Inspirations....

Since I posted my first drawing ever (how to make tile mosaics on wood)--I wanted to show you a few of the many outstanding ones in the class!

Kool-Aid Pie

This one I like--but the lettering is a bit hard to read, isn't it?

Ratatouille

Tomato Jam

How to Paint With Water Color

Basil Pesto Spaghetti

This one is about this class so far: what we need, etc.

I chose these and about ten more to study closely.   I like the colors, the layouts, the clarity of the explanations.

I can't even believe how absorbing this drawing venture is for me.  Mine is one of the most amateurish renderings in the class--but we all know what amateur means if you track it down to the French roots: To love to do!

I LOVE to do this!  And I love to look at what others do with the same assignment.

Happiness is...

I graduated high school in the class of '66.  Now I am about to join the class of another Sixty-Six.  When we graduated, we sang "Climb Every Mountain"--though at the time there weren't all that many mountains from which to choose.  Many of us climbed Marriage Mountain, but all the others were obscured: Career Mountain, Adventure Mountain, Art Mountain....

At this Sixty-Six, I see peaks everywhere and want to climb them all!

My birthday was launched last night--dinner at Cappy's with two of my oldest friends (not age-old, but friendship-vintage), Freda and Bonnie.  It was wonderful to eat delicious scallops and creme brûlée outside on the patio and open presents and talk!

Then I came home and continued my conversations on the web, tried out my first homework assignment for Sketchbook Skool, and played with different kinds of markers and pencils.  Our assignment was to describe, visually, the story of a process: how we do or making something.  My attempt is very amateurish compared to so many artists in the Sketchbook community, but here it is:

This morning, I met my friend Pam at the McNay for a painting class--which, actually, wasn't a class but a gathering of women with easels doing whatever we felt like doing.  I made my first painting ever, and I enjoyed being with Pam and meeting new people and playing with acrylics.  

Pam and Ellen

Pam and Linda

To close out my reporting of yesterday's Liz Gilbert interview, I'd like to try to capture the part that keeps echoing in my mindl:

She talked about the monsters and demons that live in her brain.  When she let go of the wrong path and started on her real path, she had to confront them all.  But what she did was to put them in their place, not give them such power over her as she had previously done.  She took control.  She imagined each one of them as a little kid--all  part of her, but none of whom got to boss her around.

"Mama's driving now," she told them, patting them all as she would real children.  "You just go to sleep."

I loved that analogy: mama driving, fear and guilt and all the other "monsters" shrunk down to size and relegated to the back seat!

Oprah has done a great service to women over the years--by bringing together voices of wisdom and inspiration. So many of her guests, like Liz Gilbert, remind us of how important it is for women to claim their own journeys....

A happy day ended happily with a wonderful writing group and Charlotte's Italian cream cake! We wrote about our own individual heroine's journey--naming our questions and our obstacles.  In a way, no matter what we write, that is the story vibrating at the center of it all, isn't it?

To stay or to leave...

Anaïs Nin: “And the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom”

One day, Elizabeth Gilbert found herself on the bathroom floor, crying, knowing that she wasn't living her own life.  "This is not my path!  This is not my life!"  But leaving (and upsetting the status quo)  was--as we all know--terrifying.

She left.
As she wrote in Eat, Pray, Love, she chose "transformation over status quo."

But how do we know for sure when it's time to leave or move or do everything differently?

Liz Gilbert's answer to this question gave me goosebumps:

There are many "voices" in your head--from the little screaming kid who wants all the ice cream he can hold to the bossy big sister who judges everything you do and calls you an "idiot" if you don't do what she says.

But how do you know it's the voice of your highest self?

Here it is:

"Any voice that attacks you is not your highest voice."
"Any voice that says, 'You screwed up,' and gives you a kick in the butt--not it."

Grace/God/Good--whatever you want to call it--says, "I don't care what you did...." and leaves you feeling exalted, never guilty or fearful.

(I found all these quotations on Oprah.com)

I got lucky!

