Revamped My Personal Site

I have revamped my personal/artist website.  It's still a work in progress -- I'm learning CSS and still need to figure out how to change the fonts from the template.

I plan to add images of my artwork -- some old and some more recent.  And I'll be maintaining a blog there to discuss my art, creativity coaching and daily life.

The Art & Life of D'Marie

New Cooking Class -- Southwestern Vegetarian with a hint of Vegan

The culinary half of Artistic Nomads, aka the Kitchen Shaman, will be presenting yet another cooking class in Phoenix.  It will be this Sunday, July 10th. 

Details can be found at Kitchen Shaman - Southwestern Cuisine Vegetarian Style or you can register directly here.

The Dream is Still Alive

It sometimes feels as if I'm spinning my wheels with regards to these dreams.  I know it's really just a case of having to do the groundwork first.  I have to come to terms with a lifetime of bad mental conditioning in order to give myself permission to pursue this dream.

I gave the blog a quick facelift and am giving myself the task of updating something here at least once a week.  It may just be a link to something interesting or a short comment.  Eventually I will start using this blog and working consistently towards the nomadic dream.

This is a promise I make to myself.

Time for art

Prior to moving to Santa Fe, we had come out to explore, and found the Baca Street Arts area. There are several galleries, a coffee shop, a gem and mineral store, and a glass blower who makes little fish, skulls and other cool blown glass art. She likes to frame her stuff. Now, we are about getting rid of stuff, so that we can travel in an RV. I hauled these frames from Phoenix with every intention of giving them to the glass blower.

The 9-5 and everything in between got in the way. Six months later, I finally run down to her shop.

"Would you like some frames."

"Sure. I'll trade you a piece of glass."

"Ok."

So I took the frames over to her shop. Mind you I was only going to give her the frames, but I came away with a really cool miniature blown glass skull. This is what happens when you really put that artistic energy out there.

Movement

It is amazing how life can take turns, and you find yourself somewhere else. Over the summer we took a road trip that brought us to Santa Fe, NM. Now there isn't much that would shake me out of my warm Arizona tree, unless it was living in the RV full time. The Universe shook its head, and we moved to Santa Fe. Six weeks from time of inception to movement.

Fortunately my day job could transfer me out here.
And now, I am inspired, more than I was before. I have been painting, a little bit, the other aspiring artistic nomad is busy coloring mandalas that She printed out. We have looked around a bit at the Art Community of Santa Fe, I have plugged into the Poets of Albuquerque, and we hope to share and sell our work, soon, and maybe sooner.

All in preparation for going on the road. The move will hopefully bring us closer to the goal of traveling on the road and making art 24/7. This is a good goal to have.

The RV show and introduction

In preparation for the journey on the road, D'Marie and I have been recording the yearly RV show that comes out. I've finally cataloged enough VHS to know where those tapes are, and am compiling a DVD disk of RV 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, & 2007! We now can go back, watch, look and compare innovations and designs of RV's of the last several years. It also gives us an idea of what to look for in an RV.

Sure I'd like to be able to afford the fancy 1/2 million dollar RV coach, but it ain't gonna happen. We have to be able to afford the trailer for the Art Studio, and car. Still, it's exciting to have all the shows on one disk where we can watch all of this.

There is an art to cataloging and figuring out all the VHS tapes. And my background in media still gives me the love of editing. Our little DVD recorder/player affords me minimal artistic satisfaction in editing, since I still don't have the editing program I want for the computer. (soon, one of these days I'll have Sony Vegas Pro, retail $450.00).

And of course, this is my first post here, I'm Johnna, nicknamed johnnie, partner to D'Marie who started this blog. I'm excited about art, poetry, cooking, and all sorts of quirky things. I'm looking forward to documenting our journey when we finally start, and the path we take to get there. Right now I am currently employed as a cook in a 5 star resort. And that makes me pretty happy. As summer hits, I'll have more time to create, and I'll be looking forward to that as well...

Happy trails!

art prospects

When my day job moved to new offices a few weeks ago, I noticed that one of the companies on the building directory had something to do with kids and art. Yesterday in the elevator heading home, a woman introduced herself to me and said she worked for that organization. When I mentioned that I'm an artist (something I still hesitate to do, but that's another post), she said that they are always looking for new artists to teach the kids. When I said I'm not that experienced, she said it doesn't matter, because they are kids. The elevator only goes down one floor, so I'll have to talk to her another time.

Maybe this organization is more about imparting the passion of art and the fun of creativity than teaching techniques or established methods. If that's the case, it might be something for me to investigate. A way to start "spreading art" as that seems to be the path the Universe is calling me to follow.

Getting Started

We've had a dream for almost five years of living a nomadic life. In the last 12-18 months, that dream has crystalized into specific goals. And those goals are slowly becoming actual plans: steps that we need to take in order to make the dream our reality.

This blog is one of the many steps of the plan. It will be a place to chronicle our initial journey. We will share the developing plans, the trial runs, the progress of our potential "resource generating" activities. Best of all, we'll be able to share our hopes for the future and our passion for art, the nomadic life, and the importance of living a dream rather than caving to the expectations of society and convention.