81 years young!

I DROVE across the street (because it was pouring buckets) today to give our neighbor Dick a birthday card and discovered him happily tromping from the rain into his carport with a big smile on his face and his arms brimming with these magnificent golden maple leaves. He said they had fallen on his truck earlier and he thought they were too pretty to just brush off, so he brought them home like newfound treasure.

He may be 81, but he beams with a child's sense of wonder -- must be what keeps him so young. That and cruising the neighborhood on his John Deere riding mower looking for lawns to cut for fun.

 HAPPY BIRTHDAY! 

Soul of an Irish poet

This is what Kevin likes 

Fog in my front yard in Washington

My brother, Kevin, lives in sunny San Diego. I live in rainy (half the year, at least) western Washington. Kevin loves fog and rain and hates it when he has to deal with day after day of sun and heat. I get depressed when it's rainy and gray and come alive when the sun makes everything glow. So we're constantly volunteering to swap weather with one another.

This is what I like

Japanese maple in the sun by my door last week

Sunshine makes me happy!

The other day, Kevin was bemoaning the fact that the rain and fog promised by the weatherman didn't materialize and he had to deal with yet another sunny day in paradise. I volunteered once again to swap, and I liked his reply so much that I asked permission to put it here:

"I guess I’m just a sad Irish poet at heart. 

Watch the dark and dreary skies

through rivulets of rain running down the foggy windows,

while laboriously dragging leaden pen over pitted, yellowed parchment

to opine about the trials and tribulations of the 

human condition.

Then head over to Patrick’s place with the 

potato-whiskey jug

to drown out the bitter taste of another gray day." 

                               

                                                                  -- My brother, Kevin

Then he added: "Modern man can flip on the solar-spectrum lights and work indoors, log onto the blog and bitch about missing Hawaii since that last vacation, and order out for delivery.  It must have really sucked to be a potato farmer in Ireland back then."

Why, is that a green Irish potato on our Washington beach? No, it's just a rock and I took its picture last week because the green stood out so splendidly against the gray stones.

It all came together last week -- the sun and the rain and the Irish and their pot of gold at the end of the rainbow -- when I spotted this rainbow over the bay behind our house. That's the Bay of the Green Potato Rocks.

Have a colorful day!

Fall snapshots

We Pacific Northwesterners make the most of the sun when it appears this time of year. Today is gloriously sunny after a record rainfall earlier in the week, time to take pictures of the maples in front of the house before they drop the rest of their leaves. These next two photos are looking up and looking down at the same tree:

And while the sun is out, time to walk down to the water (which is really high today), past this little guy:
This next one shows the underwater plants and reflected trees in the estuary below our house:
On my way back into the house after taking these snapshots, I noticed that the lower angle of sun -- are we really turning the clock back in just a few days! -- gilded my quilt aptly titled "Light" that hangs near the front window, casting architectural shadows:
 Last week, I photographed Rosemary's winter pansies -- she has baskets full of them brightening her balcony:



Time for me to switch to fall colors in my coiled fabric baskets ...

... and here is some cotton that I just painted in the colors of fall leaves and blue sky. I may go back over it in select areas to give it more depth before I use it in my art:

But I saved the best for last. Here is Bunners snuggled in Julia's arms, all safe and cozy:

  

Isn't he the CUTEST THING?
I really think he needs his own Facebook page.

Have a colorful day!

Feet and Forks adventures

Oh, my! 

The ladies 

of the Feet and Forks walking group trekked through Bremerton this week and came across this sign in an antique store. Bremerton is a Navy town, but still, we

were SHOCKED!

The Feet and Forks

First we walk, then we eat

 

This week, we drove to Port Orchard and took a little foot ferry (that means no cars) to Bremerton for $2. Once there, we walked over a couple of bridges, through a park, along the downtown streets and -- surprise -- ended at a restaurant where we had

FISH TACOS AND CHOWDER.

