Compass Rose

Originally uploaded by Two Cranes

I love compass roses. If you visit my store at www.patinae.etsy.com you’ll see other compass roses there. This collage is one of my favorites because I used one of my best stamps, a literary stamp from Monaco that illustrates a scene from the book Five Weeks in a Balloon by Jules Verne.

On the advice of my daughter, I decided to mat my collages using 8×10 mats in cream or black. This was good advice. They look wonderful matted. My collages are small, intimate, meant to be viewed up close. I like to frame them and put them next to a chair, or in my hall (with good lighting) so someone can get close and examine all the beautiful details of the stamps.

  This is the second installment in my recipe series.  The Dutch Oven Cookbook is where I am getting all these recipes that are becoming my favorite things to make.  Decided to make this because it’s easy and not too fatty.

MAKES 8 SERVINGS

1/4 cup olive oil*

1 cup peeled and finely diced yellow onion

5 cloves garlic, peeled and minced*

1 1/2 pounds ground turkey

1 red bell pepper, stemmed, seeded, and finely chopped

1 cup diced celery*

One 12-ounce jar of your favorite salsa

One 28-ounce can diced plum tomatoes with sauce

Two 14.5-ounce black beans, rinsed and drained

One 14.5-ounce can corn, drained

1/2 teaspoon chili powder*

1/4 teaspoon ground cumin*

Salt and pepper to taste

Grated pepper Jack cheese, for garnish

  ♦  Heat the olive oil with the onions and garlic in a 51/2-quart Dutch oven over medium heat.  Cook for 5 minutes.  Add the ground turkey and brown lightly, crumbling with a fork as it cooks.  Add the red pepper and celery.  Then add the salsa and simmer uncovered for five minutes.  Add the tomatoes with sauce, black beans, corn, chili powder, and cumin.  Season with salt and pepper.

    This is the new best thing I’ve ever made, it’s perfect for this time of year.  I love making this chili because it’s quick and it taste so labor intensive.  I like to cook 6 strips of bacon first to season the pot, because I do this I don’t use the *1/4 cup of olive oil.  At the end I cut up and put the bacon in the chili.  *I use 9 cloves of garlic.  Celery for me in this recipe is not appealing, I have made it twice and used celery both times and didn’t like it, I am currently storming to think of what I could replace it with.  *For the cumin and chili powder the amount you will use depends on your spices.  A good French bread makes a great addition to this chili.  I hope you enjoy this recipe as much as I do.    

People do judge a book by its cover.  Or at least, it’s the cover that gets people to pick up the book in the bookstore and see whether they like it.  Here are rough cover ideas for Two Bad Pilgrims.

Art Director Jim Hoover liked Idea A  I did tight sketches of the boys, the New Worlde mappe and the title type, which Jim put together as a comp.

The boys and the map are painted as a single image.  One last request: show the boys having burst through the map.  The compass rose is a separate piece of art.  The type I inked in as separate black & white art.  Jim Hoover combined these elements into one cover image and added the credits at the bottom.

Check out the latest Standards Shot – a review from 3rd grade social studies produced by Mrs. Clarken’s class!  Is your pen pal featured?

So at the beginning of this school year, one of my best friend’s roommates found out I was an art major.  He was planning on getting a new tattoo and asked if I could help draw one out for the tattoo artist. Honestly I was a little scared about the whole thing because I hate making things for people and them not liking what I come up with.  He knew he wanted  a compass rose since he’s a huge outdoors-man.  The issue was what to put inside of it.  I then thought of the helm of a boat for the center (the steering wheel).  I drew it out and then that weekend he came back with a new tattoo.  Here’s a picture of his tattoo and the concept I created.  It’s crazy to me that an idea I had is permanently on someone’s body.

We mounted a 4 x 4 block on the building at the Evart airport yesterday. Apparently there is some history revolving around the Compass Rose pattern and small airports. I need to find out more about that.

Compass Rose on Evart Airport

    Okay I have decided to start using my dutch oven my fiance got form me last year.  I picked up an awesome book from Compass Rose (a local shop here in Olympia) titled “The Dutch Oven Cookbook”.  Ripping from “Julie and Julia” I am going to try my hardest to make all the recipes in this book.  So the first I chose is lentil sausage soup.

