~ Random Doings ~

Already more than a week into March, and the time is galloping away. Talking of galloping, I am really hoping to keep the promise I made myself a few years ago, and get back on a horse this year. My walking friend and I are going to visit a riding stables and go like the wind across those hills beyond the fence! I'll keep you posted.

We set up a display in our local library to advertise the Astronomy group we belong to. I made the hat...and the scarf....that 'Mr Newton' is proudly wearing. My Man painted away his nakedness and we set up everything else around him. Notice My Man's lovely illustration on the poster. He's so clever :~))

The monthly meeting was on Tuesday evening, and everyone was frustrated by the viewing, which had been gloriously clear on Monday, and again last night....but clouded out and wet on Tuesday :~((( However, the committee had prepared indoor doings....a powerpoint slideshow showing what was going on in the sky this month, many different telescopes on show, with questions answered, and a showing of the wonderful astro photos taken by our best photographer. My Man is Chairman, and I volunteer as the welcoming committee, tea maker, and biscuit provider.

Our first meeting was in November last year, with six of us in attendance, so we were really happy that twenty or more turned up on Tuesday :~)))

My Milky Way Man :~) 

with his trusty and beloved Tal 1

I love that he's a dreamer ~

Have loved the light coming in to our 

living room recently

Several stones are happy to come and live with us for a while. 

Some like being together, like these; 

others prefer to be alone. 

We love having them share our space ~

This is our trusty steed of FUN :~))))

Hope you are all having good days.

Cariad Mawr

H x

~ Magic in the Skies Tonight ~

Jupiter, Venus and a crescent moon ~ which looks full in this image! ~ 

 slanting westwards in a diagonal line. 

Venus, evening star, goddess of love and beauty,

mistress of Friday, Springtime and flowers,

chased by her father Jupiter,

tries to reach Diana, that

powerful and protective goddess,

and by Sunday night she will be hiding behind

the skirts of this huntress....

protectress of women.

Tomorrow night though...look out for Venus and the Moon being so close to each other as to appear to be almost touching. 

Hoping for clear skies.

Cariad Mawr

H x

~ Clear skies ~ St Dwynwen's ~ and a bit of a sociable day ~

My Man had told me of this astro event more than a week ago,

 and we were so hoping for clear skies.

This is what we saw at dusk.

It helped to 'fill the well'

 Crescent moon and venus

at one and seven o' clock

Yesterday was St Dwynwen's Day...our Welsh equivalent of St Valentines day, but without any of the commercialism. Because of that, I love to celebrate this day of cariad, and made my love a card ~

 The linen base and next layer of silk were dyed

in a pot of old, dried bay leaves. The heart ~ green

(for the heart chakra) ~ from a velvet thrifted skirt

We had tea, (blackberry and blueberry), in one of our favourite cafes and talked about art and writing, and the great special offer I purchased at Jude's Small Journeys that morning. I have been wanting to do this for a long time, and was so happy to finally manage it :~))) ~ They are fantastic..as are all her classes....even her pdf's are beautiful ~

On Monday we had a most sociable day...very unusual for us....and we enjoyed it. We had gone to Cardigan to visit the dentist, and afterwards happened to meet My Man's boss from years ago, when he used to be a printer. We went in to the printshop and there, after 18 years, still attached to the wall with yellowing, aged tape, were My Man's line~drawings!

Later I asked him if he had come face to face with his younger self in there....

We also had a chance meeting with a friend we had not seen for a long time, who's book we promoted in the bookshop we used to have in Cardigan over 13 years ago. 

We went to this art cafe to catch~up with lots of his news....

I had mocha coffee...oh yummm

that's him on the left. The gentleman on the right joined us and we had a 

most interesting conversation about building with lime , WWll bomber 

planes(!), and what our friend had planned for tonight (Thursday).

A visit with a friend who shared her delicious lunch of home made tomato soup and humus rounded off this rather companiable day. 

Cardigan was abloom with happy~making pansies :~)

We were lucky to see this, as later the clouds came in and the wet 

stuff came back.

