Pumpkin Cottage

Pumpkin Cottage
sit and visit a spell
Showing posts with label artwork. Show all posts
Showing posts with label artwork. Show all posts

Saturday, July 27, 2013

Hot and Sticky...Humid

The humidity is so painful.   Symptoms of
Ankylosing spondylitis are my constant
unwanted companions.  Extreme weather
aggravates the inflammatory pain. 

Renegade Los Angeles



















Mind over matter.  Mind over matter.
The only way to cope with the pain, without
the help of modern often harmful
medicine, is to distract the mind.

At the root of my strength is my
faith:

16 Rejoice always, 17 pray continually,
18 give thanks in all circumstances;
for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus. 
                                    1 Thessalonians 5:16 -18

and creative endeavors.

4th of July Idyllwild




Monday, June 10, 2013

Patchwork, Long Beach, California

Patchwork Shows

As a family, we love thrift stores, street food and art shows.
This love affair may have started with the Pumpkin Festival in my
hometown, Half Moon Bay.

We seek out these events and invite friends to join us.

Jodi was our get along guest.


























Color.

























Meringues, in Portuguese suspiros: to sigh. 
My oldest sister, Mericia,  was an amazing cook.
She would treat us with suspiros.  Street
festivals hold joyful memories.




























The library store on wheels.  Come on, don't you love this.
My summers were spent in a small town library.










































Fooooood truck.



































Walking back to Mabel, our faithful mini-van,  along the shore.


























From here, we headed to San Pedro for dinner.  The get along
gets around.....

Monday, February 25, 2013

Thrifting for Treasures


 Mirror mirror on the wall.


























Transform thy self.
Once and for all.




























This is where Mr. Lee, without gloves or safety glasses, 
cut himself.
Always, my dear readers,
wear proper safety equipment.  


























With a little help from our friends.
Garage and side door open for proper ventilation.


























shake shake shake
your can of paint



















Gorgeous.

Montana spray paint available at Aaron Brothers.
Love Aaron Brothers. Go to their link above just click.
Sign up for coupons and special events. The get-along-gang
highly recommend AR featured art product lines.

Simply divine for REAL artists and just crafters like moi.

Last night, the children and I watched,
Diana Vreeland's The Eye has to Travel.

We were mesmerized.
Completely and utterly captivated.
Glued to our seats.
Not even one request for a pause to go potty.

I woke at 2:00 a.m. to watch  it again.
Highly recommended it for anyone fascinated
by genius, fashion, art or business.

Mrs. Vreeland kept saying she was simply "mad" about this and that.
Can you imagine being mad about anything?
What a love affair.
Mrs. Vreeland had it at home with her beautiful husband and
in her work. 

She simply described her relationship with her mother as unsympathetic.
You will have to watch it for yourself to learn more. 

A fascinating life.    

Saturday, September 22, 2012

Day Trip

No homework.  None.  Nada.

Mr. Lee is sleeping.  I am planning our day.

For those of you who don't live in California. 
California is a big state. 

I am thinking of a BIG day with a  day trip down
to Escondido, up to Long Beach and inland back to Riverside.


 


 

 Are you old enough to remember Johnny Carson?
He used to say this joke: You take the 91, to the 55 to 22 wrap around
to the 405.  It's just like that in sunny Southern California.

We are going to take the 215, to the 15 and then 5 North to Long Beach.
Tomorrow we rest.


It is crazy mileage but a girl has to do what a girl has to do.

First, stop Queen Bee Market....sounds right up my alley.

Aaron Brothers summer roadtrip to visit Traci Bautista.

Home to Pumpkin Cottage.





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YAHOO....

Saturday, August 25, 2012

Longevity in Life and Love

Years ago while trying to sustain an unsustainable marriage,
I started reading mind body connection books.  Once I felt
stable and left the marriage I abandoned the books I was reading.


Today, I started reading When the Body Says No
exploring the stress-disease connection by Gabor Mate, M.D.

A best selling author in Canada but not here.

Many of us live, if not alone, then in emotionally inadequate relationships 
that do not recognize, or honour our deepest needs.  Isolation and stress
affect many who may believe their lives are quite satisfactory. 

                                                                       - Gabor Mate, M.D.


Life is not easy.  Pick a praying man.




































Ask your suitor.  Do you pray?
If his answer is,
"I am not religious but I appreciate (or love) that you are."

RUN the way. You need a partner in all you do.
Gone should be the days when only the wife or mother
attends the places of worship.

In truth I am not religious  in the conventional bible thumper way.
In the way people use religion to support their anger and hate.
In the way religion is used to segregate.  The way some priests
used their position of authority to abuse children  or support slavery.


