I Am Getting Rusty

 

 

May is going to be a powerhouse month.  There will be lots going on and we have some great ideas.  I am completely out of my comfort zone on the very theme, never mind trying to do a whole month on Steampunk and Grunge.  I will be giving hints all through the month.  There is making clay of different kinds and you can use up old clay or get new at WalMart.  In fact, you can make your own paper clay, or even casting material/plaster wrap.  You can use things you find in your garage, in your junk drawer.  So for this blog post, I am going to be showing you ways to rust things, other than what I will be showing you to do within the blog posts themselves. 

So, let’s rust some stuff:

Collect and prepare:

1.      Find something rusty.  I happen to have a couple of railway spikes and they are big so I raided The Bee Man's bottle of nails and screws and rings and rods and..  I found a great amount of rusty things.  (He was not available...heheheheaa)

 

2.      A ball of cordage or string, or something you can use for tying up bundles.

3.      Collect some white or beige material strips (can be lightly coffee dyed). Preferably cotton fabrics. 

4.     Collect some cheesecloth (get at dollar store)  and maybe some wide lace.

5.     Collect some coffee filters, some tracing paper or any papers that is white or light.  Maybe some Scott towel would work.

6.     Fill a spray bottle half full of water and the top half of the bottle with vinegar. 

7.     Fill another spray bottle with water.

Grab a bowl of last night's coffee and stick a bundle in there for overnight.  

Method: 

1.      Saturate your first thing to be rusted, be it material, or cheesecloth, or paper, etc.  Saturate and roll it up, wetting as you go, and then tie it up with cord. 

***I soaked one bundle in left over coffee, including grounds.

 

2.     Continue making little bundles of whatever materials and rusted stuff that you can.

 

3.     Leave for a few days until dry.  Put on a plastic or glass tray or cake pan, etc. so it is not bunched up.  I started mine in a bowl because it was so wet and then the next morning, I laid them out on a glass tray.

4.     When dry, carefully unwrap it and voila, you have materials for grunge and steampunk. 

 

Also, you should be gathering cardboard coasters.  I have used beer coasters, but only four, because I am not a drinker and do not go where there are coasters.  But I have friends who do and one collected them when she was much younger and still ahs a bunch.  Yah for friends who enable me in my addiction of gathering ‘stuff’.

Watch for our two, surprise, mini-workshop leaders this month.  This is new and we have chosen our first leaders because they have shared and amazed us with all they do.

Let’s have a fabulous art journaling month coming up.  I hope you are following along and giving some of the ideas and hints a go.

Bless our new month, that our hands that express our soul, and that our sharing will inspire.

 

©Carol Desjarlais 4.30.21

 

 

 

Carol’s Humble Art Journaling 101: Showing Movement– Jingle Dancer

 

 

I totally experimented with trying to get movement in the background by using a fan brush.  It is really difficult and I only did what I could and have left it to finish later because I was stuck.

 

In the meantime, I decided I would tell you some history about the jingle dancers.  

 

Every tribe that dances the jingle dance has their own beginning stories.  But they all go like this:  It is said that there was a little girl who was very ill and nothing was helping.  Her father prayed hard, and when he fell to sleep, he dreamed of a dance that would heal her.  In the morning he told his wife how to make the dress he saw in his dream.  They collected the cones (eventually using the tobacco tin lids that were metal and curled perfectly into a cone.) and he dreamed that there needed to be 365 on each dress plus one for the dancer or the dress-maker.  He also dreamed the steps.  When they finished the dress, the women jingle danced and the little girl was healed.  It was called The Medicine Dress.

Before a jingle dancer dances, they carry Tobacco in a loose tobacco pouch as it is a healing medicine.  As she dances, the tobacco dances out of the pouch and blesses the ground. 

Still, today, someone dreams the design of a new Jingle Dress, although he number of cones does not change, the design and colors do.  The dance is a prayer of healing, a prayer for healing. 

It is said that the dancer that carries the most medicine is a girl who has been very close to death, herself, and/or healed by the jingle dress.  And, if a male is healed, all the women in his family must help make a Medicine Dress for a young girl in the family to dance the jingle dance.  The protocols vary with tribes. 

The dance is quite intricate in that the bottom of the moccasins must never show as the dancer dances in a snake pattern.  This is symbolic in that the snake pattern reminds all to shed one’s skin, to renew oneself.  While the girl dancers, all in attendance pray in unison, especially the elders, for the purpose of the dance to happen and healing take place for that person/those persons. 

As we move through Covid, so much global healing takes place and many tribes and healers are working very hard to help heal the earth and its people.  We, too, have a responsibility to think all the way out to Mother Earth with our prayers and thoughts, wishes and dreams.  Women are said, by the Elders, to be the ones who will heal the earth and its peoples.  We are here to make a difference way beyond our ken.  Our divine energy has been so forgotten about but it is there and available to us to use.  May we all remember this and begin using our feminine energy to heal the earth and each other.  

 

 I am not sure I captured movement.  but, sometimes, a painting is going to go that way. 

 Much love, sisterfriends.