We have Castles

Can you see the ruins below the Ute Mountain- looks for the circular shapes on the edges of the canyon.

I really enjoy looking through the pics from bloggers over in the UK- when they take strolls through old churchyards or ruins. So here is a pictorial stroll through our ruined castles! Hovenweep is a less know site to Mesa Verde, which is on the left side of the Sleeping Ute Range-marking the Ute Reservation.

We escaped there last weekend to get away from the snow.

They are now thinking the Hovenweep ruins main purpose might of been "Astrological"- if that is a word- the ruins are very well lined up to the stars and the soltices.

My youngest daughter- pulled the camera from my hand when we got out of the car and wouldn't give it back- so she has credit for the pics- which I had  to weed through dozen of her "imprompt to"  model shots of her sister, having watched Ameirca's Next Top Model" that morning- I confess as an embaressed mother! Thank goodness for digitial cameras unlimited capacity!!

Quote to Remember

Getting over a painful experience is much like crossing monkey bars. You have to let go at some point in order to move forward.

C.S Lewis

IF-"Propagate"

Hummm? Had two ways to go on this one-
Skipped the first, more obvious definition when I went to www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/propagate- - one- because I just had no desire to go there, but more importantly because the less used definition fits very well into my plans of showing the progression of my first picture book project that I am going to share on the blog-
intrigued?

 the second definition of propagate- according to old Webster- now so high tech- is as follows-"to cause to spread out and affect a greater number or greater area b: to foster growing knowledge of, familiarity with, or acceptance of (as an idea or belief) "

Sounds pretty- good? Helping a larger audience, like children, through a vehicle like....books gain knowledge and understanding to an idea or belief.............well that depends on exactly what one would be trying to "sway" the audience into believing. Something I believe we as writers and illustrators, especially, let me underline that- especially because we are trying to sway the innocent, have signed up for a special kind of judgement. Even with the best intentions, myself included, we all are trying to influence in one way or another.
"To propagate" has an "ickier" sounding Noun- "Propaganda" when heard evokes images of Stalin and the Iron Curtain, Hitler and his throngs of loyal children marching in their black shorts, white shirts and arms bands- guess what- America- "The Land of the Free" does not escape without a black mark of trying to "propagate" the masses.
Still intrigued? Or are you thinking- "Man! She's turned this light Illustration Friday into a Propaganda piece!" If the second- my apologies and have a great weekend!
For those sticking around-

Apache Children entering the Carlisle Indian School

In dealing with the "Indian Problem" words of the Nineteenth Century US Government- the last and most efficient solution when out and out warfare and the reservation system was not working so well to "tame the red man" was to eradicate the Native populations culture- the way to do that..... take their children, yes sometimes at gun point, pull little ones out of their mothers arms!

Between the mid 1800s and far into the 1900 thousands of Native American children, were taken from their mothers, some as young as three, many around the age of five, girls and boy, but more boys, to get them before they got their rebellious ways and were placed in Off Reservation Indian Schools. Where immediately on their arrival, their hair, sacred to many tribes, was cut off, they were scrubbed down with kerosene for lice, and every remnant of their culture in their dress and decorations taken from them. They were dressed in white man's clothes, set at a dining room table, slept in a bed, and beaten if they spoke a word of their language- or practiced a bit of their culture. Let me say that again- "they were beaten if they spoke their language"

Same children as above a few months later-

They were schooled half the day in reading writing and arithmetic- though the official writings of those in charge expressed very little expectation in their intelligence and so the emphasis was more to train them for skilled labor. Now for even more "Propaganda" - We did a pretty good job of making the whole thing sound like we were saving the Native from himself. We were giving these poor, subservient people a chance to exist in our greater culture- throw in that many were also doing it in the name of God, with missionary schools and well it becomes a huge convoluted shameful part of our history- which we have done little to make amends for- even suggesting there is a way to make amends sounds like I am belittling the issue. No amends can be made.

Canada and Australia are ahead of us, in at least taking responsibility for what they did and bringing some amount of redemption to their Native People- just bringing such heinous parts of our history to the light can bring some healing.

So.... lovely subject.... but one I think is as much a part of my history, as an white emigrant- my family settled all over the West- My home sits on what was once sovereign Ute land, I graduated from Fort Lewis College, started as a military base, turned into an Indian School, then a college- where today any Native person can go tuition free- one positive change- to deal with this part of Native/White history- because it really is both our histories.

