Art For Missions - New in The Shop

"My Mother"

Everyone knows that reading is the key to wisdom and knowledge.  If you had a mother who read to you, you are so richly blessed.

5x5x1.5 canvas, beautifully and unusually mounted on cast iron trivet

Acrylics, gesso, guache, inks, modeling paste, with a genuine antique key mounted on the canvas

 hand-stamped and hand lettered, on antique book pages. 

This original painting features an excerpt from a poem by Strickland Gillian

"...richer than I you could never be -

I had a mother who read to me."

Here are some other detail views for you ~

The antique key

the words on the top of the canvas peek out: "Literary Lanes"

And on the side, the antique book page reads "A Sermon on Reading"

So uniquely mounted, with one last surprise - the back is stamped burlap.  This piece looks rustic and pretty and finished, even from behind. 

Love this.  It so speaks to what has always been a major philosophy of motherhood in my life and home. I read to my children every single day, even as high school students, I read to them for a few minutes each day, for the sheer joy of reading books.  Reading aloud is truly the key to all learning!

  

This one is a hit here...we are all so partial to it.  Lots of love went into it, and The Preacher even did all the fabrication and mounting, Hannah did the photography.

$45 postage paid

If you love this "My Mother" canvas, if you can give it a good home just in the nick of time for Mother's Day, please email me right away! 

Remember - half of everything I make - gross, not net - goes to missions, the other half goes back into my art supplies...which now must necessarily include cool and unusual mountings for smaller square canvases!  Fun!

Rockin' the Role

This boy rocks at the role of grandson.  Literally (he sits in our rocking chair, as you see above, and rocks with decisive authority) and figuratively.  He brings me my coffee every morning (in Pop-pop's arms...Pop-pop carries the coffee, but of course, it is Timothy who "brings" it)  and delivers it with a kiss.

"Hey Girl!"

I'm sure you've seen Ryan Gosling's "Hey Girl" meme...I've saved a few along the way that speak to me...

If you only knew.  I don't do screen printing...yet...but my studio is in my dining room.  And my very own  personal  Hey Girl cutie pie truly does not mind.  He would "Hey girl" me, and eat over the sink all day long if it made me happy.  On top of that, he's man enough to make me the perfect lunch, if I wanted it.


Man enough to serve.  Hollah! I must be livin' the dream.

Yup.  My new(ish) black yoga pants, and my Michael Kors jeans.  Both have paint on them now.  Tim just smiles and says, "Hey girl..."

 ::Cough:: 

I do have a nice pair of German made all metal scissors - even with my half price coupon, they were not cheap. 

Got them at Michael's.  ::cough::

I am pretty sure Tim would not use them to cut paper. 

Don't hate on me, but I pretty much am a spoiled woman.  It takes a real man to spoil a woman like me.  I am loved, kept, spoiled rotten, respected, understood, and allowed to be who I am.

And he's got it made, himself!  My very own Mr. Hey-Girl-Preacher-Husband is loved, kept, spoiled rotten, respected, understood, and allowed to be who he is.  All that, and he gets to be in charge. 

But I ain't showin' him my Michael's receipts.

 

My Testimony...A Picture Worth a Thousand Words...

The Gospel is about the grace of God, and the grace of God is the Gospel.  I testify to this daily. 

And while others express their polite, educated disagreement...

I testify again.

Sunday in East Tennessee - Church Sign

I went out by myself (again) today for a couple of hours...armed with my vintage Brownie Hawkeye and Instagram on my phone...on a quest for the perfect picture.

Oh, man, was I rewarded:

...talk about your catch 22...

Only here.  Only in east Tennessee.  Lord, I love the Bible Belt!

My New Camera - A Vintage Brownie Hawkeye

I have two words for you:  Madeleine Peyroux.  Pour yourself a glass of great Merlot, and turn up your speakers.

::deeeeep breath::

I know, right?  Bliss.  The song La Javenese describes my day today...though I haven't a clue what it is saying.  The mood.  The mood of the song has been the mood of this day.

I wish I could rewind this day, and take you with me.  What.  A.  Perfect.  Day.

I woke up, and decided that, with The Preacher in Venezuela, and my youngest visiting the basketball coach at his future college, I actually could go do whatever I felt like doing...without anyone missing me. 

Without anyone needing me.  Oh my dear sweet Lord.

La Javenese.  I don't know what that means, but that's all I got to say about that.

