Mother's Day

This salt and pepper shaker set belonged to my mother. I played with it as a child. When my parents house suffered damage in the 1994 Northridge, CA,  earthquake, I was visiting them. During clean up, I found these undamaged and told Mom that I was taking them home with me. I'm happy to have them, they remind me of my Mother.

 The modern holiday of Mother's Day was first celebrated in 1908, when Anna Jarvis held a memorial for her mother in America. She then began a campaign to make "Mother's Day" a recognized holiday in the United States. Although she was successful in 1914, she was already disappointed with its commercialization by the 1920s. Jarvis' holiday was adopted by other countries and it's now celebrated all over the world. She specifically wanted it spelled as a singular possessive noun so that each family could celebrate their own mother. 

Skull Appreciation Day 2012

It's not too late to send in an entry to the Mail Art exhibit for Skull Appreciation Day 2012. Click here for details.
You can make something simple and pop it right into the mail. You'll be happy you appreciated your skull!

I had a surprise late afternoon visit from Jonah, baby Luna and parents. They'd been at a school festival in the neighborhood. I let Jonah pick through my rubber stamp drawer and he had a great time making stuff. Mother's Day cards were made using alphabet stamps and Luna's foot prints, for the grandmother's. Jonah did his handprints. What fun. AND the doorbell rang again! It was Adrianna and Sage. They joined in the fun, while sharing what they did at the same festival. They also gave us an update on the Chicken situation. City Council is going to meet and decide. Oh boy, everyone, send some good clucky thought out into the universe that the Ladies will be able to stay with the girls.

Mail Art, chickens, and Mom

#919

 I'm moving slowly forward towards my 1000 cards since 1 Dec. 2010. Slowly, for some reason, not wanting to rush my experience. The base for this one is a cracker box. I like the crackers appearing over a horizon. This is part of a continuing series of "poetry" cards.

 The plant in the foreground is an azalea bush. My honey thought he was buying a gardenia bush, didn't read the tag, just saw three big white blossom. He was surprised when he got home. But it's a nice plant, and my honey's arrangement of potted greenery looks nice. This is a very homey corner of the back garden/patio. We like to sit out here.

 These cement chickens have been part of our life for a long time. I just decided that they had to live by the steps so I could spot the edge at night. They look good here, don't they?  Which reminds me to tell you about this-------

 Here's an adorable note from my neighbor girls. They brought us eggs from their chickens. The chickens are in danger from a neighbor, who's complained to the city about them. There had appeared to be an allowance for people to have a small number of chickens, no roosters, in the city so I don't know the details of the complaint. The girls have taken around a petition. They're fighting the complaint. I give the chickens my organic veggie scraps. They're beautiful birds. The girls are very sad. I'll see if I can get some nice photos of the hens to show you.

 Here's Mom doing another of the things she likes to do, read the daily newspaper. She can read it four times during the day, each time, like it's new news. She'll read aloud items she finds particularly interesting.

Liebster Award!

Wow, how lovely this is! My mail art 365 friend, Chris, http://auchenflowertowhereever.blogspot.com/ has nominated my blog for this award! Thanks so much Chris (ChrisBris) for thinking of me.
Now the hard part, I have to choose 5 blogs, with fewer than 200 followers, to nominate for this award.   S

#1 my DIL at http://jessicascalin.wordpress.com
#2 Margie of the wonderful fotos  & haiku at http://latebloomerbuds.wordpress.com/
#3 just cause it's so fun -  http://thetoothbrushchronicles.blogspot.com
#4 Bridget cause she provides so much information http://beingwoman.blogspot.com
#5 Roberto posts mail art received and sent http://pirosmailart.blogspot.com

Now, for those nominated - I hope you will participate and nominate others.

