Long Winter Nights...

...are perfect for getting crafty! But before I show you what I've been up to this week, below is the June page of my calendar. The haiku was written a year ago today and appeared in The Heron's Nest. The photo was also taken a year ago at the new Te Puke Cemetery, as the last of the sun was going down.

June 2012 - Kirsten's Calendar of Haiku & Photography

Now that winter has hit us here again in the Southern Hemisphere, I've been spending some time each evening sticking stuff to other stuff, and coming out with these cards:

I love using bits and pieces I find in old books, and adding a bit of origami is always fun. I look at these cards as mini canvases. I just see an image in my head, then try to collage it out into the real world. I'm not making these with any person or any occasion in mind. I'm just enjoying getting stuck into my crafting again, and enjoying having my own creating room for the first time, to do it in! :)

Crafty with a K

Here's my latest crafty piece: turning the wooden 'k' from my childhood (the front surface of which had been defaced with stickers - yes I loved sticking stuff to other stuff even then:) into an item of interest once again that I'm happy to display on my writing desk.

It's a project I'd had in mind for some time but wasn't sure what to cover it with. Then I remembered a page I'd marked in one of the old children's books I keep for collage and knew it would be perfect! You'll see I've kept that sense of childhood about it - I think we all need things around us to remind us to play.

One Day You're In, The Next Day You're Out

This is one of my haiku and photo combinations that hasn't made it into my calendar. I love the image (taken at the entrance to Tauranga's Mission Cemetery in June this year) and the haiku - but found the pairing to be over illustrated, with not enough for the mind and eye to ponder.

Haiku first published in Presence #40 (Jan, 2010)

This haiku is now matched with another of my images taken around a similar time (just at the end of autumn). It still features a gate but it doesn't dominate the shot leaving room for the haiku to breath and the senses to expand. (Please click on the photo to see a larger image.)

A Vision of Birds

New ideas for creative projects seem to come to me no matter what mood I'm in nor where my energy levels are sitting. Some ideas can simply never be realised and have to be let go. Others just keep bubbling back up into my conscious awareness and need to be fulfilled.

          escaping

          from a 2nd-hand

          book

          two tickets for

          the bird gardens

The feeling of wanting to create something out of all the cards I was sent while in hospital last year can no longer be ignored. I have a vision of birds: of cutting each card into a bird silhouette and setting them on a background to be hung on the wall.

All the cards I was given during my time in hospital having IV
chemotherapy for leukaemia last year, from March to July, 2010.

I don't know how it's all going to work out but I'm willing to follow this vision and see where it leads! Will keep you updated :)

Riding My Creativity Waves

The poetry is slow in coming at the moment, which seems to happen after I do any month-long poetry challenge. But I've found what I do write during these times of recuperation is quality. I'm learning to ride my own creativity waves and no longer get concerned during these down times. Instead I focus my creative energy on other more hands-on crafts.

Monday night saw me finally finish the collage haiga that had been sadly sitting on my art table for over two months. It's a great feeling to have this one complete and looking so good now standing proudly on my easel (where all new artworks stand for a spell). Then last night, I made a card for my Mum's upcoming birthday, which features the colours she likes and an origami crane.

The card I made for my Mum's birthday 2011

I've done some more work on my haiga calendar as I decided I wasn't happy with two of the photographs and two of the haiku in my first printing. Now it is closer to fabulous. And I also did some baking over the weekend, which counts as creativity in my book! Black Doris Plum Crumble and a Date and Walnut Loaf - both wheat and dairy free, and super yummy! :)

Enjoy riding your creativity wave today, wherever it may take you.

small stones of gratitude - day 19

Grateful for the energy I was given to create today, which will nourish my body and soul: baking a wheat-free, dairy-free banana loaf with some walnuts and pumpkin seeds thrown in, and sticking the last few words and pictures to my vision board, making it my largest work of art and a powerful tool for change.

Banana loaf Kirsten style!

Check out this post to find out how to get in the draw for my book give-away this month.

Vision Boards And Sticking Stuff To Other Stuff

I'm in the process of making my biggest ever vision board. Hubby-to-be and I are looking at buying our first home together later this year and this vision board is my contribution to the magic of making it happen.

Vision boards have worked for me in the past (it's how I found my wonderful man, after all!) and plus, I just love sticking stuff to other stuff! Most of my vision boards end up becoming a work of art, and although I use words, it's a good exercise is working/playing with images to a greater extend.

Vision board in progress - approx. 1m x 1.2m

I made my first vision board in 2008 with friend and fellow writer and artist Janet Keen. Janet has vision boards all around her home and studio, and has had great success from them. Check out her recent post on How to make a vision board. You can also read an article I wrote about Janet and her art, which she has archived on her blog here.

Check out an earlier post of mine, including two poems, about why we want to move from Wordsmith House - Location, Location, Location.

STOP! Haiga In Progress. DO NOT DISTURB!

Finally! I have found a decent time/energy envelope to focus back on my collage haiga. I haven't made one in well over a month: exhausting myself with poetry prompts throughout April and having nothing left to give to my hands-on artwork/play. I've been itching to get stuck into it again! And I'm very excited about my first piece back.

About a week after NaPoWriMo ended for me (which was four days later than everyone else:) an idea flooded my vision for a haiga, as I knew it would: Create the space and the creation will come. (Note: Always have pencil and Post-It notes handy!)

So I started work/play on the idea last week and have had to leave it sitting for a few days at a time as health (or rather illness) demands. But I'm in the final stage now of sticking stuff to other stuff (one of my most favourite things to do!) and then I shall place my collage haiga on my easel and stand back to delight in the full 3D effect of my original vision.

My currently empty easel

I've found haiga are the artwork/play that most often turns out better than my original idea or vision in my mind's eye. And this is the magic for me.

My writing of prose pieces never turns out the same as first thought, which doesn't usually mean that it's better or worse than the first concept, just different. But I am sometimes left with a feeling that I haven't quite created what I set out to achieve. Granted this hasn't happened for some time as I haven't done much prose work; not as in previous years. I've been concentrating more on poetry and this has been wonderful: my diary has never been so empty of appointments and so full of haiku, senryu, tanka, small stones, one-liners, inspirations, poetry, Poetry, POERTY!

With my visual art I've learned (after much struggle!) to just go with my gut and NOT my head. I may think that a poem involving blood tests or transfusions should sit on red card, and so instinctively allow my mind to override my unconscious flow and grab for the red straight away. But when I just sit for a moment I find I want to choose blue card for this one. I can't explain why, and my mind tries to fight this, puts up an argument that there is no good reason to choose blue over red, red is of course the obvious choice for this haiga!

However, my mind does NOT know best: definitely not when it comes to art anyway! So I've learnt to slow down, enjoy the process, quiet my mind, and go with what comes up without questioning.


"My Art is my Heart" February 2011
Paint, origami, transfers, stickers on stretched canvas.



Too often in the past I would complete an artwork, say a painting, and just not be satisfied by what I'd created because I could see where I had fought against a natural colour choice or natural stopping/finishing point. I had listened to my head instead of my heart/soul/spirit/unconscious.

Now I gain so much enjoyment from my art work/play and I know it's because this process of creation is one of the few times in a day that I really let my spirit have a voice, and this is vital to my well being.

The haiga I'm creating is for a senryu that's part of my collection exploring my leukaemia journey, and has been accepted for the next issue of Prune Juice. I hope to have it finished this week. Then I can sit back and wait for a new idea to pass through me and onto the page. Happy creating to you! 

"Peace is the Way of my Heart" February 2011
Paint, origami, transfers, stickers, brads on stretched canvas.