There are four basic food groups: plain chocolate, milk chocolate, dark chocolate, and white chocolate.
Jill Shalvis
Month: August 2022
Is It Art If You Don’t Like It?
This past weekend I went to another live music event — a Smooth Jazz Festival held in a beautiful music and concert hall in Milwaukee.
There were three performing segments — wonderful, upbeat music. Saxophones and Base Altos and guitars and drums all melded to make peppy, feel-good music.
Until the third band. The most famous band. The artist I’ve followed for more than 40 years. His form of smooth jazz was, well smooth. Melodious. Bright. Mellow. Did I say melodious?
Somewhere in the past 40 years my main man had gone a little contemporary. A little hip hop. A little infusion.
And that’s all his portion of the concert was.
I tried to find and follow a melody in all the songs he and his little band played. I am used to jazz players going off script a bit, throwing some fancy key strokes in and above what the song calls for. A lot of musicians do that.
But every one of his songs added a mess of notes that matched nothing. Riffs and repeats and wrong keys and 10 minute drum solos and base solos that played the same riff over and over and a saxophonist who played the same four or five notes 15 times in a row before moving the next four notes, repeating the jam again.
I hated it. I felt bad, but I hated it.
It was painful to listen to. My hopes for a melodious conclusion were smashed against the rocks. I couldn’t wait until the set was over. Eventually it was.
The audience loved it.
They cheered and screamed and yelled yeah baby after every solo, after every piano riff, after every jam and hip hop funky fusion song.
So my question to you today is — was that performance still art?
The musicians were spectacular. Amazing drum work. Smooth steady base playing. The saxophonist played the flute as well, and he was spot on. The headliner ran his fingers over the keyboard like Liberace.
Yet every song grated on my nerves like some abstract art painting.
Was the music still art if I didn’t like it? If it didn’t sound like music? If it didn’t ebb and flow and bring joy to some of the hearts in the audience?
I think over 40 years everybody changes. We are not the starving artists of our 20s. We are more mature these days, more confident, more willing to try something new and exciting.
Just not like this.
What do you think?
Sunday Evening Art Gallery — Unique Flowers
Flowers have spoken to me more than I can tell in written words. They are the hieroglyphics of angels, loved by all men for the beauty of their character, though few can decipher even fragments of their meaning.
– Lydia M. Child
Saturday Night — Tell Me A Story
Wandering as I usually do, I came across this photo, and I fell in love with it.
Besides the obvious Poe reference, it calls for a story.
What kind of story would YOU write?
I’ll go first:
It’s a story about a little girl with dark brown hair and green eyes hidden by wire rimmed glasses. She is only nine — feeling much older, of course, when she has to keep an eye on her little brother.
But that’s besides the point.
It’s once upon a midnight dreary because it’s Christmas Eve — heck, past Christmas Eve — and, sneaking downstairs sometime after midnight, the little girl discovered that Santa had not come yet! How dreary!
Who Are You?
In digging around my website today, I saw that I have 2,213 followers.
No way.
There is no way that 2,213 people are interested in what I have to say.
I thank you all from the bottom of my heart for taking the time to click that little button that says “follow.” But its more than that. So much more than that.
I have always managed to throw a little magic, a little BoHo, a little philosophy, a little old lady wisdom into my posts, along with a lot of unique art and moral support for creative people of all sorts. I really believe in encouraging and discovering each other’s possibilities.
But 2,213 people.
Who are you?
What are you all about?
Dipping into the followers names I see SheDesigns and KHartless and Perfectlyimperfectme5 and MalloryHasler and junemurphy57 and JeffFlesh and hundreds more, and I wonder — what are you all about? What is your life about? What do you do for a living, for fun, for inspiration?
Is your life full of heartbreak? Happiness? Confusion? Are you an artist? A brick layer? A dancer?
At this semi-advanced age I would have a hard time remembering everything you shared, yet I would love to know how you got to where you are now. Where you are going. What you want to be when (and if) you grow up.
I’d love to know if followers like empressakosua and AprellMay and scottatirrell really read me now and then, if I share anything worthwhile, make any of them smile.
