window shopping

window dressing spotted at chanel in the champs-elysees arrondissements. patriotic, huh?

just one of the beautiful stained glass windows at notre dame cathedral. amazing!!

art that caught my eye on the ile st. louis while looking for berthillon ice cream which is purported to be the "best ice cream in the world"...i opted instead for the most delicious l'aubergine et fromage le sandwich (that's eggplant & cheese...but doesn't it even sound tastier en francais?) berthillon will have to wait for another day.

and just in case, you are wondering...if yesterday and today were my only days here, it would have been well worth the trip!! i think it's time for quiche et vin. au revoir et a bientot!

welcome to my neighborhood

"Today help me ask questions without worrying about looking foolish, and respond to questions in the most helpful way I can." ~~anonymous

the "window" and the "bike" were both taken while i was having lunch at cafe du marche where i ordered a caesar salad because it was the only thing i recognized on the menu and for some silly reason the waiter thought i spoke french. the salad i received did not resemble anything close to what i thought i ordered. did i ask any questions? heck, no. i probably didn't want to appear foolish ☺. (it's a lot easier to be brave and witty in your native language.)

i found this little church and courtyard tucked in among the shops along the rue de grenelle. it is a lovely little sanctuary in all respects and the blooming flowers were welcome additions to a very gray day! (the weather is almost exactly what i left behind in seattle...guess that makes me prepared, huh?)

too pooped for many more words tonight! it's been a long day of traveling and exploring. mais c'est tres bon! (but it's very good!!!) au revoir et bon soir. a bientot!

chapter one

"A good traveler has no fixed plans, and is not intent on arriving." ~Lao Tzu

winging my way toward the city of lights. if all goes well, i will be arriving at the arc de triomphe around 10:00 a.m. thursday morning (2:00 a.m. pst).

i think i will be better prepared to follow lao tzu's wise words once i have landed, found my apartment and dropped off my bags...then begins the "no fixed plans" except, of course, to meet my friend, tess (who i have never before met) for lunch on saturday. we plan to let the wind blow us where it may...in other words, we hope to be quite "good travelers!"

sepia

This poem inspired by the photo found at Abbey of the Arts Invitation to Poetry.
I hope you will choose to join in the fun!

captured in sepia
frozen in time
shall i take your hand
or will you take mine?

offering bread crumbs
we move through our days
dressed in our finery
love kept at bay.

feeding the pigeons
who always want more
like love unrequited
that shadows our door.

captured in sepia
frozen in time
shall i take your hand
or will you take mine?

tell me what you see...

open vessel

"holding nothing back means holding the intention to be an open vessel, in a daily way."
--mark nepo

morning light

"To love beauty is to see light." -- Victor Hugo

friday fancy

is it just me or do the weeks seem to just fly by? this week i spent three days collaboratively creating a new workshop for couples called "the paradoxical dance." it was stimulating and exhausting work!

the week also included a bit of soul collage and more visual journaling. both seem to be great tools alongside my writing to help keep me centered. i enjoyed another class of NIA which seems to be a creative way to exercise. yea!

yesterday i went to my collage class and while i really enjoyed it, i became frustrated with myself for allowing the teacher to place her vision of my collage on me. shown here, this is considered to be a travel piece of my chosen site of bermuda. the teacher suggested it was "too pristine" and so i spent some time softening & blending. (it definitely is not yet finished!!) last night i realized that bermuda IS pristine and that was the affect i was going for. i got lost in listening to someone more experienced than me rather than listening to my own instincts! ah yes, another little creative learning bit.

no poetry of my own this week. i feel that absence. hopefully, i will feel the mood strike in this coming week. ha! next friday i will be in paris!!!

bon jour, mon artistes!!!

eclipse

Last night was a total lunar eclipse. I have the good fortune of living with a photographer who has all the equipment to capture a shot like this. We loved sitting on the deck in the cool crisp night watching this miracle unfold.

"And God called the light day, and the darkness God called night. And there was evening and there was morning, one day." Genesis 1:5

photo © h3images

be joyful

"the principal thing in this world is to keep one's soul aloft."
--gustave flaubert

rumi with a view

tell me what you see...

