Finding Beauty in the Brown

Winter in the desert... To many, it's bliss in comparison to cold snow and icy climates. It gets cold here too. This winter, the Valley of the Sun had day after day of below freezing temps at night. Gardens everywhere are now various shades of brown.

 

I took a stroll around my garden last weekend looking for any form of beauty in this nastiness of freeze burn. Varigated agave above.

Popcorn plant pods.

The once flame colored fire stick.

Post bloom Dawe's aloe.

Tipu tree leaves. My tree is naked! It's not supposed to be.

Bougainvillea leaves.

San Diego Red Bougainvillea.

And yet, amongst all the brown, the 2nd barrel cactus is sprouting blooms. Hello, color!

This one has me stumped. The ice plant is blooming! It's up to 4 flowers as of yesterday. This poor plant struggles through the summer but I insist in growing them. I'll be hounding every nursery on this side of town again this year for red ones. They've been hard to find the last two seasons due to a hard freeze in California a few years ago. Blooming bunches of Ice plant in the spring are spectacular and not a common sight here. It's my ode to California and years of traveling along those Los Angeles freeways...

Despite all the dead vegetation, the bees and hummingbirds still get their lunch stop over of Mexican Honeysuckle. The two bushes were too big to cover with freeze blankets but I hedged my bets that being against the house, they'd stay warmer than plants left exposed in the garden. All the plants up against the house made it through. Lets hear it for micro climates!

As we inch closer to March, daydreaming of what going to grow in the garden begins. Fertilizing is on the schedule for next weekend. There's going to be a lot of yard clean-up. Pruning must wait! I'll have to keep my itchy fingers busy in the studio instead :)

Marissa

Winter Color

 Having grown up in Southern California and now living in Arizona, I'm used to year around color. Yet, I know that feeling of traveling to another planet when I make the trek to Los Angeles and the world feels very different. For those of you in cold climates, I'd like to share a little bit of color from my garden. Above is our winter blooming Dawes Aloe in front of my bedroom windows.

 Barrel cactus in bloom this past week.

 Ice plant

 Fire stick

 Bouganvillea-San Diego Red

 Dawes Aloe

Popcorn plant-rub the leaves and the oil on your fingers smell like popcorn!

Marissa

Critters and Prickly Things

This time last week I was anticipating the week of Spring break ahead of me. Time has flown and only one day is left before it's back to work. I hope to squeeze as much out of one last day as possible. Rain or no rain!

 

Here's the postcard shot from the Desert Botanical Garden. Blooming wild flowers, Saguaro cactus, sunny sky and Papago Buttes in the background.

 

The butterfly pavilion is in full swing. Here's a Julia butterfly which is a big hit in our household. 

 

We visit the butterflies yearly but I doubt I've gotten four at once.

 I expected to see plenty of critters but there were only a few. We caught this ground squirrel in the act. It scurried under the protective netting and helped itself to fresh wildflowers.

Collared Lizard. Nice looking creature but we almost missed it from the camoflauge.

Yucca. Not native to the Sonoran Desert but to the Mojave Desert. Our next door neighbor in California used to have some along the fence. Love the creamy, white flowers. Something about them reminds me of weddings/wedding dresses...

The other side of Yucca. The textured side...

Textures and layers and the many greens of cacti.

Two types of Prickly Pear cacti in the foreground.

Two types of Chollas in the middleground.

Towering Totem Pole cacti in the background.

Barrel cactus with a little somthing on the noggin. We concluded that the whitish, powdery stuff is pollen. We're far from scientists. I'm addicted to the visual stimulation.

 

I see this pink and green together and my mind goes back to a fabric my mother once had. I'm sure it was the early 70's. Striped, ribbed knit in two olive greens and a bright pink and off white.

Did something like this inspire the designer of that fabric?

We often think of "desert" and think of a barren landscape. I've learned otherwise and contemplate the discoveries to be made with every excursion.

Marissa

Heard Museum North

The second week of school is ending and I'm home sick with a nasty cold :(

Things have been pretty quiet lately. School has been keeping the Chicklet and I busy. The stickiness of the humid weather keeps us indoors. I know it doesn't compare to other places with high humidity but what we have here saps my energy.

Earlier this month I read about an exhibition of Native American artists books on display at the Heard Museum North. I'd never been there before.I followed the directions on the museum website. It was a long drive taking streets. I jumped on the freeway on the way back. It was much faster!
Dallin Maybee, Northern Arapaho/Seneca-Ink and watercolor on ledger paper

As a satellite to the main museum, this one was much more intimate. The gallery was filled with book after book and beautiful illustrations... Fritz Scholder, Luiseño "Animal" printed by Dan Mayer

I loved these animal prints by Fritz Scholder. He's big here in the Southwest but his paintings haven't captured my interest. Perhaps from over exposure...

