KpacoTa CnaceT Mup-Beauty Will Save the World

(Quote from Fyodor M. Dostoyevsky's THE IDIOT, 1869)


Thursday, January 29, 2009

"..... God counts her tears...."






A good friend emailed me the following. I especially love the first line, and the last. I'd never heard it before.

" "A Woman"
This is written in the Hebrew Talmud, the book where all of the sayings and preaching of Rabbis are conserved over time.

It says: "Be careful if you make a woman cry, because God Counts her tears.
The woman came out of the man's rib. Not from his feet to be walked on.
Not from his head to be superior, but from the side to be equal. Under the
arm to be protected and next to the heart to be loved." "



I had my husband and son read this. Of course, being a romantic and poet, my daughter wanted a copy.


I have been getting ready for my oldest daughter's graduation party to be held on the 7th of February. She just graduated university. She deserves a celebration. So, I have been very busy. Yet, I have wanted to work every day on artwork. Everything seems to take longer than planned, so I have been a bit frustrated. Tonight I finally made headway, working on many pieces in their base layers- on wood, and on canvas. Pictures soon to follow.

Tomorrow I drive my other daughter 2 hrs.+-(halfway) to meet a friend, then she's on to another retreat for the weekend. So I have a nice chunk of time out of my day tomorrow. I'm planning on stopping at antique joints along the way home, as I 'll be driving in Pa..Wanna' come along? :)

PS- She had a great time shoveling the ice and snow . Here are a few pics- of our house, and what this daughter does when she's on her own:) She also ate the snow on the car. She's my 'butterfly chasing girl'. :)

Goodnite!

PPS- Actually, having been to a couple of Jewish weddings, I believe that I have heard the above saying/quote/reading- yet I guess that I never paid much attention/or, maybe now I'm hearing it more clearly.I believe that I may have heard it there .Just lovely.

Friday, January 23, 2009

bunny in a 'boat',and a Santa/Elf


Having fun with Photo Booth.


Sailing my office in a shoe 'boat.


Close up of the little guy-he's worried that the waves are getting too choppy, and doesn't want to fall in.

So here's a little wool felt bunny guy that I made one night in bed last week before settling down for the night. He's got cotton pipe cleaner limbs and a really cute face. I like his expression.

I think he's taking a sail in the little Dutch shoe 'boat'. What do you think?

His mouth is made from a couple of knitted threads I pulled out of an an old sweater top of my daughter's( that she owned when she was about 8 or 9. She's 19 now). I saved the sweater because it's a wonderful cotton pattern that I knew I would want to use. I made a sweater for another little gentleman- a red hot kitty, who is not pictured here.

His tie is a fine brown corduroy with cute greenish polka dots. He , his face, and tie are all all hand sewn.

Then , the other photo is my daughter holding up a paper mache Santa/ Elf I made a while back. I finally finished him last November, and he sold right away in a show. Real folk art like.

What do you make late at night in bed? Now no personal stuff here:) Lydia

Wednesday, January 21, 2009

The Baton is Passed...a new generation is born!




My darling niece Christine , remember the one whose shower I went to,( and got stuck on the Interstate for 6 hrs. due to black ice(in Dec.))???

She had the most BEAUTIFUL baby girl yesterday early am, when all the early morning inauguration travellers were leaving their toasty homes to go to the freezing capitol(I live about an hour to an hour and a half from DC).

Yeah, Tina !!! Super wonderful job! And she has the most wonderful hubby who will be/is a doting and loving papa! The baton is passed. Christine is the oldest from all the 'kids' between myself and my siblings.

Mnogaya Lyeta!!! xoxoxoxoxo aunt la

A new Angel is in the Family!!! Yeah!!!

1st pic is Jason and Christine, w/Christine in Bonnet- and it was a 'beauty'.
2nd is Jason wearing the bonnet- Alex actually fooled everyone and put it on him first- Alex made the bonnet.
3rd are packages. I embellished the doll trunk for baby in Russian, and the stork is my glittered creation...

Monday, January 12, 2009

Vivian's apron and goodies- VERY Belated pictures



So, Mica at Garb-oodles Soup(www.garboodles.blogspot.com) had a Vintage APRON SWAP in Aug of last year. I never got the pictures up of Vivian's wonderful apron and goodies. I like my middle daughter modeling, and the only pictures that I got were when she was Little -Bo-Peep for Halloween. So the costume conflicted with the fab. apron. Boo Hoo. So I have wanted to retake pictures, and as of yet have not. So, I'm posting the first group of pictures here; which is what I should've done when I took them originally. (Just click to enlarge).

