The red sand hut is a cross between a shanty town in South Africa and a Norman Rockwell painting. It is what happens when you mix brothers, sisters, and friends old and new, and you give them an afternoon of device-free down time. They built the hut into the side of a Mesa with scraps of lumber, drift wood, and old metal. Then they defended it with stick swords and metal trash can shields. As I painted this, I loved playing with the lost edges between the kids skin and the red dirt. It seems that if their skin and the dirt weren’t the same color when the day started, they became more and more so as the afternoon passed on.
“Out of gardens grow fleeting flowers but lasting friendships.”…Beverly Rose Hopper
I felt a bit like Tom Sawyer when I asked my fiends for help in the garden this week. I hoped we could make a trade: help me in my garden, and you can have produce, fresh eggs, and show your kids a “morning on the farm.” They came. They endured the 100+ degrees, and hard work. I am humbled. How can we value the seeds of asking for help, and the fruit of growing friendships? That harvest awaits us always…..
Meet Mrs. Cherry. She comes from a place where magic is made every day. Four years ago my son Micah had her as his preschool teacher for the 3 year old class. One day during a family bike ride, Micah looked up and noticed that the trees met above him in a canopy. “Reminds me of Rousseau,” he said. “Who?” asked my husband. “You know, Rousseau painted trees the way Michelangelo painted Bible stories.” “Did Mommie teach you that?” “No, Mrs. Cherry did.”
People who teach are special, and people who teach preschoolers are extra special. So here is Mrs. Cherry doing what she does every day, sharing her gifts with little souls. She meets these little wonders, some timid, some bold, and teaches them both the expected and remarkable…making it all seem like play. This little soul is named Atticus. Atticus was diagnosed with an inoperable brain tumor this winter. When he became too sick to go to go to school, she just kept doing what she has always done – this time she just had to take the magic to him. I still have kids at New World Day School, and I shared the pain with the staff and teachers as they accompanied Atticus on his painful journey to its end this spring. Mrs. Cherry, you are one of my real life, everyday heroes, thank you. Thank you for doing what you do – and I thank God for who you are.
This is my son Noah hiking with his pop in a box canyon in Ghost Ranch, NM. It is a cool oasis of green in the harsh desert that surrounds it, and a perfect place to pass a hot afternoon (as long as you watch for storms).
I have always been a puddle person. I remember when I was 6 years old. My parents took me to Disney World, we saw the sights, watched the shows, and rode the rides. At the end of the trip they asked me what my favorite part was, “the puddles!” I answered. I had never seen so much car-free cement in my life (nor have I since). I can feel the jump, the satisfying smack as my feet hit the puddle, and then, the weird limbo as my feet displaced the water beneath me, and my feet hit the ground with a satisfying spray of water all around me. I am still a puddle jumper, and I try to remember how much I love them when my labrador-children run and leap for the shining ground, or trudge through the lowest spots after the rain.
Boots, bathing suit, and puddles. What could be better? Note: I painted another painting in this series, Long Legs Splashing. For the artists reading this blog, I used the palette of colors on the tray of my easel from the first painting, and with the colors and values picked out – the painting was really fast to paint.
This is my 5 year old daughter Miriam, and her great-grandmother, Doris. They are visiting, smoothing, folding, and hanging. Doris told us that when she was little every Monday they went to the washateria. All the neighbors were there, and there was always coffee. They packed sandwiches, and someone always made a cake. They washed, and the children played, they worked, and helped. We don’t have wash day anymore, I can drop a load of laundry in anytime…I sometimes think about all that we have lost with the gains in technology.
paintandsimple 