Bit by Bit with Ruthie

December 18, 2025

Dear Liza,

Ruthie Inman is not just an old and dear friend, she is an artist who manages to challenge and open my brain every time we get together on ZOOM. At our four-times-a-month Zoom classes, she comes up with projects that expand my idea of What Art can be.

This month, we started by cutting out and painting nine rectangles of similar (but not identical) sizes and painting each of them two colors.

Then we cut circles that would fit into the rectangles, sectioned, and colored them. There were also circles with loosely-goosey spirals. It was an intriguing set of things, but I didn’t see it turning into much.

I didn’t like the flat colors, so I gave the rectangles some flicks of black and the circles, some grey. They looked more folksy and organic.

The next class, things got more interesting as we started stacking our shapes. Seeing which colors went well together, I altered some, adding black lines or white highlights. International stamps and Gelli prints came into play.

We cut and added Corrugated cardboard circles, to give our creations some height. With a few more dots and lines, I made the pieces feel cohesive and right.

And then, what to do with all these bits? I knew if I kept them separate, they would get lost. Ruthie suggested laying them in an interesting combination in our Art Journals.

Since my Art Journal is also my ‘what I did today’ Journal, these lovely rectangles became part of December 2025.

I really like how this project turned out! I keep learning to see art better and make it better.

Love,

Grandma Judy

Elevated Doodles

December 10, 2025

Dear Liza,

Sometimes, instead of a well-thought out, challenging art project, I just want to doodle on the couch with Auntie Bridgett and Grandpa Nelson.

That’s how this series came about. It started with this, a ballpoint pen doodle filled in with colored pencils and patterns. Then I rounded the corners and added some flourishes. I liked how it looked, so I photographed it.

I decided to try and make another one like it, to see each step and share with you. Here’s the doodle. I wasn’t crazy about the wonky corners, but Picasso said that if you hate a piece, keep going.

So I colored it in with Staedtler colored pencils, like the first one. I left some spaces empty for Micron #12 patterns.

Once the spaces were filled in dots and dashes, it started coming together. Almost like a free form quilt.

I thickened up the lines and rounded the corners, and belatedly noticed that these were watercolor pencils I was working with! So I got my brush pen and added the tiniest bit of water… and magic happened!

I get the feeling this is going to be the beginning of a beautiful friendship.

Love,

Grandma Judy

Christmas Cards for Positive Charge

December 4, 2025

Dear Liza,

Our dark, rainy weather has started, but I have a sunny warmth in my heart (and my art closet). Auntie Bridgett and I are making Christmas cards to give away through a local non-profit called Positive Charge. These lovely ladies make sure that folks in rest homes and hospitals get a bit of holiday cheer from people they don’t even know!

I love to make art, but I’m not very consistent. Some days I seem to have a gift, and other days, everything I touch goes to smudges. So to make a bunch of cards, I need a few Grandma Judy proof tricks.

I found this one on several YouTube channels, and gave it a try. It is pretty easy.

Start with a blank greeting card. About an inch or so from the top, measure to find the center and put a tiny pencil dot. About an inch from the bottom, measure and put dots about 3/4” from each edge. Run strips of painter’s tape between the dots to make a Christmas tree sort of triangle. Press the inside edge to get a good seal.

Then comes the fun part! Using whatever paint, sponges, brushes, or other mark-making tools you have, add some color inside the triangle.

Here is acrylic paint applied with a packing material sponge. It is more interesting if there are flecks, dots, or other irregularities.

When you like the look of it, carefully peel the tape off to leave the triangle. You can re-use each piece of tape about three times before it starts ‘leaking’.

Then you decorate your tree! I made several, but have only decorated one so far.

I used UHU to apply circles punched from a fancy Christmas envelope from my dentist’s office for the baubles and star, and some recycled wrapping paper for the base.

These are just the basics. You can add ribbon, glitter, or whatever you like.

Enjoy!

Love,

Grandma Judy

Bonsai in Fall, 2025

November 12, 2025

Dear Liza,

Well, it’s November, so it must be time for the annual Hundred Acre Wood Check-in.

This is what my bonsai forest of three looked like last year at this time.

