hey dooders

Playing Chicken

2012-01-22T10:01:00.001-06:00

Over Christmas I actually got to make a few things. All two of you who are part of the in crowd of theo already know about this, but posting it anyway for posterity:

Heh yeah I just stole the pictures off of Holly's blog. I guess the USian government H8s me now. Oh well, not like I ever played by other people's rules.

I saw a chicken quilt on pinterest, and decided to make one for Holly since she is a pastoralist now--there has to be some advantage to having little char to care for. Although I'm sure little char can probably care for herself, I'm also pretty sure she's probably totally self-absorbed and narcissistic, which means she is very demanding. And she prolly tries to peck out the eyes of all the happy chickens named after hebrew letters who don't give her books even after they promised to.

Anyway it's a pretty simple piece, just fused the pieces on and machine embroidered, and quilted in a freeform feather pattern. It's been a long time since I've done any extensive machine embroidery, so I wasn't sure how it would turn out (especially because I had no stablizer), but I used some old bounce sheets and went to it. Here is a shot Holly posted of the embroidery.

Skillz-I still has em.

Going to Ignore Life and Make Things Now.

2011-12-17T03:16:00.000-06:00

Wow. Do not like this new blogger. It keeps changing the post!

I haven't made anything in a long time. And it's been even longer since I did any beading (a good 5 years at least). When I first learned how to do beading, I started with peyote stitch. It's been more constistently the one stitch I go back to all the time just because it's pretty easy and doesn't require equipment of any kind.

Because I hoard the first thing I made in any technique (I have plans of one day making a crazy quilt with a lot of this junk in it) and because I love it, I still have the first thing I ever made in peyote stitch:

I made this bracelet when I was about 20. I saw a picture of a similar one in a magazine and like everything, thought I could make that. So I learned peyote stitch in order to make it, not knowing that the wider something is, the more difficult it is to keep it even. Anyway, I stitched it loose (which I always liked because it's kind of drapey) and made a lot of mistakes, but I always really loved the bracelet. It is huge-at least 2.5" wide (though not consistently as you can see) and it really reflects my philosophy of trying new things. That being when you are first learning a technique you should try the hardest thing you possibly can just to see if you can do it. If it looks good you can pat yourself on the back because of your mad skillz. And if it looks terrible, you can blame the difficulty of the pattern rather than your lack of said mad skillz.

Anyway, the bracelet is getting very raggedy and has had to be repaired several times, so to distract myself from the fact that there is currently nothing in my life that doesn't make me utterly miserable, I decided to make another one. I didn't want to rip that one up (the hoarding) so I picked out new beads to make a second one.

These are the tests I did with different bead combinations. At first I didn't like the one with the silver lined turquoise (at the bottom), but it has definitely grown on me. I think I just didn't like the fact that it was very different than the original. Out of the combos I settled on, I used mostly Japanese beads (prefer the rounded cylindrical shape of the non-delicas) but the perfect turquoise I found was a Czech. Caused some problems because a) the doughnut shape and b) I accidentally bought a size 10 instead of 11 like the rest, but hey it makes things interesting. The pictures don't do the frosty opacity of that turquoise bead justice (the one drawback of my phone is that its camera is frankly crap). It's a really pleasing colour.

The new version. It's pretty wavy and not so even, due partly to the differences in beads and the width of the weaving, but turned out pretty well. It also was a fair bit shorter than the original so it just fits on my wrist (and as mem knows I have the Moore toothpick wrists, so it's small).

See?

This picture really doesn't capture well how different they look. The silverlined reds do show up nicely in the newer cuff though. One more of them together to show a little of the contrast:

First Church of the Utter Narcissist

2011-08-29T09:56:00.001-06:00

Brothers do not be children in your thinking.

One of the interesting things that has often been noted about the book of 1 Corinthians is how Paul corrects the errant behaviour and childishness of the Corinthians with the gospel. It seems counter intuitive, and leaves one wondering why he thought this was so important when it’s pretty clear they had major issues with practice. Why is Christ Crucified the only thing he determines to know among them? Why does he lace a letter that has to deal with a variety of terrible behaviour with doctrinal truths?

I think the reason becomes apparent when we consider the common thread of the behaviour itself. While there seem to be a plethora of issues, all of them-from picking Apostolic sides to interrupting the assembly to eating up everything at the Lord’s supper-are mere symptoms of what the Corinthian problem really was. Paul diagnoses the underlying illness, it is this problem that he seeks to heal with the word of the gospel-the problem is simply incurvatus. Or in English, plain old selfishness.

The Corinthians exhibit all to the childishness that only narcissists are capable of, because narcissists really do believe the world does revolve around them. Even Christianity is all about my salvation, my satisfaction, my sanctification. Right? Me me me.

But unfortunately for our narcissistic tendencies, our religion isn’t called “metianity.” There is someone else’s name in the title. Someone else who gets the top billing. The story has another protagonist.

Paul hits the narcissists of Corinth with the gospel because anyone who really thinks it’s still all about them after everything he has preached has missed and misunderstood what the gospel really is. And Paul reminds them of the fact. When he preaches Christ Crucified, he does it to remind them not only of the work of Christ, the climax of all human history, but also to say “that means the climax isn’t you, you short-sighted morons“.

The gospel transforms us because the gospel inverts us. It pulls us from our natural orientation of self as centre of a decaying universe, and pulls us outward. Suddenly we see a new kingdom, where someone else is King. Not only does it present us with the true centre of the universe giving up everything to pay our debts, but it reorients our entire perspective to him. To the one bearing the shame of the cross. Not because he demanded his rights, but because he gave to those who had wronged and deserved nothing from him.

To say we still want to do it our own damn way is to return to our own navels. So we throw childish tantrums, sue one another, take offence at minor slights, even disrespect the table of the Lord. Our belief that everything is permissible is nothing more than a colossal example of missing the point. Of everything. Paul repeatedly tells his childish readers “imitate me”-then goes on to say how he has given up everything, asked for nothing, demanded no rights-”as I imitate Christ”.

We are given insight to the need for the narcissist to hear the gospel by the parable of the unmerciful servant. As Christ said, if you don’t forgive neither have you been forgiven. And I have long thought he meant that the bitter and unforgiving have no idea what they’ve been given in forgiveness. They do not appreciate how much was done for their benefit. They don’t really “get” forgiveness. We who have been forgiven much should love much. Not only love God whom we haven’t seen, but love our brothers whom we have. This is why John ties this kind of love to the gospel. Not because it’s a substitute for the preaching of Christ, or because it somehow is part of the gospel, but because people who get the gospel inevitably come to love the unlovable, even as they themselves have been unloveable recipients of the love of God.

So the one who can’t forgive and sues his brother, the one who eats up all the food and ignores his hungry brother, the one who lords his gift of tongues over his brothers-these people simply don’t get the gospel. They really don’t get it. And they need it. Those who think they are wise and worthy, those who think they have the right to have everything their way, those who love to be first-there is something very deficient in their thinking. And that thing is the vision of God himself not grasping for equality, but lowering himself to become a servant. Divesting himself of his right to destroy and punish and absorbing the cost in the body he took to himself forever. That’s what it’s about. Any who still whine when they don’t get what they want or have their way haven’t been sufficiently shamed out of it by the power of the gospel.

And Paul does use the gospel like a surgeon. As a sharp knife that cuts away the flesh of our hearts and eyes, that cuts the contracted tendons, that cuts the tie to our own navels. The knife that makes the painful cuts to kill and purge evil-the evil that is our native tongue. Not with eloquent words, but in power and by the Spirit.

It's been five years

2011-03-24T15:10:00.000-06:00

The anniversary of my dad's death reminded me of this song.

It seems like a long time of waiting. And I think of how different things are now than they were then. And how different I am. The ironic thing in it all is that that ordeal is what put me here now. God really is true to his word and he does reveal himself in contraries. Still I wish that I had one more chance...

You Wish You Were This Brilliant

2011-01-20T22:28:00.000-06:00

In case you were wondering how John is looking (I'm sure you weren't but here he is in all his decorous glory anyway). These things do take time. It never looks right in small versions and this picture does read pretty dark (and grainy), so make sure to click through to the full picture to see it.

Mostly I've been working on the hair. Some of the usual build up of white spaces also. It's always interesting to see how it reads in photos, because you can see problems that aren't obvious when actually in front of the work. Well and I hate the lighting in the crapartment. Along with everything else about it.

I have to settle on some background stuff because I really only have bits of tweaking to do before the local colours. Nothing is really what I want.

I have to say one thing I do like is that he looks way smarter and more learned than You. Which is of course a reflection of reality. So that's good.

This is Why We Call it Arian

2010-12-28T17:24:00.000-06:00

In brief, God is inexpressible to the Son.
For he is in himself what he is, that is, indescribable,
So that the son does not comprehend any of these things or have the understanding to explain them.
For it is impossible for him to fathom the Father, who is by himself.
For the Son himself does not even know his own essence (ousia),
For being Son, his existence is most certainly at the will of the Father.

Arius of Alexandria (context here)

The Son, as a human, couldn't possibly know his own ousia you see.

I Know Just How He Felt

2010-12-27T06:33:00.003-06:00

Earlier in the month, Rey wrote a pretty funny send up of the problems with Kenotic Arian anthropology. Read it here:

Was Jesus Upset About Santa?

I realize this is a little late, but I wanted all the KA stuff to point back to one place (ie MY blog) when The Don or The Don's minions stumble across it so that he (or the minions) can then contact me about his excellent forthcoming forward to the book. Mem even gave me a German subtitle: Lehrung der Tools. Or something like that. Hopefully The Don approves.

I bet Jesus was also was super excited about The Don writing a forward to his book so he knows just how I feel and will work to give me what he got! Right?

Modern Guilt

2010-12-20T14:17:00.001-06:00

One of our discussions reminded me of one of my many aborted blog posts sitting in the drafts of this blog. Since it's back in my mind, I decided to dust it off a little and post.

One of the things I find interesting about human nature is how adverse we are to anything that might be unpleasant, even that which is good. I think it says a lot about our incurvatus and how pathetically desperate we are to maintain it. So here we are, creating many theories and religions and devices to prove that unpleasantness isn't really real, much less necessary. Even we Christians have our Word-Faith heresies.

I was recently reminded of how we, in our narcissism, now tend to see guilt as a deadly enemy. Guilt is ~~unpleasant~~ evil, and one couldn't possibly feel guilt because they are guilty. Oh anything but that. That kind of attitude just keeps one from being truly happy. Guilt is no consequence of your wrongdoing-it's the problem. And the solution then is to remove the sting of it, and re-label your sins, yourself.

But this dresses the wound only slightly and proclaims double fold peace when there is no peace at all. How can there be peace when we rip ourselves from our creator and then pretend we can "walk it off" as we bleed out all over the place? So we go through life suffering a vague and unsettling sort of "modern guilt"-like the song says, we don't know what we've done but we do feel ashamed.

This I think is captured well here;

The sad thing here is that this flight from guilt means not only a life of delusion, but a life of spiritual misery. If you are guilty, you are alienated from God, and you flee from Him. Then you are lonely at a fundamental level, because only God understands you deeply and can supply the deep fellowship that you yearn for. Cut off from God, your life is meaningless, because meaning flows from God. In addition, you lose capacity genuinely to befriend other people, because you can't admit your guilt to them. Instead of loving others, you are caught up with maintaining your own self-esteem—your own pride. You are swirling in a downward spiral toward death.

Vern Poythress (see the rest of this article here)

A spiral of death-orbiting around my navel.

He Put an End to Corruption for All

2010-11-30T18:21:00.004-06:00

You may be wondering why we are discussing the origin of men when we set out to talk about the Word's becoming Man. The former subject is relevant to the latter for this reason: it was our sorry case that caused the Word to come down, our transgression that called out His love for us, so that He made haste to help us and to appear among us.

It is we who were the cause of His taking human form, and for our salvation that in His great love He was both born and manifested in a human body. For God had made man thus (that is, as an embodied spirit), and had willed that he should remain in incorruption. But men, having turned from the contemplation of God to evil of their own devising, had come inevitably under the law of death. Instead of remaining in the state in which God had created them, they were in process of becoming corrupted entirely, and death had them completely under its dominion.

For the transgression of the commandment was making them turn back again according to their nature; and as they had at the beginning come into being out of non-existence, so were they now on the way to returning, through corruption, to non-existence again.

The presence and love of the Word had called them into being; inevitably, therefore when they lost the knowledge of God, they lost existence with it; for it is God alone Who exists--evil is non-being, the negation and antithesis of good.

...The Word perceived that corruption could not be got rid of otherwise than through death; yet He Himself, as the Word, being immortal and the Father's Son, was such as could not die. For this reason, therefore, He assumed a body capable of death, in order that it, through belonging to the Word Who is above all, might become in dying a sufficient exchange for all, and, itself remaining incorruptible through His indwelling, might thereafter put an end to corruption for all others as well, by the grace of the resurrection.

Death By Incarnation

2010-11-03T14:18:00.001-06:00

More on the KA front; Mem told me to google and see how Rey's post introing mine still beat mine out on Google hits. Which is lame. But it also yielded this (check out the bottom third of the article).

Not sure how old it is, but this guy nailed it-and in a much more succinct manner than I was able to do. Especially this:

this version of kenosis is presenting incarnation by subtraction rather than by addition. Indeed, kenosis is incarnation by deicide!

Incarnational deicide. Man I wish I'd thought of that one.

The Blog Post That Launched a Thousand Blog Posts

2010-10-19T11:35:00.005-06:00

I've noticed that some theological errors are very much born out of the specific milieu in which they fester. There are former baptists who become Reformed and become enamoured of Federal Vision or Arminians who go all out in Open Theism. They're pretty specific to their respective groups, and those groups spend a lot of time battling their own flavour of heresy. But sometimes errors come along that are wide-reaching and amorphous enough to touch many people and denominations in many ways.

One I'm seeing crop up from several different angles is something I've dubbed Kenotic Arianism. Kenotic because it has to do with the nature of Christ's lowering himself in the incarnation, and Arian because it ultimately strips him of his divinity at some point, even while it paradoxically struggles to affirm that he is God.

Because some people keep bothering me, I'm going to try to trace this trend and hopefully refute it (and maybe Don Carson will pick up the torch and edit a massive tome on it with a German subtitle). The doctrine has many implications, and the antecedents in known kenotic theology are proving a fascinating maze. It branches out all over the place really, especially given the diversity of positions amongst those who hold to some variation of it. And I'm a terrible intuitive and non-linear thinker. But to get the theo boys off my back, I'm providing a brief(ish) overview here, with the possibility of fleshing it out later.

From what I'm seeing, Kenotic Arianism starts out as an anthropological error that leads to graver theological problems. That is, in most forms I'm familiar with, it begins with a mistaken notion of what it means to be human.

Rey asked once "is the statement 'to err is human' an ontological one?" That is, are errors an essential part of our created nature as humans, or are they an acquired characteristic? I think the question is apropos-it's one the kenotic Arian will ultimately answer "yes" to in one way or another. And from this springs many of his problems. He, in typical idolatrous human fashion, looks at himself in order to see God. But it's done in a very different manner than the idolator might. He will say he looks at himself to describe the human nature of Christ. The logic is, "I am human, and Christ was made in the likeness of sinful flesh, so what I am as a human must be what Christ also took on in the incarnation." That only makes sense doesn't it? Surely Christ was one of us-that's scriptural. But the conclusion is bass-ackwards. It also fails to take into account the effects of the fall on the human race-which has left us irreparably damaged and something less than fully human. Several church fathers (especially my favorite, Athanasius) refer to the effects of the fall as "corruption," and I think this is the most useful term for us to keep in mind.

Corruption suggests a deterioration of soundness, particularly through a destructive or contaminating influence. It is especially used for those falling from a high position as those made in the image of God must be. Sin entered, and I died. The Torah concept of "uncleanness" is in essence, a temporal picture of corruption. We were made for communion with God, as branches receiving life from the vine. At the fall, the branch was chopped off of the vine and began to die. Now, the branch, humanity, displays the effects and stench of slow decay. We are now something less than human. We are contaminated. We are corrupt.

Christ on the other hand was and is not corrupt in any way. He is fully man-more fully man in fact than any of us have ever been. I would say the Kenotic Arian emphasizes the man part of that phrase (even as they insist marks of corruption are what make us fully human); I would however emphasize fully. There is no deterioration or contamination in the humanity of Christ. This is why he is in the likeness of sinful man, but is not himself a sinful man. This is why he as the high priest does not make atonement for himself. Part of our redemption is the restoration of our full humanity via union with Christ-a grafting back in to the life-giving vine.

But if Christ is truly human in a way we know nothing about, looking at ourselves to determine what Christ must be like as a human is like looking at a dead body and wondering why living people aren't so blue and stiff and smelly. Can they really be human if they're not blue, stiff and smelly? Does being pink and active mean one is super-human?

I will say in the KA's favour that many of them seem to want to avoid docetism (the super-human argument in essence). I'm no fan of it myself. But the KA swings hard the other way in emphasizing the humanity of Christ-and unfortunately it's this flawed view of humanity they emphasize rather than his actual perfect humanity.

KAs also usually affirm that Christ didn't sin-they understand that to say otherwise is incorrect. But then that is turned on its head when they say he did show evidence of corruption by becoming unclean or affirming falsehoods, because they see elements of corruption as an integral part of the human person rather than what it really is: a result of the fall. If this is so, then a de facto sinning Christ enters in from the back door.

Here is where we would cite sin as a result of corruption (note sin is not the same thing as corruption). Sin is the natural end state for the corrupted, and in one sense I think it could be argued that when the KA denies Christ sinned, it is he who makes him into a super-powered man because he is capable of doing something no other man can do-act against nature. As an analogy: if you have unsterile conditions in a surgery, infection and then illness are the inevitable results. That's easily understood. But the KA reverses the logic of this understanding and in essence argues Christ was unsterile and infected (corruption) but never actually presented the signs of the illness (sin). This seems incredible.

More incredible yet is that scripture actually presents Christ as something of a "sterilizing agent". When he touched the unclean, they were cleansed. But that then leaves no room for corruption at all. How can bleach harbour the bacteria it kills? How can Christ harbour the decay that he kills?

So what corruption? There are all kinds of ways it plays out in our minds. Did Christ really share all of my experiences or risk losing his humanity? Perhaps Christ didn't know this or that because I don't. Yet in terms of his knowledge of his Godhood, Christ is never portrayed as anything other than fully aware of it (and even as a human being he knew what was in a man). We all make errors in judgement, yet Christ is presented to us as the one who always makes right judgements. The unclean could not be part of the assembly, But Christ was always in communion with the Father. In terms of error, uncleanness, sickness and so on, these apply to us because of our corruption not because of our humanity-we can see this in how he, as God, destroyed uncleanness, sickness and ultimately death.

That error is, as stated, basically anthropological. It first mistakes what humanity really is or should be, and then secondly applies that to Christ as human (usually to avoid docetism as mentioned). Whatever form it takes, as soon as the error is applied to him, troublesome theological implications arise. Besides making Christ ironically less human rather than more (as we are repainting him corrupt as we ourselves are) Christ is suddenly also less God. In order for him to become this more "real" human, the KA strips away many divine attributes from Christ and replaces them with contradictory human aspects that exist because of our corrupt and Godless state. Aspects that are at odds with the character of God. So none of these would or can apply to him, and are not applied by scripture but by human speculation.

Some do this in a self conscious manner that is ultimately Nestorian. Generally the "kenosis" passage of Phillipians 2 is cited. This, it is argued, shows that Christ divested himself of his divinity in the incarnation. It's almost as if his divinity was a nicely pressed suit that he didn't want to get dirty, so he left it hanging in the closet of heaven. But it leaves us with a Christ who during his incarnation on this earth, was essentially not God. It is the only way that the application of error or ruined dna or uncleanness can be applied to Christ. These things can not be applied to God surely. But then Christ loses his divinity for the scheme to work. An essentially Arian scheme is created, even if unwittingly. All because of a mistaken notion of what it means to be human.

