Tag: art

National Dress Day!

The other day, Tom walked by the writing sanctuary with a pair of socks in his hand and said, “These have worn places on them. I guess I should just throw them away?”

“What are you talking about?” I asked, snatching the socks from him. “These are doll clothes!”

Then today, I heard that March 6 is National Dress Day. After I got home from a doctor’s appointment, I had a few other things to do, and then I picked a model from the doll closet, named her Roberta, and designed and created a dress for her from one of those socks.

In honor of the day, and the late Roberta Flack, songbird of the Seventies, here’s Roberta on an outing to a Peter Max exhibit, dressed in bespoke fashion from Becks.

From the National Today site: On National Dress Day March 6, we celebrate the most versatile and fun article of clothing there is — the dress! Fashion designer Ashley Lauren founded the day to help pay homage to dresses and the magical moments that happen when we wear them. “I remember the dresses I wore to my prom, first job interview, first date, competing in a pageant, my first red carpet event, the list goes on,” she says. “This is a fun day to cherish and celebrate those memories.”

Sunday Sundries

The planets aligned last week (literally!). These are some of the things that happened as a result.

I went on a mending spree.

Repaired the decorative top of this soapstone box I featured last Sunday.


This ornament was already damaged when I bought it last December, but the parts were there and just needed to be glued. However, it was so fragile that even though I was able to attach the broken piece, in doing so, part of the front disintegrated in my hands and wasn’t fixable. Solution: glue a couple of gold, flowery sequins in place on the bottom right. Tom said I made a country music guitar fancy.

The first photo I posted in 2024 (i.e., last year) was of this Christmas ornament, which has always been special to me.

When I removed all the ornaments from the tree a few days after posting that photo, it was the only one I dropped. Not only was it broken in several places, so was my heart. I couldn’t throw it away. I had an idea for it and bought what I needed, but somehow it sat waiting over a year for repair and a new way to shine. Finally, last week, I put it all together.


Repaired with glue as best it could be and hanging in its own shadow box, surrounded by glistening snowflakes. Not lost; only changed; still loved.

For several years, I’ve had fifteen wooden, unpainted cigar boxes that once had a purpose they no longer served. I always wondered if I’d eventually do something crafty with them.


Yep. Paint and an old piece of my jewelry repurposed a wooden cigar box into a fairy box filled with goodies for Debby in a late celebration of her February birthday.

 

 

Paint and embellishments (including a star, the one remaining earring of a pair) repurposed a wooden cigar box into a steampunk box filled with goodies for Lindsey in a late celebration of her January birthday.

More craftiness will be shared in the coming days.

Sunday Sundries


I don’t think I’ve ever featured this book on here before, though I see it’s in a shot of a group of journals and other books I took in June of 2021, so it’s been around a while. The Magic of Mindset is a journal, by Johanna Wright, to be written in, so if I had filled in any of the pages (I haven’t), it’s likely what I wrote would be too private to share.


That’s still true with the page I’m featuring, where under the title “Expect Resistance,” a girl meeting a dragon says, “Oh, hi.” The text on the accompanying page says, “RESISTANCE is A NORMAL PART OF THE PROCESS. LIST all of the REASONS WHY IT FEELS impossible TO LET GO OF YOUR OLD MINDSET AND MOVE OUT OF the stuck PLACE.

Those little items on the plate are like small talismans (crystal ball held in cupped palms; a wee dachshund carved of wood; a soapstone container, lid off, to show a variety of tiny stones; a small river rock in the shape of a heart; a sunflower incense burner holding a stick of sandalwood incense) that are either from or reference people, all a part of my history, who at one time or another were a force that could either subdue my voice or inspire and encourage it.

Relationships are complicated, and more than once, I’ve allowed them to block the flow of my creative energy. This time, I want to face that dragon and make a choice truer to myself.

This week’s theme may be arriving organically on each new day.

Photo Friday, No. 948

Current Photo Friday theme: Tiled.

Had a little fun with this theme by using several of my own tiles (the New Orleans tile was my mother’s), ringed by Sowminoes™ ceramic dominos, along with Scrabble tiles and artist Jeff Fisher’s cover illustration for British writer Louis de Bernières’ 1994 novel Captain Corelli’s Mandolin. (My theme this week has been books.) Some sources say the cover was inspired by the art of Matisse; another speaks of how the figures are like those on Mediterranean pottery. I read the book several years ago (I think it’s excellent, by the way), and remembered as soon as I saw the Photo Friday theme how the illustration always made me think of old tiles, as well as the way the cover figures are like “keys” to people and things in the novel.

