Sketches and little fairy doors

I haven’t sketched properly in what feels like years. Made plenty of art over that time, sure, but I certainly haven’t just sat down with a pencil to translate what’s in front of me. I’m pleased that I was still able to draw hands, they can be so hard!

Im also dreaming of little laser cut fairy doors, hidden in the woods outside of my parents house and in our little secret garden, treasures for the kids to hunt down and enjoy. That must be a new project.

we’ve got today off and will be setting up Rip’s room, moving the laser downstairs, and working on projects. It’s beautiful and sunny outside and I am feeling so grateful for my family and our life. 🌙

The full swing of summer

The full swing of summer is here. It pendulums back and forth between walls of heat, dragging its full belly over a waterlogged groundcover garden of purslane and clover, stopping occasionally to roll belly up in the sun or disappear into the shade for a long nap. The nights see us up late, most of the time, since it’s still light when we get home from work and we feel like we will live forever. But the mornings see us up early, too, since 7am is as bright as noon and the magpies scream urgently for us to bolt outside and breathe in the morning air, lest we miss another minute. So, we balance occasionally by going to bed early or sleeping in late, although there are days I’d be willing to stalk a full-grown, half-starved grizzly to steal their hibernation of winter.

The magpies screams are companionable by now. It’s silly, almost, how loud they can be, but if you’re listening closely they always have something to say. You’ll know the moment something shows up in your yard because the parliament addresses it so promptly.

We’ve been missing the bees; not many of them have made it to our garden this year and I can’t help but feel troubled. Even our deliciously bolted arugula this year seems to be visited by more wasps than their bee brethren, and it makes me miss the days of a fully swarming lilac or honeysuckle. (edited to add: later in this same day I drove past a huge lot full of mature lavender, positively swarming with bees. A reminder that perhaps the universe reads my blog, thinks I’m a touch over-dramatic, and wants me to know that it has a good sense of humor.)

Meanwhile, at 30 weeks pregnant I feel as swollen as summer herself and I too drag my belly over the ground cover and pull shade over myself to hide from the sun. There’s still plenty of road left to travel here but we’re climbing the last hill, and I keep having dreams of labor and meeting this baby boy. I keep my hands busy by developing new laser projects, designing files and painting small wooden pieces, gluing and photographing and puzzling things together. It’s incredibly satisfying and also cathartic to complete. (When they are a little more “put-together”, I shall post some pics.) I also have a few painting commissions to wrap up for the summer, and a number of other small projects to complete, then it’ll be fall and I’ll be itching to weave brooms and I’ll also have a little babe in my arms so I’ll have to figure out how to do it all one handed for a while. (I’m not going to lie; I’m so very excited for the fall. A cool breeze, a pumpkin cream cold brew, a nice scarf, the sound of leaves traveling like a flock of starlings across the sidewalk.. swoon!)

I’ll have to write another post about all the summer things I love so that I don’t sound too ungrateful. As humans, isn’t is always a strain to focus on the present instead of pining for the future? I struggle with this during the newborn stage, too; wanting so badly for my body to heal and change and strengthen more quickly and for their tiny little bodies to stay cuddly and small and sweet for longer. But they seem to grow so fast and I seem to change so slow and the only way to reconcile the two is simply to enjoy the particulars of each moment, instead of getting caught up in what comes next.

so. I’ll do that.


Digital Nesting

This will have to be short, but it’s an important placeholder if you pay any attention at all to the timestamps on my recent blog posts (spoiler alert- they’re not all very recent.) For years, I’ve had one blog and an increasing number of unpublished drafts. They range from anything too moody, too personal, too emotional, or too rude for the general public (who of course must be protected from emotions at all costs, of course), and as such I just let them hang out in blog-purgatory. Well, I’ve finally found a new system (you’ll still never see those posts as a standard webpage visitor), but it allows me a lot more organization on the backend which is just delightful. I also publicly approved and published a few random posts from over the years that were vanilla enough for your delicate eyes. :)

So, here’s the cleaned up version of my blog. Which, to the casual observer, looks exactly the same as it did before. But to me, it feels more authentic and cathartic to have it all organized, which is really all that matters in the end, eh?

(Note to self; write up another post sometime on how damn difficult it is to curate all the different pieces of yourself into one cohesive Being.) 🖤

Memorial day weekend 2021; A wedding and two funerals

It’d really be more appropriate to title this, “two funerals and a wedding”, because it really was a funeral-wedding-funeral sandwich, but I wanted to put the more optimistic event first. Don’t get me wrong, all three events were of equal importance; but when you tell people you’ve got to go to two funerals in one weekend (even without mentioning the happiness of the wedding in between them!) then they give you that head-tilting pity look and I just hate that. So, thusly the title for this post became, A Wedding! And two funerals. Although it could have also been titled; Zach and five months pregnant Annie honor family in three different celebrations, in two different states, in 36 hours with no sleep. Either way.

