summer poem

summer
and a yellow suitcase by the door
chai tea and naps
baby kicks and gardens
all sweet and spicy
and savory
with anticipation 

homemade patriotic ice cream sandwiches we shared with our life group on monday -
summer is here!

shape poem

the prompt: "what shape are you in today?"


may 25.2012

too hot...

sweaty even

wishing for

an air-

conditioner

that worked.

i have to pee

but do not risk

hardwood floors

squeaking... and

rousing my boy

from slumber

i long

for a

break

some

space

to be

just

me.

sit.

rest.

and then
love so well

i took it literally... doesn't it look like me?

as promised...

jason read my last couple of blog posts yesterday and said "you need to finish that piece and post it!" so i did :) i don't love it, but i had fun working within the guidelines of our grid project from last week & seeing what happened! :)

and some more thankfulnesses:

41. a husband that enjoys fixing things
42. a boy that LOVES to help daddy
43. the voice of God showing up to my heart through song lyrics and lovely music
44. my spiritual director
45. how much joey ADORES babies, and is so gentle with them - he is really looking forward to his baby brother's arrival
46. watching how a 2-year-old mind works - he was a little worried about the baby yesterday: "he's stuck in your belly!! he needs to come out!" - no, gotta wait till he's a little bigger, buddy...
47. my sister's blog post about my mom, reminding me once again how blessed i have been to grow up in that home
48. joey's curls
49. jason's eyes
50. that he thinks i'm beautiful when i'm pregnant
51. grey toenail polish - i especially think it's comical that my boy doesn't like it - "i need it off, mommy!"
52. perfectly ripe fruit
53. the ability to feel actual hunger now, and not just nausea-needing-to-be-fed-to-stop
54. insurance and good doctors
55. flower rings (and bracelets and necklaces...)

"new" coffee table

 so we've been saying for months that we need a new coffee table... this one's surface is all bubbly for some reason (water damage or something? who knows). it's a cheap laminate/particle board ikea table we've had for years, and it has been on it's way out for a while... but i saw this DIY on a beautiful mess forever ago, and finally thought we should do it to this one! i love how it turned out, and it was SO EASY. just masked off what i didn't want painted, taped down a large piece of lace (thanks, April!) and spray-painted it! and the new visual texture totally hides those surface imperfections! yay!

joey wasted no time in "trying out" the new table as a race track ;)

thankful this month for:

26. distant shadow-leaves dancing in the wind at sunset

27. a morning of treasure-hunting, returning with a vintage jewelry box, 

lovely mugs, a toddler bed, and a gift for a friend.

28. naptime chance to reflect, write, share...

29. joey has the best auntie(s) in the world

30. that i felt better enough to go to the screenprinting class - happy 

mother's day to me!

31. baklava

32. coffee shop employees that ask if you want that decaf (looking at me, 

8pm and pregnant) - YES!! i do!!!

33. an evening ALONE with a (decaf ;) white mocha at a bookstore

34. a longer-than-usual talk with a dear friend while our 2-year-olds 

entertain each other

35. being seen

36. new friend with hard stories and an open heart

37. baking with joey

38. lovely ranunculus from my love

39. a week and a half till summer, and jason HOME! and potty training, 

big boy beds, growing belly, family time (recorded 5.16 - now it's 

TOMORROW!!)

40. my morning chai

glimpses of community

a  corner of erica's gray-and-yellow beauty

so i have some wonderful friends who humor love me by coming over a couple evenings a month and "being creative" with me. we call it "artsycrafty club". i love it. just getting to share my studio space and introduce them to a little of my art-world... most of them claim to be "NOT creative". but they come play anyways :) and this week, i thought i'd share some  glimpses of the 3-dimensional collages they made friday night...

my sister kimmy's "random" piece - i think it came together so lovely and bright and fun!

blayne, our recently moved from portland friend, put a bird on it ;)

allison made me crop her name out of the shot of the piece (but i put it here anyway ;)

 i loved how maura picked so many of my little "finds" that i most adore, and put them all together!

jan totally departed from the 4x4 grid idea... she's an artist, so i figured she'd "break the rules" ;)

rachel's serengeti sunset loveliness 

 somehow, i never end up finding a chance to actually make something on these nights that i'm hosting... but i got inspired by having all my little bits of found "things" everywhere, so i'm working on my own piece now... maybe you'll see it soon ;)

the one thing i DID make that night- baked brie with basil and blackberries and apple wedges (thanks to indiana for the recipe! :)

and some glimpses of what i've been thankful for (completing the the rest of april)...

