Alex's Bday Party

We held Alex's 19th bday party tonight on the deck. Candles and torches everywhere (I love all that soft light) and it looked so nice. Plus we had all that good company. Alex is a health nut and wanted a healthy treat in place of cake and ice cream, so I made two custard pies with berries. They were soooooo good, and a definite hit! I loved them too.. but I make them for myself quite often because of my 'ol diabetes. Sigh...

Sitting around the fire on Alex's 19th bday

What a wonderful day. We celebrated the first part of Alex's 19th birthday with a bonfire tonight and later, after the fire settled down, we sat around and chatted for a few hours with family and friends. It was wonderful. One of Alex's friends, Jesse, hopes to go to Oxford after graduation and he was a lot of fun to talk to. He made the night. Tomorrow we're cooking out, hanging out, and chilling out. (And I can't believe my little Alex is 19 years old!!)

By the way, this is the illustration that will grace the cover of Alex's graduation invitation. Didn't he do a great job? The wording says "Imagination has always come natural to me, but I never imagined I would be here so fast."

Mushroom Hunting

Yes, you read it right... we went mushroom hunting today. No, we don't use little guns or little snares to catch the ever-so-clever mushroom... rather we go for a walk on shaded hillsides looking for springtime mushrooms to gather and fry in a once a year feast. We had a butt load of them the other day (I found - 0-. Nothing. Nada.) but here we were searching yet again. This is a photo from our trip. Silas and Chrissy hiking into the woods, the lake that we went to in Athens Ohio and the mayapples we look for (because nearly all the mushrooms I've found, since I was a little bitty girl, were living among the mayapples.)

Reflections

Not too sure why I like this photo so much... but I do.

Hiking with Heather

Silas and I went on a hike today with Heather. Though we were supposed to be looking for yummy mushrooms, I came back empty handed (except for these photos).

Why I like to drink

but I rarely do.... because I tend to get a bit stupid. And I take people down with me when I do it. So these pics are from last night's party. Me and Heather were getting kinda silly. And yes, I'm licking her face (but I don't have to be drunk to do that..... unfortunately).

Come to think of it, I should probably drink MORE. This was a lot of fun!

Photos from Heathers site at:
http://heatherandterri.blogspot.com/

Out and About

A few interesting photos from the woods. I laid down to shot most of them, which is a lot of fun in itself, but I really liked the idea of seeing the object from a completely different angle.

Here's some weird growth on a dead tree. It reminded me of crunched paper.

Yes, this is a photo of a hole in an old hollow log, but from this angle, it looks (to me) like a dragon's eye

I liked this fungi pic... how it pops out of the photo and you can see all its details.

This close, these new ferns look more like seahorses

The Prowling Tree

Doesn't this tree seem to be moving? When I saw it, I immediately invisioned it prowling through out the woods, like a big powerful cat. And when it saw me, it froze in place so I'd never know it's secret.

Bark

I was hypnotized by this single piece of bark. I sat, looking and following all the winding lines with my eyes, for what seemed like hours... though it was much, much shorter. I stuffed it in my pocket so I could share it with others, but I lost it while walking back home. Luckily, I took this photo so others could see what it was I was going on (and on) about.

I met my Role Model !!

A dream came true this weekend. I met my professional role model, Charlene Teters. I picked her up at the Dayton, Ohio airport yesterday and was absolutely thrilled to have her all to myself during the 3 hour drive to Athens. She's wonderfully warm and personable, and I really liked her. Today we (my entire family minus the toddler) had brunch with her and some friends and local folks and then we toured a local museum, with Charlene, and then listended to her two hour (inspirational) lecture. For those of you who do not know Charlene, she is an artist and a professor - but she's also called the Rosa Parks of the Native American people. Charlene Teters, from the Spokane nation in Washington, made national (and international) news in the late 80's when she was attending an Illinois college that had a chief Illini as its mascot. She took her children to a game and were mortified when the mascot came onto the arena mimicking their ceremonies, traditions, and leaders (chief). And the "mascot" was wearing 90 real eagle feathers while dancing and prancing to some fictional ideal of what an Indian dance would be like. She stood outside the stadium days later with a sign saying Indian aren't mascots, they're human beings. She is literally the face of the anti-Indian mascot movement and her courage and conviction are admirable. She is my inspiration and my role model and today I accomplished a major professional/personal goal when I not only met her, but I got to know her and, if all things work out the way I hope they do, I will actually get to work with her. (insert huge smile here)

Mr Broadway

Went to watch Alex tonight in the school play. This is his last play because he's a senior. It's sad. I love watching him act. He's quite good at it.

