2010 Easter Cards

Easter is this weekend, and as always, I feel late for this year, early for next year. Some day I'll actually be in sync with the holidays.

The stress of my art portfolio has kind of put me in a creative pit, so I really had to force myself to make some Easter cards, even though they were incredibly simple. Absolutely nothing goes to waste when it comes to paper; a habit ingrained in me by my Grade 6 teacher. "Paper has two sides" she used to tell us, and encouraged us to fill a box with barely used paper. Kids can be pretty wasteful and this was before my hometown, Edmonton, had recycling pick up. Anyway, from my own scrap paper box I soon had a pile of bunnies punched out in spare moments. The next question was, what to do with so many bunnies? Make cards of course!

I tried a few window sizes until I settled on a square one made with a Marvy Uchida Extra Giga punch. I could see making just a purely yellow card on the outside with bunnies too. The possibilities are endless, really, I just have to discover them. Hopefully I can find something just as inspiring in time for Mother's Day :-)

I'm going to start signing my posts with my name btw - I signed up for a Google alert and there's another Purple Pony blog out there! Naturally I want mine to show up too :-) Some day I'll tell you all how I arrived at that name!

Christine Bennett
Purple Pony Art
http://www.purple-pony.com

Not A Dream!

For many mornings now, I thought I dimly heard a robin calling in the wee hours. Perhaps it was just a wishful subconscious, but nope, yesterday I saw my first robin! She (or he) was hopping around in a barren ash tree not too far from my house. It trilled briefly, and took off. And naturally, I did not have my camera!

I did not have my camera either last week when I left for work late. The unmistakable, carefree toodle-ooh-doo of the house finch made him easy to spot. I think I'm going to be in for an early walk on Saturday morning - one of my photography goals is to get a nice picture of a robin. And if I get a house finch - all the better!





It's scenes like my front yard, above, that make me wonder why I live where I do. I have been to Lexington, Memphis and Seattle; half of my heritage is from the Mediterranean. All these places are lush and humid in comparison to ol' dry Alberta. But, if I ever left Alberta, I wouldn't leave the prairies. There's so much I love about them, but I haven't been able to really express the "why". I think this little ditty sums it up nicely though:



Ask why the eagle soars in the air
Or builds so high his craggy nest,
Ask why the fishes love the sea -
Then ask me why I love the West

(attributed to John D. Higenbotham, 1933)

In the mail!

All the little lovebird ACEOs have taken flight :-)

There is another artist trading card meet up this Saturday night - I can't wait to see how that one goes. I bought some new sparkle gel pens, so it sounds like good excuse to do some drawing.