Green grass beyond the curtains

Sometimes life is more rich than others.

Once upon a time there was a girl and one day the girl managed to squeeze some spinal fluid out, and she lost the feeling in her foot and couldn't sit...for 3 months. She managed to loose her job and have to move out of her house...in the same glorious historic moment too. Aaaah life.

Aaah massive humiliation and  excruciating physical and psychological pain.

As we said, there was the girl...but attached to her, or she to them were....her daughter...her daughters father...her boyfriend...his daughter...the girls mother, father and brother, this other family with three boys...then another one with two girls...and that was just the way it was. 

One night the daughter was sad and wanted her own room.  "Daughter", 'the girl' said 'you're right, we don't have A house. We are EXTREMELY lucky, we not only have...count..." and the daughter counted..."4 houses?" she asked her little face starting to relax into a small smile. "YES!" I said "not only that but who's in your family now?"  1,2,3.......12..."12!" "YES! Where once it was 3, now you have 12!! You are one of the luckiest girls EVER!" 

And she was, and she felt the love and she fell asleep happy.

Sometimes family members sneak out at night though when other family return from the opera. Sometimes they just wont come in and sometimes those family members get eaten. Yes. Be thankful YOU have not been eaten by a coyote. It is the one real tragedy of this story that we lost

inky black the pirate cat 

in the middle of the night, one night, from that dark rodent infested field. I am sure he was just WAY too focused on a gopher hole and that it was a swift passing. He was always clumsy, he was the only cat I knew to regularly fall off fences, but we were his and he was ours and we miss him.

Beyond the curtains of my daughters sweet sleep, beyond the closed curtains on the life of our dear friend Inky black, there was need for other curtains, REAL curtains, not just dish towels or old skirts, but REAL working curtains.  

So I made some...out of paper bags.

I think that's all I want to say about that. They're easy to make, and at some point I'll put the HOW TO in the HOW TO place. In the meantime - I've got some green grass in my head for Inky black to play in for a while.

Bas Couture

Check it out homies! (if I may be so bold)... 

T-shirt-self made screen print of self portrait, leather jacket-£5 from Flip in Edinburgh.

Oh look!  We're in Scotland! Actually, I'm on scottish time right now having woken at 2 this am...i've been up since then. 

But this is Jill! She and I were in the same year in college in Dundee some 300 years ago. She's a shit hot painter. She's the one with the attitude on the left. Aaah Dundee days

There she is RIGHT NOW via satellite! Technology is so great! OK...She lives in Edinburgh and we talked about doing a house exchange a while back but I've been gathering no moss and that makes for a hard landing. I've got other friends over there too who would probably love to summer in SB so if anyone ever wants to swap flats for a while...and you're cool and all - let me know and my people can call their people etc etc. NOW...

T-shirt £5 at h&m,head scarf £3 at h&m, bracelet- Spanish steel,necklace- silver cake fork,large ring-Indian silver and Cubit Zirconi,Scone-Edinburgh.

Those are pound signs peeps. I can't help you with the air fare either. 

Hey Jill...will you have some clotted cream for me? I LOVE that stuff! 

 Thanks for participating and if anyone wants to send in photos of them selves looking great in their cheep ass clothes- PLEASE do so, and if I like you I'll post them! 

xxx

For more about my Bas Couture series, CLICK HERE

Bas Couture

 

This was a couple of days ago. Right now I look bad - up since two, but there I look like the guy from the Addicts/clockwork Orange, don't you think? Can you believe they showed that to us in Junior High film class? Clockwork Orange? Well - so our teacher was french, and super cool - but I was sensitive and had to walk out. Someone had already showed me a paperback called Helter Skelter...need I say more? Shoot! I had head gear, a rainbow hat and was listening to show tunes to put me to sleep every night.

Forever 21 has these great deals on stripy sweaters...this b eing one of them, and my skirt is hand made and from humboldt. I do love stripes and spots together!

For more about this series, click here.

My very clever boyfriend: garlic and the local farm

This is not a food blog...but when my very clever boyfriend does something spectacular in the kitchen (which he does allot - and just to set the record straight - I NEVER do) and if it some way relates - I'm going to mention it.

I'm a huge believer in the farmers market, organic food, buying local and all that stuff. With the risk of sounding too boringly earnest, I think it's really important to pay attention where your food, especially, comes from.

Santa Barbara's Farmers Market is pretty impressive all year round I think, but we lost a farm recently, one that was dear to my cash poor little heart. 

Windrose Farm in Paso Robles stopped traveling to us in SB as far as I can tell, so now we have to go to them. Why? Because they have THE BEST FRIGGING GARLIC  EVER! Yes they have lots of other awesome food and plants and stuff, but their garlic is amazing.

Last month my boyfriend bought something like two shopping bags full of different kinds.

Last night we had music garlic and something with an asian name. I am still in heaven.

But I have to run now and save the sunflower heads from the FRIGGING SCRUB JAYS! 

The business

Oulalie

These are my first business cards. They are from MOO who are totally nice to work with. Check them out, they're great and they have mini cards and sticker books...it's really super cool. The cards are printed on paper made from sustainably harvested trees in a box made from recycled pulp. The whole thing just looks good to me.

and look at this great box they came with. I'm just so excited !!!

