Karen's Muse and Musings

Day for Challenges

It's been kind of a crazy week with not much time for art. I did not get to participate in Wednesday Stamper, so today I decided I would make time to take part in some of the challenges.

Above is my entry for the theme, Balloon, at the Layers of Color challenge. I am in a group that trades Gothic Arches, so I decided to make mine in that shape. It's for Caryl so I hope she likes it. I stayed with my new color obsession, baltic blue, olive and black. I used Nicholas and the goose from my collage sheets, along with stamps from Layers of Color. The words were clipped from a book — a necessity since I jammed my husband's printer trying to print on vellum. He doesn't know about it yet, so shh! This week's Gothic Arch is "any theme", so this is also my entry for that challenge.

Next I turned to Dans ma maison il y a ...  This week there is a sun in our house!

As I worked on this piece, I kept thinking "man, is this thing bright!" but hey, sunshine is bright, right? The poem is from Robert Louis Stevenson's A Child's Garden of Verses, one of my favorite sources. I need to hit the used bookstores and try to find more copies.

Prairie Sisters

Did you watch Little House on the Prairie? When I saw the photograph of these two little girls dressed just alike, I thought of a particular episode in which the mother, Caroline, bought some beautiful fabric to make herself a new dress. However, she ended up making 2 identical dresses for her daughters, Mary and Laura, instead. True mother's love!

For the background of the collage, I used an old letter written from North Dakota in 1909. It begins, "Dear Sis." in English, but then continues in what I believe is Danish. I added some strips from an old primer and hymnal. I call the piece, Prairie Sister, and it's now for sale in my Etsy shop.

They were all happy that night. The fire on the hearth was pleasant, for on the High Prairie even the summer nights were cool. The red-checked cloth was on the table, the little china woman glimmered on the mantel-shelf, and the new floor was golden in the flickering firelight. Outside, the night was large and full of stars. Pa sat for a long time in the doorway and played his fiddle and sang to Ma and Mary and Laura in the house and to the starry night outside.

Laura Ingalls Wilder
(This quote is taken from "Little House On the Prairie," page 131)

Meet Bobby

A beautiful cabinet card arrived in my mail yesterday from Christine. I just love this little boy with his ball and his adorable toy horse — so much so that I sat right down and created this collage sheet.

Here's a little poem from A Child's Garden of Verses by Robert Louis Stevenson.

Looking Forward

When I am grown to man's estate
I shall be very proud and great,
And tell the other girls and boys
Not to meddle with my toys.

Boy with Goose

Make up your own story to go with this one.

You can now order prints of my artwork such as this one at Etsy.

 

Goose photographed by my good friend Joanne Thieme Huffman and used with her permission. Thank you, Joanne.