Thursday, February 28, 2008

explanation

if you are one of the folks that regularly reads my Studio Blog, you may notice this morning that the countdown ticker to Nevada City has been removed.

Now it might seem more appropriate for this explanation to be over there than here, but because this is something with a lot of emotional baggage, I decided to do it here instead because this is the blog where I "let it all hang out"

For 16 years in a row we had begun our show season with a trip to Nevada City. For a good number of those years it was a financially successful trip, and it was a great way to "fill the well" creatively.

In addition, it has been a wonderful place to "connect" with other artists, and renew friendships.

Since we moved to Colorado it has been the trip every year that has allowed me to visit that "other life" I wish I could have -- {"another life, I want another life,...and every where I ever go, I'm someone who they want to know"} -- and that is the most difficult part for me of making a decision that is practical here.

Since for the past 4 years we have take huge losses by attending this show (it costs us about $1000.00 to do it), and since on our otherwise fixed income with ever increasing costs, we have made the smart business decision and will not be making the trip to California.

I am heart broken.

Please excuse me if there are no posts on the blogs for a few days -- I need time to grieve and try to find some purpose for doing stuff

Wednesday, February 27, 2008

Just wondering......

why it is that I've started on this project that involves a large cloth doll (that I've been working on for 6 months and its not finished yet because I haven't figured out the rest of the design yet) and a large cloth winged horse (which is so far just the horse because I haven't figured out the wings yet) are we sensing a theme here?

anyway, I had originally thought I would try to get this all done for a show I'm doing in about a month, and I realized yesterday that because I need to finish pieces that might actually sell, this piece will go to the back burner for now (rats)

which lead to "so why am I doing this"? the second thought of what show it might go to was the Jubilee which is held in Kansas City in September, but yesterday after a look at our budget we regretfully scratched that show off of our list for this year because there is no $$ to apply

so the giant flying horse with the large cloth doll is a project in limbo -- I'm thinking that if I actually get it finished whenever that might be that I might just pack it up and send it off to the Art Doll magazine and see if they'll use it in their publication -- we'll see

sort of sad sometimes how projects I get excited about doing turn into just another unfinished object..............

Tuesday, February 26, 2008

I'm still here

but nothing to show you today

Saturday morning I woke up feeling kind of "off" -- little did I know I'd spend Saturday afternoon, Sunday and Monday alternating between dozing in my recliner and running to the bathroom -- needless to say, I've had better weekends!

So today I'll try to catch up with the house chores -- do some laundry, etc., and maybe even work on something.

All this after being just mad enought to spit nails on Friday when I talked to my mother.

Seems the "village" they live in has decided that they are in violation of the city ordinance regarding driveways. They have been told that they must put in concrete, asphalt or 3 inches of gravel in their driveway.

Now they have lived in their house since 1956. It never had any of that stuff and neither did anyone else in the neighborhood. Gradually over the years, the neighbors that could afford it have but those things in. And evidently at some point the city passed an ordinance that said every house had to do it.

I looked up the ordinance to try to find out when this little lovely was passed (and why they weren't told something then) -- the web site doesn't give any date on it.

All that and I guess it never occurred to the city that if my folks could afford to do that to the driveway they would have -- DUH!

Sometimes I get so annoyed at government that thinks its more important to butt into our personal property than to actually provide some services (you know, like clearing the street in front of my parents house)

Geesh!

Thursday, February 21, 2008

Mind Muddle

I hate mid winter

its so.....well ---- GRAY!

I think as soon as its warm enough for the snow to be gone things should be green

Alas, such is not the case -- {sigh!}

And of course it seems that right now I'm in that "working on a dozen things and nothing is finished" stage of getting ready for shows, which does not help

I think I need a play day, but I don't even have any ideas for what I would do on one

Really I should be spending some serious time working on the website re-write, but this year I just haven't been able to get into it

I spent some time this morning surfing around in fabric websites looking at possible stuff for the back of the quilt I'm working on right now -- I found some neat stuff that is a lovely red batik -- and added it to my wish list

(have you noticed my wish list at the side of this blog? I know, there are a lot of mundane items there, but after all a wish list should be those things that you want but won't/can't buy for yourself right now!) Mostly this list was added because my daughter asked me to give her some ideas for what I might want for my birthday/mother's day/Christmas or whatever occasion seems to call for a present. I'm happy to oblige her.

