from the depths of the sealed shut doors

Confessions of a Hausfrau

2011-04-19T04:47:00.000-07:00

Want to slowly post some little items I've been working on. With my current lifestyle it's all about taking the environment I'm in and enjoying the moment. I am basically at present a full on housewife/mommy. Or that is how the majority of my time is spent these days. Which is fabulous- something I always dreamed of doing. Yet, creativity calls. To make, create, to sing and write....those elements are sneaking their way back into my schedule. During this in between time, I've been trying to find ways to celebrate the now...not just to tolerate it. And to juxtapose all this busyness with the peace that is so necessary in my daily life. Thus these embroidery pieces (on dish towels of course).

I have done some embroidery pieces in the past- when I was maybe 8 years old and then again later here- when I was a part of Markus Merkle's Hug

But I got the idea to start again when I was reading for the hundredth time the kids book "Goodnight Moon." There's this old lady whispering hush and what is she doing? Sitting in a rocking chair knitting. Great idea, I wait for my kids to fall asleep, so what a nice quiet thing to do while waiting. I'm posting only one now, but stay tuned for more.

Stuttgart NEINundzwanzig

2010-10-22T13:07:00.000-07:00

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Bye Bye Beauty

Stuttgart 21 bewegt im Moment viele Menschen. Ein grosses Projekt, ein unterirdischer Bahnhof soll gebaut werden um 3 Minuten füher von Stuttgart in Ulm zu sein. Hört sich harmlos an, die Kosten von mehreren Milliarden Euros sind es nicht.

Das Projekt begann vor vielen Jahren und viele Stuttgarter waren dagegen. Der Höhepunkt der Proteste ist kam mit der Demonstration zehntausender Menschen gegen die Abholzung der Bäume im angrenzenden Park. Die Polizei schlug zu, mit Tränengas, Schlagstöcken und Wasserwerfern.

Im Jahr 2008 bin ich durch den Park mit den faszinierenden Bäumen gelaufen, sie sind sehr gross und schon sehr alt. In der Rinde fanden sich Gesichter die zurückschauten. Diese Gesichter habe ich fotografiert und in der Serie "Bye Bye Beauty" gemalt.

I'm guessing the big news over here has not even reached across the ocean to over there. Stuttgart 21 is on many peoples minds these days. This is a big project to renovate the main train station in Stuttgart making it into an underground railway, and saving 3 minutes on the commute from Stuttgart to Ulm. Sounds perhaps harmless, but it's costing an undisclosed billions of Euros. The project has already started some years ago and there have been many a Stuttgarter against it. But the fight is at it's climax now including thousands of people protesting in the park where the first tree was cut down to make way for the new train station. The police fought back using tear gas and water cannons. In 2008 I walked through Schlosspark where those amazing trees stood. They are incredibly tall and decades older than the politicians making these decisions. Looking into the bark were faces looking back. I photographed those faces and painted them in this series "Bye Bye Beauty" They've heard the news; unfortunately it’s quite possible that their end is near. You can see it in their faces.

I'm Back

2010-10-02T04:10:00.000-07:00

After almost two years sabbatical, I'm back on this blog. The intention for this blog has been to share art photos, artwork, and music. Since having twins 13 months ago, those three areas have slowed down significantly. But the need/desire/drive to create is gaining momentum and I'm hoping that by trying to blog once a week or once every other week, will give me some kind of needed deadline to get some stuff done. I had a break today and started searching through my photos to find some that were taken for artistic purposes. There were not nearly as many as I would have liked to have found. LOTS of photos of my babies of course... but the other photos I did find told the story of my life right now. Mommyhood. It's clear that my time is spent as a good old housewife and Mother. Below are some images that glimpse into that.

Expired Breast milk slowly makes it way down the drain. Waisted work is more like it. I spent hours mostly in the middle of the night pumping milk for the possibility of the babies needing extra or that chance that I would get to get away and someone else would have to feed them. That was hard to do. Breast milk is such an amazing substance I almost felt like I should have drank it. /////I see Faces. I'm trying to collect the faces I see in so many places. This one being the kitchen vent. ///////// Who said Pizza Crust should be round? ////////Feed Me & Me.

Election Night 2008 Germany

2008-11-07T11:21:00.000-08:00

Needless to say, I'm thrilled with the results- stayed up till 4am trying to watch to see who would win, but sleep won at that point- but what wonderful news in the morning! BAM!!! oBAMa!!