 Makes 8 servings

1 cup dried lentils

2 quarts (8 cups) chicken broth(vegetable both will work)

1 cup chopped yellow onion

1 clove garlic, peeled and chopped

1 bay leaf

1 1/2 cups peeled and chopped carrots

1 cup finely chopped celery

8 ounces smoked sausage, halved lengthwise then cut crosswise into 1/2 inch slices

Salt and pepper to taste

♦Put the lentils, chicken broth, onion, garlic, bay leaf, carrots, and celery in a 5 1/2-9 quart Dutch oven.Simmer over low heat, uncovered, for 45 minutes.Add the sausage and cook for ten minutes longer.

♦Season with salt and pepper

    I have cooked this twice now and I have some suggestions.  Because there are so few elements to this dish it is vital you use quality ingredients.  I have been able to find most ingredients at the local Olympia Farmers Market.  The elements I couldn’t find were bay leaves, lentils, and chicken broth.  I used Linguisa from Stewart’s Meat Market, veggies from the Wobbly Cart, and chicken broth from Trader Joes.  Salt has never been necessary due to the Linguisa.

    This has been the best food I have ever made.  When I tasted it the first time the thing that came to my head was “mom” food, you know the kind of meal you don’t make becuase you want your mom to make it because she does it best.  This is definitely a recipe I will be making for a long time.

M.F. 

You married standing on one at the Courthouse famous for its Malibu tiles.  Your head was full of dreams about stability and a white picket fence and the decent man you chose because of the way he held your cat Alladin in his arms like a little baby.

He stood behind you and pointed out all the constellations in the night sky.  He knew all of them.

“You were making chicken with roasted potatoes,” he says later.

“I loved that.”

These nights you look to the stars for guidance.  The stars that hang brightly above in a dome when the fog doesn’t obscure them.

You married standing on that compass rose and two of your best friends were there, and your mother, and it was a civil ceremony.

Civil for civilized.

Which is what you were.

Once.

“My mother cooked that for me,” he says.

Your recipe was different.  You put rosemary and onions and the whole thing reduced itself in your largest cast iron pan to a smoked sweetness.  Honeyed carrots were what you served with this.  Buttery honeyed carrots blanched until perfectly orange.

You grew the rosemary outside with other potted herbs and lemons.  A potagerie.

He had no idea what that was or what that meant, did he?  At first.

Years later he says, “I don’t see why people use garlic.”

He doesn’t like garlic even though he has consumed every exquiste thing you ever made for him that was full of its redolence and slow smoky charm.

Twenty four years worth as a matter of fact.  You were his third wife.

He was your first husband.

The glittering padre tiles shined waxen as you climbed the steps.

Your tiny bouquet held narcissus and rose.

You were dressed in street clothes, avant garde in the way you dressed then.  There are pictures to prove it, and papers to prove it, even though you realize later that he has spent the better part of 24 years trying to erase you from the face of this earth.

The fact that he picked the rings should have been a tip off.

You liked a different one.

You never had a real engagement.

Not the way your brother had his.

Your brother and his big shiny diamond ring that she wanted a certificate of authenticity for, in las Vegas.

The whole thought of that made you cry.

You wake up with the clarity you had as a child reading Nathaniel West.

You realize that he has been something like a boa constrictor.

Once Daddy found one in the yard when you were kids.  It had wedged itself into the circular ring the Eucalyptus trees made that was your secret childhood fort.

It had slithered from somebody else’s house right on over to yours and Mommy was in the kitchen baking brownies from a box that was never supposed to fail.

You had a feather boa once.

You might have even had that boa when the two of you met, because you still had costumes then.  You had vintage things and kimonos and antiques and your whole family was there if you needed them.

The first thing you buy on the run is a paper parasol.  Red.  And a straw bag, or several straw bags because it is summer and somehow he has turned you into a bag lady on the street or in her car.

Maybe he couldn’t stand the frenchness of it all.

And so as he started in on the removal of your spirit like the slow chinese drip of water at your third eye — a process which must have been planned in secret for years, in the dark, like a slithering snake might…

You woke up like Kerouac one fine fogged in morning with the word “Enough,” ready to pounce straight out of your pen.

And it did.

A mariner’s compass is what you will need in the first days.

You fashion this from bits of twigs and feathers that you find by the side of the road or circumstances you fall into accidentally or friends who reach towards you and professionals whose advice you have sought.

Black feathers.

Crow’s feathers.

You start to make a collection of them like the way he kept the ones from hawks.

It was all just a dream, wasn’t it?

Like that child that you wanted or the white picket fence and the lapstrake cottage under the big pine tree.

It was all just a dream or a nightmare that will pass soon, as one door opens and another door closes and you realize that it took you years to arrive at Hesse.  It took you years to really understand Siddhartha.

Your life has been a quest to arrive at non-attachment.

