Who does art while in the toilet?

My daughter, that's who. She has a passion that cannot be quelled. She is an art explosion! Everywhere she goes, she leaves a trail, remnants of creativity. She's radioactive! She shoots off bits of trash wherever she goes!

School starts Tuesday. 

Music Monday: Snoop Dogg

This video is amazing. The music is not, of course. Best to listen with sound off.

Sheep!

Carl Fredricks came by and took pictures of our sheep a few days ago.

Houdini is a Chicken

Houdini is out again tonight. I don't know how she does it. Our chicken coop is an enclosed area within an outside shed, with a chicken door leading to the outdoors, and a person door leading into the shed. All of the other chickens stay where they ought, but not Houdini. Somehow, Houdini spends her nights in the greater shed, kicking up dirt and pooping everywhere. She lays eggs in inaccessible places. When I come out to feed the chickens in the morning, she squawks for me to let her out.

She never lets me catch her. She can fly.

I hate that chicken.

Music Monday: Kids Playing Ukes

I like this trend lately of teaching your kids to play the ukulele. My dad taught Wonder Niece to play the ukulele, too. I don't know these children. As of this posting, this video has sixty views. I like the cooperation between apparent siblings. And the little solo. It's all so sweet.

What is art? an excerpt from "A Tale for the Time Being"

    This blog has, from time to time, has asked the question, "What is art?" so when I read this part of A Tale for the Time Being by Ruth Ozeki, I thought I would share it with you. The fictional version of the author is married to an artist,

    "He was the least egotistical man she'd ever met, nor was he particularly ambitious. His land art projects, like the Means of Production, he deemed successful only when he himself had disappeared from them.
    "I want viewers to forget about me."
    "Why?" she asked. "Don't you want credit for your work?"
    "That's not the point. It's not about any system of credit. It's not about the art market. The work succeeds when all the cleverness and artifice have disappeared, after years of harvest and regrowth, when people begin to experience it as ambiance. Any residual auto of me as artist or horticultural dramaturge will have faded. It will no longer matter. That's when the work gets interesting."
    "Interesting, how?"
    "It becomes more than 'art.' It becomes part of the optical subconscious. Change has occurred. It's the new normal, just the way things are."
    By his own measure, then, his work was successful, but the more successful he became, the more difficult he found it to make a living.
    "I'll never be a captain of industry," he said, ruefully, one night when they were looking over their finances and trying to figure out how they would pay their bills. "I feel like such a loser."
    "Don't be ridiculous," she said. "If I'd wanted a captain of industry, I would have married one."
    He shook his head, sadly. "You picked a lemon in the garden of love."  (P. 297-298)
        

And I have to say, also: READ THIS BOOK. Or listen to it. The audio book is read by the author with singing and expression and chanting and loveliness. It seems weird at first, but go with it. It questions the nature of reality, and somehow does it in a believable way. And it surprised me. So few books really surprise me anymore.

Candy Gets Her Head in a Knot

Do you remember when we saved this little lamb named Candy Darling? Candy is a sweet little lamb. Little Z has decided, because Z doesn't have a horse, that she will ride Candy like a horse- which is fine, except that Candy is a wee little lamb still. She's just getting her horns!

Which brings us to her current predicament:

A couple times a day, Candy Darling gets her head stuck in the fence! She has four little horns poking out every which way. Then she sees some sort of tastiness- Goldenrod, usually. She's just getting the hang of how to turn her head just right to squeeze them through. But sometimes she doesn't get it out again. 

And after we get her head out, the fence is wrapped in wool. 

I'm worried she might stick her head in and get stuck in the middle of the night, and then whatever ate the ducks will come and eat Candy! 

A few weeks ago, I got smart and put an automatic chicken door that opens and closes on its own when it gets dark. So I don't have to put the chicken in at night! 

And now, here I am hiking a quarter mile out to pull Candy Darling's head out of the fence each night. 

Sweet little lamb. 

While you were out...

The internet was down at my house for a few days. I don't get cell phone reception at my house, either, so it was a true black out! And then the regular phone just stopped working, in the middle of a conversation! So I said to the kiddo,

"Put on your pants! We're going to town!"

"Going to town?" she asked. "why ever for, dear mother?" (I'm paraphrasing.)

"We must tell the telephone people that the telephone is out of service!"

So off to town we went!

They sent over the same man who set up the modem five years ago. He walked into the house, and went straight up the stairs,

"I remember where it is!" he said.

He rewired some things, and now we're right as rain. Except, of course, that I made a blog post mid week that was completely lost in the aether. Although, really- isn't that where all of this will end up, someday? Lost in the abyss of all time? Who is reading this? You are, of course. But not for long! No, not for long. The ephemeral essence of the internet will take over, alas, and all will be lost.

Tomorrow is the big day! Am I ready? No, no. Not at all. Never ready until the moment of.

Frank will be there. 

Are you ready?

Art Show Setup!

It's not until next Saturday, but we decided to set up early. It was crazy with the farmer's market downtown, and the 120 degree skywalk, but we got her done.

This is strange. Perhaps only you who follow me would understand. I think I'm being influenced by Wanda Gag. 

She was always writing about the folds in fabric. Capturing that. I was never interested in doing that, until I read her diary.

I drew this this morning. I never do pencil drawings, but this is a pencil drawing. I never do these lovely folds of fabric, but there it is. And I never do these distortions- at least not on purpose- but this time I did it in purpose. I wasn't thinking about it or anything, because that would be wrong, but I did it. On purpose. 

It became all round and lovely and weird. 

I call it "Wanda."

Bad Assed Husband calls it, "legs." 

Keeping it real! 

I don't care if anyone likes it. I'll keep it on my wall forever.