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Bex Hall > nature journal

nature journal

A nature walk as an artist date this week

August 13, 2021

You don’t have to know the name to see what you need to see

Tiger swallowtail

For this week’s artist date, I wandered in nature with my camera. Some subjects were old favorites, like the touch-me-knots, which I used to call popsie-doodles when I was a child. Their seed pods ready to burst open into a curlicue with a light touch.

Touch-me-knots

Or the Pokeweed plants and their deep purple berries. I used to crush them to use as paint and the color matched my favorite syrup, boysenberry, ergo this plant was a boysenberry, which I believed was its name for many years.

Pokeweed

But some names I didn’t know, like the tall, bushy mauve flowers or the yellow butterfly with black stripes or the caterpillar with spikes on its spikes.

A guide tells me the light purple flowers are Joe Pye weed. According to legend, Joe Pye was a Native American herbalist who used it to cure a variety of illnesses, including typhoid fever.

The butterfly appears to be a Tiger Swallowtail.

The spiny caterpillar appears to be a buck moth, which gets its name because it’s one of the few moths that fly during the day during deer season.

Buck moth caterpillar

I went on the artist date this week intending to capture snapshots of nature to use as reference for drawing. But my curiosity demanded to know the names of what I saw and I did that research afterward. Now I know. And so do you.

But the real magic happened before I looked up the names of everything. The real magic was being in nature. I didn’t see Joe Pye weed or a tiger swallowtail or a buck moth caterpillar. 

Joe Pye weed

No, what I saw were mauve air castles nestled among verdant waves dappled with sunlight and shadow. I saw delicate yellow and black fairies dance around the parapets while an armor clad guard stood watch.

I saw summers long past filled with boysenberry painted faces and contests with my cousin to see who could get the most popsie-doodle pops. Seed pod curlicues tied into necklaces. Caterpillars collected and held captive while we witnessed them become whatever they were to become.

To see, we must forget the name of the thing we are looking at.”

—Claude Monet

Until next week, all my love.

Filed Under: The Artists Way Tagged With: artist date, creative life, creativity exercises, nature journal

July brings celebration in nature

August 3, 2021

July 2021 Phenology Wheel

It may have been the wettest July on record, at least in nearby Huntington, WV, but we still had plenty of hot and sunshiny days.

July 2021 Nature Journal

The Mimosa tree blooms are still fragrant and plentiful. The delicate white of Queen Anne’s Lace and the periwinkle blue of Chicory adorn the roadsides. Dragonflies and Swallowtails flit and feed along with what so far has been only female hummingbirds at the wild trumpet vine and Stick Verbena flowers.

Queen Anne’s Lace and Chicory

The morning glories are a month behind their usual domination of the patio trellis and so far only deep purple blooms dot the green wall of heart-shaped leaves.

Fifty Cent, the House Wren

Most mornings at exactly 5:30, the first bird to shatter the night’s silence is a House Wren I named Fifty Cent. The bird book says they weigh about as much as two quarters, so… 

For fun, I play an audio recording of a House Wren and watch with amusement as he warbles and scolds in response. He built a nest and found a mate. But from what I’ve read, this is probably just one of his multiple families.

A few of the sunflowers have bloomed, some with petals growing in the centers of the heads, but they still serve their purpose; the bees don’t seem to mind their odd appearance. One monster sunflower has reached a height just past the gutter. Its head seeks the setting sun on the opposite side of the house, even though the bloom has yet to open.

The full buck moon this month was a baby aspirin orange when it first appeared which led to a new nickname: pumpkin moon. Is it wrong to be thinking about pumpkins in July? I see patches of the brilliant orange and yellow leaves of the Staghorn Sumac nestled among a sea of green. A harbinger of Autumn, a mere seven weeks away.

A Whitetail Skimmer

But for now, today I will notice and enjoy the sultry air, the dance of the bats and lightning bugs at dusk and dawn, the fiery sunsets, bare feet on grass and in puddles, and flower heads that magically move under the weight of bumblebees and butterflies. 

“Woods are filled with the music of birds, and all nature is laughing under the glorious influence of Summer.” — Charles Lanham, Author, Artist, Librarian

Well done, July. 👏🏻

Charles Lanham quote

Filed Under: Art Projects Tagged With: creative life, creativity exercises, nature journal, phenology wheel

The month of June bursts with life

July 7, 2021

Bugs, birds, and bunnies are stars of the show

June 2021 Nature Journal & Phenology Wheel

June unfolded with hanging wisteria, feral roadside tiger lilies, and mimosa trees laden with pink powder puffs. Little yellows and common blue butterflies flit from coneflower to verbena to dianthus.