The juniper, being evergreen doesn’t change much. But the larch’s thin needles go yellow and drop, and the Japanese maple goes bright red.

It’s a wonderful study in contrasts.

During the year, of course, everything is green. I did some weight-training (I know that’s not the proper term) on the Larch to get it out of its straight habit. It was mildly successful.

And after a year’s growth, the Japanese maple (whom I call Mr. Toranaga-sama) has gained quite a bit of height. See him there? As tall as the larch!

And now fall has rolled around again, and the colors play out as they should.

I plan on scissor-training the maple this winter, cutting it short at a growth node to encourage sideways branching. This should help fill out the understory nicely.

And over the winter, I can look back at these lovely colors and be inspired.

Love,

Grandma Judy

Books with Pictures Pop Up!!

November 8, 2025

Dear Liza,

Just in time for the holiday shopping season, Auntie Katie has a new Pop Up shop for Books with Pictures in Portland! It is part of the PDX Pop Up Program to encourage more foot traffic and shopping in the core of downtown, where there are too many vacant store fronts.

As excited as she is to have 2,000 square feet of prime retail space free for two months, it hasn’t been easy. She got the keys to the place just 8 days before opening, and there was lots to do.

The floors were filthy, walls needed patching and painting, and the enormous windows were covered with adhesive film and city grime. Still, Katie is not one to flinch at hard work. And she had some help.

She cleaned floors and windows, I sanded, and Cecily painted. Friends and neighbors offered rugs, tables and chairs to “homey up” the big empty space. Twelve hour days paid off, the day before she opened, it was looking pretty nice.

And opening day, folks came in to look around and buy things! I am currently recovering from Covid, so I couldn’t go, but Grandpa Nelson headed down to say Hi and take pictures.

And as they were chatting, folks started coming in! First a few, then more! The theory is that a crowd draws a crowd, and I guess it’s true. I hope they stuck around and bought lots of books.

The Books with Pictures Pop Up will be open 12-6 PM, Wednesday through Sunday, until January 6th. It would be lovely if you could come visit.

Love,

Grandma Judy

Starting Early on Christmas!

October 29, 2025

Dear Liza,

I love it when two of my favorite people (who don’t even know each other) work together to give me good ideas. Let me explain.

Last week, my ZOOM art teacher Ruthie Inman taught us to make these tiny books.

You cut six strips of white paper 1” wide, then fold and cut 1” sections. Each section will become one book. Make the fold really sharp, then staple at the crease to hold the tiny pages together. Make sure the ‘feet’ of the staple are outside the book, so they will be hidden by the cover.

For the cover, choose slightly heavier decorative paper , and cut it just a bit longer than the book. Apply glue stick and use a bone folder to press it down.

Then fold the extra long edges over the first page to make a ‘dust cover’ edge. Really give this a good fold and press. And voilá, there is your tiny book, about one inch by one inch.

They are easy enough to make, I did 10 in a little more than an hour.

Then came the next favorite person. I was visiting with Auntie Katie and told her about the tiny books. “Could you string them…. Maybe on tiny twinkle lights… to hang on a Christmas tree?” She asked. Katie owns Books with Pictures here in Portland, and can always use pretty decorations.

Of course you could! The awl from my book-making kit (a gift from Ruthie), and a string of tiny lights ( from my SOAK jellyfish costume), and there we have it!

They look best in low light, of course, but very sweet even in normal light, giving the impression of flying, glowing books !

Could these be the newest Christmas tree sensation? Stranger things have happened!

Love,

Grandma Judy

Fall Beauty

October 23, 2025

Dear Liza,

Our Portland Fall has kicked into colorful overdrive this week.

I love this time of year, with the cooler temperatures and rain giving abundant permission to stay inside with books, yea, and kittens. Calm is easier in Fall than in frantic, growing Summer.

It also feels like Shakespeare weather. I read through the sonnets and found the one that had been tickling my brain. I have taken the liberty of modernizing the language and cutting two lines which leaned a bit too heavily on death for my taste.

Rewritten Sonnet 73

That time of year you may in me behold

When yellow leaves, or none, or few, do hang

Upon these boughs which shake against the cold,

Bare ruined choirs, where late the sweet birds sang.

