Spring poem "THIS is being alive"

I awoke early today and was out walking as the sun just barely came above the horizon.  It is warm here in southern Ontario and the wind was delicious and smelled fresh.  It was a joyful walk and a wonderful morning

Upon return, I felt like writing for the first time in a long time.
I've posted the poem/prose over at my wordy blog May Words Flow.
It's called "THIS is being alive"

Redbird sings
sweet piercing
sunrise salutation

Robins, en masse,
hunt for breakfast

and a school janitor
quietly collects garbage
blown around by the night winds.

After walking,
I sit on a bench
and raise my arms to the sky.

Sitting here typing now,
I look out the window and see
a rainbow!

This
is being alive.

Magic Tags and Love Collage

Made from scraps of failed paintings and filled with words I love, interspersed with sparkly tinsel, these 'magic tags' all in a row make my art room a happier place:

Update: I finally came across the photo that inspired me to do these (although the method is a bit different, the core idea was from here).  Like much of my favourite inspiration, this came from Daisy Yellow (thank again Tammy!).

While sorting boxes, I found a collage done a few years ago.
It is so simple yet when I got to this point, I loved how it looked and didn't want to clutter it up!  The wonderful image in the centre is by an artist I love - Susan Seddon Boulet.

Green Your Art! Ecojot Sketchbooks and Journals Review

Ecojot sketchbooks and journals are AWESOME!  I totally love them.
I love the spiral binding that allows me to lie them flat or fold them all the way over, I love the texture and brightness of the paper, but most of all, I love that they don't use chlorine to whiten the paper.

I first found Ecojot when I was searching for paper that had not been whitened with chlorine (because I react to chlorine-whitened paper).  I even have to use chlorine-free kleenex, paper towel and toilet paper (not to mention 'feminine' products ;-).

The first thing I found by them was a spiral-bound journal (the lines are veggie-based inks!).  Suddenly I could write without wearing gloves to protect my skin from the chlorine!!  Awesome!
Then I discovered... to my absolute joy... sketchbooks!
With wonderful, funky covers made with vegetable-based inks and glues - less toxic than regular inks used in printing.  They have sketchbooks with plain covers if you prefer to decorate your own.
They also have scrapbooks, folders, cards, wrapping paper and more.

In addition to using veggie based, biodegradable inks and glues, and whitening with hydrogen peroxide, Ecojot papers, including the hard fronts and backs of books, are 100% recycled and acid-free!  And the few products that have packaging use biodegradable corn-based plastic wrap.  A purchase you can feel good about on every level.

If you have high speed internet, I encourage you to check out their catalogue (will be slow on dial-up).
They also have e-cards. :-)

The sketchbook paper takes every medium I've tried on it well: ink, marker, glue, pencil and pencil crayon.  Some examples of things I've done in these sketchbooks are: Home, Joy, the as-yet-uncoloured flower shown below, and the 'Inspiration Cloud' shown in the image above (you can see a bigger version here.)

What's your favourite eco-friendly art supply or material?

Cute Paper Flower... King Arthur had a parrot!

Did you know that King Arthur, of legend, had a pet parrot?
Neither did I!
I bought an Arthurian Mythology book for 50 cents recently to use for altered pages and that tidbit popped up on a page I was using to paint background to use for paper flowers.
I've seen paper flowers on a few different sites and decided to try my hand at making one. You can make them more 3D than this but I wanted to be able to mail it in a regular envelope to a friend.


Here's the front, it hangs on the wall by a string:

Once I realised that I needed a bead on the back to tie the knot to, I decided I may as well make the back look not half bad (but not so nice that my friend would have trouble deciding which should face out:).
The back view:

After I strung the flower, I spun the layers around until I liked how they were, then used dabs of gluestick under each petal to hold them in place.

It lies almost flat on the wall.

There are infinite possibilities for paper flowers or non-flower decorations!
I love having something funky that can fit in an envelope to brighten someone's day.

Materials:

watercolour paint

page from book

scrap paper

double-sided cardstock (middles layer)

homemade 'milk paint' (food colour and evaporated milk with extra milk powder added)

string

sequins

beads

scissors

gluestick

sparkles