Thanks MOO!

(P.S. You'll have to swap  cards with me if you want to see the back, which makes me feel like I'm suspended in a cloud.

Recycle this...

G          A          R          L          I          C  

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 Its ok!

Don't feel bad!

I don't understand it all anyways.

I'll just shake...and roll again

Outfit: Skirt $4 Alpha Thrift,(a long time ago), Sweater Buffalo Exchange, hair - Manic Panic, chair: Ikea

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Triumph of the little people

Can I refer to all of them as 'my' children? I worked with my daughters second grade class again yesterday...they RULE!

I have been making these little sheets  for them to warm up with. It's still hard to get a room full of 2nd graders to pay attention and do the same thing. Actually, it is pretty funny how much they DON'T listen.

I tell them to copy the box above, line, tone, shading, gradation, contrast, crosshatching, dots,erasing etc. Copy that first and remember guys: you need to develop your hand mussels to draw these kinds of lines, just like leg mussels for soccer, or arm mussels for tetherball or arm wrestling. I am promoting specific muscular development as much as I am trying to develop their keen little eyes. 

 I'm not using gimmicks, and the results may be hard to measure, but through these basic warm ups and looking and drawing projects - they are learning to observe.

Each class we start with the warm up lines and different ways of making marks with the pencil. It's like learning the alphabet. What can a pencil do and how they can control that.

Then we do blind contours. They are understanding the concept so much more this week. It is an  emotional thing for me to see this transformation happening because, if they practice this, if they get comfortable with this way of looking and drawing, they will be able to draw ANYTHING for the rest of their lives.

Draw what you see, not what you think you see. Look with your eyes, not with your brain.

 

I believe a foundation in art begins with learning how to observe. 

I wanted to say to them that there is no right or wrong way to make art, just different ways. But, it is a discipline like math or english, and as much as it benefits a person to learn to spell, and put sentences together - knowing how to observe, and translate those observations into drawings will be an invaluable ability.  

Why? Why do we write? Why do we do math? They are navigational tools, communication systems. They allow us to innovate and explore, to quantify and record. 

Art is that and so much more.

 

I see it as a back and forth. You learn how to look at a thing like it was the first time you ever saw it, and with virgin eyes you explore it's nuances while recording it with your pencil.

Then you learn how to generalize, you gather general information and techniques that help describe the object faster. I think for me, its this back and forth, between the general and the specific, the trained and the innovated, the method and the made up that produces the drawings with the most integrity.

By blocking out an object in general shapes on a page they are starting to experience an awareness of the general form of a thing, they are stretched beyond the attraction point, the thing that catches their eye and need to think about the whole first. Think of this in terms of the rest of ones life. Looking at the big picture first, positioning the framework then go for the details. 

And then there's  that thing called perspective. An individual point of view...and in my opinion, there's nothing better for these guys to explore than the concept that there are other perspectives out there and most are not exactly alike and this is a good thing. If you accept that someone else's perspective is just more information about the object or subject of your mutual exploration - you're on your way to having allot better time on this planet I think. 

I need to listen to myself here right now. PAY ATTENTION Holly.

At the end of the class I had them all draw me, from their own smart, sweet, oh so talented perspectives of course.

I am so glad I was wearing stripes!

Bas Couture

Oh yeah. The whole outfit costs maybe...$32 - thrift stores and f21, accept for my docks which I've had for 11 years now. They were $100 11 years ago. Want to see them? 

OOOOOOOh yeah. True love, complete support, flexibility, understanding, strength and durability. Houses for my souls. That's funny. You don't really hear about people having more than one soul...sole...or sea bass for that matter.

You know, I just went to the kitchen to get an egg and on the way I was thinking that what I really want is for YOU all to send in photos of what YOU are wearing, with the understanding that this is a nook about reuse, thrift stuff, very inexpensive clothes or things like that. That would be so cool! Will someone do it? Send me a couple of photos of some cool thing you're wearing and I'll see if it fits? And write a couple of things, or paragraphs about well...the clothes or your mood or what's happening that day?

Try to look as attractive as you can.

Try not to look like this....

but what am I saying? If you're feeling it...do it!

I have to say one more thing. I'm hoping misguided self image falls under the "mistakes are stepping stones" umbrella because I was having coffee with a pal today, talking about wanting a sleek, cutting edge, aesthetically stelar visually tight space...thinking this would somehow be easy, come naturally for me...when I realized I was sitting there in polyester shirt, really badly died bright red hair stuck in a topknot sticking straight up in the middle of my head, chewing my 1/2 blue painted nails. Oh yea...the living embodiment of high design. Ha! This series shouldn't have been called 'what was she wearing?' but 'what was she thinking?' Hmmmm, I like that. 

Bas Couture

There's my bottom half. That is MINUS the polkadot bag I was sporting in my hand across the school yard this morning. OOOOOOOh how much I have to say about this.  But I  won't. 

There's my top half formulating infant peace signs or getting ready to fight vampires. I'm not sure which. What I DO know is that I had a great time in my daughters 2nd grade class today and they did these FANTASTIC drawings of my outfit, and me. I'll try and get photos of them tomorrow.

Peace out. Chill and don't bring the bag to school again Holly.

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