Gourd art with Dremels and Other Dilemmas of Life

I hosted our SCAT art group at my house on Wednesday and because of some wonderful quirk of nature, the weather cooperated by being cooler than usual. This was a nice change in the weather and fortunate, because we had to work on our project outside. It was still very warm but not into the 100's like the week before.
My friend, Mary Jane, did a mini workshop on using a Dremel drill to decorate the outside of a gourd.
She showed us a beautiful example of what we needed to work toward.

And explained, in detail, how to achieve this affect using the right drill bits. How we would cut the curves into the gourd and remove the brown outside layer, leaving just the right amount to "shade the edges.

In theory, I understood what she was telling us and some of us caught on really fast. Some of us are very good at this sort of thing. Some of us had already started on this project ahead of time.

Me?... not so much.

Wait! I'm not finished yet. Staying on a curved line with a tool that moves clockwise, when you're left handed and want to go to the LEFT, is hard. I used a broken piece of gourd because I wanted to practice. Kind of looks like Freddie Kruger's scratch marks in Nightmare on Elm Street doesn't it?
Mary Jane was so kind. She helped all of us and tried to show me what I was, obviously, doing wrong.
We all worked diligently. The afternoon got quite a bit warmer.

We wore our masks when drilling. Gourd dust is notorious for creating chaos in the lungs, so you always want to wear some kind of mask while your working on one.

It was getting quite warm in the sun so everyone was trying to sit closer to the house, in the shade... except for the "redhead". She was trying for a suntan, like me. Some of us always try. I've been trying since I was in junior high school. You'd think that I would learn.

Red was doing a great job with the "curves". So, I kept working on my piece of artwork and even thought Mary Jane presented us with another gourd to inspire...

I never quite got it. This is how it looked right before I said something like, " I'm going to take a break and do what I know how to do."  Under my mask I was sweating and swearing to myself.

Just remember that in showing all of you this, I'm pouring out my insecurities and laying them on the table. Please do not comment on the quality of this gourd piece. It's hard to admit that carving is not "my thing", but it obviously isn't.

I brought more ice tea and water out to everyone, got my camera and did MY thing. Then we moved inside for dessert and drinks with lots of ice in them. We sat and enjoyed each others company. This is such a wonderful group of woman. I'm glad I know all of them.
They weren't allowed to leave until they took some tomatoes and I offered them some hollyhock seeds to go. I've been drying all the seeds and I have A LOT. Only three people took me up on my offer to send hollyhock seeds to them. The will each receive enough for their whole neighborhood shortly.

That night I came back from my walk and stayed out in the garden until after dark. I shot this photo of a French marigold just before dark with my new Speedlight flash and diffuser.

Then, when it got really dark, I took a flashlight and back lit the same marigold, without a flash, and got this shot.

And then the moon...

which will be full in three days. It's the first time I had EVER gotten detail on the moon surface. I'm so pleased. It's not tack sharp but I'll work on this until I get a good one. I want to work on the back lighting because the photography forum, that I joined, is having a contest using the technique called Contre-jour. This means "into the light". You can read about it here. I can't wait to work on this process and see what I can do with it. 
I think I was over compensating for my gourd drilling failure...staying outside in the dark... trying to do something amazing and creative, but the bottom line is that you can't be good at everything. Life is short... you have to pick your battles and your artistic endeavors.
I can loose time (and myself) when I'm walking around with my camera. I realize that photography truly is a passion and I can only say that about a few efforts in my life. Like raising children, gardening and writing stories, photography takes dedication and a willingness to swallow your ego, love what your doing and fertilizing your brain with information about the subject.  These special things in my life were and are a challenge, a learning process and  most of all they need PASSION.
 Next month we are going to do some felting at our SCAT meeting. I CAN DO FELTING. I can felt my little heart out. My confidence is back all ready, just thinking about it.

Taste of the Arts

Saturday I spent the day helping the Art Council with their yearly "Taste of the Arts" workshops. This is my third year being a part of this creative day.

We always have a good time but it's a lot of work for our fearless leader Christie.  She is the "teacher" and Mary Jane (who is a gourd artist and who I pick blackberries with in the summer) and I are her humble assistants.This year we taught three classes with 15 adults and high school students in each class.

We started with a lot of clean dry gourds.

The students pick one that they like. Christie introduces us and  talks about where gourds come from, how they grow and what we will do with them.
Then the fun begins...

They take a look at the finished gourds we bring (our own) to show what can be done with practice and many different kinds of techniques.

