spring — Page 2

My Verve Spilleth Over

April 28, 2010 by The Noisy Plume

It’s true.

My verve spilleth over.

My pensiveness hath evaporatethed. Somewhat.

My pesky displaced ribs are feeling miraculously better after a trip to the chiropractor and hours upon hours of tempering wretched muscles with ice packs yesterday and today. I say, one never realizes how important breathing is until every breath pokes a wonky rib into a lung.

I’ve been enameling and constructing for most of the day.

I plan to work late.

The view from the studio is grand, it’s snowing on the West Bench. Low clouds are threatening to drop down into the valley

and water the herb garden I planted yesterday.

Wait.

It’s eerily calm. The gale force winds have suddenly ceased. Perhaps I’ve slipped into the eye of the storm.

Do you ever imagine your house and the land that surrounds it by a mile square is actually up in the air rotating like a vinyl record? I’m performing this very imagination as I type this. For a second, it gave some sort of pseudo logical reason for the calmness outside.

This is a necklace I finished today. It’s an extension of the Rumors of the Sea Series and features an orange peel fired and repoussed copper disc, prong set, as well as a little pearl. There are plenty of details to share about this necklace and I promise to do so in the Etsy listing, when the time comes! I find it rather captivating. Plus, that Scandinavian blue is one of my favorite colors. What a shock! I know. Most people love green best of all. I’m rabid for pretty paraphernalia in hues of cerulean.

And oh dear goodness gosh.

Let’s talk about this little necklace.

It’s the first in a seed series!

I’ve taken a sterling, repoussed disc and fired it with translucent enamel — it’s supposed to be a seed. The necklace is stylistically a drop choker so hanging down from the seed is a repoussed, anticlastically raised and enameled sterling leaf.

So pretty. So lifelike, in some manners.

So organic.

Both enameled components look practically edible. J’adore this piece. How could I not? The colors are bombastic. I’ve three more necklaces in similar design on deck for completion this week and I’m going to be thrilled to show you the other finished products. It’s rather obvious that I’ve been taking more cues than usual from nature these past few weeks. The things I find beautiful and inspiring have been blowing huge and fragrant puffs of springtime wind into everything I touch, write, sketch and construct.

The possibilities are so endless that I’m often overwhelmed by the creative options in my mind.

I’m sure that many of you can relate.

In other news, I’m on the hunt for a Little Red Riding Hood cape.

Send me thine linketh if you knoweth of one!

I am hoping you all had a most glorious Tuesday!

I’ll bet you’re growing tulips between your toes.

Rah rah springtime!

We love you so!

PLUME

Filed Under: New Jewelry, rumors of the sea, seeds, spring

April 26, 2010 by The Noisy Plume

The tulips look like grandiose, upside down exclamation marks where they stand bright and beaming;

rooted in the dark dirt.

The rain has stopped.

It’s blue skies all around.

But I’m still feeling the pinch of melancholy.

I think I’ll put on a yellow hat.

Or perhaps a yellow dress…

https://www.thenoisyplume.com/blog/2010/04/26/666/

Filed Under: sad, spring, tulips

So Let The Sun Shine In

April 14, 2010 by The Noisy Plume

The longer daylight hours have me in a tizzy.

I’m filled with energy this time of year!

Look at this:

When I wake up in the morning I step into my shower, into the light that pours through this large window, I water my plants as I deep condition. I inspect my orchids for new leaves and roots. I snap off sections of spent fern. I pour a couple of drops of sweet orange oil into the hot water as it falls and inhale deeply. But the most activating ingredient of all of these is the daylight — bright and new — falling in the window of this room.

The long smile of sunlight pours in the windows, sinks into my hair and skin. It thaws me, inch by inch. My creative river is flowing like a glacial torrent from crevices of blue and layered ice as far as the eye can see. It’s fare thee well to Winter, 4×4 traction, salts and shovels, wind like icy knives and forever expanding white in all directions.

There’s a buttery glow to all I witness. I take on more than I can handle in a day. I work until 7PM, absentmindedly (because the sun is still shining). When I come in for an afternoon snack, I’m shocked by the time on the clock. I leap into running shoes and shorts and take Farley for a quick spin on the side of the mountains.

