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maybe, maybe not….this is a test.

it was the WIND.  about 6 things appeared on the screen today asking me if i wanted to click something, try something out etc.  the last of which was Picasa.  wondering if i might want to update? and since i know they are going to make some changes in April anyway, i clicked OK and

now, i am mad.  maybe.  here is a test to see whether or not i should be mad or if i don't need to.

004

005

006

neither are right, the stitching.  one looks more like a horned toad.  the second was an improvement but it's butt is too big and there needs to be a much more subtle transition into the blueness of the tail.   AND again, it is evident that i need to really address my stitching skill;  come up with a plan and stick to it.  

the other thing here, i am in this moment realizing…..practicing on tea dye muslin isn't going to work.  the Diaries Cloth is dark.  the lizards will be a grey brown.  i need to practice on some of the same Diaries Cloth…or as close as i can find to really have any idea what it will look like.

ok.  am going to go see if i need to be mad at Picasa or not.

and here is an unusual view of the West rim.  if you look hard you can actually see the division of the layered mountain ranges.  ordinarily, it all looks like just one.  i think there are 6 visible here.

002

 

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33 responses to “maybe, maybe not….this is a test.”

  1. grace Forrest Maestas Avatar
    grace Forrest Maestas

    this is me, commenting to my self.
    i just love this view. it is so PLAIN. the evidence seen in
    the distance of human inhabitance is so
    poor.
    nothin much.
    and the skinny horses, uncared for in the pasture. nothin much.
    but i love the view because it is
    us
    living on Earth.
    beneath and above and beyond is Earth. Earth.

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  2. Linda Avatar
    Linda

    i love this view too. such a great state to see and probably to live in. so much SPACE.
    i don’t have this kind of view. i have a good one. lake, mountains, trees but not this.
    but it is also living on earth and living in a good place and a loving it.
    also love your lizard. i think they are fabulous. you are too hard on yourself.
    XOXO

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  3. ali Avatar
    ali

    I love: that you comment to yourself; the view–what an incredibly rich vista, a vivid picture of feet-on-the-ground, grounded rural living; your lizards! there’s real personality in the tilt of their heads, the swagger of their tails, and their tiny reptilian cling-to-the-walls feet

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  4. grace Forrest Maestas Avatar
    grace Forrest Maestas

    yes. New Mexico is New Mexico.
    hard on self…well….hmmmm. if you KNOW that you just
    need to try a little more…………..
    but, thank you and Love…………

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  5. grace Forrest Maestas Avatar
    grace Forrest Maestas

    i wish they were “awake” already. i want to look at
    THEM, for real, not just remember them.
    they are really quite something, how they pause and
    look up at me. even when i am squating as small as
    i can make myself, they need to look up.
    the eye contact is what makes me Crazy about them……..

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  6. Valerianna Avatar
    Valerianna

    Love the lizards! I see the bits you’re not satisfied with, but I love their lizardyness. And your beautiful mountains. I clicked on it so I could see all the receding ridges – beautiful – and soo much like what I was painting yesterday, misty ridges receding in space.

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  7. Michelle in NYC Avatar
    Michelle in NYC

    #1–to be or not to be mad about what?
    #2–lizards are fine…super…individuals.
    #3–i know that gaze…..that looking up gaze. The mice (still here) have that gaze…like a flash before they disappear back into the wall.

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  8. Yvonne Avatar
    Yvonne

    I love your lizards! This morning I could see out my window to an unusually clear view of distant hills that are a series of islands and then mountains – so I took a photo. Normally I might see just the mountains or nothing – so I feel right in tune with your post.

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  9. Nanette Avatar
    Nanette

    I love your lizards too, they’re so real, not fake photoshop lizards. But…I know what you’re feeling, if I’d made them I’d be hard on myself and looking ever so closely and being knit pickety, and I probably wouldn’t believe everyone who came along and said they were just fine. Maybe they lost their tails and the new ones aren’t quite grown back properly…..do your lizards lose their tails when they’re in danger? Some of our Oz ones do. View is great.

