St. Peter's Day June 29th.

In Norwegian:
Persok

Catholic:
In remembrance of St.Peter and St. Paul's martyrdom. The most common sign is a key, and the day was also called: Peter with the golden key, because Jesus gave Peter the management of the keys to heaven.

Old tradition:
Gathering herbs was important today.

Engraved signs:
Flower, cross, sword, ax, and key.

It's quite amazing giving one person alone the keys to heaven. What if he is haveing a bad day? I'm not sure this is the smartest I have done, to make the key out of bookpaper. Can you see the horizontal cross, the two dots and the two triangles?
It seems photo manupilating has become a habit with these small artpieces. I have thought, let so be it with this series. It will be nice to have them all in the same tecknique.

This is the end of June, and half way throug the year. Now I need a break so the next half will start coming July 1st next year.

St,John's Wake June 24th.

In Norwegian:
Jonsok, St.Hans

Catholic:
In remembrance of John the Baptist's birth.

Old traditions:
Bonfires are the most known and used symbol of midsummer, but there are plenty of other things connected to the solstice too. In old times this was the day they celebrated the solstice, and there were alot of danger to be aware of, All things good and evil was coming forward around the solstice, and fire was a good way to help strenghten the power of the sun. Many people sought the church this day, probably to pray and ensure them selves against all evil.
There were a strong belief that witches was out flying this night together with the black one, he who has a green tail and a pitchfork.( never mention him by his real name. :) am I a bit influenced of old superstition too? )
Around here, it's said that the household didn't sleep in their beds this night, ( of course not, out partying I would call it.) the beds should be clean and done for the dead ones to sleep in. The dead ones who once belonged to the household.
The livestock were protected by drawing a tar cross on their forehead.
This was the best time to gather herbs, and young girls could pick 7 different wild flowers and put them under their pillow. During the night they could possibly see/ dream of the person they would be married to. Water could have magic power coming night. This day announced the weather for coming summer. Every other weathersign was outdone by this one.

If it was raining, the Autumn would appear early.Other weathermarks could be: high flying swallows, meant good weather. If the swallows flew low in the sky, rain was expected. The same with ants, ants in top of straws meant wet weather. It was also a good sign if some specific birds nested high in the treetop, good weather. I'm sure you all know some different weather marks from where you live, it seems they're still alive.

Engraved signs:
Sun, cross,three men, hourglass and on my stick a church.

It is always exciting to see what can be done to my original painting in picasa. Some of them simply can't take colors, while others are "growing" with use of colors. No matter what, I end up liking the result and todays piece is no exception.

Summer solstice June 21st.

In Norwegian:
Sommersolhverv

The sun reaches its highest point and we have the day with the longest period of light in the year.
Hence also the "shortest" night.

Old traditions:
Way back in time people had a large amount of respect for everything concerning the sun. Where I live people were afraid the sun would not reappear in the sky after winter solstice. Because of that they were not allowed to do work which went in circles. Not spin, not grind flour, things like that. The same goes for summer solstice. They believed the circle moves gave negative energi to the sun and helped it fall off the clode. Probably they thought what's good in winter will help in summer as well, hence the ban in summer too.

Engraved signs:
"turning" sun.

This is the sun at its highest. The line pointing down, not a sunray, indicates coming phase.....lower. I love how the sky turned out, and the ocean/ground too. It's quite interesting to enlarge the photos, that's when it's possible to see all the colors used.

St. Botolph Mass June 17th.

In Norwegian: 

Botolfsmesse, Botsok.

Catholic:
In remembrance of St. Botolph who, according to legend, built a monastery in England in year 654. Most knowledge about him is lost, but it's said he was a very popular man.

Old traditions:
This day has been an important one in Norway. Back in 1276 our chief court of law, lagtinget, opened this day. As late as ca. 1850 this day were still held as a holyday some places in our country.
One should not work this day.

Coming week is said to be a good one to work new land. All roots and weeds will be easy to pull up and will later rot. Even now, some farmers work according to this tradition. I have a slightly different experience, around each full moon and new moon the weeds's root system are sitting loose. Every year I pull up difficult weeds and their complete root systems according to the moonphase. A couple of days later it's impossible to loosen them.

Engraved signs:
Sheep, Ears of corn, Bishop's pastoral staff.
In my stick it's the Bishop's pastoral staff.

 It's such a joy to make these pieces and interesting also to build them up to a final result. This specific one was made using more lines and details to create a bit more interest to it. All my pieces are based upon simple signs, and I try to make each one of them a piece of it's own. When I'm done with this project I'll have 60 pieces or so, and it would be nice if each one of them could live on their own without all the rest.

Vitus Mass, June 15th.

In Norwegian:
Vitusmesse

Catholic:
In remembrance of St. Vitus who is the patron for those who suffers from epilepsy and Vitus's dance.

Engraved sign:
I havn't been able to find the marks of this day. It's not a well known day and it was not much celebrated here in Norway. The sign in my stick is a line and tiny dot only.

Old traditions:
Not special for this day only but, as kids we tried to capture a ladybug holding it in our closed hands and carefully shaking while saying: ladybug ladybug fly today tomorrow we'll have a brighter day. Then we opened up and if the ladybug flew away we would have pretty and warm weather. Oh, if it only was easy as that.
Some say this is the day for cleaning the celing and walls.
In Kaupanger stave church they celebrate this day each year the sunday closest to June 15th. King Sverre sat the old stave church on fire the night before Vitus day in year 1184. Hence the yearly celebration.
I've learnt alot working with this stuff, and this day explained to me why one of the drugstore chains in Norway is called Vitus.
By clicking this link you'll be lead to a site telling about Vitus.

I'm not sure whether I should make this one. As I see it, it's just the dot that is ment to be a reminder of the day. The line below is leading up from the actual dayline. To make a tiny dot only felt meaningless, as it is now, it can be related to different things.

I love this time of year.

Last night I took my camera out to photograph some flowers.

This time of year we have daylight till late in the evenings. That's the best there is, if the weather is good we can stay out in the garden till late and still have light. Always when abroad we notice how short the evenings are compared to ours. It always amazes me. We kind of take it for granted that the summer evenings are long and with good natural light, but that's not how it is.

The photos below are taken at 10.30 pm with the sky as the only lightsource.

The lower one is not as good as I hoped for, but it's the light I wanted to show you.
I have not spent much time on my computer lately, and that's the way it's going to be till August. It's important to enjoy the summer while it's still here. I hope you'll have a nice summer too.

Tell All Tuesday, it's me!

 I am this weeks artist on Jennibellies Tell All Tuesday series.

It's both scary and fun at the same time. I have been reading  Jenny's blog for awhile and she really is a busy artist. Her you-tube channel is a very interesting place too, go have a look if you have never been there before. She shares alot of good ideas.

You'll find the link to her site and my interview here.

I hope you'll have a nice day exploring my blog.

Something new.

 

I bought myself a new cell phone yesterday.

 

That means alot of work to figure out how to use it and how everything works, and if I dislike anything, that's it. So to cheer myself up a bit I sat down today and made some bags to carry it in, and that's a whole different cup of tea. I love making such small things, and I love all the colors too. I asked handyman what he thought about them and all he said was: hmf...... Too much color for him.

 

 

 

I think I'll make one or two more, always fun to have something to choose from. We've had such a cold day here today so staying indoors making something fun was just the right thing for me.

 

I hope you are having a fun day too!