I grabbed my Nikon and was out the door.  Sans makeup.  The world was lucky I got dressed!  I was bustin' to cash in my "get out of jail free" card.  (Not that my home is a jail or anything...I've just been tending to lots of details lately.  And I had worked until 2 A.M. this morning! It has been months of "nose to the grindstone" for me here at The Cottage.)

I drove to the University of Tennessee's arboretum, where I walked and shot with the Nikon - the sun was that perfect morning golden.  I haven't uploaded any of those pictures, so I don't know what I've got on my big girl camera yet. 

But I had something else in my back pocket.  My smart phone.  And interestingly, I'm hugely pleased with the Instagram photos I took with it!  Easy, easy...

Shot from a little foot bridge, over a small pond...hear the birds?

How can you not be deliriously happy, walking in total silence, but for birdsong, while praying while taking pictures while inhaling the sweetest fragrance?  I am itching to upload this onto Photoshop, tweak it some,  and slap a texture on it.  And maybe a short quote.

After leaving the arboretum, I swung into an antique shop.  I even left my purse in the truck, tucking it behind the bench seat.  I told myself, "Today is a "look, don't buy" kind of day."

(You know, the kind of day you have after you pay to have your son's car repaired...)

But.  But.  But I found this beauty:

A Brownie Hawkeye camera.  1950's model.  $12. 

Would you say no?  I didn't think so.

My son-in-law, artist and photographer Jonathan Howe looked it over for me, and tutored me regarding this camera.  He even took me to Thompson Photo Supply to get me some 120 film for it - which he painstakingly, in a pitch black bedroom closet, re-spooled onto this camera's 620 film spools.  (620 film has been mostly discontinued, and costs  $12-$15 for a 12 shot roll.  120 film is still available in camera specialty stores, costs $5, and can be used in this camera by respooling it in pitch black darkness.  Thank you, son-in-law.)

My baby is ready to go!  I cannot wait to see what I get with this camera.  The shots I've seen online, all taken with this very model Brownie Hawkeye, are dream-like in quality...very vintagey.  Tomorrow, I hope it will be sunny again, because I already know what I want to shoot, after church lets out...

...the perfect barn, about 5 miles away from my house.

...the same flowers I shot at the arboretum with Instagram (see above).

...some downtown architecture.

...a 50's model  Chevy truck I saw today, with weeds growing all around it, and vines climbing onto it.

...some old signs, if I can find some great ones.

Any more ideas for me?  I'd love to hear from you, if you are a Brownie camera lover!  Apparently, there are quite a few of you out there.  I hope I get some sweet, sweet shots tomorrow.

"Fishing" in Venezuela

Twenty-six years ago, I fell in love with a Preacher. Those are his hands, up there. 

Well...back then, he was a technician at an engineering company. And he'd preach to anything that seemed it remotely might have an Eternal Soul. He had a six pack of abs, muddy work boots, a big smile, and eyes looking out at me from underneath his baseball cap that that made me melt like buttah.

Preacher-boy could do "the smolder".

And tonight he is in Venezuela, preaching the Gospel. People came to Christ, tonight, and my heart savors the knowledge that a few more eternities have been forever sealed. Tonight, I miss him. My sadness collides with my joy, and joy is left standing.

Oh, the fathomless grace of God. And the word of His grace, which, the Bible says, is able to save our soul. 

Twenty-six years, four children, one church plant, two decades of home schooling, many mission trips, prodigals-come-home, and two grandchildren later -  I need that word of His grace more than ever.  I need to hear it preached and sung that "He became sin, who knew no sin, that we might be made the very righteousness of God, through Christ Jesus..."

And I am ever discovering how the truth of the Finished Work of Christ applies to my present circumstances.

Professional burden-bearer am I.  I bet you are, too.  We compensate for compensating.  We end up not just dysfunctional.  We end up anticontradysfunctional...whatever the very, very, very opposite of "functional" and whole is.  That would be us, without the strong consolation of the Gospel.

A wrong idea of God - an incomplete understanding of the Gospel - leads to heartache and burnout.

Twenty-six years ago, I fell in love with  a Preacher, who is in Venezuela tonight, preaching of the liberty that is ours in Christ. 

His yoke is easy, and His burden is light.   If just one person - maybe one Venezuelan pastor's wife, in the pastor's conference where my Preacher is speaking tomorrow - can be freed from the perpetual burden of performance-based Christianity, then my time spent on the over-consumption of cookies and feeling mighty lonely will be worth it all.