Kalaya Steede

"While death burns the lips of other cultures,  Mexicans are familiar with death,  joke about it, caress it, sleep with it,  celebrate it;  it is one of their favorite toys and their most steadfast love." ~Octavio Paz I have made a lot of designs in jewelry but am always happiest when making skulls.  A friend of mine last night actually told me that she thought my best work was with the skulls and why not concentrate on that alone?  Oh...would not that be business suicide?  Hahaha!!! Who knows but I think I need to do what I love. Currently I am having mucho fun at making these skulls and am in the process of designing more skulls of a scary kind.  These skulls are made from recycled Louisiana license plates, found objects, and tin collected from several places, Mexico being one of them.  Although a friend of mine brought the ones from Mexico on over. Words are stamped on the back side of everyone of the TinSkulls....

Sometimes I feel like I should put just as much energy into cleaning my house as I do with my art.  And I ask myself why don't I?  What is this need for me to create?  I guess the simple answer would be, "It is what I do."   Like the story of the poisonous spider and the man ( The Spider and the Sage ) who saves the spider but gets stung every time...it is what they do.  The spider stings and the man saves. I had this Mardi Gras wreath since after Katrina in 2005.  Since then it has lost its life, lost its  vibrancy.  The wreath used to be a vibrant purple, now it's yellow and the beads are all faded.  That does not say Mardi Gras to me.  It says, "BLAGH!"   Mardi Gras is about COLOR and King cake of course! I thought to myself that this would have to go in the trash and I would have to go out and buy one.  I don't know if it's age or what but I said to myself, "self, why not just replace the ribbon and...