Musings

When I was in college, I bought myself a sewing machine. A good one with all metal components and smooth as silk. It was a big investment at the time, but well worth it. For years I used it to sew all manner of things, from the textile artwork in my thesis show to the long green curtains in my first home. I thought I’d have it forever until my daughter, now near the age I was when I bought it, asked if she could borrow it.

[Read more…] about Seriously

Like many of you, I’ve been listening to the public school debates. Long before I became a full-time artist I was a teacher. Education is close to my heart. As I listen to parents and teachers swimming in the stress of remote learning vs. onsite and what it all will look like, I can feel the emotions well up. When I see schools installing what amount to plexiglas cubicles for students, or teachers being encouraged to update their wills, I lose it.

[Read more…] about Reimagining Education

A friend of mine has a saying when it’s hot as blazes: It’s good for the grapes. He owns a vineyard; grapes are his specialty. He can read them like the pages of a wine-stained book. More importantly, I love the attitude that even when the weather is brutal, something still thrives.

[Read more…] about Good For The Grapes

As many of you know, my husband Alan and I live on a farm. We don’t own a TV, much to the dismay of my nieces and nephews. Our attention is absorbed by the world around us – the wildflowers that bloom in brilliant succession, the garden that needs constant tending, the chickens that trade us feed for breakfast.

[Read more…] about Bottoms Up

When I built my studio, one of the first things I did once the space was enclosed was to put everything on casters. Every tool, table, and workbench has its own set of wheels. I ordered so many from Amazon that it became a running joke.

[Read more…] about A World On Wheels

I’ve been doing a lot of invisible creative work lately. The kind where progress can’t be seen.

The other day I spent a solid eight hours clicking buttons to transform paper illustrations into digital, then lousy digital into good digital, then the wrong kind of file into the right kind right before plinking them down into a virtual manuscript. At the end of the day everything looked exactly the same as when I started. Even the folders on my desktop, where all the work had seemingly occurred, hadn’t changed. The only signs of life were a half dozen mugs filled with varying levels of stagnant dregs.

[Read more…] about Through The Mess