I made some sketches of some interesting leather book construction and closures. Then I wandered through the permanent works gallery and the museum store. The museum store was full of interesting works for sale as well as some inspiring techniques.Next stop, the sculpture garden. Mosaic benches and desert flora.Mmmm....mmm.... a big, chunky barrel cactus. This one was around 18" in diameter and almost as high.The ribs were easily 3" deep. Nature's sculpture leaves man made sculpture in the dust.Leaving the museum, the textures and patterns of the wall and walkway caught my attention.
A new exhibition of Native American Dolls is now on display. The Chicklet and I will be visiting soon.
Marissa

Math Is Not My Forte

Ok, so I have some room to spread out in my classroom. I brought some big, parent sheets of handmade, Indian watercolor paper called Nujabi to cut down for pages in a book I'm planning to make. I fold the pages, wet the fold to make tearing them easier...It's heavy duty stuff. My bone folder is practically eaten up!

The paper is folded, the fold is moistened. I tear on the fold and start stacking the sheets. Looked a tad chunky. What a bird brain. I needed 5 sheets of paper to make five signatures of four pages each....... So why did I buy and cut down 10 sheets??????? I now enough enough to make 2 books. Oh, hello!!!!!! It's a good thing I teach art!!!!!!

I'm still recuperating from the weekend. We started out by going to the Staff vs. Staff Volley ball game for The Chicklet's school against their rivals. It's been a long time since I've sat in a school gym cheering on our home team. I was delegated to sitting on my own while The Chicklet hung out with her pals. The Chicklet would not let me take her picture with the school mascot but was cool with letting me take a pic with her favorite teacher, Mrs. H. We did have fun. Go Rams!The Chicklet went off with her father on Friday evening. If he was willing to brave the crowds to go to the movies, so be it. I took the opportunity to get some Hanukkah shopping done. Found some fun stuff for her.

Saturday morning had me in the studio first thing. After making coffee, I plunked myself in the studio to finish a little book I started on Friday. RV Guy has a little munchkin of his own who likes purple. I gathered a bunch of goodies together to make a little book he could give to her. I was pretty happy with the result. Actually, I was pretty thrilled to have gotten it started and finished for him to take it to her.It was time to head over to Frenzy Stamper for my very first class with Cindy Novack, "Royal Nametag." We started out with 2 crown forms but I pulled out another two that I bought when I signed up for the class. It was a bit crazy working on four at a time but fun too. What worked with one, fed ideas for another. What didn't fit one was perfect on another piece....Came home with these. Ooh exciting, these were so much fun! I forgot the part about taking small pics to put inside the chipboard frames but it was a bit more liberating. I didn't go in with a mindset of what I wanted to make other than a purple one for my niece and a pink one for the Chicklet.

Little by little each piece came to fruition. Between Cindy's baubles and the goodies I packed, all four were close to being finished.Back to purple. I made a phone call to my sister just to confirm that my niece still likes purple. The verdict was, "Yes." We've got baubles, silk flowers, metallic confetti, Mardi Gras beads, rhinestones, charms and some industrial, silver thingamajigger that fit perfectly in the chipboard frame. Her pic, a few more charms and one more bit of embellishment and it's done.We each were given a gold, plastic crown that Cindy found at a yard sale. The craziest things end up in our hands.... the Chicklet's crown is tarnished and decorated with rhinestones. My button box came out in addition to using more silk flowers, beaded garland and charms. Cindy suggested adding chipboard wings. I found some but they weren't the ones I had in mind. Luckily, I found what I was looking for later. I'll add them to my niece's and the Chicklet's piece.The next two pieces just evolved. This one is in honor of my Tia Mary. Between the pearls and the hanging crystals, it was all about her. Cindy gave us a belt buckle which I sanded and painted. I used more crystal beaded garland, added some hooks and eyes and a portion of a zipper. Above the pearls, in the center is a bulb or fuse. My aunt always encouraged my interest in art and design. She was a mentor, role model, confidante... She had a hanging light fixture with crystals that always reminded me of the feathered hats Phyllis Diller used to wear. I have the crystals and will add two to the bottom and then my aunt's picture.Lastly, and the piece that requires the most digging. It worked out randomly that three pieces had 3 holes for charms at the bottom but this one has five. The lady who loved blue, collected clocks and had me attach her stockings with the garter clasps when I was little, was my Mom. The empty cameo frame inspired this piece. Mom had a cameo that she was either given or she saved up for and she quite valued it. It might seem like a trinket now but at the time, it was very special.

My sister and I divided up all the jewelery and I made sure to scoop up all the broken stuff. I'll have to dig thru it to find the last parts to this piece.

The first two crowns were meant to give as gifts. I'm not sure what my intentions are with these. I'm not sure I want to part with them. If I do, I know the recipient will value them. We'll see...

That was Saturday day. Next stop was an evening in the company of RV Guy. He'd had a bad day at work. 'Didn't know how the evening was going to go but in my experience, sitting around dwelling can be pretty bad. So off I went. We're pretty glad I did. We had some quality time together. The chicken I cooked was good too!Last but not least-a garden update. Yes, Ms. Debbie, more flowers! Our excusion to the plant sale at the botanical garden added these fine specimens to our patio. A couple of exotic Barrel Cacti and a Mountain Aloe, (like the one I drool over at the garden). Now I can drool closer to home. AND... the Popcorn plant in the background is making a full recovery after the invasion of the caterpillars.Look!!!!!! More flowers on the way. It's always nice to know I haven't killed anything during the transplanting stage. Didn't get nicked and cut either. Whew! I'm still more dangerous flinging paint than flinging dirt. Good to know!

Happy Tuesday!
Marissa