| 🌨 🌱 Spring, Sprang, Sprung- 🌱 🐇 Celebrating Nature’s New Year’s time! It’s been an especially long winter and now I’m Celebrating Nature’s New Year’s time!…and I want to thank you for supporting me along this journey of introspection, faith and, alas, the opportunities extra time and isolation can bring! I hope you are enjoying your family and the special joy and meaning Easter and the spring season provides. I’m reminding myself that, to my indigenous ancestors, spring is actually New Year’s time!…and I’m really enjoying it and all the renewal this season brings. This includes tons of yard work and garden creation that has become a new “art form of necessity” making good use of found castaways-my specialty! See the mint plant on broken cinder block plant stand in pie pan below:  |
| Read On for a Woodlot Spring Cleaning Account! “O.P.T.” & “Art Forms of Renewal” Thanks to COVID-19, I got a head start on spring cleaning this year, actually cleaning out a narrow strip of woods adjacent to my property. There are fox holes in there, with deer passing through, and lots of song birds. It makes me feel energized to clean up the environment…even if it’s only a slim acre or two!  “O.P.T.” (Other Peoples’ Trash) Extravaganza On rainy days in February I cleared out 4 industrial sized trash bins worth of glass bottles, food packaging and various and sundry items ejected into the woods from the road way! The creek on my property is next!…and then maintenance time after that. It’s renewal and revitalization time around here!  …Check out this “gnarly” photo! This tree was entwined with a shopping cart, which I cut loose and discarded. I also found an old toilet nearby.  Sanctuary Personally, I want to create a kind of sanctuary in my yard, with bird feeders, a wide variety of trees and bushes, berries, gourd bird houses, a fire pit for gatherings and a raised bed garden. Eventually I will have art workshops and gatherings for small group getaways. Actually, I’ve already started all of this! Check out the two little birds on the bird feeder! It took a while, but they finally realized I had put suet out! This brings me joy!  Trash To Treasure Art Forms: “O.P.T.” broken cement blocks and broken sinks from the woods have been integrated into my rock garden/tree nursery.  …And then there’s this “O.P.T.” black plastic case of some kind that I dragged from the woods and embedded by my garden trail. It will soon be blossoming with marigolds and wild flowers!  Another recent creation! Yard art bird bath made from, you guessed it, my specialty, discarded junk I dug out of the woods near my house (except for the thrift shop dish on top). The birds discovered it and started using it about one week later. I put it near the bird feeders.  Thanks for allowing me to share my idea of COVID fun and relaxation with you after an entire year on lockdown! |
| An Era of Renewal 🌱 🐇 E.C.C.R. Book Feeling stressed? Feeling like the world is sorely out of balance? I hear you. In fact, I invite you to explore the artwork and writings in my 94 page book Earth Consciousness & Cultural Revelations or offer it as a timely gift. The book has tons of large color plates of my work and includes a forward by Chadwick Allen, author of Re-scripting Indigenous America: Earthworks in Native Art. Learn about my journey on the path of rediscovering my roots within a world that is in the process of re-awakening and coming alive again, a “new/old” Indian world that has profound lessons of transformation for our times. CLICK HERE FOR THE BOOK:  Signing my ECCR book at breakfast in Dublin, Ireland The indigenous world view that inspires the art in this book is full of hopeful teachings for how the earth aligns with the sky and how everyday living can mirror that earth/sky balance. Every image in the book has accompanying writing to shed light on this philosophy of reciprocity.  In our times (an era of renewal), the sacred stories, mounds and other sites are being rediscovered. This was talked about in the ancient prophecies of indigenous peoples. This is not a time to be feared, rather a time to embrace the inevitable transformation taking place! |
