I’m off to Bellydance Class, but just wanted to post a picture of what my Meditation Tree poster will look like.
It’s will be the same size as my other posters, 11×17″ and will be $30 including shipping. Brad at A&M Printers is already working on it.
I hope to have it in a couple of weeks if not sooner.
I didn’t know how important that piece of cardboard on the back of the refrigerator was until Bud broke it to pieces when he was trying to get at the rat.
Our fridge is old and that piece of cardboard which helps with the flow of air and keeps the compressor from overheating, has been discontinued. I searched around for a used one and when I couldn’t find one I knew I’d have to make my own.
Luckily I hadn’t thrown the damaged one out. And it was really mostly still there, only in two pieces.
I was able to figure out how much of it was supposed to be solid and how much needed those small opening in it by where the pieces screwed into the back of the fridge.
It was like a puzzle in some ways, just one with missing pieces that had to be replicated.
I found an old cardboard shipping envelope that I saved to reuse. It was the perfect thickness and weight. I just cut it to size, then mades some holes replicating the ones that was all ready there the best I could.
With the help of some duct tape I was able to fit it all together.
The strange thing is that before the rat incident, the refrigerator used to make a lot of noise. Now it’s much quieter.
I don’t know why, maybe Bud and the rat jiggled something back into place.
The moth was floating on top of the water bucket. She looked so beautiful her lacy wings spread thin, almost translucent, on the surface of the water.
I wanted to take a picture, but by now I know that just because they are not moving doesn’t mean they are dead. So instead I floated my finger tip gently under the water, under the moth, and lifted her out.
It was only moments before she started to pull her wings in then release her drowned antennas.
I gently slid her off my finger onto the fencepost where she blended perfectly with the weathered wood.
Today a friend told me that her father used to catch flies in a glass and put them outside instead of killing them. I use a fly swatter, wouldn’t have thought of doing that.
And yet….
By now the sheep were baaing and the donkeys were impatiently pushing the sheep around, because they could. Zip was pacing in front of the gate and the chickens were clucking, reminding me they too wanted to be fed.
So I didn’t wait to see her fly away, but I know, from experience, that eventually she did.
I know I take Fanny and Lulu for granted sometimes.
I just expect them to be in the barnyard healthy and happy whenever I visit. But of course that could change any day for so many different reasons.
I wonder if it would have made a difference to ten-year-old-me to know that the older I got the happier I’d be and that donkeys would be a part of my everyday life.
When I was about 10years old, I wanted a horse so bad (like so many little girls) I had an imaginary one. Her name was Star and I’d hold her imaginary lead and walk her around. She felt so real to me that it seemed as good as having an actual horse.
I don’t ride the donkeys or even walk around with them. But I brush them and clean their hooves and ears. We sit together and communicate without words.
I suppose the silent agreement is that they guard the farm and be good to the other animals and people who live here and I make sure they always have food, water, and shelter.
Then there is the love.
Not that Fanny and Lulu would necessarily think of it that way. But they do like attention from Jon and me. Enough that they ask for it by quietly walking up to us when we are in the barnyard, or nudging us with their noses, or braying at the gate.
People have lived with donkeys for thousands of years. That connection may be forgotten if not tended to, but I believe it lives deep inside both humans and donkeys.
It has been reawakened in me. And I only hope that if I get to grow old, I will be able to do it with Fanny and Lulu. They will be forty (the life expectancy of a donkey) when I am eighty. Perhaps it’s just a fantasy, like my horse Star, but at least I can still imagine the reality I desire.
Bud got a good night’s sleep after yesterday’s rat.
But he was back hunting today outside my studio. I saw him nosing around in some leaves by the fence. In moments he pulled his nose out of the leaves and had a mole in his mouth.
Unlike a cat, Bud wasn’t interested in playing with mole. When he dropped it on the ground it didn’t move. I was wondering if he would eat it, but instead he bit it in half, left the two parts on the ground and walked away.
When I told Jon about it he said that was how Boston Terriers kill rats. I guess it’s a good way to make sure they’re really dead.
I told the mole I was sorry and put it in a pile of leaves on the other side of the fence. I didn’t need Zinnia eating it and throwing it up at 3am.
I know that Bud hunts, but I’d never seen him catch and kill an animal before. I was both horrified and impressed.