The air up there is thick with the songs of meadowlarks.

There’s a brisk green pushing forth.

There’s the adamant cackling of pheasant and sharptail grouse spinning up like music from the height of the sage and cheatgrass.

Patchwork nests. Young things on wobbly legs or weak wings.

And all the time, that light, straining to have the last word as it settles lower and lower in the West.

I’m so easily romanced

by springtime.

I’m so flattered that she gives me so much bright attention.

I’m so honored that for me, she never wants to turn day into night;

she wants to beam down on me forever. And ever. Amen.

I’m drinking the springshine like it’s pricey contraband.

Bathing in it like a chinchilla in a dust bowl.

Wading through it like a shepherdess in the knee deep, curling white of lambs.

I’m essentially oblivious to all else.

I’m affected, I’m useless.

I’m glad.

I’m hardworking.

I’m a puddle of warm butter.

I’m full energy and bursting.

Yesterday in the studio I spent hours enameling.

My hands were sore, broken and chapped by the end of my work day.

My knee has recovered from its trauma and I ran in the hills, cutting in and out of the sunset like a bird on the wing.

I cooked dinner, took a hot bath, waited for RW to come home from the Gilbert Ranch.

I fell into bed exhausted.

I fell asleep in record time.

And today I’m going to do it all again.

I’m under the spell of spring and with all the sun shining in, I can’t help but face everything with a grin.

Love to you, one and all, on this very beautiful day,

Jillian Susan

ouch.

just stubbed my toe.

Filed Under: idaho, spring

CUTENESS OVERLOAD with a pinch of the serious…

March 28, 2010 by The Noisy Plume

OH GOLLY.

RW and I have been making many trips to our local

ranching supply store so that I can hold all of the fluffy baby things.

At the moment, they have rabbits (yes, I know I look like a gleeful 12 year old in this photo).

They have baby ducks.

They have a million precious little waggling chicken butts.

I want to take everything home.

RW reminds me we can get two little chickies as soon as the coop is finished being built.

Then I say, “WAHHHH.”

And we leave with steer manure and a couple of bales of peat moss instead.

Life is unfair.

I must say, on the serious side of things, I feel like I’ve been HERE but mildly absent lately.

From the blogosphere.

From the interwebs.

Besides hosting company at The Gables and being generally, very busy, I realized last week that I’m losing RW very soon to the Northern Cascades and parachutes and airplanes and in a fit of pure panic I’ve been very conscious about taking a lot of time to hold him close, kiss him every time I walk past him in our house, dance with him, bake him treats, cook him delicious food and spend every spare moment I can muster with him before May hits and I find myself without my best friend. Again.

That’s just the way things are right now.

That’s just the way my priorities are lining up right now.

I’m zealously loving my man in the moment before I have to tell him good bye.

Before long, I’ll be wrapped up in a solo summer

wherein time will be full of other things:

*adventure

*personal growth

*sterling dreams

*gardening

*running and extending my mileage on the mountain

trails, foot after foot, long strides, wind in my hair

*traveling by truck in The West

*fishing, hiking, climbing

It’s a dreadfully fantastic thing, being the wife of a wildland firefighter.

I’m learning, year by year, to look at the summertime as an opportunity

instead of a sum of time to be passed as quickly as possible.

I know it’s only springtime

but I’m looking ahead and preparing myself.

It’s the only way I’m sure I’ll bounce, when the time comes.

In the meanwhile, I’m all heart-akimbo

for my manly-mano

and I thank you for your gracious-excuso

for my quiet-itessmo.

Happy Sunday to you all.

I hope your heart and soul are well rested and ready for a new week!

Grab the next seven days by the horns

and hold on tight.

Love to you,

Jillian

PS Awesomeness alert:

HERE

Filed Under: chickens, fire fighting, RW, spring

Faux Spring

March 27, 2010 by The Noisy Plume

I suppose Idaho isn’t quite ready for springtime.

IMAGE SNAPPED AT 8:42PM, MST.

IN THE DARK. IN THE MIDDLE OF A SPRING BLIZZARD.

Filed Under: idaho, spring, winter