bio of the author, checked the appendices and ordered my very own copy from Amazon.  This is basically a university level course in mark making with thread done extremely well with dense detail that it will take me weeks to work through. 

I am still struggling with my fatigue. back pain and vision problems and one path I was considering was doing some hand work in the evenings.  I tried some knitting after a couple of decades not doing it and while I could easily do the work, it didn't satisfy me as being an art medium that worked for me.  So I've been mulling over what to do.  Now, I have a plan involving stitching. 

I have not previously enjoyed slow stitching.  I did one bargello pillow top in my 20's and after that went for speedier results.  I think the universe is planning to teach me patience with these health issues so I dove into this book with that thought in mind.  And found this lovely image of a spiral done entirely with hand stitching.

So i made a small fused collage and plan to try some stitching this week in the evenings.  I have my variegated perle floss, some new varied sizes of needles and my 12" square collage.  I'm thinking of doing something similar to a dna helix with the colored circles in the middle of the two intertwining lines.  And we'll see how it goes.

For anyone interested in hand stitching, this is a fabulous reference book.  I'm particularly looking forward to the differences in line possible with different stitches and threads.   I only wish it was available as an ebook so I could read it when my eyes don't want to deal with printed pages.

Dealing with epic resin failures

We're back from vacation and both Jeff & I are suffering some back issues brought on by the furniture in the condo we were at.  So my attempt to pour resin and do all the small pieces I had set up was pushing it a bit.  And my back got worse between the first pour and the second pour so I rushed the process to finish before I had to quit due to pain.  This was the first lesson of this epic failure in my resin adventures:  Don't work while in pain, especially if the work requires using the part of the body that's in pain.

Here's all but 2 of the pieces I made.  The other two got trashed because really they were total failures.  All of the above pieces have flaws and only two are fixable.  So this has turned out to be an epic learning experience.  What did I learn?

1) don't work while in pain.  see above.
2)  prewarm resin for both pours, not just the first. 3 pieces ended up with massive bubbles due to not prewarming the resin on the second pour. The leftmost piece above was perfect except for the tiny cluster of bubbles along one edge.  And check for bubbles every pour because they are fixable if caught soon enough.
3)  Do fewer pieces at one time.  One piece, the six pointed star, failed because the box that is supposed to keep the pieces from getting dust in the resin while curing got put directly on the edge of the piece rather than next to it which left some of the paper from the box on 2 of the points. Less crowding of the space by doing fewer pieces would have saved this one.
4)  No plopping the pictures down on the resin.  Lay them out from one edge toward the other so as not to trap air under them.  The large oval and the pink square both had this as the only flaw.  (I'm particularly unhappy about these failures as I already learned this lesson from marbling.  Bad Liz!  No keto cookies!)
5)  Elevate the items so I can better see the doming when I'm doing the second pour.  I overpoured several pieces, particularly the 2 I tossed.  While some of this can be trimmed and filed off, it's still something that's easier to prevent than to fix.
6) Keep the temp up in the correct zone for the entire curing time.  Two of the pieces have soft spots on the edges because of failure to cure correctly.  (This also occurs if  the resin mixing is not done properly but I don't believe that was the cause since both pieces were on the same side of the work table.  I have a small heater on order to fix this.)

What good things came out of this work?  I succeeded in using the 2 molds I made and they worked fine.  I mixed colors, tested an idea about marbling, and learned some things about using the mandala transparencies with colors behind them.  While I was incredibly frustrated right after unmolding things, I feel I learned a lot from the work.  And James Clear's email today reminded me of some important things to keep in mind.  His ideas today -

"If you haven’t started, then taking action is more important than finding a better strategy.

If you’re already taking action, then ensuring you’re working on the right thing is more important than working harder."

This is causing me to think about which part of the resin work is the right thing for me to be working on.  If only life's lessons weren't so rough sometimes. 

Ocean Shores vacation to refresh my soul

One of my theories about people is that we each connect to the universe spiritually through different landscapes.  I'm a water girl; moving water is better than still but I'll take a lake if there's no ocean shore or babbling brook.  I suspect this connection explains the popularity of landscapes for art but that's a whole other discussion about art & emotion.

Being a water person, I like to vacation at the beach.  Just standing on the sand, breathing in the sea air, watching the waves, evokes a calm that nurtures and refreshes.  So here we are, at Ocean Shores for the week, having left the cats and the house in good hands.  The view from our 3rd floor balcony is the golf course in the foreground with hotels and the ocean in the background.  So even when it's windy and rainy, which it has been pretty much since we got here Friday, we have an interesting view and opening the door slightly gives me all the sea air I could want. 

View of storm coming in on Friday

 Saturday we ventured down to the shore in the car during a break in the rain.  There are no islands off shore as there are off the coast of Bellingham.  The next land out there is Japan, I believe.  So there's a lovely vastness that I find both soothing and invigorating.  Tensions evaporate.

Sunbreak during the shore visit

Alas we only got a few minutes of sunniness.  We were not the only ones at the shore, and others were braver than we and went out into the windiness to walk along the beach.  I got out to take the above picture and had to chase down my birding cap as the wind was strong enough to rip it off my head and send it scudding along the sand.

gulls huddling on the windy beach

So I quickly got back in the car and we cracked the leeward window so I could smell the ocean.  Watching the gulls is always fun and we enjoyed seeing them deal with the wind as they moved about the beach when cars came by.

Sunday was less rainy so we got to watch mallards, geese and a ginormous quantity of gulls on the golf course.  They were playing in the myriad puddles but all took off when a coyote came wandering along.  It took us  long enough to identify it as a coyote rather than a dog, or even a deer which are plentiful in the neighborhood, that I failed to grab my camera in time to catch it.  We have days yet so I have hopes he'll wander by again.

geese grazing

And last but not least in the amusing photos so far is this sign glued to the sliding glass door. 

So glad this is here because being mugged by gulls every time we opened the door would not add to our enjoyment.