...or what does this evoke?

how do you see compassion?

"live to the point of tears." -- camus

the artist's dream

This is the artist's dream: To receive the inspiration to create, To share that creation with others, And to be totally supported in the process.

--author unknown

So, all you artists out there...is this your dream? If not, what is your dream? Thoughts?

"switch" © h3images

friday fancy

I go back and forth between seeing my friday post as a list or a musing. Again, this week certain themes continued for me: spaciousness, health, vessels and, of course, Paris. Those themes manifested themselves in soul collage, visual journaling, photography and lots of morning pages.

This week's creativity included:

1. Yoga and NIA (non-impact aerobics...way fun!!)
2. Healthy eating and strong walks.
3. Soul collage workshop with a theme of compassion & love.
4. Gathering supplies for Paris (maps, a bag, money belt, etc.)
5. A trip to the art store for some new paints (still unchristened.)
6. A valentine for my sweetheart
7. Sad to say, NO collage class this week. It was cancelled. Boo hoo.
8. 21 morning pages.
9. Photographs and "mental" snapshots.
10. Research for couples workshop.
11. Spaciousness!
    

my valentine

fortune has smiled on me with a wonderful husband. he is not only creative in his own right, but supports me in my ventures. others might consider what i do frivolous, extravagant or time wasting, but he delights in my delight. how much more could a girl ask for? so, today's creation is for you, my dear sweet husband.

happy valentine's day!!!

this card was started with a scan of my visual journal page, "lucy meets h3". (the journal page is a combo of magazine cutouts, paint, fabric, markers & confetti hearts.) i added the border in iphoto and printed on photo paper. after deciding on the inside sentiment, "i love all the ways you support me," i created the inside page with magazine clippings, accented it with a sponge and ink pad and ultimately tied the front and back together with gold and black ribbon. it was way more fun than picking out a card at the store. I love it and hope he does too!!!

just like a woman

Today, "The Dream", posted a beautiful new painting along with the words of Bob Dylan's, Just Like a Woman. It was a reminder to me that I had used those same words a few weeks back in my visual journal. It seemed like the perfect bit of synchronicity to share it here today. Enjoy!

(p.s. if the image looks familiar, it's because i did show it here as a soul collage.)

morning walk

Love is the soul's light, the taste of morning... --Rumi

shirley temple, anyone?

thought for the day

"our love for our children is often defined by the fact that we cannot spare them pain and save them; that we give them their freedom as necessary steps to creativity, wisdom, and love; that we raise them for the world they go on to create."
--krista tippett

consider this...

"people who bring light into the world wrench it out of darkness, and contend openly with darkness all of their days."
krista tippett

friday fancy

this week's theme (loosely speaking, of course) seemed to run along the lines of "creating space" and "creating health." much time this week was spent in conversation with students, friends, family and myself [which usually includes God.] these conversations all entail what i call creating space.

as far as "creating health" goes, it turns out that my lenten practice this year centers around spaciousness for myself and listening to what that looks like in regard to eating better, moving my body (some would call that exercise) and getting good rest. this really sounds to me again like "creating space," thus the theme of the week.

as far as tangible products of the week there were: collages, visual journaling, morning pages, a little poetry and some delicious salads created by moi. the somewhat less tangible, included new music from jack johnson, sleep through the static and beth neilsen chapman's hymns--both conducive to space making. the other audio treat of the week was my continued foray into drive time french.

my visual theme for the week was centered around vessels. the first collage shown here is a continuing work in progress from my class and the second is a page from my visual journal.

i am certain i have left a few things out, but this sounds like a pretty spacious and creative week to me, so i will end with that!

au revoir et merci beaucoup!!

the path shimmers

the path shimmers with hearts covered in frost
frozen in regret and resentment
dipping. rising. threading in and out.

