Events featuring current and past Holly House resident artists are free to the public as part of Hypatia’s effort to enrich the cultural life of the local community while supporting women in the arts and academia with unrestricted time to complete their projects at Holly House in solo residencies.
2026
Linda Berkley: Japanese Resist Dye Painting
When: Tuesday, August 25, 2026, 4:00 pm – 5:30 pm
Where: Shelton Timberland Library, 710 W. Alder, Shelton, WA 98584
Linda Berkley will present a slideshow of her artwork. She will explain the process of the Japanese resist dye painting techniques Rozome and Katazome, which she has used in her recent paintings on silk.
Berkley is a visual artist residing in the Pacific Northwest with her husband and cat. She works in her studio and in nature (www.lindaberkley.com) in celebration of creative process and the power of observation.
In addition to drawing and traditional Western art techniques, Linda works with Japanese resist dye painting techniques and natural pigments, exploring a brilliance of color relationships, a balance of design untethered by western perspective, and line quality. She “follows her observations as they translate into visual pattern, symbol, and expression: a correspondence between her inner and outer world.”
Linda’s education includes a Bachelor of Fine Arts (BFA) from the Museum School of Fine Arts, Boston, and an MFA from the University of Arizona. She earned a Scientific Illustration certificate from University of Washington. She is retired from academic life after 27 years teaching as a college art professor in Portland and Everett.
In addition her Hypatia-in-the-Woods residency, she has attended artist residencies in Iceland, Japan, France, Vermont Studio School and Anderson Ranch Arts Center, Colorado.
Julie Kinn — “Finding Your Writing Momentum”
When: Tuesday, July 28 , 2026, 4:30 pm – 5:30 pm
Where: Shelton Timberland Library, 710 W. Alder, Shelton, WA 98584
Writer’s block can happen to anyone. Join local clinical psychologist and author Julie Kinn to explore why we sometimes get stuck and what helps us move forward. Through discussion and low-pressure activities, you’ll identify common barriers to writing productivity, including anxiety, perfectionism, and procrastination. You’ll also learn practical strategies to regain momentum. You’ll leave with useful tools to support your writing and other aspects of daily life.
Dr. Julie T. Kinn is a Pacific Northwest writer and clinical psychologist. She is the author of the novel Picky and is currently a psychologist in private practice following 15 years serving as a civilian military psychologist for the U.S. Department of Defense. Since earning her PhD in 2009, Julie has dedicated her career to making mental health information interesting and engaging through technology, media, and story. She entertains readers while sneakily offering insight from a psychological perspective. When she’s not writing or working with her clients, Julie’s in the woods with her dogs, trying a new hobby, or experimenting with butter and sugar in the kitchen. Her website is Juliekinn.com.
Heather Ryan — “Grow Your Creative Practice”
When: Tuesday, June 30, 2026, 4:00 pm – 5:00 pm
Where: Shelton Timberland Library, 710 W. Alder, Shelton, WA 98584
“One of the challenges of practicing any kind of art or craft, especially when you’re just starting out, is learning how to establish and grow a creative practice,” Ryan observes. “We tend to approach our art or craft from the perspective of needing to do it ‘right,’ which gets in the way of our creativity.
“As a writer,” she recalls, “it took me many years to understand the ways my creative practice needed to be nurtured and that my creative practice needed to include many expressions that were not writing based. It also took me years to let go of my perfectionist tendencies.”
Ryan says the workshop will help participants identify and practice activities they can use to grow and nurture their creativity while also identifying and practicing ways to undermine that need to be perfect. The workshop will include some movement, some drawing, and short writing exercises.
Participants ages 16 and up are encouraged to attend regardless of their writing or artistic ability.
Ryan is a writer and professor who calls Olympia, Washington home. She writes both fiction and creative nonfiction and her work has been published in The Los Angeles Review, Southern Humanities Review, Terrain, and NPR, and is forthcoming in Fourth Genre.
She is the parent of five adult kids in a blended family and one very high-maintenance German shepherd dog. She teaches writing and English at Pierce College in Puyallup, and has spent the last several years focusing her classes on helping students access their creativity. She is currently working on a memoir about a failed road trip with her kids, the Covid lockdown, and single parenting.
Diana Six — “Art and Forest Entomology”
When: Friday, May 29, 2026, 4:00 pm
Where: Marmo Gallery and Caffè, 217 W. Cota Street, Shelton, WA 98584
Scientist and artist Diana Six will lead the artist exchange at Marmo Gallery at 4 p.m. Friday, May 29, with a talk about how art has helped her cope with research as a forest entomologist.
“As a scientist, I study symbioses from the genetic and microbial levels to the landscape level, most often using forest insects (mainly bark beetles) and their interactions with microbes. Much of my work in recent years has been investigating whether our natural forests have the capacity to adapt to a changing climate as well as increasing alterations by humans,” Six says, noting that her research has been in North America, Africa, and Europe.
Her work “has allowed me to experience a wide range of cultures and ecosystems and encounter the loss of nature on a global scale,” she says. “I began my career as an ecologist because I was excited to unravel the mysteries of nature and tell stories of life. However, now I find I am reporting less on life and more on death. I moved at some point from being an ecologist to being a coroner, documenting the loss of life of Earth.
“I now use art as a way of expressing my grief, either through anger, more subtly expressed sadness, or to celebrate the beauty that remains,” she adds.
