trying not to be a yawner

by Riana 2009

The pastel piece above is by my daughter Riana (16). She made it tonight for a friend of hers--Mary. I thought I would share it, because I don't know about you, but it's got to be tiring looking at all the birds on our blog. So I will try not to post so many of my birds, and try to keep it a little more diverse, yet still showcase personal artwork. Although this is not mine or Heather's, Riana wanted me to blog about it. Probably not so much about the art itself, but about the atmosphere in which it was created.

Tonight we worked together in my studio--her pasteling, me packaging up paintings to ship out--all while listening to some mixes from her ipod by DJ DV ONE.

We're one in the same about working with music, so she shared a sweet reggae mix, then some west coast gangster rap. I'm not really sure what other parents would think about me listening to some of the lyrics that we listened to together, but as I explained to Riana when she noted the possible awkwardness of the situation, lyrics are just (artistically) expressive words. Man that's a dorky way to say big deal--who cares, bad words. I know she knows I dig reggae, and I know she knows I dig hip-hop, but I think maybe she thinks I somehow have missed all music with questionable content and lyrics?

Anyway, she was disappointed that she is grounded from using the computer at the moment and couldn't hop onto facebook and update her status to "listening to Too Short with my mom."

So that was me trying not to be a yawner with my girl, and by sharing her art, also trying not to be a yawner with the blog.

(jen)