Beware the Blue Owl

If you see this peering into your house ... Do not open the door !

Aloha, Mr. President

Happy 90th Birthday Velva!!!

Velva turns 90 on Monday! HAPPY BIRTHDAY to the best Mother-In-Law a girl could ask for!

Doesn't she look great? That hair is all natural!!!!

Welcome 2009

As winter break comes to a close, time to say goodbye to Amelia again. It's been a fun, relaxing time with her. We've had a lot of time to do things like lay around by the fire, watch movies, cook, eat, shop, visit our favorite cafes, go scootering, biking, sketching, and visit with relatives and friends. We even took a couple of day trips - to the city and to Gualala. I think she's enjoyed this relaxing time at home, and we sure have enjoyed having her around. It's pretty safe to say she's caught up on her sleep. :)

Here's a photo from our trip to Gualala.



These are some things I am thinking about focusing on for 2009:

Find a new job! Numero uno on my priority list.
Start up an Etsy shop, and be more productive with my felting.
Organize. Donate things no longer used and organize my things.
Learn. Continue to develop and improve skills. Strain the brain. Remember, use it or lose it. Specifically: Illustrator, Photoshop, 'ukulele, sketching, hula.
Excercise. For losing weight, endurance, strength, balance, mental clarity, all that. Keep up the biking and get better so that I can do more; maybe try Zumba! Hike more.
Eat right. I don't have to learn this; I already know how; just do it.
Stay connected with family and friends.

Rayne's Embroidered Mexican Blouses

Rayne Wolfe is another buddy from the Press Democrat - a really talented reporter, and super fun gal. She's the one with the laugh you can hear across the office. She's an incredible jewelry designer, and has recently found a niche doing embroidery on a basic Mexican blouse pattern. She & I share a passion for poultry. And vintage stuff.

http://collectingjourneys.wordpress.com/

Dave

Here's Dave, playing his bass in the garden:


And onstage: "Bass Solo!"

A Nice Review of The Venice Chronicles

I like this review of "The Venice Chronicles" because she did a great job of capturing the feel of the book. And she included some of my favorite watercolors out of the book.

http://www.comicrelated.com/display.php?item=318

Wet-felted Mittens

I've been wanting to try wet-felting mittens for awhile now. Here's my first try. I over-did it and made these too thick. (Dave says they look like oven mitts, and he's right) Plus, it took me 5 hours!

Somebody likes Christmas

Mushrooms

Today Sib & I rode our bikes up to Luther Burbank's Experiment Farm. Sib & Ross had discovered an incredible outcropping of amanita muscaria mushrooms - the big, orange/red ones with white spores on top. It was so beautiful - for whatever reason, they loved growing under this one particular tree - a Chestnut. We walked all over the property looking for more, and found several other varieties, but no more of the amanita muscarias. I can see how people can get into mushroom huntin'. It's kind of addicting - like looking for pretty pebbles on the beach. I had to be very careful not to step on any of them.

Amanita Muscaria






I've never seen so many mushrooms.







Sibi




Breaking Ground, literally.

Dust Bathing in the Sun

Looks like a Chicken.

....Penny?





Dust bath!




Oh, yeah ...



Don't Disturb Me.



All Done!



And looking fine.

My Bass Girl

I seriously doubt she misses her bass as much as I miss hearing it around the house!

Laid off again...

I've been laid off before, but it's never come as a shock to me.

"Nancy, the company is announcing layoffs today, and your job is one of them." The words of my boss last Friday. Completely out of the blue - I had no idea they were even talking of layoffs. This company just does not communicate with its employees. In the 6 months I was there, I never received ONE company-wide office e-mail. Which was a blessing in a way, but kind of weird. I would overhear things that indicated they were ok, like, the machine shop's running 20 hours a day, they've added x number of machines, the fin shop is working Saturdays to keep up with orders, etc. And they had hired a bunch of people earlier this year... Now, I'm told, due to order slowdown at the boat builders, they decide to lay off 14 of us - that's about 10% of the company. And besides coming as a shock, I had to pack up my stuff and leave immediately, which was really bizarre. I drove home at 11am and just drifted around the house, mindlessly doing stuff like cleaning out the fridge, not really knowing what to think. I'm still waking up in the middle of the night, going "what the ... did that really happen?" "Aren't I supposed to be getting ready for work?"

