Winter Willow

Some yeas I sort by color -- so orderly!

Willowikins in the studio, getting ready for a sweater exhibition

A good time was had by all at the show

The colors just slay me

Hard to photograph this fiddler

Weaving legs? Oh dear.

Old Time Trio. Or is it Bluegrass? No -- didn't make a mandolin. Pardon the poor photo -- digital photography has improved a touch since I made these musicians.

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These photos show a few of the willow people I've made in the last decade or two.
​
Some have gone to to fund-raising auctions.

Others I've given away.

And a few have ended up outside my house
serenading passers-by until the time came
to retire to the woods
 to hang out with birds and coyotes 
and other shrubby things like themselves.

This year, the brown willow outside my house was really tall
so I decided to make something I could go inside.

Is this actually going to turn into something?

Yanking grape vines out of our lilac bushes nearly tore my arms out of their sockets--
each was so long I could spiral it around the entire structure
​ and pin it into place with lengths of red osier dogwood.

I don't quite know what to say about this little time machine--
or staycation hut, or bird watching blind, or whatever it is--
except that I wish all of you could hang out in it for a little while too. ​

Next week it'll go off to a fund raising auction at the Pritchard Gallery in Moscow
leaving a big hole (or free space) in my studio.

Can't get enough of these shadows.

Till then, I'll hang out in it as much as I can.

I do love Winter Willow.

It changes the way I see everything.

PS: The ATA Blog Tour continues:
Tomorrow (Wednesday 13 January 2016) = Mirrix!