Errand Day and stinky fish

Si and I were out running errands today and it was such a beautiful day, I thought it would be nice to pack a little picnic and eat at Strouds Run (lake). So, we went up on top of the damn and had a little lunch of grapes, salad and water. He loved the damn, though he did keep telling me that the placed smelled like "stinky fish."

Things like this always make me happy

I was strolling through my field the other day - enjoying another warm day with the kids - and I came across this simple flower absorbing the sun's rays and aching to have its photo taken. So, it posed for me ... and this is the final result. Nice, huh?

Fav photos from this weeks walks

I've been a bit snap-happy this week and now I have several new favorite photographs to share. The weather has been perfect, and it really revs me up for a good, long walk.

A natural vase for these lovely purple flowers

A dandelion with the morning dew.

Not too sure what kind on fungi this is, but I loved it! It's so freaky and cool looking. I tried to pick one to preserve it,but it fell apart.

A beautiful gree fern glistening in the bright sunshine.

In case you were wondering...

what it is that I do at the Red Roots Educational Project. Well, the purpose of the group is to expose and explore steretotypes and misinformation pertaining to indigenous people and to re-educate the public on accurate Native history, culture, people, traditions, and events. Plus, we show these things from an indigenous perspective, and we celebrate American Indian Heritage Month. This is a banner from a project I'm working on. It explains things a bit more...

I'd rather spend a night under the moon than a day under the sun.... and I spend a LOT of time outside at night, on my deck that's attached to my little house in the woods, listening to my peepers (or whatever else is out that night), sipping tea and pondering the days events. My mom got me hooked on star and moon gazing. And now I do it with my own kids.

If I were going crazy, would I actually know it?

Do crazy people know they're crazy, cause sometimes I wonder about my own state of mind.

Okay, so I might actually be sane, but a crazy diagnosis would explain a lot of things. For example, it would give me an excuse as to why my second book isn't out of my head just yet. I mean, it has been nearly 3 years now and still... all I have is a pile of papers and a mound of photos of a toddler who takes up ALL of my time. I have publishers interested and several fascinating topics (and equally fascinating outlines and marketing plans)... but I have nothing actually finished. Am I nuts or should I already have a book out by now??

Stop. Don't answer that. Instead, enjoy this lovely photo. I took it the other day when Silas and I were out on a walk....

my latest project

This is a BIG project I've been working on for more than 2 months now. It's a mosaic (hope I spelled that right) of a stereotypical American Indian image made from nearly 3000 stereotypical images I've either "stolen" from the internet (I can use them as long as the image is in an artistic piece criticizing the actual image itself), photographed myself, scanned in or had sent to me. I've been collecting the images for more than 2 years (and I collect actual steretypical pieces such as Indian toys, games, books, clothing, ads, etc) and then photographed each item. Whew! Then I put them into this program and printed out all 20 panels, glued them onto foam board, and collectively they made this image. So when you get upclose you see thousands of tiny images, but when you're back a ways, you get this. Now I'm finishing up the piece by taking out (in the program files) any and all images that didn't print well (some were blurry) and replacing them with something else. Then, I print again, mount on a foam board and it'll be used in an educational exhibit called Mama What's an Indian.

ugh

I'm having problems. Ugh. My old website host site is experiencing problems and I can no longer upload photos to my website (www.terrijean.com). This is sooooo frustrating! Now I have to switch hosts, which I did this week, and now I can't figure out how to work anything. Nothing! So I bought the frontpage software, which is supposed to be super easy and almost idiot proof (or so I heard) and I can't figure it out either!! What does that say about me??? So I'm stuck. I'm paying for a brand new website space and I cant figure out how to use it. tick tock tick tock ... the days keep passing by and I'm no closer to knowing how to do this. Help!

(Photo taken last year at my mom's flower garden. Wish it were my flower garden. She's got the greenest thumb I've ever seen.)

Turtle Tuesday

Out on another walk, just me and Silas, we came across this little bitty turtle sunning itself. The two of us were fascinated, standing by the creek bank until we snapped some branches and the little guy dove into the water. Silas thinks the tree looks like an elephant, and I think he's right.

The dogwood's back

The dogwood's out and I can't stop photographing them.