Hobnobbing In NYC

Okay, finally, here's my last post about our trip to NYC for spring break.  I was waiting to unpack my goodies from my "rock star" experience so I could show photos of all, ergo, voila!  Here is the photo of me with none other than WENDY ADDISON at Tinsel Trading Company.  For y'all who aren't in the same art circle as I am and don't know who Wendy is, do yourself a favor and check out her link.  She is one of the first artists that Mary Engelbreit launched through her Home Companion Magazine, so I've been a big fan for a long time.  She walked through behind the counter of the store while I was working with the sales girl and I told the girl I though I had peed my pants a little.  The girl asked if I'd like to meet her and I said...umm...ya!  Wendy was very gracious about meeting me and then offered a photo op.  Oh hale yeah.

Here is one of the little "Wendy's" I got while there.

And finally out and up in my bedroom over the bathroom door where there's a little alcove with a shelf of some of my faves.  (Yes, I have numbers on all the doors in the house)

This is also another "Wendy" I got while at Tinsel Trading Co., the, umm, "vest" of lightweight metal in a light grey finish.  It took a little finessing to get it to fit on my favorite bust but I did it.  You can see more detail of it if you click on the photo and make it bigger; it's cool.  And Tinsel is a huge candy store for artists, love going there whenever we're in town. 

Cleaning Up

Sexy singing voice...aaaaaaat laaaaast...for the second time in a week I've had the energy and wherewithal to tackle my, in swanky language, studio.  The extra bedroom is dedicated to holding the art supplies and waiting for me to be disciplined enough to get off the computer and go in and make things.  Recently, I've had the extra incentive to create art for fundraisers for friends in need.  Wading through the...well, you'll see...to make things has gotten irritating enough to finally do something about it.

This one of those adhesive plastic signs I had made for the studio window a few years ago.  Because of the sun, the sign has gotten chippy, pieces have fallen off, dots missing, but I can't get it off.  The instructions said to use alcohol but, no matter how much I drink, it won't come off.  Just KIDDING.  It's the least of my problems in there.

Here's the mess.  This a grand improvement from several days ago.  This is just one side of the room; the other three sides look better.

In the meantime I pulled this nugget out from behind some things; not hidden but not displayed the way it deserves.  This antique soap dish was given to me by my sister, Valori, and her then-husband, Greg.  They totally got me.  I was all of 14 and it was 1972.  I loved antiques starting at a young age.  This is a perfect, all three pieces, English soap dish.  The brand?  Bristol.  The street we grew up on.  I used it for years but over time I've realized it's just too precious to take the chance, so it's eye candy.  A pretty to make me smile; so simple yet so much love inside it.

My inheritance

Okay y'all read this whole post before you hysterically change this window to Southwest.com and book a ticket to BWI.  And don't grab the phone just yet either.  I'm not sharing.  Get over it.

As you may or may not have read, my dear friend, Carolyn, passed away earlier this month.  Above are Carolyn, me, one of Carolyn's beautifully transformed mannequins, and Fab Janine.   Yeah, it's a good one of us all.  Janine, Woody, and I had gone to one of Carolyn's open houses at the Howard County Art Center.  Her mannequin was in the main gallery that night.  She was pretty sick here; chemo and dialysis, but nothing stopped her.  In fact, it was her last real fun outing that the three of us made together a couple of years ago, right before she was diagnosed with stomach cancer and kidney failure.  I accidentally parked too far away from the Mexican restaurant that was her favorite that I had introduced her to in Silver Spring.  It was a cool but pretty windy day and she was complaining constantly.  There had been a little wolf-crying over the years but Janine and I (rolling our eyes) did our best to make it easier for her as she said she hadn't been feeling well (well, no kidding in hindsight).  In fact, I walked to get the car and drove to pick them up after we ate so she wouldn't have to walk back (or did I just not get us lost on the way back to the car?).  We did have fun that day besides that part.  There's a little guilt that will probably never leave since she was, quite indeed, ill.  As I mentioned previously, I hadn't spent much time with her in the last few months because of all the other fucking shit (pardon meeeee) going on. As these things go, she was not bad off until the end and then it was fast.  Too fast for almost none of her friends to get to see her. So the funeral was the week we went to NYC for spring break.  It was over a week after she passed.  I had no idea I would miss it until it was too late and we were locked into our NY plans.  Yeah, I could have sent the guys and met them two days later but I knew she wouldn't want that-I did-but, trust me, there's no sense in arguing with her.  From my friends who did go...AND THIS MIGHT BE WHERE YOU WANT TO READ IF THIS HAS BEEN TOO LONG OF A POST SO FAR..., I learned that her grandson, D'angelo, who she raised and helped him raise his kids, said that when a person went to Carolyn's home, they were sure to get two things-a hot meal and the cold truth.  He got quite a laugh.  I have so many stories.  One was being caught in a disagreement of what I should do with a rug (they weren't disagreeing, they were each just telling me to do something different) between my newly-widowed mother and Carolyn.  Oh Lord, who do I side with?  I think I ended up running to the bathroom (this was at Oella Mill) and throwing up.  She was a loving force.  And so loved.  She brought big ol' Paul Wolfgang to his knees at least once a week (okay, he's a teddy bear anyway, but he would have given up his magic wand for her).  Anyway, I felt so honored that she thought to set aside some things for me.  She told her son, Sean, and D'angelo what to give me.  I heard it was more but things got confused and I don't care; I have pieces with her DNA on them.

