Telling Stories

Last week, I set up the first of ten new weekly art projects. When Amy asked me if I was interested, I jumped at the chance of stretching my paper sculpture legs. But I must admit that I am a tad overwhelmed, too.

Each week, my work is supposed to illustrate a story from the Old Testament. When Amy first gave me her plan for the ten weeks, I have to admit that I did know or completely forgot several of the stories. The burning bush and parting of the Red Sea was pretty easy to remember, but I wasn't so sure of the others. I finally sat down to look them up. I silently panicked when I thought how I was going to possibly illustrate these stories.



The first week (last week) was easy. It was the story of when Jacob wanted to marry Rachel and her dad tricked him into marrying his older sister Leah. I don't have a sister, but I would be pretty upset if that happened to me. Anyway, I knew immediately that I could transform my paper doll from Penland, which I also call my creativity princess, into a bride. She has a colorful crown on her head, plus these alien like swirls on top of her head, which also hold up a colorful necklace. I slide her antenna down a little lower so they weren't so obvious. She was lovely. The display - easy peasy. And I received tons of compliments on how beautiful she was.

As for this week, it is Jacob wrestling God. The whole thought caused me a restless night. I bought some paper, balled it up into a figure, and got seriously depressed as I saw it lifeless on the living room floor. On to the next plan...

Next I was going to create a giant cut out of the angel and Jacob. But then somehow we started talking about shadow puppets. I wasn't really certain how to set up a shadow puppet. But I looked up Owly Shadow Puppets, one of my favorite from Crafty Bastards.



So I made Henry draw a picture of Jacob and the angel for me. Then I spent most of yesterday cutting and creating hinges. I am pretty pleased by the final piece. I haven't attached any sticks, so they aren't fully functioning shadow puppets. But they were really fun to pose for a series of photos that are being used for the bulletin cover.







But this week's art still isn't set. That may be the reason for the mild headache that hasn't left me all day. Or my cutback on my coffee intake this morning. So the verdict is still out on how to display the work. It does involve the screen and more cutting on my part. But you can see the final work at 11 am on Sunday.

guess what's for dinner?

Carrie emailed me to set up a meeting and mentioned that she was making homemade pizza for dinner. This got my wheels a churning and we are going to have pizza for dinner!

Henry and I love pizza. That should go with out saying. But our fridge is looking pretty bare at this point. When I called him at work to suggest homemade pizza, he asked what was going to be on it. I said anchovies and capers based on the Napoletana, which is our favorite pizza at Pizzeria Paradiso. We have tried several of their pizzas and this one is hands down the best. We have concluded that the best option is to start with a Panzanella salad served over homemade bread and finish with a large Napoletana.

When Eris and Robert were visiting earlier this month, I was quite impressed with my decisiveness. I knew exactly where we should go for all of our snacks and meals. I even knew what we should eat. So after an hour at Paper Source, we headed up M to grab some pizza. When the waiter read the specials, we caved and went with one small Napoletana and one small cheese burger special. Midway through the meal, Robert admitted we should have stuck with one large. So yum!

I have a delicious crust recipe that my mother used for several years. I believe that it came in a book published by Dixie Crystal sugar. But today I tempted to try the white crust recipe as presented on this series of Monkey See videos! Enjoy!

follow-up to teaching activities

Last week, I wrote up my thoughts about my trip to New Orleans and my experience with the Becoming the Beloved Community retreat. The first thing that I thought was I also need to do this for the Exotic Dancer MBA! And some form of this for Penland, too. I go through these amazing experiences and have something significant I want to say. But it is almost like I have so many different thoughts that I don't really know where to begin. The interview format helped me capture a pretty well-rounded view of the experience. Plus an overly smiley picture of me with very curly hair.

And for a brief review of my latest Wedding Event Invitations class at Paper Source, check out what Ms. Alexandria of DC Nearlyweds had to say. Her husband was my first male in a wedding-related class. He was great and had a lot of experience. I think that this is also the first class where people bonded so quickly. Plus my first workshop on the floor downstairs. I have to admit that despite my skepticism, I had to look for things way less than when I was in the third floor workshop space. I guess I was hyper-organized, which is great!

For upcoming events, I have a Google calendar of events that I include on my web page under workshops. It is time to update it once again! The fall is already starting to fill up. So hard to believe.

Back from NOLA

This past weekend I took my first trip to New Orleans. When Amy asked me if I wanted to help her with a retreat at St. Charles Avenue Baptist Church, her previous employer, I jumped at the chance. They are in the process of finding a new minister and asked her to lead them through a visioning retreat. She asked if I could help them create a mosaic. Of course!

And so I went, not completely sure of what I was getting myself into, nor what I was going to say. But I did my homework, bought supplies, packed lightly and fortunately, made it to the correct airport on time.