This is, of course, only the tip of the iceberg and various parts of Scriptures--specifically Hebrews--would address it. Because it is such a maze, that's going to take some heavy duty posts from people better than me (ie Don Carson) and not in battleaxe school. But since rey and mem are bleating piteously and incessantly about it like my cat used to do directly outside my window when I threw him outside because he had worms (and probably looking all sad and big eyed too), I am posting what I've got if only to stop the whinging.

Now, what is The Don's email??

Theological Domination

2010-07-11T05:16:00.002-06:00

As you all know, I totally think John Owen was an ENTJ. When I am conversing with his books (yes you have to converse with Owen in his books or you'll miss things) I see him ambitious, brilliant and trying to take over the theological world (Richard Baxter notwithstanding). His intuitive powers make him both difficult and fascinating. And now that he's enjoying a renaissance, I imagine he's probably ribbing Richard Baxter in heaven every time someone mentions him as England's greatest theologian, or the greatest Puritan theologian or greatest whatever.

When I decided to make John Owen as brother for Athanasius, I knew that as with Athanasius I had to choose a descriptive mood. Athanasius I had wanted to look indomitable, but I felt John Owen should be vested with a rather imposing sense of gravitas (though in real life he was much more jovial) to match his argumentation. Like a juggernaut, he's not stopping to ask you if you managed to hop on. If you don't get it, it's just going to run you over and crush you into pieces. And that's your problem you silly person.

This is how far I've gotten. He's coming along okay though some more contrast work has to be done. The hook in his nose was ANNOYING as anything. At least I think I've finally got everything where I want it, so it's mostly down to building up the highlights (which of course is the most time consuming part). Hopefully soon I'll be adding local colours and thinking about the background.

I mentioned previously that I liked Greenhill's portrait and mostly used that with imput from others. The eyes in Greenhill's work belie a certain weariness that his drivenness coupled with seeing every one of his children die must have imposed on him. Hoping I did that justice.

Still not sure about what to do with the background yet. I'm going to have to do some homework on that. I've been working a fair bit, but I do have more time now to make stuff. I put up shelves in my room in the apartment so that at least some of my art schtuff can be available-where I'm going to use it is another issue unfortunately.

Also I hate my flash because it's making the colour bleh.

Anyway it's coming along. Athanasius has returned home after his exile at SIAST, so he is currently staring at me and waiting for his brother. I'm working on it!

School's Out

2010-06-29T04:49:00.002-06:00

I made it through my first year of university without killing anyone! (Only because I didn't have clinicals). Well, Mama came really close to not making it through April but I don't want to talk about that.

Some random things I've taken away from my first year:

I've learned that I am even less suited for nursing than I thought given the philosophical basis of the program in Saskatchewan (and I know--NTs usually become doctors, which is why all doctors are jerks. I don't need another person telling me I would be a good doctor so just don't) but I'm persevering.

I'm still too intuitive and unconventional in my thought processes. Sometimes that actually worked really well for me (English), and sometimes it backfired pretty badly (113 paper). Nurses aren't big on unconventional thinking unfortunately. Though many of them do try to be considerate of ideas they really think are just weird.

This is also the most marxist nursing program probably ever. I'd have no problem breaking down some of their status quo.

I'd prefer the program if it contained more hard science and less development of self junk. I don't even like hard science--but at least it has value. That said, I've always resisted the basic attempt of most educational systems to make me over into some other person anyway. Ask my kindergarten teacher who was the only child in like 25 years that she couldn't "bring around to her way of thinking" by the end of the year. Hint: it was me.

In order to pass my drug calculations, I bought a book for math retards and twenty years later than everyone else in the world, learned to do fractions. I found the method of teaching to be really important, because I started with a remedial math book from SIAST which made me thow it then sob melodramatically for at least two hours after about how I'd wasted all this time and money just to FAIL. But the retard book finally made it all make sense. So maybe there's still hope for my driving (though probably not since people in Regina drive incredibly stupidly). I admit it'd be nice not to have to take the bus, and I am going to have problems with clinicals. But man. Most drivers are terrifying. I've seen one huge accident and four almost-accidents on my corner since moving in April because people rip down the street at 70 and ignore stop signs.

I also took and passed statistics! I got an 81, the highest mark I think I ever got in any math ever. I've already completely blocked the trauma from my memory so please don't ask me any questions on stats.

When I was in school, I was okay with 70s. Now that I'm paying for my classes and I actually have to work at it, I hate them.

I started losing my hair. Mama thinks it's because of the stress of work and school, which means it might grow back. I hope so. Of course that would also mean it probably won't grow back for another three years. My hair was always the only non ugly thing about me, so I can't help being vain about it.

It's surreal to be going to university at my age. When the teachers talk about using typewriters "which none of you would know about" or other things I frickin remember, it makes me feel even older. At one point I realized the year I graduated, my youngest classmates were in kindergarten. Man. That said, I'm not the oldest person in the class, and lots of people are taking second degrees (because their first degree is pretty much useless in getting a job).

All in all, I still really love learning new things. I had to remind my self to stay focused on what I was supposed to be researching as I started reading journal articles off of CINAHL just because they looked "interesting" and had nothing to do with my papers. I LOVE having complete access to EBSCOhost! I have also downloaded the entire catalogue of a number of theological journals...

I also discovered just how fearfully and wonderfully made we really are. And I've shared that with everyone.

I've also learned that Providence is totally crazy.

You know how people do things they thought would be difficult and once it's done say "that wasn't so bad"? I am not one of those people. It's been hard (and I've still got three more years of it). I'm being forced to do a lot of things I don't want to do and am not good at. God knows how I am about things I'm not good at. But he still seems to want me to do them, even after all this time. He still puts my hand to plows that don't fit. I think it's all part of his restructuring plan.

So now I'm going to work and take some time to do what I'm best at--as little as possible. Read John Owen. Fix my blog (I finally re-added the header picture, yay). Pine for a kitteh. I do have some junk to do for the summer: earn money to pay for second year, take CPR, write that wretched blog post to get theo boys to quit badgering me (mem is the worst badgerer--he encourages. What's with that?), stress about Assessment, and other assorted things. But mostly I'm just glad I made it this far.

Did anyone else notice

2010-05-22T09:10:00.004-06:00

Blogger has deleted all comments from older posts. I find this annoying. Heads usually roll when I get annoyed (for the record blogger).

B Team

2010-03-29T05:07:00.004-06:00

As you all know, I enjoy history of theology. Usually when we study the history of faith we like to emphasize the stalwart heroes. Those are good and inspiring stories after all. We all know how much Athanasius suffered and how brilliantly he fought both the Arians and the progressive Originians (at least you should if you've ever read this blog). Luther was a lighting rod with the strength to withstand the charge that began the reformation that was years in the making.

Yet we know that for every Athanasius there's a Liberius and for every Luther there's a Melanchthon. The ones who fell down a few times. Hard. I find that people with no experience of such pressure and a Donatist streak in their hearts like to reach through the ages to push them down all over again. Yet in many ways, they exemplify the struggles of the faithful better than their stronger contemporaries. Not everyone has the strength to stand contra mundum. Not everyone is meant to. We repeat the story of Peter's betrayal, understanding he was forgiven, but often do not extend the same to those who followed after him.

So I love Athanasius and Luther, but I understand Liberius and Melanchthon. And I think if most of us were honest with ourselves we would. We aren't Athanasiuses (as much as we would like to pretend we are while arguing with losers on the internet). We don't have his brilliance or his foresight or his ability to know which battles to pick and how to pick them. Most of us are b team with the other rejects.

Liberius had both the weight of exile and of his flock back at home on his shoulders. In the end it proved too hard to be separated from them all. His lapse was certainly a disappointment and it seems he tried hard to forget it. He capsized in humiliation and weakness.

I have often thought Philipp Melanchthon was a man in some ways out of his own time, faulted for lacking conviction and being too conciliatory (today he'd probably be commended for his irenicism). He seemed so unsuited to the role foistered on to him-the scholar now following around in Luther's wake like a clean up crew of one, apologizing for all the destruction. He tried hard to build bridges--but too often those bridges led to nowhere and he wavered and foundered in trying to build them. While he did show weakness of conviction, he struggled to do what he thought was best. It turned out it wasn't.

As much as I'd like to hang with Athanasius, this sounds like my team.

In the end I think we need to give the less than heroic brothers a break. They have much to teach us. If the Christian life really is one of repentance as Melanchthon's great friend said, it requires some ugly and abject defeats. But our failures could not give up on the faithfulness of God even when they had to give up on themselves as sunken wrecks and disappointments. They, not the heroes, are the ones who remind us of the faithfulness of God in Christ to the faithless, to the broken. When one is sinking in the sea, one can only reach out in one direction. In weakness, they can only point to him.

Already but Not Yet

2010-01-20T22:28:00.000-06:00

The early months of the change of year always strike me as a micro version of the already and the not yet. This little parenthesis celebrating newness impresses that tension we still live in. A new year, a new decade-it reminds us of the time when all things will be new. But tragedy and failure quickly rush in to remind us that we're not there yet. Soon resolutions will be broken or forgotten (if they aren't already) and the bite of our "sameness" will be felt.

Things are different now, yet things are predictably the same. The old is still following along behind us. It's still the middle of winter, it's still cold and dark. But then we are reminded by these things that there is "new promise in the night". Even now, wheels are slowly turning. And we know instinctively that the new will one day come and with Christ has already begun. So with creation, we continue at times like this to groan for that final arrival.

Though the expectation that things will be different just by the change on the date on the calendar seems arbitrary I think it reveals our longing for the reality of a truly new year, one where all the hopes and dreams made for it are going to come to pass. We, as sojourners in the world, look at new beginnings and see the place we started out, and the place where we are going. So we wait for the time when all things are made new as we are. We live in our tents and await our kingdom, hoping with each passing year this will be the one.We wonder how long we will have to live with the old, the broken promise, the quickly spoiled year, the ravages of our flesh. God alone knows. So even while we see this age, we look past it to the age to come.

It is another time to say even so, Come Lord Jesus.

The Glory of Christ

2009-10-30T20:33:00.017-06:00

that real view which we may have of Christ and his glory in this world by faith,--however weak and obscure that knowledge which we may attain of them by divine revelation,—is inexpressibly to be preferred above all other wisdom, understanding, or knowledge whatever...

The revelation made of Christ in the blessed Gospel is far more excellent, more glorious, and more filled with rays of divine wisdom and goodness, than the whole creation and the just comprehension of it, if attainable, can contain or afford. Without the knowledge hereof, the mind of man, however priding itself in other inventions and discoveries, is wrapped up in darkness and confusion.

John Owen, The Glory of Christ, preface to the reader.

As he lay dying, Owen was notified of the pending publication of this work. To this he replied that he had finally arrived at the long awaited day when he would see that glory in a way that he had never seen or could even imagine seeing in this world. He was ready to finally see the glory of Christ, truly as it is, with no glass, no veil. One can't help but think he was ready even as he wrote the words above. Ready to pass from glory to glory, and be transformed.

I am busy with school so I don't have time for much else but I hate the feely paper I have to write for class next week so I am skiving off at the moment. Athanasius is visiting SIAST library for a year (and everyone insists I should declare him finished-he is NOT finished-admittedly he might never be). Some people really gushed over him which was a little embarrassing, and one woman told me she was glad he wasn't white. (Anglicans...) But everyone seemed to recognize his indomitable stare, so that was cool. Hey I conveyed something.

Anyway I started John Owen as a brother for Athanasius over the summer-the noil was as difficult as ever to dye. I did it in logwood, let it soak for weeks, bathed it in iron and back to the logwood. Then I did a wash over it with soliel paint. It's very uneven, but not in a totally bad or unfixable way. That really showed up worse in the picture. I'll fix some of the worst of it later.

This one is a little different just because we know what John Owen basically looked like from contemporary portraits. I am using the John Greenhill portrait of him, which is the most detailed and I think captured his eyes best. I love his eyes in that one. It's also the only portrait including the man's actual hair. But I'm also using a few others for reference so it won't look just like that one-I think it is a tad idealized after all. I sketched it out and am pleased with the sketch. So far the big piece looks okay-I have to make the hook in his nose more apparent and work on the mouth.

As you can also see, while Athanasius is very low contrast, John Owen will be quite high contrast. The white layers have been rather heavy thus far, so I haven't added as many and I have a good imprint. I found a nice slubby black/grey duppioni that would do well for the background-not too shiny. I should probably buy some. I'm not as sure how I am going to work the background yet. John Owen is hard to pin down, but I am working with his work on communion with God by/and the glory of Christ at the moment-hense the name. I have some shadowy ideas on that, but I haven't come up with anything concrete. So I'll just work on the face for now.

With work and school, I don't have so much time to work on this, but I am thinking I will need at least some distraction some time or feely class will make me tear my hair out. So it's there, waiting. And these portraits require a fair bit of drying time and are easy to just pick up and work on a little here and there, so I think it will be ideal.

Behbeh Head Sez

2009-10-20T00:02:00.006-06:00

School makes blogging hard.

Happy Birthday

2009-07-10T22:25:00.005-06:00

Kay I know he didn't like the attention, but once every 500 years isn't going to hurt.

I am a Thesaurus...

2009-06-13T15:33:00.023-06:00

Thesaurus-a storehouse, repository, or treasury.

As you all know I am a book fiend. I love getting books, though especially good ones. As you also know my dad bequeathed his books to me. So mama is renting her house out and going to come and live in Regina full time, which means I have to remove my books.

Hercules thought his tasks were difficult.

So I currently have books in every imaginable space at the moment. I started putting them into my library thing, but got tired of that pretty quickly since books older than the mid 60s apparently didn't need ISBN numbers. Pheh.

Our already messy and pulled apart house is becoming a repository for the stacks of books I am sorting roughly by subject.

My old room is housing drama, classic liturature and some general fiction. We've been able to contain that into only a few boxes, which is cool. I haven't delved into the underside of my bed yet though and I think there are some others there.

The hallway is home to Canadian History, with one box being almost entirely books written by Pierre Burton. There is of course plenty on Riel which I threatened mama not to let her friends have.

Beside that is Modern History, WWI and WWII, English history, primary source documents, Mediaeval history as well as books about Churchill in particular. I found some cool magazines about the Parliamentarian period in England, those will probably fit in here too somewhere.

The dining room is where the theology, christian living, devotionals and the like have moved. Most of my books are here too, as you all know theology is my faevrit.

My dad had a lot of evangelical stuff for a liberal in the United Church. Ah so much the better... :)

I still can't find that copy of Good Morning Holy Spirit someone gave him. I was totally going to relish tearing it apart and throwing it page by page into the burning barrel. Of course I may have to come to terms with the possibility that he may have already beat me to the punch. I can't say I'm not disappointed. And surprised-dad would have had difficulty burning even the worst drivel printed in the form of a book.

The living room is holding general fiction (boxes are out of the picture), some cook books and hymn books that mama has stolen from several churches over the years. She tried to deny that it was really stealing and I asked her "uh didn't you just take them from the church without saying anything?" She said "Well yeah of course". uh, mama....

The only woman I know who would steal hymn books.

Most of those are hers (or the church's).

The kitchen is the repository for historical fiction, psych, political science, art, craft (on the floor) and books that I can't categorize just yet. There are some English and grammar books also, thesauruses and dictionaries.

Some of my children's books that I want to keep and the Moore history book with the only picture I have of my now famous shotgun toting Great Grandfather are there.

He doesn't look that bad for a fighter, though the picture is not that great-but then as far as we know he only got hit really really good in the face once in his fighting days and it was an ambush by the loser's girlfriend. I guess the moral of that is even if you have a super long reach, beware sneaky RC girls with heavy socks. Especially if you are wailing on their boyfriends.

Anyway back on task;

Here is mama's bookshelf, still holding vestiges of several genres. These still have to be sorted, but a lot of them are her mystery books. I've picked it apart and taken most of dad's books out, though I've still got some to pull out of there, as you can see. Mama does not for example own Hitler: a Study in Tyranny.

The killer book case now has most of the outer layer of the books removed, and a good portion of the second layer. It's like an onion, and I cry at the thought of what I am going to do with all my precious books. Richard came in and said he never realized we had that many books (I don't know where he was for most of our lives). Then he looked at the shelf and remarked that he had no idea they had been stacked two deep. Oh they were.

The tub contains mostly magazines.

The Durant set is large enough that I'm not sure what I am going to do with them. It would be hard to box them. There are a number of paperbacks there we will probably get rid of (sigh). Atlases and geography books and medical sets are still there as well as many textbooks and the vintage readers.

Speaking of vintage readers, look. It's the very first banned book I ever read:

Ah Mrs Lovequist...

I remember she used to keep her Dick and Jane readers in a locked cabinet, distribute them to us to read and then take them away and lock them in the cabinet again. This was a source of mystery to me for years until my dad told me she locked them up because the administration had banned Dick and Jane and told her if they ever caught her teaching with them she could be fired. So, she just made sure she never got caught. We were the only children in the province who learned to read with Dick and Jane in the 80's and 90's.

I was actually discussing this at a quilt show last September with two women who had been teachers and they gave me the last piece of information in the unraveling saga of Dick and Jane-why it was banned. They told me it was due to the way it portrayed the nuclear family and the role of women which some argued would hurt the feelings of children who did not come from that sort of background. No wonder Mrs. Lovequist thought they were a bunch of boobs and used it anyway!

That lady stuck it to the MAN. This made her awesome. She was also unafraid of the repercussions of taping the mouths of yappy six year olds shut. She just did not care. Her and my dad were both terrible subversives. Who can't appreciate the teacher that goes against policy for the good of their students? They did that.

Anyway, I have likely wasted enough time discussing the cataloging of the books and should get down to actually doing it. As in the cartoon, if I keep singing "I just want to organize the books" I'll never get around to actually organizing the books. Then I have to find space for them in the shed. This may prove difficult as there are already five or six boxes of them out there.

Baa Baa...uh...Different Coloured Sheep...

2009-06-11T12:38:00.002-06:00

If you all recall, I only get occasional visits from fibre fairies. They forget about my house frequently enough and I think they do it on purpose to be annoying.

So to make up for their lack of foresight someone brought some wool to the post office for mama to give me. Did I say some wool? I meant lots of wool.

I'm sure you're wondering how much is "lots"? Well...lots:

Yes sir, three bags full (and a bucket too). You know the rest.

And she sent along an old drum carder too...

I admit my first thought was "man I just payed 60 bucks for a pair of hand carders a few months ago!" But hey I can get good use out of that. And I got more fibre-just in time for experiments. I am moving my supplies slowly to Regina...

2009-05-12T22:24:00.003-06:00

Look what is all over my yard:

Yes, it is finally getting warm.

Ocean Colour (and) Scenes

2009-04-27T03:02:00.012-06:00

Waaay back when I went down east I spent a lot of the time I wasn't sleeping trying to score local yarn. I especially sought the Fleece Artist/Hand Maiden stuff, and managed to get my hands on some lovely silks and wools. I found a beautiful kit of silk and silk blends in colours that remind me of beaches on the ocean and I thought it would be perfect-and it's so soft. This is totally petting yarn.

Anyway it took me a while to quit petting only and get around to starting it, and when I did I decided to knit it continental so that I could use a stitch I had seen on the interweb called a Norwegian purl. Basically you don't have to throw the yarn back and forth repeatedly when doing K1 P1. I hate doing ribs and the like for that reason, so I gotta say I love whoever thought of the Norwegian purl stitch.

I couldn't get out of knitting in the round though (which I also hate), and it took some time to get the hang of the continental style. It's meant to be better for lefties, but knitting is the one thing I have always done right handed-mostly because in order to do crochet or tatting or a litany of other things left handed, one controls the tool with the left hand and thread with the right. So my natural inclination is to control the thread with my right and basically manipulate the needles with the left.

So yeah continental took getting used to, and it's harder to keep tight. I do have to say it's about 900 times more efficient. I still can't do a normal continental purl stitch though, just the Norwegian. It's totally beyond me-so back to English for most things I think. It's actually nice to switch out between the two styles, as your hands don't get as tired.