15. rain on a tin roof
16. boy laughter floating in from the backyard
17. a movie that brings unexpected tears
18. a blog post full of comments from seekers like me, making me feel less alone
19. a woman who writes so beautifully, it stirs my soul every time
20. a lone gull winging its way through dark grey sky over slow freeway traffic
21. unisom sleeptabs
22. feeling better today (4.16)
23. my boy begging me to read him "one more" book, as if it's not my favorite thing in the world to do
24. joey taking a nap today (4.27), allowing me to take one, since i ended up having to work a 12-hour shift unexpectedly tonight!
25. pink-striped skies and wind on my surprise drive into Los Angeles for work

 yeah, you can pin that. ha. i actually stole this DIY entirely from A Beautiful Mess, so please feel free to give them proper credit ;) just thought i'd let you see how mine went step-by-step.

i started with a bright warhol-style self-portrait done in a painting class a few years ago. it was always too bold for me to display as-is... just looking at a 30" x 30" picture of myself all day... not my thing ;)

 i applied letter stickers to spell out some song lyrics that have been deeply placed in my soul as part of my journey with God over the last couple of years (from a Ten Shekel Shirt song called "over the room"). 

note: the "repositionable" stickers stuck to the canvas much better than the "permanent" adhesive ones for some reason, giving a much crisper edge to the letters.

then, per elsie's recommendations, i used spray paint (we did this project at artsycrafty club last week, and used craft paint then, with brushes, and i wanted to see how superior the spray paint really came out) and covered the whole canvas. it actually was no better than with brushes... i think the trick is more how well-adhered the stickers are before you paint. 

but i love how it turned out (and you know me - never disappointed by the little "imperfections" - love the character imprecision brings :)

here is an instagram shot of one of the girls' canvases from last friday - she started with a landscape painting and used blue instead of white - turned out so fun!

 and this is such an easy project, i tried it the next day with my  2-year-old. i just applied the stickers for him and let him go at it painting all over the (white, in this case) canvas - now he has new wall art for his room! 

and then the project started evolving. if you saw my post earlier this week, you saw we broke out of just letters into the wide world of stickers in general... 

the only caution i have is do not try this on paper. haha. i thought it'd be cool to send some of joey's "art" out to friends and family in the mail, so i took some watercolor postcards and did the same process... no good. it just pulled the paper up with the stickers, ruining whatever design we were trying to accomplish...

 but try it with a canvas! and have fun!

poetry: skin deep

orange-peel smooth

as cool and calm as wildfire

cloudy-sky clear

matte as rainy-day sidewalk

volcanoes waiting

i hate you

and hide you... and wish i didn't.

(another heptastich - poem of 7 lines)

poetry: mindfulness

learning to be truly aware in the tiny things. i spent 15 or 20 minutes being "mindful" in this experience, and then wrote about it...

mindfulness

i chose what was near me

a christmas gift

dark chocolate-covered edamame

and drank in all the texture

and color and sound of movement

babbling like a brook

as my hand explored their depth

the richness of something

never-before-head-of

surprised me as i tasted

so many layers

of melting and breaking

a deformed one at first bothered me

until i saw its shape
then i knew: it was a gift

poetry: a heptastich

a heptastich (poem of 7 lines) written the day i found out i was pregnant with my second child... 

i posted it in our Open Studio facebook group as my announcement

my body, cradling another

deep within, a seed

unwitnessed

erupts with furious growth

swelling, dividing, proliferating

maturing until autumn

unknown until today

ever since i took a photo of one hollowed pomegranate cradling another, i've thought how much that looked like pregnancy... now i finally painted it! i made it colors that would match the boys' room...

and while i was painting the above piece this afternoon, joey was painting this one...

ok, so mommy may have put the stickers on the canvas before, and taken them off at the end, but he chose all the colors and did the actual painting, determined to give it to auntie kristi once it was complete! he's TWO, folks - there are non-cheesy projects you can do with a toddler! :)

his desk setup right next to mommy's studio area

poetry: i am here

so i finished day 1 of Open Studio Workshop! (only 24 left ;) 

day 2 was our first lesson on writing... mostly in the vein of poetry.

 i'll be sharing those poems as i get a chance to write this week... 

but to start off, i wanted to share the pre-class poem she had us write, with "i am here..." as our prompt/title.

i am here...

i am here

in the chaos

in the true and the questions

in moments of quiet soul-space

and soft longing

and big dreams

in the midst of a life full

of sweet two-year-old boy voice

and strong man-arms

and the running

it never seems to stop

the moments are rare when

awake and quiet intersect

and depth and lightheartedness

dance

but i crave it

and he fights for it with me

my beloved

and i flourish

as the chaos fades into paint

and paper and rust

and my heart shows up

back to the drawing board...

