Valentine's Day GIVEAWAY!!! WOOHOO!!!!

I have been so inspired lately by the art giveaways from my friends Dotee and Dawn that I too decided that it would be nice to create something for someone to celebrate Valentine's Day!!! Dotee is holding another love art doll giveaway, so you may want to visit her blog here!!!

I didn't really know what i was going to paint at first but looks like i painted an angel lol. After several layers of paint on canvas, some transfer attempts (which i learnt from some instructions by a very talented friend Kelsey), encouraged by music from Andrea Bocelli, leaf prints from the garden, 4 hours of attention without having lunch and voila.......... this is the final outcome. hehe.

If you would like to be in the running for this piece of Original art, please put your name down in the comments section and a name will be drawn on ... how about Wednesday 14th of February!!!

'Love's Muse'

mxed media on canvas

16 by 22 cm

With much Love,

Sulea

Reflections ........

Tired of arguing, explaining or defending,

tired of blocking, avoiding or confronting

tired of reacting, trying, or grasping

no more to excuses, confusion or delusion

futile are words

when the heart is elsewhere

residing in silence

~

Painting - The Burning

The Burning

acrylic on canvas

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february comes

before i am ready

i look to see

what is going on

for i am in my own world
mingling in beingness
waiting for absoluteness
when will mind fall off the brink
of knowingness
into infinite
nothingness

spending the days throwing thoughts
into the furnace of beingness

burning up knowingness
into paintings
and scribbles
watching passion and boredom manifest
from nothing into meaningfulness
and back again to nothingness

like the high and lows of the ocean wave
pushing and pulling
pacing to and fro
not going

anywhere at all

watching

it all turn to dust
memories fade
never existed at all
nothing done in doing

what am i
if i never was

~

Painting - The Sleeper

The Sleeper

acrylic on canvas

60 x 55 cm

I was sleeping when the sun rose, and set

unconscious

in the waking hour

defaulting

to ignorance

- not knowing anymore than that

it took losing myself

in order to find the waking hour

to free the sleeper

from its delusion

It was light

that shattered the delusion

and horrified the sleeper

falling into darkness

before arising

into clear light once more

In sorrow and in joy, the clear light now shines

no longer blind in darkness or in light

the day and night is clear

to that who is

light

Minky the guinea PIG

Munch Munch MUNCH... Minky going spastic over green grass... lol Minky cow... mooo

if you do have a similar pet... maybe a bunny, this cage is just great. it's bottomless, so they can munch on grass and play. Has a shade cloth too to prevent sunburn and over friendly cats.

Plus you will never need to mow your lawn again. it's amazing how much grass they eat.

Not Just Any Ordinary Choc Chip Recipe AWESOME COOKIES

i made these tonight and all i can say is..... you just got to try making these.

i thought it would be a nice idea to make them as a gift for a friend's bday.
They just don't sell cookies like these.... Guaranteed to tame the cookie monster in you.. you got to try it!!! :oD The recipe makes more cookies than is in the jar.

Island Cookies

1 2/3 cups plain flour
3/4 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
187 g butter/margarine (i mixed half half)
3/4 cup packed brown sugar
1/3 cup white granulated sugar
1 tsp vanilla essence
1 large egg
1 3/4 cups Nestle milk choc chips
1 cup dessicated coconut
3/4 cup chopped walnuts

1) Preheat oven to 190 degrees celcius.

2) Combine flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt in a bowl.

3) In a separate bowl, beat butter/margarine, brown sugar, granulated sugar and vanilla essence iin large mixing bowl until creamy. Beat in egg. Gradually beat in flour mixture.

4) Stir in choc chips, coconut and walnuts.

5) Drop slightly rounded tsps of dough onto trays with baking paper on it.

6) Bake in batches for about 15 minutes or until edges are lightly browned. Do not overbake. Cool cookies completely. Makes about 3 dozen cookies.

At Dawn

Hello there.. whoever you are out there...

So is it really 2007.. yes a little late but at least i made it. i'm giggling here at the fact that it's almost the end of January and i've finally come to terms with the fact that we will never see 2006 ever again. Daylight savings however is another matter.... let's not go there lol.

