Dish of Milk

A frequent dessert when I was a young child was chocolate pudding prepared in individual bowls and served with milk poured on top. My dad would often carry my bowl from counter to table, saying, "Here's your dish of milk, Dotty!" I'd laugh and laugh, dip my spoon below the layer of milk, and prove him wrong by lifting a scoop of pudding.

Except for the time when he actually did give me a dish of milk.

Cruel, I tell ya!

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When prepping for my recent West Virginia vacation, one item I packed was the hand-painted anniversary card I'd made for Dave—another card made from a painting started on Monhegan Island in August.

On the 11th, I pulled it out to perch at his place on the table.

Turns out that, although I carefully wrote his name on the envelope and carefully placed the envelope in a protective folder for safe travel, I left the card itself under the cover of our scanner at home.

Dish of milk!

anniversary card
4 x 5.5"; watercolor, acrylic pen, and water-soluble pastels on canvas paper,
mounted on card stock
abstract
2018
[gift]

Parameters

Ferry.

Maine.

Monhegan.

Island.

Sky.

Trees.

Water.

Color.

Watercolor.

Watercolor paints?

That's what I brought on vacation with me when my dad and I plunked ourselves ten miles out to sea on a one-square-mile island for four days—watercolor paints, water-soluble crayons, and a few marking tools.

In the same way that if I were going to get anywhere while on Monhegan it would have to be by foot, if I were going to paint it would have to be with watercolors.

Alrighty then.

One experiment became this card, to which I added only four teeny bits of collage once I returned home.

Ridiculously
3x4"; watercolor, water-soluble crayon, ink, and collage on watercolor paper
abstract
2018
[gift]

August Benchmark

Stepping into painting/creating almost always lets me step out of whatever is on my busy mind. I slow down and 'get lost' in the act of painting. Often, thoughts and memories bubble up from my subconscience. Today's meander:

August 1975. Teaching in the summer program at Landmark School. Lunchtime. Sitting with a few women at a picnic table overlooking the Atlantic. None of us married, then-new acquaintance Sylvia and I with weddings on the near horizon. Topic of discussion: would we keep our maiden names or take our husbands' surnames?*

August 2018. Sylvia and I have been BFF's for 43 years now, and our respective marriages are very much alive and kicking. Pretty awesome.

Happy Anniversary, Sylvia and Dan!

As We Go Along, Ways Open Before Us
4x5"; acrylic and ink on paper
abstract
2018
[gift]

* We took our hubbies' names.

Time-Travel Tuesday

Here's a little piece of art I crafted sometime right around the turn of the century. Mind you, I still equate 'turn of the century' with 1900, but this piece came into being about thirteen years ago at the turn of a different century!

I used to have a small entrepreneurial business called art❤️warmers for seven years, but that is a story for another day.

Today's story is the fun of remembering the origins of the various layers of this piece, each layer of which is a larger fuller story in its own right, also for another day.

For now:

• the hearts were drawn into a styrofoam meat tray, inked up, and printed as part of a once-a-month get-together of yore called Round of Art at My Table with friends Anne, Joan, and Linda,

• the hearts were printed on paper that was from a stash of remnants from the printing business where the husband of a friend worked,

• the printed music came from a hymnal sold at a fundraiser yard sale,

• the black foam was scrap from the gasket company where my husband used to work, and

• the mat board was garnered from a frame business willing to donate its scraps.

Happy anniversary, B&K!

The Real Deal
4x4"; mixed media assemblage on matte board
[gift]

Twenty-Nine Years

Buildings could burn 

right next to us in the car, 

and 

if we were in the middle 

of a kiss 

we wouldn't notice. 

–Jane Hamilton, The Book of Ruth

Hey, L&J, buildings are burning! Right next to you!

Happy anniversary : )

In the Middle of a Kiss
4x5"; acrylic and oil pastel on paper, mounted on cardstock
abstract
2018
[gift]