A few updates…

I just had a chance to update our website’s main page, and added a couple of things to our Currently for Sale page! (And subtracted quite a few… thank you to our dear customers!) If you get a chance, go take a peek over there!

The papercutting above is I think my very favorite new design… it was fun to work with a limited palette of blues, greens, and golds, and also to incorporate those fun fraktur flowers! The basket was inspired by those seen in old theorem paintings. Scherenschnitte always seems to “come to life” for me with the final touches of ink and lettering, but this one was alive from the get-go, with the happy colors & florals!

And before I go, I thought I’d share this little critter with you… I caught him with the camera a couple of weeks ago. He was a very tiny “little man that goes to church” (our family’s term for a praying mantis… dubbed so by a little cousin of mine many moons ago!) in the music room… he was maybe an inch long?

However, he took offense at being photographed and begin waving his arms and coming toward me…

… and climbed right over the lens to attack me!

Sorry for the blurry picture… it was taken in haste! He was a fiesty little critter, and soon thereafter was placed out-of-doors. Mostly due to the GET-HIM-OFF-OF-ME tone of voice I had as I was requesting help from Hubby Dear. Who, by the way, thought the entire situation was hilarious.

Thought you’d get a laugh too!

How eXciting!

I finally had a chance to pick a winner for the free papercutting! First I jotted everyone’s name on little slips of paper…

And then I folded them up…

And put them in a mug…

And had Kate pick one out…

Congratulations DiXymiss!!! I’ll get it on its way to you!

(Did I give it away in the title of the post?)

Sunday Drive…and a PEEP! (edit)

Tonight Kate got to take a ride in “Lola”…

… which was built from scratch by a very good buddy of hers! They needed a little push to get her started…

… and two Dads and a Pop-Pop (Pop-Pop’s behind Kate’s head!) were very happy to offer their assistance…

…and off they went! 

Isn’t that the coolest car you’ve ever seen?! Great job Stevie!!! 

And thanks to everyone who commented on the Freebie post! There’s still time to sign up for the drawing! (And I’ll have another papercutting freebie coming soon, so keep checking!) Hope everyone had a wonderful Lord’s Day! 

Monday morning edit: Sometime in the night a Peep hatched! More may be coming…

Scratch & Dent Freebie…

Actually it’s not scratched or dented. At one of our spring shows, we had a very rainy day, and fortunately, this picture was the only casualty. The damage was so minute that we just discovered it. So, it’s either toss the papercutting and recycle the frame, or offer it as a Freebie on the blog! I thought you all might like the Freebie idea.

It’s a pretty Pennsylvania German floral, with my very favorite Bible verse penned around the border… Philippians 4:8. The water damage is a little smudge in the bottom right hand corner…

… and you pretty much need your bifocals on to see it. If you’d like to be included in the drawing, just leave a comment on this post, and I’ll randomly select one on June 30th. (Please make sure you leave your e-mail as you comment… not in the post, but in the “posting process” so I can get in touch with you!) Winner to be announced as soon as I can get a post up in July! 

The only gift is a portion of thyself.
~ Emerson ~ 

Defragmenting.

Hello folks! Hope you all had a blessed Monday! We did! I spent the morning doing Monday sorts of things… trying to make a “To-Do” list for the week, hanging laundry, washing dishes, getting groceries, and painting frames. My Dad came over and power washed our house, deck, and patio… THANK YOU DAD!!!! Wow, it sure looks good! We headed out for a strawberry picking adventure this afternoon, only to find we had officially missed strawberry season. Honest. The sign at the produce stand actually said “U Missed It” instead of “U Pick It.” Oh well. I probably didn’t need to make jam this week anyway. And we came home with a watermelon, so our adventure was not fruitless. Literally.

We came home and picked a bowlful of  our very own blueberries, though. Well, some were Pop-Pop’s but we took half of the berries over to Mom & Dad! I love having berry bushes! Kate and I surveyed the wild berry prospects along Hudson Corner’s  ditches, and it looks like there is foraging potential in the coming months. We also discovered a very happy black raspberry growing in Jordan’s pine tree. Did you plant that, Jo?

I’ve finally decided on a summer goal for myself. Defragmentation. It sort of goes along with the “negative space” idea. You know those puzzles where you slide the blocks around until you get everything back in order? That’s kind of what it feels like to defragment. It takes a while to see the order coming about, but I think I might be getting somewhere!  My first “read” of the summer was Little House on the Freeway, and I loved it. If you’re feeling a little hurried (or harried!), I definitely recommend it! Next I’m hoping to read something just for fun! You might even catch me hanging in Kate’s hammock!

 

Etsy, revisited.

Hello folks! We’ve been working tonight on getting our long-neglected Etsy site up and running again. Hopefully, we’ll be putting some of our picture frames on there, but all we managed tonight was to upload a set of small scherenschnitte… Parsley, Sage, Rosemary, and Thyme. I added them in the correct order (like the old S & G song) but forgot that they would show up backward, so the song reference lost something in the translation.

On a happy note, we saw PEOPLE in the store today! Mom and I have been getting a little lonely wondering where everyone was hiding, but we had folks in all day today! And they were happy people, which means a lot to two lonely shopkeepers! We had tea and discussed its many virtues with a lovely Scottish lady who was nearly 90 years old. She had played 9 holes of golf before she came to the store today with her two daughters. I hope I’m doing that good at 90! 

Have a good night and God Bless!

Stay inside a sturdy building.

Well. I was getting ready to hang a small load of laundry on the line, and heard a distant rumble. A long way away ominous sort of rumble. So, I decided to check the weather to see what was coming. It was a storm, and our entire county was under a severe storm warning until 9:30 a.m. Not unusual. However, I don’t think I’d ever seen the warning to…

Stay inside a sturdy building.

