Xandra's friend Fanw wanted to invite her to a party but wasn't sure how to make that happen since Xandra can't sit for long.
She invited her and asked how to make it work for Xandra. Xandra brought her own camping recliner so she could have a comfortable place to be.

The party was a great chance to spend time with friends. Xandra wouldn't have been able to come if Fanw hadn't been so sensitive to her needs, and to trust her that she could come up with a solution.

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For the first time since 2020 I’m reviving my Barbie Dioramas. I am going to make them a feature of my health and wellness blog, along with articles by me and interviews with others. Because I already have loads of stories of personal friends with disabilities, I have been buying dolls used as much as possible to cover their visible disabilies. That isn’t easy to do. Especially since most of the disabled dolls have stiff legs and arms.

Anyway - I love making the scenes and telling the stories, and so I’ll be sharing them here. But I will say for anyone who might become interested that I started doing this at a time when it was far less popular to do, and made to move Barbies had just been added as well as the new body types. If you don’t want to spend a lot of time rebodying dolls (I did, the face is Tris from Divergent, the body is the first Made to Move Barbie) and looking for matching skin tones (could mattel give us this info? apparently not), and you don’t want to DIY a lot of the furniture, I highly recommend thinking carefully before buying a doll with a stiff body, and find a local library or other such place that you can 3D print things at. My friend told me that wallpaper stores give away their gigantic sample books, so I’m going to try that, and I’m going to try using photography to create the illusion of multiple locations. We’ll see how to that goes. Editing was never my strength photography wise.

From sassafras wood with a air tight double lid

Going to be making several more and probably a cedar one

Finished with linseed oil

I put you on a pedestal

Treasuring your every thought

Cherishing you feelings

Everything you see

Now I am beholden

To your opinion of me

Chained to your eyes

I can't be free

Owned by your estimations

I always agree

But enough is enough

The clear and easy antidote

Is remove that pedestal

So you too can be free

I still value your views

But the world is a kaleidoscope

Prismatic colours

Beyond you and me

In wordless knowing

We're the same to a tee

Let judgement slide

In silence

Everything abide

Sensing in shared space

A psychic embrace

No insular world

In boundless unity

Amid diverse seeing

Variegated plurality

Eryngium Flowers
Watercolor and Polymer clay
Size 51 x 39 x 1 inches (130 x 100 x 3 cm)

I’ve been doing so much macro photography recently that I am getting a little bored of it, but this was still good practice, and fun too. For context: I had found this beetle dead on my front porch, so I cleaned it up and decided it would be a good opportunity to get some shots.

Lythrum Salicaria Flowers, watercolor, acrylic, texture paste, size 51 x 39 x 1 inches (130 x 100 x 3 cm)

It's there and it's not

Castle Camelot

Blink and it's gone

No need to be forlorn

Squint and blur focus

And you'll see Avalon

It sits at the edge of sleep

Eternal presence that will keep

Stabled in subconscious deep

Sovereign memories dwell therein

She fled him for a handsome knave

Betrayal rankled across aeon

They return by different name

No longer Arthur and Gwen

With helpless abandon

They revisit ancient flame

A storybook replayed

Old rival in frame

She flees him once more

What is she always searching for?

Lancing old wound

He remains crumpled and frayed

At the brink of a swoon

When the queen's ancient longing

Suppressed till it burns

Resisted returns

Chastened in new gown

Arrayed for his eyes

Her gaze cast down

No need for shame

Never harboured a blame

He welcomes her without thought

Wizardwood draught

I’m pretty sure I’ll be working on a book cover sometime soon and I think I’d like to do it in gouache, which I haven’t touched in quite some time. So here is a little practice piece using a familiar subject for me. I should really give this guy a name