We don't know what's being made in this project, but it was interesting to watch from the middle of a bridge. Below is a view of the snow-capped Olympic Mountains from another bridge.

And here are a few of the many

cool sculptures

 sprinkled throughout town:

To keep this quilt-related, here are two little fabric and bead collages I made using mostly fabric that I painted. I'll be doing more of these colorful pieces as we burrow deeper into the gray winter.

Have a colorful day!

Haiku and color inspirations

Hawaii sunset in January

Aqua skies streaked pink,
Lavender quilted fields float
through greens of summer.

-- Sherrie Spangler

Haiku accepted in "Eye of the Quilter"

Technically, this verse doesn't meet all the criteria for a haiku, but that's because I wasn't aware of all the rules when I wrote it. (I didn't include a "cutting" word.) Nevertheless, it was accepted into a photography/haiku exhibit called "Eye of the Quilter," which will open next month at the International Quilt Festival in Houston. The idea of the exhibit is to give viewers a glimpse into 

what inspires quilt artists.

Beautiful greens and lavenders of our summer garden ...

... and greens, lavender and soft blue in my hand-painted silk

Color is obviously what inspires me, especially colors from Nature. Sunsets, clouds, fields, water, lichen-covered rocks and mossy trees, deserts and flowers. I don't care much about realistic interpretations of Nature in my art. I like to just wallow in the color.

Shimmery fabrics in this quilt mimic watery reflections below

Sunset reflections in Gig Harbor last summer

And winter sunset reflections in California

I painted silk organza in watery blues and greens and suspended it in a window. Transparency and light are partners in my art inspiration, as well as color. It's a pretty good color match, though unplanned, with the photo below that I took last winter on my first trip to Hawaii.

Clear turquoise water in Hawaii against a steely sky
and black lava beach

Turquoise and a peachy coral is a luscious combination. Blue and orange are complementary colors -- opposite each other on the color wheel -- that make each other sing. Imagine the orange clouds below with the turquoise sea above.

 

 Gig Harbor sky, above, and water, below,

on different days.

 

The color that really makes me light up is a glowing yellowy green, like these leaves that I snapped near Hilo, Hawaii.

Brilliant green and purple is a common color pairing in nature,

one I often use in quilts to give them energy. 

Shots of fuschia and blue keep the eye moving

over this green quilt that I made years ago.

My furry "grandson," Marty, loves spring-green grass as much as I do. He's frolicking here in a dog park near Madison, Wisconsin. Black and white doesn't do much for me artistically, but it sure makes a cute dog. I think he needs a lime green and hot pink bandanna.

A note about my photographs: I don't like diddling around with camera settings or digital manipulations, so nearly all of my photos are taken on automatic with no further changes or "enhancements" except for an occasional crop.

Have a colorful day!

Pumpkins, owls and fallen leaves

Maple leaves, glistening after the storm.

Sunday (Rainday) started with Julia's pumpkin pancakes, lingon-berries and steaming coffee.

We've had days of rain, wind, thunder (almost unheard of here), and sporadic power outages. It's nice to hunker down inside for awhile, then that nagging voice says, "Get outside and make some vitamin D." So on went the rain jacket and down to the bay I trudged. The gravel roadway was matted with freshly fallen giant maple leaves, all yellow and orange (my favorite color). Some of those leaves are about a foot in diameter -- they grow 'em big out here. Ominous clouds obscured the Olympics on the horizon.

 

 Then it was off in the other direction to check out the cow pasture by the mailboxes (above). More downed branches and leaves.

 

On the way back, I stopped in Farmer Dave's garden and picked a few big Swiss chard leaves for vegetable lasagne, some lettuce and a green onion for a salad, and parsley for Bunners.

Midweek, we lucked out and had sunshine during a nature hike at the Tacoma Nature Center at Snake Lake, where paths wind through 71 acres of wetlands (above and below) and thick fir forests.

We chased the sun up into the tall trees, where it sprinkled the forest with the last rays of the day.

Above the trail, a barred owl 
waited silently for night.