Do followers like lorraineanne and JacR and santmarcair enjoy my art galleries? Do friends like Jaypatel and thebetterhouseco and cgusti find any inspiration from my walks down Faerie Paths?
It’s a wide, wonderful, horrible world out there. There are some losses I will never overcome, other blessings I will never forget. Like all of you, I love and hate and laugh and dance in front of the stereo and read the classics and make Angel Tears that sparkle in the sunlight. Writing makes me feel good, walking through the woods makes me feel good, and you all make me feel good.
It’s something we all should do. Feel good, that is. And share. Who we are, what we’re doing, where we’re going.
That’s what makes life so sweet.
Sunday Evening Art Gallery — Michal Trpák
Michal Trpák was born in 1982 in České Budějovice, Czech Republic. Continue reading “Sunday Evening Art Gallery — Michal Trpák”
Faerie Paths — Night
Athwart the star-lit midnight sky
Luminous fleecy clouds drift by,
As the mysterious, pallid moon
Sinks in the waveless still lagoon.
Now that the queen of night is dead,
The starry commonwealth o’erhead
(Softer and fairer than gaudy day)
Sheds lustrous light from the Milky Way;
While the Dog-star gleams, and the Sisters Seven,
Float tremulously in the misty heaven.
Faintly, afar the horse-bells ring;
Myriads of wakened crickets sing;
And the spirit voices of the night
Sing snatches of fairy music bright,
Old-world melodies – lang syne sung –
Recalling days when the heart was young,
Whose wonderful cadences fall and rise,
As the wind in the casuarina sighs;
And the world seems ‘gulfed, this summer night,
In a flood of delicious, dreamy light.
~Harry Breaker Morant
Getting On Track Monday Morning
It’s Monday Morning and I already feel the creative juices flowing as I sip my morning coffee.
I am one of those fortunate creatures who are able to start creatin’ in the morning, as I am retired. I have a tendency to look forward with trepidation, as I DO have fewer years ahead of me than behind, but I make a point to not think about what I won’t be able to do and focus on what I can do.
I went to an Irish music festival over the weekend, and I can tell you, there’s nothing more motivating than watching music and creativity and talent all shining through individual and group entertainers. The excitement, the power of emotions, the precise notes matched and enhanced, the wonderful combination of traditional and modern, all swirled and melded into wonderful music and wonderful inspiration.
I am forever in awe of artists who can play a piano or a guitar or sing with grace and talent. It’s all hard work — to begin, to continue your craft. There are no shortcuts to fine tuning any skill.
Those of us who are not “born” with talent still have a chance to show off our skills. With practice, dedication, and love of our art, there is no reason why we can’t show off our worth, too.
We may not be an Ernest Hemingway or an Itzhak Perlman or a Georgia O’Keeffe.
But then again, we might be.
We never know until the very end. Even then we have no idea where our creativity will wind up. So why not have fun with what we’ve got and where we’re going?
Don’t give up on your piano, your knitting, or your writing. Go abstract! Go traditional! Go wild!
Make your Monday Mornings count for something… even if you can’t get going ’till Monday Evening!
Sunday Evening Art Gallery — Maria Rivans
Maria Rivans is a contemporary British artist known for her scrapbook-style collage artwork.
A mash-up of Surrealism meets Pop-Art, Rivans’ work re-appropriates vintage collectables to create dreamy realms which transport the viewer into fantastical worlds of the imaginary, each one suffused with vivid color, arresting imagery, and intricate detail.
Rivans’ collages have a firm running theme of vintage Hollywood films, B-movies and old television shows. 
Her process begins with her extensive collection of vintage papers which she scavenges from antique books and retro magazines.
She is always on the look-out for that perfect ‘something’ in second-hand shops and at market stalls.
Like piecing together an unruly jigsaw puzzle, Rivans begins to collate and assemble the skillfully cut-out fragments and scraps, laboring over long periods and making alteration after alteration, until the collage begins to take shape.
