As my birthday has recently passed, I've found myself reflecting on my year of art making. I'm surprised at how little art I've created, to my liking anyway! My job keeps me busy, busy and it is a very loosely structured work schedule, so it is hard to designate creative time. And when I do have extra time, I want to spend it with my family, not to mention there is house cleaning, Ugh! My only saving grace is I was sweetly reminded that although I don't have much time for my own creations, through MECCA, I create a space for and encourage the creativity in countless others. In this way, my creative efforts are actually multiplied 100 fold or more. This thought helps to soothe my soul.
Since I've been reviewing my creative year, I thought I'd share some of my pieces with you. I'll do this over a couple posts as there are several pics. First I'll share some paintings I made for a Paintings and Poetry book project with several artists I truly admire. Below are most of my pages. I chose the poetry of Anne Morrow Lindbergh as my inspiration. While I was pregnant with Raven I found her book The Unicorn and other poetry and would read it out loud to my big baby belly while rocking in the rocking chair. Her words often inspired vast visions in my mind and brought about physical reactions from my body. She was the obvious choice for me. The paintings are 6" x 6", if I remember correctly, and I used textured vinyl wallpaper samples as my canvases.
This painting is called The Anemone Garden and the line "her swaying garden of anemones" is painted on the right side.
This one is called Seed of Love and the line "the seed of love must be eternally resown" is painted on the left side.
This painting is called Captive Spirit and the line "captive spirit running free" is painted on the right side, in light blue. 
This one is called Burning Tree and the line "burning tree upon the hill and burning tree within my heart" is painted in yellow along the tree trunk.
Stand Alone is the title of this painting and the line "Swept hollow of your presence, I must stand alone and in their empty faces stare" are the painted words. 
This painting is titled Bolted Door and the line "Break down the bolted door, rip open, spread and pour" are painted around the door.
This piece is called More than Wings and the line "here soar with more than wings" is painted below the flying image.
And lastly, this painting is called Leaves of Youth. It is apropos as I find myself struggling to admit I am "middle aged" and fully exposed on top of the mountain of my life, looking down to the other side. Yes, it still looks a long way down but everyone knows that traveling down hill happens twice as fast, if not faster. Anne's words "Already I have shed the leaves of youth, stripped by the winds of time down to the truth" make me hopeful. That I may appreciate the experiences of my younger years, how they've protected and shaped me, but that as they fall away my true self will become more fully exposed, in all it's strength and glory.I will be sharing some other art I've created over the last year in near future posts. So stay tuned.