"The Liebster award (German for Favorite) is usually presented to smaller blogs as a form of recognition and support. 'Smaller blog' is one with 200 followers or less. As a recipient you are to:"

1. Link back to the person who gave it to you and thank them.

2. Post the award to your blog.

3. Give the award to 5 bloggers with less than 200 followers that you appreciate and value.

4. Leave a comment on the 5 blogs to let them know that they have been offered this award.

Mail Art, the canal & the bird feeder

 Do you remember those little hard disks that we used to store data from our computer? I have a lot of them left from previous "careers." The data is no longer accessible nor needed.
Last week, I saw that a member of the Mail Art Union used one to make Mail Art. How fun! Why hadn't I thought of that.

 Despite dealing with my cough, hackhackhack, I managed to make several collages using the disks. I mailed the yellow one first. I sent it far, then wished I'd sent it to a nearer destination to test the waters so to speak. Will it arrive? I hope so. This blue one will also go far.

The disk in the center still moves, but the black slider is immobilized by the collage.

 This one is #918. It was sent some where closer. The reverse has a label for the address and a smaller one for the date stamp and number of the piece. There is no return address. I can't wait to hear when they arrive and in what condition.

Sunday night, we met up with our niece and nephew to hear a concert outdoors on Brown's Island. I seemed to have my cough under control and wanted an outing. The is the view looking west as we walked over the bridge to the island.

 This is the view looking east. In the background is the bridge that goes over the island and the James River to southside Richmond. I like this view very much and wish that the entire length of the canal were accessible for walking and picnicing.

This is the new bird feeder. We moved it back so the pole goes through the bamboo leaves, hoping to deter the squirrels. One of them was spotted inside enjoying a meal of sunflower seeds. Two cardinals checked it out but so far, it's not been used. We may turn it into a planter if the action doesn't pick up. I like the way it looks. The orange is such a nice bright addition to the green-ness of the little garden. Do you have a bird feeder? Do birds use it? How do you deter squirrels?

Mail Art, Veggies and a recipe

 I love the way this card looks, with the uneven edges.  I cut it out of some cardboard package while in Los Angeles, using scissors. It was a thicker carton so I couldn't do a very even job. Turns out, I like it! I brought the blank home and created this simple 2 element piece with letters yesterday. #914

#915

 For this, I used a cardboard cut with my papercutter, from a piece of cardboard. Minimal with only 3 pieces, very subtle, and I like the effect.

 Though I'm struggling with a cold/cough these days, I managed to get over to the farmers' market for the first day pick up of my CSA. Here are some of the items in my basket.

And here's the veggie flan I made for dinner. I'll post a recipe on my other blog which you can find here.  It turned out really tasty and my honey, who doesn't like kale, liked it a lot.

Mail Art, Slow Art, Bird Art & Billboard Art!

#913

 Here's a recent piece of Mail Art that I sent out to Dusseldorf, Germany. I used some old photos that had no value to me, though torn up as elements for a collage - high value indeed. The base is from a package of veggie burgers.

 Here's part of the group who attended my Slow Art event last Saturday. They're looking at a tiny landscape painted in 1820.

 Here's another part of the group looking at a painting that is very "trompe l'oiel" called "Free Sample, Take One." It was painted in 1890 by De Scott Evans.
My event was successful! We had 21 participants and the discussions were lively. My choices were obscure and people seemed to like that they hadn't seen, nor ordinarily look at, the art work that I chose. It was a lot of fun.

 Sunday, we went over to HighPoint Gallery, which was new to us. They are the folks who do the Bill Board Art project.  While there, we got introduced to Premium Taxidermy and were invited into Robert Olson's workshop. It was so interesting. He does amazing work.

 I found out later on in the day, that there was an event going on in the world on Saturday that was called Obscura Day. We felt like we had an obscura day of our own by seeing a taxidermy workshop.

After see Robert's work, we went off to find the access to see this Art Billboard. So cool, off the beaten track, for sure. When we pulled in to the area, some people were packing up their folding chairs into their vehicle. They'd been sitting there
watching the display for awhile. Fun, right.

This was a very interesting week-end, full of very interesting things to see. I hope you had a good weekend, too.