So, I'm Verrrrrrrrrrrrrrrry Sorry Vivian, but, life kinda' took over, and , well, all good intentions and all..and my camera is very old and hard to work.... but, I have been oh, so thrilled to receive all the goodies that I did. I love using the apron when cooking for special events/holidays, because it does a great job protecting my clothing. She also gave this wonderful candle in a white enamel container, which just happens to go with two white enamel cups that my daughter gave(you can see one of them here), and all three are living happily in my kids' bathroom. I also got a scalloped -edged rectangular , cool, old, aluminum cookie cutter-which I think would be great for making papier mache tags one day.And, I got red and white kitchen dish towels. How spoiled is that? :) And.... she made a cute sunflower pin!

Personally, I don't know how Vivian posts and photographs so much, and I am jealous that I can't do the same.

So, Once again, Viv, thank you from the bottom of my heart. xo Lydia

One down, two to go-or- Alex graduates University! Yeah!



So my first baby graduated yesterday , with a BA from the College of Fine Arts and Communications, at her university. She has a BA in PR-Mass Communications.

Whew- and Now, in debt, but two more to go! A small milestone:) Or is it? :)

We are so proud of you sweetie! We celebrated with dinner last night, and will have a party in February.

Trials and a Pair of Feet


Walkin' up the shoreline
I came across a wall.
I tried to climb it,
I had been invited to climb it,
but each time that I made an attempt
my nails kept scraping as I slid
back down the wall

Will there ever be a day that things will just go right?
I tried to teach Russian when I earned my degree 30 years ago. But there were no Russian teaching positions. So I traveled- all over the world. And each place that I moved to, I would look into the local programs, but there never were any open and available.

It's such a shame that the world keeps fighting, and not listening to one another.

When we need the diplomacy, there are just more new barbed words. ie- When we need languages like Russian to be taught in our schools, they just keep teaching, or attempting to teach, the basics. It's the dumbying down of our students. They don't even want to learn. They just want to learn how to pass the class. All because the system is broken, and all these tests are required to leave no one behind. And in effect, they leave many behind.

It's really very sad.

So I've applied for a position with a new local school for the arts, opening next teaching year. Of course they want Spanish and French. But, the kids don't even want to be there. It's such a shame.

So, I unexpectedly had the ear of the new principal, one phonecall, and offered to try to sway him to have Russian taught in his school.I applied by the Dec. 1st deadline. The next stage was a copy of my teaching certificate.

Well, When we moved into this house 3 years ago, there was a problem with our office. It was musty smelling. It took a long time, phone calls, promises, air quality inspectors, Attorney Generals office conversations and letters, and finally the builder made good. The problem had been from day one, and they were obligated, but because of the housing slump, did not want to deliver. They still have other items on our punch list to deliver. We've worked away the hardest, and more costly, and are still working on the basics like hot water heater...

So our office did not get set up 'til this fall. It's finished, but our paperwork is not.

So I could not locate my original teaching certificate. Things had gotten so moved around, so many times... So I had to write them about this situation,of which I was none too pleased . Well, in the meantime, I contacted my university, then NY State. Problem is, they have only 4 people working in archives in Albany, and you can never get through. !!!!! What a rig-a-ma-role!!!

So you can never reach them by telephone, email, or fax- and they never answer you. Well, I finally did get through, but all has to be done on line. I had to wait for them to locate my papers. They called me back that they had, and to form a account on-line to process the request.

EXCEPT, WHEN IT CAME TO PAYING, THE PAGE SAID 'SYSTEM ERROR' TRY AGAIN IN A FEW MINUTES. Yet, hours later , and many attempts later, produced only the same System Error! page. Get my drift? Well, try as I may, I was unable to contact them. Tried faxing, emailing, nothing.

Then one day last week, I was in my basement. Having gone through about 80 boxes, I decided to try looking again in places where I had already looked.

The first box I looked, there was a file folder, labeled, COLLEGE INFO. Of course I'd been through the whole file. But, being that I tend to be a bit organized, I knew that I would never just put such an important item just anywhere. And so I pulled out a file paper clipped, with a little piece of paper numbered 1 to about 16. I looked through the papers, and found the innocuous blue nothing page, with a copy of it right after it.

But , no, dear reader, I did not scream, as one who knew me might think. I then looked at the list on the front, and there , quite clearly, was written at number 12, teaching certificate qualification and copy.

