Wednesday, April 22, 2009

Cats are suddenly EVERYWHERE!

Suddenly cats are everywhere!
I'm finding them all over the place...in books, on the net, outside my house.
lovely people are giving me cat things...like books and toys and stickers...i suddenly have cat earrings...and girls are looking more and more like cats everyday...
a really good friend of mine let me borrow her Taschen illustration now book...and i found a treasure trove of lovely things...most of which had cats in them somewhere... :)




















carine abraham

I absolutely adore this, and its definately where i want to be next year! I love the real and the drawn intermingleing...outlines and drips and collage...its wonderful!




















i really like this dude, his name is hugh d'andrade...and he does creepy things with cats...
i think this is a portrait of me... :)

Saturday, April 18, 2009

It WAS beginnig to look alot like...WINTER

Yesterday was a pure excuse of a day in my opinion. It wasnt raining, but it looked threatening. It was mild, but very windy. There were no clouds, just a bland blanket of gray without shape or varying tones...
Today, you would forgive Ireland all its shortcomeings, because today was truely glorious! The sky is a dusty blue, the sun is beating down. The choir of birds is deafening, almost to the point of annoyance...but not quite.
Im just taking a break from my sewing, which is coming on lovely. I dragged on of our old yellow velvet armchairs outside. Its high back makes it ideal for long laborious periods of sitting in a ball being tortured with the intriquices of my embroidery......!

Redbush (Rooibos) tea is keeping me sane these last two weeks, and for Jane's introduction to the red/ambre liquid, i am truely endebted! it is a drink that must be escaped into..no matter the circumstance...and i have been drinking it with all things sweet and savoury...but of course there are no biscuits in this house...not even Rich Tea, for our sins...just an avalanche of Cadbury's easter eggs, or 'the devil wrapped in purple foil'...
oh i just break off another piece... :crack: and half the egg lands in your palm!

So i have been sitting outside in the yellow chair, with my purple sewing bag-Penny's finest-enjoying the sun and company of Suzie, who keeps thinking that my lap, with my embroidery on top, truely is her throne, and i cannot convince her otherwise.
Daddy is at the top of the road in the Hitachi digger manuvering stones, or diggin a moate around our vast kingdom...or at least that is what i imagine he is doing...

there was also a spider attached to my sewing, who just would not get the hint that i wanted rid of her, so after much mediation, i waited for her to crawl onto a loose thread, the cut her free...
eventho she only drifted a few feet away, i feel safer.

and now i can hear the muffeled tunes of the boy's 'early morning' routine...which i would much rather listen to then 2fm, or lyric for that matter...
because it means that he is home
and in a way
he is happy

Friday, April 17, 2009

Good Bye Mister Fox


Last Sunday, before mass at half five...because we are such good catholic children, the parents went to the match in castlebar to sell easter lilies.

I stayed at home, working away...stitching and stuffing and being a home bird. On their arrival, they told me that a fox had seemingly just been killed between the Stewert's and the Carney's new house. But there was no time...

After a discussion insued, the boy was trying to remember if the fox had been there when he landed home early that morning...

I was whisked off to mass...which the boy managed to dodge somehow...

but i could not help think of the poor fox the whole way through...his poor little head


When we got home i instructed the dogs and cats not to follow me, as i briskly made my way for him. I was compelled to see him, to rescue him, to see if he was alive and just sleeping...or very old and dieing...


when i thought i had gone too far, my eyes strained, and there he was...


the poor old thing...i walked closer and more of him appeared, he was nestled into the bank as if he just curled up for a nap in the sun.

he was perfect, his velvet ears, bushy red tail tipped with frothy white, and gently closed eyes...his dainty little legs, and tender paws...


i wanted so to scoup him up in my arms and instill life back into his already rigid body...

but the energy of him had changed...he was no longer a living, breathing creature...and the energy of the place where he was wasnt the same either, it was dull, and still and quiet...as if the ground was mourning...

he happened to be nestled beneath what i have always called a 'singing tree'...im not sure what their really called...but it squeeked and groaned with the death...


i rested a dandalion on his neck, but wished i could somehow cover him over, to protect his broken body...

people who think that animals dont have spirits...well...i dont understand.




Reflecting on the loss of mister fox, i cant help but wonder if he is the same beautiful fox i met over christmas holidays.

sitting in the kitchen, just after lunch, dad sprang up from his chair and looking out the front window, whispered in a low gasp-is that Jackson?

Jackson is a golden retriever from down by the river and he often crosses our fields without us, or him passing any remarks.

but this was not Jackson, and daddy quickly retrieved his statement

its a fox- !

in broad daylight-mother was confused

he's coming up the side now


So i stood at the sliding door, and as i cast my eye looking for a pale orange, scrawny creature- to my surprise- i watched a large, healthy, RED canine leap up and perch daintily on the uneven wall boarding our land and the next.


And he looked back

and looked straight at me


it was magic



so as i walked away from the fox, passed, i felt a sorror and an unbalance. as of o was walking at a slant, or i was suffering from sleep deprivation


another tragedy

between the twin towers and the titanic.

Thursday, April 16, 2009

break





















Chloe Early- because Im obsessed with the circus at the moment




Beautiful Whins at Grace's sisters' house
Lori Field


I am having such a wonderful easter...and I half didn't expect I would.
The weather has been fine nearly every day, and my room has been lending itself to me...
My work is the best, I think that I have possibly ever done...
Life is good.
I have been finding things that keep me pressing on, and proving that this is the right direction...








Wednesday, April 15, 2009

new work

these are ideas/plans...if i have to use such limiting language...


maybe its better to say that im 'drawing out'...the poison???










these last two are my favorite. this is where my work is headed now. theres just something about the leaping cats that makes me really...happy :)