Up on our walls

Where so much of my fall and summer focus was spent out doors, winter has given me the chance to really "move in".  And having moved so many times in the last 15 years I have not been quick to hang pictures, in fact, most of the pictures I have put up have been in bubble wrap since we lived in Charlotte 8 years ago.  I share them here because I feel it is important to create spaces that invoke feeling, especially ones that remind us to bask in the richness of life.

This first piece is a needle point that Paul's mom completed in 1983.  She presented it to us a few months ago and said, "I feel like I made this for your home".  I feel the same way, it is as if it has always been up there, and when I see it I am amazed by her many skills and talents, and more importantly the continual love and care she offers.  

Paul's mom also created this Sesame Street Scene.  It was completed in 1980 for Paul as a child and then given back to him again shortly after James was born.  This is actually the one piece that has always been up on our walls, it has always shared the happy space where our littlest ones sleep.

These next two pieces were completed by Paul and I in 1984, we were in the same class that year and it is funny how both our mothers unwrapped them this past summer while cleaning out boxes in their basements.  They now hang together in our kitchen and I wonder of the blessing that our lives came together as well.  Can you guess who made which one?

Also new to our walls is this shirt I picked up from and an antique market in China.  While living there in 1997 I took a short break from teaching English in Guangzhou and backpacked with a few girl friends up to a remote rice terraced village in the mountains, the experience was surreal. The individuals who fed us and met with us all wore this specific dress as part of their ethnic tradition.  I cannot remember the name of the tribe or even the village or Provence we were in, but when I see this piece of clothing up on my wall I think of the adventures that were had, and more importantly, the connection I feel to a people so far away, both in distance and culture.

This next piece my mom found while we were cleaning out boxes in the barn.  Another needlework, she brought this one home from a trip to Switzerland many years ago.  I love the vibrant blue velvet background and that the wild flower bouquet reminds me of my Swiss heritage.

Sometimes it is hard to know how to fill a giant blank wall.  The presentation below was created on a very rainy day last fall when the kids were not use to spending the bulk of the day in doors.  

The original plan was to start a unit on the human body and paste cut outs of all the organs on top of our traced figures.  As I was proceeding with that idea however, someone called out, "wait, what about our spirit body? we first have to put down our spirits".  So I pulled out the watercolors and we each painted how our spirit was feeling on that day.  The lesson we came away with was that not one of them was the same, that we each are truly unique.  These figures turned out so happy that we had to have them up on the wall, we've enjoyed them for more than one season and only very recently taken down because the heat and dust from the wood stove weakened the tape. 

In its place we've created a large alphabet canvas.  It was made much like the kitchen verse from last year except instead of painted text we glued down letters cut from tissue paper.  

As much as I loved the colorful water colored figures up on the wall, this alphabet project was created with a very clear intention.  A few of the younger children who would like to write are struggling to do so, so, before anything else was layered upon this canvas I declared our intention in pencil and across its surface:  "for the joy, power and freedom of forming one's own thoughts into words".

That's it for now, I'll never be a fine art collector but I'm already dreaming up creative ways to display more useful information for our little homeschool here.  Because if it's going to be put up on the wall and something we have to look at everyday, it might as well enliven the spirit as well.