 Heirlooms are the only material things that I truly love.  The things that people who I loved and/or ancestors I never met are all I have of them; it's a tangible piece of them.  What she left me were the molds that she used to make jewelry.  I have several of her art pieces that I purchased from her over the years but these are what she wanted for me.  Molds she made with her own hands...her hands.   

The ones in the top photo are my favorites-the faces.  I love all of them, of course.  The ones above look like something you would find in the pyramids in Egypt.  I have them, as you can see by the "boot picture" in a drawer (not a closed drawer, a drawer used as an open box type a deal) in my guest room all in one place.  There are many.  And then there were a couple of neat silver molds and also the (if you look close enough) some Creepy Crawler molds.  Oh, Justin and his friend, Luke, would spend hours and hours making those.  I still have the machine.  Anyway, I put them in the boot with the other molds and it made me think of Woody in Toy Story..."I've got a snake in my boot!".  Laugh or cry or...snort (wink, wink to someone below)...more on that later.  

Oh, P.S.  Something they mentioned at the funeral was how tickled Carolyn was by all the attention she got when she worked with me on an Historic Ellicott City show house one year.  She painted the floor.  By hand.  On her hands and knees (at 70?-no one ever knew her age until she passed).  And it was beautiful.  I tried to find the photos of that house in this blog archives but couldn't.  I'm going to hunt them down and post them.  It was a beautiful space; two small rooms and a very small balcony that she also painted.  The then-governer's wife loved it, but more importantly, we loved it.  And I loved her, I always will.

Okay, here's the deal with Pinterest.

I finally put my finger on the justification for all the obession of Pinterest.  Besides being a big bowl of candy for visual folk, it is a big book of tear sheets.  Seriously, for those of us who have piles and piles of pages ripped out of magazines we want to keep for ideas and/or inspiration.  All neatly ordered by color or subject or whatever you want.

I'd seen this on facebook but found it on Pinterest so I could save it to my "I Want It".  And by I Want It I mean that it's inspiration for a future home, not that Paul would go for this or, for that matter, most of the items in that category! 

And for a good laugh, appropriate or inappropriate.  I prefer, well, we all know. 

I remember this one from the book Rolling Homes.  My sister converted a school bus into a rolling home from this inspiration.  When this photo came up on Pinterest a woman commented that she remembered the photo from a book when she was little.  I was tickled that I could be the one who could remind her what the name of the book was.  BTW, you can't find that book now for under $50; it's out of print and a collectors item.

Self explanatory.

One of mine.  I love clocks.

I never outgrew dolls and doll houses.  The child in me is still alive and well.

This one is for real.  Seriously, this is my dream home.  I was describing this one night while we were out with friends for dinner.  I said that with Paul having been so unhappy with his job for, umm, 13 of the last 15 years, he should retire and we move to San Miguel de Allende and build this.  A friend, Mike, told Paul, "Good luck with that downsized $800,000 tree house".  He's probably right but a girl can dream.

Intervention on isle...she's on the move...hurry Lance!!!!

Okay, I'm an artist and have a shop where I need to sell items other than just my art in order to make huge amounts of money (ha!).  Most of the 15 other women in our co-op shop at garage or estate sales.  I don't like to do that because it makes me feel much the same way I do when I buy a lottery ticket; I get real jacked up about what's next-anxious about what I might find but, of course, don't.  Some shop at actual other retail stores and flip items; something I won't do because I'd would be mortified if someone recognized that I did that.  Not that there's anything wrong with it.  I will do thrift shops though.  And the first rule for dealers is DON'T BUY YOUR OWN SHIT.  After, in my case, 12 years, you would be surprised how many times you look at an item and wonder if you had donated it.  I have actually gotten home with something I'd bought then realized I had donated it and just purchases it again.  I went to a new place last week and had that deja vu feeling but I think I did okay.  However, the last few months, as y'all know, have been, mmm, rough.  I've still been purchasing (I've improved a lot the last few years) but, the kicker is, I haven't been doing well about unpacking and "doing" when I get the items home.  Just this last week and, especially the last few days, I've had a boost (knock wood) and am starting to follow through on the soooo many things I need to do.  Above is just the first piece I pulled out Sunday that I got while in New York.  I got some great things from Wendy (another post coming) that I haven't even waded through to but, on the right, is a Jill Scwartz collage that I picked up at a great little shop (Chaos) I spied through the taxi window while Matt and I were on our way somewhere else then walked back to.  I'd seen the cutest top in the window I thought I had to have. $400.  Right.  But, while trying to escape the focused saleswoman, I saw several fun things on some shelves in the back and grabbed three things.  Ha!, it was the clearance area.  I didn't remember that the collage was one of JS's until I unpacked it (I was wearing one of her necklaces when I bought it!).  Isn't it cute?  The book?  Well, that's a vintage Jell-o recipe book of Paul's mom's that I found while moving things around in our small guest room this morning which I thought looked good with the colors in the collage.  So more to come, as per use...