What I'm reading....

I always have more books on my night table, my living room side table and my dining room shelves than I can possibly read in whatever time period I'm planning.

Like most of us who love books, I have been reading for as long as I can remember and listening to stories before that. I read a broad range of books that includes fiction, non-fiction, essays, history, art criticism, nature writing and so on. Oh, and mysteries, especially easy breezy mysteries such as the herbally linked mysteries by Susan Wittig Albert. Above are some of the books waiting to be read in the near future. I also love short stories and read as many as I can get my hands on. I have just finished the New Yorker Stories by Ann Beattie, one of my favorite short story authors. I think I read all these stories as they were published but it has been great fun to read them again.

I also read a lot of children's books, especially ones written for children in the middle years, 8-12 years old. These are some of the latest ones I've read.

I loved the two books on the left...the two on the right, not so much....I am writing a book for kids this age so am always looking at what is out there, what is doing well, what I think is a horrid mistake of publishing and so on....

So that's what I'm up to. What have you been reading?

What hope looks like....

This is what I love most about nature....even in the midst of darkness and death...

new life happens. This new little sapling is growing out of the old trunk of this fallen tree....and is in bud against the dead brown leaves of last summer.

As I snapped this picture this past weekend I smiled and thought this must be one of the ways hope would manifest if it stopped to pose for a picture.

A morning walk with Arlo

on the beach is always a nice way to start the day....like many others my heart is heavy while Japan waits to see the fate of these failing nuclear plants....

Walking the beach and seeing the sun rise is always a peaceful, contemplative way to start the day....

Arlo stopped running around, frapping around as they say in corgi land, long enough to consider the rising sun...

Gradually the sun showed itself over the island in the distance and over the low dunes...

Shedding its golden reflection into the water....

Casting its light upon the beach ahead of us after we'd turned the bend...

lighting up the skeleton of a whelk shell....

Giving reason for this song sparrow to belt out his song...

And giving one happy little dog one more reason to run happily along the sand....

Holding onto hope...

Sometimes everything seems so upside down and wrong in the world that it is easy to fall into despair...

But then there is that one surprising moment of beauty that reminds you to hold onto hope....

My heart is heavy for all those suffering today, especially those in Japan....and if we give up hope, we have nothing to give...

New in the shop....

Monday seems like a good day to put up some of the new paintings I've added to my shop. This egret is quite small, about 5 1/2 x 7"

This great horned owl is a little larger, about 8 x 10"

And this little tern is pretty tiny, at about 4 x 6"

These are all available at my shop, along with several dozen others here. These are not prints. Once they are sold they will be gone.

Sketching people....

Whenever I know I am going to be sitting in a group of people for a long time, like at a conference or while traveling, I always bring my sketchbook along.

Yesterday I was at the Cape Cod Natural History Conference and while there I did these sketches in my current moleskine book of some of the presenters and some of the people watching and listening.

It is a great way to get in a little drawing practice because the people are always moving--even the ones sitting fidget and move their heads and hands....

I also take notes of things being said and whatever else seems relevant at the time..

Do you carry a sketchbook or notebook?

Time to plant the seeds...

Do you plant seeds indoors each spring? I do...it doesn't always work so well because sometimes I get so busy I neglect them and I get a bunch of weak, leggy wonders that don't survive the transition to outside. But other years I get great plants so every March I do it again and hope for the best.

I save old egg cartons for all sorts of things but they make great seed starters. Today I am just planting my basil. I have 2 kinds, regular and a lime basil. We use lots of basil all summer long and I give away plants as well....

I love the tininess of these seeds. Imagine all the life that is in each one...

I put them on top of the seed mix (I buy a seed starter mix that has no additives, etc. but is nice and airy. I tamp them down a bit and then spray them with my trusty spray bottle.

Once they are good and damp I cover them loosely with plastic bags I save for this occasion and then put them in a warm, not overly bright spot to wait for them to germinate. I check them every day to be sure they are damp but not soaking and once the sprouts are up I remove them from the plastic and put them in a bright but not overly bright spot...tomorrow or over the weekend I will start my tomatoes...

Picture your jewelry in a frame....

I don't know who to credit this idea to since I've seen it lots of places, including HGTV but as someone who wears the same earrings every day because the others are lost in a tangle in my drawer I thought this would be fun to try.

It is ridiculously easy and involves a frame I wasn't using, some old picture wire cut to size and I used shipping tape to fasten the wire to the frame since it was strong, covered the prickly ends and allowec the frame to hang flat. I let the wires hang sort of haphazardly but you could make them straight, put them in a pattern, whatever....

And I can't even tell you how excited I was to find some of my favorite earrings once again and hang them where I can find them. Who knows? A necklace hanger may be in my future as well....

What to do with old or unfinished watercolors...

If you are like me you have all sorts of old and unfinished drawings, sketches and watercolor studies hanging around that you need to either use in some way or toss in the recycling pile...

 I came across these three watercolor sketches the other day from a trip to Maine. They were done quickly and didn't do much for me but I remembered what my friend, Beryl, taught me about using up my old paintings...

 Beryl is one of my former students who is now in her 80s but she was doing this 30 years ago...She cut up the parts of the paintings that she liked and made cards for birthdays or thank you notes or even for sending sympathy notes. She also made bookmarks and gift cards and her friends and family have loved them for years.

 It only takes a few minutes. I happen to have a small paper cutter but of course you can cut them any way you'd like. I gathered my hole puncher and some ribbon left over from other projects.

 I punched holes and added the ribbon....

 and in less than 15 minutes I had a nice little supply of gift cards, bookmarks and an all occasion card to put away in my little box of cards and tags.

You can do this with cards you receive too but I like the heaviness of the watercolor paper and people love to get them. If you have too many you can always donate them to a fund raiser somewhere...

Often I end up liking the little bits of the paintings far better than I ever did the larger versions. What do you do with your old paintings and sketches?

Playing with papercutting....

Years ago I took a weekend long papercutting workshop. We used teeny tiny scissors and began with pieces of newsprint before moving on the magazine pages. I loved it.

 We folded a paper in half and then cut the design. When we opened the paper we had a symmetrical design.

 Then we moved on to cutting freehand without folding the paper. This was a bit trickier.

 These are all quite small and are mounted on nice white bristol board.

Just for fun I listed a few in my shop.

What do you think? Should I do some more?