Dr. Six is professor emerita at the University of Montana, an extraordinary professor of ecology at the University of Pretoria, South Africa, a fellow of the Royal Entomological Society, and a Mercator Research Fellow (forest biodiversity) in Germany. She has received numerous awards including the E.O. Wilson Biotechnology Biodiversity Pioneer Award.
Amie Thurber — “Knotted and Bound: Irving Reichert, Anti-Zionism, and the Contested Road to Jewish Safety
When: Friday, May 15, 4:00 pm – 5:00 pm
Where: Shelton Timberland Library, 710 W. Alder, Shelton, WA 98584
Dr. Amie Thurber will discuss a critical biography in-progress on Rabbi Irving F. Reichert, an ambitious, influential and controversial civic leader. Reichert served as Senior Rabbi of San Francisco’s Temple Emanu-El from 1930-1947, and his numerous civic roles brought him to Jewish communities throughout the West Coast. Rabbi Reichert’s stances on a variety of social justice issues— opposing Japanese internment, supporting the rights of striking Mexican migrant workers, and resisting the spread of Zionism through his work with the American Council on Judaism (ACJ) —were criticized during his life, leading to the loss of his pulpit and prominence.
Drawing from a wide array of archival and secondary sources, this presentation traces Reichert’s development as a civic leader; his contributions to—and ultimate departure from—the ACJ; and the qualities of character that propelled his successes and exacerbated his failings.
Dr. Amie Thurber is an Associate Professor in the Portland State University School of Social Work. Her research explores how communities, social movements, and policy makers respond to contested spaces: settings marked by social divisions, uneven distributions of power, and by political marginalization and erasure.
Cynthia Giovagnoli — “Find Your Story’s Engine” writing workshop
When: Thursday, April 30, 4:00 pm – 5:00 pm
Where: Shelton Timberland Library, 710 W. Alder, Shelton, WA 98584
Find Your Story’s Engine is a 60-minute workshop that will help writers make sure that as they develop their stories, they not only create a compelling set of events and twists for their readers to follow, but also connect those readers to why it all matters.
We’ll discuss how to find the engine of your story and how to organize what you discover into a tool that will keep your story on track and resonating with your readers without stifling your creative discovery as the writing unfolds.
While this workshop is designed with long-form fiction in mind, it’s equally useful for those writing short fiction and memoir.
Cindy Giovagnoli is a lawyer-turned-writer and Author Accelerator-certified book coach from Olympia. When she’s not writing or helping other writers finish their books, she spends as much time as possible in the mountains of western Washington with her husband and two rescue dogs. Find her at mulberryandrange.com.
Fine Art Raffle
When: Sunday, April 12 through Friday, May 1, 2026, 4:00 pm
Where: Marmo Gallery and Caffè, 217 W. Cota Street, Shelton, WA 98584
Hypatia-in-the-Woods is holding a fine art raffle.
Some years ago multi-media artist Mona Monroe, after a residency at Holly House, gifted Hypatia with a collage/painting entitled “Strategic Messiness” with a gallery price of $1,300.
It’s time it found a home, so we are putting it up for raffle at Marmo Gallery at 217 West Cota Street in Shelton.
Monroe is based in Wyoming and Portland. She earned her BA with a major in printmaking from Goddard College in Plainfield, VT and also studied painting at the Moore College of Art & Design in Philadelphia, PA. Monroe has received artist residencies at the Jentel Foundation in Banner, WY, Hypathia-In-The Woods. and the Centrum Foundation in Pt. Townsend. She was awarded an Honorable Mention in the 2021 Wyoming Arts Council Fellowships and is a 2024 NYC Crit Club Canopy Program artist.
A profile of Monroe, “Mapping the Self” appeared in the September/October 2022 issue of Artists Magazine. Her work is in private and public collections in the United States and internationally.
Tickets are $2 or 3 for $5 (cash or check), and will be available at Marmo until a drawing at a no-host happy hour at 4 p.m. Friday, May1. The proceeds will benefit Hypatia’s scholarships for residencies for low-income applicants.
Margo Davis — Reading
When: Saturday, April 4, 2026, 4:00 pm
Where: Browsers Bookshop, 107 Capitol Way, N., Olympia, WA 98501
and
Saturday, April 11, 2026, at 4:00 pm
at Marmo Gallery and Caffè, 217 Cota St. Shelton WA, 98584
Hypatia Resident Margo Davis will read from her new book, Uncoupling. Margo’s poems include Pushcart nominees, and have appeared in Equinox Biannual Journal, Passager, Verse Daily, The Ekphrastic Review, Deep South Magazine, Midwest Quarterly, Panoply, and numerous anthologies. Her collections include Quicksilver (2022) and Uncoupling (Lamar University Press, 2026). She has a master’s degree in creative writing from the University of New Orleans, where she’s from.
Jennifer Astion — Memory Collage Workshop
When: Friday, March 27, 2026, 4:00 pm
Where: Shelton Timberland Library, 710 W. Alder, Shelton, WA 98584
Astion, a cartoon artist and writer, will conduct a workshop on memory and art. Jennifer asks participants to explore a memory, and, with prompts, transform the memory into a pencil or ink sketch collage. Materials will be provided. The workshop is appropriate for teens and adults.
Participants are invited to bring old magazines, wrapping paper, and other types of paper to share with the group. Some might also want to bring more personal items on paper for their own collage.
