busy at work

Originally uploaded by bbmarie.

This has felt like a busy time. A lot of things to do sort of piling up on each other. I was putting the last touches on a hand carved frame an hour before it and 8 other paintings were gonna be picked up for a show at Fountain Street Church. I just finnished a full page illustration for a magazine which turned into a lot of work mostly becuase I am not yet practiced in the art of making art to fit another person’s needs and vision. I am used to making what I want to make, period.

I am also getting a show of collage paintings readu that will be exhibited at Taylor University in Indiana. They are still waiting on the paper work for that show.

At the end of the month I will be flying to NYC for the IAM Encounter that Mako and his friends have put together. I will be staying in Brooklyn just minutes away from where our family lived two years ago.

In the picture here I am sending some cards out that sold on Etsy. I have set up a shop on line to sell cards and some original art work. It is always exciting when I get a notice that I have sold something. Etsy is exciting for the way it takes the work all over the country and potentially all over the world(though I haven’t made a sale over seas yet).

All this business has not meant a lot of money in the bank as you know if you read the last post. In fact we were down to $136 in our back account and about $30 in cash in our collective pockets when a check from the Chicago gallery came yesterday which put us back in a more comfortable cash flow zone for a while. The whole family watched as the cupboards got more and more bare. For the past few weeks we have been coming back from the grocery store with only the essentials. And I must say living like this has a way of keeping you awake to moment and appreciative of every little thing that gives life its comfort and beauty.

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Prayer Collage in Progress - this ain’t photo-shop!

Originally uploaded by bbmarie.

I just completed the finished work for a magazine illustration. The article was about developing a life of prayer by including the small and regular things of life. It was funny in a way because Brenda and I had prayed that we would get some more illustration work and later that day an art director we had never heard of before sent us an inquiring email after she had discovered our work online. As it turns out, she had prayed that same morning that God would put her together with the right artist for this particular article. (She shared this with me after I confessed that her getting in touch with us was a direct answer to our recent prayer.) I find that very cool.

As it turned out it was a tough job because it took me quite a while to get it right. I am so used to strictly fine art and doing what ever I please it can be a difficult adjustment to be making art to serve someone elses specific need. It is a good reminder that just because God has created an opprotunity in our life in some obvious way does not mean our experience will be an easy one.

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prayer #1

Originally uploaded by bbmarie.

Snow, snow and more snow. It just keeps coming here in Michigan. When it snows like this the chickens pretty much stay in the coop. The other day it had warmed up into the 40s and we had a few chickens in the tractor for the day and then forgot to let them out to roost in the coop for the night and a winter storm kicked up. By the morning they were still alive but covered with snow and ice on much of there feathers. We brought them in the house to thaw out and in the first few minutes one of them dropped the chicken shit mess from hell to let us know that leaving them out all night in a winter storm was NOT all right.

Some times I feel forgotten by God. I know he doesn’t really ever forget about us but it sure can feel that way. We are currently in one of those dwindling check book free falls when simple tasks like grocery shopping become steps of faith. (uh, should I get maple syrup today or just go with out?) I really think God allows these periods of extreme vulnerability to teach us to walk by faith rather than by sight. I know these times are precious becuase he has a way of pulling us in tighter to him through the process of living and trusting when the way ahead is scary.

In Matthew 25 Jesus is telling the story about the master who gives his servants different amounts of money depending on their ability. The first two work with the money they are given to increase it. The double what they were given and are rewarded when the master returns. The third servant buried the money for safe keeping. When the master finds this out he is pissed off and declares that it is “criminal to live cautiously like that!…get rid of this play-it-safe who won’t go out on a limb. Throw him out into utter darkness.” Reading this reminds me that living dangerously is simply the way it is when you are living life God’s way.

The drawing pictured here is an illustration proposal for an article on praying I am currently working on for Disciplship Magazine. The art director rejected this idea so I am currently taking it in a different direction.

Please pray that the Beerhorst family will have what it needs when it needs it (and maybe even a day or two early).

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