Peek

I know this is bizarre.  About fifty years ago, in Japan, they made these little taxidermy chicks and ducks.  I have no idea why but I have a few of them that I bought at flea markets.  This little one is peeping out of my new display table and a duckling sits in the back.

I added a few more 'treasures' to my display table.  The two carved objects just up from the old wallet, are arrow shapers.  Native American indians each had them and the shape and markings were carved into the pottery.  It was how they told which ones were their own.  The shapers had a hole through the center and the indians would put them over a stick and go back and forth, sanding and shaping their arrows.  From where I got them, I think they are from the Muscogee Creek Nation.

The little hand made soft leather doll just above is in an indian style dress.  The thunderbird inlay necklace to the left was made by a SW indian tribe, but I can't remember which one right now.  They made them for the tourist trade and used old 78 records to cut up for a firm base and template then used coral and turquoise and other stones for decoration.

The tiny basket to the left of it is Cherokee.  The black basket just above it is made from horsehair and has a lid on it.  Can't remember that tribe at the moment.  Two little arrowheads sit just to the left of the baskets, but the thing above is a medicine bag.  I opened it once and it was full of different plant materials.

I had a friend once and her step-father, a full blood Choctaw indian, used to have these little bags tucked under cushions and beds; all over the house.  She said he would take hair from their hairbrushes and wrap it around bones and things to make good medicine and keep bad medicine away from them.  

Days In A Life

Do you ever wonder what really goes on behind the scenes of our blogging buddies?  I mean, no one wants to hear us drone on about our bone spurs, or dark depression and anxiety disorders.  Right?  But, how many beautiful bouquets and finely decorated tableaux can we look at?  

Case in point - my good blogging friend, Jo, a Brit in TN, posted such a beautiful blog about strawberries.  Well, mine are mush this year because of non-stop, flooding rains.  Who wants to look at that?  And, Sister, my weenie, got in the middle of them yesterday and pooped.  I don't know if I can possibly go looking for any now.  Fertilizer perhaps?  Now that would be a positive way to look at things.  I haven't reached my maximum level for beauty though.  I might if I were to start doing Pinterest.

Please, don't all of you jump ship on me yet.  I am pretty hopeless, er, I am still hopeful.  I do not like technology; need an assistant to handle all of it.  It is so frustrating to me.  Nevertheless, I have had this camera for two years, maybe three.  Different lenses and is an SLR which I used to love before the digital days.  So what's the problem?  I just got it out for the first time today.  I simply do not want to read about it and fiddle with it.  Picture me with my head bowed in shame, but, I am going to fiddle with it today.  If I put things away in a cabinet or drawer, I forget about them (okay, I think about them occasionally), but the alternative is leaving it sitting around and I don't like a messy house.

Same thing with my art supplies.  The only place with enough light to work in my house is the dining room table.  It will become covered with paints and brushes, papers et al, and looks so messy.  I have had it all put away since the fall, but am going to get it all back out and start to paint and create again.  Hopeful huh?

Okay, I'll get off the subject.  I call this statue my booger.  I bought it from a small local shop.  It was made by an African American goat herder in a nearby town.  Probably made from an oak tree; it has goat bones for teeth.  

It has a two sided face, four arms and four feet, nostrils and not sure what other carvings are.  Maybe eyes or ears.

Arms and fingers.

Feet and toes.

A look inside one of his gaping mouths.  It is very heavy; must have been awfully hard to carve.  Was it a way to pass the time or a shamanic creation?  I looked at some other tribal African art and saw some similar horned creatures.  Could the creator have remembered something from a long ago culture?  Had an epiphany from somewhere out there?  I bought it for $5.00 and an old, broken harpsichord.  It must have taken the artist a long time to carve it. And, I do so love folk art.