Thinking of Red-winged Blackbirds

I often look at the world as one big tarot deck, meaning everything that happens is a symbol for something more. I especially feel this way when something happens that is on the news and effects more people than just me. I have been thinking a lot about these blackbirds that fell from the sky on New Year's Eve over Arkansas. What is the deeper meaning of this?

I am connected to Arkansas as it was the place of my birth. I was born in a small town called Mountainburg in the Ozark mountains of Northern Arkansas. Arkansas is a state that gets overlooked a lot. If it wasn't for Bill and Hillary being from there, many people would have never have even heard of it. It is a beautiful place with one of the most beautiful rivers in the world running through it, The Buffalo river. It also has some magical properties right in the heart of it. It has these incredible healing hot springs and produces a large amount of diamonds and quartz crystals all in the same area. I always felt magic when I walked outside of Hot Springs, Arkansas and would find hundreds of quartz crystals and amethyst lying naturally all over the ground. Let's just say that there is quite a lot of faerie energy there.

Then there is the fact that these blackbirds were red-winged blackbirds. I think these birds are very magical. When I was working on my painting 'The Seer" a couple of years ago I remember reading a lot about red-winged blackbirds. Here is a quote from Ted Andrew's "Animal Speak" about red-winged blackbirds:

"This bird has a red path on its wings, with a dash of yellow as well. These colors connect this bird to the level known as Binah in the Qabalistic Tree of Life. This is the level associated with the Dark Mother and the primal feminine energies. This bird has ties to all of the creative forces of nature." pg. 119 "Animal Speak" by Ted Andrews.

I have mentioned before, as I am fascinated by these three colors, that red, black, and white (yellow in the Native American tradition) are always associated with the Dark Mother, and the Faerie realm in Celtic lore. Red-winged balckbirds are indeed a very special bird and messenger from the Otherworld.

So what is the message we should be getting from thousands of them falling lifeless from the sky? Well it certainly does seem ominous at first. Certainly blackbirds have been thought to be a bearer of bad omens for centuries.

I personally think it is a message about urgency and our power to create change. The womb of the Dark mother is where all of life springs from. The creative energy emerges from the darkness into the light. It is she who holds the power of creation. When we work with her we discover our own creative force. We have to accept our darkness before we can transmute it into the light. It is time, now more than ever, for us to get this. We can create great change in the world.

I also think there is a message about understanding our deep connection to nature. Nature speaks volumes to us if we will just listen to her. She is speaking loudly to us now, are you listening?

New pendants

I can paint and draw, but it seems everything else that is considered crafty I am dismally lacking in any talent. I tried making art pendants with prints of my work, the kind where you glue your print to a glass cabochon and a cameo. I had so much trouble with those. I tried multiple kinds of glues and they all soaked through to the print, no matter what I did to prevent it. I had a couple turn out okay, but gave up on them eventually.

So just the other day I got the idea to start actually painting on little wooden circles and making handpainted pendants. I have made two so far. Although I am enjoying this, my neck is so sore from bending over these and working with tiny brushes. I will have to see how popular they are before I make too many of them. Here is a sneak peak at the two I have done so far.

These are of the Welsh goddesses Arianrhod and Rhiannon. I plan to do goddesses mainly and some more pop surrealistic big eyed girls. They are 1 1/2 inch pendants with layers of glaze to protect the work and a bail glued on the back. Now I have to figure out how much to charge for these. They are pretty detailed and each one takes me awhile to do. I think it is pretty cool to be able to wear an original piece of art.

Coimimeadh comes out of nowhere

This has been an odd month to say the least. Like everyone else I have been busy getting ready for the Holiday, and then the energy of this month has really been wacky. The mix of Venus in Scorpio making me feel sorry for myself with Mercury Retrograde blocking my abilities to communicate my feelings has been tough. I have been feeling completely uninspired in some ways, and that is where the feeling sorry for myself comes in. I keep trying to start paintings and then getting angry because I can't do what I want to do and trashing them. I started a Rhiannon and I was struggling making her look right.
Sometimes I have trouble when I try to put too much into one painting. Although I would like to do more illustrative scenes, I seem to be better at doing portraiture and keeping the backgrounds simple. When I try to add too much to the scene the work just seems to become a jumbled mess, and this is what happened to Rhiannon. I had to walk away from her, but I had this overwhelming desire to paint something and I was out of canvas. I found one of the faeries I started a couple of months back and didn't finish. At the time she was just a faerie with a sort of Klimt like cloak over her. A couple of months ago I got completely bored with her, and yet suddenly I looked at her and fell in love with her again.
I started working on her again and finished her within a couple of days. I added a barn owl, and then felt like I was looking at my co-walker. In the Faerie Tradition you meditate or journey to the Otherworld or Faerie realm as a sort of Shamanic practice. One of the practices is to meet and work with your co-walker, or Coimimeadh in Gaelic. This co-walker is like your double on the otherside and by working with them you form a sort of symbiotic relationship in which you both grow by bringing the energies of the other's world into your own.