...literally!! these past few months, as i have felt so sick, and been on the couch much of the time, i haven't even felt "up to" trying to keep up with art in any form. i have had a very uncreative three months. and while it's not entirely true that i haven't been drawing at ALL...

i don't think "draw something"s really count ;)

but i'm finally feeling better (and even starting to wean off my med!) so i've been able the last couple days to get back in my studio! i am still planning to complete the Open Studio Workshop assignments from Misty Mawn's class i took online for 5 weeks in january/february... so i started where i left off... on day 1! the next assignment was to draw an expressive portrait using as many dry mediums as you can. since it had been months away from the drawing board, i definitely thought drawing from a reference would be the best... so i did a self-portrait.

i don't love it. and i couldn't figure out how to work well with the pastels... so i went back and watched all the lesson videos - and came out inspired! :) i had forgotten hoe much i love watching Misty work. it always makes me laugh when i think the drawing is just about perfect and she goes in and "messes" with it again, almost to the point of starting over (i need to be able to learn to do that with my own work - i have a hard time reworking it... usually just give up instead, as seen in this next portrait, where i just did not have enough patience to try to get the hands right, so i gave up on finishing the whole thing...)

i decided i need a LOT more practice, and am super-inspired to draw regularly in a sketchbook. just so many possibilities when you can draw a portrait or figure with the expression you're looking for... this next one was done with no reference - just drew a face. it's my favorite of these (though of course i see glaring imperfections that i would definitely "fix" if it was to be used for something specific)...

and the last (the LAST!!!) assignment of DAY ONE (!) was to draw your body as you feel it, not as you see it. so i used no reference and just drew this growing belly-body... my legs are too short & head is too big... but it wasn't supposed to be a good likeness anyways :)

do you feel like i'm looking at you?? (disapprovingly? ;) i decided to title this one "the skeptic", and purposely introduced NO color into the eye area framed by the glasses... i'm watching you...

upolu

finally, a month later, i am getting to post shots and thoughts from our trip to hawaii to visit my parents! they live in kona, on the Big Island, and there are so many lovely places to drink in. 

my favorite place (so far) on the planet is here... 

a little dirt road near a tiny airstrip leads you to this staggering view. red and black lava cliffs descend into rough gorgeous water. 

here is a bit from my journal as i sat alone in this beauty and just drank...

it's like this place was made just for me. my dad loves it because it's almost always clear blue and windy... but there's more waiting for my heart. 

you come to the edge of the cliffs and look over to wild, untamed tumultuous beauty, the sea so blue, heaving this way and that, waves crashing on the black lava, sending spray twenty feet in the air and gently misting my face. 

but then you turn around and look at the cliffs themselves. and they are embedded with a thousand rusty things, so much a part of them now that it's hard to tell if it's the dirt that's red, or the disintegrated rusty metal making it so. there must be whole cars rusting here. millions of shards of glass... vintage shapes, decorative elements... melted, twisted in some fire... 

but oh, the shapes of the red iron equipment against the backdrop of pure turquoise turbulence. 

i am in awe. 

so if all of it is grace, and every gift points to christ, i sit wondering how. this thrill in my heart as blue explodes into white, and rock joins with rust... what does it all mean? eucharisteo before i understand [referring to Ann Voskamp's One Thousand Gifts]. i think i would be happy if i died here.

usually my favorite "beauty" involves the quiet solitude of the mountains with its pine-fresh air... but nothing comes close to this. i feel like i could stay here all my days and never tire of exploring the beauty.

it's your love for me.

the rocks push back ferociously but nothing can keep it at bay. the wave ever coming, over and over again to lavish itself, bring life to the terrain, refresh the tidepools on its surface.

for the first time i understand the C.S. Lewis quote:“We do not want merely to see beauty, though, God knows, even that is bounty enough. We want something else which can hardly be put into words – to be united with the beauty we see, to pass into it, to receive it into ourselves.” – C.S. Lewis (The Weight of Glory)

a couple more journal pages

my love with me at upolu point

exploring more wild majesty as a family

joey sandwich!!!!!!!!!!!!

mima & sleepy joey on our drive around the island

joey with his papa

more thankfulness in our trip:

10. unexpected honu (sea turtles) when we ended up at a different beach than planned

11. the wild majesty of upolu point, the Big Island of Hawaii

12.love-rust-embedded cliffs just for me

13. feeling suddenly alive as i found this perfect coral pendant in the sand

14. coming home from vacation at 1am to a clean house and flowers and blueberry coffee cake on the counter, all anonymous!