~ Stitching ~ Sunshine ~ and a Motorbike Ride ~

Some things finished, some things on the go, some, just barely started. It is possible that most of these will become part of the Magic Diaries Cloth. The piece at top left, is my first ever star.....which developed from this 'playground'.....

I've had great enjoyment with natural dyeing.....the pinks are from avocado skins. I'm not keen on pink, but I love the dyeing and that was one of the things I had plenty of! There are greys in there that came from a large bundle of old, dried bay leaves I was about to throw out, but thankfully the thought popped into my head to try them as a dye.


The browns are from acorns, which my Man and I enjoyed collecting. The pale yellow and that green silk on the top are from carrot tops from my father-in-law's garden....the silk was an over~dye of a very pale grey and it makes me really happy :~)

The blue....well, I do not have indigo or woad plants here yet, but blue is a must in just about anything I do, so I use what I've got, which is cyanotype. I use it both for making prints, and also just paint it on the cloth and leave it in the sun to create its alchemical magic.


Some more dyeing ~

Soya milk soaked

red cabbage and black bean dyes

black bean dyed linen: can~wrapped

before washing in machine

dried before washing

after washing in machine

Talking of sun ~ sol ~ haul.....for many years I have kept a daily journal and I include a daily weather report. For December, we had grey, dull, heavy and dark for 28 days, with just 3 (THREE) days of hazy brightness...no wonder we Brits are mad :~)

s-o-o-o-o


January is already whipping December's butt.....last night's sky, after a SUNNY day...

a

a

a

n

d

happy me, happy bird in tree, and happy Man.....he got to take this last night.....

Jupiter ~ photo by Mark Lee

Today was glorious and we went out on the motorbike, stopping for tea on the way.....

~ Hmmmm ~

This is pretty much how my head~space has been for days...filled with cotton...bog cotton at that. I decided to not fight it for a change...just go with it. Letting the frustration go has been a relief, and so, I've been floating quite pleasantly through the week.....the tragedies of the week~end....well that's a different matter, and I have no way of conveying the intense feelings involved.


Reading.....


I enjoyed reading Lyndall Gordon's biography on Emily Dickinson. I only knew she was reclusive ~ Ms Gordon puts forward a convincing case for why she may have been so. Her brother's mistress made me want to rant and rave ~ she was so conniving and manipulative, ambitious and greedy....horrid little woman. Her one redeeming factor, for me, was that she was talented and tireless as an editor of Emily Dickinson's work.


Green Dolphin Country by Elizabeth Goudge let me escape to the Channel Islands and New Zealand in the nineteenth century.


Completely loved The Hours by Michael Cunningham...how seamlessly he weaved his story of three women in three different decades....and, as I am fascinated by Virginia Woolf, I now look forward to watching the film too.


Yesterday I started Dared & Done The Marriage of Elizabeth Barrett & Robert Browning by Julia Markus which so far, is promising to be another enjoyable read.


Being.....


One night, after five whole days of low cloud, the sky cleared and I joined my love in his observatory. He took me on a star~studded journey, where I saw an Eagle (Aquila), even observing the carbon star shining red in this constellation, a Swan (Cygnus), double~stars, double~double stars and bright, bright Vega....so blue and beautiful. Finally we lay on the wooden floor and just gazed upwards......


My Man, Tilly~Dog and I went for a walk in our favourite woods....Ffynnone.


In our Welsh mythology ~ The Mabinogi ~ it's waterfall is the entrance to the Celtic Otherworld ~ Annwn, where Pwyll, who married my favourite Welsh Goddess Rhiannon, went through some rigorous trials for twelve months.

I like to think the face in the rock on the right is the Gate~keeper of Annwn.

It is one of those places that feels otherworldly.....hushed, even with the sound of the waterfall, with a charge to the air and a knowing that you are very close to the land of faerie.

~ Y Lleuad Gwair ~

My Man took this last night

~ sigh ~

~ Celebrations ~

It was My Man's birthday on the 24th June, and our 18th wedding anniversary on 1st July.