Astion is from Seattle, where she is a yoga instructor. Long a fan of cartoons and comics, she began taking classes in comic illustration when she noted how much more her youngsters related to graphic novels than non-illustrated literature. She says graphic memoirs have shown her the capacity the medium has for self-discovery and healing as well as story-telling. She wrote about her love for walking near the beach In a comic called “Seattle Selkie,” featured in the zine “Hey, Neighbor,” which includes art and writing from northeast Seattle artists.
Astion also created a comic about picking wild blackberries called “The Very Forgiving Crumble.” She publishes under the name JenAster.
Rebecca Brams — Reading
When: Saturday, March 14, 2026, 4:00 pm
Where: Marmo Gallery and Caffè, 217 W. Cota Street, Shelton, WA 98584
Rebecca will read from her novel, House of Chosen Women, and do a slideshow from her research in Peru while a Fulbright fellow.
Rebecca Brams is a fiction and essay writer who grew up in California’s Mojave Desert and has traveled extensively in Latin America. Her historical novel, House of Chosen Women, takes place in South America during the Inca Empire. Rebecca lived in Peru and conducted extensive research for the novel with the support of a Fulbright Fellowship. She has a B.A. in Anthropology from Stanford University and an M.F.A. in Creative Writing from St. Mary’s College of California.
Rebecca’s short fiction and creative nonfiction have been published in The Stonecoast Review, MUTHA, Dark Matter: Women Witnessing, Carve, and Literary Mama. She has been awarded writing residencies at Hypatia-in-the-Woods, Vermont Studio Center, Kimmel Harding Nelson Center for the Arts, Rockvale Writers’ Colony, Write On Door County, Dorland Arts Colony, and Cill Rialaig in Ireland. House of Chosen Women was named a semi-finalist in the Key West Literary Seminar’s Marianne Russo Emerging Writer Award, and in the Faulkner-Wisdom Creative Writing Competition. Rebecca lives in Berkeley, California, traditional territory of the Lisjan Ohlone, with her husband, two sons, and a little fluffy white dog. She can be found online at www.rebeccabrams.com.
Kathleen Woods – Writing Workshop
When: Friday, March 6, 2026, 4:00 pm
Where: St. David of Wales Episcopal Church, 324 W. Cedar St, Shelton , WA 98584
Katie will lead a workshop for writers, poets, and writers-to-be, in the church library. Attendees please use the door in the corner of the building by the parking lot. Space is limited: please preregister with Carolyn Maddux.
Inspiration Through Emulation
In this workshop, you’ll break open a favorite short piece or passage to discover how and why it works, mapping the patterns and rhythm of effective craft. Then, in a supportive group of other writers, you’ll weave your own ideas through that outline, learning from a writing style by actively trying it on. We’ll also discuss ways to apply this process to other forms of art, like music and painting. Discover how mimicry can lead you to something completely new!
Please bring a short excerpt by another poet/writer–something you love and/or admire! We will be using these pieces as part of the workshop.
Kathleen Woods is the author of the novel White Wedding. She earned an M.F.A in Creative Writing from the University of Colorado at Boulder, where she served as Managing Editor for Timber Journal. She is an alum of SF Writers Grotto Fellowship, the Tin House Summer Writers Conference, and the Wellstone Center Residency. Her work has been featured in Electric Literature, Literary Hub, Pacifica Literary Review, Western Humanities Review, The Racket, and others. She lives, writes, and reads in the San Francisco Bay Area, and is honored to currently have work on her next novel supported by Hypatia-in-the-Woods.
Sister Laura Swan – St Placid Priory History
When: Tuesday, February 10, 2026, 4:30 PM
Where: Shelton Timberland Library, 710 W. Alder, Shelton, WA 98584
Benedictine Sister Laura Swan is a member of St. Placid Priory, a women’s Benedictine monastic community located in Lacey, WA. A member for over 35 years, she is a spiritual director and archivist as well as faculty at Saint Martin’s University where the students inspire her to learn and rethink and learn even more. St. Placid Priory is called a “Legacy Community,” Swan says, “yet few people, especially Roman Catholics, know we even exist, despite a 135 year continued presence in the South Puget Sound region.”
In her talk, she says she’ll “share a bit of our history, including funny stories, and how our outreach to the South Sound region has changed over the years. We’ll talk about how archivists do our work and turn archives into history. And I’ll share a massive project that all the Women’s Religious communities are up to — that is making historians very happy.” Her talk will include some projected images.
Her passion has been around restoring the histories and stories of women to history (to the narratives that shape our understanding and perceptions). She has published a number of nonfiction and fiction books: The Forgotten Desert Mothers: Sayings, Lives,and Stories of Early Christian Women; The Wisdom of the Beguines: the Forgotten Story of a Medieval Women’s Movement; Engaging Benedict: What the Rule Can Teach Us Today; The Benedictine Tradition; and her first novel, The Hannah Document.
Find her on YouTube. She is at work on several fiction projects at this time.
Miriam Gershow — “A Symphony of Voices”
When: Friday, January 16, 2026, 4:30 PM
Where: Shelton Timberland Library, 710 W. Alder, Shelton, WA 98584
Oregon writer Miriam Gershow will read from her work in a program called “A Symphony of Voices” at the Shelton Timberland Library at 4:30 p.m. Friday, January 16.
