empty nest

I'm excited. I'm excited for her, and I'm excited for me. People keep asking me, with serious, frowny expressions, "How will that be?" and I feel too embarrassed to say what I think is true: "It's going to be great."

She's leaving the nest. My husband said today, "She's grown, and has completely filled up the space that we can provide as parents. She needs new space to grow in to."

I know it's true. And I know that we, too, are ready for new space to grow in to; that we can choose how we are going to grow in to the space of her absence; with sadness, or with hope and excitement.

The truth is, I've been trying to write this post for a month, and I just haven't been able to finish it. But now it's time - this afternoon I watched her plane until it disappeared into the clouds. Literally. And I have no idea how I feel. I just told my husband "Forget it. I can't finish that post. I don't have some wise and pithy thing to say to other mothers - I have no idea how I even feel!" He said "That's it. Forget pith. Just say what's really happening. Go ahead. That's what matters." So what's really happening?

It's an emptiness that feels right. That's the best way I can describe it. In my body, in my psyche, it actually feels like the day she was born. Suddenly she's out in the world - she really doesn't need me to survive - (look! she's breathing on her own!) - and I still want to hold her close, but I know she'll never depend on me in the same way, because she's started her own journey. And yes, I feel empty, I feel strange. But I also know that I have my self back, in a new and important way. It's a new journey for me, too. So it's an occasion for joy. Win, win. And still, I'm weeping.

Sneak Preview

This is a sneak preview - ONLY here on my blog - of my new line of jewelry... the result of my recent button obsession. I've combined cast porcelain backings of my own making with actual Victorian buttons. By the end of the month I'll be launching a new Etsy shop to showcase these beauties and I'm really excited. I'd really appreciate your feedback on these new creations. What do you think of them? Which one do you like best? Would you buy one? What would you expect to pay for a piece like this? What other kind of imagery would you like to see on the buttons (bugs, birds, mythological scenes?)

Mixed Media Accordian Book

I created this little accordion book to showcase some of my New Year's goals and wishes. I submitted it to the new Cloth Paper Scissors online community, and was really pleased to discover that it is featured among other mixed media New Year's creations! Check it out here!

Aftermath

We had a wonderful going-away-party for my daughter tonight. A handful of us women had all seen our daughters off to the first day of kindergarten together. It had been a few years since we were all in the same room, all of us with our daughters. We found much to celebrate - mothers and daughters each and all moving into new phases of life, spreading our wings, moving on, discovering. It was an evening to reflect on the strength of women at every stage of life,t he endurance of friendship, the joys and challenges of parenting, the meaning of community, the mystery and excitement of growing up.

Mixed Media Monday: Thinking

I practice mindfulness meditation, a deceptively simple and very powerful buddhist mind training practice. In mindfulness meditation we don't attempt to empty our minds, we don't focus on an object, image, or mantra; we don't hold a goal of peace or transcendence or changing the nature of our mind in any way. It's all about noticing and observing. You sit, you notice and observe the breath. And when you notice that you are thinking, instead of judging the stream of thoughts ot attempting to stop or change it, you just notice, and gently remind yourself, "thinking." Just name the thought, "thinking."

When I saw this week's Mixed Media Monday topic, "What Was S/He Thinking," I knew I wanted to submit a piece about the process of mindfulness mediatation - so here are two more ATC's! Happy Monday!

Artful Reminders:


Soulful, artful island RETREATS for women - make art, journal, dance, do yoga, practice deep self care, learn to celebrate the sacred in daily life - all with a group of like minded women in our forest retreat at the heart of our Gulf Island... YUM!!!!!! Read more here, and join the mailing list here.





Seven Keys to an Artful Life - I'm so excited about launching this on-line circle for artful living - begins March 21st! Read more here.

Early Masters of Mixed Media

No, Mixed Media is not new. The radical techniques of collage, assemblage and use of found objects were pioneered by artists like Kurt Schwitters (top two), Robert Rauschenberg (third down) and Joseph Cornell (bottom two) in the early and mid 2oth Century.