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  10. Nancy Avatar
    Nancy

    Grace, I took a picture of a lizard the other day and as I had tried to be super silent and was zooming in on it…I was looking at the whole shape of it to fit it in the screen and then later when I showed it to my guy…it turned out that this lizard was injured and I may have ‘saved’ it from whatever had caught it. There’s lots of cats around here. It was missing a foot and part of its tail. When I looked at the photos closer (in the computer) you could see the trauma it had been through. It had a very old man looking face that made me feel so sad.

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  11. Doris Avatar
    Doris

    Hi Grace I understand very well your critical view on your own work but you have shown the personality of your lizards I think. One can improve the skills thats right but that doesn´t mean that you can express better the soul of your lizards.sometimes perfection prevents to do this.
    I love to look at your mountains. I live in a city, in a quiet street but in the city. I can see a part of the sky but not very much. So I long for seeing the horizon and have always some pictures on my pin wall to look at.
    Please look at your lizards with love.

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  12. saskia Avatar
    saskia

    LOVE the view, the grandness of plain open spaces

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  13. ali Avatar
    ali

    lizard gaze, yes– I know it, too. I stayed in an eco-village in Cuba a few years back, and when I’d go into my room and turn on the light at night, dozens of lizards and frogs would be on the walls and they’d turn and look at me–it was a bit unnerving but also thrilling to feel so connected to the little creatures

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  14. patricia Avatar
    patricia

    For what it’s worth, I think the lizards are great.

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  15. ;uie Avatar
    ;uie

    Since I know so little about cloth and stitching technique, please take that into consideration as I respond to this post: Is your cloth a diary of technique, or is it telling your story? For me, your encompassing, magnificent cloth is telling me your STORY, of your land, of what you hold precious and dear, of who you are and where you fit in this planetary world of ours. I look at cloth with emotional eyes since this is all I know and sometimes, what I see leaves me cold. Tells me nothing about the why of the cloth but all about the flourishes, the mastery of technique;I would much rather see and feel the life knowledge in a cloth.
    .

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  16. deb taylor Avatar
    deb taylor

    OK…now my Mom will be in love with you, as she LOVES lizardy-froggy type critters!!

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  17. grace Forrest Maestas Avatar
    grace Forrest Maestas

    yes…love this. when i was in India, there would be
    geckos all over the walls. i was grateful to them…
    the scorpions….
    and isn’t it something………how different cultures
    differ? the USA in general is so
    sterile in their life habits. the first instinct anymore, to kill it. sad to me.

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  18. grace Forrest Maestas Avatar
    grace Forrest Maestas

    yes, i knew you would connect with those layered
    distances. your misty world is beyond wonderful. it
    makes me wish i could paint

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  19. grace Forrest Maestas Avatar
    grace Forrest Maestas

    1….that Picasa CHANGED things leaving me no way to
    get back to how it was. how it has been. how it WORKS
    for me. they present it as “try this”…but then leave
    no way out.
    3…yes. it’s the same gaze as mice. and the same
    flash before disappearing……..as long as we don’t
    move

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  20. grace Forrest Maestas Avatar
    grace Forrest Maestas

    yes…it takes just the exact right atmospheric condition. i’m going to go look now to see if you posted your islands……

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  21. grace Forrest Maestas Avatar
    grace Forrest Maestas

    nope. no fake lizards here.
    i have never seen these Whiptails do that. i know my
    childhood chameleon did. on a couple occasions. there
    are a few of other lizards here and yes…one of the big
    brown ones had a stump.
    all just “endearing”, but, not so much for a year long
    cloth i’m thinking….
    is the View similar to something you see?

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  22. grace Forrest Maestas Avatar
    grace Forrest Maestas

    i’d never really thought of that before…a lizard with
    an old face…thank you for telling this.
    i think it means that he is very good at getting away,
    with these battle scars. lizards are prey for so many.

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  23. grace Forrest Maestas Avatar
    grace Forrest Maestas

    yes , Doris….i will look at them with love. you are
    such a person, to say that. xoxo
    and i don’t want to lose their soul, but also i want to
    Honor my Whiptails here by showing them as they are…
    it’s a fine line. i am hoping that you see the new
    pics today and think they are good.
    these i love too, but not on this cloth. someday when
    i am ready, i will make many cloths, small ones with
    lizards just as these are.
    i will look forward to what you think about today’s
    lizard.
    if i could give anything to anyone as a gift, it would
    be a horizon. when i lived in a city, i would often
    drive to a high place…up the hill from where i lived
    because of the NEED for horizon. here, it encircles
    me. in all directions. i will “say your name to it”
    whenever i go out…
    thank you more and again for your response to me, to
    my lizards, my world…i love it.