Also Fort Lewis College houses the Center of Southwest Studies- a vast research library full of original documents, manuscripts, books , photographs and artifacts of the Southwest. A few days ago I had the privilege to get to know and be helped by Elyane Silversmith, Navajo and the Centers Librarian- in both doing research for my in progress YA novel on the early tourist of Mesa Verde but also on initial ideas for a picture book on Indian Schools- more interesting tidbits from the library to come.

Sorry for such a sobering post-if you want to see more photos here is a good link to the University of Washingtons Digitial Collection (unfortunately there is very little documentation on the Fort Lewis Indian school due to many factor including some rather violent- tell you later about that.

Happy "Pancake Tuesday"

While others are getting ready for "Fat Tuesday" or Mardi Gras, we on the insistence of Jon, had pancakes- why- because he declared that is what our Irish ancestors and much of Europe has done through the ages. "Why" I asked again, reminding him the reason for such traditions of collecting Mardi Gras beads, that we now so often see the students coming out of school on Mardi Gras wearing- I've explained to our girls what traditionally would be expected of them to collect such beads and both don't like wearing them, even in fun as part of the innocent festivities at school.
So I wanted to know exactly why pancakes were eaten on this day and sent him off to Wikipedia the answer- this is what he came back with - a much more practical tradition then "whooping up the night, before forty days of false piate' .
Pancakes- use up much of the good things in the cupboard that would go bad if not used in the fasting of Lent- sugar, milk and eggs!
I have gained many European friends through this blog- have you ever heard of "Pancake Tuesday- do you practice it- or is it like Cornbeef and Cabbage on St. Patrick's day- a very American thing.
The picture is of Roy Ethridge, Al Wetherill and Seth Taner cooking pancakes or pones on the Colorado River taken in 1891 by Gustaf Nordenskiold on their way to be tourist and check out the Grand Canyon amongst other things- it's in the collection of Fred Blackburn, a very nice man and authority on the Wetherill family and Mesa Verde- who has been gracious enough to help me in my research for my YA novel. Check out his webside at http://www.wetherillfamily.com/

Happy Valentine's Day

This old picture is not the best, but it is one of my favorite of the girls

running to catch up with their daddy for a walk in the woods.

Some day other men will have their hearts- but right now,

they all belong to him!

(post script- as I write this- the girls are coming in from stacking firewood with their dad,

pissed and glaring at him for teasing them- "someday another will have their heart, make them cry and laugh and climb the highest mountain and ford the deepest river for them... but for now it is their dad")

reading...

Sunday evening, I was working upstairs on my computer and my attention was drawn to the sound of my husband's voice- rhythmic and soft and realized he was reading out loud to our girls. My curiosity peeked, I listened more carefully trying to distinguish what he was reading from- for the list was long. He has been reading to them from the time the first was still inside me. Not concerned if I was myself was listening or was fast asleep, nestled in bed, he read Laura Ingalls Wilder's "Farmer Boy" to my belly.
When they were toddlers, he never insisted they sit still or stay even in the same room, looking down from our loft, I can still see him there on the couch, the older, snuggled close, the littler one toddling around, with her pappy in her mouth, dragging her blanket around, poking at the dogs or playing but also listening.
His reading list is long and I highly recommend it- for it is made up of the greatest authors of all times and are the stories that influenced me to be an author and surprisingly are not often discussed in the blog-o-sphere- where the watch is for the new writing- but these are the stories that have managed to stick around for a bit- maybe we should ask ourselves why?

Jon's List
Laura Ingalls Wilder
Shakespeare
Greek Mythology
Kipling "Jungle Book", "Riki Tiki Tave"
"Pilgrim's Progress"
Charles Dickens
Frances Hodgsons Burnett- "Secret Garden" "Little Princess"
Mark Twain
Norman Maclean
You can find many children's editions of the more heavy fare- giving a taste of something they will hopefully want to go back and read more of later in life. I would add a few authors that he isn't much interested in-
Jane Austin
L.M Montgomery- "Anne of Green Gable"
Jack London
"To Kill a Mockingbird"

 

And if you are wondering- when I finally snuck downstairs- he was reading Macleans' "A River Runs Through It", with our 16 and 11 year old, curled up on each side of him.
So, what are the classics you love?

Strater Hotel, Durango- An Example of Victorian Opulence

You can see it in the background, the Strater Hotel in Durango. Built in 1887, many people of the small mountain town, getting rich from mining, would close up their houses and go live in the great hotel during the winters, much like the winter we have been having this year.

The hotel is a wonderful example of Victorian opulence where every surface, wether carpeted, wallpapered or carved had intricut patterns and detail.