Gershow will share passages from her published novels, The Local News and Closer, as well as from her current novel in progress, discussing the evolution from one narrator in her first book to a symphony of nearly 30 narrators in her current work, written in the style of an oral history.
She teaches writing at The University of Oregon in Eugene, as well as teaching workshops for writers from elementary school to retirement age.
Her collection of short stories, Survival Tips, was a finalist for the Oregon Book Awards 2025 Best Book and won the Pencraft Book Award for short story collections in 2024.
Gershow is completing a third novel and starting another during her residency while on sabbatical from the university.
2025
Alexis Clements — Film Screening: “There Must Be a Word”
When: Friday, November 14, 2025, 5:00 PM
Where: Marmo Gallery and Caffè, 217 W. Cota Street, Shelton, WA 98584
Details: https://www.marmogallery.com/events/film-screening-alexis-clements
Alexis Clements is a writer and filmmaker based in Brooklyn, New York (traditional land of the Lenape people). Her creative work has been produced, published, and screened across the US, and in Europe, South America, and Asia. Her feature-length documentary film, All We’ve Got, premiered at NewFest, has toured the globe, and is currently airing on select PBS stations around the US. In 2021 she launched a podcast called The Answer is No. She regularly publishes essays and reviews online, and is currently at work on two projects that mix prose and film.
She has been awarded a New York State Council on the Arts Grant, a New York City Artist Corps Grant, a Bruce and Arch Brown Foundation Grant, a Dramatists Guild of America Fellowship, two Puffin Foundation Artist Grants, a Ludwig Vogelstein Foundation Grant, and the Source Theatre’s Washington Theatre Festival Literary Prize. She has been a resident at the Millay Colony, as well as the Helene Wurlitzer Foundation, and is an alumna of the WP Theater Playwrights Lab. She is also founder of the multi-disciplinary arts project New Acquisition, which produced projects from 2007-2010, and a co-founder of the queer writing group and publisher, Private Commission, which was active from 2012-2017.
THERE MUST BE A WORD
Written and directed by Alexis Clements
Short film and handmade Riso-printed zine
An exploration of place, queer identity, and desire, this piece asks questions about how place shapes the ways our identities are realized, and the ways in which categorizing/naming our selves both shapes us and invites resistance. The project draws on the work of scholars and artists such as bell hooks, Trinh T. Minh-ha, Japonica Brown-Saracino, Larry Mitchell, and Lauren Berlant.
Ages 18+ This film contains nudity; minors are allowed with adult supervision.
Chamber Music & Silent Auction: A fundraiser for Hypatia-in-the-Woods
When: Sunday, November 2, 2025, 2:00 PM
Where: St. David’s Church, 4th and Cedar, Shelton, WA 98584
At auction: art, artifacts, books, and desserts
Music: April Kuhr, piano; Roberta Hason Downey, cello; music by Ralph Vaughan Williams, Ludwig van Beethoven, and Cesar Franck
Coffee and cookies will be served. Suggested donation $10.
Charlotte Gross — Writing Workshop: EMBODIED WRITING | Reconnecting to Ourselves and the Living World Through Stories
When: Saturday, October 18, 2025, 2:00 PM 4:00 PM
Where: Marmo Gallery and Caffè, 217 Cota St., Shelton, WA 98584
In this workshop, we will get out of our heads and into our animal selves to write the stories only we can tell. What is our sensory, sensual experience of our surroundings? In what ways are we woven into the ecosystems we inhabit? And in what ways might we explore and map our inner terrain like we do the land we walk on?
Together we will respond to prompts and writing invitations; craft short fiction and/or essays; and offer each other encouraging feedback. Whether you have an existing writing practice or are new to writing creatively but are seeking a more meaningful connection with your inner self and the natural world, this course is for you.
Materials provided, but if you have a particular writing utensil and notebook you love, please bring them.
This workshop is geared for ages 18+
Free/public
Charlotte Gross is a writer and outdoor educator living in Truckee, CA on Washoe land. She has worked as a fire lookout, a backpacking guide in the High Sierra, and a Nordic ski patroller. Her stories emerge from the power of elemental forces and the cycles that shape our landscape. The characters in her stories find their way back to connection with the living world while tracing inner terrain of love, grief, and loss both personal and ecological. Through all of her work, Charlotte depicts the animacy of the world we are part of and offers ways of returning to that alive-ness. Her work has been published by Salamander, Dartmouth Alumni Magazine, and Whitefish Review, among others, and can be found at charlottelgross.com
Alicia O’Dell — Building Your Language in Stitch (Workshop)
When: Friday, October 3, 3:00 pm – 5:00 pm
Where: Marmo Gallery and Caffè, 217 Cota St., Shelton, WA 98584
This hands-on workshop will explore the art of stitching as a form of personal expression, with six simple stitches that can be combined, repeated, and adapted to begin developing your own unique visual language. The session includes guided instruction, open-ended exploration, and creative play, all designed to help you observe and begin to shape your own artistic style through stitching.
All materials provided.
Alicia O’Dell is a textile artist, slow stitch enthusiast, and natural dye explorer. Her creative practice is a form of meditation, an embodied way to connect more deeply with herself and the world around her. Through slow stitching and working with plants, she listens to the quiet conversation between the natural world and the human experience. Her work is informed by place and the impermanence of seasons. You can follow along with her latest stitch work and dye garden experiments on Instagram: @woveninplace
Alicia writes, “Nature is my greatest teacher. My creative practice always begins with time spent in nature, often through slow walks where I can observe and absorb the landscape around me. My work is a translation of place—a way to listen, respond, and engage with the environment.”