I had part of one sleeve left to do on this since like June. I knew I'd have to rip out the neck as it was too big and was procrastinating because I hate ripping and picking up. But the last time I was down at Broadview, I decided it was time to get it done. I finished the arm, ripped out the neck and decreased it by 18 stitches altogether. It worked.

Here it is after blocking (silk stretched exponentially).

So I have my oceany sweater now. It's very basic, but I like that as the yarn is showcased by it's simplicity. I didn't even realize until I looked at this picture that the pattern is like honeycomb. Hey cool.

And I won't get arrested while wearing it I see-gotta watch anything that covers my collarbones as they are sharp enough to be considered concealed weapons when I wear turtlenecks.

Right around the same time I got it done, the Hellions arrived. So here for random enjoyment, is a picture I took of hellion #2 doing his patented villain face:

He was unfortunately just pulling out of the face when I took the pic. Normally his tongue is sticking through his teeth and his eyes are crossed. Gotta say I am impressed because the kid has this look down even to the one squinty eye-very consistant. That takes dedication.

But damn that kid is a ham. No idea where he gets it from.

On a totally unrelated note, especially for Ser; this is why we need a beautiful actress to play me in Theologica: the Motion Picture.

I know you don't want to look at that.

Man

2009-03-27T03:29:00.004-06:00

There are days that you wish you could just smoke crack with Origen. This is one of mine. :(

Can we start skipping the month of March entirely (eta, except Stan's birthday for those in Stan's world)??

I Give a Glowing Review.

2009-02-06T00:15:00.008-06:00

I am excited to announce the unearthing of a new and exciting scholastic field. My close personal friend whom I only know from the internet Dr Rey Reynoso PHD n. BS, TE has answered the call of nature as it were and given us a trilogy of works exploring a much neglected field of theological studies, Exretology.

These are destined to be classics referred to again and again, well worth the money spent. Indeed if you can only buy one set of theological books this year, forget the Puritan Divine Dr Owen. Go with the extretological Divine Dr Reynoso. I daresay these works are poised to become as authoritative in their field as Owen on the Holy Ghost. To be sure the bar in the fertile soils of exctretology has been set very high.

Indeed D. A. Carson has reputedly put aside his own studies on the subject declaring Dr Reynoso's work to be definitive.

Dr Reynoso is not afraid to get his hands dirty and do the hard work of mining the truths of scripture in this scholarly work. However though thorough his work is highly accessible for the unwashed masses who hold no doctorates. No abstruse prattling, rather Dr Reynoso talks down to your level of ignorance.

In the first work, the doctor lays the groundwork for his theses. The second narrows in on the theological and philosophical implications of incontinence. The last, set for release early this year, is the Dr's magnum opus. Dr Reynoso works hard in way of application, covering wiping, digging and indoor plumbing besides a host of other subjects. The breadth of this work is truly amazing.

You may leave unabashed praise and adulation for the Doctor's high level of education and therefore value or purchase the books here:
Centre for the study of Exretology.

Treasures old and new

2009-01-12T10:28:00.006-06:00

Haha! I got books! New books from Stan and old books from Mem. All potential treasures. Admire the beauties-this makes me happy and I am thankful to know people who are willing to mail me happiness in codex form. The downside (if there is one) is that now I have to read this colossal stack (including all the ones I already had in the queue) before I can buy moar. That's okay, it's cold and ugly out and I am back on nights-all conducive to some good reading.

Oh and I also get to add them to my librarything. *cackling with glee*

I am the man

2008-12-20T00:48:00.008-06:00

Remember my affliction and my wanderings,
the wormwood and the gall!
My soul continually remembers it
and is bowed down within me.
But this I call to mind,
and therefore I have hope:
The steadfast love of the LORD never ceases;
his mercies never come to an end;
they are new every morning;
great is your faithfulness.

So it's been a few years since this was the daily cry of my heart. For awhile it seemed every day was one of lamenting, one saturated with the stench of blood, filth and death. And I guess most days still are. I would say I am a different person now than I was then, and it was in part on this anvil this new me was shaped. I remember the afflictions and the wanderings. As do we all.

Things are in better perspective now than they were then I suppose. But I've been thinking lately about the gospel of the man who has seen affliction again from this new perspective-I guess I'm in a reflective mood and things keep reminding me of my time of wallowing in it. It is still powerful, still horrifying and still beautiful.

At the time I wept many tears and spilled much ink (probably melodramatically) echoing and pondering the cries of the suffering poet of the lamentations-especially the central work of the book, the third lament. The only one that carried in it words of hope, the one that personified the horror and points to life in death. It is pure gospel.

It is a world of judgment and pain into which steps the man of the lament. He is the archetype of human experience. He suffers God's wrath. He is brought down in darkness, walks in death. As we do. He is a chilling mirror to the torment of our souls.

To think that when God became a man, when he entered the broken world clothed in flesh, it was to this he came. This was the cry he took upon himself and made his own. Jesus wept at the death of Lazarus and perhaps this is what he cried; I have seen affliction. The wail of agony from the man suffering in his sins became his-indeed none could take it as he did. And he did take it-to the grave and back again. It was he who lay in the dust silently with our yoke of iron around his neck-a yoke that strangled and killed, one that no man could bear. But he bore it. And there in the midst of death and judgment he came giving a yoke that is easy, one of life and hope.

Though it may be hard to see in the darkness of the pit of despair, hope is there. For he is there. The man who was filled with our disgrace and came near when we were in the pit. He came, the man who was God himself, and showed that he had not cast us off forever. There in the pit of death he descended to us. There he wept for our destruction, and there he redeemed our lives as his was vindicated when he rose. We don't deserve this dark and painful grace, the beauty and power of the cross. We are scum and refuse. Yet he takes up our case.

The years have abated the sorrows with which I cried this lament. It is however as stark and profound a proclamation of the gospel as ever. Though I no longer struggle through it, it still has the power to make me weep-though now from a new perspective. Praise God that he has given such voice to the cries of our hearts and more than that taken them himself in the person of Christ.

The Lord indeed is good to those whose hope is in him.

More colour to see...

2008-11-13T03:25:00.003-06:00

I am sure you guys remember my assertion that natural dyers love natural media because we see colour differently than other people. At least you should since I only posted that a month ago and I don't think dementia is setting in for any of you yet.

Anyway to test the theory, I found a cool little colour IQ test. Because it is a hue gradation the colour of one's screen shouldn't affect it.

So I scored a goose egg. However that happens to be a perfect score. I did it again more quickly and scored an unfortunate four (that would be two switched around)-probably could have gotten another zero if I had done it more carefully. So I have almost perfect colour recognition-this is grist for the mill of my theory.

Someone else take it and tell me what you get. I want more grist.

I always get a second go. It's like grace.

2008-11-10T13:31:00.003-06:00

So Stan is doing memes again. This one involves finding the nearest book, going to page 123, going to the fifth sentence on that page and finally posting the three succeeding sentences. Here is my first go at it.

Hume took Locke's theory of meaning as his point of departure, and drew conclusions which were at once more radical and more disturbing than those of Berkeley.

As already noted, Hume presented his philosophy as though it began from a natural science of the human mind, being the results of observations which could be confirmed by his readers by direct introspection. He distingushed among the contents of the mind 'impressions' and 'ideas'.

Roger Scruton A Short History of Modern Philosophy

I would like it if it was something other than philosophy. Hume gave Scots such a bad name and we don't like to talk about it. He probably didn't wear a kilt either that nancyboy. So I am going to pick the next one in the bookshelf that I like better than philosophy (that is most things that are not math).

The knight urges his horse and comes to the mound,
alights nimbly, and makes fast to a tree
The reigns and his noble steed with a rough branch.
Then he goes to the mound and walks around it.
Wondering to himself what it could be.
It had a hole at the end and on either side,
And was covered all over with patches of grass,
And was hollow inside; nothing but an old cave,
Or a fissure in an old rock: What to call it he could hardly tell.

The thing is the format of the book (which I like very much) puts on pg 123 the (dull but totally readable) modern English translation of the original on page 122:

The knyght kachez his caple and com to the lawe,
Lightez doun lufyly and at a lynde tachez
The rayne and his riche with a roghe braunche.
Thenne he bowez to the berwe, about hit he walkez
Debatande with hymself quat hit be myght.
Hit had a hole on the ende and on ayther syde,
And overgrowen with grasse in glodes aywhere,
Abd al watz holw inwith, nobot an olde cave,
Or a crevisse of an olde cragge, he couthe hit noght deme with spelle.

Sir Gawain and the Green Knight

I am sure mem must love this work because mem loves alliteration and such a masterpiece of it would not have escaped his notice. Also mem likes JRR Tolkien junk and I know he did a version of it which was, predictably, not as good as the original.
For that I think mem must do the meme.

Regula Fidei

2008-10-22T22:34:00.017-06:00

The Church, though dispersed through the whole world, even to the ends of the earth, has received from the apostles and their disciples this faith:
in one God, the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven, and earth, and the sea, and all things that are in them;
and in one Christ Jesus, the Son of God, who became incarnate for our salvation;
and in the Holy Spirit, who proclaimed through the prophets the dispensations of God, and the advents, and the birth from a virgin, and the passion, and the resurrection from the dead, and the ascension into heaven in the flesh of the beloved Christ Jesus, our Lord, and His manifestation from heaven in the glory of the Father “to gather all things in one,” and to raise up anew all flesh of the whole human race, in order that to Christ Jesus, our Lord, and God, and Saviour, and King, according to the will of the invisible Father, “every knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth, and that every tongue should confess” to Him, and that He should execute just judgment towards all; that He may send “spiritual wickednesses,” and the angels who transgressed and became apostates, together with the ungodly, and unrighteous, and wicked, and profane among men, into everlasting fire; but may, in the exercise of His grace, confer immortality on the righteous, and holy, and those who have kept His commandments, and have persevered in His love, some from the beginning, and others from their repentance, and may surround them with everlasting glory.

Irenaeus, Against Heresies Book I, Ch X

(isn't that sentence on the Holy Spirit just about the longest you've ever seen??)

Warning for Stan: Spoiler-if you like surprises in the mail, don't look any further. If you don't care or you're not Stan, go right ahead.

For those other two of you not in the know I have been working on a piece related to Athanasius for Stan for the last few months. It was designed at roughly the same time, and they were meant to be the beginning of a series.

Anyway because I am horribly lazy and fickle, only the two were ever designed, so I created this one for Stan in blue and copper/browns. It is a picture of Irenaeus, backed by Polycarp and lastly John (which I like to think is the Apostle just because I do and it makes the picture work). So it worked out like this:

The coppery lines across the faces is just the end of a thread I am using to quilt the background.

I still have that same old indigo vat. It freezes solid every year and every year I am surprised that it revives. I ran out of lye so it took an entire container of soda ash and over a week to balance the vat this time around, it was that acidic. But I did it-in fact the indigo gave the best colour I've ever gotten with it. I threw some silks and cottons in also at the time, with varying lovely colours. The colour is stunning and is a wonderful example of my earlier post on the luminosity of Natural dyes. I almost didn't want to paint over it. I darkened it with the tannin from some tea and it mellowed the colour and deepened it for a week or so afterward. This is another wonderful thing about natural dyes-surprises! The photo does not do the colour justice really.

Because the printer was being rather prickish in enlarging the image, I got to learn to make my very own projector from a shoebox, a camera lens, a mirror and a christmas tree light. It sort of worked-kind of. I don't want to do it again.

Here is the pen rendering of the design which was enlarged to become the pattern.

Because of the alkalinity of the vat (okay and because I could not find the noil I had used for Athanasius) I decided to use linen. While it worked out okay and I think that is the reason I got such a good colour, I don't think I'll use linen again. It started to pill as I scrubbed paint on there. The slubs also made an even layer of paint impossible. You can see the slubs and it isn't smooth like the application on Athanasius. It is also smaller, so there is less detail.

Except for those snags the paint went on okay. I am relatively okay with it.

I used the same pattern I had made in gesso for Athanasius to do the rubbing for the background. What can I say, I'm lazy.

I had a hard time deciding how I would add the words to the bottom, so I left it for awhile. Eventually I decided to do a rubbing so I used some old cerne relief paint that I had to pipe out the letters on a piece of paper and then rub over top of them with the copper paintstick. The piece moved when I went to do a second go over at the top, so the letters are not so clear there. I did go back and add some more paint in to render them clearer and some blue ink to make them stand in relief a little more. I actually like the deconstructed ancient look of the letters, even if they are likely quite difficult to read. It is the first part of the above quote that is used. I am thinking I might brown out the letters a little because as copper as they are now they are a little overwhelming.

I found a piece of dupionni that sort of mimicked the copper of indigo blossoms reasonably by being copper shot with blue. I decided to use it for the backing (it is not as orange as it appears in the photo because of the blue warp).

I've still got most of the quilting to do, but I don't foresee many snags there. I put the batting between the linen and the silk, and the edges of the silk are already finished and ready for hanging. Any day I don't have to do a binding is a good one. The linen is a little wonky, but I think it's livable. I'll update when the quilting is done, probably in the next few weeks.

ETA: Here it is with I think the quilting done. As you can see I unfortunately placed it a little crooked, but it hangs okay over all, better than I thought it might given the fact that the centre is so much heavier.

I should quilt the faces to contour them, but I am really wary of doing so. I might and I might not. The colours read truer on the first photo than on this one. Of course the silk is not so orange as it is in either.

Richard looked at it and said "Charlton Heston as John!" Okay so I guess it does kind of look like Charlton Heston. Haha. I hope you don't mind that Stan.

In Christ...

2008-10-06T16:06:00.012-06:00

A Christian is an impregnable person. He is a person that never can be conquered. Emmanuel became man to make the church and every Christian to be one with him. Christ's nature is out of danger of all that is hurtful. The sun shall not shine, the wind shall not blow, to the church's hurt. For the church's Head ruleth over all things and hath all things in subjection. Therefore let all the enemies consult together, this king and that power, there is a counsel in heaven which will disturb and dash all their counsels. Emmanuel in heaven laugheth them to scorn.

Richard Sibbes

As I'm sure you all know I love Richard Sibbes (have you read the Bruised Reed yet?). I was reminded of this quote once again by the struggles of an acquaintance.It's one of my faves.

Sibbes here reminds me a little of Torah and Numbers in particular. Nothing could prevent God from delivering his people, not the many enemies without nor the people delivered. Just so, nothing can prevent Christ from fully redeeming his church. He has already done it in fact and if we are in Christ, we have nothing to fear from what may be done to us or even from ourselves and our own weaknesses. Even the enemy of self is under his subjugation. For those of us bleeding out from self-inflicted wounds it is powerful to remember that he controls all things and works them together for the good of his people. Of course this turns our normal perception on it's head for it means that when evil comes there is ultimately goodness hidden in the evil which we receive by Christ. All our sufferings are good, even those self-inflicted ones. Evil then is turned in on itself by the power of the crucified and risen Christ.

Of course we are not safe from evil because we are special, get things right, or feel the right way, but because we are in Christ. We are weak and we fail and pain comes, but Christ has succeeded even when we feel like utter failures. Christ is victorious even when we feel like we have been completely conquered by others' cruelty or our weaknesses. No suffering harms us in Christ. In Christ. No two sweeter words may comfort us in trial. All the promises of God find their yes in Christ. That is why it is through him we utter our amen to God-for his glory.

Ultimately it is all about him and his glory, glory revealed in suffering, Christ's and ours. This is why God upholds us-for Christ's sake and for the glory of his Name. Not because one day we would "pay him back" and be a good return investment. No from beginning to end, salvation is of God and he alone. That is why we may rest so securely in it, That is why we can laugh with God to the scorn of his enemies (and our old man is certainly one of them) and not fear what they may or may not do. He will do what he has set out to accomplish, and he has set out to make us his own sons, at one with him. These sufferings are his way of making it happen.

And finally when we are revealed as the sons of God and with Christ in his glory we will see just how powerful our God is. On that day I'm sure we'll laugh at how foolish we were to cower fearfully in the impenetrable fortress that is Christ-which even now we reside in.

Anyway that is where my mind has been wandering lately.

Seeing Colour, Abrash and the Trinity

2008-10-03T17:13:00.001-06:00

Some people have asked me about my work in natural dyes. It seems like so much work, they ask, why even bother? Wouldn't it just be easier to just use acid or procion powders, as well as more predictable and safer?

Well yeah actually it would. But though I also work with synthetics, natural dyes have something that the ease of the synthetic can not replace. Some I am sure work in natural dyes because they like to play chemist, but for most of us I think it is because the colour of a natural dye is simply beautiful in a way that can't be mimicked in a synthetic.

I have read many impassioned arguments for the superior beauty of natural colour from it's advocates which is met with confusion and lost on those who don't work in the media. I know enough people who see no difference in the blue of indigo and the indigo blue of a synthetic, yet to me they are clearly not the same colour. So I have begun to think that maybe those who work in natural dyes (or with natural pigments) actually see colour differently than other people. Perhaps we see more colours or distinguish them better?

What we are seeing can be put under the umbrella of what is called abrash (one of many spellings) in the rug trade. All natural dyes, no matter how carefully one may dye them, have abrash-that is variation in hue, chroma and value from dyelot to dyelot or even in the same dyelot. It can be quite noticeable or at times can be very subtle, however it is always present in a naturally dyed item. Even one that at first glance appears to be a single colour always upon closer inspection is comprised of many other colours making it sparkle like facets do for a gemstone.

I think this may be the reason we prefer natural pigment, abrash makes for a richly diverse and luminous colour, a colour that obviously contains other colours. The cold sea of uniformity that is common to the chemically uniform synthetic dye is dreadfully austere and boring. All unity, no diversity. One must take specific steps to try and artificially achieve Abrash-which some actually do (okay okay some is me. I always tinker with the dyes and synthetic dyes gone bad are some of my favorites...) but it is never as beautiful. However this isn't as plain to everyone as it is to those of us who love it.

One might say natural media reflects the trinity, heh. Of course it shouldn't surprise that creations do reflect their creator. A synthetic dye is so singular and homogenous like the men that developed it. A natural dye experiences a little bit of perichoresis of it's own. And of course even though it is beautiful in it's complexity, it isn't always apparent or appreciated by those who don't want to see it.

Everything can be related to theology some way or another.

10 years from now I'll be even older! And more cantankerous.

2008-08-10T10:20:00.003-06:00

Stan tagged me to do a short meme with a bizarre mix of questions. They are;

Q1. If you were to be in ministry 10 years from now (whether you’re in ministry now or not) what would you like to be doing and where?

Q2. If you could wake up tomorrow with a degree and all the learning that would have gone with it from any seminary which one would you pick and why?

Q3. What’s your poison: donuts, beer, wine, pizza, chocolate, twinkies, key-lime pie?

1. The Lord is a compassionate and gracious God slow to anger and abounding in love and faithfulness. Therefore I surmise that due to this great love for his children, he would keep me out of ministry of any kind, both now and 10 years from now.

As an aside I am hoping he does this by quickly returning 10 years before 10 years from now. Like say September. Now I'm not predicting that it will be September, make no mistake-because as my life quote says "God often works by contraries" and therefore I am sure he would make certain not to come back in September just because I said he would. I tend to think that as soon as someone gives a date I can rest assured he is not coming then. So I'm not saying he will, but I wouldn't complain if he did.

So I'm crossing my fingers for new earth...

2. Uh Oxford at the time of Owen? Then I could see if he actually talked like that also. I am convinced he really thought in latin all the time.

3. I consume theology books. Next to that I react badly to caffeine, but I still drink tea and pop.

I don't think my readership extends to five, but anyone who reads this and feels like doing it can consider themselves tagged.

It's That Season

2008-05-19T15:52:00.011-06:00

It's May long and not bad outside. This means one thing.

(silk in alum on the left, logwood being extracted and reduced a little on the right)

That's right: dyeing ~~accidents~~ experiments!!

I was so happy to have found the big canning pots this spring after having lost them two years ago by putting them somewhere "safe" to winter. I thought I could extract my logwood in a little pot and transfer each extraction to the large pot. Happiness dissipated when I discovered the one had a hole rusted right through. And I always find these things out the hard way, like coming out to wonder hey why is there dark liquid leeching out from underneath the pot...?