I don't know if it's a one-time thing, or if it happens every Sunday--but I got to watch the interview with Liz Gilbert live on Oprah. com!  Every Sunday at 10:00 Central time?  Do we get to watch these Super Soul Sundays online?  (Part 2 is next Sunday morning).

It was a brilliant interview--which I'll re-cap below.  But here's the strange serendipity: Later, when the electrician was leaving, I heard her voice coming through the radio again!  I perked up my ears--isn't that Liz Gilbert again?  In fact, it was--on Ted Radio Hour, National Public Radio.

The talk today was about the hero's journey--or the heroine's--based on Joseph Campbell's model:

First, you get a call.  If it's a genuine calling, it won't leave you.  It will wake you up in the night.   It will be persistent.

Is this a call that you hear in an audible voice?

Liz believes that it comes as the question: "What have I come here to do with my life?"  We can refuse the to answer the question or we can ask it--and thereby begins the quest.  It's not the arrival that equates with success; it's pursuing the quest, just that.

There will be obstacles.
As Joseph Campbell said in writing about the hero's journey, all great heroic tales include obstacles and challenges.

It's not easy.  We can expect disapproval, hurt, self-doubt, and frustration. That is why it's called "the road of trials."

Ultimately, all the trials and challenges prepare you for the bigger battle.

"What were your trails?" Oprah asked.

"Self abuse," she said.  "I couldn't let go of my inventory of things to feel shame and guilt about."

All travelers, in all hero stories, have fear--Dorothy on her way to find the Wizard, Luke Skywalker, Moses--and yet every would-be hero knows, "If I don't change, I'm going to die."  Or "A part of me is going to die."  As we stay put and refuse change, parts of us atrophy.

A conversation with Elizabeth Gilbert

This morning--if I had more than ten channels on my television--I'd turn on the Oprah network and watch "Super Soul Sunday" with Elizabeth Gilbert, author of Eat, Pray, Love.

There are a few wonderful excerpts on Oprah's website--and I will quote them as accurately as I can:

Liz quotes Pema Chodrin who says that "every problem is just fear."

Most of the questions people ask Liz Gilbert boil down to fear: "I'm stuck and I'm scared to make a move or make a change."  She talks about different versions of fear, including perfectionism--which is just fear 'in really good shoes."

And then, the zinger we can all relate to:

"Some women never got the memo that their lives belong to them.  There's this instinct that they need to get permission slips from the principal's office before they can do anything.  In a way, Eat, Pray, Love was a permission slip telling women they are allowed to ask their own questions and take ownership of their own lives."

Check out these websites

They Draw And Cook.  (theydrawandcook.com)

They Draw and Travel. (theydrawandtravel.com)

I'm so enjoying the second viewing of my first class of Sketchbook Skool--a lesson in which the teacher combines her love of food and her love of art-making.

My homework (which I've not started yet) is to "tell a story" about how I do something, step by step, in visual language.

Since this is all so new to me, I'm taking a break and looking at the websites mentioned by the teacher.

They Draw and Cook is a site by foodies who draw--and you'll love reading recipes in words and pictures, like these:

They Draw and Travel is a site of creative maps drawn by people all over the world--and the fanciful mapmaking is wonderful to see.

Since I most recently traveled to Chicago, I chose a "map" of Chicago to share with you:

 I could just go on and on being inspired and intimidated by these colorful pages, or I could....(gulp!)....buckle down and do my homework!

Three in the morning....

That's when I finally fell asleep, I think--because I was in school.

My first Sketchbook Skool class began just after midnight and I thought I'd just take a tiny peak.  It was so much fun for me that I watched the whole class straight through. (I'll watch it again and actually attempt the assignments.)

The teacher is an enthusiastic cook and coffee drinker and artist.  She showed us her sketchbooks and final drawings of illustrated recipes and coffee cups.  She demonstrated fanciful ways of "telling the story" of how the coffee machine works.

"Oh my!" I thought, inspired as I was, "She's not teaching me HOW to draw exactly; instead she's making me to want to draw."

