My Quiet Corner

I live with my 2 adorable cats and my husband of 23 years, in our first home in western CT, not very far from the red dot. In this part of the state, there are many long, winding roads, barns & farms, covered bridges as well as a rich Native American history (Chief Waramaug, the great sachem, lived nearby) with lots of trees and still wild areas, where the houses are fairly spread apart. Not being able to see neighbors, was in our top 5 criteria when we were looking to buy and.. meeting all 5 and THEN SOME, is most likely why we're still here, 21 years later and still in love with the location.

Last night on the porch and today (forecast, above) were perfect examples, of the peace and the rejuvenation that we find here in the solitude of living on a dead end street in beautiful New England: quiet except for the tree toads and cicadas, taking naps, watching a Red Sox baseball game and having to put on sweats before dinner! Nature is all around us and we enjoyed the show that the "battling hummingbirds" were putting on for us at the 2 feeders and even heard the Barred Owl pair screeching deep in the woods.

I am ever grateful that we both count the simple things as blessings, because we have SO MUCH to be thankful for! Living in a quiet corner of our town, being surrounded by trees and having privacy from the neighbors, being perched on the edge of a large, protected nature preserve for hiking and snowshoeing and having so many back roads for biking and long walks with little traffic.. oh, yes, and our health and each other!

April in Boston. At a ballgame, of course!

Fear of Living Large

...on canvas, that is!

Ready to start my FIRST EVER painted canvas.

I'm back! It HAS been too long, hasn't it? :: insert cricket sound :: The good news is that Effy has inspird me with her 30 posts/30 days challenge, which started on August first. Though daily posting's not likely, it's gotten me off of my keister!

Frustrated, one of the reasons I stopped blogging was that I stopped using my desktop computer when I got my iphone last summer and couldn't attach photos via Safari! Now I am using Puffin for the ipad.. and that should do the trick!

So for my return post, I thought I'd share the (rather earth-shaking) decision I made yesterday to "Go Big" after 1.5 years of creating inside my art journals! yay! Here's a recent 10" x 10" page in my altered book:

And here's the finished canvas, a whopping 26" x 18" ~

With a busy creative life and a rich inner life, I'm anxious to share this journey and I hope you are just as anxious to return. 

Art From My Heart

Tonight, as I was browsing through my flickr collection of the same name, I recalled many fond memories of the wonderful mixed media artist friends I've made over the years through collaborations of all shapes and sizes. We met through flickr, our blogs, Ebay ATC groups, Yahoo groups, NINGs from 6 years ago, challenges, swaps, skinny books, art-e-zine and SO MUCH MORE. So.... here is a random selection of a few of my older art pieces that were part of all that "coming together!" 

I am happy to say, many of us still keep in touch!

Thank you for inspiring me, dear friends! (Art is from June 2007-Nov 2009.)

Faces #11, 12 & 13 ~ Mixing It Up

All three of the latest faces were sketched, initially, and then altered digitally! Being a photographer for almost 30 years, i've embraced the idea of digital manipulation YEARS ago and find it such an exciting way to express myself, artistically. I love taking the initial "vision" and then creating several fresh, new versions!

Trying a "cartoon" effect and playing with color, proved to be the most rewarding tweaks for the latest batch of sketches. It was exciting to see the results of thinking a little bit outside the box. I think you'd be quite pleased with the results using one of your sketches and either photoshop or one of the many free websites available!

Faces #9 and #10 - "Only" 19 Left To Go

Two more faces to contribute to the challenge! I do love them all, but being a child of the 60's I would have to say the inspiration from the 1967 poster by San Francisco (resident Filmore) artist Bonnie MacLean has to be my favorite so far. As i plan to finish these 15 minute sketches with the application of color, i am making notes and recording my thoughts along the way!

So far, it's been GREAT FUN!! 

