Good gravy -- what a trip! It's so strange to be back. You may know how it is, like you've come back from another life, or woke up from a dream, and you're back to reality. It's a rather abrupt feeling. It takes some time for adjustment. I gotta admit, when I got home, I really didn't know what to do with myself. Both of us just sorta wandered around the house, feeling outta sorts a bit. I was very happy to have my Blobbies back again, though! Mom watched them at her abode while I was gone -- thanks Mom!But I wasn't quite ready to get back into the studio again, so into the office I went. And, lo! -- what threw me a rope back to my real life was, again, working on Boat material. I've begun outlining and writing a four-part series for The Boat on sculpting the equine head from the inside out -- from the skull to the flesh to the expressions. The whole enchilada. Readers can follow along this step-by-step series, so they can create their own horse heads from the inside out, too.
Every once and a while, it's good to throw something truly challenging in front of yourself, to try and tackle something that may seem "too big." The idea of not only creating an articulated horse head in polymer clay, from the inside out (with the hyoids!), is intimidating in itself. But then laying out a series that teaches how to do so is downright daunting! However, seeing the world from another point of view in order to clarify and convey things to others deepens my own knowledge. It's easy to take too much for granted, but having to teach forces me to relearn and re-evaluate what I already know. In turn, I'm learning tons more in the process! It's experiences like this that create obsessive behavior in me; a challenging learning situation pushes my buttons like a crazy space chimp. So it's been extremely difficult tearing myself away from working on this project to attend to more pressing things....such as the upcoming issue of The Boat! DOH. My assistant Editors should have the proofing to me soon, then I can input the changes and get that puppy published. Big issue and lots of great stuff! I'm so grateful to my Editors and authors! What a wonderful thing to know that our little industry is so willing to share knowledge to help others achieve their goals.
Anyway...I'll be getting back to sculpting on "stockie" probably next week. I'm really looking forward to it. When I came back, the first thing I did was rush into the studio to see if, so far, he still seemed "right" -- and he was! To be "right" this early in the game is a good feeling, but we'll see how he shapes up. No sculpture is that easy -- or should be. I still haven't peeked at the Haffie mare to see if she's "right," though. I'll leave that for next week, too.
In the mean time, I need to sort through and edit over 1,000 photos I took on the trip. Yes -- I got rather dorked-out with my camera. That's perhaps the great blessing and curse of a good digital camera -- not having to pay for shots up front tempts you to shoot like crazy. Yet you do get shots you might have been too skimpy to take if you did have to pay for film to see how they'd turn out. I'll be posting installments of my trip here soon, with pix, and I hope you enjoy the journey as much as we did. Suffice to say -- AC/DC ROCKED THE HOUSE. They DESTROYED the Tacomadome. OMG. More on that later, though.
As for the image in this blog post -- that's my new screen saver. Jedi Squirrels. I'm so OK with that idea. Laurie Jo also sent me a link to a "Squirrelizer," a means to insert an image of a squirrel into just about anything. Once I learn how to use it -- BEWARE.
"Every day is a journey, and the journey itself is home." ~ Matsuo Basho