cookies

These look pretty good, right? Lovely spirals of cranberry filling in buttery dough

to liven up the holiday cookie tray. Except that they don't taste good! I spent way

too much time mixing, rolling, chilling, slicing for the mediocre results. This recipe

won't make the "holiday standards" list.

Okay, so in sharp contrast - our cookies look, well, not as spirally, pretty as

Mary's - but they taste VERY good. It's Grandma's gingerbread cookie recipe

and it rocks! I don't know that she ever made traditional Mr. T cookies, or

decorated a Christmas Mushroom Cloud, but I know she would approve of our

own Christmas cookie decorating tradition. You have to look closely, but

some other treasures are ET, Rachel's annual version of Tiny Tim (with webbed,

frog foot) and the ever spirit lifting Yule-time Hand Grenade.

Chycks Choice.8

I took several photo's for Recycle the other night, and liked this one as well. It is of a

glass bottle bottom that I found when we dug our foundation for the house. It had been

tossed out by the owners of the farmhouse that had been built on the spot more than

100 years before. Now that's recycling!

I'm hitching a ride on this train......the little pieces of white with chinese characters on them are from a vase that I broke and "recycled" to the mosaic pile. Its good to have a sister who makes mosaics. It takes the sting out of that moment when you break a favorite piece.

recycle

some little gift tags that I made out of a Trader Joe's bag and a CD envelope I saved. Now if I just had some gifts to hook them onto!

Some empty booze bottles from the recycle bin. Not as artistic, but it sure was yummy.

cold

Several years ago, I saw an article about a watercolor artist who started her

paintings by freezing the paper and paint to get these beautiful, feathery ice patterns.

I didn't pay much attention to the process and it turns out it is more involved than

just putting a wet piece of paper out in the cold. I tried a few different variations on

the amount of water, paint, time and this is the best I came up with. I would keep

trying, but it also turns out it is really uncomfortable to be messing with water out

in the freezing temperatures!

Tilly agrees with the frickin freezing temperatures thing. I've been

thinking all day how to show all this snow as being COLD. Poor Tilly,

sacrificing for art once again.

print

turns out the word print has a lot of meanings-- print as in letters and writing, print as in relief-printing , lithograpy or photography or, the one I've chosen here, a design or pattern. This is a piece of antique fabric in the Russian museum that I liked.

When Mary picked the word Print, I thought of the blue Italian hand printed wrapping

paper we got at a stationery story years ago. When I dug out the roll of it, there was

the blue, and another sheet of green. Sweet!

Chycks choice.7

No, I didn't paint this.....wish I had. It is called "Spring" by Kees Van Dongen. We saw it in the Hermitage last week along with several other of his paintings that I also loved. What fun to "discover" a new painter!

When I saw this painting I was reminded of the beautiful Lupine behind my parents

house. We were there last spring when fields of it were in full bloom. Some artwork

just sends your mind into a snapping popping flash flood of memories and images. This

one did that for me, dogwood blossoms, spring days, peace and quiet.

Quote Day 1

Okay, here is a new element for our little Dyppy Blog we've got here. We

both like interesting quotes and I thought it might be fun if we took a favorite

and each did a little something with it. So today is Blogger's Choice on quotes,

but another day maybe we'll take the same quote and each do a different art take

on it. Here is my first installment of Quote Day.

deciding everything is falling into place perfectly - as long as you don't get

too picky about what you mean by place. Or perfectly. -Brian Andreas

I have been on a mission to clean some closets and cupboards around my house lately,

and this quote is exactly how I've been feeling. I suppose having four teenagers in the

house also makes a person much less picky about what's perfect, or in it's proper place.

This is one festive looking entry! The quote that prompted this collage piece......"I am proud of active, ugly art. Let the eye have little place to rest....no neatness. No tidiness. No easy pleasure." Ivan Greenberg

Pink

first grapefruit of the season.....is it a coincidence that the favorite "diet" breakfast food hits the market the same time as all the holiday goodies?

Nice color... not so Christmasy, but I'm sure we'll get to that later on!

December

I am choosing to try and tame my "inner Grinch" this Christmas by seeking out the things I like about the season and avoiding or minimizing the ones I don't. Easy to say on Dec. 1--I'll let you know how it works out!

Well, My inner grinch is alive and well, thank you very much. I had my

kids take down Christmas light today! I suppose I should have had them

take the flips flops off the roof while they were up there.