It's been over and around 38 degrees celcius in Perth over the last couple of days. It was still incredibly hot at 9 last night on Australia Day. While everyone else was probably watching the Australia Day fireworks, me and Steve were watching a different kind of fireworks. We sat on the beach at Fremantle and watched an amazing display of lightning over the ocean horizon. No rain ever came.. it felt like we were in the sweltering desert with warm wind blowing sand at our feet. Beautifully surreal .

i've been in my "what's the point of anything" mood lately. Can't seem to get going into anything. Starting but not being able to relax into it, let alone finishing it. Perhaps creativity will come soon.. it's been a good month and half now..

in the meantime, here is something i did a while ago that i haven't shown before. I was thinking about what my dad said to me once.. about the name my grandfather gave me. My name comes in 2 parts, Su and Lea. In chinese, the Lea means the first (inkling) of light at dawn... and Su means delicate or dainty. I'm not too sure i like the dainty bit... and unluckily for all my other female cousins, they too have Su in their names. Unfortunately my brother also started teasing me with Dainty Dawn for a few days after LOL.... but ...... it is really nice to know that in my darkest hour, my grandfather gave me a little torchlight to light me up once again. :o)

Anyway....

'Awakening'

Painting - Nullabor Man

'Nullabor Man' and doggie

acrylic on wood

Sunday 17th December 2006

Possibly my last post for the year 2006...
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I have been quietly grieving inside for the past month. People leaving and somehow i take it personally that they are leaving me. Yet if they did not go, I would not have new experiences and new beginnings. So they go.. so that they too would have new beginnings.. and i grieve.
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And there are those relationships which hurt me so greatly when i am around them and when they go, I still grieve. Perhaps because i am sad that it could never be resolved, perhaps because i couldn't make it better, couldn't make them feel better and i feel so sad they couldn't love me as much as i loved them.
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And in the new year, i will leave my dad once again and break his heart. I really do not like letting people down, it tears me apart.
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i used to wonder why i hated myself so much and then i realized it was because i was carrying around this bag of sad helpless feelings. Over time, it got unbearable, so unbearable i would want to get away from my own company. Sometimes, it's like that but i know now that it isn't me and I am able to look outside it and not be dragged into the delusion of pain and suffering. Perhaps, that's what buddhism meant by existence and the attachment to suffering.
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New beginnings. First, i have to end the old. New beginnings, to embrace it, i must let go of the past, not to forget it.... just to let go.
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What TIME is it???

today is lingering on hesitantly. it's all a blur as to what time it is.. some clocks in the house say it's 5:30 and some say it's 4:30. Is it time to do some gardening and weeding? If it's meant to be 5:30, why is it still so hot?
.
In case you are not from western australia and you're wondering what i'm talking about. We have just recently got daylight savings here. What this means is for the summer, we have to "wind" our clocks forward by an hour. There has been a lot of discussion for and against this move but ultimately, the decision was made by the government for us.
.
It's 5:30 i say to my other half and he goes, no it's 4:30, never heard of 5:30.. so i guess it's 4:30. Determined to ignore day light savings, he is going about as normal but i feel like i'm living in the past. When i think it's 4:30, my heart leaps with excitement to know that i have an extra hour left for the weekend but when i think i'ts 5:30, i am dissapointed.
.
so i look out the window, ignoring whatever time it should be and noticed that it's still hot. I'll wait till the sun goes down before i start on dinner and if i'm still in the mood when that time comes to do some weeding. There is a little resentment in me that we live our lives by the clock. It's like me an my mobile phone. I know it's modern times but carrying around a phone just doesn't agree with my idea of freedom. So i turn the volume down low and hopefully i won't hear it when it rings.
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can i squeeze in another painting for the weekend? is there enough time?.........
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Painting - The Loving Space

'The Loving Space'

acrylic on wood

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The loving space, although it didn't begin intentionally with meaning, i've come to realize that it has a lot to do with how i've been feeling like for the past year.

.

Looking at the space which i have called 'myself', i have seen all kinds of images and experiences appear in it. From the rejection of this space, culminating in great sadness, ironically lead to the acceptance and love of this space. On days where I could not find the space, not knowing where to relate from or relate to, ironically enabled the ownership and formation of the space.

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Most of the time, i feel like i'm nothing but a walking shaped space. And yet, when i, the identity-less space decide to love, then i am no longer meaningless space.

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Painting - Angel of Compassion

'Angel of Compassion'

acrylic on wood

38 by 25.5 cm