Teaching Danny to needle-felt

I am working on a book about needle-felting (more will be revealed later) and one aspect will be kids making totem animals. As my delightfully talented nephew Danny was visiting over the holidays we decided to do some needle felting together. He's an extremely focused and precocious seven year old and I doubt that most seven year olds could do this, especially in a classroom setting. I would recommend ages 9 and up if the kids are fairly focused. It's enormously fun. Danny loves penguins because of how they walk (waddle), how they look (cute) and their color. He recently received Club Penguin membership, which he was over the moon about. We didn't talk much about totem or power animals as he just wanted to make art and not think about it too much. Here are some of Danny's comments during the process and when I told him the pictures might end up in a book. Click on the image to enlarge for step-by-step directions.

This is worth doing. It gets you real excited.
How does the technology of this work?
Wings are easy.
Sometimes getting an idea is harder than making it.

On needle felting - Fast motion, slow motion, medium motion.
When I asked him what kind of penguin he'd be he said "Emperor penguin, because then I could do whatever I wanted but I'd rather be human. I'd really like to know what fish tastes like straight from the sea. I'd be a good penguin.

On being in a book. I want to be famous. No I don't want to be famous. I was just saying it.

So there you have it, a glimpse of my delightful nephew Danny. I love how smart, funny, and passionate about art he is. Quite a treat for this Auntie.

I will be teaching a class on felted totem animals Saturday Feb. 13, 1-4 at University Art 2610 Marconi Avenue, Sacramento, CA 95821. Kids over 10 welcome. Contact me through my website if you are interested in coming. www.mirareisberg.com

Beauty at the old cemetery in Sacramento.

The cheerful side of cemeteries

Last weekend I was feeling a little blue with the winter greys so my husband Guy took me to a beautiful cemetery to cheer me up. It always works astoundingly well. I'm not sure if it's the beauty, or the reminder of mortality and how lucky I am to be alive, but I always find old cemeteries very uplifting. My favorites are Pere lachaise in Paris, an old cemetery in Brooklyn, there's a beautiful one in Palouse Washington, and of course Colma outside of San Francisco, a city of many cemeteries. Guy saw a bumper sticker there that said "Colma, a great place to live" - the irony was not lost on him.

This particular cemetery had tributes to the early pioneers of the area. It also featured a lot of beautiful statuary, mostly ethereal and solemn looking statues of women in portent poses. I thought I'd share some here. These are color pictures and it was a delightfully eerie and refreshing afternoon.

Helene's visit and the American River

My beautiful friend Helene is visiting from Toronto where she is doing a PhD. I've known her for over 20 years from when we met in a cigarette cessation program. She's an extraordinary woman who I greatly admire. If she's up for it I want to take her to some galleries downtown (Solomon Dubnick, Axis, Museum of Contemporary Art) and then for a walk along the American River at my current favorite Sacramento park - Ancil Hoffman, before bringing her here to talk about dissertations and cultural studies. Ancil Park includes the Effie Yeaw Nature Center, which has an animal rescue program with animals that cannot be returned to the wild (I wish their cages were bigger, or better yet that they didn't have to be in cages) and lots of land with a multitude of animals. My favorites have been deer and wild turkeys. Here are some pics from the last time I was there with my friend Diane. If it's OK with Helene, I'll blog about some of her accomplishments in my next post.