The Cailleach

At home in Scotland and Ireland, she is the Old Woman of Winter who regains her youth each Spring. She is the holder of ancestral wisdom, sitting in meditation on cliffs and mountaintops, through snow and storm. She is the spirit of the land, the possessor of the land's true sovereignty. She is lichen on rock, slow and tenacious; she is the raven taking flight into the cold wind. She is the creator goddess, and her consort is the sun god.

Mixed Media Monday: Games and Play

Here are two ATC's on the theme of "Games People Play" for this week's Mixed Media Monday. For those who may not know, an ATC is an Artist Trading Card, a tiny work of art in any medium, the same size as a standard trading card (like a baseball card.) Some artists like to meet to trade their cards. The only rule for ATC's is they may not be sold - by definition their value is not commercial. ATC's are fun!

Sunday morning = Goddess Time! Here's what it's all about: I've been engaging in this practice for a while now, but listening to this podcast gave me a name for it... goddess time. Yes! This is a practice for busy women with lots of responsibilities and demands on their time and person. (That's pretty much all of us, right?) Here's how it works for me. On Sunday morning, my time is my own. No one else (including my internal taskmaster) can tell me what do, or even make requests. No phone. No e-mail. It could be a walk, or yoga, or blogging, or a wander in the garden, but usually it's bed, tea, scented candle, journal, pens, huge stack of books and magazines, plus the little dog who thoroughly approves of mornings in bed. I've worked to make my bedroom feel like a little sanctuary, so I relish this *free* time I get to spend there. It makes the whole week easier. Where can you fit some goddess time into your life?

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Friday afternoon was fun. A trip off the island and 40 minutes down the coast brings us to one of our favourite little towns, which also has my favourite thrift store, favourite natural foods market, best ceramic supply warehouse, and favourite sushi place. So that was the agenda. Actually, my sweetie dropped me off at the thrift store while he went to the ceramic supply. This works better for both of us. After a quick cruise for buttons (there weren't any) I went straight to the book section, and then straight to the back corner, where all the atlases, dictionaries, and encyclopedias are kept. I collect old dictionaries for mixed media play, and I can usually find a good one here for about 75 cents. I bent down to grab an old atlas off a lower shelf, and saw a dusty box pushed far back under the shelves. My pulse started racing a bit. I pulled the heavy box out into the open, to reveal a full 16 volume set of The Book of Knowledge, first copyright 1916, republished in 1946. The first page I opened to was a full colour plate beautifully painted common eggs of wild birds. I snapped the book closed and looked around, fearing that I might be suddenly mobbed by others who could see that I had found a real treasure. There was only one other woman in the vicinity, and she was thoroughly involved in a coffee table book about the Irish countryside. I quietly turned my body so as to block her view of the prize: 16 volumes, brimming with gorgeous colour plates, interspersed with hundreds of quaint black and white illustrations on every subject from astronomy to architecture to nursery rhymes. My head was spinning. I was thinking about creating gorgeous collage sheets, about pulling things out and framing them, about making all kinds of art, and mostly about how I just had to own these gorgeous books. I looked for the price, and found nothing on any of the books, nothing on the box. Just then, an announcement came, letting us know the store was closing in five minutes. Yikes! I tried to pick up the box, but it was much too heavy, and I already had a basket full of old atlases, which was weighing me down a bit, and I was loathe to let go of. What to do? Clutching the volume with the egg illustration (if nothing else, I wasn't leaving without this!) I went in search of someone to help me, reluctantly leaving the heavy box under the shelves. 10 minutes, $20, and a bit of sweaty dusty wrangling later, I was sitting on a bench outside the thrift store, a huge, heavy, dusty box beside me, looking, I'm sure, like the cat who swallowed the canary. My husband pulled up, smiling, then took in the box, his smile fading... So for my Goddess Time today? I'll be sitting down with these beautiful new books!