When i added the little "strokes" around this pretty girl, i wasn't sure what they were and i didn't really concern myself with it, at the time. A day or two later it came to me ~ she is radiating ENERGY. The energy of the COSMOS. Which is just more fodder for my notes, as i want to remember what each face brought to me, as i drew them :)

Face #8 - Ready For a Change

After several, more traditional sketches, today I felt like trying a bolder, cleaner graphic. And since #8 looks as if she's lost her mojo, I'm sending her off on an Artist's Date to try and retrieve some of it.. 

A bit of photoplay ~ pretty cool, huh? It may even inspire how i decide to paint her.

29 Faces ~ #1 through 7

Today is Day #7 and I'm pleased to introduce you to my growing collection of lovlies! 

When i learned about Ayala's challenge at ilove2paint, i was immediately drawn to the idea. Why? Simply put, i love to sketch faces. I discovered my mojo over the past 3-4 years and have kept at it, always aware that by the act of repetition, continued development would result. This was PERFECT for me.

And what has been especially fun, keeping in tune with different layers of awareness (similar to intuitive painting), has allowed each 15-minute sketch to reveal its message/symbolism to serve me later when i finish some of my favorites and add color with paint, watercolor, ink, oil pastels or all of the above!  

#7 "aisha" is communicating self-love as well as NEW love (springtime) through healing and nature's magic!

#6 "anahata" shows me that she has beautiful red hair, an emerald green dress and the feeling of ancient royalty. She represents spirit energy & will wear a beautiful heart chakra medallion.

#5 "sacred feminine" represents beauty, harmony & the "sweet nectar of life" through the symbol of the honeybee.

#4 represents change & transformation/metamorphosis

#3 has a "fierce" (as effy says), somewhat tribal energy to her face. I also sensed her beautiful, black hair and dark eyes contrasting against a deep shade of sunflower yellow flowers at her face.

#2 "strength" The tears flowing across her delicate features sybolize that life brings us challenges when something/someone requires our attention and focus. She represents that overcoming obstacles makes us stronger.

#1 "luna lady" represents the super moon this month on May 5th. My best friend and cousin, who is an accomplished artist/spiritualist/musician/filmmaker, told me she perfectly matched the spirit of the Scorpio Buddah Moon! ~ xo



boston sept '10
Originally uploaded by cookievf

" A friend is one to whom one may pour out all the contents of one's heart, chaff and grain together, knowing that the gentlest of hands will take and sift it, keep what is worth keeping and with a breath of kindness blow the rest away."
- Arabian Proverb

Heaven Has A Special Angel Today

Alsace Region (Mulhouse, Neuchatel, Strasbourg, Bonne) and Paris, FRANCE. Bone, TUNISIA. New York City, NY. These are the places that my husband's grandmother, Margot, lived before a long, arduos journey with her family to America where they finally settled in Connecticut.

She was 99.

Her involuntary (and frightening) exodus began when Nazi Germany invaded her hometown in France and she had to make her SOLO escape on foot... ☆ PREGNANT ☆ and caring for her very young daughter, my mother in law! In her words, "I had to leave our home, everything, with a baby in my arms, a baby in my belly and a RUCKSACK on my back for milk and diapers!" This AMAZING WOMAN had to travel alone before she could be reunited, with the help of the Red Cross, meeting up with her husband in the south of france! Soon afterwards, they continued their terrifying journey to make the crossing to Algeria, quite possibly on one of the last ships leaving the country for an African destination.

In Bonne, Algeria near the border of Tunisia, they moved in with cousins and though his grandfather took on horribly demeaning jobs to make ends meet (grave digger & more), they barely had barely enough to eat. Another troubling story I have been told was when Margot's mother Alice (a Le Cordon Blue graduate who was employed as a chef by the author, Edna Ferber in NYC) sent them a shipment of basic food and necessessities. When the authorities destroyed the packages upon inspection, the family was forced to separate the dried beans and peas from the powdered soap by hand! A story that has been told and retold over 6 decades to her descendants!

It feels good to write about it here; to be able to release some of the pain and who knows how many untold stories, out into the world... to set it free as she has been sent home to her Creator <3>

Less than 20 years after they arrived, her husband died of heart disease/high blood pressure at the age 58. Happily, my husband was 12 years old and can still treasure MANY wonderful memories of his loving grandfather. Margot was often known to repeat "he was the TRUE LOVE of my life!"

