Poco Mountain Girl

Happy anniversary to US!

This card was waiting for me in the kitchen this morning, and it made me laugh. Eleven years ago today, I wore a white dress with snowflakes and a pair of red flats just like these (except we took off the bows). We had come to cold and snowy Stockbridge, New York to visit my family for Thanksgiving–and surprise! went home to Kansas City married. I had to break it to my landlord that I was now Mrs. Lucero and would be moving into my new house right away.  Aw, snap.

Papa became a minister so he could marry us, Mama decorated the house with white lights and candles, David rented a tux and bought a ring, and I made a wedding dress–all in four days. It was great. If I had to do our wedding over again, I would do the exact same thing.

Since then, we’ve remembered each of our “month-iversaries.”  Today marks Month #132. 🙂

After eleven years, we’re still doing crazy things together, locking arms, and moving forward– now with three kids, three goats, a home, a truck, and a little piece of mountain to show for it.

Happy anniversary to my hay’it cowboy ever. <3

Our family has had a rough couple of weeks, but we are coming through like gold. 🙂 Here are a few little things I’ve made along the way.  Making things has a very nice way of brightening you up when you don’t feel very sparkly or shiny.

This is a necklace I made for our friend Dennis to take back to Germany for his wife, Beate. I fashioned the swirl from nickel silver (also called German silver, ha) and wrapped the intersections with copper wire. I really love the steeliness of the nickel silver, and it goes great with a platinum-plated chain.

Zia’s friend Lola fell in love with a certain backpack that I made for Zia’s 5th birthday. After Zia promised to give it to her, I realized we should probably keep it, since it completed a set of “Indian girl” clothes and accessories I had made for her.  So Zia and I took a custom order from Lola for a new backpack, LOL.

It is supposed to be hot pink and black, and thankfully, I found some home-deco weight fabric at Joann’s in just those colors. When I made Zia’s backpack three and a half years ago, I ran into a problem finding adjusters for the straps–and now we ran into the same problem with Lola’s. Strap adjusters, as far as I can see, are not available in Colorado. David had ordered me a set online for $.59 each, and he went back to the same company to get more for Lola. They are still $.59, and this time I wisely asked for 6 pairs.

It took a few weeks to hunt down the pattern book I had used, but finally we found it–Oliver + S Little Things to Sew–at a library in another county. It’s a great book, and Zia now has her eye on the messenger bag–which also requires the same size strap adjusters. *Grinning from ear to ear.*

Unfortunately, we were out of the yellow calico I used for Zia’s lining (Lola wanted the same thing), but I had a scrap of green calico in my fabric box, which I really love paired with the outer colors of thise backpack. I’m kind of happy we were out of the yellow. 😉

The green lining has two inner pockets, and there is also an outer front pocket (in black). The pink heart is a handmade applique. Hopefully Lola will love her bag!

I’ve been missing my friend Darci and put together a little box for her. I had made this Bohemian necklace set from hammered copper and a rock and river glass I found in Boulder creek, and it always reminded me of Darci’s earthy style (so much like my own!)

I also made this beaded wrap bracelet for her, and fastened it with a gold bird bead.

I recently had a couple of last-minute orders for cord-burning boxes, and David and I made three from cedar.

One is hand-hewn and rubbed in tung oil (now in my shop), but the custom orders are plain, since the mothers wanted their older children to decorate the sides for the new babies.

I painted this aspen tree in our tiny downstairs bathroom a week or so ago. The process was a little nuts, since it took me quite a while to get the color scheme worked out. Every time David walked past the bathroom, the tree was a different color, haha. He never said anything–just, “That looks AWESOME!!!” Smart man.

I used metallic copper and gold paints on a few of the leaves. They glimmer when you walk by, especially when the bathroom lights are off.

The tree tree theme fits well, since the hewn granite sink rests on a tree trunk from our property, and the toilet paper holder is made with three metal tree leaves. I asked David to cut a pallet in half for the magazine rack last summer–it actually worked out great and is nice and sturdy. I just have to figure out how to keep the magazines from slipping through the crack at the bottom.

This last one isn’t exactly something I’ve made yet, but it has all the right beginnings. David found a felled beetle kill pine and cut fifteen huge rounds for me to paint on. The tree has a beautiful blue pattern encircling each cross-section, and I’m pretty sure there is also some pink and red in it. The bark is super thick. I’m already envisioning a new wildlife series working its way into the existing glory. Sometimes it seems like you find a piece of nature that was made just for you.

Hope you enjoyed looking at these latest makings. 🙂

Happy Thanksgiving!

Here is another oil painting on beetle kill pine–the third in my series of Western American Plains animals.

I made each of the three paintings with a primary color hue for the background, and for this amber yellow ground, I wanted to contrast it with a blue roan (opposite color scheme of the Pronghorn).  After looking at lots of photos of blue roans, though, I decided to switch to a piebald with blue highlights. I’ve loved piebalds and skewbalds since I was little (piebalds are black and white paint horses, skewbalds are red, brown, or gold with white) and since they are often found in the wild, I really liked the idea of using one for this painting.

As I mentioned in an earlier post, I ran into some trouble with this piece. I couldn’t get the area under the horse’s feet to work, and I ended up trying several different ways of creating a foreground. Beetle kill is not very forgiving (since my main goal is to keep the grain and beetle patterns visible) and my constant rubbing out and repainting was beginning to muddy the wood.

I finally hit on a cloud of dust. It worked much better than the flat prairie I was trying to create, and I was able to pull in the reds and golds from the rest of the wood, instead of introducing a flat line of contrasting color, which was obviously not working.

I am really happy with the final product. The wood has a warm, rustic feel, and the contrast of the piebald against the amber is just what I had in mind. I love how the cloud of dust materialized–just another of those unexpected turns and twists that come with the territory of making art.

This is the last of my large semicircular pieces of wood, so until the next giant beetle kill tree comes along, I’ll be working with some small, irregular chunks. Any suggestions?

The piebald mustang is now available in my shop.