Wild Kingdom Around Here

Posted on April 29, 2008 by Kristen

First it was the boar and boar piglets (see previous posts for video links), but then last night there was a fox dodging around here, and this morning, a bobcat! I got a few quick photos – the fox was elusive and the shot isn’t great quality but there’s the added bonus of getting a scrub (blue) jay in the shot as well, which I didn’t notice until later. (The old bathtub in the field is actually in a cow pasture and is for the cattle – heh.)

The bobcat photo was much better – he was just sitting on the hillside watching us. Seems like he waited for me to snap a photo and then jogged away.

I’m pretty happy to draw the line at animal close encounters with that. I did actually see a mountain lion (cougar) here a number of years ago, but those are really big and I’m not so much interested in seeing one of those close enough to get a photo, even with my zoom lens.

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Boars and Piglets!

Posted on April 12, 2008 by Kristen
Recently, a number of wild boar have been coming down the hillside to root around for food. Luckily they aren’t the HUGE ones, just mid-size, and they scare away easily. But the other day when I was watching them, I saw this small rust streak under the boar and I realized there were boar piglets running around too! I wasn’t too successful with getting good photos at first, but then yesterday, the whole mini-herd came down and started rooting around and eating the fallen walnuts under the black walnut tree by our house (on the OTHER side of the fence, I’m happy to say.) And I was able to get some reasonable videos of the action – big boars and little colorful piglets!

Keep in mind that these videos were taken through the window screen, so they aren’t as sharp as they could be, and there’s really no sound, but the piglets are so cute – heh. Also, most of the clips are under 45 seconds long. Click here to see the videos. Enjoy!

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New Sneaks!

Posted on March 24, 2008 by Kristen
I had been shopping for some new casual shoes/sneakers, but found nothing that I liked, or was in my size or price range, even at the outlet mall – sigh. I’m also pretty picky about what I was looking for, in a mundane sort of way – something normal, but passably interesting, comfortable, and definitely no plastic colors or gold lame’ – LOL. Then, John happened to mention that people at work often buy shoes online at Zappos, and that they had free shipping both ways. (I’m probably the last person in the online world to have heard of Zappos, but I’m so NOT a fashionista – LOL.) So I dove into their web site and after just a bit of clicking around I found just what I was looking for – a cool suede sneaker from a maker called Simple Shoes (See photo at right.)

Although the ones I bought weren’t from their extreme-ecological line, they have a great philosophy and some wonderful casual shoes with a focus on recycling and sustainability – check them out! Also, although I opted for the free shipping, Zappos expedited my order and I got my shoes in no time. They’re comfy, a perfect fit, and they don’t make my feet look at big as they really are – quite a… ahem… feat! (sorry!)

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Leaf Mosaic

Posted on March 10, 2008 by Kristen

I’m still playing with the idea of angles and lines through shapes, and ended up creating what I’m calling “Leaf Mosaic” – another colored pencil piece. (The original is done on dusty blue-green charcoal paper, so no ‘white’ showing through.)

I’ve got it in my Gallery at Imagekind, and you can click the image or click here for framed or unframed prints.

I also have versions of this design on t-shirts and gifts and such, as usual – heh. Some samples:


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Cosmic Ribbons

Posted on March 3, 2008 by Kristen

I bought a set of 48 Prismacolor colored pencils and am already quite along the way of wearing them down to nubs! 🙂 One of the first pieces of art I did with them was this really colorful work called “Cosmic Ribbons” – I think I tried out at least 75% of the colors for this one – heh. The original is 14×10 on watercolor paper.

(Click the image above for prints via Imagekind.)

I’ve also got Cosmic Ribbons on stuff in my shop, for example:


(Click any of those images to see all the ‘stuff’ – includes things like mini buttons and refrigerator magnets – turn your fridge into an art gallery – LOL!)

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