Cows at the Austin Cow Warehouse

The art studio was “creative chaos” at it’s best. Julia, the artist, said her business was doing well but she felt overwhelmed with all the clutter and felt she had no room to to put things and to create. We talked about de-cluttering and reorganizing and balancing the room. She got right on it and within 3 days had cleaned up and reorganized her studio with all the suggestions we made. A few days later she was asked to be one of the artists to paint a cow for the “Cow Parade Austin,” which is sponsored by many different organizations, and is a huge opportunity and complement for an Austin Artist to be asked.

Austin is well known for its Painted Guitars and Painted Cows!

The Cows are painted, taken to a warehouse, judged, auctioned off, displayed in the “Cow Parade Austin,” and then taken to their new homes all over town. This is all a Fundraiser and all proceeds go to the Dell Children’s Hospital of Austin.

Ester Eloise was completed a few days ago and is now at the Cow warehouse. We can’t wait to see her at the private showing this coming week and the Parade to follow. It has been so much fun following this process with Julia and Ester Eloise.

Eloise the Feng Shui Cow

     Beginning on February 3rd, 2011, we enter the Chinese year of the Metal Hare or Rabbit.   We can all feel the new energies upon us, so let's take a look.  This will be a year to regain our footing after the rip-roaring Metal Tiger year of 2010. The Year of the Rabbit in general is considered a very fortunate year, a Yin year in which the feminine, intuitive influences of our benevolent Moon shine into every heart. Rabbit qualities are considered some of the most desirable for comfortable living and fortunate longevity, as, unlike our western image of the soft, domesticated bunny, the eastern understanding finds the Hare to be one of the most strong willed, clever and agile of the animal signs.
       Rabbit years contain the same strengths as people born in a rabbit year–calmness, astute heart-centered consideration, a love of order and stability. It is a year that rewards a keen sense of watching which way the wind blows, using your "whiskers" for the directional knowledge to accomplish goals. The long ears of the rabbit invite us to listen very carefully.  Cooperation, compromise and diplomacy are all skills highly rewarded in this year. The ability to proceed with informed methodical precision and intuitive sensibility brings ultimate success.  The rabbit nature loves beauty, art, music and the finer things in life, and will bring these things to those who seek them with grounded confidence.
       While Rabbit years in general are more low key and restful, encouraging feminine receptivity, 2011 is also a Metal element year, which brings the dynamic mental body into focus.  Metal strengthens our ability to see with renewed clarity what is personally valuable, and to cut out that which we no longer desire.  This will be another year of distilling the essentials–cleansing the impurities, low vibrations and clutter from every corner of our lives.  The big difference between Tiger Metal, 2010, and Rabbit Metal, 2011, is the Great Feminine, the lunar influence, and the upsurge of our own powerful intuitive bodies.  This means we will have a most helpful tool–our "gut" feeling about anything, sharpened and honed to precision, ready to guide the way–especially when we calm down and quiet our inner dialog well enough to hear it, and act quickly, like the clever wild hare who knows just which way to jump at a moment's notice.
       This year will be a year to catch your breath and calm your nerves. A year to focus on home, family, security, and diplomacy. Let yourself relax into the gentle waves of steady, fortunate progress that is there for us all.

Thank you,
Charlynn

A. My first reaction is that, yes, the ashes ARE impacting you, and it sounds like they are a positive "spirit helper" kind of companionship for you in that location. The Knowledge and Self Cultivation area is about the deep yin of personal development and wisdom seeking. Since ashes of the deceased are the one of the most yin items we can keep, their location in the strong mountain, yet still yin, energy of the K&SC gua is harmonious. Whether or not they actually support you or lower your ch'i level is something you will have to decipher from your own experience in the space.

Within the office room's bagua, I would keep them out of the "back" or "rear" three guas–Wealth, Fame, and Love, as the very yin quality might negatively impact your "harvest" of those earthly goodies in the here and now.
 

On the last day, while having their photo taken at the Meditation Gardens here in Encinitas, two students engaged a stranger to take their photo, "Say bumblebee!" he said. When asked why he chose that phrase to inspire their smiles,  he replied, "I don't know why – it just popped into my head!"