Mommy calls out that the brownies are ready and you slip back into being only eight again, loving chocolate, and Daddy out there with a shovel rousting that big snake out of the fort you and your little brother play in.  It’s brown and white and the biggest scary thing you have encountered so far in your little life.

Later you realize that there are good Daddies in the world, and even men who wanted to be daddies in the first place.

You realize that all he ever wanted from you was slavery.

What he wanted were the coins you could produce to fatten his coffers.

* * *

“Compass Rose” — copyright 2009 by Valentine Bonnaire ~ all rights reserved.

*authors note for this piece — a piece of music came to mind to go along with this — it’s a song by one of my favorite bands ever — the Talking Heads — “Houses in Motion.”  You can listen to it at this link from Rhapsody as well as hear other songs of theirs.

I’ve had this tattoo for years and now I’d like to add to it, making it the center of a compass rose.

I’ve been playing with surrounding the sun with an outer circle of blue green waves, directional lines emanating from the points of the largest rays.  Do I make the blue green waves a free-standing ring around the sun, or does the blue begin at the edge of the sun…..?  The black has bled a bit, so the blue coming to the edge of the sun would effectively clean the bleeding up.

Hmmm……

The two ducks are regular visitors from our local city park.  These two and a few others of their kind have learned to fly from home to home where bird feeders are kept.  Other birds feed, inadvertently knocking food onto the ground, and the waterfowl eat song bird feed for free.

Actually, this post concerns the backyard hobby windsock, part of my post-collegiate desire to broaden my knowledge of the sciences.  I created this windsock and wind rose by making a trip to the local Walmart for the windsock, pole,  small, but visible from our upstairs windows, stone markers, and to Micheal’s for the little wooden cross (more about that in a moment).

Step one was to employ my trusty large brass compass to find magnetic north.  Then I made the adjustment for true north for my home.

Step two was to lay out a circle and mark true north on the circumference with a small fleur dis lys (lis) shaped stone.

Traditionally, European compasses used a letter “T” to denote north because the world traveling Renaissance Italian mariners gave the winds the names used in cartography and navigation for many decades to come.  That “T” was later replaced by the fleur de lys.  I decided to follow, rather than spurn, tradition when constructing my simplified wind rose.

Step three was to mark all other seven points (save true east) with the stones of scallop design (no tradition or standard for these).  I think these things are actually meant to be feet for concrete flower pots.  I secured these things with tent stakes.

Step four was to use a small cross for east.  Mariners of the Renaissance and later typically used the cross to denote east — the direction of Jerusalem from ports of the European Mediterranean from whence the mariners issued forth to places far away in search of trade.  Many wind roses and compass roses used in cartography or ornamental design, indeed many compasses too are to this day embellished with a cross and fleur de lys.

Step five involved installing the pole and securing the windsock (using some extra wire to better secure the windsock for those occasions of very high winds).  It’s sturdy and secure.  Note:  it is the center of the windsock itself, not the pole that is directly above the center point of the wind rose.

Now I’ve a device for measuring wind direction. With eight points of the compass rose marked I can interpolate my readings with the same accuracy (to 16 points) as Weatherbug.com (and mine reports instantly rather than a minute or two later).

I made my windsock and wind rose with no intention of using windsocks that also are calibrated for wind speed.  One could establish, if only crudely, such calibration for this windsock, but that’s not interesting yet.  Give me time,  my interest in meteorology is certain to increase.

Just purchased another geocoin. This will be the first one of these I purchased. I’ve heard a LOT about these geocoins, but have never gotten one – until today.

Description and info:

Born from the deserts of western Asia, the Crystal Compass Rose Geocoin™ is made of pure glass and is made available in three different shades of color. Each coin is individually cut from very thick glass. The coin features a compass rose design on the front side with text on the backside. The compass rose design is extensively sandblasted into the front side to provide a deep relief image for a quality feel. The coin is then put through a delicate hand polishing process to give it a crystal clear appearance. The hand polishing process provides numerous small, flat, and slightly refractive surfaces on the edge making each coin subtly different from another. Due to the large amount of hand labor that goes into making them, it can take anywhere from 5 to 8 weeks to complete a small batch of these coins.

The Crystal Compass Rose Geocoins™ are approximately 2″ in diameter and 7mm thick. Each coin is trackable on Geocaching.com and the series has its own unique icon. The tracking numbers are engraved directly into the surface of each coin preserving its permanence.

    * 2″ diameter and 7mm thick.
    * Made of pure glass
    * Has a unique icon that shows on your profile when you log a discovery
    * If enough are ordered, then each shade of glass will have their own unique icons for a total of three icons.