Moving Picture Patterns

2008-10-18T16:18:00.000-07:00

signs and wonders

2008-09-27T12:35:00.000-07:00

Freitag 26. September. 2008!!!!!

2008-09-16T08:43:00.002-07:00

4th of July

2008-07-09T16:21:00.000-07:00

got a chance to play at Kurt Festival in Reutlingen- good times, then afterwards we headed to the army base with Chris, just in time to chatch some good ole fireworks with some fellow Americans. I sure love fireworks!!!

I'm playing a show on July 17th probably starting around 8:00 or 9:00pm in Ludwigsburg- at Maxstrasse Eins. It's a Thursday night, it's free (except for a little hat that'll be passed around) and I hear they have some cheap drinks. Come on by!

our new baby

2008-06-23T03:38:00.000-07:00

I'd like to introduce you to Mickey, our new baby. I bought Markus a gift certificate to pick out some fish for his birthday (after I tried to sneek around finding some kind of tank situation to hold it in.

At the Drive In

2008-06-09T07:47:00.000-07:00

Markus and I went to the Drive In Movies on Friday to see Indiana Jones. It was SO fun, I totally felt like I was in America. The photos look a little like America except for the license plates.

At the Playground

2008-06-09T07:40:00.000-07:00

White Easter, Rock n' Roll & Schwarzwald Trout

2008-05-01T14:09:00.000-07:00

I'll fly away

2008-04-04T06:27:00.001-07:00

Mother's Grandfather

Oil on paper

2008

Father's Greatgranduncle

Oil on Paper

2008

Father's Greatgrandfather

Oil on Paper

2008

New Paintings

I'll hopfully have this series finished in the next month.

Urlaub in America

2007-09-28T14:57:00.000-07:00

We had a wonderful time visiting my family and friends while on vacation, the weather was so beautifully warm and refreshing after experiencing such a cold summer this year. The two weeks just flew by too fast.

Dokumenta 2007

2007-09-28T14:20:00.000-07:00

We read and heard different reviews about Dokumenta and most were negative, but we went to see for ourselves. I was not so impressed. It's such a huge exhibition. But I did have fun shooting photos.

New Artwork

2007-08-03T08:56:00.001-07:00

schön dass du meine Mutter so gut kennengelernt hast
(great that you got to know my Mother so well)
gouache and varnish on board
2007

the rocks cry out too

goache and varnish on board, mirror
12"x16" (one piece)
2007

The Map is not the Territory I
Oil and Varnish on Board
31 1/2" x 26 3/4"
2007

The Map is not the Territory I & II
Oil and Varnish on Board
31 1/2" x 26 3/4"
2007

Home Sweet German Home

2007-07-03T12:37:00.000-07:00

It's been a crazy month, or I guess I should say that it was a crazy month. We found a place to live just a week or so before we were to move out, then we moved and now are in the midst of the renovating frensy. I have to say though, how thankful I am for our new flat. It has so many things we were hoping and praying for- and two of the most important- a balcony and tub!! Since we are in the middle of renovating, I'll wait to post some photos of where my (our) creative energy has been going and show rather our views. The photo with the rainbow is out the front and the other is from our balcony at dusk.

Art Opening- Diese Samstag- 19. Mai. 2007!

2007-05-14T11:37:00.000-07:00

New small Paintings

2007-03-02T09:45:00.000-08:00

Some new small little cute guys

Steppin' on Solid Ground

2007-02-19T10:15:00.000-08:00

Finally some non- photography artwork (even if it's only sketches)

2007-02-02T05:37:00.000-08:00

I've been looking at reflections a lot lately. It's sometimes fasinating. When I was in the States this last time I took Megabus from Minneapolis to Chicago. On the early morning trip, to did the pen and ink above (Megabus rules by the way- such cheap trip to Chicago) But trying to draw or paint the reflection and the image behind the glass (especially when the image is moving) was interesting. The other one was on the little train at O'Hare airport. Planes, trains, and megabuses- all have one thing in common fantastic double images.