Through an intense attention to detail and an artistic sensitivity to color and composition, each of Rivans’ artworks is the product of months of careful deliberations and decisions.
Her collages are fun, inventive, and full of familiar faces and extensions. The collage pieces that stand in for the hairdos of movie stars of the past create a harmony and connection between today and yesterday.
More of Maria Rivans creativity can be found at https://www.mariarivans.com/.
Everything you see has its roots in the unseen world. — Purplerays (repost)
I always find such inspiration in these posts — I hope you do, too!
* * Everything you see has its rootsin the unseen world.The forms may change,yet the essence remains the same.Every wondrous sight will vanish,every sweet word will fade.But do not be disheartened,The Source they come from is eternalgrowing, branching out,giving new life and new joy .. ~ Rumi ~ Artist Credit : Anne Marie Bonehttps://www.annmariebone.com/ * […]
Everything you see has its roots in the unseen world. — Purplerays
I Love the Impossible
It’s funny how often we are expected to suspend belief in how things work in order to be entertained.
I myself am somewhat a “duh” when it comes to technical anything, so I am one of those people who barely know the difference between possible and impossible. Real experiences and CGI. Possibility and Impossibility.
I am one of those people who watch movies and say “Can they really do that?”
There are many movies in which what they’re doing is impossible. Liquid nitrogen freezing bodies instantly. Stealing $160 million from a casino right under security’s nose. Hijackers taking over Air Force One. Outrunning fireballs and jumping through glass walls and not getting cut. Hacking government computers.
I mean, all those ideas help move the plot forward. What’s more exciting than a tank of piranhas eating someone alive in an instant? What’s better than hot wiring some ancient alien rig to so you can ride like a cowboy across the land? Or riding on a cable from one flying airplane to another before it runs out of fuel?
I love being entertained. And I love watching something that sits right at the edge of impossible.
Now, I know there is no such thing as training raptors or landing on a space station half way between the moon and earth. That there are no such things as three-headed dogs or fire-breathing dragons. No such scenarios as ghosts befriending homeowners or dogs that talk.
But through the magic of today’s technology, all of that is possible.
For all the madness and sadness around each of us, it is still a wonderful time to be alive. Anything you can imagine, movies can create. You can really feel like you are hacking through the middle of the jungle, wandering through the ancient pyramids, standing side-by-side with the emperor of the Qin Dynasty, or walking deep under ground through the worlds of dwarves.
Books have been around for centuries, successfully spinning the same sort of tales, but only in the last 20 years can you actually see something that does not exist.
How they do it I have no idea. Like magicians and their tricks, I’m not sure I want to know how it’s done. I’d rather float in the pool of ignorance and have a good time believing the impossible.
There is nothing wrong with being fooled by the magic of technology and the possibilities of the mind. The singer/actress Cher sums it up best:
“Until you’re ready to look foolish, you’ll never have the possibility of being great.”
Sunday Evening Art Gallery — Cloisonné from the Ming Empire
The art of Cloisonné first developed in the jewelry of the ancient Near East. 
From Byzantium or the Islamic world, the technique reached China in the 13–14th centuries.
Cloisonné is the technique of creating designs on metal vessels with colored-glass paste placed within enclosures made of copper or bronze wires, which have been bent or hammered into the desired pattern.
Known as cloisons (French for “partitions”), the enclosures generally are either pasted or soldered onto the metal body.
The glass paste, or enamel, is colored with metallic oxide and painted into the contained areas of the design, which is then fired in a kiln then polished.
The craftsmen in the Ming Empire (1368-1644) made enamelware by firing different powdered minerals into long-lasting enamel.
The earliest known Ming era example of cloisonné was produced sometime around the year 1430. But it isn’t known when the craft was first practiced.
Initially, craftspeople in the Ming Empire mainly created cloisonné artwork on metal objects such as brass or bronze vases, kettles, or other objects. But they also innovated beautiful cloisonné artwork on porcelain vessels.
In the first half of the Ming dynasty, the court actively recruited painters from across the empire to serve in an academy producing works on themes that acclaimed the court’s majesty and glory.])The Ming enamels, bold in design with fine depth and purity of color, were never surpassed in later epochs.
