Heart of the Lotus Comes Home!

So this is the final piece as it looks sitting in my window of my studio. Just this week, Gail called to tell me it has been installed in the door and it has made it to her final resting place in her home in Oak Creek. I can hardly wait to see it! This has been a wondrous journey, from the first phone call to a new and loving friendship. I believe one of the most exciting aspects of my creativity is working with people to help them bring to life the ideas they have in their hearts and minds. It's a beautiful collaboration! What can I create for you?
Happy New Year!
1/1/11

New Name: Raven's Eye CreativeWerks

Raven's Eye Glassworks has now grown to Raven's Eye CreativeWerks. Here is a small preview of my jewelry that will be featured at Zani's Cards & Gifts located at 107 W. Phoenix av, Flagstaff, AZ. Come Join us for December's First Friday Artwalk.

Top image: "Whimsical Goddess", cut glass seed beads, brass, cloisonne beads, raku.

Below: "Tribal Goddess", Batik yak bones capped in sterling silver, graced with pearls, sterling silver heishi, and glass beads.

New Moon in Virgo: Deb O'Connor's wise words

Please share these notes with your friends.

New Moon in Virgo

3:30 AM PDT

Wednesday

September 8, 2010

"To meet everything and everyone through stillness, instead of mental noise, is the greatest gift you can offer to the universe.” Eckhart Tolle

Take a deep breath. Please. And another.

In the spirit of these last days of retrograde Mercury in Virgo . . . and of the moon renewing itself in Virgo early this morning, I'm going to keep this note simple.

Every new moon is born out of the dark. And this empty dark is fertile ground for the nourishing seed of your desire to notice the difference between the voice within you which is clear and present, and that other voice . . . the one which isn't yours anyway.

Please be aware of any thoughts or words rising within you which are blaming you for being inadequate. They are ghosts of other times and other people. They do not belong to you. Simply say STOP. Do not let these confidence-bashing words into your head any more. And if you feel yourself picking away critically at someone else, please just stop. When you try to analyze what's happening, you will only find yourself standing in a deeper hole.

We are being tutored in the fine art of humility. This is a different concept than shame. Please be sure you notice the difference.

What if a humble approach to our lives means that we focus our attention on the nobility of a simple squash lying in the garden rather than on the blathering voice coming out of our television or radio or from inside our head?

What if humility means quieting our minds so that we can remember to lift our eyes to the dark, luminous night sky where hundreds of thousands of birds are migrating at night, guided by the stars?

Today is the perfect time to notice the perfection in all things, and to let that awareness be enough.

Many rich blessings upon you.

Deborah O'Connor

deb@lovedogdesign.com

406.531.5129

New work: Heart of the Lotus

Now that the Butterfly is done, "Costa Rica: Metamorphosis Part 3" I am focusing on my next commission, "Heart of the Lotus"

Here is the art work above and the piece in progress as it looks on my work bench. This will go in an entry way door. The size is 25"x 36".

When I first talked to Gail, I was boarding a plane to Chicago to relocate my Mom and Dad down to Little Rock, AR. My art was on hold and I had no idea when I would be able to resume my passion. But in those few minutes on the phone, I knew I really wanted to work with her! I was so happy when she called me back months later to start what has become a wonderful friendship!

Thank you Gail for having faith in me and understanding the chore I had to do and believing that I was the right artist to create this piece!

The elements for the "Lotus", including the tree, the red rocks, the sun and moon were inspired from Gail's home in Oak Creek Canyon.

I think what I love the most about creating glass for people is learning who they are and helping them bring to reality, a vision that they have.

This piece has a new challenge: the center of the lotus blossom will have a large crystal in the center, so it will be thicker then the glass and will have special consideration when soldering it together. I'll keep you posted on what I come up with and the final out come.

Peace,
Christina

Coming soon... Raven's Eye Glassworks expands into the world of jewelry. I have returned to my love of beads. Working with primarily Tibetan beads, semi-precious gems and minerals, seed beads and sterling findings. I am creating a line of necklaces that are substantial and earthy. Posting images soon!