I like Paris Six Feet Under

2007-01-28T11:10:00.000-08:00

Markus and I spent 12 Euros on eachother for one of our Christmas gifts- round trip tickets to Paris with HLX. It was a deal we couldn't pass up. We flew in Thursday night and flew out Saturday morning so we had the whole of Friday to explore the city together. We stayed with a friends cousin and her boyfriend (the cousin's boyfriend, not the friend's boyfriend because the friend is a boy and he would probably have a girlfriend before he would have a boyfriend). They lived near a famous cemetary so we decided to stop there. It supposedly hosts the bodies of some famous folk like Modigliani, Jim Morrison, Oscar Wilde, We ended up staying for over 2 hours peeking into all the private houselike grave sites and searching out some specific graves. We found Jim Morrison's grave and I took some photos. It seemed a little anti-climactic considering all the hype with the Doors and all. Lots of cigarette butts and who knows what thrown on his grave. I felt a little funny taking photos of his grave- I mean he probably got sick of people taking photos of him when he was alive and then people like me come to his grave and are still shooting photos. Oscar Wilde's grave is the photo below with the sculpture of the angel with all the kisses all over it. Rumor has it that the genitals on the sculpture were removed because they were too crude and were then used as a paperweight in the directors office.

We didn't mean for our trip to be so post-mortem, but post- lunch, we headed to the catacombs. It was 1.6Km underground passage way that eventually lead to a graveyard in the raw- the walls consist of bones and skulls of bodies that were taken down after a rampid disease spread through the city. The guy we stayed with and told us that the local kids in Paris will sneek down into the catacombs after hours. If I had grown up Parisian, I think an illigal trip down there would have been in my history.

After that we headed to the Louvre where I guess we saw artwork made by some of the bones we had passed by earlier. It all just came round circle. Just like this funny little life we have.

Our one view of the Eifel Tower from the Louvre

Bye Bye Minneapolis

2007-01-22T12:08:00.000-08:00

I was in Michigan and Minneapolis over Christmas and after Christmas. It was a great time in a lot of ways, but a little sad as well. I kinda wrapped up my job there and am planting both feet in Schoenes Deutschland. Crazy. I'll be looking for work and hoping to get some major painting done. Soon I hope to post new paintings. Till then I'll stick with photos.

light and shadows

2006-12-05T14:15:00.000-08:00

street art...little did they know it.

2006-12-05T13:21:00.001-08:00

the little things

2006-11-20T13:51:00.000-08:00

I've been feeling like I spend a whole lot of time in front of this computer- which at times can be good, but for the most part when I say that, it's not necessarily good. So I think these little things end up at times meaning a lot. Refelctions. It was a beautiful day on Saturday. The sun shone brightly on the windows of the old buildings on my street. They loved it, and they shared it with the windows across from them, making strange shapes of brightness that peeked into people's apartments.

more photos

2006-10-26T15:40:00.000-07:00

The Honeymoon

2006-10-17T14:19:00.000-07:00

I guess I will be going a little backwards as far as the series of events, but this blogging thing is a little new to me. Markus and I came back from a magical wedding in Minneapolis, hung out in Stuttgart for a couple of days, then rented a car and headed down to Cinque Terra. These are 5 villages that are on the Italian Riviera. Very beautiful. Also very touristy, but we were able to sneak around the excess of Americans and find some Italians there, and some peace and quiet. Lots of relaxing and hanging out on the beach. Just what we needed. We also did a little drawing, and lots of photos. Here are some kind of psychedelic photos I took of some ducks plus a great photos of my husband.

Volksfest

2006-10-16T14:47:00.000-07:00

My sister Tammy is here visiting for Markus and my German wedding celebration. The day she flew in I took her to Cannstatter Wasen- the Volksfest. Tammy described it as "The County Fair on Crack." I think she's right.

Fussball

2006-07-06T07:31:00.000-07:00

Greetings,
This is my first blog...actually, it could be my second blog because I think that I already tried to start one before...just one more thing for me to spend even more time in front of the computer...hmmm. Either way, it sounds fun to be able to post some photos here. So I'll start with what is on every European's mind (although I'm not technically a European)- and that's FUSSBALL. German lost the other night and these Germans were certainly disappointed, but tomorrow Germany plays for 3rd place here in Stuttgart- not far from where I live

This photo is from when Germany won- and the one at night is the sad night and the Polizei were on the look out. We'll see what happens tomorrow night, and we'll see how many Germans make their way to Stuttgart.