My bags and the environment

I began making shopping bags this summer, after seeing the plastic sacks fly off their hook at our stall at the Farmers' Market.
I had already been sensitized to the problems caused by the use of plastic bags: harm to marine life,
500 years in the landfill, use of petroleum products to make plastic, etc. and it just hit me, AGAIN, that day at the market...too many plastic bags used when a cloth bag could be used. My first bags were made from fabric left over from our upholstery project; then people began to give me their left over fabric. The bags were a success! I loved seeing people show up with my bags. Making them has been very satisfying and Voila! ~ one tiny step in one tiny place, we're helping the environment. Make a cloth bag, buy a cloth bag and use it, recycle bags, re-use bags, do your part. It's easy!

Blogger Action Day

I've registered to participate in this action. Check my blog this coming Monday to see what I'll be talking about. You can participate, too.

Elflog & more

Yesterday, the shelf still had the "Make art not war" mini-poster, some stones, a button, a tile with "Be compassionate" written on it, and a blue paper flower. This morning it was a bare shelf, until I put three little round pebbles and a photo in a plastic sleeve. I've been dating some of my additions to the shelf and writing "Elflog" on them, on the off chance that someone will put that in their search engine. I wonder what the bare shelf is about...maybe the coffee cup guy sweeps it clean so he can put his cup down!

Three blocks down, I found another random art work. The man waiting at the bus stop said that it'd been there awhile. I'm glad I got this photo of it.

I couldn't resist snapping a photo of this lovely tiny city yard. What a sweet yard full of flowers.

Pickles and toes.

Two disparate images, eh? This is the jar of pickles that we bought at the fair last Sunday. It's one of those big canning jars so we're glad that we like the pickles. Lots of pickles.

On Tuesday, I walked around the nieghborhood with Smitty ...paying my bill at the dentist, stopping in at the frame shop to see Jude's new glass work, checking in at Red, one of the many hair cutting shops on Robinson St, to see if they did pedicures. I had in mind to pamper my feet. My last pedicure was for my birthday last July, and the blue polish had held up really well. However, I needed pampering and a change of color. Red didn't do nails but they referred me to the Hair Theater further down the street. Yes, they did nails, and yes, I could get an appointment for Wednesday. Smitty got lots of attention at the dentist's office and the hair places. He enjoyed the petting and the oohs and ahs. He's a very cute dog. And don't my toes looks cute? The violet polish is so perfect for the fall.

Collages

Wow, these look SO enormous! In reality, these collages are 1 5/8" (appx 4.2 cm) square. They're my entries in the upcoming ThinkSmall exhibition, which opens the first Thursday in Nov. With the frame, they'll be 3" (appx 7.7 cm) They're based on the larger pieces I did while in Paris last year. Medium: found paper

St. Andrews' community fair, cont'd.

This was the cool thing about the fair...men in skirts, I mean kilts. The sound of the bagpipes, the smell of the grill, sent me back to our visit to the chestnut festival at Olargue in the south of France. Okay, not exactly the south of Fance here, but that was the last place that I'd heard bagpipes in person.
I like bagpipe music, I like seeing men in kilts, and the little dance troop was delightful. People were sitting at tables under umbrellas, eating, watching, listening, and for a moment...it was a little village.

St. Andrews' community fair

Last Saturday, our friends Susan and John told us about a community fair and invited us to join them on Sunday to see it. "They're going to have homemade pickles," they said. Wow! Who could resist homemade pickles! Sunday noon found us at the fair. There was a tiny pen with livestock, a burro, a llama (or alpaca, ) a few little goats, a pony. There was an even tinier pen with two bunnies and a piglet. A small fire truck was great fun for kids.


There was a grill, a plant and bulb sale, and lots of great books for only 50¢ each. There were police officers on horses. And pickles, homemade bread and butter pickles. We came home with pickles and books.