Posts Tagged ‘creativity’
Silk Scarves
During December, I’ve been enjoying the privilege of a front-row seat for an art project by one of Santa’s loveliest elves. I didn’t even know that painting silk scarves was a thing. Cyndie manufactured a rig to suspend the scarves so she could draw on designs before filling them with wonderful brushed colors.
Each one is unique and custom-designed for the person she was thinking about. I wish I had taken more pictures when she was doing the painting but I was hesitant due to the hush-hush nature of the project.
Wednesday night she and her friends celebrated with a holiday dinner and an exchange of gifts so I have now been granted permission to share some clips of the finished scarves.
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It brings me so much joy to see how Cyndie has been experimenting with different techniques to bring about beautiful artistic images with a variety of media. These silk scarves look really great. I love how she managed to mix a whimsical energy with an almost business-like calmness worthy of silk.
I’m very familiar with Cyndie’s artistry in the kitchen but her increasing proficiency in producing creative art from many different methods is showing me a whole new side of her. It thrills me to no end.
It shouldn’t surprise me that Cyndie continues to master new accomplishments, but her artistic creativity of late has. Her art projects since retiring stand out in contrast with her previous lifetime of more academic pursuits. Instead of cramming a world of ideas into reports and professional articles, she is now letting them flow freely into shapes and colors.
I am truly honored to have the pleasure of watching her work and then being able to gaze upon the finished pieces. I’m so happy when she allows me to share samples with the rest of you here.
I wonder what she will find to tackle next. You can bet I will strive to take more pictures during the messy phases.
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The Dancestronaut
I would like to introduce you to a video by MKXero, an artist who just released a fabulous electronic dance track, “Gimme That Beat.” If house music is your thing, this song will sound familiar as it triggers your urge to move. For me, the part that grabbed my mesmerized attention was the visual of a space-suited human revealing dance moves never before associated with full-on space attire.
I highly encourage you to keep your eyes on the screen long enough to witness what happens as the wormhole dancing plays out.
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If for some reason your curiosity wasn’t spurred to click on that video, let me point out this additional detail: The only reason I know this dance track video exists is that my son, Julian, composed the song, devised the unique nom de plume MKXero, released the track on streaming services, and then used his game development skills and tools to put together this synced music video to go along with it.
Color me proud of such creative artistry and initiative. And a little bit jealous.
Is it possible for me to “inherit” some of the desirable traits my children manifest?
From his Youtube post:
The year is 2034. A wormhole has appeared above Earth. A fearless explorer has ventured into space to investigate. As he passes through the wormhole, the beats begin… The explorer finds himself helplessly trapped in the gravitational pull of a nearby star. As he is pulled to his untimely demise, he does what any rational human would do. He shakes, shuffles, and dances his heart out. Back on Earth he has been dubbed: The Dancestronaut
I wish I’d thought of that.
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Slowing Down
I’m going to try something new. With apologies to those of you who have told me how much you enjoy checking in every morning to read or view my daily “relative somethings,” I have decided to readjust my energies to free up time that I have been holding in reserve every day for over a decade.
I am not going to commit to how this change will play out, other than to announce that I am moving away from my old priority of striving to assure a new post every single day. This isn’t the first time I have considered making this sort of change, so I already have some ideas I may try out going forward.
One possibility I have favored in the past would be to post a single picture. That seems like it wouldn’t take much time. However, I have learned from experience that my picture-taking often goes in spurts and days can pass when I don’t get out with the camera. If I committed to posting a daily picture, I would still be in the mode of reserving some time every day to achieve that.
There are also fewer daily stories to tell about our adventures here since we returned the horses and Wintervale activity has dwindled, so, to spare you repeating versions of ‘me walking Delilah’ or ‘me plowing snow’ (two things that have commanded my time and energy recently), allowing some quiet time between tales will hopefully germinate new content of more intriguing substance.
One can hope.
Of course, one other option I considered was to just cease blogging altogether, but being so “all-or-none” extreme was an older trait of mine that has softened with time. There is no reason I can’t keep this blog space open for use as more of a periodical. Weekly? Monthly?
Who knows?
That sort of mystery is one of the fun aspects of creativity. I will be creative about slowing down my rate of publishing posts.
Before I step away for my initial pause from daily posting, I’ll leave you with two images that made their way onto the SD memory card late yesterday afternoon…
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No critters were harmed in the recording of that adventure (but not for lack of intent).