(P.S. You’ve now seen your Daily Cow, plus a bonus cow!)

Mindful Monday


I got this beautiful image from Mindworks.org. I’m including the link because it’s always good to revisit guidance for improving mindfulness. Some of the words in the image are real challenges for me.

Last night, I was reading my Tom Robbins novel before bed and so much enjoying the euphoria of seeing someone put words together in all the right ways. I checked one of my social media accounts briefly before turning off the lights, commented on a post by someone (who I know only by being a fan of many decades), and my dreams wove crazy stories out of those two reading experiences. They included a song that I’ll now need to play to hear if my brain picked that particular song or its lyrics for my dream soundtrack for a reason.

Anyway, it all made me wake up in a good mood (plus there were two nice dogs snoozing next to me) but then…this…which I probably shouldn’t even post, but it speaks to some of my mindfulness challenges.

Oh, if only ones who told me some of my anxiety triggers would NEVER happen… At least the false idols will be taking good care of themselves.

I’ll be over here gutting deleting that chapter that’s given me so much trouble and trying not to think of real world nightmares for a while. Maybe I can put the words together in all the right ways.

Sunday Sundries


Photo of a much-loved novel; a gift (the ball with swirly paint) from the person who got me reading Tom Robbins; mushrooms and a butterfly that connect me to the book’s cover; the “magic” star, because there’s always something magical in Tom Robbins’s writing; and that lovely gold book pin because books are magic, too, and will forever link me to the writers who create them and impact my life.

I mentioned how on my recently-joined social media account, I’d been doing a book-cover challenge, posting a photo a day of a book that impacted me, but NO WORDS or EXPLANATIONS. Just the cover. On February 7, I posted the cover of Another Roadside Attraction by Tom Robbins (his first novel from 1971). Yesterday, I found out Tom Robbins died on February 9. I’ve decided to reread all his books in order. I’m not really sure yet what my week’s theme will be, but I arranged those items because they made me feel connected to the novel/its cover/Tom Robbins.

Good company


I wish I could credit the photographer of this photo. So many symbols: the bare tree; a large bird (perhaps a crow?), with maybe a few smaller birds scattered among the limbs; and a solitary woman on a swing. It makes me think of this Emily Dickinson poem.

This is my letter to the World
That never wrote to Me —
The simple News that Nature told
With tender Majesty

Her Message is committed
To Hands I cannot see —
For love of Her — Sweet — countrymen
Judge tenderly — of Me

Over the past few days, I’ve had the enjoyment of reading the draft of someone’s manuscript. It’s spec fiction–i.e., outside my genre–but good writing is good writing. A good story is a good story. It was refreshing to be able to ask the writer, with honesty and enthusiasm, “May I read it?” I rarely do this, but we have a bond of trust and a history.

Writing is so solitary, and writers get so little of the validation that can help fuel us. I don’t think he needs validation from me, but I know what it feels like to receive it. And what it’s like to wish for it.

In my decades of reading and loving Emily Dickinson’s poetry, I never dreamed I’d end up with my own version of her life. She’s good company.

ETA, one day later:
The poem below showed up Thursday morning in one of my social media feeds. The poet is one whose poetry prompt book I’ve featured on here before.

The Beatles sang it early in the soundtrack of my life: “There will be an answer. Let it be. Let it be.”

Today I finished another of Fasano’s poetry prompts. Black text is Fasano’s; green font indicates where I filled in his blanks with my own words.

The Saddest Truth

I stand at the door of admission
and am afraid to speak.
But I will confess.
I go in.
I touch the pain, the agony
I touch the unremitting sustenance
in the honesty.
This is the feast of sorrow:
the memories and manipulations on the table.
What can I do but eat?
Freedom, I know you are waiting
in the sunlight.
But first I must suffer in the shadows.
First I must admit my complicity.

©Becky Cochrane, 2025

I put all this here not as a message to anyone who either couldn’t or wouldn’t understand it anyway. It’s a reminder to myself, because so often I require the same lesson over and over.