We show them the paint, glue, scissors, beads, feathers, glue guns, and all the embellishments that they will have available to decorate the gourd.
Then we let them be as creative as they want to be. It's so fun to see what they do. I'm convinced that everyone has a creative streak in them.
Some begin cautiously, start slowly and then get into it.

And some jump right into it.

Eventually we find that each person creates their own unique piece of art.
We guide, answer questions, help with the glue guns or hold a gourd steady while they glue something in place. It's so interesting to see how amazingly creative all of these folks can be.

These are some of the finished gourds.

 The beautiful gift from the sea.

 The charming beaded bird house.

This gourd basket, bought at a thrift store, was brought to the class to be "repurposed" and decorated for this lady's collection of crystals and stones.

One person wanted to make a gourd instrument or facsimile with a long gourd, shells and string. It was beautiful when she finished.

We set out some rabbit skins... which were more popular than we had imagined. By the final class, the supply was almost depleted and it looked like a bear attack on the sink..

This man, who came with his whole family, created a wonderful creature using the fur for its hair and a white mustache as well. He and his son had a great time working together on these gourd heads. The fur was flying.

This gourd was my personal favorite. I love a more natural look using nature's embellishments.  It also happen to be a gourd that I had in my living room for a long time. I had a personal attachment to it. The artist did it proud. I was so happy to see what the gourd finally decided to "become." In all the time that it sat in my house, it never told me what it wanted to be but, obviously, it told this lady everything.

There is an old adage in gourd art. It says that the gourd will tell you what it wants to be. This one waited, found the right person and look what happen.

 I'm a little sad that it didn't do this for me, but this woman was so happy with what she created that I felt it was meant to be for her... and the fulfilled gourd.
I think I better start listening more closely to some of the gourds that I have laying around the house.


We thought that all of the gourds were creative and wonderful, but this was our Best of Show...

It went, in our opinion, to a 16 year old with a flair for the Gothic, lord of the darkside ... "with a twist".  He said that the birds were for balance within the split personality. After he was finished, he decided this small gourd "being" needed a hat so he created "Le chapeau" out of two shells. He had a vision and wasn't afraid to express it.
When do we loose this ability to express ourselves so uniquely? When do we lose the ability to be unchecked and free with ideas and creativity? Society and our upbringing tend to put constraints on liberal, (I'm talking about being creative in thought here, not politics.) and original inventiveness. What an injustice we do to creative youngsters. Maybe children (and the resulting adult) would be happier if they were allowed more freedom of observation and creative expression and less of being given established, "safe" choices. Enough Farmlady?
 This young man was so happy about his "creation". Others might not understand his concept, but he did. It was his expression of his ideas.
Someone gave this boy a gift from the start. A gift of being creativity without   "a reason" or "a purpose"... or an in depth explanation of its value. I admire that kind of parenting in some ways. It's a fine line between giving a child some freedom of thought and expression and still maintaining some boundaries.
His gourd art is different... creative... inventive and his own.The ears are buttons. The fur is dyed  rabbit. We thought that this was the most creative gourd art for the day. This young man was really pleased with his work.

I paint my own reality. The only thing I know is that I paint because I need to, and I paint whatever passes through my head without any other consideration.

Frida Kahlo (1907-1954)

We had a very creative time.

What's in the Canon?

I have a Canon Power Shot sx130 camera that I use for backup with my Nikon D40. I use it when I want to carry something light and easy or when I forget to charge my Nikon's batteries and the big camera just dies on me, unexpectedly. The Canon is one of the best point and shoot cameras I have ever had. I don't use it all the time. It's usually in a little felted bag tucked into my purse. It's my "discreet" camera... my "not so obvious" camera.
Every once in a while I remember that I took a picture, but I can't find it. That's when I say to myself, "Oh, maybe it's in the Canon." and, low and behold, there is the picture I've been looking for... trapped in a memory card inside the Canon.
So, this time, I was looking for the "Vulture" shots that I took recently and decided to check the little Canon. They were there, but so were a few others that I had completely forgotten about.  Like the day Cutter walked into the living room sporting a new look.

I don't have any idea how he did this, but both of his huge, corgi ears were tucked back in nice, neat folds. He must have been rolling on the rug and the ears just got stuck. Too funny. I grabbed the Canon and got one fairly clear photo of this phenomena.
And then there was the day that I decided to brush Annie because she was starting to look like a motley farm cat. I brushed her and used an animal comb on the fur balls that were matted on her back. She looked so good when I was done but her hair was everywhere.

