Carrots and Cotton

I finding out what the new theme is every month at *Art*Journal*Journey!  This month, Tracey has selected "The Meaning Of."  She is letting us interpret it any way we want which is very thought-provoking.  You need to pop over and see the gorgeous landscape she made and how she personally interpreted her theme.

I have a goal to finish Lamentations in my BAJ so I went to Lamentations 2 which is pretty dark and tells about the destruction of Jerusalem when God was angered.  I read several commentaries on it, but they were very deep and just didn't want to stick in my head...(not much wants to these days unless it is super fun or a new recipe - lol).  So I decided to focus on the fact that we need to learn from God's lessons to us.  We may not like the act that leads to the lesson, but our goal is to survive the act and learn from the lesson.  So then I researched learning from lessons and found this awesome quote by Alan Cohen:

"The apparent goal of the journey is simply the carrot the universe dangles before you to get you to learn the lessons the adventure yields."

Then I started thinking about C-19 and how our carrot is that magical and elusive day we all get a vaccine or the numbers drop off. Who knows when that will happen as so many people I know are saying they don't want to take the vaccine... (I plan to be one of the first people in line).  The lessons we should be learning are many but include:

*Slow down

*Don't take things for granted

*Enjoy and focus on your family and friends  - they are the real treasure in life

*We NEED God because we are not smart enough rich enough or powerful enough to solve everything

*Money can't buy fame

*If you don't have good hobbies and things you enjoy - life can be very empty

*Those things you think you will do when you have time really probably won't get done even when you do (at least for me - lol)

There are many more, but these are the first that come to my mind. Then I remembered I had a carrot stencil in a stencil book I got at the Thrift store for $1 (it is in the background in my picture).  

I just did my stenciling with inks and a make up brush, drew in a little faux stitching, and added some interesting carrot quotes.  The page underneath had circles nd they came through the page which made interesting designs on the carrot and radish.  I am going to enjoy the AJJ theme this month - lots of ideas swirling around in my head.

This weekend I watched a lot of painting videos.  My daughter needs a Christmas card for her cotton growing boyfriend's family so I found THIS great how to paint cotton bolls video.  Then I typed up a sentiment and inside and mounted it on kraft paper.  She loved it. I had fun painting it with my Arteza gouache colors.  Had to buy a new tube of white and got it in two days!

Thanks for popping by!  I sure appreciate you!!!

Hugz