Friday, November 28, 2003
Ummm spitting snow, it is.. so curl up in a warm kitchen and make sugar scones.. :)
Skydancer's Iron Skillet Scones
Two cups self rising flour - soft wheat flour works best.
4 Tablespoons packed brown sugar
1/4 cup solid shortning. Butter very cold cut in small chunks, or like I am doing, just ordinary lard.
1 egg
approximately 1/2 cup cold milk.
Cast Iron Skillet, oiled and floured.
pre heat oven to 500 F.
combine flour and sugar
cut in shortning with a pastry cutter, two forks, or use your food processor, just pulsing until you have a crumbly texture.
add egg and a little of the milk. Mix, or pulse. Keep adding a little milk until the dough just pulls together and comes away from the sides of the container.
Then turn out onto a floured surface and fold several times kneading the dough, but do not over work it.
Press into an even layer in the skillet and bake for approximate 12 min. If desired, sprinkle granulated sugar on the top before baking and then use the broiler for a few seconds to brown the top after the 12 minutes are up.
Let cool and cut into wedges. Marvelous with your favorite jam or preserves.
Finding the perfect amount of liguid will take a little experimentation to get just the right crumb for your taste. Have fun trying.. and of course you can always add raisins or berries to the dough.. :)
Blessings,
Skydancer's Iron Skillet Scones
Two cups self rising flour - soft wheat flour works best.
4 Tablespoons packed brown sugar
1/4 cup solid shortning. Butter very cold cut in small chunks, or like I am doing, just ordinary lard.
1 egg
approximately 1/2 cup cold milk.
Cast Iron Skillet, oiled and floured.
pre heat oven to 500 F.
combine flour and sugar
cut in shortning with a pastry cutter, two forks, or use your food processor, just pulsing until you have a crumbly texture.
add egg and a little of the milk. Mix, or pulse. Keep adding a little milk until the dough just pulls together and comes away from the sides of the container.
Then turn out onto a floured surface and fold several times kneading the dough, but do not over work it.
Press into an even layer in the skillet and bake for approximate 12 min. If desired, sprinkle granulated sugar on the top before baking and then use the broiler for a few seconds to brown the top after the 12 minutes are up.
Let cool and cut into wedges. Marvelous with your favorite jam or preserves.
Finding the perfect amount of liguid will take a little experimentation to get just the right crumb for your taste. Have fun trying.. and of course you can always add raisins or berries to the dough.. :)
Blessings,
Wednesday, November 19, 2003
Inbetween the worlds of man and Gaia, walking the threads of mind, touching the colors of my own soul. Weaving the visions given me into threads I can place upon a page, or upon a screen and share with you. Art for me is simply expression, not of a message, but of a journey. I am not angry or bored, or enlightened, and I am not dancing to the illusion of what I see in the cultures of modern man, nor am I reacting to, and working in counter to those illusions. I am only laying forth what comes to hand, to mind, at the moment. Maybe that is why the Chaos Dragonfly is such an appropriate totem for me. Not because I worship Chaos, or I feel that destruction and anarchy is inevitable or is my journey, but because in pure chaos is not the end of all things, but the potential for all things. I have no media, no medium, no school of expression or rules to my work. I don't care what the rules are. I only care what spirit expresses through me. What I can find a way to express of what I see, or feel, or think, or just fall into. It is not a message. It is only a vision. Do with it what you will, it is not my treasure, or my salvation, or my screaming at the world. Its sometimes a bit of something I find funny, or pretty, or unusual, or just because I feel like it. And you know.. that is more than enough.
{Very Large Smile}
And that my loves, is a very clear example of pure spontaneous expression. It simply flows from my fingertips to the page. Like my art. You know why I grew a beard and did a Yule King? Because I did not feel like shaving for a week, and in that time I grew a half way decent beginning to a beard. Thats why. Do you want to know why I like to use folk as models and subjects for my images? Because I build the images around them. THEY, are the images. I simply take them and expand and express and unfold what I feel about that person in that moment, in that image. Thats why. And that is why the subject, all those marvelous people that have worked with me, that have risked putting their image, their bodies in my hands, have been the inspiriation and the very existance of the art that they, not I, were the reason for. I am glad you enjoy my work. Because in the end, I need you, much more than you need me.