Look at that hole. Damn. Now I have to find some new ones.

And now I also have a nice purple ring on the step. Glorious dye-wasted!>:(

I told mama "dyeing accidents!" She said "wood makes that colour?" Such things no longer phase her. Then again the porch always was a catch all for messy projects and I think the wood has been every colour it could be. One time an entire 5 gallon pail of blue fibre reactive dye spilled on the floor. I can't remember how that one happened...I think it was the dog. Well whatever it makes the place more interesting, and we have another story to tell to go along with the others. At least it isn't india ink.

Logwood is an indicator though and I'm tempted to throw some ammonia and/or vinegar on the step. Just to see. ETA: so I did. The vinegar made it fade to yellow. The ammonia darkened the purple and ate what paint was left on the step. Heh.

I can be productive occasionally. I Just don't like it.

2008-05-12T00:34:00.004-06:00

I am sick. And alone. So I decided to avoid going out or cleaning by making something. I had planned to make a dress out of eyelet lace with a silk bodice last year and like everything never got around to it. Since it is now kind of attempting to be warm, I thought I would try and make it. I was going to draft the pattern, but had recently bought the Hotpatterns Weekender Monaco dress pattern, which looked much like the idea I had so I decided to use it instead.

It worked out pretty well. It was a simple pattern with little shaping so it was difficult for even me to ruin. I originally added the optional sleeves, but the first try on with them had me immediately ripping them off. (they are gathered and looked nauseatingly precious with the lace) So now it is a sleeveless dress. I don't like sleeveless dresses so much but at least it doesn't give me the same queasy feeling that eating an entire bag of cotton candy does.

Here be the dress. Well me wearing the dress. Ignore the fact that my hair is not straight and looks like a lousekitch (before anyone asks, I have no idea what a lousekitch is, beyond that being what my grandma called your hair when it looked terrible). I am also reminded of how much I hate those new fricking glasses. Bah.

Because I used the lace edge for the bottom, I didn't even have to hem it! Surprisingly I actually did all the rest of the finishing for it. That's unusual for me and one of the reasons I don't frequently sew clothes (besides that I'm terrible at fitting).

Here is the back yoke on which I also used the perty silk. I would have liked to have gotten more of the back of the dress into it, but hey it's not particularly special. I also wish I didn't look stoned, but the fix red eye does that to you (well crack does too, but I don't have any of that). When I was a kid I closed my eyes in pictures all the time because they always went red.

I hate that Hotpatterns no longer drafts their patterns in different sizes anymore (though I understand why they don't for practical reasons). They used to draft for women who were well endowed, ones who were average sized, and girls with smaller chests than a lot of men (guess which group I fall into). Anyway this was the first multisized pattern I tried and once I had finished it I realized that a good inch needed to be taken out of the front insert. I am terrible at altering patterns but I did attempt to redraft it in case I make another in the future because it is a nice pattern, and not too difficult to make. Maybe it will work, maybe it won't.

As it is mostly eyelet fabric, I decided to make a separate slip rather than line it. originally I made the slip too big so I brought it in and it is now too tight in the butt. Well fortunately it's stretchy. I admit I was getting lazy at that point.

When I took the pictures of the dress I also took some that tell a little story, it's like a vignette. Remember the Continental? It's kind of like that but more violent. I call it Two Books, One of Life and One of Death:

Hello my friend it looks like you have some heavy books that you might like to offload and leave at my house for ~~ever~~ awhile...I'll keep them as a favour...

Oh they are your old Seminary textbooks? You don't want them and want to share them?? GIVE!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Sweet boookssmmmmmm are they Owen? Carson? Schaff's Nicene and post Nicene Fathers?

They are The New Measures, Good Morning Holy Spirit and Your Best Life Now?! Where the hell did you go, Crackerjack School of Divinity?

What do you mean I just need see God move through these works? I don't think he has bowel movements.

Then at this point there would be lights flashing from my eyes to kill so I left the red eye in that one. I thought I would leave it at that to avoid an R rating.

Somewhere around here I wondered if I wasn't overdoing it on the pain medication. You know looking at that second last picture I really do look like I'm on crack don't I. Maybe the complete works of Origen is in there.

As Brightness from a Light

2008-05-02T07:47:00.007-06:00

We believe in one Unbegotten God, Father Almighty, maker of all things both visible and invisible, that hath His being from Himself. And in one Only-begotten Word, Wisdom, Son, begotten of the Father without beginning and eternally; word not pronounced, nor mental, nor an effluence of the Perfect, nor a dividing of the impassible Essence, nor an issue; but absolutely perfect Son, living and powerful, the true Image of the Father, equal in honour and glory.

...In humanity He was crucified and died for us, and rose from the dead, and was taken up into the heavens, having been created as the beginning of ways for us, when on earth He shewed us light from out of darkness, salvation from error, life from the dead, an entrance to paradise, from which Adam was cast out, and into which he again entered by means of the thief, as the Lord said, ‘This day shalt thou be with Me in paradise’...

Statement of Faith of Athanasius

I hope you take some time to remember our favorite Church Father today peeps. Praise God for preserving his doctrine by means of earthen vessels such as he.

And if that seems like too much, well we could always make an effigy of Eusebius of Nicomedia and burn the crap out of that sucker.

Two Ways

2008-04-30T04:20:00.007-06:00

Didache 1:1, folded book

I got this idea a while back and today I decided to see if it would actually work. The answer is yes...and no. It folds up to about a 2.5 inch square. The folding is not the easiest thing and the join in the middle is rather fagile-I backed it with a skinny little piece of fabric hoping it would hold. Also as I used relatively thick watercolour paper (unlike the plain bond paper of the mockup) I found that I had to cut the top right open and add a piece behind to make it actually close.

And of course the lettering is not as exact as I might like, it never is. I lettered partly with the parallels and partly with traditional dip pens (the white side). The gradation was overpainted once I had the letters in place. That turned out kind of meh. All in all it could have been better and I am tempted to try a second rendition as this one didn't take so long (it did eat up the best part of my day and much swearing was heard over the small size of the art room when things kept getting tipped over...)

I do like the way the background painted, I used Sennelier inks (they are very nice) and Caran D'Ashe Neocolour crayons (also very nice). I hit it with the blowdryer to get some patterning also.

These pictures are from my camera phone because when I went to take a picture with mama's camera it crapped out with the lens half exposed. This is the third time this has happened with the powershots, twice with mine and now with mama's. I thought maybe they had gotten banged or something, but I didn't do anything to this one. This is very irritating.

Anyway teeny cell phone pics:

This is the way it is supposed to lie when open, I had this opposing folds idea very much in my mind, but am now wondering if a flag book style would not suit the idea better (simply because it is fragile)? How would I add the words right though. Hmm.

And this is just what the cover looks like (this one's rather yellow-the cover is actually covered in silver/blue duppioni)

Spring

2008-04-18T15:11:00.002-06:00

It's turning spring which generally means mud and seeding and shaving the cat. It's really unusually warm for Saskatchewan at this time of year, but I'm not going to complain-especially since we are due for snow on the weekend. Nothing gold can stay blah blah. I got to get some of my dye stuff out and muck with that, so I'm relatively happy. I would be more happy if I could find my thiourea dioxide. Ah It'll turn up eventually, my misplaced chemicals usually do (and not always in the ground water).

Someone found crocuses and brought them to work so I went to look for some today without success. I did manage to find the first crawly bug of the season on my neck however and take some pictures while out wandering. I like the mud pool in this one:

I admit I am ambivalent to my home. Sometimes I think I would like to live elsewhere, but I don't know if I could ever get too far away from the prairie sky. At least I'm not sure I could do this and guarantee that everyone would survive it.

Hey look, it's also time for the grader to throw all the gravel in the ditch.

Tekhelet

2008-03-28T11:45:00.004-06:00

While roaming the internet looking at obscenely high priced murex pigments, I found this site, describing how dibromoindigo of the murex trunculus snail becomes indigo in uv light, thus arguing that it is in fact the tekhelet of Torah.

I just wanted to share a site that puts the Bible and dyeing together-all the things I like! AAAHHHH-I think my head just exploded.

The Pledge and Token of his Victory

2008-03-23T21:44:00.004-06:00

Fitting indeed, then, and wholly consonant was the death on the cross for us; and we can see how reasonable it was, and why it is that the salvation of the world could be accomplished in no other way. Even on the cross He did not hide Himself from sight; rather, He made all creation witness to the presence of its Maker. Then, having once let it be seen that it was truly dead, He did not allow that temple of His body to linger long, but forthwith on the third day raised it up, impassable and incorruptible, the pledge and token of His victory.

On The Incarnation book 5

I Love This Stuff

2008-02-17T22:13:00.004-06:00

I've coveted a needle felting machine since the Embellisher hit the market however many years ago, so many things you could do with one! People were always making cool things with them. This week the quilt store I frequent had the Pfaff version on sale. Though it only had five needles (some like the Embellisher itself have seven) I liked that you could change individual needles, and it was a little less chere than they usually are so I bought one.

I have been playing with it all day and I want to go back and play some more. I've done a landscape, a flower, some abstractions, whatever I can think of. I have already broken oh five or so of the needles in my playing, perhaps I am a little too, uh, enthusiastic. I am learning. I haven't gotten to any fancy techniques yet, but I have enjoyed working with it. Oh yeah this is why I used to love to do this stuff-it's wicked fun. I had totally forgotten that little detail.

Now I wonder what I will do with the experiments. Anyone want a needle felted postcard?
ETA: Here they are ready to go. Yay I found a use for the beautiful sari silk yarn I bought awhile back. Now I have to go buy more needles. I have discovered the problem with the needles is that the presser foot is not stopping the machine as soon as I lift my foot. In fact it is sticking pretty good sometimes. I'll have to see what I can do about it.

The Golden Decade

2008-02-12T21:10:00.006-06:00

Constantine's sons favoured opposite sides in the controversy. The first return was brief for Constantius again deposed Athanasius and after hiding out in the city for awhile he escaped to Rome. In the intervening years the Arians held counsels and wrote their own creeds while the Nicenes countered, many of whom had ended up in exile in the West under the protection of Constans and the Bishop Julius.
At the end of his second exile, Athanasius had been from his people for about seven years and now the Arian bishop who had replaced him was dead. In those years Eusebius also died. Constantius finally offered to reinstate him and Athanasius returned to his beloved flock In Alexandria. The Golden Decade had begun.

Aren't you glad we're to the part of the story where we get rid of Eusebius? Happy turning point there. Ding dong and all that.

It hasn't been seven years but this piece has languished some-though I have regularly been building highlights on it. Particularly given how the test piece worked out, I was afraid of embroidering it as I had originally planned. I still think that would have looked awesome, but I love the piece too much to take many risks with it at this point. I mean I'm sure we can all agree that the test piece looked pretty awful.

Anyway I think that Athanasius would not be impressed to know that fear of ruination would keep me from moving forward, so I decided to abandon the original idea for the embroidery and did running stitches by hand instead. these will be built up in the quilting which I have decided will also be done by hand. The contrast and texture I had intended is simply not there and while I think this does hurt the piece, I can live with this as opposed to an unmitigated disaster of threads.

Perhaps I will expand that coptic theme until I am better at it-companion pieces! Anyway here is how the piece stands. The dupioni has been added and stitches done for the moment.

Because I had chosen to make the halo and the world basically the same size, this meant an unusually small halo, and it is set oddly in the picture because of the shading. That was the thing I played with again and again in the original layout.

I was leary of my original idea of applying gold leaf in a deconstructed manner, but decided to go ahead with it. Now I am regretting that a little...Here is a close-up of the way the halo turned out. I think I can still do some salvaging once paint has dried. I still need to apply the 96th layer of paint to even the intensity out, and some other things.

As mentioned, varying intensities in the paint at the moment are leaving it looking a little wonky, and I have a good amount of work to do on that halo to fix it. But once I decide whether I want to do the edge treatment I had considered then forgotten about then found again, ( I like it but am again leaning against it) I can move on to quilting. Then it's only a few more exiles until finishing.

Light of the Sun...and Heat of the Soldering Iron

2008-02-05T21:20:00.000-06:00

Love, embroidered fabrics on fabric/paper ground

I saw this technique in a magazine not long after I started the project (literally years ago now. Gah) and chose it for this piece. It consists of a painted paper/fabric combination, covered in several layers of synthetic sheers, embroidered from the back and cut with a soldering iron.
I did a test one which I sent to someone as a postcard. It was a valuable experience as that one looked more deconstructed than I wanted, particularly in the sun. So I altered my method a little in the final work.

Things went well until I went to cut the picture down and while moving things to get to the cutting mat I burned my hand on the still hot soldering iron. Damn even being better organized than I have ever been in my entire life makes no difference, I still have to move everything from here to there whenever I want to do something. The cutting mat and sewing machine occupying exactly the same space is not working, I need them both at once. There just isn't enough room in there.

Anyway outside of whineyness, it turned out quite nicely, pretty much just how I wanted and certainly better than the last few.

Like a Spotless Lamb

2008-01-15T21:38:00.001-06:00

Clean; discharged.

The concept for this is all in the technique. Can anyone recall boring classes in school about how the medium is the message? It was discharged with bleach gel, which is of course a cleaning agent. That's about it.

The paper buckled quite badly and when I applied it to to the black piece it didn't go on straight. I also ironed it and this caused some staining to the piece (because bertha is always covered in goo of some kind). I applied a blur filter to the background so that this would be less distracting in the scan, as it was most noticeable.

I originally was going to do it in black and discharge it out to a gold tone. The black wouldn't discharge enough. Curse those scrapbookers and their insatiable need for the archival and fade-resistant!! But conceptually I felt red worked just as well if not better, even if it doesn't look as well. I did have some problems with discharging the bleach in some places as it was simply drying too fast and I ended up applying it thick and so lost some detail. But ultimately I managed to get the image so I am mostly okay with it.

The Cavalry Arrived Five Years Later

2008-01-09T23:05:00.000-06:00

I never got Hebrew font on this computer so I can't write the title. Sorry. And I think I might have forgotten it anyway. It works out to the horses and chariots of Israel-the words are all on the bottom there so look.

I have not bound it-I initially determined I would bind only the bottom and perhaps the sides, but I wanted the jagged raw edges on the top. I am thinking I might use an organza to do a loose binding however. Before anyone asks, it is not square and the pieces were not meant to match up or look the same.

So I had it in my head that I started this piece in 04-then I looked at my journal and discovered I had done it in 03. Oh man. I had the top finished, the wheels finished, everything. It languished because I could never figure out how to add the quilting design I had chosen of horses and wheels. I didn't dare freehand and I couldn't mark the top since it is mostly handpaints and hand dyed fabrics and there is no way I am ever going to wash it. I have never been proficient enough to quilt from the back and anyway I needed to see where Elisha was. So fast forward nearly five years.

When I was scouring the internet for storage ideas for the abbreviated art room (which is still not done because I sent mama to buy me drapery lining and the woman there convinced her to buy batting. She was all "The woman told me to buy this warm and natural stuff..."I said "that's batting!" Well I can always use it for other things. Damn this parenthetical aside is long) I came across someone showing the process they used for quilting with Glad press n' seal wrap. I realized that this was finally the perfect vehicle for my horses and bought some with the intention of using when I finished the art room (which I now realize isn't going to happen for at least five years so what the hell. This one was shorter).

When I got teh noo masheen I decided to try its quilting powers and pulled the press n' seal out. This stuff sticks. It did not shift, heck it didn't budge. And I drew the design right on the top with a sharpie-no bleed through-the sharpie marks did turn the jumping foot pink though.

Here it is with the press n seal, laid out and ready to go. Mama actually asked me why I was taping it to the floor. "The same reason I always tape them to the floor" I said. That woman's memory is so bad, she must be in the early stages of dementia already. Of course it's been a few years since I've done it with life getting in the way.

Close up of the sharpie marks. As you can see I just layered one sheet right over another until I had all the top covered. I stuck them on there before layering the quilt and they did not move at all. I did however remove the press n seal after finishing only the main horse shapes because I didn't want to be picking out five hundred one millimetre sized pieces off of it. I had some trouble with the quilting and am unsure if this is due to the press n seal or the very heavy valdani thread (valdani 30 wt is much heavier than the same from sulky. Where are the standards? I actually like the weight of the valdani better) because the thread broke frequently, even after I started using a metafil needle. I swore at teh noo machine a lot because you can't get into the machine anymore. Who's genius idea was this?

Here is a picture without the flash to show the quilting a bit better. Can anyone see the horses? I think I can only because I know where they are. Still they are there so that makes me happy. I like the way the wheels ghosted in this picture.

Uhh should I mention what this is a quilt OF?

Well...it's complicated. The least complicated version: when I was going to do Biblia/Biblica Hebraica I planned several pieces of which this was one so it is tied conceptually and stylistically to that. It is a depiction of 2 kings 6:17 with nods to the declaration made of Elijah and Elisha as they left the world. The basic design of the top is that of two stylized chariot bodies which were meant to look random and offset. It has a companion that I started and then ripped to pieces in order to overhaul the design completely. That one got stalled at that point while this one progressed to the quilt stage-I also never got around to writing all of the name of that one, heh. The wheels are rather the design focus of both pieces, they are netted lace.

This uses a number of hand painted and some dyed fabrics. The letters in the base are sunprints. It is completely pieced and turned out smaller than I intended because the paper I used as foundation was only that large (heh).

In my quilt journal entry for this piece I babbled for a good page and a half about the might of God and types of Christ and blah blah. Of all of that I'm going to say Elisha was always one of my favorite people in scripture. And of course I always thought Malachi's well worn prophesy was actually saying the Lord would be in the mold of Elisha. I mean really who followed Elijah the first time people? I also tend to pair he and Joshua together as a specific type because of their names and duties, and the transfiguration. It also speaks for the might of God which is never in the things we think it is. That is the mercifully abbreviated version.

ETA: I thought maybe I should add a close-up of Elisha so you can see what he actually looks like. The shoulder in particular was placed weird, but could have been worse. I sketched it, altered and then printed directly to the fabric. The lines were done with a twin needle.

In The Cloud of Witnesses

2007-12-28T10:29:00.001-06:00

Kenaniah, felt tipped and ball point pens, watercolour wash.

This is one of those ones that I like and I don't like at the same time. The main problem being the figures which I did much too quick like and tried to knock back with blue washes, which makes the piece in general look much too sombre. While meant to be singing they look too sad and pained. Damn it would look good if it weren't for that. I knew I shouldn't have done that part while tired at work.

Of course once more I played the partial iconoclast that I am by using the tetragrammaton. This time I tried to tie it into the bizarro notes above, all of which I am reasonably pleased with.
I always thought of this one as Petra's song until Sacred Trust came along. So now there's two of them I guess. Or something. Ha.

The Twelve Shifts of Christmas

2007-12-24T08:40:00.001-06:00

On the first shift of Christmas, a resident gave to me
a diaper full of pee

On the second shift of Christmas, a resident gave to me
emesis x2
and a diaper full of pee

On the third shift of Christmas, a resident gave to me
three spit wads
emesis x2
and a diaper full of pee

On the fourth shift of Christmas, a resident gave to me
four escape attempts
three spit wads
emesis x2
and a diaper full of pee

On the fifth shift of Christmas, my boss gave to me
FIVE MORE SHIFTS

four escape attempts
three spit wads
emesis x2
and a diaper full of pee

On the sixth shift of Christmas, a resident gave to me
six yelling fits

FIVE MORE SHIFTS

four escape attempts
three spit wads
emesis x2
and a diaper full of pee

On the seventh shift of Christmas, a resident gave to me
Seven pounds of poo
six yelling fits

FIVE MORE SHIFTS

four escape attempts
three spit wads
emesis x2
and a diaper full of pee

On the eighth shift of Christmas, a resident gave to me
....

Okay by this time I'm not sure I'm going to be coherent or alive, so as Bob and Doug said, Welcome to shift twelve.