Taylor Wallau — Poetry Open Mic
When: Friday, September 26, 4:00 pm
Where: Shelton Timberland Library, 710 W. Alder, Shelton, WA 98584
Taylor is a queer, multi-disciplinary artist, a writer, an educator, and a community organizer, living in so-called “Portland, Oregon,” on the traditional land of the Chinook and other Indigenous peoples. After earning her BA in English and Studio Art from Lewis & Clark College, she received a Fulbright scholarship to teach high school English in Vietnam. She later pursued a Master’s of Education from Portland State University, and taught secondary English in Portland Public Schools. Currently, she works as a substitute, which allows her to advocate for fair labor practices in the union, while investing the majority of her time in the anti-capitalist pursuits of creative writing, printmaking, mutual aid, and political education. She is a proud member of the Independent Publishing Resource Center, Oregon Educators for Palestine, The Peoples’ Store, and Portland Association of Teachers.
Through poems and personal essays, Taylor explores the boundaries of language and the poetics of transformation. Her work is inspired by the somatic healing arts, anti-imperialist struggles around the globe, astrology, tarot, and the animistic traditions of her Irish ancestors. Taylor has published in Palette Poetry, and has shown mixed-media work at the Hoffman Gallery, Grin City Collective Gallery, and the Alberta Arts Gallery; her work is forthcoming in the Buckman Journal. She has received generous support from the Regional Arts & Culture Council and Sou’Wester Arts. She has also self-published many zines, including the 30-page, Risograph-printed, hand-bound chapbook titled Notes on Inheritance (2023). You can follow her work on Instagram @practice_rebellion (a substack account is in development).
At the conclusion of her residency, Taylor will read new poems and excerpts from in-progress essays at an open mic. She is thrilled to offer the opportunity to other local poets and writers to share their work, as she believes that creativity and community are two of the most effective forms of resistance to oppression.
Rose Menyon Heflin — Reading
When: The public reading has been cancelled, due to temporary closure of Marmo for repairs.
Where: Marmo Gallery and Caffè, 217 Cota St., Shelton, WA 98584
Rose Menyon Heflin spent her early youth running delightedly barefoot, wild, and free — practically feral — among the fields and forests of rural, southern Kentucky, and this instilled a lifelong love of nature and a fierce stubbornness. Ultimately, this prompted her to get a degree in environmental studies (in addition to East Asian languages and cultures) at Beloit College in Beloit, Wisconsin. Nowadays, she is a poet, writer, and visual artist living in Madison, Wisconsin. With over 250 poems published in outlets spanning five continents, her poetry has evolved to include formal, free verse, performance, and prose, and it often features environmental, feminist, or other justice-related issues.
Besides poetry, she has also published a few creative nonfiction, flash fiction, and journalistic pieces. Rose Menyon’s poetry has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize and won numerous state and national awards. Still, she is most proud of her more unorthodox accomplishments: two of her haiku were published in a gumball machine; several of her poems were featured in an exhibit at A4 Art Museum in Chengdu, China; another of her poems was choreographed and danced; and some of her poetry was performed by Washington, DC’s Rose Theatre. An OCD sufferer since childhood, she strongly prefers hugging trees instead of people.
When not writing, she practices cyanotyping, photography, papermaking, jewelry-making, and mixed media collaging at Artworking, a local makerspace for disabled artists. Among other venues, her work has recently been published or is forthcoming in: Ariel Chart, Asahi Haikuist Network, Bramble, and many other venues.
Caroline Koopford — The Line Between Autobiography and Fiction
When: Friday, August 22, 4:00 pm
Where: Marmo Gallery and Caffè, 217 Cota St., Shelton, WA 98584
Oregon writer Caroline Koopford will read from a new work at 4 p.m. Friday, August 22, at Marmo Gallery, addressing the fine line between autobiography and fiction. Her reading and talk is open to writers and readers in all genre.
She is working on a multi-genre project called “One Hundred Roots Silently Drinking.” A work with one hundred movements, it takes as inspiration a poem by Rainer Rilke, and “explores familial relationships across generations probing into the gap between what we mean to pass and communicate to those we love and are otherwise bound to, and what is left behind once those communications vanish and turn to memory.”
Koopford is an instructor in the creative writing program at the University of Oregon in Eugene and teaches at Thurston High School in Springfield. She has, she says, been involved in writing since high school. She graduated magna cum laude from Rutgers University in 2004, earned her MFA in fiction writing at U of O in 2012, and has been “writing, workshopping with peers, and teaching ever since.” She maintains a substack called Intellectual Outpost. She enjoys the out of doors and hiking with her husband and sons.
The talk is free of charge. Beverages and snacks are available at Marmo.
Debra Dean Murphy — Grieving the End of the World: Climate Collapse and Other Breakdowns
When: Friday, August 8, 6:00 pm
Where: Marmo Gallery and Caffè, 217 Cota St., Shelton, WA 98584
Debra Dean Murphy, a professor at West Virginia Wesleyan College, will read from the book she’s currently editing. Dr. Murphy teaches theology and ethics, restorative justice, and other subjects. She is founder and Co-Director of the Center for Restorative Justice at West Virginia Wesleyan College, and serves on the college’s liberal arts core committee. She writes, “In the last two to three years I have been thinking and teaching and writing about the many facets and experiences of grief in relation to the unprecedented climate emergencies we face. I organized a conference around this topic in southern California this past summer.” One of the undergraduate classes she teaches is called “Climate Grief and Radical Hope.”
