The Apple…
…never falls far from the tree.
R.I.P Steve Jobs
Carrot Cake, the Aftermath
It’s cold today. Rain coming down. I’m wearing a heavy flannel shirt and a pair of jeans that fit me better last spring. Wonder why that is…
Oh right…the carrot cake. I don’t drink. I don’t do drugs. But after Mama died, I did carrot cake like it was crack. Like I couldn’t get enough. I had to have it–EVERY DAY. Every day for six weeks. I would go on carrot cake hunts, seeking out the best in town. I’d buy it by the piece because I didn’t dare keep a full one in the house. And then I’d stand there like this crazy woman eyeballing the selection to figure out which was the biggest piece and telling the clerk I had to have THAT one. No, no–THAT one, the one behind the one she was trying to sell me. And it had to have cream cheese frosting, the real deal. Not a schmere of frosting but a thick-heavy-solid-artery-clogging heap ‘o creamy sugar goodness.
It could even be a carrot muffin, as long as it had the cream cheese.
And then… Just. Like. That. I woke up one morning and realized I didn’t want it anymore.
By that time it was summer and I was in my loose, baggy cargo pants, the kind of pants that are like the old fashioned circus car–you know the one I’m talking about, small car like an old VW bug. Comes to a stop and the clowns keep pouring out. Like, where did they come from? And how did they fit in there? And when are they going to STOP coming out? And you’re kicking yourself because you didn’t start counting ’em right away and you don’t know how many it’s been but it has to be at least fifteen. Or forty. Or three hundred.
Well, that’s what those cargo pants are like. Put them on and you are totally unaware that you’re in big trouble because your fat cells are multiplying like Tribbles–and if you’re too young to know what a Tribble is or if you’re too old to remember, then watch this before reading any further.
Back from Tribbles? Okay, so I was saying all the time I wore these loose, comfy pants I had NO idea what was going on inside them. Not. A. Clue.
Until the cold front moved in and I decided to wear my jeans, the ones that had been shrinking in the closet all summer….
About the battle with the zipper? I will spare you the grizzly details. I won…but it wasn’t pretty.
I wore those jeans all day…and I did not pass out.
But I considered it.
The Girl Effect
Today I’m joining with thousands of other bloggers throughout the world to talk about girls.
Why girls?
Tick tock. Tick tock.
Because by the time a girl in a developing country is twelve–twelve–she’s considered a woman. Marriage is on the horizon, if she hasn’t been married off already.
And why should we care if some kid in a far off poverty stricken country marries some man two, three or four times her age–why should we care…I mean, aside from basic human decency, WHY SHOULD WE CARE?
Because take that girl and multiply her by the six hundred million other girls in the developing world and look at the pattern. Poverty. Famine. Disease. Infant mortality. Human trafficking. Political instability that affects us all.
But, give a girl an education…
Look what happens when you empower a girl with education. When you give her the tools to better her life, you give her the tools to better the lives of her family. Which impacts her village.
Multiply by six hundred million and you’ve impacted the world.
So what can we do? “We” as in YOU. And ME. Really, what can we do?
Quite a lot. Multiply the ‘you’ and ‘me’ by telling your friends, your coworkers, your church. Spread the word in the schools–get the kids involved. If you’re a blogger write a post. If you like to entertain, throw a party and start the conversation. Retweet this post. Like it on FaceBook.
SPREAD THE WORD.
But this isn’t just about words. It’s about action. I just did my part to keep a little girl in Ethiopia from becoming a child bride. For $25, the cost of a few lattes, the Berhane Hewan project helps prevent girls from becoming child brides by providing a sheep to families who commit to keeping their girls in school.
There are lots of projects like this, lots of organizations dedicated to helping girls in developing countries have a chance in life. To find out more go to here.
We CAN make a difference in this world. One girl at a time.
Supper Outside the Box
Autumn is here, for sure. Mr. Spouse and I readied for the first winter type storm due to blow in sometime early in the week. He did the gutters, I raked pine needles and cleaned up down at the barn. Don’t need pictures of any of that, trust me. Grumpy husband, piles of pony poo. Really. Some things are best left to the imagination. Or better still, forgotten entirely.
After two hours of barn work I was hungry. And cold. And tired. And craving eggs and oatmeal. Go figure. By that time Mr. Spouse was on his way to the airport and Daughter Dearest, being an opportunistic self-feeder, had polished off the remains of the chicken in the fridge.
But I couldn’t have just eggs and oatmeal, right? Even though I really wanted ’em. This was dinner. And what’s dinner without veggies? Don’t say breakfast–too easy.
So while the oats were cooking–steel cut, by the way, solid substantial oats–I washed and chopped up some baby spinach. I’ve always got some in the fridge, kale too, because I loves me my greens. Look how pretty they are.
Then came the oats. And a little bit o’butter.
Couple of poached eggs.
Chopped ’em up, mixed it all together. But wait–that’s when the lightbulb went off inside my head and I knew, I just knew what it needed–
Shredded Parmesan! Garlic powder! Salt and fresh ground pepper….
It was absolutely, positively, INSANELY delicious.
YAY!!!
[yumprint-recipe id=’3′]
All Fired Up
Studio day! Yay! All day in the studio!!! Pinch me pinch me pinch me–I can’t believe I got to make art ALL DAY–except for the part of the day when I was loading up at the feed store and then back here unloading a truckload of hay. All by myself. But the rest of the day, well, most of the rest of the day… I WAS IN THE STUDIO–
Burning, torching, scorching, playing with fire. Literally. Experimenting with some new (to me) techniques. I love love love trying new stuff. Allowing myself to make mistakes…which is a good thing since I make them regularly. And often.
Some samples from today–but first the disclaimer:
- That picture up above–that’s just part of my wax counter. No burning was done in that room.
- I did NOT burn anything down. Like a building. Or the mountain.
- I
used proper ventilationhad all the fans going, blowing out. - And I wore a respirator. Which proves I value self-preservation over vanity.
- Yes. I HAD A PLAN. I didn’t just go in there with a torch and start firing away. I had a book, “Encaustic Mixed Media” by Patricia Baldwin Seggebruch. I read it (looked at the pictures) and then I started firing away. Sorta knowing where I was going. Art by the seat of my pants.
So this is a closeup of some texture attained by burning wood glue. It was on a cradled board and there was plaster involved. Looks like there was some green paint too. But that unfortunate lapse of judgement came after the fact. It will go away.
Reminds me of a toasted marshmallow. Haven’t had one of those in years. I had a two part marshmallow technique. Stick it in the flames. Burn it to a crisp. Eat the charred part then toast the sticky wet inner part to a nice bubbly brown.
But no mistaking this for a marshmallow, especially after I added some more plaster, leaving the texture alone. Can’t do any more until tomorrow so the plaster can dry. Right now I’m thinking I’ll sand the plaster smooth and sand off the paint as well. But who knows what I’ll do when the time comes.
It’s butt ugly right now but, like all of us, it has potential. I’ll post a photo when it’s finished.
The second piece I did was the same technique sans plaster. Just glue and wood, fire and wax. And a few beads.This one might be done, might not. I’ll live with it and decide later.
