Category: Sources of inspiration

Color Junkie, continued

Lavender and I have a history. My older sister had a lavender dress that I thought was Absoloootely Beyoootiful, and I couldn’t wait for her to outgrow it. After about a zillion years, I finally made it to 3rd grade, and the dress was finally mine. I tried it on, stood in front of Mom’s full-length mirror to admire myself and was horrified to discover that my skin looked yellow! T I ran from the room, yelling for Mom! She said, “My goodness! Looks like lavendar isn’t your color!” It was a terrible moment, one that sealed a poor opinion in me toward lavender and its stronger cousin purple (or more correctly known as “violet”). Since then I’ve learned that anyone can wear almost any color. It is the shade that matters, the hue, the variation. That particular shade had too much red in it, and still makes me look like an advanced case of jaundice. Put me in a shade with lots of blue, and the compliments fly my way. Lavender, violet, purple, lilac – there are many names for this color.

Lavender, the plant

Lilac, the plant

color obsession lavendar

True confessions of a Color Junkie

A few months ago I was at Creekside Yarns, knitting with April and getting some help with a project. As we sat there together, I kept seeing the bins of sale yarn and they were bugging me. Finally I told April that I just HAD to organize the yarn by color. She just looked at me for a moment, and then said, “Color Junkie.” WOW! THAT’S IT! I am a Color Junkie! After she outed me in that small but momentous revelation, all the evidence of being a color junkie is surfacing in my memory. Here is the first one: as a kid, I remember lying on my bed just contemplating the colors in the bedspread. Suddenly I was totally captivated by the blue – it just mesmerized me with its beauty. I jumped up, ran to find Mom and tell her. Lacking an understanding of my Color Junkie beginnings, all I could think to express was this: “My favorite color isn’t pink anymore – it’s blue!” I’m sure she was puzzled what brought it all on; I’m thankful she just kindly listened. Here is a look at part of my blue obsession:

favorite flower

a painting subject I couldn’t resist and will probably paint over and over

my kitchen floor

chair in my herb garden

blue color obsession

More on Yokohl Valley

Looks ever so slightly Montana-ish to me.

This calls for a bicycle to follow the road!

This one definitely wants a picnic.

Another Morning Walk

Because the redbud wasn’t fully out yet, I had to return to BLM land yesterday. Here is the only photo that really shows the across-the-canyon display:

It isn’t paint-able for me – but perhaps a abstract painter or a weaver (HEY NIKKI, you listening??) might find inspiration here. Of course, I could always get yarn in these colors. . . of course, I could always get more yarn!

Exploring further afield

Instead of confining my adventures to Three Rivers and Mineral King, I went into Yokohl Valley. Not sure if this beautiful place will survive because of the plans of Boswell to create a new town. The building up of Orange County in my childhood horrified me – it looked less rural every time we visited Grandma or Grammy. It would break my heart to see that happen here in Tulare County. Yes, I know everyone has to live somewhere; please, let it be somewhere else! Michael came along as my driver so I could fill my eyes and decide where to stop without causing wrecks. We worked the first layer of the road along with a wee bit of trespassing over the course of 2 days. The flowers were fantastic. It is hard for me to compose shots of just hills and grass; my better pictures involved fences, trees and/or flowing water. Here are a few ideas for upcoming paintings:

Tulare county yokohl valley

Morning Walk in Three Rivers

A mile above my house is a beautiful place which goes by many different names: Case Mountain, Salt Creek, Craig Ranch, and BLM. I call it the last one, which, if you are not a Westerner, you might not know means “Bureau of Land Management”, which is under the Department of the Interior. But enough blah, blah, blah – you probably came here for the pictures.

Earl McKee keeps his horses here. In the morning before the sun hits, they have a little convention that looks like they are frozen in place. It was chilly!

The other JB and I were headed into the sunshine.

There are 2 seasonal waterfalls up there.

Did you know “cataract” is another word for waterfall? The dictionary says it is “a large waterfall”; I wonder if “large” refers to volume or height.

The variety of wildflowers was stunning, and I am rather proud of knowing the names of all these. I’m content with photos; JB wanted some to press and dry. Reminds me of my great Aunt Mary, who lived in Three Rivers when I was young. She made beautiful stationery with dried wildflowers and taught me their names.

We walked for a little over 3 miles before having to turn around. The only consolation in cutting our walk short is that the Redbud aren’t yet in bloom and give us a reason to return soon.

BLM land Case Mountain Craig Ranch Salt Creek Three Rivers

Winter, continued

I’m writing blog entries when I should be painting. Painting is supposed to be my first priority now, so anything else produces guilt. But, I feel compelled to stay in touch, and tell you about another trip into Mineral King. As usual, it provided more inspiration, recreation and good times with Michael in the snow.

