sowing and sewing

both require patience, faith and hard work, in abundance; the ranunculus above is not the product of my labour, or maybe you could say it is, in a very round-about way: by working in the office I earned some money with which I chose to buy this bunch of flowers; today was truly a day off, having no plans whatsoever and as these things then go, the unexpected unfolds; friend M. rang and asked whether she could come over to my place to start a lino-cut; once here we decided we both wanted to go for a walk first as the weather is so wonderfully soft, grey and soft. In the pic below you can see the willows turning green, the bright yellows of the rapeseed and the cow parsley is blossoming in white tufts along 'our' dike, 

 we visited a friend where M. held this tiny chick, his?her? mother was no longer interested in it and our friend led it to another hen who had already adopted four other chicks, we were on tenterhooks: would she accept it? he crept towards her and just manoeuvred itself under her wings, amidst the others, MotherHen spread her wings over all of them Yes! 

and then on our way back home we found this unfortunate bird, smothered by car wheels.....



long cloth with lots of stitches





really nice old fashioned basket came along with M.

at last the start of a new cloth: an owl

two new inhabitants: mother goose and chick, I am very glad they came together as I have no idea what the chick needs at this point in her life; it's nice to have a mother close by when you're this small.


 an attempt at making a goose print, smudgy results, things don't always go the way you expect them to.....

which also applies to the seed sowing; this year I decided to sow mainly edible flowering plants, I sowed them last Friday for four reasons: the earth is now warm, rain was predicted (and today fell), the moon is waxing and I remembered to.
I have no idea what will eventually appear, I like this kind of suspense, a lot.


Comments

Marti said…
See that's what I love about you Saskia, you keep trying, you just go and do and by the way, I love the goose prints, both of them. Me, I'm an orderly sort, very organized, like knowing what is coming so one of the life lessons that I have been working on is learning to loosen up, let what comes, come. The best thing that I ever did was to dabble in the natural dyeing pots because there is no known outcome and that to me is so freeing and is a gift I give to myself, over and over again.
Nancy said…
Saskia...new friends, goose prints and the soft colors of your landscape...Beautiful! And the threads in the shadow box...Love It! I saw that owl, even bore I read what you wrote!
Debbie said…
Beautiful cloth again, love the owl and the threads. We are busy sowing seeds as well, are they squashed frogs?
Anonymous said…
the little goose has her mother and the little chick a new wing to hide under... I love the picture of the soft sky with the grey and the grasses...
Marti said…
One more thing to add Saskia.
I'm reading Willa Cather's book, Death Comes for the Archbishop, a book that many authors consider one of the best on New Mexico. Her descriptions of the land and places that I am coming to know is excellent. On pg. 69, chapter titled," The Mass at Acoma" there is mention of parrots and how the Pueblo Indians came to honor and them. It is said that when one died, the whole pueblo mourned and "piously preserved the bones."In Isleta, a pueblo not far from where I live, mention is made in the book of a great. ancient parrot skull that was highly revered. (I've done a little research about the reverence of birds in Pueblo life but can't exactly find anything on parrots.) But in any case, I thought you would like to know about this since you have his majesty, the Bird King, living with you and is just another connection that you have here with us in New Mexico !
jan said…
Your 'labels' on this post read to me of poetry;
'bird, friend, garden, prints, project, walk'
Life in essence X
Saskia said…
dear readers:
I must apologize for not having responded promptly to your comments this past week; I have been very busy in the office as I have been 'promoted' to coach, I have now joined our coach-team and have been in training these past couple of days, very enjoyable, intense and tiring; this does not mean I won't still be doing my regular office tasks: mainly dealing with customer calls, but it is an added bonus! And of course I will continue my studio-life and all that that involves.

So here goes
Marti: aha you are highly organised, does that also mean your life is usually on track? Do you manage to get things done just the way you want them to? My approach means I have to adjust a lot!! it has also made me realise I do have (subconscious) expectations and have had at times to realign -which is the keep on going and trying part-, however in my round-about-way of being I have also managed to fulfil certain dreams f.e. I used to imagine living in the countryside in a small house with a garden studio, and that has happened.....just goes to show there are many roads to get to where you want to be; re the OldBirdKing and revering (bird) skulls, thanks for yet another connection to New Mexico. I like that we're interested in the same things.

Nancy: I must ask my friend if the chick survived!

Debbie: squashed toads, this time of year they travel back and forth as it's the spawning season, alas this involves crossing the roads at least twice and many are run over by cars, most of their corpses are eaten by crows and such like, what remains is collected by me, ha.

Dee: we have quite a few of these soft grey days, as long as it stays dry I don't mind too much.....

Jan: what a lovely thought, nice to see poetry in unexpected places

tungsten

tungsten

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