I’ll frame this as a birthday card for my grandchild, Ruby who is about to turn 3. She tells me butterflies are very gentle.
I enjoyed the process of designing yesterday’s Mexican Feather Grass collage so much that I thought it was worthy of a series. Two down and probably two more to go. A grouping of four would be nice. The possible color combinations are endless. Unfortunately, the supply of pressed grass — at least for the moment — is not.
While this beautiful grass with its ethereal feel lends itself to simple presentations, mounting it can be tricky. For most botanicals, I use an acid free, diluted white glue which I apply with a brush. Not possible with Mexican feather grass — Nassella tenuissima. The threadlike strands that hold the slightly heavier seed pods easily become tangled and bunched-up if disturbed. As a result, I must use a spray adhesive while holding the stem aloft and then mount it in one try. Careful work with tweezers allows for minor adjustments, then — voila — success or back to the drawing board with fresh graphics and fresh grass. This one cooperated sweetly.
If you’d like to see more, I have a different series of these listed at my Etsy shop at http://alturl.com/mk23o
At first glimpse, this is a simple and classic botanical — pastel-tinted yellow archangel on a subtle heart-shaped background. On closer inspection, however, the graphics that surround the heart carry a special message: “I love you! Will you marry me?” Never underestimate the value of packaging the message!
Although I usually initial and date my pieces in a corner of the image, this one is signed verso for obvious reasons. See it properly matted and framed in my Etsy shop – My Stonington Garden.
The day before yesterday, I promised an update on this image when I decided what plant to use for the ‘bottom feeders’ in my second underwater fantasy in what is so far a series of 2. I needed something small enough to display as a ‘school’ within the composition but different in some way from my pastel-tinted azalea. Ultimately, I settled on Eunonynus.
I thought yesterday’s pseudo seascape needed a companion, but my dried dill was just a small-scale experiment. Even though it worked out well, it will be weeks before another batch will be ready to work with. What to do in the meantime? I decided to try the denuded flower stems of my Andromeda bush as bottom growth. Stuck with the Azalea fish though and turned yesterday’s ‘waves’ into todays ‘kelp’. Still, I need some bottom feeders, don’t you think? I’ll have to sleep on it. Check back tomorrow.
After playing with wave and color effects, I was reminded of the sea so I checked my inventory of dried plants and selected dill as the main plant. To this I added a few curving fern leaflets and a ‘school’ of azalea leaves. My husband was reminded of winter instead because he thought the ‘bubbles’ looked like snow. That’s the beauty of fantasy. Everyone creates his or her own.
Meanwhile, I think I’ll pay more attention to my husband’s herb garden next season.
Most varieties of ferns are lovely (I’m not a fan of staghorn) and they appear often in tradtional botanical compositions, but sometimes its fun to ask ‘when is a fern not a fern?” One answer is when its stem is removed and its individual leaves are displayed upright like denizens of an extra-terretrial formation, or maybe just on the distant rolling hills of an alternate universe.
Right now my gardens are covered by two feet of snow from the “Blizzard of 2013” How optimistic of the media to assume the worst is over in that way. The only casualty in my garden was my beautiful and very old Euonymous fortunei. It’s lying in its side pinned to the earth by heavy snow. We are holding out just a little hope that we can right it when the snow melts, but I see my garden through rose-colored glasses sometimes.
All I can do right now is make the best of it. The little flower bud clusters may or may not press well, but with the buds removed, the flower drupes make great little “trees” to support other types of leaves. Meanwhile, the Andromeda is evergreen so the little leaf rosettes which resemble Schefflera may just be candidates for pressing as well. Time will tell.
It’s always a dilemma to decide whether to present foliage on its own — whether enhanced or not — or to use it to represent other things. Both work for me but rarely do they work together.