There has been avalanche activity in the valley. First, a slide came down off spud mountain. The real name is Potato Hill because it reminded the Irish miners of rows of potatoes in the fields of home. Those rows are avalanche chutes. Here is one result:

This is a little shed that prolly needed rebuilding anyway. . . out of respect for my friends and neighbors, I will leave this without identification, and will also not show the cabin that got knocked off its posts. (It doesn’t look nearly as dramatic in the photos as real life anyway!)

Another slide came down Chihuahua, which is the drainage across the valley from Spring Creek (about 1/2 mile before Crystal).

It is all snowy, so how do you know this is a slide instead of just snowfall? It is fan shaped, like an alluvial fan but made of snow instead of dirt. And, it covered the creek that is exposed in other parts of the valley:

There are also broken branches and other debris, but it isn’t that pretty in a photo, so I skipped that part of today’s lesson in Mineral King Winter. (There won’t be a test or any homework, no worries!)

Mineral King Mineral King in winter

Spring in Kaweah Country

If you are reading this in Chicago or Alexandria or somewhere else that is having a real winter, please don’t do anything rash but just try to enjoy this posting. February is spring in Three Rivers. Down the hill in Visalia those poor folks have to contend with fog and gray days, but up here there are fiddlenecks in bloom, along with something white, an occasional plum tree, and narcissus. The daffodils are about to pop in my yard, as is the flowering quince. The green kind of looks fake because it is so very intensely green. This is how things looked on a recent walk:

My husband sometimes rides his bike along with me on my long walks. It helps pass the time, and he brings water. 😎 On days like this I have my little camera; someday you may see paintings that look oddly familiar!

Three Rivers

More on Mendocino

There is a popular book among artists called The Artist’s Way by Julia Cameron. It recommends that artists take field trips to gather new inspiration. So, I took a field trip to Mendocino. I believe that we absorb much more visually that we realize, and although I might not have immediate plans to paint scenes of the North Coast (no outlet for selling them – gotta be practical here!), the beauty, the colors, something I saw in one of the galleries (or the yarn shop), something I saw or thought of while on my 9-1/2 hour drive could be the seed of a new idea. My friend is as obsessed with seaglass as I am with yarn, and since she lives in the Seattle area, we don’t get to spend much time together. I learned of Glass Beach in Ft. Bragg, and we decided to meet there. Although it was a stormy weekend, it was ideal. The best time to find seaglass is after a storm, and we were blessed with a sunny Saturday for our foraging.

The waves were awe inspiring.

This just cracks me up – Seattle girl soaking up Vitamin D on a California beach in January, BAREFOOT in a place called “Glass Beach” and with Starbuck’s coffee in her hand!

We had shoes on for this part.

It was definitely what John Eldredge refers to as a “rainbow day”. http://blog.ransomedheart.com/john/

Ft. Bragg Glass Beach John Eldredge mendocino

Wild cats in my workshop

You may have discerned that I have a real weakness for cats. Back in 1987, there were some wild cats living underneath Thrifty Drug Store in downtown Visalia. I shared a parking lot with these cats and fell in love with one of the little ones. A man named George fed them regularly and helped me catch the long-haired one with Siamese coloring. Turns out this is a breed of cat called “American Ragdoll”. Of course I understand that my little cat was just a lucky accident of random breeding, but she most definitely had the characteristics of the Ragdoll breed. We had Fritzi for 13 years, and she was definitely the cat love of my life. After we lost her, I began looking for a baby Fritz. We had Wilson (aka Buster), Scout and Prudence, and then Zeke and Amos. The only survivor in this attempt so far is Zeke. He is definitely NOT of the American Ragdoll breed, although he does have the coloring and the size. Last fall, my friend from the Sequoia RV Ranch http://www.sequoiarvranch.com/ told me of a litter of cats underneath one of their storage mobile homes. When she described them, I knew I was a goner. Michael told me to just go get all three, and now for about 2 months we have had a mom (Cashmere) and her 2 little boy cats living in the workshop where I paint.

One of those little guys still won’t let us touch him. Look at him:

He has no tail and he hoppity-runs like a Manx. So far we have called him Hoppy, Cassidy, Butch, Manx, Dummy, and currently, Steely Dan. (He steals around? His eyes are steely blue?) How can one name a cat who won’t respond to any overtures in a positive manner? I could call him Scairdy or Chicken Little, but I like names with a little dignity for the cats in my life. By the way, Cashmere is reminding me an awful lot of my sweet Fritzi! Her son O’Reilly is just bold and fresh, and reminds me a bit of Buster. This guy? I dunno, I just dunno. Sigh.

American Ragdoll