Tonight's picture was taken in July of 2009. This was a typical scene at the art therapy table if Mattie was around. He was like a moth to a flame! Mattie was surrounded by his friends Jocelyn (who also died of osteosarcoma) and Maya, along with Mattie's social worker (Denise) and the Magic Man (Bob). Bob devoted the year Mattie was hospitalized to teaching him the art of magic, and Mattie LOVED it. Magic made Mattie feel special and good about himself. That day, Mattie was performing a mini magic show at the art table! As Mattie's cancer treatment wore on, his desire to be social decreased dramatically. Yet magic enabled Mattie to engage with others and in those moments, he wasn't a kid with cancer, he was simply a KID!
Quote of the day: Love is knowing that your feet carry you to a painful place, and still go anyway. ~ Mitta Xinindlu
When we moved into our house in 2021, NONE of us could agree on what to hang on our large family room wall. I ranged from wanting to capture Mattie Miracle moments on the wall, to displaying some of the beautiful photography my husband captured over the years on our family travels together. My ideas were shot down, so I had to come up with plan B.
That is when I proposed that we commission a local impressionist artist to capture landscape scenes of our gardens and the house's exterior. Everyone loved that idea. I had the wonderful opportunity to meet Kim Richards at the Vale Schoolhouse Annual Art Show in 2023. I actually have four of her smaller paintings in our home. Ironically these two
paintings, my husband purchased for me to celebrate my birthday and our wedding anniversary in 2023. I saw them at the Vale Schoolhouse art show. They weren't featured together, I literally got them off the walls and put them together. To me they spoke to one another when they were placed side by side. When I look at these paintings now in my house, they remind me ALWAYS that my marriage and love were REAL! It had to be, otherwise, why stay together for 37 years?
paintings, my husband purchased for me to celebrate my birthday and our wedding anniversary in 2023. I saw them at the Vale Schoolhouse art show. They weren't featured together, I literally got them off the walls and put them together. To me they spoke to one another when they were placed side by side. When I look at these paintings now in my house, they remind me ALWAYS that my marriage and love were REAL! It had to be, otherwise, why stay together for 37 years?
While my dad was in the hospital for two weeks, I finally took Kim's prints to the framer (if you are looking for great craftsmanship in Virginia... go to Frame Masters, and ask for Richard Best.... amazing professional and he knows his frames) and I got them back last week! Keep in mind it has taken me two years to manage this project. At first I was going to forget about all of it, but since I paid for half already and the paintings are stunning, I decided to make my vision a reality and find a way to get them up on the wall. Any case, while my dad was at his memory care center today, I spent hours trying to figure out where to hang these large paintings. I created orange paper templates of the paintings. Then spent the next several hours measuring the space, measuring again, dragging in ladders into the house, and getting my level out. I am doing this all alone. There is on one in the house holding the tape measure, no one giving me a perspective from the ground and the list goes on! However, I am not a novice to picture hanging on a wall. I have done it for all of my parent's moves in California and naturally always worked with my husband on hanging art in our own home. So I picked up many of his skills over the years, as truly I think one of the facts about myself is I always welcome learning new things! I absorbed all the ways my husband would prepare a space when hanging photos or art. Therefore he may not be with me now, but his knowledge has been transferred to this student over the years.
I am still playing around with the template placement, as I want 18" to be between the window frame and the painting, 18" between the two paintings, and then 18" between the second painting and the balcony molding above. I will sit with this for a few days, and then begin the measurement calculations for J hooks on the walls. If you have an opinion about this layout or other insights, feel free to leave a comment. The framer encouraged me to get a professional to hang these paintings. But I decided that I did not want to pay someone hundreds of dollars to do something I was equipped to manage, I just have to take my time. I figure if I can single handedly manage this house, all our finances, and caregiving, then no way are these two picture frames going to stop me.
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