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  24. grace Forrest Maestas Avatar
    grace Forrest Maestas

    yes. the grandness of plain. it took me a while to
    love it to the degree that i have come to. but now,
    i can just feel myself OPEN OUT…expand, with the
    looking……

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  25. grace Forrest Maestas Avatar
    grace Forrest Maestas

    it’s worth a Lot. thank you. and they thank you too.

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  26. grace Forrest Maestas Avatar
    grace Forrest Maestas

    Marti…no…not technique. but i need them to appear
    on the cloth as they are in my heart. i need to honor
    how they look/BE. as close as i can get to that, i want
    to.
    these are Good lizards. i would say that. but they
    aren’t
    soft.
    the Whiptails that dominate this little ecosystem are
    soft looking to me…all smooth and just so tender and
    well…soft. smooth. in my eye almost silky with their
    quickness and humor and willingness to “know” me…
    that’s what i’m looking for. got closer today.

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  27. grace Forrest Maestas Avatar
    grace Forrest Maestas

    GOOOD! cause i sure had an immediate sense of familiarity
    with your mom…or wanted it….
    Moms like her are hard to come by.
    and just to say…i still am trying to teach self how
    to create LINKS…if i ever manage, i’ll link to your
    blog
    Thanks, deb taylor and thank you for coming here and
    looking around. NICE that your toe got caught in the
    ripple, yes?

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  28. ali Avatar
    ali

    Oh, Grace, we do have so much in common- India — I have spent time there, too. Once I came face to face with a cobra–my heart raced but the thrill of making eye contact as she or he fanned her head was something Ill always remember–a sacred moment. Where/when where you in India?
    Ali Lichtenstein
    Sent from my iPhone

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  29. grace Forrest Maestas Avatar
    grace Forrest Maestas

    the Peace Corps. Madhya Pradesh, the Heart of India.
    SOOOOOO many stories from then….it’s one of those other
    selves that i am forever weaving back in…
    you were very lucky to have this exchange with Cobra.
    Very.
    India…such an other World. i love it now when i
    get mixed up with a phone sales person with an accent
    who says his name is Joe. i bug till he tells me REALLY
    where he is and we talk. having the best conversations
    and i tell him how much i love his country.
    AND AND AND…you know which words stand out in brilliant
    color from my oh so rudimentary hindi????
    Chipcali and titalie the spelling may be way off, we
    only learned how to speak
    but
    it’s
    lizard and butterfly.
    of course, she says to her self……….

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  30. Terri Avatar
    Terri

    grace! I never knew you were in India and the Peace Corps. Love this post!!!

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  31. Robyn Ayaz Avatar
    Robyn Ayaz

    I love that near mountain, bare country, my soul country – and yet I love trees deeply! Something about bare rocky ground just grabs at my heart. Sometimes there may be a little grass, sometimes not. How lovely to look out and see that every day. In Pakistan they have those same geckos (home of former husband) and we have lots of lizards in our yard. Thin streaky ones and fat bluetongue lizards that really do give you the eye, the evil eye – I am a bit scared of them as is our cat; they like to raid his food bowl ha! So one lizard is a little lumpy but they both say essence of lizard, really, all lizards.

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  32. grace Forrest Maestas Avatar
    grace Forrest Maestas

    Terri…yes. the kids dad, this was before them, was
    in the draft anxiety…Viet Nam. a way to avoid was
    to join Peace Corps. the only program available at that
    time was for married couples. and so….

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  33. grace Forrest Maestas Avatar
    grace Forrest Maestas

    ooooo eeee the Fat Bluetongue who steel from bowls….
    i’d like to see them someday. i’m going to google
    them. here we do have Gila Monsters that might be
    similar in body type.
    and we also have ones that will rise up on their hind
    legs and run at you…..but they are skinny.
    a Fat one that did that would be a little unnearving….
    don’t you just love All of It?????????
    wonder what they think of us.

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