Special Note:
Due to the amount of hand work that goes into making these coins, it can take anywhere from 6 to 9 weeks to make these coins after the presale ends, plus the amount of time it takes for your postal system to ship them

to you. Do not order these coins if you do not want to wait this long for the coins to be shipped out to you. Carefully read our presale program terms and make special note that complaints about this timeline will result in us permanently cancelling your order.

The one I just purchased is the “Crystal Compass Rose Geocoin – Earth Stone”

I think it’s a great looking geocoin. Can’t wait to get it so I can take a few photos of it!

I can’t remember the last time I used a single bookmark. I tend to have something for different moods and mentalities. Some nights don’t allow me to read “just one more chapter” until the wee hours of the morning so I’ll keep temptation at bay by not reading a page turner. I currently have bookmarks in:

1. Ravens in the Library: A fundraising fantasy anthology that I’ve slowly been savoring since its arrival on April Fool’s day. Because it’s personally precious I’m less inclined to put it in my duffle as I usually do when away, which leads me to…

2. The Compass Rose by Ursula Le Guin: The day after saying I hadn’t yet read any of Le Guin’s short stories, a friend handed me this sci-fi anthology. It’s good, but is better digested one or two stories at a time. After reading about quantum theory my head wanted to implode. Ravens and Compass balance each other out quite nicely. At my personal library- I mean my friend’s- I’m also reading some…

3. Irish folklore: Knowing my love for mythology and all things Celtic, my friend passed me this some time ago. It’s easy to pick up and continue whenever I’m over.

4. Animal-Speak by Ted Andrews: An encyclopedia of sorts about animal medicine and totems that I decided to read from cover to cover after a conversation with a friend and spiritual mentor about going back to basics. It has a lot of interesting information about animals in general and is good for those “short read” nights.

5. Tao Te Ching translated by Urusla Le Guin: Meditavive poetry. I’m on my second cycle, but it’s one those books that can be flipped to any page, like #33- “Kinds of Power”:

Knowing other people is intelligence,
knowing yourself is wisdom,
Overcoming others takes strength,
overcoming yourself takes greatness.
Contentment is wealth.

Boldly pushing forward takes resolution.
Staying put keeps you in position.

To live till you die
is to live long enough.

6. the Bible: I’m a Jewish Pagan who likes learning about religions and beliefs, whether my own or not. I also like having a better idea of where the other person is coming from when getting into debating discussions. I’m still in the Old Testement, Samuel I/Kings I to be exact. After hearing which translation I’ve been reading, a friend said, “you’re reading the 17-something-something version of the King James! What a slogger”. The language is fine, it’s the who begat who, detailed descriptions of construction (100 cubits by 100 cubits), and repetitiveness that slow it down. I haven’t decided yet if I’ll continue slogging through or take her suggestion of changing translations.

That’s what I’m in the middle of at the moment. Is anyone else an ADD-reader like me? Be it one or more, what are you reading? Or from this week’s Booking Through Thursday:

Some people read one book at a time. Some people have a number of them on the go at any given time, perhaps a reading in bed book, a breakfast table book, a bathroom book, and so on, which leads me to… 1. Are you currently reading more than one book? 2. If so, how many books are you currently reading? 3. Is this normal for you? 4. Where do you keep your current reads?

Take a peek at how I made  “Neverland.” Many of my ATCs use a somewhat similar thought process. While I’m sure you are capable of all these techniques, I always find it fascinating to see how other artists work, so I thought I’d share. And who knows? You might learn something. Also, there is a mini-tutorial on drawing a compass rose included. Enjoy!

ATC Tutorial: The Making of “Neverland.”

Step 1:Choose a suitable page of text, preferably one that is nice and yellowed, like the one pictured. Using an extra-fine tipped felt pen, draw your map. I used my brown “Le Pen” pen, but the Steadtler fine tip pens in the picture would work, as would one of the new sharpy pens. As you can see, my map looks pretty pathetic right now. Just have faith and continue on. Trust me. I was worried too. Also, ten points if anyone can recognize what book this is from.

Step 2:Using a medium to light brown colored pencil, shade the edges of the land (essentially, all the beaches). I shaded about half a centimeter in, then let the color fade out. Don’t forget to shade the islands too. Also, I shaded the sides of the mountains for dimension.

Step 3:Using a tan colored pencil, shade towards the interior, starting where the previous color began to fade, then lighter towards the center

Step 4: Using a dark brown pencil, shade just inside the lines, giving the effect of blending the linework into the colored pencil. The shading should be only slightly wider than if you were drawing rather than coloring.