In me you see the twilight of such day

After sunset has faded in the west.

In me you see the glowing of such fire

That on the ashes of my youth do lie,

As the bed whereon it must expire,

Consumed with that which it was nourished by.

This you  perceive, which makes your love more strong,

To love that well which you must leave ere long.

And before you worry, I am happy and well. Just a bit older and Autumn-introspective.

Love,

Grandma Judy

No King’s Collage

October 22, 2025

Dear Liza,

Once I had rested and recovered from the long, crowded No King’s March, I wanted to capture the spirit of it for my Journal. I mean, how often does one get to be part of such a gathering? I wrote about it, of course, but words were missing what I was looking for.

Gathering bits from the collage box and junk mail, I found lots of ideas, from the silly to the civic. Scooby Doo certainly captured the goofy spirit of the day, and a Liberty torch seemed appropriate. The random animals represent all the costumes and pets that were on display.

I needed The Willamette River, of course, and green grass of Tom McCall Waterfront Park. But this was definitely a CITY march…

So, skyscrapers cut from the recent voter’s pamphlet got added. But now the sky looked too empty! I tried a cool tissue paper Gelli print, but it was just too much. And where should that bicycle go?

I finally settled on a dot-printed sky of teal blue, made using a piece of plastic shelf liner Ruthie Inman gave me years ago. I like how it fills the space but doesn’t overpower the scene. The long blue wisps in the sky are slivers cut from the same magazine page as the river.

I like how the collage captures the urban, goofy, joyous feel of the city and the crowd. and I am grateful to have been there.

Love,

Grandma Judy

No Kings March 2.0

October 19, 2025

Dear Liza,

Yesterday was the second country-wide No Kings March here in the U.S. Auntie Bridgett and I got to participate while Grandpa Nelson stayed home with the kittens.

A lot of what made this demonstration special was the silly costumes! I didn’t have my phone where I could get at it easily, so I didn’t take any pictures. But they are all over the Internet if you want to see. Here is me in my bright yellow Lala the Teletubby suit. Happy shout out to Buffalo Exchange for the joy!

Once we were properly costumed, we took a Standing Room Only full #15 bus downtown. The route had been altered because of the march, which put us even closer to the Battleship Oregon Monument, where the crowd was gathering to hear speakers.

There were so many happy, dressed up, smiling people! The signs were wonderful, too. My favorite so far is, “If we don’t fix the timeline, Spock gets a beard!” Ask your Dad about that one.

Once the march started (and it takes a really long time to get thousands of people pointed in the same direction) we walked East on Pine to 3rd, then south to the Hawthorne Bridge, then to the East side, where we just kept on walking home.

The Unpresidented (yes, that’s right) marching band made us all dance as we went along, and some drones took pictures of the crowd. The one above shows about a one block area….

And in this one, zoomed in quite a bit, you can just spot me in my yellow suit with a big round head. See? Just to the right of center?

Crazy to see myself in that throng, but so happy to have been there!

Love,

Grandma Judy

PS. I am still trying to figure out how I changed fonts and how to go back. No worries.

Kittens in a Backpack

October 13, 2025

Dear Liza,

One of the things we were hoping to teach our new kittens, Moxie and Molly, was to ride outside in a cat backpack. That way they could see, hear, and smell the outside world without being in danger of traffic or other animals. When I mentioned this to our veterinarian, she said we should start as soon as possible.

We bought an Apollo Walker Cat Backpack online and set it down on the floor, waiting for them to explore it. But they didn’t, not for days.

Then this morning, I decided to let them see me put it on and walk around in it. NOW I had their attention. Both cats were very interested, and when I backed up to the cat tower, Molly hopped right in! This surprised me, because Molly has usually been the shyer of the two.

She sat quietly as I took a few steps, and hopped out when she had had enough.

Once I put it back on the floor, Molly continued her exploration, enjoying the treats we gave for her bravery. Moxie, after just a few nose-pokes, seemed to lose interest. Maybe she’s not a hiker.

But this is only the beginning of a long road, and we all have a lot to learn.

Life with kittens is just one new thing after another!

Love,

Grandma Judy