It looked like some animal had lost its life.
I brushed a ton of hair out of Miss Annabel. She loves to be brushed. She gets kind of wild and crazy about it. Then she wanted to thank me and rubbed against me to show her affection.

But. "Annie! What did you do? I had you all brushed and you looked beautiful."

She rolled over again and laid down in all the leaves and dirt. She didn't stay beautiful for long. She may not care about how she looks, but she will thank me on these afternoons when it's so blessed hot and she has half that hair on her little cat body.
I also found buzzard photos. There were two of them flying overhead the other day.

And when I walked back toward the house, there was one that had landed on the power line.

He just sat there and watched me take pictures of him. He even moved around as if he was posing for me.

I took some quick pictures  and he kept watching me. Both Annie and I kept moving. You want them to know that you're ALIVE.
 I find these huge birds fascinating. These Turkey Vultures are the scavengers of the bird world. They find and eat dead things. This one never flew away. He just sat there being majestic.

I also had photos  of the last SCAT meeting in the camera. That's a new art group that we created for local artists... any art. Not just gourd art. We share our talents and what we are working on. This is going to be one of our projects.

It's a Jack in the gourd... or, in this case, a 'bird in the gourd' pop up toy for kids and adults. This one is made with an upside down gourd that has been cleaned out and a dowel has been used inside to move the gourd chick up and down. The fabric is sewn to both gourds to cover up all the inside. This could be a puppet, or anything that you want to emerge from the bigger gourd. "J" did a great job on this Easter gourd pop up. The chick is a small gourd with twigs for legs. This photo above, is in the "up" position.
This photo, below, is the toy in the "down" position.

Up, down, up, down.... It's such a great idea. I think I will make a scary, black one for Halloween, for my sister. She loves Halloween art. We can call it Spooky, in the Box.
And last... one final photo of Lake Tahoe. One of the prettiest that I took. Not sure why there was only one picture (on the Canon) of the Lake on the small camera, but there it was.

I could be IN that water right now. It would be so nice to swim around in it. But, I heard, this morning, that they are having thunder and lightening storms this week so...
 Dear Cuz.... "Stay out of the water until the storms pass."

The Canon is empty and back in my purse. I found the photos I was looking for. It's always like a little surprise to see what pictures I took with this camera.
Please don't forget about that memory card. You may have someone trapped in there.
What's in YOUR camera?

Knitting, Gourding and Felting... Oh, My.

 This morning I took my coffee outside...

and sat down to enjoy a few moments of  late summer  peace and quiet.

 and then the gunfire started.
Dove season is in full swing. The weekend will be even noisier.
What sport is it in shooting these little birds? I don't get it.

When I finished my coffee and oh, it was good...
I watered the garden.
It was going to be a really hot day.
The Prospector asked for some help and by the time I returned to the house, I realized that whatever I did today would be done INSIDE. At 8:00 a.m. it was already hot.

A member of the gourd group and I are giving a demonstration at the Art Association meeting next Wednesday so I have been working on what I want to demonstrate. One of the projects is this bowl.

It's a cleaned out gourd that has been cut, stained and waxed with shoe polish.The inside of the gourd has been layered with torn paper from a magazine.  I decoupaged the paper with Mod Podge.
The edges were notched with a Dremel tool and have a hole under each indentation. Then I looped leather strapping into the holes and wrapped the leather around the lip of the bowl. The loose ends are where I will attach some twigs and feathers before I glue them down. Then I will add a few small rocks.
Do you think I should use chicken feathers?...

or Turkey feathers?.

The chicken feathers are more subtle, but the turkey feathers are more decorative and the colors are brighter.
What do you think? I need to get this finished by Wednesday so I've got to get going on it. More twigs and small rocks.. or moss. I haven't tried a lot of other things yet, except the feathers. Maybe I could wrap the bottoms of the feathers with the leather ties. Too many ideas.... to little time.

Another project is a baby blanket.

This is for a Mom that doesn't like traditional baby colors. She's kind of a gypsy woman and she's having a tiny, gypsy baby girl very shortly. She loves purple, magenta, bright greens and anything that is not just  "pink and blue" so I hope that this will fit into her gypsy bedroom.  This is really nice yarn to work with. It's RED HEART Acrylic yarn. You can machine wash and dry anything made with it and it is rather inexpensive. It has a nice feel to it. I will add a ruffled edge of green to it when I finish .

I'm also making a scarf out of some gray Paton's classic Wool Roving and a mystery yarn that I've had for a long time. I love the combination of the two yarns. I wish you could feel it.