When I told Phil I was working twelve shifts the first thing he said was "hey the twelve shifts of Christmas." and he totally gave me the best line (five). Ha.

No Other Name

2007-12-15T04:32:00.001-06:00

What's In A Name, lettered in india ink with various pens

Really what else was I going to do for this one? I did get to try out the expensive drawing board I bought a while back which I had been unable to really test run until now since grandma was driving me too crazy to want to. It's wonderful BTW and much better than the North American ones I've seen, good working angles.
The few b nib (oval) lettering styles really evidence how infrequently I use the b nib, and the second go around spaced the words a little differently than the practice one (from which I liked the layout better). Letter spacing also got rather wonky at times-more on this one than the practice one in fact-still the right justification while not great is also not hideously bad. Really there isn't much opaque white on this piece, so I consider that pretty decent.

Peekturs

2007-12-03T19:27:00.000-06:00

Richard and Avery came down this weekend and Richard treated us to a fresh application of his own special brand of annoyingness-mostly by taking many terrible pictures this time around.

This is the picture Richard took of me (I am standing at the bathroom sink) while I was trying to tell him how to work the camera.

He thinks terrible pictures of me are somehow funny.

I retaliate with this.
Okay terrible pictures can be funny. If they aren't of me. Don't you love the horns his toque made in his hair? Right at this point we were discussing how cool it would be to play the labour day classic as nonchalantly as possible and then make a round about Taylor Field (yes TAYLOR FIELD) with the cup.

Since we're posting terrible pictures of everyone, here is one of marvin k haggler (aka mumbley peg/hieme h manush/mothra) and my hand. This picture made Richard and I both laugh.

Mama hates it and when auntie linder tells her I posted it she'll probably give me a beating. I know she can still do it because about five minutes after this I said to her "see if you can catch me Mama!" and jumped on her-and she did manage to do it so even though she's getting all super old and true seniorhood looms imminently, she can still carry my weight-which means she can still whip me around. Having said that I probably weigh below max lifting weight for labour standards.

And Grandma and Avery.

Well at least it's a good picture of Grandma anyway. I think Avery is trying to be a raptor or something. I got partially cut out of the picture.

Avery squealing as I did the old "don't smile-tissues" routine. I had to leave the red-eye in there.

This kid does not know how to take teasing-I blame only child syndrome. He gets very angry so that we laugh and do it even more, just like we used to do to Liz-the best cure for only child syndrome is the tissues routine. He was so mad. Bwahahahahaha perfect.

Me laughing while we teased Avery.
I wanted to post this one simply because mama's camera flash does not make my hair look orange. I am trying to get her to trade cameras with me now based on that fact alone.

Richard sitting in dad's chair looking like dad. When I told him that he said "hey better that than the milkman."

Here I Am

2007-11-26T09:50:00.000-06:00

Take Me In, felt-tipped marker and watercolour wash.

I like this one. I maintained from the start that it would depict a coal in a golden tong, but the deco/cubist look evolved in my mind over sketches until it became this in the last rendering. I was altering the design to the end. I am annoyed that my favorite grey brush marker has dried out, so I had to go with the next lightest for the lines in the background, and I don't like that grey as much.
I did the final rendering at work, because the full moon is past and the psych patients behaved themselves!

AHH

2007-11-26T08:00:00.000-06:00

..hhhh!
WE WON!!!

Bleed Green Baby

2007-11-18T23:19:00.000-06:00

Boo YA

DEATH TO WINNIPEG!!!

I still hate Kent Austin, just so you know. But perhaps he will prove himself useful once again. He does seem a little less arrogant these days.
Now back to the regular schedule...

KILL THE BLUE BASTARDS!

95 Theses and Beer on the Wall

2007-10-31T13:48:00.000-06:00

Happy 490th Reformation day peeps!!

And without further ado, my attire for the day, the Calvin hat.

This is the only picture without the book (my copy of the institutes vol 1), and unfortunately, just about the only one where I am not pissing myself laughing. I was trying to look austere and Calvin-like which did not work and only served to make us laugh harder. I should post the "thinking about Pelagius" picture, that one is fricking hilarious.

And yeah I am working today and that is a uniform.

20/20 Vision

2007-10-29T00:45:00.001-06:00

God Fixation; ink and crowquill pen

I'm not crazy about the last one, and especially the way it looks in the scan. I posted it mostly because of it's relation to the Athanasius piece. Anyway I want to bump it, so here is this one.

This is all ink, done with a crowquill (the lettering is done with a c4 and c5). The scan makes it look black and blue, but it is in fact brown and blue. This (along with Stand) was the second idea utilizing the shield of the trinity. I decided to put it in latin for some reason. I dunno, that "deus" in the middle of that dilated pupil just looks cool. And I wanted it to be at least a little less man-centred than the actual song is.

You Are the Holy One

2007-10-28T19:12:00.000-06:00

Hallowed Be Thy Name, machine embroidered with metallic threads on silk noil and dupioni.

This has not translated in the scan well at all. I am still debating how I feel about the actual piece, particularly since it was a test piece for Athanasius. I know he has been languishing in his desert exile for almost a year; hanging out with Antony, writing subversive letters and whatnot. As history bore out, those complete losers Eusebius and Constantius couldn't keep him down and he is gearing for a triumphal return. There will probably be some rioting in the near future.

Anyway I am not so proficient with my machine work these days (especially since I am still getting used to teh noo machine), so it's a good thing I tried this out. The metallics of course don't show up the way they should. The gold is the only one you can really see in the scan, however in the actual piece I am thinking it is too distracting. I think I need to keep playing with thread colours. I like the copper and I think I am going to go tonal and eliminate the gold. We'll see.

This is the first CIP piece I've done since we ripped up the back room-yes I am still working on it! I'm still not finished the art room-I have to make the curtains and set up the paper hangers yet. There were other minor things I was intending on, but I am getting tired of it and I think that once those two things are done then so is the room.

My hands smell like oil paint from the paintstiks....since you all think I stink anyway, it doesn't matter.

You Have NO Idea

2007-10-22T07:35:00.000-06:00

Many of us in the field watched this program with interest;

marketplace

It's certainly true that long term facilities become "dumping grounds" and by no means provide care only for the frail elderly. The thing is, long term beds are cheap and psych beds very expensive and at a premium-many psych centers have been closed and are no longer options.

I take exception to the assertion that this behavior is accepted by staff-there is only so much staff CAN do. The model of care is anarchistic and over and OVER we hear that these people have the right to integrate. It's like everything, we hear that segregation of problem people is unfair to them, just as it is on the other end in schools-and everyone else has to lump it.

I am reminded however that at the same time people are horrified by segufixes.

Ach with the baby boomers and their absolute demand for personal autonomy aging, expect things to get shittier.

Petra is the BGM of the Rest of My Life Too

2007-10-13T02:16:00.001-06:00

For my auntie; this is the way one of my mail art friends folded the zine she created, which I find easier to demonstrate than explain. I thought it was ingenious. The most work would be in setting up the original to be copied.

To A Friend

2007-10-04T20:30:00.000-06:00

By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.

I think more than anything, you exuded this love. You were one of the most joyful, open and loving people I think I've ever met. I wish I could have known you longer, that I could trade places with you. I am lazy and selfish and I know the world would miss me less than it will you. Such irony that those who are so full of life should lose it, while those of us who waste it are left to continue floating along. The world is still unjust still fallen.

I remind myself that our enemy has been and is being defeated-yet he still manages to get his swipes in. Such an ugly, even if temporary, separation.

I have to say I'll never be able to forget the "man under the bridge" story. If we see each other in the new earth perhaps I will say "but can you describe his face?" hee.

Now would be the time

2007-09-17T02:32:00.000-06:00

To speak up and make whatever requests you may have of me. You know, art, hits, whatever. I only have a year of wasted youth left and I am sure that at the end of it I will dissolve into a gurgling puddle of goo.

Since my laziness is well documented get your applications in now. No guarantee I'll actually do it of course, but if you wait you won't get the warm feeling that comes with wondering what the hell I am doing instead of the art/hit/etc.

BAH.

I Has Noo Toi!

2007-09-12T01:03:00.001-06:00

Now I don't really need a new sewing machine but I am a brand loyal sort of person so every time I go to the quilt store I always look at Janomes (and as a brand-loyal person, I have always wondered if the e is silent or not. I usually say it, but the lady at the store did not and that just opens that right up again). Anyway the mechanical version of the QC is on promotion in all Janome dealerships, which makes me wonder if they are phasing it out-I am wary of computerized models in a completely luddite sort of way, and the thought made me kind of want to buy one while they are still around.
So they were basically throwing in the table for the price of the machine (the tables are usually extra and they make you pay lots of money. Everyone is taking lessons from Apple on How to Charge Extra for Everything and Still Have Idiots Buy Your Stuff these days)...Mama made me buy it. No really I was buying other stuff and she said "oh and she'll take the machine too". Mama likes making executive decisions like that. Then she said later "I guess I could have bought it for you for your birthday or at least gone halfs." Yeah that probably would have been nice.
Oh well. I got a table-and quickly disabused mama of the idea that I was getting rid of the old machine. HA!

Now I just have two of them.

Well at Least I can do Something

2007-08-31T02:33:00.003-06:00

I confess I am becoming frustrated. I have been without an artroom for two months (and with grandma there was all but without it for the two months previous-though at least I still had access to art supplies) and it begins to wear on me. I haven't been making so much art for the last long while, but I guess it was enough that the absence of all my favorite tools is making me cranky.

As is normal during the summer, I have been working quite frequently during those two months, and have not had the time to get into the city to buy stuff, shelves foremost. This reminds me of why I hate Broadview. Anyone else can just go to the lumber yard or what have you and get what they need. I have to drive an hour and a half-even more irritating since I can't frickin drive. Anyway, with nowhere to put art stuff, there's no opportunity to get it out and work on something. The room is half full of things I have rescued from mom's good idea of putting them all outside (granted in her defense, it's Saskatchewan. Our rainy season is usually like May. This year it was a lot longer, and hot).

Poor Art Schtuff. You were great and I'll miss you.

Anyway, since I can't do any of my conventional art, I made the executive decision to decorate the walls of the art room with flourishes. I had actually painted the walls two different shades of green, which is not immediately apparent, so when I did the flourishes I reversed them. I am still undecided if I am going to bring my two neutrals in or not. Just depends on how far along I get before I get the materials I need to finish the room.

Here is the corner between the two doorways; the original doorway was finished with no door.

As you can see.

These two pictures were pieced in photoshop, so they look a little odd. This is the south wall, with flourishes emanating from the outlet. This is the wall I am a little disappointed with. I think there is tweakage to do here.

Another pieced one, this is the east wall (trim for the window is another thing I have to buy)with flourishes starting at the corner of the window. The pictures unfortunately didn't actually overlap. I think this wall be my faevrit!

Since the room is so small and half full of the crap that I salvaged from the great outdoors, it's pretty difficult to take pictures of and get a feel for what I was doing. So here is the basic layout from the Book of Plans. The initial version of my flourish lemur is there too (you can see a bit of the better version of him on the page behind). I am not yet sure where he will go, though I am thinking on the wall by the dresser (which is why it has a little less ornamentation).

I never did take a picture of the other side of the west wall though.

Anyway, we have enough paint that I could always paint over it if I decide I hate it. We'll see.

The Reason the Internet Exists

2007-08-28T23:06:00.001-06:00

For wasting time on really cool stuff, obviously. I am putting flourishes in the art room and found these ones. One word for all those words-AWESOME. The calligraphic forms of arabic have always made me want to learn it.
I had forgotten what a great site bibliodyssey is for the sheer amount of hours you can spend browsing on it. Only the best sites can do that...

Green Room Serenade

2007-07-31T04:17:00.000-06:00

I am finally toward the end of completing grandma's room. If I hadn't been working, then waiting over a week for the trim to be delivered I might have gotten it done sooner. I am a terrible procrastinator though and we are still having no end of problems with the closet...So probably not.

I am also wasting time writing lists and making diagrams and other ideas for how I am going to fit everything I don't cull in to the other side. I have a book dedicated to this, about which Mama said "Oh no you are making PLANS." I don't know what her problem is. Several pages of to-scale diagrams are not obsessive, they are signs of organization or something like that.

Speaking of diagrams I've also become enamored of the idea of buying a new drawing board, but all the nice desktop ones come from the UK and cost like 90 pounds. I decided against a desk as all the split top ones cost lots of money and discriminate against me by having the flat part on the right side only.

Anyway, I have everything painted and most of the trim up, so we can move the furniture back in. As for the paint; my mom and grandma have one notion of colour and I another. Theirs being pale and wan versions of white and mine being, well colour:

I have wanted to paint that back room green for quite awhile, and now that it is two rooms I said I didn't care what was done with my side as long as it was green (which was a lie as the Book of Plans attests, but that was the paramount part of the plan even when I thought I was going to be able to have the whole room-as the Book of Plans also attests). Grandma who is not here at the moment will hate it but that's just too frickin bad.

Mom suggested what else but pale pale green. I countered with whining. What's the point of picking a colour if all I have to choose from are variations of white non-colours? We had the same argument when my own bedroom was built years ago. I had wanted blue and to my mother that meant bluish white. To me it meant blue. People would look and say 'hey your room is blue" blue. Granted both of these rooms are now impossibly small (8 ft and 5 ft) and if I'm being honest, the colours, even though they are not overly dark, do tend to overwhelm. Still I like to see real colours and that is what I have gotten. Now the whole house is shades of white with the exception of the rooms that I have involved myself in...
Dad always said that too many colours got you a Ukrainian house. Well they did give us perogies after all how bad could a Ukrainian house be?

Here you can have a look into the off-whiteness of Grandma's room, which should make us both happy.

The WORST

2007-07-18T23:13:00.001-06:00

My brother finally managed to get down here and work on the back room (now rooms). Though he did the bulk of the work, he had to go back home before the mudding of the drywall was done. So I get to finish sanding.

This is how I feel about sanding drywall:

He was trying to say that mudding beads is messiest. WTF-does this look neat and clean to you? No I'm not a professional, but I've helped put up the drywall in almost every room of this house and I know for a fact the sanding is the WORST part. Bar none.
This was at about two in the morning (as I did the sanding after working an evening) and it was still about 30 degrees in there. It REALLY sucks when you are sweating so much that the drywall dust is turning back into mud as it hits your body.
And of course there was dust everywhere. Look at the drywall dust behind me! I had it in my hair, on my eyelashes and up my nose for heaven's sake.

And now I get to do it all over again. Bah.

Mine!

2007-07-09T21:44:00.000-06:00

In his lecture on the background of the British drawing collection owned by the National Gallery, the curator who originally put this exhibit together reminded the audience that all of the drawings belonged to the people of Canada. So I already own a CRM-I just have to share it with 30 million other people. I don't know why they wouldn't let me get my time's worth out of it at by keeping it at my house for awhile.

Okay I didn't steal it, but I did buy the retrospective book that went with the exhibit, and by posting this picture from that am likely violating copyright so I'm still breakin the laaaawww.

At the time this was painted, the Mackintoshes careers were in the tank. While architectural and other design were abandoned, Charles focused on serene landscapes and continued doing his beautiful, painstakingly detailed flower paintings. I was reminded of the famous quote from a lecture he gave:

Art is the Flower...Life is the Green Leaf.
Let every artist strive to make his flower a beautiful living thing, something that will convince the world that there may be, there are, things more precious, more beautiful-more lasting than life itself.

I was so drawn to the cartouche, which he inscribed with his own and Margaret's initials in pencil.

The Salon itself was interesting. They had organized lectures, a piano performance (Mama and I only recognizing the most common of the four pieces he did-Clair de Lune-since we are part of the unwashed masses), a rather amusing tableau in which the performers re-created one of the paintings, and a poetry reading. All of these were interspersed with periods for conversational circles relating to various subjects. The major complaint I had was that the conversational circles were almost impossible to join in because we couldn't hear a thing. I tried very hard to hear the fellow who was involved in the work with the synchrotron, but to no avail.

At least we got booze and food-totally the redeeming part for mama. :-P She said it was just like all the functions she used to go to with dad; she had no idea what the hell they were on about half the time.

Here is what 100 of my dollars looks like. Why do art books always have to be so expensive? I think someone is trying to keep them from we unwashed masses or some such thing. Okay and they have lots of pictures-and colour ones at that.
I had to go back the next day and buy the book as the gift shop was closed during the Salon, then went back a third time and bought the Lanigan collection book. Since admission is by donation, I visited my favorite pictures-and especially the CRM-every time. :)
I didn't buy them at once was because I didn't think I could really afford both until mama the buying enabler got involved and told me to go back for the one on the left. Though both exhibits were beautiful, some of my favorites were from the Lanigan collection (he is reported to own the most impressive personal collection of PRB and related works in the country).

This one does however partially belong to me:

This is a detail of a large and meticulous pen sketch by David Wilkie chronicling a visit to Scotland of George IV. I just love this guy, he's all "who gives a rip about that fatarsed German king? Don't these people know if it's not Scottish it's crrap?!"

Leetle White Box of Nerd Cooties

2007-06-21T22:06:00.000-06:00

As I type there is a little white box sitting on the desk of my room. As the title suggests, I am sure said little white box is jam-packed with nerd cooties, just waiting to be released so they can get me. Now one might think that because it is small there can't be that many cooties in there and conclude it is not so dangerous. Don't be fooled, for the strength of the nerd cooties in this box are particularly virulent and there is a thousand dollars worth of them in there. I'm also sure that, unlike their human hosts, they replicate like mad too. In fact the little white box is likely a nerd-cootie factory, one which I wouldn't be surprised to know runs on role playing games and science fiction films.

Behold The Cootie Machine:

EEeeeeeEeEEeeEeeeWWwwWWWwwWww!!!!!! Why did I pay money for this??!

Oh yeah because mama the buying enabler told me I had to.

I think she wants to poison me with nerdyness. What a slow and painful death that is, sadistic mama. She'll definitely never get grandchildren out of me now (not that she ever was mind you).

I also secondarily blame Grandma, as it is because of her that I must move the computer out of the back room and into my room where there is no room for the large tower I have now. I was looking at laptops but I didn't want to get rid of the lurvely wide-screen monitor I got for Christmas, and well, to me laptops kind of suck. I thought I might as well get a smaller computer that was wireless so we could keep the modem and router where they are-and I'd get to keep the Most Beloved Monitor.

Thirdly I blame my other Grandma, because mama had an ulterior motive in convincing me to buy the Leetle White Box of Nerd Cooties; she wants Grandma B. to have my old computer so they can all chat on the computer together (mama, aunts-who never visit my blog after I carefully erased all the evil things I said about them!!-and grandma). So she has a hand in it as well!

but you know it is so leetle and kind of cute-in a completely nerdtacular way...

BTW, "Leetle White Box of Nerd Cooties" has already become this computer's official name.

ETA and my keyboard doesn't work with it! Damn damn DAMN. Now I've unhooked everything from my other computer and I can't even work on the cootie machine.

Let's talk no more of the virus that has invaded my house.

Here is some consolation: about four years ago I bought six iris bulbs (or rhizomes or whatever the heck they're called) to plant in the crop circle because irises are one of my favorite flowers. When I got them, three were bad and the company replaced them, but I thought I might plant those away from the others. So I looked up how they were meant to be planted and cared for and carefully followed all instructions as I planted the nine bulbs I had. I waited and got...nothing.
It took a year or two before one lone little leaf appeared. I have been watching it with interest since, and finally this year, it got a flower. Yesterday the flower bloomed. So of those nine bulbs this is all I ended up with, but it is pretty so I think it was worth it. Maybe it's beautifulness is even powerful enough to cancel out the nerd cooties...

AaaaAAaart

2007-06-13T05:50:00.000-06:00

While at work the other day, I was looking at a Saskatoon tourism booklet that had come with the paper. They had a listing of the current exhibitions at the Mendel Art Gallery. As the Mendel is just across the kinsmen park from what is still my grandma's apartment for the next month or so, I have spent many a good time hanging out there, looking at conceptual art involving cut up bodies and whatnot, and wondering who eats the bananas from the conservatory banana tree. It's always good to take some time to go there when we are in the city.