I do have a personal relationship with Christ.
Maybe that is why it is so easy for me
to vocalize things of the spirit. 
I enjoy sincerely enjoy symbols of organized religion.
A Bible is a constant.

Do I wish I attended church more often, yes.
Do I enjoy fellowship, yes.
Do I have friends from all faiths, yes.
Good people can be found as believers and nonbelievers.  
In selecting a partner, I still insist a shared faith is easier.
The more things in common the better for the longevity of  marriage.


Be equally yoked.  The scripture below
was not about marriage but it is useful here.
Great visual of the two oxen yoked together.


2 Corinthians 6:14
Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers:
for what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness? 
and what communion hath light with darkness?

If attending church, praying in crisis, or
raising children in a a faith.
Eating vegetarian, voting for the Dems or GOP matters.
Pick a like minded mate.

Vintage tablecloths as art



















Mr. Lee from the beginning told me he was a praying man.
He had jealous bones.

He was secure in his manhood and heterosexuality.
He was not homophobia.  In my opinion, men that are are scary.
He had been raised by a strong mother who worked outside of the home.
He would support my perpetual student tendencies.
Most importantly, he understood children come first.

Green olives...yum.





















 



The bonus was he enjoyed reading, magazines,
thrifting, art, music, old movies,
and the hunt for vintage 
Oh yes, Joe would want me to tell you, Mr. Lee could
move a big couch. 
And agreed we would care for my mother if the opportunity
arose.  

You know homemakers took care in setting their dinner tables.


















Monday, August 6, 2012

Art in a Can

Have I shared how much I
LOVE spray paint?

Spray paint has transformative power.
Mystic. 

A can of spray paint is affordable medium
requiring a bit of talent and little else.
Graffiti is just one art form of the mighty
paint can.  Graffiti as an element of crime
disturbs me.

Graffiti as a crime is a waste of public funding
better used to educate, to inspire artist expression or
or release activist impulses.  If these impulses are not
contained and developed into something positive
then what you get is the explosion of
unwanted angry graffiti. 

A can of magic as fine art.
Check out the artist visiting near you at
Aaron Brothers Road Trip.

“case” is the alias of Andreas von Chrzanowski
an artist from the German graffiti scene
who was born and raised East Germany.

These photos do not do his work justice.








































Watching adults create validates the tangible life of artists.
And ignites fires in growing souls.

 

 

Imagination is more important than knowledge. 

For knowledge is limited to all we now know and understand,

while imagination embraces the entire world, 

and all there ever will be to know and understand.”


                                                         Albert Einstein








































Holly art reflected as a puddle but it is Count Dracula.











Sunday, August 5, 2012

Whispers from the Lord

“We delight in the beauty of the butterfly,
but rarely admit the changes it has gone
through to achieve that beauty.”
Maya Angelou



Cabinet Feet
























Words take my breath away.

I hear the Lord speaking to me.
He leads me to places, bible verses, books,
messages, and music to stretch my imagination.
Delighting my soul.

He lead me to a man who healed my heart and
shares my spirit.

Multitasking...painting and magazine appreciation


My platform will become a canvas

























In art, as in marriage, it is the evolution, the
growth of spirit through exploring.

This little cabinet from Tim Holtz's
Idea-ology collection has been
in process since our last wedding anniversary.
Nearly a year in process.  Still more to do.

Wednesday, July 18, 2012

Thrifting treasures

Cheap all wood thrift frame.
It was golden with ugly dirty fabric.
Gold is not my favorite.
Pulled fabric off the middle wood area.

























Used paint and a little antiquing medium.
 Reused the canvas included with the frame.
 It had a cheesy amateur landscape...not cute at all.

 Cut up magazines to create a cottage village scene.






































You can do anything in this world
if you are prepared to take the consequences.

W. Somerset Maugham

Thursday, June 21, 2012

Future Masterpiece for the Garden

























See the two of us in the background?
Girl in the foreground with our newest
future masterpiece.

Monday, April 23, 2012

Splash of Color

It hasn't happened yet but I have a plan.
Up in our upstairs hallway there exists
a collection of six doorways.
Initially, I imagined them all painted
a different Caribbean color.

My soul needs color and embroidery.  Go
figure.



































Then I purchased Paris in Color.
A trip to HomeDepot and ta da.  
The door at the top of the stairs
will strut purple.  Its intended jewelry
is a vintage amethyst knob.

Holly does not like walking
by the door less closet where
our Halloween paraphernalia is stored.

Daddy blocks the doorway as we
squeeze by.  Can't wait to show you.