Although cloisonné is a world-wide art form, the colors and style of ancient Chinese history offer a unique and beautiful reflection of a people and their craftmanship.
Faerie Paths — Birds
Be like the bird, who
Halting in his flight
On limb too slight
Feels it give way beneath him,
Yet sings
Knowing he hath wings.
– Victor Hugo
Words
Do you think that certain words are overused these days?
In conversations, in publications, in social media, there are words that are repeated over and over so much that they often lose their appeal. Their purpose.
I know ~I~ tend to overuse certain words when writing. I’ve caught myself repeating words like “like” and “as if” every other sentence. That’s one of the words/phrases I double check for when I read through something.
I also find myself saying “cool” and “wonderful” and “amazing” a lot. I suppose it doesn’t take much to impress me, and those are the words that instantly come up when I describe something new that I like.
The media is just as guilty of overuse to get a reaction, too “Exciting,” “cutting edge”, “innovative,” and “unprecedented” are just a few of the over-used words referred to in polls on the Internet.
Often these words, when seen, loose the punch they were meant to give. Especially if you overuse them in the same article/story/conversation.
But I also find that when you substitute words for the most popular ones, your pattern of speech changes. If I change out “I had a wonderful day yesterday!” with “I had a superb day yesterday!” does it feel the same? Flow the same? If I say “Her artwork is stunning” instead of “Her work is marvelous,” does it mean the same thing?
I was thinking this morning about a name for this blog. I wanted to talk about sharing information or advice or other blogs I enjoy with you. Sharing links or ideas or snippets of conversation that may bring a smile to your face.
Of course, you can also share drugs, diseases, gossip and hatred. Perhaps that’s the double edged sword of many words. They can be taken either way.
All this came about because I wanted to let you know I enjoy sharing other people’s blogs with you. I know there are a million blogs out there, everyone creating their own niche, their own following. And that you already have too many blogs you are already committed to.
But like a great recipe, if there’s truth and/or humor and/or information to share from someone else’s offerings, it’s worth sharing. If you share because you are impressed and delighted by what you experienced, that’s good. If you share because it is an unpopular opinion or because you want others to be “on your side”, that’s not as positive.
Try to extend and renovate your vernacular. Wonderful and amazing are great words, but use them sparingly. Find other adjectives for your same-o same-o. Shake it up! Reinvent yourself!
Sharing is cool. So is language. Use both to your embetterment!
Sunday Evening Art Gallery — Giuseppe Arcimboldo
Giuseppe Arcimboldo (1527–1593) was an Italian painter best known for creating imaginative portrait heads made entirely of objects such as fruits, vegetables, flowers, fish and books.
He was a conventional court painter of portraits for three Holy Roman Emperors in Vienna and Prague, also producing religious subjects and, among other things, a series of colored drawings of exotic animals in the imperial menagerie.
Arcimboldo’s conventional work on traditional religious subjects has fallen into oblivion, but his portraits of human heads made up of vegetables, fruit and tree roots, were greatly admired by his contemporaries and remain a source of fascination today.
Art critics debated whether these paintings were whimsical or the product of a deranged mind, but the majority of scholars hold to the view that given the Renaissance fascination with riddles, puzzles, and the bizarre, Arcimboldo, far from being mentally imbalanced, catered to the taste of his times.
Arcimboldo did not leave written certificates on himself or his artwork.
After the deaths of Arcimboldo and his patron, the emperor Rudolph II, the heritage of the artist was quickly forgotten, and many of his works were lost.
When the Swedish army invaded Prague in 1648, during the Thirty Years’ War, many of Arcimboldo’s paintings were taken from Rudolf II’s collection.
His paintings have been cited as precursors to Surrealism and were highly prized by Salvador Dalí and other members of the movement.
More of Giuseppe Arcimboldo‘s wonderfully strange paintings can be found at https://www.giuseppe-arcimboldo.org/ and https://www.wikiart.org/en/giuseppe-arcimboldo.