While writing tonight, I asked my husband to recall some of his childhood memories and he just said "I was very close to my grandfather who loved to take me places and I often spent the night with them. Family gatherings revolved around food & cooking! This was central to the 4 women: my mother, my aunt, my grandmother and my great-grandmother who were always in the kitchen... for hours, preparing fine French dishes. Of course, this was followed by hours spent around the dining room table EATING!" He said, "I remember that my grandmother loved showing me off when out to dinner for my birthday because the waiters were impressed by my menu selections." He was under the age of 10!

I have to close these stories of family memories, food and love, by saying that as I was typing, my husband was IN THE KITCHEN cooking an incredibly delicious shrimp scampi for dinner! It's in the genes ~ lucky me!

Many joys and a long, rich life followed. Tonight we are saying a prayer for this family's deep loss. Kiss someone you love tonight ~ we are all only here for a short while XO

A Family's Pride for "Our" WWII Veteran

A little background history on naval aviation in the US:

By the end of WWI, Naval Aviation had firmly established itself as a premier fighting force for our country. At this time, approximately 100 pilots were being trained each month. As the nation entered into WWII, Naval Aviation and Pensacola was again called upon to produce the much needed flight crews to support the war effort. Naval Aviator production grew to over 1000 pilots a month and the Navy's aircraft inventory swelled to over 130,000 aircraft and during 1944, NAS Pensacola trained an all time high of 12,010 pilots that year. It is said that the War in the Pacific was largely won by the heroic actions of Naval Aviators aboard the carriers that wages war both at sea and during the island campaigns supporting the Marines and Army ground forces.

His story:

After college, my father joined the Navy and waited to be called. Upon graduation from Springfield College, with a degree in Phys.Ed., he returned to his hometown in New Jersey and taught the same while coaching Basketball. I recently learned that during this same time, in addition to teaching and coaching, he also travelled the short distance to Philadelphia and was a dance instructor (in his spare time) for Arthur Murray Dance Studio.

When dad was called up, he was selected for Naval Air Primary Flight Training Command, studying long and hard over the next 9 months, to become a pilot. He studied at some of the top universities on the east coast and was eternally grateful for what he called, "a million dollar education!"


Following several months deliberation, it was determined that dad's graduating class would not be needed for active duty, as our military successes increased and there was no longer a need to replace our downed pilots. My father would become a (fighter plane) Flight Instructor. Having gotten his wings, my parents could now go forward with their plans to be married. What a relief my mother must've experienced to learn her new husband would remain stateside and they could live off-base together!


... and they lived happily ever after, married for almost 60 years - xo

My 1st Booth Pics

Updated Display

Please refer to June 12 post, as a reference. Or, better yet, scroll down past Twitter, to just beneath my photo (tags) and click on "display."

Table one. Found a nice, tall "T Bar" for $5.00 at a store closing, that will hold 24" chains.

Rotating display rack was a Thrift Shop find for $3. Handmade earring cards finally allow me to eliminate those DREADED dangling price tags!! YUCK!

Table two at the very posh

Linda Rich Salon, 32 Church St, New Milford, CT

April in Boston

"stately" beacon hill, boston MA
Originally uploaded by cookievf

The first of four trips this year, April 2010 clearly rates as one of the TOP FIVE ALL TIME (out of 50) trips to this fine city in the last 15 years!

Following any day game, no matter what the weather, it's a tradition to walk from fenway park to dinner in the north end by way of our favorite martini bar! That afternoon we decided to take a new route through kenmore square, down comm ave through the neighborhoods of back bay and beacon hill across the top of the commons and on through faneuil hall to hanover street.

We had to slow our pace to take in all the history and fine architecture, courtyards in bloom and vintage facades that surrounded us on this rainy day under a leaden, overcast sky!

Umbrellas or not, the air was crisp and fresh, the walk and the company invigorating and the lighting perfect for my photo shoot. Truly memorable!

Ice Cold and Dee-lish!

And don't forget to look down!