This is his image of Vega ~ The Harp Star ~

Isn't it beautiful.
As is he.

~ Happy Summer Solstice ~

My Man was busy taking solar images and a video this morning after the clouds finally cleared away, and kindly let me use them here.

Those filmy clouds racing over the sun make it look to me as though it is spinning.

Happy Summer Solstice 

~ Sun Moon Stars and the Sea ~

I have been feeling rather mute recently. I don't know why, and just have to accept that sometimes this is how it is with me. The moon was full yesterday and today I  feel inspired to write a new post. Maybe her waxing pregnancy influenced my mood to be a time of quiet reflection, and now her slow waning has given birth to a creative flow. I hope so.

I'm house~sitting in one of my favourite places for a few days. This little video...my very first one :~) ....is the view I see as I sit here writing.  

I filmed a little more this morning. I couldn't resist that blue.

Life is good

Soon after we arrived, my Man spotted something other than seagulls flying low over the water ~ frequently diving in with a splash. He excitedly identified them as Gannets. I had never seen them before and was enthralled by their size, the black tipped wings and pale yellow heads, not to mention their grace in the air. We were entertained for an hour as three of them did some serious hunting for their dinner. 

At the beginning of this month I signed up for Jude's next mini whispering class in the series, Whispering Sun Moon and Stars. Her classes are relaxed, extremely informative, inspiring and encouraging and seeing the results of her students' work is testament to her teaching skills. 

I have done some preparation for the class....

....using cyanotype sun~developing on white silk to create moons, or maybe suns. The blue velvet is a piece from a table runner I've had for years and has faded to a gorgeous golden colour in some places. I was sitting in my studio tidying up its frayed edges after washing, when I noticed the similarities in its colour...including the shots of gold....to the piece of labradorite that shares my deskspace.

On Monday, I found lots of lovely cotton tops in a charity shop. It's not that often that the really good quality materials turn up, so I bought quite a few....including a couple of white fine lawn blouses.

My stitching has taken second place to gardening in the last few weeks, as I've been transplanting cucumbers, courgettes and basils into bigger pots, preparing beds and planting lettuce, runner beans and peas. Cleaning and clearing the greenhouse and planting some more lettuce and a tomato plant, and preparing for the cucumbers for when they are big enough. 

When I was weeding one of the beds, I came across a gardener's friend tucked into the corner...

Mr Toad. I was very happy to see him, and asked him to please keep the slugs under control as I hate to use slug pellets. So far, lettuce and salad~mix leaves have not been attacked....but I also left a load of borage plants that had self~seeded in there, as slugs adore their leaves, and there have been a few nibbles taken out of them, so maybe this will turn out to be a successful experiment in slug control. That would be very satisfying.

As this is a post on Sun Moon Stars and Sea.....here's one of the results of Solar Imaging from My Man...

....complete with a couple of sun~spots. This was taken from our garden. It is incredibly exciting to be able to look at the sun. This image has to cover the 'stars' part too! So far, May has been a most astronomical month.....fitting really as Taurus is one of my favourite constellations...along with Cassiopeia....time to do some join~the~dot stitching I think.

~ April Crescent Moon ~

My Man and I went down to Newgale.

The moon was brightly crescent

in the wake of a rosy sunset.

I raced up the stones

to see the beach.

There wasn't one.

The tide was swollen and full.

The sea, wild ~ powerful,

with waves furiously chasing each other,

the hunter catching the hunted

with a resounding crash

against the pebbles,

before dragging it helplessly back,

stealing its breath

with a whoosh,

then doing it all again,

over and over

in the rhythm of

deepest time.

With energy high,

I danced weightlessly

over sliding stones

and gathered gifts left from a previous tide,

a higher one,

a Super Perigee Moon tide.

Driftwood and heart~stones filled

arms and pockets

until the dusk turned to night

and details crept and seeped

into one another,

hiding until the dawn.

Other gifts were waiting,

and we watched as

Orion, Taurus,

Cassiopeia (my favourite),

and The Plough

slowly switched on their distant

time~travelled light.

6th April, 2011