Where Your Thoughts Dwell | Heavenletters — Rainbow Wave of Light (repost)
Reach out for the diamonds and the rubies of the universe.
Wonderful thoughts for a Saturday morning.
God said: You have to get out of thoughts about yourself, not because you have to be unselfish, but because thoughts about yourself are on a limited track. You can go only so far with thoughts about yourself. They are in a one-way direction, or they go round and round in a small circle. You […]
Where Your Thoughts Dwell | Heavenletters — Rainbow Wave of Light
Birth Is Easier Once It Happens
It felt like I birthed a baby. Although at 69 that would be somewhat of a miracle.
The anticipation, the anxiety, the apprehension of putting something out there in front of the masses is an experience unlike any you have undergone.
People may laugh at your work.
People may make fun of your work.
People may not like your work.
For all that and more, most of us are not willing to put ourselves out in the open for others to view.
I know that’s how I felt when I had my first craft show. I mean — what are Angel Tears? Why would I want one? They’re homemade, not precisely crafted by a machine. The stone is a little off here, a little off there.
Yet….
I birthed yet another fruit of my loins (so to speak) last Monday.
Put a book out there for people to download. For free. Something that had been percolating in various stages of embryonic development for 20 years.
Yes, 20 years.
I have written a lot more books since Corn and Shadows, but none like the first. The biggest hurdle has been jumped over, or, in my case, climbed over with a ladder and landing pads.
Isn’t that how your creativity goes?
Isn’t there something about your first creation that holds a special place in your heart?
Maybe it wasn’t your best work. Maybe it was rough at the edges or painted a little darkly or the stitches weren’t quite even.
But it was the first. Your first baby. And letting it go out into the world was a tough experience for you. Wasn’t it?
But if it wasn’t for that first release, that first foray into worlds not yours, for eyes not yours, emotions not yours, you would never have moved on to create what you do today.
For some, once is enough. For one reason or another, Vincent Van Gogh only sold one painting during his lifetime. Margaret Mitchell only wrote one book.
For others, hundreds of paintings or books or ceramic pieces aren’t enough.
But for me, Corn and Shadows was a start.
Don’t be afraid to share your work with the world. People just want to feel you, know you, through your work. Just another phase of taking one step out of the door. It is frightening and nerve wracking.
But it is also the most liberating feeling you will ever get from your own true self.
Sunday Evening Art Gallery — Boguslaw Strempel
Boguslaw Strempel is a photographer living in Dankowice, Śląskie, Poland.
Strempel is know for showcasing the charming landscape of his country and of the Czech Republic.
There is something at once magical, mysterious and eerie about fog, but Strempel focuses mainly on the former.
He enjoys shooting landscapes in what appears to be the wee hours of the morning to capture the mist that hovers above tree lines and mountain ranges before being evaporated by the sun.
Highlighting the stunning picturesque scenes in his own native country, Strempel eeasily tempts people to travel to those beautiful countries.
Full of staggering beauty, his portfolio captivates the magic of the land and the wilderness. 
A step into Strempel’s photographs is a step into the past.
More of Boguslaw Strempel‘s breathtaking photography can be found at 500px and at ArtPeopleNet.
Faerie Paths — Writing
The writer is an explorer. Every step is an advance into a new land.
– Ralph Waldo Emerson
Corn and Shadows is Available as a Free E-Book
I am thrilled to be able to offer you my first book for free download!
Corn and Shadows
Midlife covers a wide range of emotions and second thoughts, and 43-year-old Annabella Powers was experiencing them all. Frustrated with her job, her husband, and herself, all she wanted was a little excitement in her boring life.
Crashing her car at the bottom of a rain-soaked hill, Anna wakes up in 1880 Claremont with broken ribs and a punctured lung. Doing her best to recover, she is drawn into an atmosphere of suppression and strict social mores as she befriends the 17-year-old daughter of the estate while matching wits with the domineering matriarch and her bullish son. Besides all of that, Anna finds herself falling for the estate’s caretaker, a handsome rogue half her age.