We’ll go chronologically; this post is mostly for a photo dump, although I’ve got plenty to say about each part of the trip so far, but I just didn’t want to lose the important pics in the murky depths of my camera roll. It was a truly unforgettable weekend in so many ways, and it all went down so smoothly (for which I will be eternally grateful.)

Hug your people. <3


A more interesting title.

Looking back at the last few posts I’ve made, I realize that I haven’t had much direction in their content. It’s mostly just me showing up, being here and not really knowing what comes next. And, that’s important, too. But I thought I’d try to give this post a more interesting title. (Did it work?)

I am rounding the bend towards an exciting new place in life where I have tome to create. Everyday. And experiment. Every day. And make new things and paint and be excited and sell art and do the thing!! I am truly over the moon about where our little family is right now, especially with the world in as crazy of a place as it is.

I need to inventory my art, make some sales to get some space freed up, and buckle down to making some new things! This may be a new season for me.

Perhaps..

Perhaps I need TWO blog pages! Brilliant! Then I can post some to the public one, some to the private one. An elegant solution to a few-year-old problem that will keep me from having to save all my private posts as drafts instead of publishing them.

I think that’s all for today. Nothing enlightening. Just trying to get a little something on the books each day. Bowie is being adorable as always. ❤️

Here we are.

July 15 2020

I’m sitting on the floor of the Littleton school, after having just turned on the lights and connecting my phone. “Yesterday” by the Beatles is playing and Bowie just walked over to sit in my lap. I am tired but life is good. I need to write more, so here I am, (here we are), writing. Sitting on the floor. Just trying to get some words out. Motherhood is a lot of things but it is certainly also squeezing in time for you, for things that fill your cup, wherever possible. And in our current heartbreaking cultural climate, I’ll take what I can get. I have hope that we can make this world better for our kids, but it’s going to take a lot of cycle-breaking and self-educating and compassion, for others and ourselves. So we may as well raise them to be bad assess just in case.

Today I’m feeling pretty introspective, it’s a little overcast, I have 4 classes to teach, work and phone calls to catch up on, and some momentum to maintain. Let’s do this. 🖤

I miss the feeling of ink on my skin.

I miss the feeling of ink on my skin. Aug 2019

I am sitting in the bathroom at work, pumping. I sat a timer on my phone for 10 minutes. I brought my day planner with me; thinking I could capitalize on the extra time to make the rest of my day run a little smoother, but when I got in here, all I wanted to do was write.

I used to write daily. Id bring a fountain pen and vial of ink with me everywhere I went, and my journal was filled with sketches, blotches, dots, specks, thoughts, and a myriad of other things. I felt powerful in the presence of my mementos. And, more often than not, I had fingers smeared with ink from documenting my brain’s gymnastic efforts.

Now, I sit here typing on my phone. I am literally holding a pen, even! But I only thought to bring my planner in here (how practical) and I’d be foolish (wouldn’t I?) to carry around an inkwell and an infant everywhere I go. SO. Here we are. Missing that ink smear, that daily evolving reminder that I expressed myself, and instead, I am typing away like a valley girl on my IPhone while I “express” myself. Oh, the things we do for love. I think I shall plan my day, make a little doodle in the corner of my planner, think about how I used to be cool, then focus on the future by making a list of art things to keep in my bag to use while I pump.

🖤

Bite sized chunks.

Bite sized chunks. Aug 14 2019

Life can be overwhelming.

Especially when you do so much. Literally, every day can feel like we are just running in place to get to tomorrow. It’s a lot to accomplish; trying to be a great mom, wife, employee, artist, athlete, human, etc. Any of those on their own can be a full time job. And I know I’m preaching to the choir here… many people in my life routinely take on even more daunting challenges with more gusto and less complaint than I. But it’s still a lot.

I think that the best way to tackle something as daunting as life is just to take it one bite a time… we only have one brain, two hands, this minute at a time to live this life. We need to make the most of it. Each moment I have with my daughter is precious, and I am insanely grateful for it. If I start thinking about the big picture, of everything at once, I get lost and overwhelmed in the flood. So instead, I just try to take it one bite at a time.

Today I started a few paintings, only working for about 30 minutes. I am trying to write 10 minutes at a time, when I can. I try to work out, one day at a time, every day. Eat right, one meal at a time. Kiss my perfect baby one little kiss at a time. We do what we can.

<3