May Day

"Blue Marble and Stone"

Today is a beautiful sunny day with floaty clouds, the apple trees in my yard are budding, bugs are buzzing, and the creek is high and rushing. Our yard borders Three Mile Creek on the back side and most every Spring when the days start to get warm the waters rise and start eating away the banks and creeping up into the neighbors yard. Only one year that we have lived here did I ever feel threatened by it as it rose so high I thought it was going to come over the high bank on our property and move toward our house. This year I don’t think that will be an issue as it has been a gradual melting of snow in the valleys and unless we get a downpouring deluge of rain, the creek bed will likely be able to handle the melting mountain snows. Crossing my fingers.

"Goldfinch Summer"

As I look out my windows throughout the day I see birds busy gathering mouthfuls of grasses and carting them off to wherever they are building their nests, others feeding madly on the cracked corn and sunflower seeds we put out for them, and still others are singing and chortling at each other from the tops of trees and fenceposts. With the aforementioned creek in the back, we get ducks, herons, red-winged blackbirds and kingfishers winging through our yard and since we are very near the wildlife refuge we get other birds winging over the yard---geese, Sandhill cranes, eagles, osprey, hawks, owls, vultures, and many varieties of songbirds. On the ground are pheasant and quail quickly scooting from the cover of trees and tall grasses to check out our feeders and occasionally calling loudly to their friends. I love all the spring activity and growing things.

"Capture The Sunrise"

May is my favorite month in Montana and it is almost always a good one. There might be some rain, and some cool nights, but in general the days are beautiful and the sounds and smells of spring are welcome and comforting after a long weary winter. It doesn’t hurt that my birthday is in May—I always loved that it was. When I worked a regular job I would often take my birthday off and go somewhere fun all by myself, like the Brookfield Zoo in Chicago or out into the woods of Western Montana to look for roadside wild asparagus or the first morel mushrooms. It was always a calming, pleasant time and I remember the leisure and joy of those days still.

"Blackberries and Dandelions"

In times like these odd ones we are in now with the Covid virus and social distancing, I especially appreciate the fact that I live where I am surrounded by wildness, beauty, nature. Right now, as a matter of fact, I look out my studio window to the willows and cottonwoods by the creek and see that the tiny yellow-green leaves are just starting to come out but the architectural structure of the tree branches is still visible and the early evening sunlight is making for a lovely landscape. In a couple months I won’t be able to see the trunks and branches, only lots of fluttering leaves. As the seasons change I enjoy all the nuances of each one and that is what truly inspires me in my studio when I am creating art.

My art is abstract, but very reflective of the elements, colors and shapes found in nature. When you look at a truly abstract composition, like a collage of scraps with no recognizable shape to them, how is it that it can evoke a memory or tell a story of being in a place surrounded by or interacting with nature? Somehow my memories, experiences and life lived in awe of what nature is about comes through in each piece that I create. It is there—my mother told me so. It is in the weave of the cloth, the stitch of the thread, the depth of the color, and the curves and angles of the lines. Inherent in my work is appreciation and reverence for the gift that is nature. Flora, fauna, landscape, microcosm, light and shadow. It is all so good, and it inspires me. I am a lucky girl.

"Adrift On The Current"

"Sunny Disposition" - Me according to my mom.

NOTE:  These are all older pieces that I am rather fond of, and most of them are sold.  Stay tuned for my next post which will be about my new work and where I might go from here...