Folks who already volunteered: we now have a fabulous volunteer coordinator!

Help coordinate him? Put VOLUNTEER in subject line to :  sockit2MEcfs@gmail.com   so he will have your contact info.

Greens Beer has many different styles that have the same full body, texture and color as its gluten loaded counterparts.

I found it at my local Fred Meyer to boot!

YAY for brewers who think out of the box and with their tastebuds, rather than just an ingredient list!!!!!

EVERYONE looks better in garb in my estimation.     I think what has kept me from doing a lot of portraits in the past is the isistance of people that their portraits be visually synonymous with glamour shot photography or state portraiture type stuff.

How much more fun would it be to capture everyone’s inner Lord and/or Lady?     Since I have a small talent for realism, I think this could be a fun exercise.

This idea tickles my creative fancy as well, since I have an abiding interest  in both textiles and history that actually passes over into the perseveration zone…

W00T for multi-level creative itch scratching!

Hmmmm, now all I need is subjects….

I utterly, totally, completely and royally SUCK at sewing.

Weird thing that…I can turn a double finished edge with less than a quarter inch tolerance without even pinning (let alone pressing) and machine applique in my sleep. But do you think I can figure out even basic piecing or manage to set a non- puckered gore? Nope.

What started out as a simple Dark Ages  mans tunic ended up as a 4 gore,  inset underarm gusset tunic that’s about 4 yards around the bottom with approximately 20 yards of piping and 10 yards of tablet weaving that had to be top stitched . And I don’t sew well….

It turned out looking fairly nice as all the ornamentation sort of distracts from the little flub ups here and there.

Only 2 Gowns, 2 more tunics and 2 pairs of trews to go. Before the end of the month that is.
Ah well, as I’ve always said, anything worth doing is worth obsessing over.

I find that I usually either don’t look at people at all or inversely I stare like I’m boring holes in them. The latter usually happens if I find them OR what the light is doing to them interesting. Just how do I explain that I’m bugging out on the series of planes that their face has become?

One thing that I’ll say for photography work is that the camera acts as a social buffer against my unabashed tendency to fall into whatever it is that I’m looking at.

Artism strikes again, much to the detriment of my social calender….

After 20 years of doing just visual art as a mainstay I’ve decided to expand my options and take on finishing my BA, adding a goodly dose of Art History to the mix.   Ultimately my goal is to acheive my MA in Museum Science from University of Washington, one of the few in the country that offers that specific degree.

I’ve worked in museums as a day job before and I must say that my own work benefited from the experience.     A good museum is more than just a warehouse…it can be a think tank, library,classroom,social hub and multi-media center as well.    I found that the daily company of others passionate about art stoked  my  creative fires.

I truly believe that my experience as a working artist could be of benefit…and no, I’m not planning on stopping my own work.     The prime word here is AND.

As someone who has worked on both sides of the aisle on this issue let me start by saying that nothing is “just whipped up” in any working artists studio that I know, my own included.

I’ve been working with digital media off and on for well over 20 years. As of late I’ve been working in combinations of digital and analog mediums. Has the digital experience changed my approach as an artist?

Yes and No.

I work mostly with Corel Painter IX these days. It has a gazillion and fifty two nifty features that I don’t use, opting to work the digital format like an analog medium. Why don’t I just work the analog equivalences you may ask?

My reasons are as follows:

1. Pixels aren’t toxic.

I worked in oils for years, then switched to wax pastels due to toxicity issues. I tend to not pay attention to where my brushes and solvents are and also have an unfortunate propensity when rapt in work to stick my brushes in my mouth when I need a point or to wipe solvent laden brushes on my pants leg. *DOH*

Even though there are other mediums that don’t require toxic solvents I realized that most artists pigments are, in and of themselves, toxic. This includes the pigments in pastels, acrylics,watercolors etc. Cadmium anyone? And then there’s always the issue of toxic fixatives.

2 Pixels are green

No solvents, no minerals, no wasted paper in reworks , no waste in general.

3. Safety of Originals

I had a studio flood on me a few years back. I lost a lot of pieces. I’ve also had pieces meet a number of more unusual demises, some involving housecats.

Back up your files on disc regularly and your originals are safe

3. Space

it takes a whole lot less space to work on a Wacom Tablet than to work on an easel, as well as a drafting table and airbrush booth. That and one doesn’t have to pay for all of that equipment.

4. Versitility

See entry 3.

I tend to approach my digital works the same as my analog work ie with classical layering technique.

I also tend to combine scanned analog and digital, using the best of both worlds.

The only thing I really miss about analog is working with  impasto, but then again a girl can’t have everything.

When I was in college , back in the earlier days of computer art, my instructor told me 2 things that have stuck with me throughout my career.

The first is that it doesn’t matter what tools an artist uses to get the effect that they’re going for. They STILL have to come up with the idea for the piece and make every call along the way as far as approach.

The second is that a computer is really nothing more than a fast pencil. You still have to be able to draw and be well grounded in artistic fundamentals in order to make it do what you want.

My challenge to you is this…look around the works posted on this site and My Imagekind Gallery.

I have a whole lot of pieces that are marked mixed media. Can you tell which are purely analog and which are analog/digital?

I’d be interested to hear which you think are which.

Why is this???? There are certainly adults along the autism spectrum, and the children that everyone seems so very single pointedly focused upon do tend to grow up when ones back is turned. And gee, they become adults. I truly applaud the efforts of parents to help their children and the network of information that has ensued. I guess what I’m grousing about is the dearth of stuff available to many adults that need it….and I know many.

While I understand that statistically speaking there are a whole lot fewer girls than boys that are AS/Autistic, I also understand that it tends to manifest very differently in girls and women than in the male of the species due to gender based neurological differences. Speaking statistically again, girls are far more likely to be misdiagnosed due to these differences in manifestation. I know that was certainly the case in my life.

I’d love to hear from y’all adult spectrum specters. Have you found resources? Diets that work? Coping Mechanisms? And how about the stuff that doesn’t work?

Inquiring minds want to know

On a side note I had my first GFCF dinner party the other night…oh and add VEGAN to that as well.

I did a lasagna that was pretty darned good, if I do say so myself. BUT the crowning achievement of the nite was dessert…rich chocolate layer cake , filled with marion/raspberry filling, coated with a semi-sweet chocolate ganache and decorated with fresh berries. This was served with a very rich bittersweet coconut/chocolate ice cream that I whipped up. It was good by any standard, let alone gfcf.

I’m insufferably pleased with myself at this point.

It’s amazing just how much more time I have to produce.