JJ Worden

I love reading books.
I love seeing them stacked into enticing piles, spines luring me in.
I love feeling the heft of books, of leafing through them, the sound of pages ... worlds... thoughts... dreams... whooshing by.
I love fingering raised print, indented print, smelling old paper and moldy bindings.

I love how they can take me away. And jolt me into the present.
I love how they can be art.
I love how they can be repurposed into carriers and secret holders of things.
I love how they can be added to and reduced.

I love books.

Concealed Within – Destroying Identity by Linda Welch

Inga Hunter - Unwilling Journey

If She Thought It Would Help... Jody Alexander

Love Poem . Jo Stealey

I've always loved projects.
I haven't necessarily called them projects but I love grabbing a theme jumping onto a bandwagon ...solo or with others... clearing space, mental physical, and giving it all I've got.
I love to eat, breathe, sleep a project, a challenge, a "thing".
I love how it encompasses everything. It magnifies and in that miraculous way expands one's horizon.
A project latches onto its own universal energy and gloms onto similar like-minded energies.

Love. That.

I love that the internets is full of ongoing projects.
Nanowrimo . 52 projects . Texture Tuesdays . Flashback Thursdays . Freebie Fridays . The Sketchbook Project . Doodle Swap . Mail Art . ATCs . 20 Things . 100 Artists . The Mirror Project . Art By The Inch . Art Every Day . 365 Days . Project Life . Index Card-a-Day . and on and on and on.

I have 2 current projects.

1. Ten Teeny Things ... 10 artists create 10 things (TEENY things, the size of a small matchbox) send them to me and I return 10 individually artistic creations to each artist. This will be my 3rd time doing this type of project and I've been thrilled with the outcome. Can't imagine this one will be any different!

The First 20 Things!

2. A small Altered Book RR with 4 other people. As snobby as it sounds, the artistic caliber is high for this one, and I love how it makes me really stretch my thought process. What will my book be? How will it be presented? What do I hope for my compatriots experience to be when in front of my book? (wow. that was one awkward sentence/question!) I'll leave it at that for the moment, though that brain string led me down the most awesome path yesterday!!

Back on track ... Projects!
Love'em!

So. If you ever hear of an awesome project and think I might be interested? I probably am. Write me. Tell me. Let me in ... I'm ready to jump!

this is probably gonna be a 10 things list post. yah. lists are good.

1. I'm having trouble stringing words together. 
2. allergy meds are wrecking havoc with my life.
3. I can't believe that april is more than half way over.
4. completely ambivalent about food right now.
5. my kitchen homage to jamie oliver needs to be dismantled*
6. I miss that balls to the wall surge that only a deadline can create.
7. I made 4 things... clothing type things... last week.
8. ...and dyEd 2 of them. with turmeric!
9. I only like one of them. and then, only kinda sorta but I'm okay with that.
10. I haven't done anything with my garden. as in ZIPPOnada.

kitchen christmas frippery

... come closer (I think it might be Spring!)

As we headed out for our walk this morning, I was hatless and mittenless for the first time in months. As we walked up the hill, I unbuttoned my farm jacket and by the time we'd crossed the stream I'd tied it around my waist.

It's breezy. But warm. Flies buzz in my face ... happily drunk on being woken up out of their winter stupor. Any standing water has a ring of green surrounding it ... moss, algae, tender grass shoots. Stella was playing cow nibbling at any grass big enough to get her teeth on.

The garden soil is still cold but is completely thawed. Buds are full to bursting. With a few pussy willows waving in the wind. The lake is empty (of ice!) and we saw a loon circling. Tom said he heard one calling late afternoon yesterday. The crocus are out and the tulips push through the leaves and winter debris, inches at a time.

Windows are open and I have an overwhelming desire to put up the screens and haul out the porch chairs. And it feels like this is the first time, the very first time I've felt Spring. Every. Single. Year!

1. Overwhelmed by the response to my pondering post, my heartfelt thanks to all who stopped by and took the time to read and respond. I'm truly glad people think blogging isn't dead and that it's worth taking the time to read, ponder and connect. Maybe, just maybe there IS hope and I am not blogging in the wilderness.
2. I have postponed my Intro to Assemblage Workshop at The Biscuit Eater. Possibly indefinitely. Tom asked if I was okay with that, fearing my devastation perhaps.That whole not being loved thing, I guess. Truth be told, I'm MORE than okay with it. Teaching really isn't my thing. I don't think I'd be very good at that whole teaching-touring thing ... waaaay too much of an introvert for that. I need my downtime. But sharing? playing? yah. LOVE that. which got me thinking...
3. I'm contemplating an art-play-time-get-together-workshop thingie. how's that for completely ambiguous? my ideal pie-in-the-sky would be to invite 2 or 3 or 4 artists whose work I admire to come and stay here. where each person might give a half-day class/show and tell with the remainder of the time hanging out creating  and playing, learning from each other. Interested?
4. I've also been thinking of Art Challenges. (have yet to receive anything from this one folks. just sayin'!) I know I've mentioned this before wherein I used to do weekly/monthly art challenges. Something about the "we're all in this together" mindset that makes for such lovely shared connections and I miss it. I have a number of mail art type things on my plate and while I love these one doesn't really get to know the participants very well unless it's a Round Robin. Right now I'm at that in-betweeny stage of having just finished a giant push of work and nothing has quite gelled for  the "what's next". PERFECT time for an art challenge. So. if you're reading this. and you'd either like to participate in and/or have an idea for one, PLEASE comment okay?
5. I've been inspired by natural dyeing and slow stitching and paper and cloth. I have yet to DO anything about it however. And I know I want these things to be incorporated into mixed media and/or assemblage. The exact formulation however remains elusive. Come ON brain. Keep up!

Patched up . Ines Seidel

Geoffrey Gorman . Alipinus In Action