An environmental spill: small scale revelations

Dear Friends,

I wanted to share these two pieces with you. 

First, the article on the left is extremely important in that it highlights the reality of oil spills:  the damage is extreme and long lasting and there is no way to effectively clean it up.  This relatively small spill is an excellent case study and has allowed experts to examine the effects of oil in a stream in a very controlled fashion.  Please read, discuss and share!

Then below is a picture that appeared in our local paper after a protest.  I have not verified if the information on the placards, but given the Harper government and Canada's slow support of solar energy I imagine both are true. 

The good ol' days

So we spent the weekend purging, filling 2 recycle bins with papers and magazines and setting aside about 2 boxes worth of books that will be brought to the Humane Society's annual garage sale.  It felt really great to create some wiggle-room!  I highly recommend it, if you're also the sort of person who has magazines from 2003.  Oops.

  This purging also brought me to go through a 4 inch stack of letters exchanged between 1998 and 2003 between myself and a Teddy Bear artist with whom I was sharing

Rita's traditional bears

an incredibly rich friendship.  I combed through these letters, reducing the pile to 1 inch, keeping only those of depth and that spoke of the Teddy Bear artists' world.  Imagine:  in 1998, my friend did 18 Teddy Bear shows, only one requiring plane travel, all the rest in the eastern United States, mostly New England.  18 Teddy shows, not combined doll shows or craft shows, but dedicated Teddy shows.  And she sold, making a fair living creating and selling her art!!!
Sadly, the world has radically changed (many of these shows no longer exist) and, even for my highly productive and well-known friend, it became impossible to survive only on the 

and her more adventurous creations

bears.  In 2002, she had to take a part time job, my friend noting that more and more crafters were coming on the scene trying to "make a quick buck" and that she was selling fewer and fewer animals, needing to diversify more and more.  How sad.  I wish I had been in a position to enjoy the 1990s boon, but I was only getting started and certainly not in a position to fly down into the States to do all these shows.


  I recently heard that the last long-running Canadian Teddy show, Mark McKay's Teddy Bears on Vacation, is closing its doors for a year to rethink its goals, with the impression that more and more of the attending people, seniors now, are looking to sell their collections, not add to them.  Bear artist Michele Seraphim also talks about this in her blog.  In my area, there are a few annual doll shows or joint doll/Teddy shows but no Teddy shows at all.

We, as a group, we Teddy and doll artists, very much need to rejuvenate our art and take it to a new generation, but how do you get teens and tweens to look up from their iPads and cellphones?  I don't know.  One thing that Michele talks about is the growth of online shows which makes the participating artists' work accessible to many more collectors (although losing the touch-and-feel aspect and the face-to-face contact).  I've been active in that area, of course, with my Online Hallowe'en Artists' Studio Trick or Treat with this being our 6th year!  Yes, I am looking for new participants so email me if you're interested or want to know more!  Let's keep our dreams alive and kicking!   

Thank you, Rita, you still have the power to inspire!
"To have a good friend is one of the highest delights of life; to be a good friend is one of the noblest and most difficult undertakings." --Anonymous

Friggin cold!

I've never seen a halo around the sun before... it was SO cold that we saw this as the sun was rising on Monday, January 6th.   

Our yard in full of snow, perfectly white and crunchy!  

And here's proof:  -26C !  Oh Canada!  Man, it was bitter and really windy!

“Winter then in its early and clear stages, was a purifying engine that ran unhindered over city and country, alerting the stars to sparkle violently and shower their silver light into the arms of bare up-reaching trees. It was a mad and beautiful thing that scoured raw the souls of animals and man, driving them before it until they loved to run. And what it did to Northern forests can hardly be described, considering that it iced the branches of the sycamores on Chrystie Street and swept them back and forth until they rang like ranks of bells.” 
 ― Mark Helprin, Winter's Tale

Thank you, fellow Hallowe'ener Hector Turner for sharing this great quote!  I think it goes well with my winter photos, "scoured raw" for sure!

Make it so!

I was inspired by this...

 

to put this together at work: 

 

 

Let's make 2014 magical! 

 

 

And what's more magical than Mother Nature?  We've been thrilled to enjoy the company of this gorgeous backyard visitor, a Cooper's Hawk maybe?  He's enjoying the pigeons and sparrows in the neighbourhood, it's amazing how very little he leaves behind, just feathers and a little bit of blood on the snow. 

Mad world

Sigh... my Holidays are almost over.  I did manage to read a book, after all!  It was a children's book with lots of pictures but it was an entire book and it was EXCELLENT! 

"A Coyote Solstice Tale" is the story of Coyote and his friends getting together to celebrate and a little human girl showing up, having fled the horror of Holiday madness.  The animals are introduced to her world and then return to the safety of the forest.  Beautifully told in rhyme, this meaningful story is very relevant to our times and clearly outlines the crazy consumerism that's ruining the Holiday.  I highly recommend sharing this story with your loved ones.

We also saw "The Purge", which turned out to be much better and far more thought-provoking than I had hoped.  We were in Los Angeles for Hallowe'en and could have gone to "The Purge" walk-through attraction but were turned off by the violence.  Well, the movie was far more meaningful and interesting, but of course very violent (although NOT gory).  It  speaks about apathy and indifference and how people ignore the things that are very wrong all around them until they're forced to confront them.  Creepy and uncomfortable, definitely watch the extra "making of" featurette to start the discussion going!

Happy New Year!

Happy New Year, everyone!

I just, finally, updated my website (better late than never!) and added a few images to my flickr page (you can see it here:  http://www.flickr.com/photos/scratchingatthewindow/ ).

(That's Cere and Bella, they're still looking for their forever homes.  If at all possible, they'd like to be adopted as a pair.  Yes, Bella will eat ANYTHING.) 

Christmas with Krampus and rats, of course

Chuckle... well, it's true... or a good dose of Krampus!  Thank you, Rose, for Krampus-ing my Yule, your friendship is a true gift! 

Rose visits all the most interesting places in the United States and spots Krampus everywhere!    At a paper show, she found this die cut "scrap".... 

At a gingerbread competition she caught Krampus terrorizing two kiddies!  That's so unbelievably cute! 
 

 

And in a shop selling glass ornaments!

 

And now he hangs out in my tree, thank you Rose! 

Happy Holidays!

 

Rats are also everywhere in the house this Season, and I have to thank Cathy who adopted Gryphon the Rat a few years ago for not only sending an adorable rodent card but taking the time to affix a rat stamp!!!  Wow.  That's so thoughtful, I love it!

 

I am blessed.