Blogger has been very fickle about providing me access to post here... I am trying to keep this blog alive to direct any latecomers to my new home at http://vintagemoonstudio.typepad.com See you there!

NEW HOME!!!!!

This bird has flown the coop and landed in Typepad! Please follow me there @ this link:

http://vintagemoonstudio.typepad.com

I hope you will all find me there and change any link you may have on your blog.

Look forward to welcoming you to my new nest! I am still in the process of setting up and may not post there too much for a while, but stay tuned... I am planning on a new art give-away sometime very soon!!

Sleeping In The Forest

I thought the earth remembered me,
she took me back so tenderly,
arranging her dark skirts, her pockets full of lichens and seeds.
I slept as never before, a stone on the riverbed,
nothing between me and the white fire of the stars but my thoughts,
and they floated light as moths among the branches of the perfect trees.
All night I heard the small kingdoms breathing around me,
the insects, and the birds who do their work in the darkness.
All night I rose and fell, as if in water, grappling with a luminous doom.
By morning I had vanished at least a dozen times
into something better.

poem by Mary Oliver

Familiar Phrases

I will not be posting much artwork for a while... am in the middle of completing some long-term projects...but thought I would share these interesting little tidbits I found today in a really unique old book titled "Modern Book of Thoughts" published in 1930. The book contains a lot of quotes from Shakespeare, English poets and Proverbs. One section in the book is "Familiar Phrases" which gives the origins of phrases that we still use today. I thought it was really interesting to see how old some of them actually are:

"Birds of a feather flock together" - Plato
"As busy as a bee" - Chaucer 1386
" Cherchez la femme (Find the Woman)" - Alexander Dumas
"As pleased as Punch" - Charles Dickens in "Hard Times"
" A closed mouth catches no flies" - Cervantes in "Don Quixote"
" Here's you hat, what's your hurry?" - B. Costello 1904 song title
"Swan Song" - Plato
"O.K." - archives of Sumner County in Tennessee 1796 - was a mistake for
"O.R." (Order Recorded)
"Who loves me loves my dog also" - St. Bernard 1150
"By hook or crook" - John Wycliffe 1380 - based on the custom of allowing
tenants as much timber as could be gathered with their hook (staff) and
crook.

And that completes my lesson for today!!

I also want to thank everyone who has sent me get well wishes and prayers... am on the road to recovery and I have gained much strength from my friends!

Have a great week everyone!

Artwork above from an altered mini composition book

heart is 8" tall

Doodle Days (Daze)

I know.. here's a woman with way too much time on her hands... but oh, it is SO much fun to doodle!

My Word for the New Year

My sweet friend Liz (check out her wonderful blog here!) shared a link to the blog of Christine Kane, who writes about her perspective regarding New Years resolutions (see her blog here and scroll down to read "you say you want a resolution". Her approach is to choose a single word to focus on and hold in your thoughts and actions throughout the year.

It took all of 3 seconds for a word to come to mind for me... "persevere"...and once I read the dictionary's definition, I knew I had chosen the right word.

Since I am doing a fair amount of "couch potato" activity while I am recovering, I took out my brand spanking new set of Neocolor crayons and black Castell pens and went to town. The little girl is an image from a vintage photo - the rest is drawn. If you have never used these water-coluble crayons before, I encourage you to give them a try. So much fun!! And I ended up with something that is as close to a journaling page as I have ever come... there IS hope for me yet!

What is your word?