Rain's Thursday Art Date - wisdom of the ages

Hi Everybody!

I can hardly believe it, but today it didn't rain at all, and this afternoon even the wind died down, so that was really lovely. But they've promised us a new storm for Sunday....Still, we need to enjoy the good days whenever we get them!

Rain's theme this week is a very comprehensive one, and it would take weeks to list all of the wisdom of the ages, so here are just a few examples:

The ancient Egyptians were master builders and constructors, and the remaining examples of their constructions and art always amaze me. This illustrates an old proverb:

This is another ancient Egyptian proverb:

And springing forward a few thousand years we come to Sigmund Freud, whose theories were supposed to be full of wisdom.  Unfortunately he didn't know that cigars and cocaine were dangerous.... But he founded the science of psychoanalysis and enabled people to learn about themselves and their feelings. The quote here is part of a song from Peter Sarstedt:

Some of my fave Freud quotes:

One day, in retrospect, the years of struggle will strike you as the most beautiful.

Being entirely honest with oneself is a good exercise.

The wisdom of owls is also legendary (quote from Rumi):

And one of my fave wise people was Albert Einstein, who was clever and funny.

(Photo from Pinterest)

The idea of being borne away by time has always fascinated me, here in the words of a hymn from Isaac Watts:

This piece is to honour a very wise lady, Dame Julian of Norwich.

She lived in the 14th century. Here an extract from Wikipedia:

Julian (or Juliana) of Norwich, also known as Dame Julian or Mother Julian (late 1342 – after 1416) was an English anchorite of the Middle Ages. She wrote the earliest surviving book in the English language to be written by a woman, Revelations of Divine Love. She lived in a little room built onto the Church, with a window to the world, where she spoke to people and gave them advice, and on the other side a window to God, where she could look into Church and take part in services.

One of her  'mantras' was:

 “All shall be well, and all shall be well and all manner of thing shall be well.” “He said not 'Thou shalt not be tempested, thou shalt not be travailed, thou shalt not be diseased'; but he said, 'Thou shalt not be overcome.”

And the Bible is also full of wonderful passages and texts - psalms, proverbs and stories, which tell of an age old wisdom. This is one of my faves:

Ecclesiastes 3:1-8 American Standard Version (ASV)

3 For everything there is a season, and a time for every purpose under heaven: 2 a time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted; 3 a time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build up; 4 a time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance; 5 a time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together; a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing; 6 a time to seek, and a time to lose; a time to keep, and a time to cast away; 7 a time to rend, and a time to sew; a time to keep silence, and a time to speak; 8 a time to love, and a time to hate; a time for war, and a time for peace.

And I love this quote, honouring women:

I could carry on with this topic for days, it takes me back to my studies of  religions and philosophy, but I'll stop now before you all fall asleep!

Some random pics from my walks:

Have a great day, take care,

and thanks a lot for coming by!

Midweek post:

Hi Everybody!

We had another wild and windy day here, but at least the wind kept the rain off most of the time, so that's something!

I have one more tag for my 'Spring is in the air' challenge at Tag Tuesday. I used the masterboard for the background and another stamp from Catherine Moore. She seems to be related to the other bird girl I showed last week. And I couldn't resist using another bunny, I just love those bunnies! You still have a week to link to us, and there will be a prize for one participant picked randomly, so hope to see some more people joining in:

And here are all 5 together. I made 6, but still haven't found the sixth one, although I cleared everything off my table. It has just disappeared. I hope I find it one day!

I made these little birds to send off together with a card as happy mail to David. As they have already landed in Canada I can now show them. They were hand cut (with a lot of difficulty) from a piece of card recycled from some packaging and painted and textured with pink and blue acrylics. I am linking to TIOT, recycle or go green:

Yesterday I had a doctor's appointment in Düsseldorf, so made the most of the few sunny minutes before the rain came down again to take some pictures:

This mural is an ad for a bookshop (The quote has been altered to read, 'You can only read well with your heart'):

On both sides of the rail-tracks they are building more and more apartments and offices, and they are really expensive. I can't imagine anyone wanting to live here and even paying lots of money for it:

I'm always happy to come back home and enjoy the river, meadows and the sheep and other animals and birds:

Last week this path was covered by the Rhine. It has receded a lot, but is still quite high:

  The Canadian geese love it:

Kids were writing in the mud on the path:

And I'm always happy to see spring flowers:

A man working in an elevated position:

Have a great day, take care,

and thanks a lot for coming by!

T sTands for a Tag and more

Hi Everybody!

Hope you enjoyed your weekend. Here we had spring like temperatures up to 19° together with high winds and lots of rain. The storm was worse in other places, but there was less damage overall than in last week's storm. The weather is really crazy, with the temps soaring up and down from one day to the next. And some people are still not convinced that the climate is changing!

For my 'spring is in the air' challenge at Tag Tuesday I have another tag made from the same masterboard. And I still hope that a few other people will join in!
The background stamps are from Artemio. I added a bunny again, as I love these little creatures, and I saw some real ones today:

And I have another journal page for Elizabeth's 'hearts' challenge at AJJ
made using elements from Serif, Mischief Circus and me on a hand-painted and glittered background:

This evening will be  time for our weekly T sTands for Tuesday gathering at Elizabeth's blog, so here a warm welcome to all of the lovely ladies who visit. Our local ice-cream parlour opened again this week after 2 months winter-break, so we went there for our afternoon snack. Nathalie had  a Latte Macchiato and I had a cappuccino, and we both ate waffles, as we hadn't had any lunch:

And we went back another day, but this time just for drinks:

And yesterday I cleared my working table in the kitchen. I forgot to take a 'before' pic, but suffice it to say that the bowl was NOT visible under all of the 

junk stash that was on the table:

And my window-ledge garden is blooming nicely:

These pics were taken on my Sunday morning walk:

And I still have a couple of photos from the garden centre I visited last week:

This shop is in our little town:

More photos from today's walk:

The paths were very muddy:

 But the trees are enjoying the warm, wet weather:

Have a great day, take care,
and thanks a lot for coming by!