So I went to the web and found a class in figure drawing--on Craftsy.com.  You can go there if you like. I learned about graphite and white chalk and kneaded erasers, and got to watch her block out a drawing as she looked at her live model.  Then she filled it in with gestures and lines.

On the right side of the screen, students were making comments.  Some criticized the teacher's presentation ("too many shots of the teachers's face," etc.) Some argued that the method she was teaching wasn't as good as their own--gesture drawing. I fired off an indignant response--something to the effect of "Would you all just take what you like and leave the rest and stop sparring here?"

For a novice like me, the class was fascinating--and I will (after I go back to sleep for a few hours and catch up on my sleep) try out the teacher's suggestions.

Then I went to Dirty Footprints Studio and watched a few more sessions of that free class on art journaling--a class that shows me how to free up and play with paints and pencils.

I set up one of Elena's storybook dolls and attempted a 2-minute drawing  It wasn't something to post on anybody's blog, but it got me making lines on the page.

On Monday morning, Pam and I are going to a free drawing class at the McNay--drawing for two hours outside.  Whether or not this turns me into a Grandma Moses, all these new classes and teachers are going to teach me how to appreciate art in different ways.

For each of these classes, there are Facebook and other online chat rooms where students can hang out and show each other what they're doing.  It's like a great big student center courtyard where newbies can look over the shoulders of the star students, and vice versa, and see what's going on in their notebooks.

Here goes: me and some empty pages! (And new online classmates who are liking this as much as I am)

Halloween Party on Ogden Lane

When I return from my birthday trip to Georgia, Veronica and I are having our Third Annual Halloween Party on Ogden Lane.  Everyone is welcome--including your dogs.

My street doesn't do up Halloween all that much, but Argo and Abiso, the next streets over, go all out.

Nathan and Elena, Halloween 2012
Monkey and Bee

Our usual Halloween Trick-or-Treaters will be here: Linda Quintero and her boys, now living in Hondo; friends and family of the Pritchetts;  Sebastien and Makkin from next door.

It's a motley family affair--including scarecrows, witches, ghosts, and robots. Come join us!

The Baby Artist and the Grandmother

Yesterday morning, Elena told her mommy, "I want to go see Yenna and show her I'm sick."  By the time they got here, she seemed better and we played while Veronica went to an appointment.

Late in the afternoon, her fever spiked again and she was miserable.  All she wanted was to sit in my lap.  Tears were running down her cheeks, but she didn't cry outright.

After about an hour, I could tell that the Tylenol was taking effect because she started talking again.  "I'm having my birthday party on Friday," she said.  (Her birthday is in January.)

"Who's coming?" I asked.

"All the peoples!"

Then we got down on the floor and started painting.  "You're an artist," I said.

"YOU'RE an artist, Yenna," she said.  "We are both artists."

About that time, the Coumbian electrician came, and they conversed a bit--in Spanish!  It amazes me how she can shift back and forth from English to Spanish.

A scarf made of a roll of red stickers

This morning, I woke up feeling teary.  Before I knew it, driving along Austin Highway for my morning coke, I was full-fledged crying.

I don't cry easily or often, but seeing Baby Artist in pain was heartbreaking.  I was so worried, I texted her parents and her nanny.  When Will called to let me know her fever had broken and she's better,  he heard the unmistakable sound of a grandmother crying.

Even though she's on the mend,  a fold had formed in my day.  I felt connected to all grandmothers--including two of my friends whose grandsons have had lengthy (and more serious) illnesses than Elena's.  And I felt connected to the grandparents behind the scenes in the news stories about children who are paralyzed after a strange new virus.  And the old people in Third World countries whose little ones die of diseases ours are vaccinated against.

I had to call Great-Grandmother, Nana.  Then my daughter, Day.  Then I had a lively conversation with my two big Virginia grandsons.  Before going to bed, a grandmother has to know all her chicks are safe.

Sick baby girl

Here she is at my table making crafts.

And here, on the porch, cooking dinner

And this is Elena Tea

Elena came down with a respiratory virus yesterday.  She had a temperature of 103 during the night, but seems to feel better today--though she has a croaky voice!