I felted a test piece and the beige-gray yarn didn't shrink very much when I felted it. I will have to be careful not to felt this scarf too much because I don't want the gray roving to shrink up and pull the other yard in strange ways. But... sometimes, how different yarns shrink can be very interesting and it can form some rather unique patterns.

I love the way this off white yarn knits together.
 I really love the openness of the sections that are only knitted with the lighter yarn.
Can't wait to finish the scarf and felt it.
Felting is the fun part... the magic process part of all this.
It's really the only reason I learned to knit.


So I've got a few things to do next week.

Our oldest son will be here for the weekend so all of this will be on hold for a few days....
I have a blackberry pie to bake for "M". I promised him.
He's our son who always wanted pie, and not cake, on his birthdays when he was growing up.
So if I say...
"I will bake a pie for you when you come up."
I better darned will mean it.
Lucky, his cat, will be coming too... I think.
We won't tell Carl and Cutter.
No point in causing chaos before it happens... or not.

Will you look at this.

Cutter Butter.... hiding under the bed... where the overhead fan won't blow down on him and he can see Carl coming. Cute nose...

Oh, and Happy Birthday Uncle Earl.

My Favorite Little Town

It was so hot at the Wine Art and Music Summer Social last night that you could have fried the proverbial egg on the sidewalk. Christie and I set up our table on the east side of the street which had canvas shades that were dropped down to give us some reprieve from the blistering heat but ,as you can see in the above photo, they only shaded the table and not our legs and feet. I now have a sunburned pedicure after three hours of trying to hide my feet from the late afternoon sun as it moved around and down the west side of the foothills. There was a breeze once in a while but most of the time it was hot and still. We drank LOTS OF WATER.
Both of us sold some of our gourds which was a pleasant change from other fairs and festivals where we worked at it all day and sold nothing. We saw people we knew and enjoyed talking to others about gourds. Lots of folks were interested and thought we made beautiful art from what one lady called a "hard pumpkin". I had to laugh...not at her of course.
Even with the heat we had a good time. With all the music floating in the air, people laughing and wine flowing ...everyone enjoyed themselves. It's nice to see folks relaxing, talking, and enjoying a summer evening together.

This is the Imperial Hotel. This is where you bought your glass for the wine tasting and got a map to direct you to all the vendors and wine tables.
I love these old historic buildings. In this area most of the old buildings have been restored instead of torn down. Fires did destroy many buildings and, sometimes, whole towns around here back when there were no fire departments and little water. Stone and rock became the building method of choice because it didn't burn. It's a wonderful thing to see these beautiful old stores, hotels, and houses taken care of , used for new businesses and being lived in.

 This old wall is a foundation for an old hotel. It reads Amador Hotel circa 1855. Someone has tried to remove the E and L on the end of Hotel...possibly as a protest to the hot summers we get up here. It was probably some unhappy tourist who didn't realize how amazing the heat is here in the summer. Or maybe it was some local teenager who didn't have anything better to do. There's not a lot going on in this little town for teenagers unless your into 4H, gold prospecting or rattlesnake hunting.

Only two miles from Sutter Creek on Highway 49, Amador City is the state's smallest incorporated city by area.
It was incorporated into a city around 1915. Historically, it's located in a rich gold bearing area of the Motherlode of California. In 1848-1849 an unknown creek was prospected by a wealthy rancher named Jose Maria Amador. There were no known settlements until 1851 but the California Gold Rush changed the landscape of California forever and towns began to appear everywhere.A post office was established at Amador City in 1863.
Amador's most famous and productive mine, the Keystone, produced about $24 million in gold during 1853-1942. These prices would be higher using today's gold values....a lot higher. Gold was around $20. an ounce back then and today averages $1200. an ounce. Wow!....Yea!! If those miners had only known what was going to happen to the price of gold 150 years later I'm sure they would have saved some for their grandchildren. Life was hard though and the work was backbreaking. Most of them died trying. Prices for everything were obscenely expensive and most of the miners were taken advantage of by local suppliers. It was called "mining the miners".
Women played a big roll in this depending on their skills. They started restaurants, laundries, boarding houses, bath houses and brothels. Never let it be said that women didn't have the moxie to stand on their own two feet in the history of the western movement. They did what they had to do and some succeeded rather well.

Well, enough of the history lesson. We had a nice evening in spite of the hot weather. We made a little money and had a good time. It was what The Bean, my five year old grandson, would call a "handsome" evening.