She is writing her current book under a contract with Cascade Books. Dr. Murphy notes, “The chapter after the introduction is “Geographies of Grief,”, which explores geography both as a metaphor for grief and as real places and spaces, the loss of which can occasion deep sorrow. In the climate crises we face, we always grieve from somewhere and for somewhere. But the book also explores the related themes of beauty and the act and art of paying attention. One of our tasks in this grievous time of loss—of biodiversity, of ecosystems, of habitable spaces—is to tend to the beauty that is the world we inhabit.”
Food and drink available for purchase at Marmo. View menu at https://marmogallery.com/caffe
Michelle Horgen — Discussion and Music from “Scarlet”
When: Tuesday, July 22, 4:00 pm
Where: Shelton Timberland Library, 710 W. Alder, Shelton, WA 98584
Portland soprano, pianist and conductor Michelle Horgen has created a musical, “Scarlet,” based on Nathaniel Hawthorne’s classic “The Scarlet Letter,” and she’ll share some of the music at a talk and concert at the Shelton library at 4 p.m. Tuesday, July 22.
Her presentation will include a talk about how Hawthorne’s tale remains relevant today, and she will walk attendees through her treatment of the classic story as a modern musical, including performing several songs from the show. She plans to engage her audience in a feedback session that will help guide her work during the week of residency.
A classically trained mezzo soprano, pianist and conductor, Michelle Horgen’s choral compositions and arrangements have been performed by choirs in Oregon, California, Colorado, and Utah. As a clinician, she has taught musical theater and jazz workshops. She holds a bachelor’s degree in vocal performance and a Master of Music degree in conducting from Portland State University. She has taught in the choral programs at Lower Columbia College and Portland State University. She has directed more than 30 musicals and plays in the Pacific Northwest.
“Scarlet” is her first major work; brought to life by a successful Kickstarter campaign to fund the full-length concept album and the inaugural staged reading. It went on to be included in the New York Musical Theater Festival and FingerLakes PiTCH Fest, was publicly staged by Portland Playhouse in Portland and won multiple regional awards including Best New Musical.
Horgen has received grants from NEA, Renegade Opera and an $80,000 Oregon Creative Heights award. When not writing, she watches a lot of musicals and takes her German Shepherd to the dog park.
Jennifer MacKenzie — Poetry Writing Workshop
When: Tuesday, July 15, 4:00 pm
Where: Shelton Timberland Library, 710 W. Alder, Shelton, WA 98584
MacKenzie, a poet from the Bronx, New York, will lead a workshop in poetry writing at 4 p.m. Tuesday, July 15, at the Shelton Timberland Library. Jennifer says we’ll “listen to and quilt together inner and outer worlds, using quotations and images from whom and whatever else you live and work with and among.
“This poetry workshop will experiment with expanding poems’ capaciousness and capacity to hold awareness, attention and attunement to both internal and external information, sensing, memory and music. Simply put, practice welcoming and incorporating more–voices, registers, histories–into your writing process, and surprising yourself more in what as well as how you find yourself making.”
You don’t need to bring anything other than a notebook, but you are welcome to bring any books about historical, ancestral, environmental, or other fields that inspire your curiosity and attention, and/or personal documents that root you in a particular place, people and history, such as family albums. We will sample from these materials and others for inspiration.
Jennifer’s books are My Not-My Soldier (Fence Books Modern Poets Series) and pain survey (Hillary Gravendyk Prize, Inlandia Books). Her poems have appeared widely including in jubilat, Prelude, and Conduit, and prose in the Kenyon Review Online, Guernica, Latin American Literature Today, and Hyperallergic.
She grew up in Michigan and earned degrees at Wesleyan University and the University of Iowa Writers Workshop. After living in Duvall, WA, Damascus, Syria, and Istanbul, Turkey, she now makes her home in the Bronx, where she teaches English and journalism at Lehman College, CUNY, and occasionally co-translates poems from the Arabic.
Emily Welty — Work in Progress
When: Tuesday, July 1, 4:00 pm
Where: Shelton Timberland Library, 710 W. Alder, Shelton, WA 98584
Welty directs one of the largest largest undergraduate Peace and Justice Studies programs in the USA at Pace University, New York City. A playwright and professor, she will be writer-in-residence with Hypatia-in-the-Woods, working on a memoir from which she’ll read on Tuesday.
She was part of the team at the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons that won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2017. Welty says she first became involved in activism in college, and being in community with various minorities struggling for liberation taught her “humility, hopefulness and determination.”
“In between threading together jobs to survive, I lived and worked all over the world, in Palestine/Israel, South Africa, Northern Ireland, Uganda, South Sudan and Kenya, learning how to accompany people on their own terms,” Welty says.
When she moved to New York City, she was invited into the nuclear disarmament movement and engaged with the United Nations. She says she quickly learned that abolishing nuclear weapons was also part of the work to fight for the environment and denounce racialized power structures.
