Well Named

Serendipity so beautifully captures our experience putting on our art show, opening a week from YESTERDAY.  We're scheduled to set up Monday afternoon & are pleased with how much we're both enjoying the experience.  

Not sure, when the opportunity first presented itself, how it would turn out.  Turns out it's presented itself like so most of the best things in our lives - opening up naturally, without great effort.  In its time.  That's how it's played out, right to this "Oh, my gosh - it's almost here!" moment.

Looking at the gallery walls yesterday, we wondered if we'd have enough of John's work to fill them - then, on the way home, we dropped off cards to a longtime client, who gave the Budgemeister three prints of posters based on John's artwork.  And we figured out a way to get them framed without too much $$$  (they're large AND a non-standard size).  And he figured out how to display the "Aspects of Home" pictures without fuss, bother or additional $$.

Everything seems to be clicking together nicely.  Right up to arriving at the gallery as Marianne was pulling out - she recognized the car & hot footed it back, so we had a nice meeting in the parking lot!!  

Life is good - and graced with every type of serendipity!

INSPIRATO

Getting down to work on my paper chain, INSPIRATO, for the upcoming show.  A chain of yellow & goldish links,  the yellow forming the connectors, the goldish the links bearing the name of someone special to a friend's heart, along with a quality they embody to that friend.  The chain will be fashioned so the goldish links face forward, with every honored person, every quality on view.

Wordy, yes, but with the intention of eliciting feelings, not thoughts...

Thank heaven for little swirls!

Great video on how to make easy 2-color frosting swirls!

Nunc Licet

My part of our art show is entitled, Thinking outside of the... That was the right thing to dub it at the time;  now, I'd call it Nunc Licet - now it is permitted.  

Our art show - Serendipity - is a visible expression of the joint & separate journeys John & I have been on over our lives.  It visualizes in ways I didn't imagine our very relationship - different styles, different perspectives, different everything, but at the same time together, each made not complete by the other but more, more adept at expressing our deepest loves & interests.


Now it is permitted - it thrills me, thinking about gathering in one art space everything that will be there, including the fabulously unique wedding dress that Brenda drew forth from a hand-embroidered, banquet-length table cloth and examples (incorporated into my own pieces) of Mim's wonderful drawings.  The two of us, but extending beyond to family  & friends.  And welcoming everyone to be part of our experience.  Sort of my own little DisneyWorld, if you know what I mean.  (If you don't, I can't explain it.)


Now it is permitted...  Always remembering that while it's now permitted, the ONLY one who can do, can make it so, is me. 

Been too hot to write...

Oh, to have air conditioning!  Wait - there's a window fan unit that will be perfect in the computer studio window.  Thank goodness!  Will make working in here at night less hellacious!  

Cupcakes are ready for tomorrow, both DIY "blanks" and a small assortment of minis (too hot to do a lot), plus some whoopie pies.  Through whipping up my big new goodie for tomorrow's Bryn Athyn Bounty farm market - ICE POPS!  With temps set to soar past 100F, seemed a merciful treat to include in my standard fare. (The weather is supposed to stay in the 90s through Sunday ~ they're toying with us, promising temps in the 80s next week;  alas, no real rain on the horizon for another 10 days.  And it's only early July!)

Hoped they'd be refreshing, but am utterly delighted with how downright tasty they are!  Enjoyed the Green Tea & Mango; now working my way through a Cranberry Lemonade & Pineapple.  Just peeled off a pineapple chunk - deelicious!  Anchored with club soda, letting the yellow shine through.  The differently colored layers look snappy.

The two coffee varieties - Vietnamese (espresso with sweetened condensed milk) and Mexican (espresso with light brown sugar, milk, cinnamon, almond extract) - are straightforward, no layering.  Ditto for the lemonade. 

Looking forward to doing Bounty tomorrow, but mega excited that two weeks from TODAY is our show opening!!  Curtain up!  Light the lights!  We've got nothing to hit but the heights!  Starting here, starting now, baby everything's coming up roses!!

Almost forgot - gotta go down & check to see if the pops are ready for their lolly sticks!!


UPDATE ~ Vietnamese Coffee is taking A LONG time to set.  Through it into the blender with a about a cup of ice cubes.  Hey, it actually tastes even better!  Here's hoping it sets up faster.

Metamorphous

Interesting, how my INSPIRATO project goes from emotion to words & back to emotion.  Hadn't fully envisioned that when it first came to me, but it's how I'm processing turning it from concept into reality into (hopefully) an emotion-touching part of our art show.

Words are what we come up with to best describe the feelings, thoughts we experience.  Their ultimate use is to return us to wordless feeling, sensing, awareness.

Not, it's interesting, knowing.  Knowing is limited.  Today's knowledge is outdated by tomorrow's events.  My hope is for the Inspirato chain to transcend knowing & knowledge, evoking & touching something closer to intuitive energies.

Opted OUT of making the chain out of art paper paired with neutral-hued card stock.  Instead, will use all brightly-colored card stock, alternating a link with a name/quality with a blank link, so that none of the pairs are lost to view.  Will get the paper today.

Next question - straight-edged links or fancy cut?

Fascinated by its metamorphous from a stirring in the mind to vague concept to clear idea to design to...

Brightly Dawned Her Wedding Day!

Yesterday was Amy Brickman's wedding to Ivan Maddock.  And I missed it.  Bushed after Bounty, I waited too long to get the cupcakes up to Artist's Gallery to do both that (which had to be my priority, as I wanted them there before the gallery opens today) and go to the wedding (special music at 5:30, wedding at 6).  A sad decision to make, but a wise one.

As sad as I was to miss the event, it was uppermost in my mind throughout the afternoon.  Was driving past our most beloved farm, outside Doylestown, swinging past horses grazing on our left & sheep sleeping under trees on our right, when the sunlight shifted from clear to a glorious golden, transforming the pastures into something magical - looked at the time & realized, at 6:29 p.m., it was just about when Amy & Ivan would be coming out of the cathedral, happy happy happy at being husband & wife.  Special unforgettable moment for them, special moment for me.

Totally joyful the weather turned out so much better than had been forecast.  It was hot in the late afternoon, but not muggy.  And the storms that devastated parts of Virginia, D.C. and New Jersey the day before had stayed well south of us. It was fine weather for the wedding, the brief gathering afterward on the cathedral lawn, the reception at the Lord's New Church.  So happy for everyone!

Amy's wedding inspired me to come up with an unusual present, something for the bride on the occasion of her wedding, but NOT a wedding present.  Will ask Amy for the names/contact info for the 10-15 people (men & women) who form her closest circle of friends/support folk.  Will ask each to trace his/her dominant hand (left or right) on a piece of card stock-backed pretty paper, writing down a NON-wedding related wish for her, along with his/her signature.  Paper punch each at the "wrist" then bind them together with a spring-clasp metal ring.

Am making one for the art show, for me.  Good practice run.  Interesting, thinking which people I want to include.  John, of course.  Dave, Candy, Emily Jane, Karen, Beryl, Molly, Lisa, Hannah, Nora, Richard, Linda (music group), Linda (Bach), Mary O., Drew, Carolyn, Suzie Snyder, Tom Rose, Kelly, Erin, Mim.

Hope both will be priceless treasures for myself, for Amy.  May every day of her life be as full of sunshine & unexpected fair weather as yesterday!