That was quite impressive and thought provoking. So I did. Stay inside that is. The laundry will have to wait. However, it is now 10 a.m., and nothing too severe happened. The rain is gently and steadily coming down, and the thunder is thundering in a rumbly sort of way. 

While on the subject of weather, the other day we had the most wonderful breeze all day long. The windows were open so we could enjoy it, and we actually were serenaded… Kate’s harp was sitting by the window, and every time the breeze blew in just the right direction, we heard a heavenly sound! It’s a very quiet sound, but it’s as if somebody strummed their fingers across the harp strings.

And lastly… before I go… we’re very honored to be able to change the logo on our sidebar for Early American Life’s Directory of Traditional American Crafts from 2008 to 2009! Our copy of the magazine came in the mail yesterday, and it’s wonderful. I cannot say enough about this magazine. If you love Americana, please subscribe… it’s worth it!

Thought for the day…

If you pray for rain, be prepared to deal with some mud.
~ Mary Engelbreit ~ 

 

Cute as a bug in (on?) a rug….

Hello folks! Our daughter Jo just posted a Vimeo of our littlest grandboy Derik… he’s learning to crawl. Forward that is. Look out Jo… soon you’ll have two little men on the move! 

And, check out Jo’s Photography Blog… she’s been creative with her About Me page and in a few other places, using a hand-written note about herself! (Check out her Portfolio Link too! This very biased Mom thinks she’s pretty good!)

Our youngest daughter, Kate, has been busy too. Catching up on some projects that have piled up in the sewing room. I think she’s working her way down to the fabric for our new family room curtains! (Yippee!) 

In other news, I think we’re going to have a very disappointed hen on our hands. Rhodie, a young Rhode Island Red, went broody a month or so ago. She was determined to set, even if there was nothing to set on. After about two weeks of trying to remove her from the empty nesting box, Hubby gathered half a dozen eggs and placed them under her. We really didn’t know if they were fertilized, but figured the odds were high that a least a couple of them were. She’s been setting on them for over three weeks, and no signs of Peeps yet. Poor girl.

I guess that’s about it for interesting tidbits this morning. Except we’re getting ready to head out to watch our extra daughter Sara take a very important walk… to officially graduate high school! Where does the time go? She’s the pretty blonde… and the dynamic duo are on their best behavior in this picture…

This is actually more realistic….

And I only had THREE Gummy Bears!
~ Sara Jane ~ 

A peek inside… or art on the go…

Yesterday I got one of Cathy Johnson’s Art Tip Newsletters, and it had some interesting tips and links for making your own traveling watercolor boxes! Cathy’s incredibly wonderful book Living History: Drawing on the Past  sent me in the direction of being a living history artist, and was also the inspiration for my tiny watercolor box… it’s not terribly grand or exciting, but at shows or reenactments, somebody always asks to take a peek inside! In case anyone needs to create a small “on the go” art kit that wouldn’t stand out like a sore thumb at historic events, here’s an idea…

I found an old oil pastel box while cleaning out boxes of art supplies. I chunked the oil pastels in a jar with a bunch of others, and started doodling on the box lid… sort of a “schoolgirl” type of drawing. (If I wasn’t in such a hurry, I might’ve tried using a wood burning tool to etch the design, but alas, this was most likely done at midnight the night before a reenactment, so quick and fast was the goal!) Then I just painted the design a bit with watercolors. I already had two commercial travel watercolor sets that I had never used, and coincidentally the pans fit in perfectly! (Coincidences are especially appreciated at midnight the night before a reenactment.) When they’re used up, or if I ever make another, I’ll look for some metal watercolor pans, or make some homemade ones.

Anyways, here’s the cute little box… It works wonderfully for 19th century events. Probably pushing it a bit for 18th century, but it’s better than modern!

And a peek inside…

And my “historic-art-box-to-go”…

 

The watercolor box fits in my art box if I arrange things just so. Another greatly appreciated coincidence.

 

Be Still…

Tomorrow is our last planned day for a while… we’re teaching colonial dancing to a whole bunch of fourth graders. Kate and I are looking forward to it, since there is very little planning involved and we basically just show up and have fun with the kids for the day. BUT, after that, there is nothing on our calendars until September!!! I should probably clarify that… there is the normal stuff like family and church and work and gardening and homekeeping, but there are no big “Events” for a good long while. The pages of our lives have had the margins scribbled in for far too long, and I’m looking forward to seeing some white space on our “To-Do” list. Some negative space.

I think I’ll wax philosophical for a bit…

In art, negative space is as important as positive space. Empty space actually adds to the composition of a picture, enhancing, and sometimes even creating the subject!  The picture at the top of this post is a little different than most of my papercuttings. Usually there is lots of “stuff” surrounding the subject, and then a cut border that goes to the edge of the frame, filling up the entire space. The quiet sheep is different than the norm for me… with lots of negative space around him, he seems to “pop” in his frame. Our lives are like that… when they are filled to the brink it’s hard to see the big things, but when we start eliminating things that are filling in our margins, the important things start to stand out. 

Now mind you, I’m not advocating sheer laziness. (Although it’s crossed my mind this Monday morning!) There are still plenty of things I’d like to do this summer, like finally make some jam from my Dad’s gooseberries, help my Hubby get the asparagus bed established, learn botanical drawing, and sew new curtains for the family room. There are even some papercuttings in my head, just waiting to get on paper. I’d just like to ignore the calendar for a while. After all, school’s out, and it’s summer vacation!

P.S. Despite enjoying being home, here’s a peek into our weekend!  We had a ball! (Literally!) It was probably one of the most relaxed balls we’ve ever gone to… probably because I didn’t have any time to worry about getting ready! (Just showed up and had fun with the kids! I think that will be my new strategy!)