In the spirit of Thanksgiving,
Marion Z. Skydancer - November, 19, 2003
{Very Large Smile}
And that my loves, is a very clear example of pure spontaneous expression. It simply flows from my fingertips to the page. Like my art. You know why I grew a beard and did a Yule King? Because I did not feel like shaving for a week, and in that time I grew a half way decent beginning to a beard. Thats why. Do you want to know why I like to use folk as models and subjects for my images? Because I build the images around them. THEY, are the images. I simply take them and expand and express and unfold what I feel about that person in that moment, in that image. Thats why. And that is why the subject, all those marvelous people that have worked with me, that have risked putting their image, their bodies in my hands, have been the inspiriation and the very existance of the art that they, not I, were the reason for. I am glad you enjoy my work. Because in the end, I need you, much more than you need me.
In the spirit of Thanksgiving,
Marion Z. Skydancer - November, 19, 2003
Friday, November 14, 2003
Sometimes validation creeps in quietly and unexpectedly...
From: [Ravum et Viridans] (forfeit)
To: [Skydancer]
Sent: 2003-11-15 00:58:15
Comment in 4203960
Hmm...I guess this message has long since been writing itself every time I visited one your webpages. And it is not that it matters what my opinion of your art happens to be, but I feel like telling you anyhow.
At first, I very much disliked you art; I tired to liken it to porn, or something similar. But, I am now firmly agreed amongst myself (hehe) that you are indeed a talented photographer, your ideas are interesting and very creative, and you do indeed portray real people. I must respect you for all these reasons. I have also come to like your pieces. ^.^
From: [Ravum et Viridans] (forfeit)
To: [Skydancer]
Sent: 2003-11-15 00:58:15
Comment in 4203960
Hmm...I guess this message has long since been writing itself every time I visited one your webpages. And it is not that it matters what my opinion of your art happens to be, but I feel like telling you anyhow.
At first, I very much disliked you art; I tired to liken it to porn, or something similar. But, I am now firmly agreed amongst myself (hehe) that you are indeed a talented photographer, your ideas are interesting and very creative, and you do indeed portray real people. I must respect you for all these reasons. I have also come to like your pieces. ^.^
Sunday, November 09, 2003
What music makes you:
a) Happy
b) Sad
c) Nostalgic
d) Energised
e) Creative
Also, what are some of your long-term, absolute favourites ("Too many to choose" is not a valid answer!)
rather a neat questionaire as such things go.... :)
"my answers of course"
a - new age light fairy celtic compositions..
b - certain trigger songs that have strong emotional attachments.. Cherish... back in the late 60's, Mary Magdalene, more recent I think are two very highly charged ones for me..
c - hmmmm, Old Man River, from Showboat, Andy Williams in general...
d - I honestly don't associate that with any music... more with light and nature and the weather, not music....
e - I am so affected by music that truly, this runs a wide, wide gaumet...
Favs - Muskrat Love {Captain and Tenille}, Rainbow Connection {Kermit the Frog}, The music from Dark Crystal, Much of Enya's work, Tori Amos, more I suppose the music of certain artists, rather than specific songs
a) Happy
b) Sad
c) Nostalgic
d) Energised
e) Creative
Also, what are some of your long-term, absolute favourites ("Too many to choose" is not a valid answer!)
rather a neat questionaire as such things go.... :)
"my answers of course"
a - new age light fairy celtic compositions..
b - certain trigger songs that have strong emotional attachments.. Cherish... back in the late 60's, Mary Magdalene, more recent I think are two very highly charged ones for me..
c - hmmmm, Old Man River, from Showboat, Andy Williams in general...
d - I honestly don't associate that with any music... more with light and nature and the weather, not music....
e - I am so affected by music that truly, this runs a wide, wide gaumet...
Favs - Muskrat Love {Captain and Tenille}, Rainbow Connection {Kermit the Frog}, The music from Dark Crystal, Much of Enya's work, Tori Amos, more I suppose the music of certain artists, rather than specific songs
Friday, November 07, 2003
There is much that is promised that is not kept, much that is shown, then taken away, much that is said that is false words and shadows of hopes not realized.
some of us are defined by our memories, others are molded by them.. and some, just wander off to make more... :)
Tuesday, November 04, 2003
I went to the edifice of higher education... or so I thought. then I climbed a mountain and learned what the words reallly mean.
Marion Z. Skydancer - Nov. 2003
Marion Z. Skydancer - Nov. 2003
Saturday, November 01, 2003
tis good to be careful in the affairs of cats.. for they are hungry and may look at you as a mouse.
(C) MZS 11-1-2003
(C) MZS 11-1-2003