A story of twisted relationships and forbidden love that may tear the family apart, this is a novel of self-discovery as a woman comes to grips with her age and emotions in a world not her own.
Just go to the Corn and Shadows page and click the title.
I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it. Comments, criticisms, and questions are always welcome.
Sunday Evening Art Gallery — Jennybird Alcantara
Jennybird Alcantara is a Contemporary Surrealist painter from Oakland, California.
Deeply inspired by mythology, transformation, and the logic of liminal, dreamlike states, Alcantara is celebrated for her oil paintings of fantastic worlds populated by whimsical creatures and symbols.
Characterized by ornate forms painted in luminous colors including pinks and reds, Alcantara’s style appears to be influenced by both academic realism and popular Surrealists.
Her art has been described as morbidly romantic, with a dreamlike narrative at its core, reflecting the connections between living beings and their environments.
Some works combine human and animal forms as well as flowers and decorative objects in a single composition that resembles a portrait or silhouette.
Alcantara combines these motifs to create a symbol of the universal connection between all beings.
She claims that she takes an intuitive approach to creating her brilliantly hued paintings.
Alcantara’s art uses the symbolism of duality to explore the connection of life and death and the veil in between, as well as the relationship between the beauty and cruelness of nature, that of the natural world as well as human and animal nature.
More of Jennybird Alcantara’s wonderful art can be found at https://www.jennybirdart.com/.
Faerie Paths — Fairy Child
Children born of fairy stock
Never need for shirt or frock,
Never want for food or fire,
Always get their heart’s desire:
Jingle pockets full of gold,
Marry when they’re seven years old.
Every fairy child may keep
Two strong ponies and ten sheep;
All have houses, each his own,
Built of brick or granite stone;
They live on cherries, they run wild–
I’d love to be a Fairy’s child.
~ Robert Graves
The Weird World of Evil
I’d like to do a little speculating, a little exploring, a little wondering today. Come play me……
Let us first clear the way with this miserable disclaimer just so we can talk: I am not challenging anyone’s faith, doubting anyone’s truths, nor making sport of anything sacred, eternal, or inspirational.
The movie Solomon Kane begins:
There was a time when the world was plunging into darkness and chaos
A time of witchcraft and sorcery.
A time when no one stood against evil.
Now you know me. I like to play with ideas and words and dreams. And the beginning words of this movie made me wonder. What exactly is evil? Was evil an entity to be defeated? What turns people into evil creatures?
Let’s leave out the devil for a moment. The Prince of Darkness, Antichrist, and Diabolus, too.
Evil begins as a state of mind. A state of emotional instability.
Now. most of us are emotionally unstable now and then. Many of us are questionable, period. But we don’t turn evil — we don’t kill or maim or abuse. We don’t haunt or terrorize or cause irreputable damage to minds or bodies. Babies aren’t born evil. I don’t believe there is a code in one’s DNA that says “this one is evil.”
So where does it come from?
Is it bred into someone from birth? Is it manifested by abusive parents or negative sensations or bullying at school? Is it a result of a bruised ego? A broken heart? An unbearable pain?
An alien aural presence?
Hitler was an evil man. His part in World War II contributed to over 42 million deaths (and that’s a conservative estimate). Was he evil because he merely wanted to keep the species pure? Genghis Khan (1206–1227) was reported to have killed upwards of 40 million people building the great Mongol Empire. Did he manifest all that evil just to be the boss? An estimated 30-40 million Chinese died as a result of Mao Zedong’s repeated, merciless attempts to create a new “Marxism–Leninism” China. Was he evil because he wanted all of his people to think alike?
Then there’s small time evil. Ted Bundy. John Wayne Gacy. Jeffrey Dahmer. Columbine. Sandy Hook. Uvalde. The list could fill — does fill — pages in the history books.
See what I mean?
These people were the personification of evil. Self-centered, single-minded, selfish, steadfast mental cases. Yet they seemed perfectly sane to those around them.
Were they evil? Or merely misinformed? Misguided?