Anyway the Mendel is currently showing an exhibit of British Drawings from The National Gallery. The listing is graced by a nice Rossetti drawring, and the idea of resurrecting a drawing salon sounded kind of interesting so I figured I'd probably make a stop there when we go up in July. So I went to the website (I didn't even know the Mendel had a website) and saw that it's focused on Pre-Raphaelite work, which would be nice to see...then I saw those three special words.

You know the ones that cause heart fluttering and excessive swooning. That's right!

Charles Rennie Mackintosh.

AAAAAAAaaaaAAAaaaHHHHhhhhHHHH!!!!!

There's a drawing by CRM in Saskatchewan!! Now knowing me, you would be aware that I would be willing to travel there to see a piece of TP that was once stuck to the shoe of one of the Four. So you know I AM SO GOING to that now.

I am betting it's one of his smaller watercolours or flower paintings, nothing spectacular, as I think the Hunterian Gallery houses all the superextracool works of the Mackintoshes. Still wouldn't it just be awesome if it was that one...which name I don't know-but it's like my FAVORITE one, and it's all green and purple and crazy detailed and it has like shieldy-things, and I have it as my desktop background, and I close everything just to look at it sometimes, yeah that one-wouldn't it be awesome if it was that one?? I feel that either that or a textile design would be most worthy of the jail time I'd get for stealing it.

Mama will not agree to be my distractor however. I don't know what her problem is. I'm sure it will just be a little drawring and if I wear a big coat to hide it in no one will notice, even though it will be July when we go, because I'm skinny to start with.

And I'll delete this entry if successful of course.

Look I found my fave piece, isn't this...uh, superwickedawesome? I've only seen it in one book (from which I scanned it so the page break is visible in the centre) and don't know the title. It is so thick with detail-I do wish I knew what the heck was going on.

To You I Am An

2007-06-08T17:39:00.002-06:00

Open Book, frontispiece; felt pens

Open Book, opened up; felt pens

So, as a constant ripper-offer, I am always trawling about for ideas to steal. When I had been all gung-ho about finding myself a letterpress (before grandma came) I was also into looking at the art of printing, which inevitably leads one back to Dard Hunter.

This piece originally was to look extremely different, but it evolved farther away from the initial design to the gatefold and the layout-all I had to choose was the font and the designs to sit between the text. I ended up hand drawing a Hunter-like text with a classic Roycrofter tulip. I also decided to re-create the type of justification of some of his books.

This was going to be the mock-up and it is done on plain manilla. However the inked piece took sooo long and ended up looking good enough that I decided to colour it and keep it as the final piece if possible.

My colouring was terribly messy, and I'm going to have to see what I can do to clean it up. I've never been so good with brush markers, though I know a lot of people like them. Other than that I think it turned out okay.

Random Things I HATE.

2007-06-04T20:37:00.000-06:00

Since I just got finished with another round at the freakin dentist. This is one of the things I hate most in life. Dentist visits combine so many things I hate. Needles, gross tasting crap, RAINCOATS (God I abhor raincoats, burn them all in the lake of fire) drowning in your own saliva, and then paying lots of money to be tortured in such ways and have them tell you "don't drink caffeinated beverages with sugar." Hello. I can't function at five AM without being hopped up on a steady diet caffeine and sugar. If I weren't terrified of needles, I'd start an IV of it, then it wouldn't bother my teeth. Would that make you people happy?
And my TMJ always kicks the crap out of me for at least a week after a visit to the dentist.
Especially irksome is that I phoned in NOVEMBER to make this appointment and the earliest booking date was today. And losers are always whining "if we had a private health care system there would be no long wait times". When we booked for next year they told us they were booking into March already. Yes March. Considering that is only for a checkup it sounds like an inordinately long wait time to me, fools.

Getting ice cream at the end is the only thing that makes it better.

Anyway, this reminds me of all the other things that happen to have earned the label of "things I loathe with all the fire in my soul." This would be an incomplete list of my phobias and neuroses, as I find new things to hate every day. But here are the ones I can think of.

Phoning people. I hate to impose on people, probably because I consider answering the phone to be such an imposition. I usually just wait until the caller hangs up and then "pretend" to answer. Darn I missed it. I hate having to talk on the phone when I am involved in something else, especially if I am on the land line so I can't go over to the computer or my project and work on it anyway.
I was probably the only fifteen year old girl that when the phone would ring, instead of running to get it, would look around and say " so is someone going to get that?"

The title MS. As the old song goes this is the salutation for "knock-kneed bimbos walking like ho's". If you don't know why don't ask. And if you do, nod your head. And call me Miss while you're at it.

DOGS.

Getting my hair cut. I really can't rationalize this one, I just know that I really hate having to go to the salon and trying to communicate "DON'T DO A FRICKIN HACK-JOB" effectively.

Pretentious A-holes that use macs. Or any brand loyal pretentious A-holes for that matter. I have been thinking of getting a mac cube because they are leetle, but I don't really want to be that associated with A-holes incorporated. I do have an ipod, but it was a gift, and I swear at it and it's retarded clickwheel a lot.

Unitarian Cuddlefests of Tolerance and Diversity (yes I use this title as an archetype...often).

The trend of renaming every building and auditorium the "Credit Union" Centre. EVERY one. Centre of the Arts-Credit Union Centre. Sask Place-Credit Union Centre. Centennial Auditorium Credit frickin Union Centre. So you have no idea what they are talking about when they say "so-and-so will be playing at the Credit Union Centre." The real kick to the teeth was when Taylor Field was renamed Mosaic Stadium after some financial institution. At least it isn't Credit Union Stadium I suppose.

Worms! Aughghghghgh I have a longstanding phobia of maggots and worms. We've always had cats and they'd eat mice and then get worms. At which point I would pitch the cats out of the house like they'd just been blown from a rocket launcher. I remember Baba was especially bad for eating prey, and when wormy would look all sad and mew as if to say"why don't you want to cuddle me?"
At which point I'd kick him and yell "get away, wormbutt!!!" Then wash my shoe.
A few years ago I found out that this particular hatred actually has a name; helminthphobia. Personally I blame grandma for this one.

Living in a small town where everyone thinks your business is their business too because they are all above you since you are an outsider and they are all inbred Lords of the Town.

Farmers who say "without us none of you would have jobs" when four out of every five dollars they make is subsidized by the government which obtains it by taxing...all the people with regular jobs.

EI. This is not a government slush fund!

Why don't we have an American style Senate yet? I don't give a rip about our commitment to reduce fartyness. I want my damn Senate reform. This is why I voted for you people.

The Winnipeg Bluebombers, the most cheating bunch of bastards ever to live. And they are the most hated team in the league too, ask anyone!

I am torn as to whether I can truly hate the Riders, even though that useless sack of crap Kent Austin is back again. Grandma said "Well he did get us a cup", to which I replied "So did Ronnie Lancaster." She stopped there.
Okay so here is the paradox; I hate Kent Austin while I love the Riders. I hope they fire him soon. Tomorrow would be good.

Christians conflating the Gospel and...anything really.

People who play "how can a loving God allow bad things to happen to good people" like it's a trump card or something. Ah where the hell are these good people they keep talking about? Spirited away on some deserted island so that I have never never seen one of them? This only happened ONCE people and I think we could argue effectively that the salvation of the world was pretty good.

Which reminds me, Christians denying total depravity.

Certain stuffy people in the art world that don't realize Marcel Duchamp is probably laughing at them from the grave RIGHT NOW. I am convinced he just wanted to see if people would take his work as the ultimate parody seriously, and they totally did. I am with the artist who sledgehammered the Fountain; he was only part of the continuum of dada.

Passive-aggressive omega people. They always seem to pick me to annoy-unwisely as the end result usually involves taunting, tantrums and ultimately physical violence.

My skin. I am reacting to something yet again, probably air, or the effects of someone looking cross-eyed at it.

Some of the retarded rules of the health care system, most especially the interpretation of the right to privacy and the right to self-determination. Thanks alot for that.

Which reminds me; the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Way to render our legal system FUBAR. Apparently Trudeau was never educated in the "if it ain't broke don't fix it you total idiot" school. I would like to shove that thing where the monkey stuck the peanuts, as grandma would aptly say.

People that don't realize if it's not Scottish, it's CRrrAAP!

Wow I hate a lot of things, don't I. Well maybe I will do a Things Which Have Garnered My Complete and Total Adulation post to balance it out. I don't really think it will be as long. Or as fun.

ETA: I JUST got an email which says:

HINDER Playing July 10 at the

CREDIT UNION CENTRE.

Which one I will never know. The coincidence is weird.

ETA again; I totally forgot some of my most hated things!

BATH SHIFTS. I can never get through one without someone having a bm in the tub. NEVER. often more than one. Though if they wanted to really clean up the mineral deposits the water leaves in the tub, poop clears it right off. Why don't I mark myself NBS???

I am also listening to While My Guitar Gently Weeps, which reminds me that I hate covers of While My Guitar Gently Weeps.
If Eric frickin Clapton was secure enough in his abilities to do restrain the showy crap in deference to the theme and feeling of the song, certainly someone else should be able to as well. But NO. These people apparently have serious cases of aphasia, since they don't seem to realize that While My Guitar Gently Weeps is not the same thing as While My Guitar is Played in a Technically Impressive Manner by Me Aren't I Cool. Idiots.
I am sure there is a purgatory for crappy covers of great songs, and all covers of this song belong there-only the original should be kept from burning. Well the re-working of the demo on Love is quite beautiful, but it too has the advantage of George Harrison as opposed to the losers singing it.

Dip Dip

2007-05-30T22:43:00.001-06:00

I am an "idea person". There are usually several things running around on my little hamster wheel at any given time. Quite some time ago I had the idea that I would like very much to make the Alexander McQueen jacket offered on the showstudio site in a crisp but heavy silk done in arashi shibori with indigo and black walnut or some type of tannin-producing dye in order to create a subtle vertical striation on the jacket. The other day I remembered that I had planned to do this, and at that point it was getting warm enough to bother running some trials.

Yay project planning! The joy of my OCD-riddled existence!!

First I had to throw La Retardado off of my dyeing coat (I made that when I were in hippyland so you can guess which one it is).

I have a little vat I created in 04 or 05-I can't remember which, but I know it definitely sat all of last year. I figured I would probably have to dump it due to it's age and multiple freezings and begin again. But hey, I'll see what it's doing first. I was more than a little surprised to see the vat begin to turn after a shot of thiourea dioxide-when I dunked a little corner of fabric in I did get colour. It still looked peaked so I decided to keep the vat and add some more indigo to it.

This is the test cloth after dipping.

I am going to get an aquarium heater for the vat, as I think it will be much more successful if I can control the temperature. That water is freezing frickin cold right now.

I use the recipe from prochem for the lye-thiourea dioxide vat. And I have my lye locked away in the Ugly Metal Thing-so don't even think about it meth-heads of the world. BTW you all suck for making lye so difficult to get.

I find this type of vat easiest, and there are measurements there for a small vat. Mama would probably never allow a fermentation vat, as we have a large enough ecosystem to deal with under the house already.

And before you ask, No I do not use urine.

Here is the stock I made. Look at the the lovely blossoms on the spoon-Mem, this is what you would paint yourself with-if you are tough enough to do so that is...See how it is becoming an ugly green underneath the surface-which is what you want, as it means the oxygen has been stripped. I have never gotten the perfectly clear yellow that indigo white is meant to be, but it works well enough.

I didn't think it would reduce properly at all, as I dunked the jar in some hot water, thinking it would hold up like the canning jars (I'm not too sure where the actual gem jar that I usually have used is). When I heard *crack* I did about the stupidest thing anyone with SFB would have known not to-I picked it up. Half-reduced indigo went all over the deepfreeze (or all-purpose workstation for all the Moores and Moore-like peeps out there). Okay, I thought as I surveyed the damage, not too bad at least it didn't really go everywhere...went in to get some paper towel, came back and looked at the floor:

Oh.

Look at all the precious indigo-wasted! And it was getting to be quite a light green as it flew everywhere too-I think that is why it didn't seem so bad at first. Reduced for naught!! Wahahahaaaa....
My docs no longer have their famous yellow stitching at the toe either, they now have an odd sort of grey-green stitching. And I tracked it through the house. Thanks be to God that it had oxidized already at that point. Heh.

Mom saw it and said "ah well at least you didn't have it in the house (this of course was after I hurriedly wiped up all the blue doc ska sole marks on the floor). Double Heh.

It's not the worst I've ever done. I used to spill india ink fairly regularly until my parents banned me from using it until I should reach the age of majority.

Well the rest of it did reduce alright and went into the vat, which is now a nice green. Here is how the vat looked after adding the new indigo. Still as cold as Cocytus though.

I think the indigo on the top of a vat is just about the most beautiful colour. It is rather metallic, kind of coppery but purple...or blue or...something...I wish there was a way that it could be used, and keep the sheen of it. Ephemeral beauty is the most irritating!

I lost the first piece of fabric somewhere so I got a new one to test how well that took. I will never cease to be fascinated by the process of oxidation on a piece of fabric that has just been pulled out of the vat. It's just beyond cool to watch it change colour slowly from ugly snot to beautiful blue! Such a metaphor for life...okay I am not the kind of person who can resist rolling their eyes when such metaphors are made. Here is my fabric oxidizing.

Right about this time mama came around the corner and said "why the hell are you taking pictures of it?" To which I replied " I will post this to my blog-it's for the new PROJECT!" Then she left, muttering something to the effect of "yeah the project, whatever. You're going to wreak that camera." She is always that supportive of the projects.

While I was out there I took a picture of the lilac bushes, they look pretty nice right now-obviously the town has not sprayed their yearly hit of roundup so that the entire east end of town can look like a nice little nuclear waste zone. Usually the lilacs protect the rest of our yard, but they sacrifice themselves along the way. anyway I can't believe that this quarter of our yard only looks kind of crappy as opposed to utter crapaciousness. I planted grass, I hope it can defeat the weeds out there and manage to live. That is mama's superpowerbarbeque under the tarp in the corner there, and of course the picnic table/other all purpose work station.

Here is my fabric after the second dip, I added the elastics before doing that. Again you can see the process of oxidation when I fanned the fabric apart to let the air hit the folds. This is why indigo has proven to be such a fast (and therefore desirable) dye. Once it oxidizes, it is insoluble in water. Hence the need for reduction, stripping away of the oxygen from the dye molecule, or fermentation. Such is the nature of vat dyes.

Al 2.3 & 2.7 and Bonus Eye

2007-05-26T23:31:00.000-06:00

When I made the leetle goatlet for my own fibre fairy, as I have mentioned, I was told that his name was Al. I am going to guess that was an alliteration thing. Anyway Al's owner liked leetle Al very much and back in December she asked if I might make a couple more for her family members who had also admired him.

Oh sure, I said.

I probably should have added something to the effect of it's only going to take me SIX MONTHS to get around to finishing them.

So here six months later are leetle Al 2.3 and 2.7 (O.G Al and my first rendition being Al 1.0 and 2.0 respectively) sitting on one of my grandma's old aprons:

Happy that they are fully covered as they have sat on the computer desk naked since February. Can't you see the joy on their wonky leetle faces?

ETA, speaking of wonky, I just have to post this picture-because for some reason I have always been very proud of the genetic anomaly that caused my wonky eye and love to tell people about it.

I wanted to take a different picture for my avatar-one that would disguise the genetic anomaly that did NOT give me the skinny nose I deserve.
Anyway when I took this picture, the flash made my hair look orange like that flash always does, so I colour corrected it in photoshop-and lo and behold, there is my wonky eye, plain as day. It usually never shows up in pictures.

If you can't tell, my left iris is split in half colourwise. The top of it is green as the other eye but the bottom is brown. Basically I got mama's eye colour gene with a random bit of dad gene attaching itself in there. Now I've met and heard of many people who have two completely different coloured irises, but I've never met anyone (and only ever heard of one other) that had one iris that is split into two definite colours like that.

Oddity being the epitome of coolness, I have always loved my weird eye. I can remember when I was a child my mom was always hoping it would change colour to all green as I got older, while I dreaded that it would.
For some reason though people often think my eyes are brown. Ah no only half of one is...

I secondly think it's hilarious that my infamous grey hair is peeking out. People always seem drawn to pull out that particular grey hair. Often with only the warning "you have a grey hair, let me get it" *Yank*. It survived the last attempt on it's life by a co-worker the other day.
One time I had a resident point it out, and when one of the other girls teased him for being impolite, he protested "But mine are all grey". Ha.

I also have to say that judging by the look on my face in that picture, I think I may have been planning the Knife-stick match of DOOM or wondering how much more I would like the hellions if they were slathered in barbeque sauce. Heheh.

LOOKIT

2007-05-23T20:31:00.000-06:00

BLUUUUE SHOOOOES of DOOOOOM!

And indeed, with 4-and-a-half inch heels they may just be heralds of doom. At least people will notice my shoes if they cause me to go arse over teakettle.

After so many long sad days of searching and being met with nothing but a slough of crocspond, or being thwarted by the sartorial deities (er, patron saints I mean, patron saints.) in any attempt at procuring my much-needed blue shoes, lo I finally have them in my hot little hands-eh feet. Well you know. This totally makes up for the recent prickishness of certain family members (also the photos are at my house where they will remain, suckas!).

Never thought I'd own a pair of "designer shoes" as even I won't justify such outrageous prices for a couple of pieces fabric, leather and foam- but such was the depth of my need of the blue shoes-and it didn't hurt that they were actually fairly cheap as they are at end of-the-line sale.

Like Odysseus and his Ithaca, determination has brought me and the shoes together at last. Yeay!

I actually made a "Dr Tongue's 3D House of Blue Shoes" video of the shoes. I am such a freakin nerd.

Because I am a useless sack of...of...of the opposite of willpower when it comes to shoes I still ended up getting the Carlos, just in red as that was all there was on ebay.
Now I suppose I should probably give lots of money to charity to make up for my excessive nature. That's not exactly like an indulgence is it? No it's that I have more shoes to love, and my heart is so full of joy. I want to share the blue shoe joy.

>:-(

2007-05-22T10:02:00.000-06:00

Damn youtube! It won't let me watch Thriller!!!

I did however LMAO at Fight for Your Right. I had totally forgotten about the pies. Hahahaha!

Also these guys are so so SO beyond funny. Them doing Jump On It also fills me with mirth. I must take a minute for gratitude that youtube did not exist when I was a kid, as my best friend and I would have so been arsing around in exactly the same way and posting it.

Thank you God!!

ETA: I fixed the link to the dudes.

Sam a Trois

2007-05-16T19:45:00.000-06:00

Sam has not always been a curmudgeonly old nasty dog. He used to be quite easy going, and as far as dogs go was about the best you were going to get. We are not dog people at the best of times, but we have sort of gotten on with the dog-dad looked after him most.

My own theory is that dad in his estimation was the omega (bottom dogson) of the family and now that dad is gone, Sam knows he is the omega. As nobody wants to be the bottom of the pile, he is behaving aggressively and being wilfully disobedient in the hopes of challenging us for our spots in the family and having at least one dogson to look down on. When he does it of course I have a tendency to see red and start beating him with whatever is convenient, especially when he starts snarling and/or snapping at me. Mama is just as bad, and so he is always making trouble for himself.

He used to be pretty good natured. He let me dress him up as Osama Bin Laden:

And he let me put him in a cart and make him pretend to be a postal employee (though you can't see it he is wearing a postal tie) :

And I used to play fight with him.

Now I am usually just fighting with him. My SIL said that on the farm they often had dogs that got mean and ugly in their old age. I don't know if that is Sam's problem or if he will get over being his Majesty the Prick of Tails. As we will never get rid of him until he dies of extreme old age, I rather hope he does.

Part Deux

2007-05-14T19:10:00.000-06:00

Have I ever mentioned my undying hatred for DOGS? Because I really do HATE DOGS.

I seem to be getting a little deja vu here...