Such a bummer; I was really hoping that I could hang with this job for the next few years - So now it's apply for unemployment, update my portfolio, hope that something opens up...

November 4, 2008

Main St. Sebastopol by Kathy Goetzel

Another talented Graphic Designer I worked with at HP was Kathy Goetzel. Kathy is an amazing painter, and has returned to her art in the last few years. She has painted many of the animals at Safari West, as well as botanically-correct local flora - you can see notecards of her work all over Sonoma County. She also illustrated the amazing book, "Miss Hallberg's Butterfly Garden." I love Kathy's work, because it always represents the things I love about living here in Sonoma County. This one is my absolute favorite! It depicts Main St. Sebastopol - the same intersection I photographed with the Buggs Bunny! I love it because of it's whimsical style, and cool perspective. I imagine myself in an old-fashioned hot-air balloon floating above Main St. I also love that she snuck a dachshund dog in, and because it shows "Earthchild" toy store, where Amelia worked for several years.

Click on the image for a larger view.

Two Art Exhibits of Note

For many years, I sat next to Pat Haley at Hewlett-Packard. Pat was the corporate photographer. He was my photography mentor. As I was taking photography classes at the JC, he would invite me into the photo studio and let me use all his equipment. I even got to fill in as his replacement while he was on vacation. This was in the days of film - using large-format and medium-format cameras I got to shoot a lot of products for HP. I learned a whole lot from Pat, and am forever grateful to him for his mentorship.

Pat is retired now, and lives part-time near Puerto Vallerta, Mexico. He has been able to get back to his painting, and has a studio in Santa Rosa. He has a show going on currently called "Impresiones de Mexico" at Uribe Studio on Sebastopol Ave. The show is open from 11-6 Fridays thru Sundays until Nov.25. His paintings are large-scale and depict life of the locals in Mexico. I especially loved his Folklorico paintings.



And, "Innovations in Fiber Art IV" is now going on at the Sebastopol Center for the Arts. My "Popeye Gang" felt sculpture is in the show. Dave & I went to the opening on Thursday, and the show is super-impressive. Mine is definitely the least-Innovative piece, but it is the only felt sculpture. There are quilts made of hand-dyed tea bags, coats made of hog casings, weavings of wire, pine needles and more. The Gallery is open daily - M-F 11-5 and Sat & Sun 1-4. The show runs through Dec. 7th.

I Love Sebastopol

This is the main intersection of Sebastopol. One day, driving to work, I happened to notice something atop this building...

Happy Halloween!

The Venice Chronicles is here!

Hooray! Today I received 2 copies of Enrico Casarosa's brand-new book!(Yes, Amelia, one copy is on its way to you!)



Isn't it cute?
"The Venice Chronicles" is Enrico's watercolor/sketch journal of a visit to Italy with his girlfriend Marit and her parents. It is an endearing love story - with amazing watercolor artwork, and laugh-out-loud humor. I can't wait to share this book with everyone who crosses my path - so watch out! And here's the amazing part -- Enrico included, at the end of the book, a photo of my Enrico and Marit felt dolls that I gave to them last Spring. I'm so incredibly honored!

This little book will charm the socks off anybody - Especially anybody who loves watercolor, love stories, Italy, and humor... and who would that not include? If you are interested in getting a copy, (I guarantee you'll LOVE IT!!) it's available at Amazon, or at Enrico's website.

More Enrico Goodies:
Animated Birthday wishes for Marit
Sketchcrawl
Movie of one of Enrico's paintings for the Totoro Forest Project (the look on the little boy's face says it all)

Paint by Numbers

I came across a woman at the Petaluma Antique Fair a couple of weeks ago that had a bunch of Paint-by-Numbers paintings. I couldn't stop looking at them - it brought me right back to my childhood. My guess is that most those paintings done way back then no longer exist. In my mind, at least, they didn't seem very worthy at that time. Now I'm all sentimental about them. I bought this one.



Whoever did it never got around to painting the number 1 - white.