River Garden Studio

late summer moments

I have been reading on so many blogs about loving 

this time of year.  Oh, I love it too.  The days are 

cooler and shorter, 

the light streams across the forest to the west in a 

different way, and I feel different too.

 

As a teacher my life changes so completely as 

September approaches, just as the lives of my 

student's changes as well.  I get my classroom 

ready, make plans to have the "best year ever" 

and feel more creative than I have all summer 

in my own art.

So, I have so much to share with you, starting 

with my Alaska art journal, that got so grungy 

with black gesso that now I call it my grunge 

journal. 

 

Luckily I took pictures before the pages changed too 

much.

 

 

Here are some buttons, beads and a pendant I found in 

Valdez, Alaska.

 

I found a new website called Grunge Textures.  It 

has free

textures to use in art. Some of these images are 

from there...

 

Rattles such as these have been used by the Tlingit 

people in Alaska since the early 1800's.

I took a lot of pictures of numbers and metal on 

our trip.  

 

Some of these imagages are from postcards too.

 

And then I started sewing things into my "come to 

the ground" journal.  

I've been having so much fun!

 

 

 

  

I am loving the conrast of natural, and man 

made objects.  All of them are aging in nature.  All are changing.  

But all so still at this moment.

    

Onward to Alaska

I wanted to share one more series of photographs 

from our trip north.

This lake was so beautiful, and by far the loveliest 

campground we stayed at.

 

We swam and Chris tried fishing. The song of the loons 

echoed across the water.  We didn't want to end the day, 

the spell of the water was so strong.

 

 

But the next morning we were on the road again.

 

And we finally reached our destination Valdez, Alaska . 

 

My husband's sister and her husband took us out on 

their boat.  Larger fishing boats were lined up waiting to 

take their turn to fish on the waters in the bay.

 

Chris tried fishing again, this time very successful!

 

It was a gorgeous day...

 

The larger boat below is where the fishing boats 

unload their fish to go to the cannery.

 

I loved the splashes of color and the names of the boats 

at the harbor.

 

 

 

The guys cleaned their fish... twelve in all, 

(they threw back eight).

 

This beautiful little girl was proudly cleaning a 

bucket of fish for her father.  She seriously concented 

for me to take her picture.

 

On another day we drove to Chitina, Alaska.

 

Chitina began in the early 1900's as a supply town for the 

Copper River Northwestern Railway.  When copper 

prices declined, Chitina became a ghost town. 

 

Now it is being refurbished.

 

 

So much to see...

 

 

 

 

We had an unforgettable journey.  Tremendous mountains, 

wildlife and and beautiful scenery.

 

I could not believe that I got to see buffalo!

 

I leave you with a magical pool at the Liard hotsprings...

(too hot for us to go in though).  They would be 

lovely in the winter!

 

Have a wonderful week.

            

travel with me

I have been home for almost a week, still unpacking,

doing laundry, cleaning the house, watering the thirsty gardens and playing 

with photographs.  Here are some of them... 

In all of these structures I have been imagining the human connection. 

Will you travel with me through history and see...

-a discarded boat left by a fisherman, left in the 

southern tip of Alsaska when the tides went out...

 

-a house where a young girl grows up and dreams of 

the boy she met at the waterfall.

 

-a blue shed, the only color in an otherwise colorless town.

 

-a church, watch how it changes color with the sky.
 

-a train traveling through mountain and field.  

The conductor ran away from his other life. He is 

a good man now. 

 

-a house that still dreams of a family, how they once 

laughed and sang.  Where are they now?

 

-my bell used to ring, can you hear it?

 

-a man and his son opened this buisiness. Deep in 

the woods of Canada. 

Maybe the color will draw you in?

  

- inside a woman sits waiting for the sun to warm her.

She is old now, but in her dreams she is young,

dancing in a yellow dress.

 

-yes, I am still standing here.  Memories echo in my 

walls.  Wishes in my windows.

 

-I shelter and protect the grains.  A breeze

flows through me and when the doors open 

and I sing.

 

-we are the soliders that guard the port.

 

-long ago a young woman moved here from Europe.  

What we all need is a dream.

And a place to house it.

 

-fish with me and I will see you smile.

 

-travel with me on this empty road.  

We will not be strangers 

then.

 

-love the land, see it with new eyes.

 

-find a place that is hidden.

  

-remember that help is on the way.

  

-it is all important.  Made by the hands of you or I.

 

-travel these roads with me.  Feel the quiet.  

Learn the history.

 

-see how the colors change.

 

travel with me.