I’ll be back before long. In the meantime, send your precious love out into the world during the minutes you would have been perusing new Relative Somethings in the days ahead.
Namaste.
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Productive Weekend
It is a good time of year to get a lot done over a weekend when it happens to be the second to last weekend before Christmas. I had a number of goals in mind that I wanted to accomplish in the blink of days between commuting to the day-job.
It helped to have the weather warm up at just the right time. Our thermometer reached the 40s(F) both Saturday and Sunday. I was able to move one of my projects outside into the glorious sunshine.
I went from the concrete of the shop to the asphalt outside. Just look at everything I accomplished!
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I’m afraid that all projects underway during the first three weeks of December are under a media blackout. Progress will be represented only by material removed, as shown above.
Cyndie was even more productive than I was, but I can’t show any pictures of her projects, either. Not until after Christmas.
It’s the best time of the year!
“Oh by golly, have a holly jolly Christmas…”
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Trail Inspirations
After a second visit on Saturday for pure maple syrup and pancakes, Cyndie enlisted the artistic energies of visiting Williams girls, Ella and Sarah, to decorate some of the new blocks before we placed them on the trail.
It’s a bit of a shame that their designs will all too quickly be subject to the abuses of plodding muddy boots and paws, but that won’t stop the creative exclamations from still offering glimpses of inspiration to passersby.
The 60 new blocks paved another 8.5 feet of sloppy trail, but we’re still going to need a lot more pallets if we want to cover the length of perpetually wet ground down there.
The picture I used yesterday to show the blocks on the trail was from October of 2016. Yesterday, Cyndie took a picture with the newest blocks in the foreground, which is actually viewing in the opposite direction from the first image.
It’s not an exact comparison, but I like seeing one next to the other.
Can you see how far in the distance the old blocks run in the picture on the right?
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Reminds me a little of the yellow brick road. Oh my!
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An Idea
I have been trying to picture what I might be able to do with the remaining trunk after cutting off all the dead branches on the large tree at the corner of our property by the road.
Here is a mockup of what one idea I have been pondering might look like…
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It would be a subtle, perpetual message to passing neighbors and travelers, and can serve as a compliment to our banner flag with the word LOVE across it when we put that out at the end of the driveway for events.
My main question for myself is whether, or not, I could even achieve this sculpting despite my lack of experience. I would certainly need to deal with an aversion to working in such a conspicuous space.
No hiding this project from curious passersby.
How bad do I want it?
The answer to that will determine whether this project is ultimately attempted, or just remains a computer image of an idea I once had.
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Paving Paradise
We are experimenting with a new way to improve a particularly wet and muddy portion of one trail through our woods. Originally, I was hoping we could simply cover it with wood chips. It worked for a while, but we haven’t been chipping branches frequently enough to produce the supply needed to cover all of our trails.
The piles of wood blocks that I have been pulling off pallets salvaged from the day-job are suddenly proving valuable. Instantly, we have gone from having too many of these lying around, to not having enough to cover the muddy lengths of trail that need the most help.
It is interesting to consider the path (no pun intended) these pieces of former trees have traveled. Somewhere, trees are cut down and milled into boards. Then the wood gets cut into these shapes and nailed to pallets. The company that manufactures the products we receive at the day-job mount their units onto the pallets for shipment and charge the end customer for the wood.
We have asked if they wanted the pallets returned for reuse, but like so many other things in today’s world, since already paid for, they apparently weren’t worth the trouble. We end up with perfectly good, single-use pallets out of brand-new wood, albeit with four odd blocks nailed to the tops.
I’ve been pulling the nails to remove the blocks and using the pallets as a floor in my wood shed and beneath stored hay in the hay shed. I also claimed boards off some pallets to build hay feeding boxes for the 4 stalls in the barn. All the while, the odd blocks that were removed have been piling up.
When Cyndie started looking into a boardwalk as a way to get up out of the mud on our trails, we landed on the idea of using the blocks. She wanted to add some words of inspiration and enlisted Anneliese to join her in creating the enhancements.
Yesterday we laid down the first test run. So far, so good. Only a couple more miles to go. I hope there will soon be a lot of new orders for that equipment at the day-job.
It is poetic justice that we’ve found a way to ultimately bring this pallet wood full-circle, placing it on a forest floor once again.
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Relative Something 