Tag: making maps

Warm Spring Sunshine!!

Dear Liza,

Today was the first day in months that I have gone out without a coat, hat, scarf, and gloves. It was in the 50s, sunny, with just a little breeze. Spring is on the way!

The cherry trees are getting ready to bloom!

The teeny tiny Heather is blooming!

The roses are getting leaves and the crocuses are blooming!

And this afternoon, when I picked up Cousin Kestrel, we ate ice cream from Cheese and Crack in their delightful, warm, sunny, OUTSIDE seating area! Just like honest to goodness not frozen people! It was wonderful!

Once we got home, Kes worked on embroidering her jacket and I water colored a new map of Paris, to help me remember the city. Later, I used the map to show Auntie Katie where things are in Paris.

Life sure gets interesting when we get together!

Love,

Grandma Judy

Getting Ready for Winter

Dear Liza,

A lot has happened since I wrote to you in August! You and your family have moved to Horsens, Denmark, and are discovering wonderful things to do there.

I have started learning Danish on Duolingo to get ready for our visit.

I had surgery on my ear to remove a skin cancer, and then a skin graft to put me back together. I am healing nicely.

Summer has ended and Fall has begun, with all the gardening that entails and beauty it brings.

I have planted some Hairy Vetch (a real thing) as a winter cover crop for my garden patch. It should put some nitrogen back in the soil and give it a nice green mulch come Spring.

I wrote a story about imaginary Liza and imaginary Grandma Judy, called “International Adventure Grandma”.

It has maps and secrets codes and I really enjoyed writing it! It is currently being edited by a trusted friend and I promise to bring a real hold-in-your-hand copy when I come visit in the Spring.


I expect to get back to writing this blog regularly, and hope you will come along and see what I’m up to.

Love,

Grandma Judy

L’Hexagone

Dear Liza,

I am finding new ways to make maps into art for my Art Journal. Since we have loved our travels in France and hope to return someday, I have been looking at maps of that wonderful chunk of Europe.

I am not the first to notice that the map of France resembles a hexagon. In fact, people have been using the nickname ”L’hexagon” since 1949 and French school children are taught to draw the map of their country by using a hexagon as the basic shape.

So I thought I would make my map of France out of an actual, geometric hexagon. First, I had to figure out how to make one without a zillion math calculations, which would mess with my art joy.

Fortunately, I found the youtube channels of both Jenny W. Chan and a fellow named Sam. They both taught me what I needed to know. I was able to fold a sheet, cut it to fit, and then sketch in the map. Than I used that map as a pattern for my real one.

Since this is a personal map, I wanted to show the places we have visited. But I also wanted to show the feel of the place, of the geography. The French understand about ’terroir’, the importance of a sense of place.


I decided that I wanted to show what was grown where, so cattle, sheep, pigs and chickens got inked in with the orchards and vineyards.

And that’s how it looks for now. I may add some shading in the mountains, but I’ll leave that for tomorrow.

Love,

Grandma Judy