A BROKEN HEART

oh, this hurts so much.  My beloved Dad's Jimmy is broken.  I have been crying for a week since it happend.

I mean sobbing.

On the way to Denver a week ago, in the canyon, I spun out on black ice.  In a blink of an eye,  the car did 2 360's and it smashed into the guard rail. Hard.  Despite the damage, the headlights, turn signals, etc all worked.  With the help of an angel named Buck who stopped to see if I was okay, he wired the one headlight up and I got back on the highway and went to Denver to pick up my girls and return back to Glenwood.  I never got his last name, but he was so helpful.. a passing Angel.

NOW my intention is to get the Jimmy repaired.  And it will BE.  Even if the car insurance people have "totaled" the car. That's their world, but not in my world.  I am bringing this car back to life. 

I have never been so attached to a "thing" in all my life, until NOW.  This Jimmy is my link with my Dad who passed away.  Since he's been gone, I have missed him terribly.  But when I am driving in his car, he is sitting right beside me.  So with the money I get from the pay out from the "totaled" car, I will restore this car back to it's old wonderful self with the help of family who I am eternally grateful.  This 1994  Jimmy with only 101,000 miles still has a lot of life left in him and we still have a long ways to go together.

In today's throw away society, I am not willingly to toss out this car.  I am doing the reuse recycle restore

theory and keeping the memory of my Dad's spirit alive and smiling as we journey on down the road.

I promised Dad.

And I know Dad is smiling with me right NOW.

This will be our next ART project, Dad and me.

ta

MORE CARDBOARD RECYLE ART

I found some lovely cardboard.  I know, that sounds funny.  But, I am a recycle artist at heart.  I love taking something that someone would normally discard, and re-invent it into art.  It makes my heart smile, it makes the planet smile and it is just a feel good way to create.  What made this cardboard great?   it's thick and it has a nice linear texture.  So when you apply paint with an old credit card, a nice linear pattern appears.

These are just in the beginning stages.  And I am not certain exactly where they are going.  I love to work

from the heart, not the mind, so I will trust these pieces will go on their own journey with a little help from me.
I started by cutting the shapes and actually stitching them together with my sewing machine using a zigzag stitch.  I loved the sound of the sewing machine needle punching through the cardboard!

 

And heartbreaking news this morning.  I am making cardboard houses and listening to the news from Haiti about the huge earthquake and the hundreds of casualities.  If only I could magically send these cardboard houses to that island to be transformed into actual houses.  If only.

NOW

I must get to work making a living. :)

THANKFUL FOR ART

POSIES FOR YOU!  .... first in a series!
now for sale on etsy


I am planning to do a series of these girls.  I love using the license plates for their
bodies and love their big ole wacky lips. MWAH!  The lips are made from a red lid off of a mini vodka bottle.  Here's a little background on these lids...

 A few years ago, walking my dog Sadie everyday through our old neighborhood, I would spot, almost on a daily basis, two mini bottles tossed to the side. Never one bottle mind you.. but always two.  The lids were not screwed back on after he or she killed off the bottle.  No, just tossed onto the ground.  I would easily spot the red lids, and sure enough, the two empties nearby.  I have probably over 100 lids! Yep, this person had some serious habits!  One, the vodka habit and two, a big litterbug.  So in name of art and cleaning up the invironment, I would pocket the two lids and two empty bottles.  The bottles I would toss in the trash, but I saved the lids for some future art project.  I would often think about this person.  I surmized that it was somewhat troubled soul  and a man. Troubled, because he must of felt he needed those two shots even before he got home.. couldn't wait to get home to have a drink.  Why a man?  Well, I think a woman would of screwed those lids back on before she tossed the evidence into the weeds.  Just my opinion.  Plus I wondered if he was chosing vodka because it was less of a tell tale smell on his breath? Closet drinker?   And he was obviously walking as the path seemed to be coming from the bus stop.  Funny how you can make up these assumptions just from some discarded trash!  It was fun to wonder about this person while I walked along.  Then suddenly one day, the bottles never appeared again.  He had moved away.. or cleaned up his act. 

Now,  fast forward ahead a few years, and LIPS!  These lids make great lips.. they are aluminum and already a perfect red.  I can easily smush them into lip shapes even turning up the corners for smiles! 

So stay tuned for more of these recycle art dolls.. with wonderful LIPS (thanks to the drinking litterbug!)

and oh HAPPY THANKSGIVING everyone!  I am off to make a nice big apple pie.. yummy!

ta

xoxox dada

(SOLD)

I finished this sweet guy this morning.  I tried to not get the blaring glare in the photo, but it wouldn't go away, sorry...  He is full of love with a big heart that I scratched xoxox on.  I used an old metal horn and a caster wheel for the legs.  The arms are some crazy spiral metal from something.. I have no idea what.  The head is a piece of  metal I fished out of local cabinet shop's firepit.  I think the spiral metal arms came from that same place. The wood is a sample piece from the kitchen design place where I score pieces of wood.  They will often toss this kind of stuff in the dumpster where I rescue found goodies.  I used an old coffee can to cut out the metal wings.

  Keeping your eye open for junk is always fun.  You spot something, you haven't an exact idea what you

are going to use the found piece for, only that you like it and might use it in art at some point.  Then there is the hard part of collecting  found objects.  They accumulate!!! and before you know it, your studio starts to look like Sanford and Son's!  But I always smile when I think about the end result.  Where the stuff came from, even some from far away sources and here it is, all come together to create art.  It's magical.  It's a nice way to recycle.

And even a better way to start my day.

ta

BEING STILL IN NATURE

SHE IS DONE.. and I did a little Vblog to record my feelings about this piece.