My brother insists that we keep his stupid dog-he just loves the dog so much, never mind that he has not bothered to take responsibility for the stupid thing in 10 years. So we spend thousands upon thousands of dollars and all MY time keeping his dog.
It really wasn't that bad because Sam used to be a reasonably good dog (as far as dogs go) but over the last few years he has been getting incredibly obstinate and cantankerous. I threw him out of my room yesterday and he returned the favour by trying to chomp my leg off (at which point I started whacking him with my moleskine-and we tore the picture of bannock damnit).

I just noticed that one of the bites looks startlingly similar to a mocking smiley face:

Can't you just see it saying "Haha you will have to look after the dog forever."

Looking after other people's dogs will obviously be a punishment in one level of hell or another.

Guess who pooped everywhere

2007-05-11T02:04:00.000-06:00

ihatedogsihatedogsihatedogsihatedogsihatedogsihatedogsI hate dogs I hate dogs I hate dogs I hate dogs I hate dogs I hate dogs I HATE DOGS

I HATE DOGS.

That is all.

In Which I Make A Dress

2007-05-07T04:16:00.000-06:00

Digging through the piles of fabric reminded me of all the projects I had planned-a lot of it had been bought for specific pieces. One was a cheapo flowery clearance fabric I had bought to make this dress. Since it's finally getting warm enough to wear something like that, and the fabric once again has come to see the light of day, I figured I might as well make it.

When I sewed it together, I discovered the bodice was too big. Lessons learned-if you are going to make a muslin, don't wait until a year afterwards to make the actual dress as you will likely forget what alterations you had to do. I still have the muslin version I made last summer...heh.
Here is what it looked like after the first fitting-the muslin is behind me (black flowered fabric) :

I think this is an excellent picture of my tongue. The prints are due to the fact that I am always walking into this mirror (as you can see they are about nose height).

ETA-with access to photoshop (which is on my computer and not on mama's) I fixed the pictures-a little anyway.

So had to hack a bit of the bodice off, widen the seams and move the straps. Ultimately it worked out not bad. Then I had to find the zipper, which diabolical forces hid for a few hours before placing it in plain view on my desk. This happens to me often, and I know it's either boggarts or employees of Monsanto doing it. As Dad would say, "CATTLE PROD."

Certainly if we do have brownies, they have long since turned to boggarts, because they sure DON'T CLEAN ANYTHING.

Now where was I...Try as I might I couldn't get a picture that was actually in focus, maybe that's because the glasses I have on are from two prescriptions ago as I broke my regular ones at work last week-I hate those old glasses! they just accentuate the sausageyness of my already sausagy nose. Anyway-this is the best one (ignore the glasses please).

I notice that the state of my room is quite distracting-you can see the frickin floor!! But the bed and the desk are covered with crap so that's alright.

Here is a better picture of it, though wrinkly and unhemmed as of yet.

Now all I need is the fates to quit conspiring against me and my need for blue shoes to go with it.

Hemming it would probably be a good idea too.

I hate that I can't sew at four in the morning anymore. Richard says he is going to come down and we can convert the one room back into two, so Grandma can sleep and I can sew and dicker around on the computer. Of course Grandma is usually awake at that time anyway.

My Train of Thought Rides A Twisty Rail

2007-05-02T00:22:00.000-06:00

I have finally regained access to my keyboard!!!

I have had to completely rearrange this back room-and I had just gotten through my yearly bout of "cleaning" (which admittedly left it looking far worse than it had beforehand).

We got a call from my uncle a week ago all worried as only he can be-my grandma was insisting she wanted to move. We've since found out she is also is not taking her meds or eating or leaving her house. Then says "I don't know why I am getting such terrific headaches". Frick. Her doctor has told mama that she's giving herself CVA related dementia from not takeing the blood pressure meds. Double frick.
It is obvious her independent days are over and we have decided to bring her down here where of course she will move into the back room for now. While I thought I might put her in my room and move back here, I think that may have required even more work. Though my dresser was built for the closet back here...feh.

While mama went to get her I got to stay home with Estupido dog, and change the room around. I guess I could say I've made several discoveries as I moved all the stuff:

Damn I have a lot of fabric. I mean day-mn! It didn't seem that bad when I was organizing it a month or so ago, only six drawers full...Well one was full of UFO's. But now that I am trying to find some other place for six drawers worth of fabric-well, damn.

I have like ten years worth of VK's. Huh. And probably ten years worth of yarn to go with them. I forgot how beautiful some of the yarn is, or what I bought it for, for that matter. I petted the yarn for awhile, that was nice. I think I might hoard silk like Fafnir hordes gold. Death before relinquishment of the silk-not necessarily mine either.

I found the dirt I stole from PEI!

I hope whoever put the house breaker box in the wall of this huge closet so we could never make it smaller or change it has long since been choked with electrical wire.

Also that whoever painted my little sideboard bright blue died as a result of the paint being lead based. Why did I tell old Fridolf that I had one of the doors for that? He refused to make two new ones because "that one is perfectly good". And I knew darn well he'd do that. Now I have one nice one and one covered with the wicked vestiges of the electric blue paint of death.

Of course maybe it would matter if I could find the hinges I bought and actually put them on.

My dad had quite the doorknob/hinge collection. None of which fit the new door I had to put on the room...I ended getting annoyed and attacking it with my angle grinder when it wouldn't fit. It does now!

He also had a nice door collection in the shed, but I knew that. He used to rebuild the doors for sound, and the one I took off was substantially heavier than the one I replaced it with.

Also many were reconstructed after another round of hurricane Richard. One was "fixed" (I use the term loosely) by Phil trying to disguise the fact that he had smashed the front door in with a golf club. If he was your brother you'd lock him out of the house too.

The pantry door is still in one piece out there! No reconstructions.

I had to use my lino cutter on the door because if I can't see something I can't find it, and the chisel got pushed under a bag of garbage and ceased to exist for awhile.

Dad also had a ski wax set in the Ugly Metal Thing (a cabinet of sorts in our porch). It, along with the sideboard came from our camper and when we got rid of it, we brought them home. they were both covered in green, orange and yellow flowered mac-tac. Think of the fugliest patterns the 70's could conceive, that is this mac-tac. "Assault on the eyes" is simply not enough to convey it's hideousness. The Ugly Metal Thing still has it.

Also in the Ugly Metal Thing was the adaptor Mr Korfman gave us when he converted Richard's fisher price tape player to AC. Mr. Korfman could fix anything, especially electronics or bikes that you had wrecked while trying to pop-a-wheelie or something. I had a Micheal Jackson radio that never worked until he fixed it. It's probably a given, but that was back when a Michael Jackson radio was cool enough to be worth fixing. It was red and black of course. I saw Mr Korfman when I was on my practicum as he had returned to town for a visit. I wonder if he still fixes kids' bikes and radios.

I found an adaptor in with all the wires from the computer, with no corresponding thing to be adapted. No idea where it came from.

My idiot brother has kept issues of Run from 1986 because he thinks they will be worth money someday. They are full of things to do with your commodore 64. I wonder whatever happened to the commodore 64. I remember one time my auntie was coding a game on it and she was almost done when one of Phil's friends accidentally turned the power off. Hours of work -for naught! Haha.

I wonder if I'll ever be able to remember how to put that quilt hoop together again.

Happy now I did not buy a spinning wheel!!

I've had too many years of owning that back room, I had crap EVERYWHERE. And now I am not particularly sure what I am going to do with all of it, especially the books that had been in the side of the closet I converted into bookshelves and now is a closet again. I have to do something with this computer too.

Wow that is very rambley-well now you have a little look into the little hamster wheels of my mind's workings.

ETA-with all of that, I forgot to mention it is Athanasius Day. Have a happy belated fight to the death for the truth!

Some Instructive Use of Time

2007-04-22T06:25:00.000-06:00

As someone who's greatest skill happens to be time wastagement, I thought I should take up the old adage "misery loves company" and show off some of best time wasting sites I have found recently. Mostly while looking for California bungalows and the Glasgow style, as I do with probably improper regularity.

Unified Vision-Prairie architecture in Minnesota. I have spent two days looking at this! The tour of the Purcell-Cutts house is worth the time taken (the glass in the fireplace is just about the coolest idea ever). Easy to get lost in and with great attention to detail, this is what Arts and Crafts concepts applied to web design would look like I think-very fitting.

Nocloo-children's Book Illustrations-This site features illustrations from Arthur Rackham, Maxfield Parrish, Kay Nielson, and Glasgow girl Jessie M King (this is how I found it) among others.
From there I found Art Passions-more fabulous illustrations!
I must say I find it entertaining that there are many versions of the Arabian Nights and other Near Eastern stories, and in the bulk of them the women seem to have an invariable dislike toward clothing. Sure they're drawn replete with necklaces, bracelets, anklets, hair ornaments or turbans, just no actual clothes. Having said that, I do particularly like Dulac's version-a notable exception.

What a great job they had.

Hunterian Gallery A great collection of the Glasgow style (just click on Mackintosh and spend some time engrossed in the world of The Four)-This is the first website that I've seen feature solo works of J Herbert Macnair. It also features a tour of the Rebuilt interior of the Mackintoshes house in Glasgow. One of these days I am going to get myself to Glasgow and take in everything.

...Of course I will have to find a way to inoculate myself from the artschoolitis I am prone to first, as I know that if I spend much time at/near the Glasgow School of Art, I will be making plans about going to art school again. Such is the nature of the disease-I can't get within 20 feet of an art school without deciding yet again that I should totally go to art school-the ultimate time waster.

Now I need to find a really comprehensive gallery of Archibald Knox. I would be happy to find some more work of the likes of this.

Ramblings

2007-04-15T07:05:00.000-06:00

So I have been continuing to organize the wild jungle of memoorebilia we call a bookshelf. Look at how nice and *comparatively* neat it has become! (Don't look at the floor.)

I told you not to look at the floor.

Notice that the books in the lower centre shelf happen to be holding up the shelf above them. Unsurprisingly, those books had to stay where they were.

I maxed out my free membership on librarything at 202, I got one and a half shelves of this set in! Dad actually had more than one edition of many of his books I have discovered. Clearly I will need to break down and buy a membership to do the collection justice.
Mama also thinks this is a good idea-and therefore not a complete waste of time as my usual pursuits like sitting around and sleeping are-as we will have an actual catalogue of books just in case her fervent and often loudly vocalized wish to have the house burn down is ever realized.

Look what I found as I perused the shelves! It was fun to look at and see all the old guys, Bobby Jurasin-I still have our "Rider Sun" bandannas in the cedar chest, Ray Elgaard-I still can't believe they didn't retire 81-bastards!, Roger Aldag-whose nearly life sized cut-out Richard used to sleep next to heheh, Don Narcisse, and all the guys from the days when we actually managed to win a cup for the whole second time in the last hundred years. Back then, we kids had season tickets in the cheap seats but always sneaked into section 28-especially if those dirty cheating Bombers were there-so we could yell along with the drunk college students at the opposing players bench directly in front. And the flame was still there!

Ah good times....sniff.

I am hoping I can teach Avery to bleed green as he was very interested in my Gainer key chain when we were there for Easter (yes yes never mind that it just looked like a little stuffed toy to him). I don't know what I'll do if he ends up a lamo stamps fan.

Anyway, back the book; as good as the memories may be, I cannot believe this page existed in my house for all these years without having me deface it:

My family used to laugh at my undying hatred for Kent Austin. They of course would bait me by mentioning that Kent thought our recent loss of say 65 to 3 was still a good game because he felt he played well. AUUUGGGG! Kent Austin YOU SUUUUUUKKKK! Ahem. Sorry, flashback. (I come by this honestly, BTW, as my Grandma hated Ron Lancaster with an equal fury. Forever locked in my memory is "Look Ronnie is going to start crying...")

I have ALWAYS regretted not being at the game the 13th man won against BC the first year after Kent Austin was traded to them, which I think was only a season or two after this. That was unfortunately the first year we didn't get season tickets. It also happened to be like the only game we won of the season, and one of the few BC lost. If time travel were ever made possible, forget all the "big" events of history, I would sign up to go to that game.

I so would have harangued the crap out of him with the drunks in section 28.

Speaking of which, I bet this page could still make good bog roll...

Every so often I get past planning stages...

2007-03-30T20:53:00.000-06:00

Not often enough though. I have way too many projects half done-Al 2.3 and 2.7 are staring at me as I write. I should have never given them faces. I know I have been kind of lazy and scattered for the last few years, I keep planning on rectifying that...well a vicious cycle ensues.

I just found a new and interesting site-mail me art. Buddy is amassing a pretty cool collection-I wouldn't want to sell them off. This just makes my mind start formulating yet more new plans for something to send-a box large enough to hold WMRC perhaps.

2007-03-24T14:43:00.001-06:00

Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Though wise men at their end know dark is right,
Because their words had forked no lightning they
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright
Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight,
And learn, too late, they grieved it on its way,
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight
Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

And you, my father, there on that sad height,
Curse, bless, me now with your fierce tears, I pray.
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

I remember thinking how actively my dad embodied the command of this famous poem as he lay in his hospital bed. It's powerful refrain played in my mind as he fought for every slow breath that he could gasp, as his heart sluggishly pushed blood through his veins just one more time... If there ever was one to fight the dying of the light, he was the one. He lived for almost two years though his prognosis was for a few months. He just stubbornly held on.

My dad used to think he would die of a heart attack; "the Moores all have weak hearts" he'd say. His father and uncles all died when their weak hearts gave out on them. But he had a Smith heart, a strong one that fought like hell to continue beating. He was always more like his mother anyway. We told him as much as he lay there battling for another minute, another second. Obstinacy comes from the Smith side too.

It has been a year, and that strong Smith heart is probably worm food by now. However sad I may continue to be for existing in a world that does not include him, there is yet joy. Not just in knowing he is with Christ, finally knowing what it really is like to be perfect (and humble! I can't wait to see what that's like, heh) but his heart will one day beat strong again in a new body, in a new world. One that has been redeemed and freed from death, as surely as our foolish and darkened hearts have been.

The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.

Bookdom of Moores

2007-03-12T14:53:00.001-06:00

Amazingly I'm not working (of course I did work until 7:30 this morning, but that was then...)

I found a new toy. Actually I found it awhile ago and circumspectly avoided it as I knew my rabid cataloguing tendencies would make themselves known and I'd be sitting for hours putting my collection in there. I saw it again and I think the tiredness made me forget that I didn't want to start this...You see my dad's collection is now my collection, and it probably numbers high in the hundreds, perhaps thousands. Don't believe?

I started cataloguing the small bookshelves in my computer/craft room, which are the easy part. They are here. But I still have:

The one on the left is mostly mama's books so not too much of a problem there as I won't add many of them. The one on the right contains largely father's books (and just look at how many more there are and how fat they are and how many of them have something to do with Winston Churchill. My dad used to do a pretty good Winston Churchill when he got to WWII with his grade 11s-We will nevah...surrender!...but I digress.)

This one is the really deceptive killer. It's like the community chest of bookdom, a hodge-podge. Floor to ceiling books of all types double shelved. Pull out a book and you find...another layer of books. It is wider than it looks also.

Notice the two Gage Canadian dictionaries? There is another one somewhere. This goes to show the extent of our bibliolatry. Only in the Moore household do we fill every available nook with books. And there are roughly five boxes of them out in the shed as well. My brother wanted to take some of them, but I denied that request as I knew he'd probably just sell them. He took away the ten-volume set of children's stories we used to have, insisting he should have it "because I have kids". Never mind that they live closer to me than to him. Though rest assured that if I am trolling on ebay one day and happen to see them, he will die.

Anyway, I probably won't get them all on there or even close to all on there, though it would be nice to have a catalogue of them all. I'll see how far I get before I get tired of it. I wonder if I should add dad's copy of Mein Kampf? Will that get me put on a "list"?

You cannot put straight in others what is warped in yourself.

2007-03-08T14:48:00.001-06:00

When the madness of idolatry and irreligion filled the world and the knowledge of God was hidden, whose part was it to teach the world about the Father? Man's, would you say? But men cannot run everywhere over the world, nor would their words carry sufficient weight if they did, nor would they be, unaided, a match for the evil spirits. Moreover, since even the best of men were confused and blinded by evil, how could they convert the souls and minds of others? You cannot put straight in others what is warped in yourself.

Perhaps you will say, then, that creation was enough to teach men about the Father. But if that had been so, such great evils would never have occurred. Creation was there all the time, but it did not prevent men from wallowing in error.

Once more, then, it was the Word of God, Who sees all that is in man and moves all things in creation, Who alone could meet the needs of the situation. It was His part and His alone, Whose ordering of the universe reveals the Father, to renew the same teaching.

But how was He to do it? By the same means as before, perhaps you will say, that is, through the works of creation. But this was proven insufficient. Men had neglected to consider the heavens before, and now they were looking in the opposite direction.

Wherefore, in all naturalness and fitness, desiring to do good to men, as Man He dwells, taking to Himself a body like the rest; and through His actions done in that body, as it were on their own level, He teaches those who would not learn by other means to know Himself, the Word of God, and through Him the Father.

On the Incarnation, book 3

While I had always particularly favoured the section directly preceding this part, as I read this bit again I was struck by the power of it. Ah the Word.

It was the Christian teaching of man's sinfulness and total inability that convinced me Christianity was true all those years ago (and as I continue to feel the warping of such a nature, it still does). Man can't discover the knowledge of God, nor can he find God in creation. Rather, God found us in revealing to us his Word-and the Word made flesh.
And people wonder why I would be perfectly willing to name a child Athanasius :)

It's Le Suck

2007-03-02T15:29:00.000-06:00

When you have to work two shifts in one day and neither is overtime because they happen to be exactly 8 hours apart! *grumble grumble* Now I have to go sleep so I can be up for the next one. Bah!

If it hadn't been pieday friday, someone might have had to be hurt.

I have a secret...

2007-02-25T04:04:00.000-06:00

A favorite lyric of mine! Of course Petra would give us the proper interpretation of Ro 7!
Jekyll and Hyde; Acrylic

ETA: I have ran the scan through some filters so it looks a little smoother. Not as much detail, but it's a bit more reminiscent of the actual piece.

This is technically one of the older designs I planned, originally designed as a "masquerade" deco a while before I started the project. I would love to see that deco again!! Still hoping it makes it's way home one day-though if it hits a bunch of people like me it will take quite awhile...

After stabbing myself for the nineteenth time working on the crappy lino for The Coloring Song, I took a break and decided to move on to the painless though messy layers of this. I had to really kick up the contrast to get the image to show in the scan. It is very dark and murky in reality. Of course this also makes the brush lines very apparent, as well as the colour layers beneath. I attempted a pseudo-mische technique with transparent acrylics and gel medium. It worked to a certain degree as some of the layers lifted (so it looks particularly blue in places), so I guess true mische is the way to go for those of us who do not have WMRC in our homes to knock the piece to the floor in the week each layer takes to dry.

Anyway, between this one, The Colouring Song, and Stand I have my "quota" for the month. Heh.

And Having Done All, to Stand.

2007-02-24T04:53:00.000-06:00

Stand; acrylic, opaque white, felt tip pen and really foul india ink.

That's right. What else did you expect to see for this song? Didn't you expect me to worm my man Athanasius in to the project somehow? If not then all I can say is you're dumb. *sticking tongue out like petulant child*

I threw all the trad elements in there, the checkered floor, the creed and the heretic. You can think of it as Arius or Eusebius if you like. Personally I like the idea of it being Asenius with Athanasius thinking 'how's that hand now, sucka!?' HA!

Stupidity aside, my ideas seem to be all for revisiting the shield of the trinity right now. I have another piece sketched using it, which I'm thinking is going to look a little freakier. This one does have a medieaval look to it though that is fitting for the shield, doesn't it? Especially since perspective is completely irrelevant in medieaval art. BTW I scanned this before putting the letters in (except the ests I see), but Athanasius is facing the F as he is presenting his creed against the world to the Son. How deep is that!

I discovered with this piece that apparently india ink can go bad as mine smelled as rank as the dead fish my dog used to roll in at the beach. It also did not wash over the floor as well as I would have liked (which is only one of the reasons Asenius/heretic's foot looks all crazy and floaty). All in all there are some things that could be better, but I think it turned out not too bad. As always as long as the thing is in my house, I reserve the right to fiddle with it.