Costa Rica:The Blue Morpho Stained Glass Piece

This is the final piece. It measures 20"x30". This piece is available for sale, please contact me for more information about this and other pieces I have. It took awhile, but it was worth the time and detail. Inside the moon I sandblasted a poem.

Defeated by Love by Rumi,

"The sky was lit by the splendor of the moon
So powerful I fell to the ground
Your love has made me sure I am ready to
forsake this worldly life and surrender
to the magnificence of your Being"

This is the artwork
The poem is perfect. One night about a week into the trip I couldn't sleep and I walked out to the beach and lay in a hammock just yards from the ocean. Looking up, there was the full moon in all of her glory shining through the fronds of a coconut palm. Too good to be true, but it was true. I was moon struck.

Flagstaff Open Studios Tour: Ladies of the Canyon 2010

It's here again, but this year it is a month earlier! August 28-29, 10am-5pm each day.

Please come out and celebrate a weekend of creativity with us; Joni Pevarnik, pottery; Ryanne Sebern, uniquely original jewelry; Christina Norlin etched and stained glass.

Raven’s Eye Studio Location #25 in the catalog:
1255 Cox Ave. (Mountain Dell)
From the Visitors Center at Rt 66 & Beaver str. West on Route 66,
follow road to left under RR overpass (turns into Milton Rd).
At sixth traffic light turn right onto Forest Meadows. At first traffic light
turn left onto Beulah, continue through third traffic light. Go half a mile
on 89A and bear right at fork onto Mountain Dell Rd. Turn right onto
Sinclair to the 4th street, Cox, turn right, studio is just past the
stone house on the right corner.

Directions from Phx. on I-17: Exit # 337 Pulliam Airport, left on to
John Westley Powell Blvd, then right (north) onto 89A, 2 miles to
hard left to Mountain Dell Rd. Turn right onto Sinclair, Then to the 4th
street, Cox, turn right, studio is just past the stone house on the right
928-699-6824

Quaff & Nosh will be provided by:
Simply Delicious
928-774-2855

We will be doing demonstrations, so bring the kids!!

This is the Moon of Love

Full Moon in Pisces

10:05 AM PDT

Tuesday

August 24, 2010

“You who let yourselves feel: enter the breathing that is more than your own.” Rilke

Ultimately, all our questions return to our desire to understand Love. Yet so often we confuse ourselves with the allure of romance. The difference between being in-love-with-love and being in the presence of Love is an important one.

The astrological reference is this one: Tonight we feel the tug of the mystical Pisces’s Full Moon as it merges with Pisces’ ruler, Neptune, and with Chiron, the Wounded Healer. And, simultaneously, we are experiencing Mars and Venus tightly coupled in relationship-focused Libra.

For several weeks, and continuing through September, Mars and Venus are helping us to see where we've created balance--and where we're seeking balance--relative to our human desire for love.

* Enter tonight’s (and tomorrow night’s) Pisces Full Moon. Pisces teaches us that in our search to be loved, we so often miss the obvious . . . we are Love.

Pisces helps us sense the compassionate Universal Heart energy which floods our human bodies every minute of every day. The human body is, indeed, a temple . . . and the energy of this moon reminds us that we are Infinite Light moving within and out from the human experience.

Pisces understands that grief and longing for completion are part of the experience of Love. This full moon is coupled with Chiron which suggests that we may sense the places in our lives where we've felt both unloved and unlovable. Tonight's moon is reminding us of the Love which we carry within ourselves.

This is energy which can also create no small dose of delusion, so please watch for any old habits which seem to offer escape from the rough edges of your life.

You can expect a rich dream life these next couple nights. And with Pisces, it's often unclear where the dream begins and where it ends. But whatever, or whether, the dream, it is nourished by our capacity to surrender ourselves, humbly and bravely, to the wonder which is Grace.

Please share these notes with your friends.

Much peace to you.

Deborah O’Connor

deb@lovedogdesign.com

www.lovedogdesign.com

406.531.5129