When we got Bud I didn’t think of him as being a good farm dog. But I feel differently about that now. Even if he’s still trying to dig out of the yard, he helpful in other ways. Including being good at snuggling.
I finished the last Cat Face Pillow. It’s the last one because I used up the fabric. I have a few cats left over that I’m going to make in to Potholders. I started working on those today, but didn’t get far.
I’ll have one or two of these pillows for sale in a couple of days. I’m just waiting to hear back from someone who asked about them.
I love how they wove their way into my class at The Mansion today. That’s how ideas work. One leads to another. The only thing I’ve found is that if I don’t act on an idea, it withers along with what would have grown from it.
It often happens that when I’m working on something in my studio, I convert the idea into a class for The Mansion.
This time it was the cat faces from the Cat Face Pillows I’ve been making. I wanted to show how by altering a few lines or shapes you can create different expressions.
Much like the cats on the linen towel I used to make the pillows, but even more basic.
But before we began I passed around my last unfinished Cat Face Pillow so people could see what I was doing and where the idea for the class came from. I also told them the rat story from yesterday.
“Oh rats are so cute.” Susan said. And no one was really surprised. Susan likes all animals and insects. She was the only one in the class who thought it was a good idea that I let the rat go.
After that I handed out paper to each of the people sitting around the big round table in the Activities Room at the Mansion. Earlier in my studio I had drawn four squares on each piece of paper. I’d also drawn some examples of cats with different expressions on their faces.
Next I showed everyone how to draw the basic cat face shape and demonstrated how to express the emotions with simple lines.
Then they began…
Some people made only happy cats. “I’m feeling happy,” Rachel said, “so my cats are happy.”
Jennifer surprised us all. I knew she was a good artist, but she drew with such confidence and experience. Jennifer was a ballet dancer into her early twenties. She gave it up to have a family. But she said she was always good at art.
Ellen was the only one to draw her cats with colored markers. We all realized, when she was done, that the colors matched her blouse.
When I mentioned to Mary that her cats didn’t have whiskers, she said it was because he shaved them.
Most of Claudia’s cats were happy. But I loved the expression on the one below. As if she was trying hard to be happy, but was also acknowledging the realities of life.
There was a frost this morning. Enough to make a slushy layer of ice on the dog bowl outside, but nothing the spring flowers can’t handle.
I did see two barn swallows swoop into the barn circle around and fly out again. I know I startled them. I wonder if they know that Zip is around yet.
It’s early for the swallows, they usually come the first of May. But it was a warm winter. So warm that a few stalks from last years kale that I grew in my garden is growing leaves.
One day about two weeks ago a constant bird call got my attention. It was so consistent I wondered if it wasn’t tree frogs. But then I saw the birds circling over the pasture. They were Killdeers who come to the farm every year, although if they stay long, they are so well hidden, I barely see them.
This year, as far as I could tell, they didn’t even land, just circled overhead. That was the first time I wondered if they’d got news of Zip who prowls the tall grasses where the Killdeers make their nests.
I heard that birds know when a new predator has moved into an area. I don’t know how they get this information, but I do hope the barn swallows decide to stay.
Flo used to the hunt in the barn and hay loft. I’ve seen the barn swallows dive bomb her more than once.
I understand if the barn swallows choose not to stay. I’d hate for Zip to hunt them. But I will miss them if they decide to go to another farm and another barn.
I thought I’d do some portraits of the animals with the crab apple tree. The first was of Merricat and Kim that I took last week.
The tree is such an important part of the barnyard. It gives shade, food for the sheep and donkeys and is a beautiful being in itself.
I made one and a half Cat Face Pillows today. I didn’t get to putting the backing on the second one and stuffing it.
As long as the rat is really gone, I should be able to get this pillow done tomorrow. One of them may be spoken for, but then I’ll put the other one up for sale in my Etsy Shop. The pillow is 15″ square with a 4″ border. They are $90 + shipping.
I’m also working with Sara Kelly on making my Meditation Tree into an 11×17″ poster. We’re trying some colors for the border, but I haven’t made a decision yet.
And if I can’t find a backing for our refrigerator, (the one that Bud shredded trying to get rat), I’ll be making one out of cardboard. Seems it’s a more important part of the refrigerator than I would have thought.
Buy these! YOU CAN PURCHASE MY WORK IN MY ETSY SHOP >