Her memoir, she says, comprises essays that concentrates on the role of place and its influence in her life. In the fall of 2019, she began what was intended as a yearlong trip around the world to explore place “as a way of knowing,” and how it can transform life. Her journey unfolded through the Far East, South Africa, the Cook Islands and other areas before being halted first by the wildfires in Australia and then by COVID, and she learned from the aboriginals of Australia that healing can be found in the places that first knew us. “I realized,” she says, “it was much easier for me to talk about justice in other Places than it was for me to actually reflect honestly on the Place that I came from and how it shaped me. One organizing framework for my memoir in essays emerged from that contestation with rootedness and belonging.”
Welty is co-author and editor of Peace and Justice Studies: Critical Pedagogy (2019), Unity in Diversity: Interfaith Dialogue in the Middle East (2007) and Occupying Political Science (2013).
Maitri Sojourner — Collage Workshop
When: Friday, June 13, 10:30 am
Where: Shelton Timberland Library, 710 W. Alder, Shelton, WA 98584
A former Hypatia resident, former board member, and accomplished collage artist, Maitri has graciously offered to step in and present a collage workshop to replace Jennifer Astion’s cancelled workshop.
Maitri Sojourner grew up in a family where art was encouraged and anything was possible. She has taken art classes in mediums including clay, fabric, encaustic and paint. Fiber, she says, is her sweet spot, and she spins, knits, crochets, quilts, and creates pictures out of fabric. She loves color and the way light transforms objects, and considers the design elements of shapes and values when creating art.
A recent work, “The Game of Life,” is influenced by today’s challenging world and her Buddhist beliefs. Sojourner says she practices to explore her place in the universe. She believes Art Saves Lives, and encourages everyone to do something creative every day.
Jennifer Astion — Workshop: Memory and Art
When: Friday, June 13, 10:30 am –CANCELLED—
Where: — CANCELLED —
Cartoon artist and writer Jennifer Astion will offer a workshop on memory and art.
She’ll ask participants to explore a memory and then, with prompts, have them transform the memory into a pencil or ink sketch and/or collage.
All materials will be provided. Jennifer says this workshop will be appropriate for both adults and teens, so bring a young friend along.
Jennifer comes to Hypatia from Seattle, where she is a yoga instructor. Long a fan of cartoons and comics, she began taking classes in comic illustration when she noted how much more her youngsters related to graphic novels than non-illustrated literature. Graphic memoirs, she says, have shown her the capacity this medium has for self-discovery and healing as well as storytelling.
She wrote about her love for walking near the beach in a comic titled “Seattle Selkie,” and created a comic about picking wild blackberries called “The Very Forgiving Crumble.” She publishes comics under the name JenAster.
Delma Soult – Artist Talk
When: Friday, May 30, 12:00 noon
Where: Shelton Timberland Library, 710 W. Alder, Shelton, WA 98584
Soult was born and raised in Sevilla, Spain, and lives and works in the redwoods of La Honda, California. Her Spanish heritage and fascination with surrealism and magical realism color her work.
“Artistic practice,” she says, “is a sacred ritual where I can be present with myself and connect with something bigger than me. I enjoy the magic of creation through the subconscious and creating bizarre, mysterious and vibrant landscapes that combine lush organic shapes, colors and symbols as a way of searching deep into myself and the collective unconscious.”
She works in a variety of mediums and experiments with new ways of art making: from oils to acrylics, mosaics, encaustic, digital art, photography, collages, videos and mixed media.
Her recent works include a series on “The Emerging Feminine” and “The Goddess Project.”
Soult commented that in the course of making art, her explorations have led her to question identity, wounding, and feminine power. “It also led me to the realization that we are all in deep need of universal healing because of masculine values imposed on us through generations of patriarchy,” Soult said.
She holds an interdisciplinary Master of Fine Arts degree from the California Institute of Integral Studies. She is currently founder and director of Madrone Arts, a cooperative of professional artists living and working in coastal and rural areas of San Mateo County.
Caitlin Andrews – Writing Workshop
When: Friday, May 23, 3:00 pm
Where: Marmo Gallery and Caffè, 217 W. Cota St.
Andrews, a writer of historical fiction, will lead a writing workshop on setting at 3 p.m. Friday, May 23, at Marmo Gallery on Cota Street. Andrews, a writer-in-residence with Hypatia-in-the-Woods, is author of a novel in progress, a braided queer historical adventure set during the Irish War for Independence. It’s a finalist for the Marianne Russo Award and was a semifinalist for a 2021 Fulbright Scholarship in Research in Ireland.
She holds a MFA in Creative Writing from the University of Miami, has work published in a wide range of magazines and anthologies. She manages events for Hugo House in Seattle and DigiPen Institute of Technology in Redmond.
Of her workshop, Andrews cites the Irish word dindsenchas, the lore of places. “Places are holders of deep wisdom,” she says, “allowing generations to define and redefine their identity against the timelessness of location. As writers, it is our responsibility to constantly (re)engage with place responding to its stimuli and lensing its meaning.”
While writers often start a work focusing on character or plot, Andrews suggests, “What if we considered place as a character itself? What if we treated place as a fundamental motivator which drives narrative forward?” In her class, with close reading of authors like Toni Morrison, Katrina Carrasco and Sasha taqʷšəblu La Pointe, and with generative prompts, participants will engage with place “within ourselves and our work.”
