Big Catch-Up Post

I'll try to keep the writing in this big post to a minimum!  Actually, many of the drawings are labeled.  On this first page are a couple of drawings of landscape patterns from the drive from our house to our friends' house a couple of hours southwest of us.  There was a light snowfall, and it was below freezing  as we set out into the mountains Wednesday morning; so patterns showed clearly, dark shapes against white ground.  When we arrived our friends greeted us with bowls of a spectacularly good soup, the recipe for which is written around the drawing of the bowl.  On the right are some of the deer that gather around Sandy and Lee's house every morning for breakfast.  They silently materialize out of the woods, so quiet, so still, so attentive.  We watched from a window up above, and if we moved even slightly, the deer moved away.

Sandy and Lee have as extensive collection of artifacts and art objects, which I always enjoy sketching when we visit. On the left above are an Innuit doll made of bones and a Balinese container with a carved wooden head.  On the right hand page is a drawing and recipe for Sandy and Lee's son Patrick's dukkah, a roasted seed and nut delicacy that he makes every year and that we all immediately eat on fresh bread dipped in olive oil and then in dukkah.  Fabulous!

 On the left above are three Indonesian jars for ointments, oils, spices.  On the right are a group of small and interestingly made kitchen utensils.

Sandy and I always find time to do artwork together.  This time we drew together while various of the men cooked (a fine arrangement) and also spent some time in her studio where I worked a bit on my big print project, turning the prints into a book, and she showed me her installation, a work-in-process.  Last night after a movie the men made their annual batch of peanut brittle while Sandy and I sketched some cat toys, a pretty bone knife shaped like a fish, and a pair of earrings made for Sandy by a friend.  The earrings were made around a core of cat hair from recently departed Sara, the hair rolled into a ball.  There was something of the elegiac air of Victorian hair jewelry about them, and the earrings were delicate and creepily beautiful.  Sandy pointed out that the fur balls had been constructed from cat hair that had been combed out, not hacked up.

Back home this afternoon, I sketched out designs for a couple of orders that came in today for a small bag and a large laptop and iPad case.  I'm excited to get going on them, especially the laptop case since it involves an interesting innovation.  Patrick ordered it and designed it, and he has really good ideas and is great at articulating what he wants.