This is the time of abundant sweet strawberries, so June’s full moon came to be known as the Strawberry Moon by the Algonquin tribes.

June 2021 Nature Journal

June also hosts the longest day of the year in the Northern Hemisphere, also known as the summer solstice, when the sun is directly over the Tropic of Cancer. This day marks the beginning of the gradual decrease of daylight. The climax in the three-act structure of our summer narrative.

Every workday morning my husband drives down our little rural road and if he sees four or more rabbits, he calls me to report the count. We’ve seen as many as eight bunnies dive into the safety of the brush from the asphalt as we make our way to town. 

The red-winged blackbird is plentiful and I see them among the cattails in the marshy areas and near the river where the mayflies are still swarming. In the 14 years here, this is the first time I’ve seen mayflies in July.

Red-winged blackbird

At the end of the month we saw a juvenile red-tailed hawk unsuccessfully attack a snapping turtle which was creeping across the road. We’ve watched with amusement as the clumsy hawk bumps into limbs, flounders, and lands on the ground. It’s as if it “picks up its skirts” and with care, long stride lunges on its lily white legs across the grass for a few feet before it stretches its wings, takes flight and soars over the river.

June 2021 Phenology Wheel

The month held oven heated air, humidity, and a few cooling thunderstorms. Magnificent, moody sunsets. Bats swooping for a meal at dusk. Evenings into nights sprinkled with fireflies floating and blinking above the dewy grass.

Every sunset is different

“Good night, good night! Parting is such sweet sorrow, that I shall say good night till it be morrow.” —Shakespeare

Strawberry full moon

See you next year, June.

Filed Under: Art Projects Tagged With: creative life, creativity exercises, nature journal, phenology wheel

Another month in the book

June 4, 2021

May, chapter 5 of 12

May Phenology Wheel and Nature Journal

Because the last four days of the month were stormy and unseasonably cool, I am inclined to dub the entire month the same, but I look at the wheel and there only nine days of inclement weather. Nine days does not an entire month make.

This was the second of two super full moons this calendar year and it did not disappoint. Super moon means it’s at perigee, or at its closest point to the earth. It was bright and big and made four in the morning seem like an odd sort of daylight. Kind of silver tone.

Nature Journal

The flowers, birds, mayflies, bugs, and bats are in abundance after what seems like a long absence. The scent of honeysuckle, wisteria, and lilacs perfume the sometimes balmy air.

I learned about a new flower called the Star of Bethlehem. It bloomed on our river lot in the dappled shade near the bank. The iris from my daughter’s house in Tennessee is in its third year and flourishing.

This is the fifth month I’ve recorded what is happening in the natural world around me and I’ve noticed some positive shifts. 

It no longer bothers me to stop what I’m doing to watch the birds or butterflies. I feel more confident drawing freehand in pen. There’s a sweet anticipation of discovery to each new day.

One of the best side benefits I’ve realized from this project though is the reinforcement of the belief I have it in me to see something through. As of today, June 4th, I have spent 155 days tending a journal by hand.

As each month goes by, the book grows and so do I.

Phenology Wheel

Filed Under: Art Projects Tagged With: creative life, creativity exercises, nature journal, phenology wheel

Set a timer, beat procrastination

May 14, 2021

Nature journal finally caught up

April 2021 Nature Journal

“Procrastination is the bad habit of putting off until the day after tomorrow what should have been done the day before yesterday.”

— Napoleon Hill

It’s the middle of May and I’m just now finished with April’s phenology wheel and nature journal page. I kept putting it off because with each day that passed, the job got bigger. Would take more time. Further and further behind and the inner critic screamed “YOU MIGHT AS WELL JUST QUIT!”

I sat with the resistance for a few days and searched for the reason why I wasn’t making the time to paint. 1. I’m “supposed” to be writing, and 2. I know if I start, I won’t want to stop.

Conundrum.

I set a timer for 20 minutes and painted. An hour or so later, it was done. And I don’t remember hitting stop on the alarm.

Now I’m free to write. 

If you’re struggling with juggling and tending to a project, try setting a timer and work on one thing.

Tick tock!

April Monthly
April 2021 Phenology Wheel
April 2021 Nature Journal

Filed Under: Art Projects Tagged With: creative life, creativity exercises, nature journal, phenology wheel, the 100 day project

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About Bex

 

Bex Hall

Her writing has appeared in various online and print publications, most recently in Kerning, a literary magazine, and in the Stories of Hope Collection in Transplant Living. Her artwork has appeared and sold through the Grayson Gallery. She blogs here about creative life and creates in Studio BE overlooking the Ohio River. Her work in progress is a memoir about the secret life of objects.

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