I am actually a little shocked that I was able to bring her forth right now. I think it was because I needed to see her right now, to bring her into the physical. I am feeling my inspiration coming back now. The barn owl is also my spirit animal that I often meet on my journeys to the Otherworld and she appears in many of my paintings.
So I am starting to feel the return of the light, but still Mercury Retrograde bit me yesterday. The ignition switch on my car went out in the YMCA parking lot. Although it is a bad time of the year to deal with car trouble (like there is ever a good time) part of me is laughing.
Hope everyone else is dodging Mercury this time around, Merry Yule!

First doggie portrait

Well I have my very first doggie portrait almost finished. Still needs a few more layers of paint, but it is almost there. The client loves the color red and said she likes the pop aspects of my work, so I am hoping she will like the dramatic red sky behind her adorable little girl. Here is the original photo and what I have done so far:




I am having trouble with my digital camera, the viewfinder screen has decided to go out on me. This makes it extremely hard to get good shots of my work, so it looks like it is time for a new one. Doesn't it always seem to go like that, you sell a few things and something goes out where you immediately have to spend the money you made. Such is life I guess. Hope everyone is having a stress free Holiday season (is that even possible?).....

Siren's Call Finished.....or not....

Well I think I have finished with the Siren's call. I am sure every artist feels this way, sometimes I feel like they are never finished. I am a wierd mix of perfectionist and lazy sometimes. I work really hard at each painting, but I always feel like I need to do more. The only way I know I am done is when I get bored with the painting and feel like I can't stand to do anymore with it. It's not that I don't love them, I just think that is my personal in-built mechanism to make me stop painting.
It is cold, slightly snowy and cloudy here today. There is no way I will be able to get a good pic of her today outside. There is a big dilema when you take your own pictures of your work when winter comes. But hopefully I will be posting the final pictures of her soon.
I set up a new newsletter today. I guess that is pretty exciting. I want to do some fun things with it, more than just the ramblings you might read here in my blog. I hope to do some print giveaways, and do some writing about astrology, tarot, and other spiritually directed things. I hope it will be a fun and informative newsletter that people will look forward to getting once a month. You can sign up for it at my website here.
Alright then, I guess that is about it for today....sorry no pics of my Siren yet, but it is coming soon.

New WIP, The Siren's call

Started a new painting a few days ago, just haven't gotten very far with her yet. This one is going to be similar to The Bridge in many ways. I am thinking about the siren and her haunting call. In myth she calls men and/or sailors to their deaths with her song. Of course mythical beings associated with water are always connected to the feminine consciousness and the subconcious mind. Water is like the void or the womb, where all of creation springs from.
I think that the siren's call is the call that beckons us onto the spiritual path. It calls for us to begin the journey into our subconscious, the journey of unpeeling our issues and facing our egos. The problem comes when we are not quite ready to deal with these issues.
Many people have a constant yearning for something that they can never define. In a sense, that yearning is the siren's call. Many people also choose to try and distinguish that yearning with the proverbial sex, drugs, and rock n' roll. The things that they think will get them closest to union with god/goddess, without having to face their ego. I think this is the destruction that the siren leads most men too, but she can also lead you to the destruction of your ego.
I have included an egret because they are a bird, along with other herons, that are always on the edge of the two worlds (water and land, physical and spiritual). Also there is a loon because they have a haunting call just like the siren. Here is what I have so far:





I have been struggling a lot with the background on this one. It just doesn't want to show itself fully to me yet, but I think it is starting too.

The Hare and The Bridge

I finished painting The Bridge today and will start posting her places later. First I thought I would write a little about the Hare since I covered the Fox in my last post. The hare is connected to the moon in many cultures (as you can see a hare in the moon). It is also connected to the Faerie realm like the Fox, as it is mainly seen at Dusk and Dawn.
Many moon, hunting, and love and fertility goddesses are also connected to the Hare. The Hare is a very strong symbol of ancient feminine magic and the Otherworld. The hare symbolizes fertility and new life. The goddess herself represents the energy of nature and the ever-turning cycles of birth and rebirth. Therefore it makes perfect sense that the hare is so connected to the goddess as the hare is an animal that is prey to almost every predator, and yet it's hightened fertility allows it to be reborn again and again.
I was born during the year of the Hare in Chinese astrology and that is probably another reason why I am so obsessed with the moon, that and my moon was in Cancer.
Here is a not so great pic of my lil' Hare in "The Bridge":