Wyncia

Butterfly Greeting Cards: Multi-Media

Watercolor lessons and experiments produce plenty of colorful practice sheets. This season I have been creating butterflies for greeting cards. I paint a background onnto the cardstock. The butterflies and catipillars are cut from the practice watercolor sheets. The figures are mounted on vellum that is mounted on the card stock. The muted background set off the insects.

Living on What You Love To Do

This is so encouraging! "I'm Making A Living From My Hobbies" by Frank Hyman in the Sunday NYTimes. Frank lists arts, writing,gardening, and politics as the avocations that have sustained him for the last 18 years. And he says you have to try lots of different things to know what you like! Yes! And have an adequate budget for classes and books every year! Yes! And travel widely! Great! And have a wide tolerance for mistakes. I can do that.

So all I have to do is figure out the "making a living" bit! These days I am continuing with assorted fiber arts: knit, sew, layer fiber and paper; playing at encaustic wax multi-media pieces; learning to draw; starting a business with a friend using lots of recycled fibers to make wraps, mittens, oven mitts and pillows (Bwyneth Fiber Arts); and co-owning a co-operative shop and healing arts shop (Uniquely Natural in Lafayette, Colorado.) Wow!

So I am making a great life of avocations I love, even if it doesn't quite add up to a living!

  

   Bwyneth Mittens                                            Wyncia's Finger Free Gloves

Actions build Peace from Joseph Bernard

My friend Bobbi Benson is the designer of the Peace Together tee shirts we sell at Uniquely Natural. She partners her life and work with Joseph Bernard, Director of Inspiration and Vision for Peace Together. He also writes daily in his blog, explorelifeblog.com. In the latest Peace Together newsletter he suggest these peace building actions.

1. Watch Your Thoughts
Your mind creates your experience of life. Is your mind supportive of you or is there a noisy inner critic? Inner peace comes from replacing the inner critic with thoughts that are encouraging, hopeful and loving.

2. Slow Down
In this world of go, go, go you need to find a calm place inside. Breathe slowly and deeply. Find the stillness inside. Walk leisurely and take in all the beauty that surrounds you. Inner peace is just a deep breath or a slow walk away

3. Follow Your Inner Guidance
You have a higher self that always knows what is best for you. When you follow that inner guidance, life works out for the best; if you ignore the guidance, suffering is on the way. Follow your inner guide to peace and success.

4. Live On Purpose
You have a purpose in life that only you can fulfill. Find that purpose, live it fully and enjoy the energy and aliveness that comes with it. Inner peace comes from living your life with passion and purpose.

5. Seek Balance
Each day, with great care, nurture your mind with great thoughts; honor you emotions by feeling all you feel; empower your body with healthy food and good exercise; and set your spirit free through play, laughter and creativity.

ExploreLifeBlog.com

Encaustic Painting a Delight that will take Practice

It has been a long time since I have written here.  Between the newsletter for the healing, art, and locally made gift co-op that I co-own, Uniquely Natural, and the preparation for our move to a new space opening April 1st...Well, I have hardly had time to breath!

Yesterday, I took off and went to a wonderful class on encaustic painting.  This is an ancient technique of using wax and resin to carry pigment that is melted on to your surface.  I am as amateur as can be, but it was so much fun making these practice boards that I am going to share the images.  Keep going till you see artist Susan Crouse-Kemp's lovely work.

My class boards:

The texture is great, but is hard to see in the snap shot.

The milkiness is from too much un-pigmented wax, I think.  The reflection is the snap shot. The wax can be polished to a nice sheen now that it is hardened.

 

More trouble with cloudiness but I am getting some layers and image transfers.

Ta Da!

Here is what Susan Crouse-Kemp can do with the technique.  I love it!

Here's what I can do with latex paint(at the new Uniquely Natural at 409 South public Road in Lafayette, Colorado):

 

Hope to be back soon!  Namaste, Wyncia

Silk Hanging Honoring the Elements

Earth, Air, Fire, Water...the primary elements of living and being as we know it. 

The Earth - rock, soil, that which is under our feet - grounding.

The Air - breathe, wind, mystical ether of spirit - soaring.

The Fire - flame, heat, passion, destruction - cleansing.

The Water - life-giving, flow, ocean, lake - quenching.

Earth and water - mud and Golem.  Fire and air - consuming sensual passion and stardust. Fire and air - steam and force. Earth, air, fire, and water - Home.

Here is a banner with the Kanji symbols for water (blue), earth (sienna), air (purple, and fire (orange).  The backing material is handmade silk paper.  The symbols are waxed silk fabric. The hanger is beetle chewed pine. 

Earth
 

Air

 

Fire

Water

Namaste, fellow Earthings.

Studio Views: I spy something...

I started the new year by cleaning my studio.  I lugged out tons of paper to recycle, assorted clutter, even some fabric destined not to be used by me.  Now I have taken a few pictures of the room, to discover it is cluttered still.  What I see is all sorts of beloved inspirations and reminders of where my heart lies!

 

I spy a 60 year old Adirondack pack basket from my grandparent's Little Moose Lake summer home.  And beloved Larry as a boy. And plastic St. Francis for the love of critters and plastic St. Andrew for help in locating lost things.  An bowl from a Native American artist. A casting of a frieze of an ancient Celtic snake goddess (thanks Ann).  I spy Mexican folk art cross. a picture of my father as an infant, some art by Maggie, a fancy fly tied by Gardner, and a colorful goblet from Rachel owner of Arkay Workshop in San Fransisco. 

I spy an antique bag from the sleeve of a Greek dancer's outfit.  A picture of an old man in a curio shop that was a wedding gift to my mother and father. A jolly farmer doll head. A framed card of gratitude from Jenn. I can find Cardboard Man from doll pattern making class and a miniature bendy manikin dressed in a holiday ornament sweater with wool roving hair.

Here's Maggie in at a Maui waterfall on Mother's Day, appliqued and quilted. There is a picture of her under a red umbrella at the Adirondack summer home of her great grandparents along with postcards from her when she was in Bali.  Remember the little fox I knitted?  Maggie and I used to read the book Little Fox Goes to the End of the World.  And she did!

Looking out the inside window, I spy the Gypsy chandelier and the paper mobile. On the window frame I spy Maggie and me, a tongue of fire from a Kilauea postcard, a bit of free quilting sampler.  I spy vintage sewing needle cases, a dragon doll from an exchange last year.  I spy miniature prayer flags, a mess of colored threads, and hear a million whispered blessings.

I spy a scrap of an ink blot image (definitively a butterfly). I spy a print of critters of the Northwest in pairs and a couple wrapped in a marriage blanket which I bought in Seattle and which rode east across the US taped to the ceiling of the car in 1977.  I spy a card with a love note from Larry.  I spy half a postcard of the lake in the Adirondacks where my grandparents had their summer house and where I lived year round from '77 for about six years.  I see memories and paths that divided;  unimagined ways traveled into memories.

I spy a shelf of fabrics, so many creations to be born. I see a an Indigo wrap and quilted bags.  I see green cats and butterfly bears.  I see a melon colored dog bed, a window quilt from my sky light, and a summer dress for baby Mya...all imagination, all tints of dreams, a wealth of possibilities.

I feel gratitude.

Namaste.