Made up of four floors, where the famous western author, Louis Lamour, like to work in Room 222 over the Diamond Belle Saloon, for inspiration, each floor as you go up gets less and less fancy until you reach the fourth floor....

Which was known as "Monkey Alley" where it is reported the "bachelor gentleman" resided and... the maids, hummmmmmmmm need we say more!

Blog Getting Redirected

If your blog is getting redirected like many of us- try deleting the snow effect widget- thank you A Bun Can Dance, The opinion is that it is in the widgets- systematically remove them- but I ( fingers crossed) think mine is ok after it stopped snowing.

Did you know?

Here is a bit of Western lore- if you have seen the infamous movie " Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid" starring Paul Newman and Robert Redford.

Then you probably remember one of the highlights where they jump off a high cliff to get away from the posse- well it was filmed at Baker's Bridge, up the Animas Valley from Durango Colorado.

Well actually, Paul Newman and Robert Redford ran towards the edge, stuntman jumped,  of course this was in the summer and with camera tricks they made it seem like a longer fall- but then Newman and Redford actually landed in the water back in California! Ahh the magic of movies!!

What are Daddys good for?

Building Igloos of course!
(amongst many things!)

Stuck!

Snowing here again- we are about at two feet on the ground and more coming- Jon slid off the county road last night, well actually he just misgauged the road and got his truck over into the soft snow on the side and slid down, only about a mile from our house. I drove out to rescue him- my little Ford Escape is the best of all the vehicles and since I crawl like a turtle wasn't worried.
No luck digging him out, so we called a friend with a big truck to pull him out, no luck there, the tow rope slipped and came close to the break cable- just what a wife loves to hear!
So left it there to be buried by the snowplows and tried again this morning- with a tow truck- boy do those guys know what they are doing- pulled it out backwards and checked all the cables and bolts- but once we can get to town, we will take into the tire shop and have them look at it too. Everything seems to be fine!
Girls out of school again today- dogs getting restless- I took another picture of the kokopelli, (on side bar),  we have in our front flower garden for comparison, a bad winter he is up to his nose! We are getting there!!

IF-"Clumsy"

Well here is an example of my "clumsy" attempt to use pen and ink, my first loved medium. Typically I would get about 3/4 done with an illustration and then make a mistake, smear it or the pen would drip, etc. You can see I was also trying to get as much texture in as I could and thus over working it! I love fabric collage for the shear fact I can rip someones head off and try again and again! And all the textures I can put in are yummy too~ !

Now What?

I am learning the first rule of freelance illustrating.......well actually it is a toss up between- insist on a contract, early in the game or don't hold your breath depending on any job. I got myself in a pickle with both, entirely my own fault and then had to inact rule #3- once in a mess, do the best you can to survive it and not burn any bridges. Well after months of false starts and changed manuscripts, layouts, deadline, hummmm did I miss anything that good be changed after you thought you had things in the "can"- my little mini book on a Navajo Trading Post is now  "on the back burner" due to the publisher "over extending" themselves.

Not really surprised. Not really bummed- way better now then when I had completed half or all the finished illustrations!! I was at the final sketch phase. They say they will reimburse me for the work completed- did I mention the golden rule of freelancing- get a contract!! Ummmm- they sent me two with typos- and we were on our third when got the news. Did I mention my husband is an attorney!! ( its the cobbler's kids don't have shoes, mechanics cars are always breaking down, attorney are not always as careful as you would think!)

So I have a lot of reference photos, a lot of sketches, a lot of ideas and now, past next week when my current deadline for a children's magazine is due- a lot of time!

    I will come back to this idea- the editors in New York encouraged me in one way- in their total ignorance about what does happen at a Trading Post- even if they seemed to want to hang on to their misconceptions, instead of listen to me. But it just motivated me more to bring the modern life of Navajo children to other children in the world- guess that is what motivates most of us as writers and artist.

So here are some of my reference photos, believe it or not taken in four different states- when I did a circle out on the reservation on day- between dropping the girls off to school and being back in plenty of time to pick them up! The Four Corners is the only place in the USA where four states Colorado, New Mexico, Arizona, and Utah, intersect  in a +- if you know what I mean- and it is smack dab in the middle of the Navaio Reservation- the biggest reservation in the USA also.

It is a desolate barren land, with red dirt, red rock formation with names like Chimney Rock, Squaw and Papoose, and Shiprock. The Navajos are well off for a tribe due to the oil and gas leases that now are scattered across what the US thought in the 1800s was worthless land.

