Art as Usual

I've been feeling fairly housebound lately- my little boy's been sick so there's been no running around, no school etc. since last Thursday. This morning I had to call and cancel a couple of activities and felt pretty down about it. But I turned on the computer and had the chance to sit and read some of the messages there and felt a lot better. Plus, being at home with a sickie has given me the chance to play around both in my art room and with my little boy a bit more. We've done games, built a mega-zoo in the living room and spent a lot of time cuddling and reading. That has been very nice. Anyways, I thought I'd share a couple of the projects I did over the weekend. They're both an extension of some of the other work I've done. I'm trying to feel out the next step in both my wire work and my mixed media constructed pieces.

The wire ball has bits of paper torn from an old book woven into the wire. As well as some yarn, and some knots made from old t-shirt scraps. I also used some of my collection of spiral binders torn from some old lesson plan books of my mother's. She was recycling the paper pages and was going to toss the wire. I stepped in to take them home but haven't had much idea of what to do with them until now. I like the variety of shape, line and metal they add to the baling wire ball. Something new!

The piece above was another try at the constructed collage look. I had envisioned larger flowers and was going to stitch fabric to them for bright color but the piece had a mind of it's own and seemed to develop contrary to my plan. It turned out to be a fun surprise! And the overall look is still the bright color against the green with some collaged elements worked in so I'm pleased with the result. It doesn't seem completely finished but I suspect the rest will come in the next few days. I'll post it again then.

So after some reflection I guess I'm glad I had both this time at home to play in my studio as well as the time to cuddle in with my little boy and focus on him for a while. It was a small respite in the complete whirl of activity we usually find ourselves within. Who knew?