Step 5: Shade in the forest areas using a light green. It shouldn’t be much more of a tint, so don’t make it too dark.

Step 6: Shade the perimeter of the water, along the beaches and around the islands using sky blue. Fade the color as it moves further from the edges.

Step 7: Using a slightly darker shade of blue (even though you can’t tell in the picture for some reason, the pencil is a different color blue) outline the edges of the water, like you did with dark brown on the land. If needed, make and touch ups to the map (I did more shading with tan, and extended my sky blue further down so there would be enough for the card) and then set it aside.

Step 8: Using your ultra-fine tipped felt pen, draw a compass rose. Now, if you are trying to draw one without a reference, its pretty intimidating. However, with a bit of guidance, its really not so bad. I created a mini-tutorial to help you along.

Step 9: Using the dark brown pencil, shade in the darkest parts: the undersides of the East and West points, the center facing parts of the SW and SE points, and the undersides of the NW and NE facing points. Concentrate the darkness towards the center. Also, shade a bit of the North doo-dad (I forgot and had to go back and do it later).

Step 10: Shade in the lighter shadows using the light brown. I shaded the right side of the North and South points, the top of the SE and NW points, and the tips of all the darker points.

Step 11: Using tan, shade all metal parts (star points, rings, and North doo-dad) with tan, coloring over the parts already colored.

Step 12: Lightly color over all metal parts with orange and yellow to warm up the colors some and make them seem more like gold or bronze.

Step 13: I am a naughty tutorial maker. I should have done this in two steps, but I wasn’t paying attention and didn’t take a picture until this point. Oh well. First, I used blue to color in the center background segments, and then shade the edges of the outer background segments. Then I colored over both with robin’s egg blue, touching up with blue where needed. Then, I used robin’s egg blue to add just a bit of shading and dimension to the metal parts, mainly shading corners and darker areas.

Step 14: Check to be sure your compass looks done. I darkened some of my shadows, drew in “creases” on the main star at NW, NE, SE, and SW, and lightly shaded the letters. Once you are satisfied, cut out, leaveing some edge around the letters and compass. You may also want to ink the edges, but do so carefully.

Step 15: Here is where things start coming together. Cover the ATC base with the map drawing. Decide on placement of the compass (don’t be afraid of overlapping or letting parts hang off the edge)  I already had an idea in mind, but I discovered one problem: the compass faded into the map too much. I tried blue tissue paper first, but the blue I had was too bright. I then tried a bit of white, and it was a perfect balance of translucence and visibility, and the wrinkled/torn look added to the feel of the card. So I arranged the two, and glued them down.

Step 16: I tried folding back the excess edges (don’t cut! It leaves raggedy edges) and I noticed the eye was wondering right on out of the top corner. Can’t have that! So, I used another scrap of tissue paper to provide a barrier. The bottom right looked a little bare, so I chose a fleur de lis style flourish stamp and stamped it in brown. I stamped it faintly in the top left corner too, but you can barely see it.

Step 17: Through the whole project, I was trying to choose a quote, and I wanted something related to adventure. The first part of this kept coming into my mind, but it said blue to me (like flying in the sky…) not maps and such. I had a few other ideas, but when I went searching, and I saw the full line, and I decided it was perfect afterall. Now is the time to write it out. Decide on where you want it broken up (each word? each letter? phrases? if so, which?) and write it out as such. Make sure you write it small enough. Also, if you’d like, tint the paper. When I wrote it the first time, I tinted it a light blue with prismacolor markers, but it was too large. The second time, I decided I liked white better.

Step 18: Last step! Cut out words, ink the edges with brown, and decide on placement.  I chose to have mine somewhat follow the torn edge of the white tissue paper, and group by phrases (as two phrases were split into two segments.) Play with it till you find something that looks good and reads right. Glue everything down. Fold any excess edges from tissue paper or compass onto the back and glue them down as well. Finally, ink the edges with brown. Voila! Done.

I hope you enjoyed it, and maybe found a bit of inspiration. As always, I’d love to see anything you make. Drop me a link and I’ll take a look.

P.S. Take a look at my other ATCs.

La più grande rosa dei venti al mondo si trova in California, nei pressi del Dryden Flight Research Center ed è stata tracciata sul letto di un fiume prosciugato. Il diametro della figura misura ben 1,21 km tanto che è possibile distinguerla dalle foto satellitari su Google Maps.
La rosa, che punta verso il nord magnetico, viene anche utilizzata dai piloti per calibrare alcuni indicatori di posizione.
Ecco alcune immagini: