Whoa!

Whoa! I am supposed to have more time to paint, blog, read....whatever. But here it is almost May, and my last post was in January. I have been busy....still. Amazing. But life is more relaxed. And I have painted. I sold the second one of these from my Archives series.

I am beginning a year-long program at San Luis Obispo Museum of Art called Seasons of Creativity. More on that later. But I am gearing up for a year of making art. Exciting!

My Nest

It has been a little over two weeks since I left my position at the Art Center.I am beginning to feel more relaxed. But of course I have been busy.

First I worked on the studio. It isn't perfect, but much better. Now my own files are in the top drawer. Then I spent most of a day on the garage. And then my handyman and I spent another day organizing the garage. He also repaired a ceiling and painted it, made some repairs to and repainted a bathroom, and helped me haul boxes of old documents from the garage to the studio. Now I can shred and shred. I am buried under paper! And it is all over my just-reorganized studio. Sigh. I had thought I would spend all day today on that, but Papa and I opted to take his new Honda for a drive. But back to work tonight.

Meanwhile the studio kitty went to have her claws out. I am sad we had to do that, but she showed affection by patting my face - claws extended. She is doing so well that I am managing my guilt. I am already tired of the shredded paper in the litter box - but I have an excellent supply of paper.

I have managed to finish so many projects that needed to be done.....but there is always more.

And I have actually painted a little, too. What a relief to be back to work. I am not happy without it.

Vacay is Sweet

Whoa! My life just turned upside down!

Vacay was nice. But I did work. And I wrestled with whether I should remain the Art Center president or not. Because no one was waiting in the wings eager to take my job, I accepted nomination and election for another year. I thought I could still bring energy and passion to the job.

But a few days ago, after working many hours getting ready for important meetings and still working several days later, lightening struck. I had just passed my seventy first birthday, papers from work were spread over most of the surfaces in my studio, I wanted to go into town to order paint and deliver brochures, and I needed to be at the Center for a meeting at four. What was I doing!

So I finished the last email, and Papa and I took off for town. My head was spinning.

About two minutes into the trip, I told Papa I needed to resign.I am sure he didn't believe me.

Back home at three, I went straight to the Mac and typed my letter. Then I picked up my president's binder, my key and went to my meeting.

That night I packed up files and got them ready for Papa to deliver the next day. Done!

Of course I am mopping up and have a few meetings and obligations left.

So.......what next? If you know me, you know I don't sit still very long. Once the word spread, interesting offers started cming in. But I will move slowly. Collecting hugs from two adorable grandchildren and painting come first. And Papa and the rest of the family, of course.

Vacay

Whew, what a whirlwind. But now the Art Center is closed until January, the kids are in Colorado until January, too, and we are planning a small Christmas gathering. (Not that I like for the kids to be away, of course.)I am feeling the tension give way to vacay mode. I still have a few meetings and other preparations for 2012, but at an easy pace....I hope.

And I sold a painting! I am pleased.

I am enjoying lunch with friends and carching up, too. Nice.

Winding Down

I am winding down the year, but making plans for a new year with the Art Center, too.

Summary:

Cooking for Thanksgiving
Shopping for Christmas
Writing a grant report - almost done!
Wrapping up business details for the Art Center - not almost done
Planning for 2012 at the Art Center - making progress
Catching up on reading and relaxation - making progress
Enjoying Buddy and Roo - ongoing
Painting a little, now, but mostly planning new work


Our last show of the year at the Art Center is always our student scholarship show. I am proud that we give thousands to high school and college students each year. Receptions and awards were last Sunday.

The Law

So I am required to collect sales tax on the art I sell. To do that I must have a sales permit and a business license. Most artists don't do this, I am sure. But we are supposed to. So Papa and I traipsed all over town taking care of the business license. Now I have to mail in my app for my sales permit.

At this point in life I need a business license? And I may never sell any more paintings. Sigh. But I am compliant.

But the process was fun. The folks at the county tax collectors office and county planning were all pleasant and helpful. No long lines. No hassle. One woman even remembered talking to me on the phone this morning. Enjoyed watchng the puffed up suits running around trying to look important.

I am the curious sort, so I liked poking around. Then Papa and I ate New Orleans food for lunch. Fried green tomatoes - hold the hollandaise. Add red beans, rice, and collards and I feel transported. Beer washes it down pretty well.

I did not need that chocolate cake tonight, but I had to get rid of it. Sigh.

The Griddle is Hot

A creativity and aethetics workshop with David Limrite last weekend was a good way to emerge from my painting hiatus. The outcome is that I have begun a series of paintings based on the magpie.

According to legend, the magpie brings good news, is a healer, can bring riches - even though he is a thief, represents healing of rlationships......and I could go on.

I saw magpies for the first time this August. How beautiful! Yes, they are noisy and they like to dive bomb people, but still gorgeous.

In my research, I found a couple of versions of this chant:

One is for sorrow, Two is for mirth
Three is for a wedding, Four is for birth
Five is for riches, Six is for poor,
Seven is for a secret, I'll tell you no more.

The chant is supposed to invoke the spirit of the magpie:)

I am so relieved to be painting again. And I am enjoying my new direction.

Ahhhhhhhh!

I am so happy!

While I still have lots to do, my head is now above water. I finished - or rather totally re-painted one painting last night and put the last touches on the other. The studio is not in perfect shape, yet, but it is straight enough to manage. Now I can work some and organize some.

I must go through all my paintings, repair any chips or scratches, and have a whole pile of them ready for Open Studio Tour this weekend.

My little open studio exhibit will be all day Saturday and Sunday on the patio - hopefully with a friend, if she is well enough. So now I need to turn my daytime attention to the front yard. In my opinion, it always looks a little weedy - even though there are none. The plants just have that look. Gotta see what I can do about that and pick up and spread several bags of mulch. Then I will need to sweep up all the berries that fall from the strawberry tree.

Work at the Art Center is a bit slower now. Whew!

Didn't Happen

The papers are not filed. My studio table is not clean and organized. I didn't finish all the chores on my list. Not one bit of that happened.But I am on the way to Portland for the encaustic retreat. I do believe I can finish the last of what really must be done while I travel, though.

And my new Mac is in place in my studio. I plopped it on my desk, plugged it in and briefly considered whether I should finish my work on it or Papa's PC. I decided getting the Mac set up with my email accounts would be about as easy as using the PC. It was! So fast! I was up and ready to work in no time. I downloaded two programs I need and will probably need one more before seriously getting to work. But all that was fast and inexpensive, too. And I love the trackpad.

I hate to leave Mac there all alone while I fly away for four days. Waaaah! I wanted to play.

And I hate to leave Buddy and Roo:( I wanted to play with them, too. And I hate to leave Papa on his own.Yikes. Sad. But the retreat will be great once I am there.

Time to fly.

Ah, they just announced pre-boarding for my flight.

Even Closer

So of course I got way behind again, and I still have not really started painting. But I still say I am getting closer. I have been busy with meetings and putting up a retrospective exhibit to celebrate the 60th anniversary at Art Center Morro Bay. The show is a hit and the reception tunout was pretty good. Now perhaps life can get back on track......well, after I return from the International Encaustic Artists retreat in Portland. I will leave this Thursday morning and return on Monday afternoon. Though I will miss home, this retret comes at a good time for me, I think. I will get my hands back into paint and wax, see new ideas, tools, and material, watch demos, and hear presentations. I should be inspired and ready to work when I get back to my studio. My goal is to file every paper I can, put all the extraneous art stuff away, and have a new board waiting on my table - ready to begin a new piece.

Of course I have stuff to do before the filing begins. Somehow I need to make this happen, though. And I will need to pick up my new Mac sometime in the next few days.

I have seen reallly beautiful encaustic art recently. My brain is busy reviewing what I have seen and gleaning ideas and techniques I can use in my own work. This should help.

I have a new iPhone, making some of my calls easier to make. That is a good thing.

Stay tuned and look for new work soon.

Still Recovering

Do you know that when you need a break the world doesn't stop and let you get off for a few days? I tried. I did little beyond sit on the couch, cook a tiny bit, do the laundry, and point where to plant a tree to the gardener. Kids have been here some, and I have had one meeting. Other than that I read a book and played a video game, conquering the top level. Of course they have encouraged me to go through it again with a harder version, and I am working on that. Oh, and yesterday I went to lunch with a friend. Trying to catch up with her and others I have neglected for months.

The result? So now I have all the piles of stuff I didn't do for the last four or five days waiting for me. And I haven't painted. Still feel I am getting close. In a meeting about a possible 2013 exhibit, I came across some beautiful illustrative art. Very inspiring. Intimidating, too. But I can feel my fingers itching. And suddenly, sitting on the couch is not acceptable.

It Is True This Time

Not too long ago,I said that I had come to the end of several big projects and might be able to breathe again. And paint. I lied. Didn't mean to, but I did.

The last two weeks have been some of my busiest ever. Sort of like moving. A few helpers and I had to pack up one hundred paintings to be shipped out. I knew packing would take time. I wasn't looking forward to it, but it had to be done and I was in charge. I accepted that. But, whew! I didn't realize I would have so many problems getting shipping labels from artists or run into so many complicated sitautions. One artist had moved, so her new address on her package didn't match the one given on her UPS account. FedEx didn't want handwritten labels. I had no labels from many of the artists, and they didn't seem to know how to get them. I could sputter on, but at this point, I am tired of hearing myself talk about it. The job took the better part of nine days. Absurd. I made calls to artists, to UPS, to FedEx in the middle of the night - and you get India then.

And I had to, and wanted to, put in some grandmothering time. And there was a reception at the Art Center. We had just held a clay class - still trying to get masks fired. And went to meetings about the exhibit we want to present in 2013.

Painting? No way. I guess my brain needs to recover. I am reading books, finally getting in the mood to declutter the house, and just catching my breath. We are cooking at home again, I walked yesterday, and finally got to have my toes done this afternoon.

But I feel the urge coming on. Soon.

Inaugural Exhibit

About a year ago, I wrote a grant for Art Center Morro Bay, hoping for funds to purchase a laptop and projector to use in promotional presentations about the center. Of course that meant, if we were awarded the grant, that I had to design the presentations and give them.

We also asked for funds to add storage and a display wall in our Activity Room - primarily to use for our children's program.

We were awarded the grant, presentations are underway, and the new storage and display area are installed. Cork was applied to the wall earlier than I expected and loomed bare and large. A large reception was coming up, and I needed a kids show. I am surprise it took me a day or so to realize I had plenty of material right in my garage. I have hundreds of Buddy's drawings and some of Roo's paintings. That sparked more ideas, and I called the man who installed the wall to ask if his daughter would be in the inaugural show, too.

Check out the results in the pix above. Problem: Buddy and Roo were in Colorado. I am sad that they didn't get to see their show, but I will share it with them here. Their work had to come down to make room for the children's summer art camp work.

The juror for our encaustic exhibit, Consequential Fusion: Messages in Wax, spent a long while examining each of Buddy's drawings and photographing them. I am proud.

Ahhh!

Ahhhh! Home! Yes, the trip was fantastic, but I will tell you that when the intersection of Old Creek Road and Hwy 1 offered a gorgeous glimpse of the Pacific this afternoon, I thought perhaps I might be just as impressed with home as with any other place on our tour.

Then Papa and I rolled down the windows to take in the cool beach air of Los Osos. More ahhhhs. The house is tidy; the dog and cat seem happy to see us. Red flowers are blooming in the front yard. I checked my messages to discover the Art Center had sold another encaustic painting (not mine, but one form the IEA exhibit), and all the other messages were good ones, too. Now we are home with glasses of wine. Life is good.

As was the last leg of the trip - Bakersfield to Los Osos with a detour (literally) to Kern National Wildlife Refuge. Tillie the car girl had no clue how to get us there. The map was vague, and iPad offered little better. So we wandered. A CA Wildlife Official intercepted us, told us we must really be lost (I think he meant stupid), and set us on the right path. But all in all, we liked the adventure. And we finally reached Kern. We saw four or five great blue herons, great white herons and another roadrunner. Fun. The scenery was inspiring. We will go back next winter when the bird population is at its best.

Now to unpack, do laundry, and hopefully settle into a slow, comfortable pace. Is it possible?

Up and Down

Right on time, at the early hour of 10:00, we left Bishop, CA to drive through the Owens Valley area along the eastern side of the Sierras. We stopped in Lone Pine to gape at soaring Mount Wnitney. Many years ago, Papa had climbed that mountain, starting in Lone Pine and concluding his hike in Tulare. Now I can see why that eight day expedition still stands out as one of his important accomplishments! For many years he saved the boots he climbed in. Finally age and mold got the best of them. I am sure I was the one who insisted we toss them, but I did draw one boot first - the drawing is hanging in our kitchen.

The visitor's center models and maps gave me a better understanding of the Mono Lake, Mammoth Lakes, Mount Whitney, and entire Inyo areas. What wonders we have seen!

Today was a day of contrasts - from the broad valley to magnificent hills that abruptly spit us out into the flat town of Bakersfield. The temperature was consistant.....HOT. Tonight our dashboard display showed 87 at 7:17. 100 when we drove into town. I have enjoyed feeling warm, but now Los Osos is looking good.

Meanwhile Papa has totally corrupted me. For lunch we ate hot dogs from a convenience store we found right in the middle of nowhere. Then tonight in Bakersfield, we ate Basque food again. Not. The big difference in tonight's Basque restaurant and one we visited several days ago is that tonight the restaurant was packed. For the life of me I can't figure why. Yes, they serve family style, but there any resemblance to Basque ends. I think Basque has become an excuse to sloppily serve an odd assortment of greasy diner-type food. Again, Papa was in heaven. Hid did later agree that our waitress' style was rather like throwing paint at a fence. She brought bowls of soup, bread, beans, a dish of hot sauce for the beans, salad, nasty spaghetti, blah green beans, soggy french fries, and tongue. Most folks also ordered an entre. Not me. My ice cream and decaf were good. And so was our wine. In any case, dinner did provide an interesting adventure.

Spoiled

So, I am spoiled. We have established a morning routine. We wake. Papa goes to get my decaf and toasted raisin bagel while I check my mail. Eventually we muster enough energy to get ready for the next leg of our trip, usually about 10:00.

So we pulled out of Reno according to schedule and headed through Carson City and across the basin and range area into the Sierras. Papa explained that subduction of the ocean crust formed a massive batholith of magma over four hundred miles long. Millions of years ago the upward force of the magma formed the now extinct volcanoes that comprise the Sierras, mostly massive residue of granite exposed by erosion. Who knew?

At some point they were covered by glaciers that, when melted, left behind lakes like the beautiful Mono Lake we saw today. I gasped as we rounded a mountain curve to see the big, salty, very blue water. Though all the scenery today was stunning, Mono Lake was my favorite. Papa said the glacial moraines were his favorite and were worth the whole trip.

The combination of heat and altitude were ruthless, so were were happy to get back down to four or five thousand feet in Bishop tonight. Mono Lake is over nine thousand, and we were, for a short while, higher than that. Whew! No energy, I could barely move. I was happy to get back to the cool car.

Tomorrow we head for Bakersfield.

Irritation

So, last summer in Europe, I had just had my iPad for a few weeks. I thought I was a total incompetant for not knowing how to insert my photos into my blog or facebook. When I left for this trip, I figured I would research and figure it all out. Had to be simple, right?

So I have researched and found easy instructions. I have followed them exactly. When I insert a pic on my blog and preview it, the pic link is there. But it isn't. If I then publish and click to view the blog, poof! Gone. Same with facebook. I have downloaded several apps that are supposed to make it easy.

So far - nada. So I can't share photos of our trip:(

Riding High

Thankfully we were awake by the time the bikers took off from our Best Western this morning. We left a little while later, heading for Lassen Peak.

What a beautiful day! We saw more lava, of course, gorgeous vistas, and finally snow-capped Lassen in the distance. We stopped at an RV camp for lunch and resisted the cherry pie. Figured we had done enough damage.

We wanted to see as much as we could, so we picked the scenic route to our days-end destination - Reno. Our road took us through time warp towns, around many a hairpin curve, and finally up into the snow we had seen from a distance. All the smart people had come prepared with sleds, skis, and snowshoes to enjoy the spotty but deep snow that probably won't melt completely before they have more snow. I saw some drifts that were more than eight feet. I really couldn't tell how deep some of it might be. What a strange sensation to stand in the snow with the temperature at about seventy.

Of course our road didn't take us all the way to the peak, but we were way up there! About half way down from the highest point of our drive, a sign said we were at 4,000 feet.

I was still hoping for a magpie, and we sighted one in flight. I loved the beautiful tall pines, and when we stopped for photos or rest stops, the pine fragrance was powerful, nostalgic.

By about 4:00 this afternoon, we left our wonderful mountain drive and began our last stretch of the day by driving through a vast valley, leading to Nevada.

Now with a tummy full of Indian fare, Papa is snoozing in Reno. Tomorrow we head south and back into California along the eastern side of the Sierras. Tomorrow's destination is Bishop, CA.

More Tripping

So, back to the trip. We left Redding this morning, driving up I 5, the Pacific Crest Trail, with impressive Mt. Shasta as our first destination. The snow topped peaks are beautiful. We stopped for photos, of course - from every angle.

Then we headed northeast on Hwy 97 to the top of CA, then east along the CA-Oregon state line on 161. After a morning of mountains and pine trees, we headed into a huge valley toward the Klamath Wildlife Refuge. We had the road to ourselves, so we could stop on a whim to take photos or just watch birds. On our drive into the refuge, we began our bird search in earnest. I hoped for eagles and magpies, but no luck on that. We saw an enormous bird that was probably a great blue heron. He was too far away for us to be sure. So big! We followed a great white heron for a while, then ran into a flock of yellow headed blackbirds - making Papa happy. Many families of cute little grebes swam in the open water areas, and we saw swallows, a big white pelican, and gulls.

There was no shortage of turkey vultures; we came across four or five of them eating roadkill lunch that used to be a beautiful little fox. EW.

Then came the big excitement of entering the Modoc Plateau and the Lava Beds National Monument. Lots of lava and more talk of subduction, volcanoes and such. The beat part was being questioned that we were both at least 62. Well, at least it was a good part. The lava was abundant! Nice visitors centers. The scenery and leisurely drive were good medicine.

Tonight we are in Alturas with a bunch of bikers. Dinner was in a Basque restaurant that really isn't. They do serve family style, but mostly the food was just deep fried everything. Papa loved it.

Tomorrow is Mt. Lassen then to Reno.

International Encaustic Artists

So, because I am on vacation and have a little time, I will mention that between my April post and this latest flurry, I have been working on an exhibit of encaustic art, Consequential Fusion: Messages in Wax, now showing at Art Center Morro Bay. To see go to www.international-encaustic-artists.org. Sorry I can't put in the link. IPad does not want to do that. I think most of you reading this have seen it, anyway.

I am proud that we are able to host the show and pleased at the response. While preparing for the show, we were also making some needed renovations to the Art Center and I was working countless hours developing a promotional slide presentation about the center. All that is done now, and I am enjoying making my presentations around the community.

Now I have a mountain of boxes in my garage and dread the end of the encaustic show. We will have to move all the boxes back to the Art Center, repackage all the art, and ship. In the end, it will be worth it though. So far we have sold one piece. Let's hope for a few more. There is really wonderful stuff there. How I wish I could own several of those pieces.

After months of working nonstop, I am enjoying a few days away. Daughter, SIL and children were in Colorado when I was the busiest. I am happy they are back home, now, and am looking forward to a return to a little more normal schedule - whatever that is. When school starts, both children will get out at 2:30. What will I do with all that time?!