Where to from Here ?

Hi Everyone !

My apologies for it being such a long time since my last post. I had a huge mess to clean up after the Flower show and a lot of orders to process ! We had our final wrap-up meeting today and it was good to see everyone again and to get a final report on the show.

So now it is time to take a look back for a moment and say good-bye to Winter and hello to Spring. I feel like I barely touched winter this year. Usually it is one of my most treasured seasons for working with the landscape and the weather. The challenges of the cold are difficult, but the rewards of working materials so bright and gravity-defying are really something I look forward to. I feel as if somehow I missed winter entirely this year because I did not get to make many sculptures with snow and ice.
In Vermont and Northern NY we can usually count on fresh snow and cold even well into March. We have often had some of our biggest snowfalls this month and as kids we always took our ski camping trips near the official end of winter because the snow was deep but the days were long. But this winter has just faded away with hardly a whisper.

In my planning for the Flower Show, I would skip certain snow days in January and even in Feb. because I told myself there would still be March, and I imagined that after the show was over,THEN I would be able to focus on working with the ice and snow in earnest ... but not this year! It's nearly all gone now... s,o sadly... the season may be done and I have made only a handful of winter sculptures.... so sad.... I can't quite believe it !

We may have one more round of cold next week, but there is no more workable snow down here in the valley. There is only old ice along the lakeshore and a few places along the river banks, which can be interesting and perhaps something can still be done, but I feel so out of touch with it I'm not sure I'll even be able to make anything should conditions be right. I may just have to wave good-bye to winter... hence this image.

Birds are returning and soon the green shoots will be appearing... it might make more sense to look forward instead and focus on what can be made in the coming months. One thing is for sure.... more Faerie houses !! The feedback that I got from the show told me that people really want to see more of these creations so more are on their way ! In fact, I've got one nearly completed and will wait for the right location to reveal itself. It is a piece made for the Flower Show but will be lovely to see out in a more natural setting, so... I'm still here and working and I hope you will come back and keep checking in.

Thank you for being patient and for all your orders and special requests ! I hope I've finally got the last one out the door tomorrow... and then it's back to making more sculptures !!