I long to feel the warm sand beneath my feet
to dip my toes in water fresh
to move past the frozenness of heartache

thaw my heart, oh Lord
I know there is warmth beneath the snow
the shimmering flakes give me hope

the patterns speak of birds in flight
waves of snow covering grains of infinity
each as unique as the snowflake

shimmering. shaking. crying. weeping.
covering the warmth
waiting for the heart to thaw


join abbey of the arts poetry party here.

excellent day

it is an excellent day at lucy creates!!!, because i have been nominated for my very first award and i now have the delightful job of passing it on to ten blogs i think are E for Excellent. here are the rules (feel free to break them if you want!)

By accepting this Excellent Blog Award, you have to award it to 10 more people whose blogs you find Excellent Award worthy. You can give it to as many people as you want but please award at least 10. You deserve this! Feel free to award people who have already been awarded…

so here are my 10. some are old favorites and others are more recent discoveries i am particularly enjoying right now (and please know that just because you are not on the list does not mean you are not excellent, because you are!!!!) i have interpreted my own rules and am awarding it back to tess (who nominated me) as she truly is most excellent!!

abbey of the arts
anchors and masts
mind sieve
hudson's notebook
endlessly restless
paris parfait
creative everyday
you say i'm a dreamer
h3images
sacred ruminations

i am also going to take this opportunity to play a game from one more excellent blog, discombobula. here are the rules (and you know how i love to create my own rules):

Pick up the nearest book of 123 pages or more.
(No cheating!) Find Page 123.
Find the first 5 sentences.
Post the next 3 sentences.
Tag 5 people. (This is the place where i get creative...tag if you like. play if you want. you get to decide ☺.) Consider yourself invited!

the nearest book to me this morning is julia cameron's The Artist's Way--one of my top ten books for sure! here are julia's words from page 123..sentences 8-10!

"There is something enlivening about expanding our self-definition, and a risk does exactly that. Selecting a challenge and meeting it creates a sense of self-empowerment that becomes the ground for further successful challenges. Viewed this way, running a marathon increases your chance of writing a full-length play."

hmmm...definitely worth reading more.

wishing you an excellent, enlivening, expansive, creative day!!!

photo © h3images

creating space

be generous

"You don't know what you get back until you give." --Bill Clapp

tell me what you see...

...or what does this image evoke in you?

be open

be open.

Above all,
watch with
glittering
eyes the whole world
around you,
because the greatest
secrets are always
hidden in the most unlikely
places. Those who don't
believe in magic
will never find it.

--Roald Dahl

friday fancy...on saturday (again)

scrolling through the week of entries i saw lots of fun things. i played a lot this week with techniques but mainly i was drawn to color particularly vivid colors like golds and reds. it was a week of ups and downs on the home front...snarly teenagers, returning to work, a traveling husband. so, it was a great respite to add a little creativity into each day.

my art class teacher said it sounded like i was using my creative time kind of like cocktail hour...sounds good to me. come to think of it, those golds and reds are reminiscent of a good chardonnay or merlot. hmmmm...

since i am posting my friday list on saturday (again), i have included the collage and sentiment shown here that i made last evening. the words came from a commenter at diamonds in the sky with lucy and they stayed with me for several days. the resulting work has been added to my visual journal and is a fabulous reminder to me of the essence of this week.

ER...this one's for you.

collage class

thursday was the second week of my collage class. there are about 8 of us in the group and i think we span a pretty large range of artistic talent and ability. having not been in an art class since about 4th grade, it is a new experience for me. i have decided the best approach is to consider it as "play" and a time for acquiring new knowledge regarding techniques and materials.

the first week we were instructed to "not use color," in other words to work in black and white. i was glad to not bring my piece home last week and hoped it would morph into something extraordinary in my absence. unfortunately, it did not. this week our mission was to work "quickly" and create five small pieces. i chose to not bring any of my own supplies so that i would work with what i was drawn to in the class rather than relying on previous notions.

the photograph shows all six pieces (the black & white plus 5) which i consider to still be in process. the only one i may leave as is is the little roller coaster which was a piece that totally "created itself." the others, i think, may be used as a base for something else...evolving as we go. next week, we get to start using paints so things could get even messier ☺.

i truly have been following my own credo "create as though no one is watching," but here i am showing you the results of my playtime. allow it to motivate you if you will. i figure we all have to start somewhere. i'll keep you posted.

so, tell me, what's percolating in your creative day?