I often wondered why Sauron wanted to rule all the people in Middle Earth in Lord of the Rings. Or Daenerys Targaryen in Game of Thrones. Fiction is just as full of evil doers who want to rule and don’t mind killing half the population to get their way. Was it for the money? For the fame? For slights against their character, real or imagined?
Evil is not the thing of sorcerers and demons. It is a human-bred mental illness that spreads from the host to those around them.
Evil is so much more complicated than black and white statements. It doesn’t come from talismans or mirrors or crypts or buried crosses. Evil doesn’t arise from spells or enchantments or curses. It is much more personal. Which makes it much more real.
You have to admit, evil is one of those esoteric topics that never really have an explanation or reason.
Where do you think evil comes from?
Sunday Evening Art Gallery — Terhi Tolvanen
Terhi Tolvanen was born and raised in Helsinki, Finland, and studied silversmithing at the Lahti Institute of Design and Fine Arts.
She moved to Amsterdam in 1993 to attend the Gerrit Rietveld Academy and the Sandberg Instituut, from which she graduated with a master’s degree.
Though she began with silver, Tolvanen later began to and make sculptural jewelry using unconventional materials.
The artist is revered for her observations of nature transformed into stunning, sculptural jewelry.
Juxtaposing wooden branches with silver metalwork, concrete, pearls and stone, her wearable sculptures transcend expectations and norms. 
Her repertoire of materials is amazing: silver, metalwork, concrete, opals, light and dark pearls, stone, and more; woods include cherry, Corkscrew willow, hornbeam, pear, heather, lavender, and elm.
This amazing artists creates all forms of jewelry, but for this showcase I chose her necklaces for display.
Tolvanen makes no compromises, yet they feel comfortable in their scale as they are comfortably built for wear, as if nature intended them to be just as they are, and for them to be worn.
“I feel as if making jewelry is a dance,” Tolvanen shares. “I feel I should go along with materials, not work against them. What I’m trying to do is isolate the best in the material, to use it in a logical way.”
More of Terhi Tolvanen‘s unusual and wonderful jewelry can be found at https://www.terhitolvanen.com/.
Faerie Paths — Dreaming
Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there wondering, fearing,
Doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before;
. ~ Edgar Allan Poe
I Want to Go Somewhere!
I know — it’s usually in the depths of winter when the snow is blocking the doorway and cars are slipping into the ditch and the temperatures barely reach zero that people get cabin fever and want to get out and go somewhere.
Here it is, the beautiful full days of summer, green fields and golden corn and lazy fishing in the late morning and I want to go somewhere!
Anywhere!
I don’t have much money, my husband doesn’t have any vacation time left (except for the scheduled fishing and hunting trips), I have a craft fair coming up in a few months that I need to make inventory for, grandkids to see and entertain, and yet…
I want to wander aimlessly down some artsy street and stop at some nameless café and watch the people wander by as I sip a glass of Moscato or lemonade.
I want to wear oversized flowy dresses and boho hats and lots of fun crafty jewelry and stop at art galleries and copy down names for my Gallery blog and find an off beat bar that plays jazz and swoon until I get sleepy, then wander to my hotel and fall heavily and blissfully asleep.
I want to try local cuisine and buy homemade crafts and try not to look too touristy while I try and pick up their local accent. I want to get confused with the time change and local customs and sit in the park and listen to their neighborhood orchestra do their best to play Moonlight Serenade.
I want to watch the crowds on the city streets ebb and flow with a natural rhythm that is special to that particular part of town, and enjoy the city’s night lights from a quiet bench not far from where I’m staying. I want to try a small town’s version of Chinese food and a big city’s attempt at a Chicago-style hot dog.
I want to sleep late and stay up late and sample the local news and weather reports and watch the crop reports when it’s raining out. Then I want to find the rain and dance like Gene Kelly in Singing in the Rain.
I want to watch sunrise on the lake and sunset over the mountains. I want to feed popcorn to the birds and chocolate truffles to myself. I want to cry for those who couldn’t be there with me and text those who wish they were.
I have cabin fever right smack in the middle of summer.
Where should I go?
Humoring the Goddess 