Shoe Blues...

2007-02-21T05:41:00.000-06:00

I only have 27 pairs of shoes and none of them are blue. This led me to the realization about a year ago that I absolutely needed a pair of blue shoes-not navy and not turquoise mind you but a cobalt blue-and set out to look for them. I didn't count on them being particularly difficult to find-though I probably should have as I am impossibly picky about such things.

After scouring shoe stores across the county (such a difficult job!) and having to put up with my mother showing me disgusting crocs and saying "well they're blue, heheh"-to which my reply is should hideous crocs really be honoured with the title of "shoe"? Isn't this a fairly apt comparison to Finney as a theologian? Shouldn't they rather be called " unsightly blobs of pure evil, only to be destroyed at the second coming along with death and hades"? Sure less catchy but I'm all for truth in advertising. They are probably manufactured by the minions of Satan, otherwise known as Monsanto.

Anyway, after the stench of so many crocs, I finally found them.

Blue shoes!!! So perdy. Patent is kind of meh, but I could live with that. They are T-straps, that makes up for just about anything. And for our colour blind friends, did I mention they are blue!

Then I find out that the only places that carry them are in the US and will not ship out of country. Discriminators! Don't they realize how much I need the blue shoes!? Just because I could only wear them three months of the year does not mean I wouldn't rock them during those three months. Because I would.

WAAAAA I want my blue shoes.

Failing miserably-Glad for Penal Substitution!

2007-02-14T21:22:00.000-06:00

I know I am meant to be avoiding the internet. But I find more fun things all the time-like online quizzes. This one was particularly cool, even though I can never make up my mind on the questions, as I think "well if you were to take it this way..."

the thought of me being a theologian is entertaining in itself, but for added interest, my results:

You scored as Anselm. Anselm is the outstanding theologian of the medieval period.He sees man's primary problem as having failed to render unto God what we owe him, so God becomes man in Christ and gives God what he is due. You should read 'Cur Deus Homo?'

Anselm

93%

Karl Barth

80%

Jonathan Edwards

80%

John Calvin

73%

Martin Luther

67%

Friedrich Schleiermacher

47%

Charles Finney

33%

Jürgen Moltmann

20%

Augustine

20%

Paul Tillich

Which theologian are you?
created with QuizFarm.com

Once I finished this quiz and saw the results, I realized I had taken it once before a year or two ago-and scored as Anselm. Heh. The Mediaeval period had some interesting artistic feats to it's credit, so that's cool. :)
I do find the fact that Finney is not sitting at negative 300% disturbing (and yes even more than some others). Especially since he is above Augustine. Hoping against hope that is due to my equivocating...Semper reformanda indeed.

The Webernet Feeds Laziness.

2007-02-08T02:40:00.000-06:00

I have decided I need to cut down on reading interesting useless things on the www for a while. I have been rather neglecting things like art and leaving the house (though I do that every winter so nothing new)-I figure I am going to give myself a certain amount of time per day on the crackernet-uh I mean internet, and then go find other things to do. I refuse to do a complete self-imposed exile however, since cold turkey just doesn't work. For example, look at The Pyromaniacs' so called hiatus.

A good quarter of the comments are from Frank Turk and Dan Phillips-and he may not be commenting, but you know Phil Johnson is trolling on the blog practically EVERY day, reading comments and/or fiddling with the chalkboard.

Worst.
Blog hiatus.
EVER.

Yet more proof that the pyros need to work on their sanctification (I am aware that makes no sense-but don't I sound like the other haterz?).

And yes, I was looking at a blog with nothing but a chalkboard-hence the realization I need to quit wasting time trolling. I need to work on my own sanctification, obviously-my OCD is showing again.

You too are a Mighty Sinner

2007-02-04T03:11:00.001-06:00

If you are a preacher of grace, then preach a true and not a fictitious grace; if grace is true, you must bear a true and not a fictitious sin. God does not save people who are only fictitious sinners. Be a sinner and sin boldly, but believe and rejoice in Christ even more boldly, for he is victorious over sin, death, and the world. As long as we are here we have to sin. This life is not the dwelling place of righteousness but, as Peter says, we look for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells. It is enough that by the riches of God's glory we have come to know the Lamb that takes away the sin of the world. No sin will separate us from the Lamb, even though we commit fornication and murder a thousand times a day. Do you think that the purchase price that was paid for the redemption of our sins by so great a Lamb is too small? Pray boldly--you too are a mighty sinner.

Letter From Luther to Melanchthon

Must remember to believe and to pray-boldly. A comment I left elsewhere reminded me of this-again-then Of course I had to go looking for it to read again-such a great quote.
Don't you just wish sometimes you had a little of Luther's, what's the word, bombast? Blurgh.

Maybe I need to join a liturgical church....

2007-02-03T02:27:00.000-06:00

While searching for non-cheesy lace beading I found the coolest site-vestment fabrics!!! How drool worthy are they? I could stare at this fabric until I went blind, however this one I could actually afford.

Where the heck is this Global Warming they keep promising us?!

2007-01-31T21:24:00.000-06:00

Crap it's cold outside. I wouldn't've gone out but I had to get my final immunization for work.

Anyway, since I haven't worked in the last few days and I don't want to go anywhere, I was able to return to the corset I started a few weeks ago yesterday. I made the laughing moon silverado, as I read some good reviews of it on the net, and I figured since I am not the most accurate sewer I had better go with something relatively easy.
It was indeed easy, the only problems being it is a little large at the bottom (I can actually lace it closed) and well, my corset looks nothing like the one in the picture...it's supposed to be a rather long corset, and even though I added nearly an inch to the length, mine just doesn't look that long. Or really that shape. I think my waist is too low. Ah well no matter. I was actually worried it was going to be too small at first-good thing I went with a size smaller than the chart.

I decided to wear it for awhile yesterday as my back had been bothering me. Since I can't bend at the waist I also can't curve my back in an impossibly severe and contorted arch as I am wont to, so it does help. Well it did until my mom said "let me see", and proceeded to choke the life out of me because she wanted to see how tight she could get the bloody thing. I'm surprised she didn't put her knee in my back for leverage she was tugging at it so hard (and I think the only reason she didn't is because she's too short to do so). This was when I discovered it does close up at the bottom. And that mama is a sadist-no I guess I always knew that..

I still need to bind it and pick up some lace beading (that isn't too precious that is) for a trim. I decided to do some embroidery on it-and now I'm not sure I didn't prefer it without it. Mama likes the embroidery, but it just doesn't look as good as I expected I guess.

Anyway, here is the front with the embroidery-yes I hate it when people cut their heads off in photos-but it's only this once-the photo rendered my hair a truly hideous orange.

And here is the back-closed at the bottom as you can see-I should have made a 10 with an 8 bottom I guess. Well I'll know that if I ever make another. As for the weird curve in the chest part; I think that is because of the way I'm standing, though I did cut it a little less than straight and I had to take all the seams out there as my back is so broad. My brother and I have exactly the same build and I can say it looks better on a man.

Someone Else Like Me

2007-01-13T02:21:00.000-06:00

...doesn't exist, thank God! That would cause quite the spike in the rapture index-rivaled perhaps only by the legging revival. (Now I must go puke because I have thought about leggings).

Self-depreciation aside, I managed to save this from the clutches of WMRC and it turned out more or less okay;

If I Had to Die for Someone; Mohair spun on drop spindle and knitted in lace pattern on 2.5 needles.

I figured it's going to be tiny and I'll do a most simple pattern so it shouldn't take too long and started working...two months or so ago. I forgot that using 2.5 needles means that you will need 2 million rows or so to get the length. I also decided to leave the mohair as a single, which caused problems with breakage when WMRC shooed it through the ENTIRE house. Twice. Fortunately she never got the work off the needle (the ball was the fun part anyway). Also lucky was that hellion 2 didn't see it-he particularly enjoyed the zippy sound of tearing out some knitting of mama's row by row by row by row. Ad infinitium.

I did the spinning with the mohair I got from "Al" (I discovered that is the goat's name) last summer-it was actually the first thing I spun after getting the lace weight spindle and wonderful fibre combs, so it has been laying around waiting for me to start this piece so that it might tickle and itch me all over again. It's rather uneven, but that just made it interesting. Yeah, interesting. I meant it to be that way. Yeah.

I can only say as to inspiration, that I think the line I played off of here is one of their most absurd. How does one get "too old" for keeping warm? Is this caused by middle age spare tire? Hot flashes?

You are NEVER to old to avoid hypothermia, Bob.

:P

The WMRC and Other Highlights

2007-01-03T10:59:00.000-06:00

I can't believe It's 2007. I say that every year though...I told one of my coworkers that time must seem to go faster when you reach adulthood as you are no longer waiting for the milestones and events that make one "grown up" that take so long to come when you are that age.
She told me not to worry, as time slows down again once you are old enough to start counting down to the milestone of retirement. Hah!

For some reason I feel like doing the obligatory "look back", even though as usual I spent most of the time thinking "I gotta quit being so lazy-tomorrow! Or next year!" Ah as someone who lives by the power of inertia, I have to confess that I avoid change like the plague. Of course this year change has forced it's way into my life, like it or not. The year has been bookended with life altered and lost, my dad's death in March and now my aunt's terminal prognosis. With the death of my dad, I know nothing can be picked up and put back the way it was again. Well such changes are irrevocable so I am forced into learning to live with them.

In May, I finally finished my certification as a CCA (and I think the redesignation of the term from SCA is stupid but I need to make a New Year's Resolution to rant less about stupidity) after a year and a half of on and off classes, first by correspondence and then in a classroom setting. I discovered that I still hate school, though I admit I do miss many of the people I trained with.

My training did prove invaluable at the end of my dad's life as I was able to do all of his personal care, and my teacher was very helpful. That was especially appreciated as my entire family was next to useless through the last few months.

Then of course it was left to actually get a job (well in the public system rather than the crummy private facilities that is-I already had one of those). When I did my practicum at the lodge in February I hated it and was dreading having to work there. I have since gotten over it and am slowly improving, even at the 6 am shift. I managed through my first death and only sobbed like a baby about it for a day or two...I just finished my probationary period in December-now I am in with the union and they will never be rid of me! Bwahahahaha!

Mama and I also decided to take a trip out to the Maritime region. She and my Dad were going to go out there on their honeymoon and never got any farther than Montreal. They said they'd go one day-eventually (now you know where I get it from). Dad especially wanted to see the Confederation bridge after it had been built. This of course never happened, so we decided to go out there "for" him so to speak. It was lovely, as we went in the fall. Some regions of the country actually have seasons other than winter, summer and transitional week.

This has not been a particularly prolific year for me artistically. I have spent most of it obsessing over Athanasius and yet getting sidetracked continually, so all is normal in my own special world where one can exhibit traits of both ADHD and OCD at once. Now that I am actually getting somewhere on the project I am beginning to feel a little better, provided the World's Most Retarded Cat leaves it alone.

As mentioned I had a quilt published in a national magazine and tour across the US before being returned in November. I won't beat that horse anymore. Other than that, I did a few baby quilts-the one for my newest nephew/hellion James is of the most ugly fabric, but it has dragons and flames on it so I knew my brother would like it. It turned out much nicer than I expected, fabric notwithstanding. And I thought about the gospel as I made it.

I kept somewhat busy with decos and such, not as many as I would have liked though. I have also been keeping a "visual journal of mundanity" which has provoked some bemused expressions from others who come into contact with it. Still...trying...to force...self...to use...sketchbooks!

I finished numbers 44 to 66 of CIP . Yeah not a ragingly high number of pieces, but I am steadily working on it, if The World's Most Retarded Cat doesn't manage to destroy any more pieces (she is particularly fond of carrying the work for If I Had to Die For Someone up and down the house-hiding it does no good-I am convinced she must seek it out specially).

Speaking of The WMRC, when we went on vacation we asked someone to check on Morgana-which they did not do, so she disappeared. We live in a trailer, and with winter approaching, one does not go without a cat unless one is a magnanimouse person who has decided the little rabid hanta-virus spreading critters of the field need love too. At your house.
We are not those ones, so we got a new cat. She has turned out to be an idiot savant. She lays in her litter box, the friggin dumbbunny. However she displays an amazing capacity for getting at small things and playing with them to their destruction. And despite her abject stupidity, she is pretty cute.
WMRC is her official title, but her name is Marty. She's black and white, and my brother the catnamer picked the name as his son is obsessed with Madagascar. Usually we call her in the manner of the slow motion scene from the film; Maaarrrrttttyyyy.. oh sugarhoneyicetea-uh yeah the hellions were also enamored of the show and we have all seen it enough times to have memorized ninety percent of the dialogue.

Oh and the Hellions have been a town away from us since March or so. This has wreaked some interesting havoc with our lives, but we are finding ourselves adjusting accordingly. Not without complaining, as Moores are wont to do.

We are adjusting to all the changes we hate so much. Life in a state of flux has almost become routine over the past few years (if that's possible). Maybe I will even learn embrace change and make necessary ones myself. Tomorrow though. Or next year.

Isn't this Asenius?

2006-11-20T05:10:00.000-06:00

Athanasius proved to be a rock of intolerance to the Arian position. If he would not move, his enemies would dislodge him from his seat of power by other methods. An absurd smear campaign ensued. Athanasius was even accused of murdering a certain Asenius to obtain his hand for magic. The problem was Asenius was still very much alive and with both hands intact. No matter. the Arian Eusebius had the emperor's ear, and continued to put a bug in it until Athanasius was forced into exile in the west, where he remained until Constantine's death. Out of exile for a short time, but Eusebius and his new best friend Constantius weren't finished yet.

Updated: (click on the picture for a nice large version with reasonable detail) I have finished the painting for the most part, so I cut the fabric down and took this pic. Now I just have to wait a few days for it to dry so I can work on stitching. Not entirely sure what I will do, I am afraid I'll wreck it! I am also abit wary of the gold leaf I intend to apply-I've never worked with it before, and I imagine fabric to be a less than easy ground for it.
I think I will be conservative in embellishment-much more so than I had originally planned. I do hope to give it more definition, as I can't do much more with the paint. This is also about how dark the piece actually is-the fabric continually darkened for weeks after that iron bath!

I have been awake for 25 hours. I woke up far too early and finally transferred the design for Athanasius onto the silk. After coming home from work, I went right back to it. I smell like oil paint, a good feeling. At the moment the piece is too low contrast (the strength of my method is it's subtlety) I don't want it quite that subtle however. I have lightened all of these photos for better readability.

This is the first rendering of the face-I particularly liked the way it looked-less smirky than the drawing. However it was so dark it was almost unreadable in the photo. More layers of light had to be added. It doesn't look as well now though.

This one is the top laying on the floor as I was working it, paintstiks, brushes and my coat surround it. Yes I got home, took my coat off and worked at it! This is also the first time I have used sticks rather than tube oil paint (They were the thing that took months to arrive!). I like the dryness of them as they go onto my brush much more lightly, reducing the need to brush as much off.
I continually took photos to get an appreciation for how it was reading.

This is how it looks right now. He looks a bit more cranky in this picture (less so in life), perhaps he is thinking of the Eusebii (I don't know if that is actually a word...). the coptic textile design has been rendered in gold to the left. the first attempt gave me a much more readable design, but oh well.
There is still much work to do, but I feel better to have finally started work on the actual piece after all these months of stalling. I designed this just before my practicum-almost a year ago! I kind of wish I could leave it dark and low contrast; it looks very cool that way, dark and moody.

I hate writing titles, mine are always lame.

2006-11-12T05:19:00.000-06:00

I have just returned from Saskatoon, where I found some nice fabric for my Calvin hat. I didn't have enough of any red fabric for it, and though I considered making it white instead, once I get an idea it has to be done that way or I hate it. So I went looking for red. I found some beautiful scarlet wool that would have been perfect-unfortunately it was 46 dollars per metre of beautiful scarlet wool. So I bought some red corduroy with satin backed crepe to line it.

I decided to make a normal renaissance style bonnet and just add the earflaps. I'll need to do some kind of a band for it to hide the seams, not sure how I'll do that just yet.

The first go at it yielded a hat that is much too large for my head. Given my lack of abilities in math, one can guess that is where I went wrong. However I think I also should have measured higher on my head, as the earflaps would need to be quite high to accommodate the lack of largeness of my noggin.

It did work out nicely, however, even the crepe behaved reasonably well-it just would fit someone with a massive head. Germans would like it, they all have big heads. Maybe that rendition can be my Luther hat.

I bought some red and black silk brocade at the same time and I am tempted to make Calvin hat part deux out of that. Mama thinks that would be wasteful because no matter how I do it, it will be an ugly hat. Bah!

Red Letter Days

2006-10-31T16:35:00.000-06:00

As I'm sure we all know, today marks a special time of celebration for young and old alike.
It is certainly a great day to remember-perhaps by studying the 95 theses over again. Or at least you could pick up a Martin Luther is my Homeboy beer stein from Frank Turk's Pawnshop (how apropos is that?).

Happy Reformation Day!

I spent part of it getting tests done at the hospital, blech. The way I felt makes me profusely thankful that we are indeed saved by grace through faith alone-I wouldn't have merited much but the kick in the butt I got.

I think I will make a red Calvin hat if I feel up to it.

Drawring of the Day

2006-10-21T18:38:00.000-06:00

Sometimes I wonder how much of a wingnut I seem to to everyone else. Then I realize I am a wingnut and it's only fitting that I appear that way.

I am listening to old recordings of David Martyn Lloyd-Jones (he had the best accent, didn't he).
Anyway, I think he had a wonderful face so here is my drawing of the day: D Martyn Lloyd-Jones, done in a hatchy directional manner. Not really sure why I decided to do that, but I think it turned out nicely regardless. It was done relatively quickly, as I have an affinity for the look that produces.

I used the photo on the cover of the first biography by Iain Murray, which looks 20s-30s. Really Lloyd-Jones' face got more interesting as he got older (gained character of course) and I would have used a later picture, but this younger picture of him is a particular favorite type of photo portrait-good lighting which translates to sketch nicely and three-quarters view is my preferred angle.

I think I would do well on the weird peripheries of Christian blogging, heh (not the heretic country that is, just the tangential ). Anyone else in the blogosphere referencing Lloyd-Jones is going to mention his meticulous expositional preaching and theological output, for better or worse. Only here do you get an exclamation about what a delightful face he had. Told you I was a wingnut.

For the record, I have been set myself a challenge of a drawing a day for a month, mostly mundane things to improve my quick spot drawing. Today I decided to fall back on more familiar territory, hence the portrait.

Back to the dubs

2006-10-15T22:34:00.000-06:00

I returned from my trip yesterday. Thanks gwensmom and Mem for proving me right about my widespread readership, hee!

The lodge called me to work today, but I need some time to rest from my vacation first! I was told that if you return from a vacation more tired than when you left, it was a good one. Mine must have been great.

Seriously, I enjoyed myself to the tune of about 300 bucks over budget (I've always been a sucker for supporting my fellow artists and craftspeople). I did get some really unusual items, including some hand maiden yarn, which I was hoping to get my hands on.

Oh and some PEI dirt. Fortunately that was free, as I scrounged it up from the back alley in Charlottetown, heh. I mailed it home to myself. I can't wait to do some textile treatment with it.

I will post pics of all of that stuff when I get the mail-we mailed the majority of it home, so we wouldn't have to haul it around. The postal clerks told us one day an entire bag was full of parcels for the two of us alone.

When I got home and read my emails, I discovered that the QuiltingArts quilts were not being sent home at the end of the month as planned, but are going to be shown one last time in...

wait for it....

*suspence*

HOUSTON.

Those of you who are not part of the quiltiverse are probably thinking yeah so? But if you are part of it I know you get it. :) the international quilt festival in Houston is one of the most prestigious shows in the world, and now I'll be able to brag that I showed at Houston-Ooooo. Nevermind that it's as part of a company display, it's still Houston. I think they were at Chicago too, now that I think about it. Well I feel special anyway. Maybe that will get me off of my rear and make me work at new things.