Well, the story, you might think gets easier here. But, alas, no. That would be way tooooooo easy.So I emailed it, and a foreign language teacher assoc. membership card, to all concerned. I wanted to make sure that someone would get it. Things seem to stay around in these offices, as I've experienced, without anyone putting two and two together, to move things along.

Anywho, not minutes later, but days later, like today and Fri. night- I received a failure notice. Well, actually TWO of them!!!!! And this was to the main person. Now, unless her email has changed...So, I guess that I'm hand delivering and sending them.

I just cried this morning when I saw them. You see, I just want some things off my plate, so I can have fun and do art. When things hang on my shoulders, the weight just keeps getting heavier with each day, and I feel like it would be just too hard to pull everything out.

So I cried out that I was broken. I GIVE UP !!!!! I asked God to just have them let me know that they don't want me for the position, instead of this 'jerking around' of events. It is just toooo draining.

You see, my hubby is getting re-scanned as we speak, for his stage 4 lung cancer, and I'm tired of being on antibiotics for this acute, chronic, and co-infections of LYME. And after walking the Big DC Flea on Saturday, a little area in my lower back, where there is a 'fatty tumor' is aching. Nothing to write home about, but another thing to worry about 'til my Wed. Dr's. appt.. I'm thankful that I am way better. But I am really tired of being on antibiotics for over a year and a half, and want my body back.

Don't get me wrong, God has been very good to me and to us. It has been very hard financially, but I have always been able to reverse medical issues quickly. And I don't get sick when the kids do... I heal very well.

I want to feel like the other shoe won't drop off any minute. Oh, I know that there are people worse off than me. I have my children, my husband is working, but I feel much pressure to earn money. I do earn, but it's certainly not enough to pay the mortgage and then some.

Am I being selfish to try and spend time to do art? Am I being selfish to want to earn money with it? I do shows, used to have a few shops-didn't do badly with them either. Kept earning more, and having a great time. I feel , at times, that I should just throw everything out... But, then, I just can't.I feel that I have to create. Been doing it since I was so young. It would be like throwing away a huge part of me.

But, I'm in another place now. We've moved, and the area and economy are just not conducive to having a shop here. Just not yet.

OK- Pity party is done.(Well, on this blog at least). I'm sorry. Don't mean to burden anyone. That's the last thing that I would want to do. Just want to scream sometimes. EHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH !!!!!

There. That feels better. And my tears have stopped. My hubby got a tearful phone call of me giving up. By the time that he called me, I was over it. Just venting a little more here. I'm really not a woos. Some might say that I was very strong. Only, I just don't feel that way lately. And , I just don't want to be broken.

xo Lydia

PS - Ok- I have to make myself smile after that poor me rant. The picture above is labeled' Muzhiki otdikhayut'- The guys relaxing. It's my brother in Russia who sent the picture. I originally thought that it was him and his son, but my brother doesn't drink beer. Isn't it just darling?

PPS- What do you do to justify the artwork , when you feel that all is going against the grain? (If you ever feel that way).

Sunday, January 4, 2009

"Meritorious Beginnings Accomplishing Great Feats of Wisdom- The Guardian Angel's Pledge"






Ok- So I've been busy with the New Year trying out new techniques.

First 2 shots are of preliminary work, from rough sketch book to canvas. Canvases have been primed, painted, tissue papered , painted again, collaged, and painted some more ,,,

Next shot is in the wrong order- it's the finished product. Tryed the encaustic method (do I have that right??)- ie- the whole picture was painted a couple of times with wax. Unfortunately, the original should've been more brightly painted, as the wax really diminishes the color and brightness. Also, I have the clear beeswax pellets. To them, I added a little chunk of the honey colored, as all I had was a tremendous chunk of the honey colored bees wax, which would've taken a long time to melt in my Walmart cheapie crockpot.

Next picture is before the waxing was done.

And the last picture is me- about 27-30 years ago! Yeah, I still look that hot-Really, absolutely, positively, uh-huh.:)

It's a new day, it's a new dawn, it's a New Year, and I'm feeling good. So long as hubby's scans come out with good news on the 12th. Prayers are always welcome:). Have a Blessed Day.

PS- Has anyone tried the wax method? And if so, what pointers can you give me? I had to carve away at the words for them to be more clear. I actually like the effect. Title of post is what's 'written' on the canvas.

PPS- Which angel picture do you like best? The waxed, or unwaxed? Don't worry, you won't hurt my feelings, it's all experimental, anyway:)

PPPS- I pledge allegiance to the art work of the united creativities of la- la,la,la,la,la,la,la,la,la!!!... in this New Year!!!