Here it is in Arizona looking in to Colorado. The "game plan" of the US government after out and out war with the Navajos did not seem to be working- was to break them by literally killing their livelihood- the sheep, making them dependent of goods supplied by the government through trading post, and eventually taking their children out of their mothers arms and putting in them in boarding school where they cut their hair and punished them for speaking their native tongue.

The round building is called a Hogan- they are tradtional homes but mostly you see this set up- a hogan, a trailer or double wide complete with a satilite dish, a lot of cars, pick ups and a lot of rubble.

But there is a lot of beauty too- like when the cottonwoods turn in the fall as do the grasses.

The Trading Post still holds an important place, many Navajos are hours away from any real town that would have a Walmart- which they love- so they get gas, food, coal, hay etc still from the Trading Post.

And trade, buy or sell- their livestock

I'm learning alot about the "Biz" of publishing- I know it is a fast flowing stream that I am the one who needs to learn how to "swim" in it, not complain about how it flows- but if this, the Navajos, their modern life now- is not an untapped "Niche" I don't know what is. I'm just trying to figure out how to proceed and it is becoming apparent I just need to write and illustrate my own project ( create a dummy) and then try and sell it. Ok -this is on the "back burner" but  its more in a slowly bubbling pot of yummy soup- that is all the better for being on the back burning cooking away a little bit longer!

IF-Wilderness

The "Illustration Friday" theme this week was finally an easy one! It was just a matter of which illustration I should use. "Up with the Sun" depicts ice climbing in the San Miguel Mountains- surrounded by mining towns like Telluride, Ouray and Silverton. Ouray has an ice park, where they have rigged water pipes to the side of the cliffs and can build ice walls- pretty wild!

And on the theme- check out the low cloud covering Mesa Verde National Park- I was watching yesterday morning- when the sun decided to come back to Colorado- it had been absent for a very long time and finally is pouring down on us again- Isn't God's creation amazing!!

Mesa Verde has disappeared, you can see only the very tip of Lookout Point, the clouds had socked down on the valley floor.

The cloud starts to come down like a curtain!

And walla! ( this is actually this morning- I forgot to take a last picture)

To Build a Fire

    I have been enjoying reading all the wonderful "artist" blogs across the pond- recording the unusual snow fall that the United Kingdom has been getting. Many have said their days are filled with the chores of taking care of their animals and bringing more wood in for their "log burners" and figuring out the knack of keeping a for going all night! Check out Jackie Morris' wonderful blog- Drawing a Line in Time.

     She inspired me to show our set up here near the Four Corners, in the USA- where we call them "wood stoves" instead of "log burners! And are dealing with......1 1/2 feet on the ground - though it has not snowed in a week!

Of course some here in the US pride themselves on a neat stack of wood, under some protection- uhhhhummmm we talk about doing that every fall- never seems to happen though- so it becomes a matter of burrowing down- to find the wood- where it was piled in the fall- which actually does stay rather dry and protected under the blanket of snow.

     

of course there is always an audience!

This is my attempt to stack- feeling sorry for my husband who was having a bad week- when he does the stacking he will block much of the window above, And of course on the porch for the rest of the winter, one can expect to trip over skis and snow shovels!

The wood stove is our main source of heat in the cabin- we do have a propane furance that is only used when we are away and don't want the pipes to freeze- which mean I have to vacumn out the vents for dust bunnies!

The Evil Snow Cornice

A "snow cornice" is a beautiful, but dangereous and even deadly thing- defined better than I could explain as "elegant, cantilevered snow structures formed by wind drifting snow onto the downwind side of an obstacle such as a ridgeline"- they give the appearence there is more solid earth beneath the snow but in reality- it is a weak overhang and the possible start of an avalanche when they break off.

Well I have a lovely snow and ice cornice hanging off the north side of my studio- and it is blocking the sun from coming in and well..... taunting me!

I love winter-alway have- but not this winter- and this chunk of ice is really getting irritating- you can see my studio is high up  in the loft of our log house-  the roof is propanel- metal- and as a steep pitch- the ice chunk goes across maybe twenty feet of the roof- so when it falls and it will, it is going to sound like a bomb went off-

Jon says we are suppose to get more snow tomorrow, so if the cornice doesn't fall today, it will just get bigger and bigger and block more sun from my studio!!

I pondered, taking off the window screen and whacking at it with a broom handle- but know better- The dogs seem to know to stay away  from under such things.

Usually I like to ponder some understanding about life inspired by such "gifts" from nature-

Got nothing! It is just irritating and  just want the sun to again pour into my studio and my life!