I must say that the retreat was a success. I was surprised by how much I enjoyed the spontaneity of taking a tiny idea and working with a community to create a tangible creative product, plus a set of words of guidance that will help them move forward. Plus it was great working with Amy.

I am in the process of answering an interview that Amy sent to me as a follow-up. Call this blog post procrastination. I'm just kidding, Amy! Sort of.

But I have to say that I fell in love with New Orleans. I never really had any desire to go there before Katrina. To me, it involved large, drunk crowds. I hate crowds, especially drunk ones. I had enough of that with two UNC championships and several Halloweens in Chapel Hill. Besides what if I caught the spirit and ended up with my top over my head and an internet sensation? How could I possibly maintain that Girls Gone Wild reputation???

Plus I was scared that I would somehow end up in a cemetery with a crazy old woman casting a spell on me and forcing a voodoo doll in my hand. I am a complete freak magnet and have been "touched", with a series of prophetic dreams throughout my lifetime and way too many coincidences. Plus cemeteries are beautiful. I love them. So much so that I even said that was the one thing I wanted to see while I was there. Carol drove me right by one to satiate my curiosity. Later none of the psychics in Jackson Square jumped out to tell me something eerie and foreboding. I survived my trip without any intersection of black magic. What a relief.



Although I am sure that both of these scenarios are part of NOLA's culture, they are far from all of it. New Orleans is filled with dense neighborhoods of beautiful homes, delicious food, and cute shops. All of which are oozing with creativity and a slow and welcoming Southern style. How could I not completely love this place? My short visit (including the day and a half retreat, which was over an hour away) was just a taste of what New Orleans has to offer. I imagine it is a place where you can consume good food, good music, great art and yes, lots of frozen drinks, 'til you pop. I can't wait to go back. In fact, it is the first place I ever thought my family might could go as a vacation. We aren't beach people, but I believe that there is something in New Orleans that we would all love.

The finished product

We are about to begin

We are about to begin and I am officially nervous. Leah told me that
being nervous shows you care.

Testing out the plan

We sat down to see how things willwork in comparison to my original
idea. I think we'll drop one of the rings. The space seems a little
small for it. I'm excited to see what will happen as we start working
together. I think that it will be great and I'm always amazed by
collaborative art projects.

Amy's first house

Baesd on the markings in the neighborhood, her house was searched on
9/12 after Katrina.

Morning prep work

This morning we hung out on the porch breaking plates Carol and Amy
bought at the thrift store. It was a great stress reliever with the
aid of a hammer and a pillowcase. We all shed a little blood before
the porch was vacuumed. But I think we have plenty of pieces to work
with.

Waiting for lunch at Parasols

I have a feeling Henry is going to be so jealous about my lunch.
(Alex, too.) We each got a poboy cut three ways - roast beef, erster,
and catfish. All dressed. And a side of onion rings.

From my window

The flight from Baltimore to Tampa was uneventful - just how I ilke
them.

Over the years, I have gotten a little better about pushing obsessive
thoughts about flying out of my mind. Instead of what can go wrong, I
look for something beautiful.

Tonight it was the sunset. The actual sun was hidden by this massive
cloud. Just before, we passed through some weather, my neighbor
pointed out a rainbow, sans bow. It was a tall straight prism of
color, which we passed before I could take a picture.

Our flight is delayed, but I checked out "Floor Sample," Julia
Cameron's memoir from the library. I am currently racing through it.
The perfect read for a delayed lay-over.

Okay, time for me to line up.

And, I'm Off

I'm on my way to New Orleans to lead a mosaics activity as part of a
retreat called "Becoming the Beloved Community" with Amy. Should be
fun. And hot!

This is my first trip to NOLA, so I am very excited. I'll try to do
some live blogging and catch up on the last couple of weeks.

Now to Tampa.

pictobrowser is amazing...

Thanks to Pikaland for this tip! You can make your very own set of pictures from Pictobrowser. Just use a tag or photo set from Flickr and you can automatically generate a show on your web site or blog. I guess that means it is time for me to redo my web site again! This is so much better than the black background I was using before. Now I just need to remove the blurry photos from my iPhone.

Lazy Sunday

We decided to go out after Nadal's amazing victory at Wimbeldon. Go,
Spain! Two weekends of wins in a row.

Somehow we managed going inside to enjoy the outside. We are enjoying
the Kogod Courtyard at the National Portrait Gallery. Only thing
missing is a patch of grass.

"I'm just here to help."

I don't fully understand this, but there seems to be a series of videos from 2006 related to a Leprechaun spotted in Crichton, which is part of Mobile, Alabama. For your afternoon entertainment...