perhaps today I'll get back to that website writing......and figure out a day to do "play" activities

Tuesday, February 19, 2008

now I've done it...

the newpaper we get on a daily basis did a "call for writers" this month

I polished up two posts from this blog and submitted them

There's no pay for this activity, but it would be cool to be able to add it to my "resume"

also a certain amount of pride accorded to beating out all the grad students

and a bit of a flying in the face of "the critic" that makes me remember so well the line from Gypsy when she says "me, with no talent, as you've reminded me every day of my life"

Take That!

anyway, I will fall over in a dead faint if they actually accept me, but its good to enter any way

keep on keepin' on!

Thursday, February 07, 2008

Still needing to go green

Here in our little village, I feel like we're living in a time warp of 20 years ago.

A few weeks ago I decided to try to find a new trash company with the idea of:

1. saving a bit of money
2. having our recyclable materials collected instead of going into the landfill

I called every company in town, including the one I currently have service with.

Keep in mind that where we lived before the recycle pick up was part of the weekly trash collection at no extra charge. They didn't need to charge extra, the materials were being sold to companies that actually used the materials in new products.

They took paper (including junk mail and magazines), glass, metal, aluminum, and plastic (ALL kinds of plastic), you were told to pile yard waste (tree trimming, grass clippings, etc) in a specific place in the street and they came by, scooped them up and they were recycled too. And the local stores there encouraged you to bring in your own bags (in fact now in that area they charge you if you want a bag from them).

Anyway, here was the conversation with one of the local companies:

Me: I'd like some information about your recycling service.

Company: We pick up recycle items every other week; it costs an extra $3.25 a month.

Me: What kind of materials do you pick up?

Company: newspapers, aluminum cans and plastic marked 2 and 7

Me: What about glass or magazines?

Company: No, we can't handle those

Me: So do you bring out bins for things to be sorted?

Company: No, you just sort your stuff into the plastic bags you get groceries in

Me: I don't get plastic bags

Company: Well, you could use the paper ones I guess

Me: I don't get paper bags

Company: How do you bring your groceries home?

Me: In cloth bags that I carry in with me and reuse over and over

Company: Well, we have to have the stuff sorted into bags

Me: So do you recycle those too?

Company: I don't think so

Me: Never mind

It’s enough to have me mumbling and swearing I can tell ya!

Wednesday, February 06, 2008

On becoming part of the political system

Let me be clear first off here. My parents always voted. I have always voted. I was delighted when the 18 year olds got the vote even tho' it was just a little too late for me to take advantage.

But aside from having an opinion and going to the polls, my family was never all that involved in politics.

And frankly, during the time that I was working full time and being a full time mom and trying to run a small business all at once, I just didn't have much time to think about politics much more than that.

During the last seven years, however, I've become something of a political junkie.

For one thing, the current administration's bungling of all the good will we had right after the day the world went mad is so sad. Then all the evil things they have done since have made me so mad.

So, during the last election, I went to a caucus meeting for the first time.

Last night was my second time, and I can tell you, it was a whole new world.

For one thing, at the last meeting we were in this little basement class room of our local high school, two precincts in the room and all of 6 of us there. I can tell you that was a very quick meeting, but in truth, all of the deciding on the candidates had already been done because that race was so lopsided.

Last night we were in that same little basement room, but a whole world away. For our precinct alone there were 24 of us. The majority of us over 55, but some younger ones as well including one mom that brought her two elementary school aged children with her to see democracy in action -- now that was neat!

And, because there actually was a race to be decided, we actually did break into groups (although not as many as there would have been two weeks ago), and we had to "do the math" to get the right proportion of delegates selected.

It was exciting!

And so, by the end of the meeting, the DH is the new Precinct Chairman and a delegate to our county assembly which meets on Feb 23 where more business will be conducted and delegates chosen for the state convention later in the spring.

Oh yeah, I'm an alternate to the county assembly (which means I get to go even if I may not get to vote) and the new Precinct Secretary (I get to handle the emails and the paperwork -- like that's anything new!)

WOW!