Meeting Alka Joshi I had the pleasure of meeting and doing henna on author Alka Joshi, author of The Henna Artist, at the Spring Fling Henna Conference. She read an excerpt from her book, which we all enjoyed. She then told us about how it was basically her exercise in writing an storyline for how [...]
Week 3: Sights + SoundsThis week, I took my normal walk through the park, this time focusing on both the sights and sounds around me simultaneously. I recorded these three short videos that feature prominent man-made landmarks within the park...including the fences and the farm animals kept inside them (no groundhog this time - goats [...]
There were three major sounds I kept noticing on my walk this week - cars passing, my own feet, and birds. When I think about past walks, all I really remember are the sounds of the birds, probably because that is what is more sonically unique to me. I hear the sounds of my own [...]
First posted on blog and facebook: December 21, 2019Announced via email: Monday, December 30, 2019Discussion on Facebook group: Wednesday, January 22, 2020 2pm EST First, a bit on the Thriving Artist Book Club:We will have a live discussion of the book three weeks after the book to be discussed is first announced via email. Thriving [...]
In celebration of doing henna for the August Moon Festival in Quincy (voted Best of Boston in 2018!), I am happy to share this collection of moon-inspired henna designs with you. This is every single henna design I have ever watermarked and saved to my computer with "moon" in the file name. I hope that [...]
Meet Rosie the Privateer! You can think of her as Rosie the Riveter - as a pirate. The inspiration for this watercolor painting came from listening to The Pirate History Podcast. The host, Matt, was talking about how the mostly-male pirates were very often busy sailing and looting, away from shore for long periods of [...]
lyrics by Peter Nulton (and Alexander Pope) Twere ‘bout three years ago In the coster market I was down upon my luck Looking for a little racket When I spotted the mark It a right honored sort of prig Twas magistrate, a judge N’his accustomed robe and wig That periwig would fetch A fetching [...]
As a child of the '80s, I have loved Rainbow Brite forever. I was her for the first Halloween I can remember, complete with a *very* convincing handmade wig my mom made out of a yellow mop. I had the themed birthday, books, doll, and probably more . It was the number one consumer culture [...]
My friend Giuliana challenged me to do a pony henna. So I did this pegasus. I kinda dig it. I recorded video while doing it, which ended up not being only a pegasus pony henna how-to, but also a demo of how to do open five-pointed stars. There sure are a lot of stars in [...]
This design is inspired by my new favorite outfit - an Indian wool salwar kameez set with Persian inspired patterning. The design takes inspiration from the motifs on the fabric, but also from the structure of the motifs themselves. There are strongly outlined borders, large focal motifs, and swirling repetitive patterns in all the "extra" [...]