When not writing, Caitlin Andrews is known to get lost in the woods, seek out a cozy bookshop or art museum, and listen to silly D&D Podcasts. More information is available on her website, caitlinmandrews.com.
Margo Davis – Ekphrastic Poetry Workshop
When: Thursday, May 1, 3:00 pm.
Where: Shelton Timberland Library, 7th and Alder
A writer-in-residence at Hypatia-in-the Woods, Davis will focus on ekphrastic poetry—poetry that springs from the writer’s response to a work of visual art—for her reading and workshop. She says she loves ekphrastic poetry for its dialogue with other forms of art. She will read a series of ekphrastic poems written in response to Dorothea Lange’s photos of the 1930s Dust Bowl.
Margo’s workshop will focus on ekphrasis, “giving voice to what stirs in us when we see an art piece and simply can’t break away.” She adds, “Never written this type poem? There are no parameters other than delving in, experimenting, observing. You can describe, respond, argue, or record whatever thoughts surface. Reflect. Play. Risk words on the page. Join us! Sharing your work with fellow writers will be optional.”
Davis thrives on residencies in the Pacific Northwest—Hypatia-in-the-Woods and Centrum—as well as overseas, in Spain, Portugal, Budapest, and Italy. Margo’s poems include Pushcart nominees, and have appeared in Equinox Biannual Journal, Passager, Verse Daily, The Ekphrastic Review, Deep South Magazine, Midwest Quarterly, Panoply, and numerous anthologies. Her collections include Quicksilver (2022) and Uncoupling (Lamar University Press, 2026). She has a master’s degree in creative writing from the University of New Orleans, where she’s from.
September Herrin and Julia Oshiki — A Two-part Flash Fiction Workshop
When: Part 1: Friday, April 18, 2025 3:30 p.m. — 5:30 p.m. (September)
Part 2: Tuesday, April 22, 2025 3:30 p.m. — 5:30 p.m. (Julia)
Where: Shelton Timberland Library, 7th and Alder
Two Hypatia-in-the-Woods writers in residence will collaborate for a two-session experience in writing flash fiction April 18 and 22 at the Shelton Timberland Library..
Novelists September Herrin and Julia Oshiki, each of whom will spend a week at Hypatia’s Holly House to work on their full-length story projects, will offer the workshops as a coordinated pair. However, participants are welcome to attend just one or the other if their available time is limited.
Herrin, who writes using the author name September Woods Garland, will lead off with a session starting at 3:30 p.m. Friday, April 18. “In Flash Fiction Part One,” she says, “we will learn about the artistic value and craft of flash fiction. Through analyzing sample texts and exploring our own ideas through guided writing exercises, we’ll come to understand the fundamentals of flash fiction writing. Rounding out this first of two parts, we’ll spend time drafting a flash fiction piece that can be workshopped in part two, led by Julia Oshiki.”
Julia Oshiki will pick up the thread with a second workshop at 3:30 Tuesday, April 22. She writes, “In this workshop, we will chat about what makes flash fiction great. We’ll try our hand at some writing exercises, and have an opportunity to share and discuss our flash fiction towards the end of the session. This workshop builds off of last week’s flash fiction session led by September Woods Garland – attendees are encouraged to bring any writing from that session, though newcomers are very much welcomed as well.”
September Herrin/Woods Garland hails from the Pacific Northwest where she enjoys long, romantic walks through haunted houses and feeding Bigfoot peanut butter and seaweed sandwiches. Her fiction is forthcoming or has appeared in The Stray Branch, Roi Fainéant Press, Crow & Cross Keys, and elsewhere. September is currently working on her debut novel and will be a Writer-in-Residence at Arteles in Haukijärvi, Finland in September 2025. She also works as a freelance book editor and serves as Editor in Chief at Weird Lit Magazine.
Julia Oshiki, who uses pronouns they/them, is a creative nonfiction writer living in Portland, OR. They received their MFA in creative nonfiction from Colorado State University and are the winner of the Hallie Brown Ford award in creative writing. They enjoy writing about gender, sexuality, and romance media.
Atia Sattar — A Reading
When: Thursday, April 10, 2025 4:00 p.m. – 5:30 p.m.
Where: Marmo Gallery and Caffè, 217 W. Cota Street, Shelton, WA 98584
Atia Sattar is a Pakistani-born poet whose writing explores the embodied intersections of grief, gender, race, and motherhood. Her creative work has been supported by PEN America, Anaphora Arts, the Writers Colony at Dairy Hollow, and Hypatia in the Woods. Her poems have been published in Rogue Agent (Pushcart Nomination), West Trade Review, Michigan Quarterly Review: Mixtape, and SWWIM Every Day, among others. Atia’s essays appear in Lion’s Roar, Tricycle, Academe, and the Cambridge Quarterly for Health Care Ethics. She is Associate Teaching Professor of Gender and Sexuality Studies at the University of Southern California. She lives in Los Angeles with her husband and two daughters.
Sophia Deutsch – Sound Bath
When: Friday, March 21, 4 p.m.
Where: Shelton Timberland Library, 7th and Alder
Join Minneapolis-based cellist and composer Sophia Deutsch for a 30-minute sound bath that blends amplified cello and electronics to create an immersive experience of resonant sound. Drawing on her background in both classical and experimental music, Sophia crafts a sonic landscape where overtones shimmer, dissonances unfold, and vibrations fill the space, inviting a deep connection with sound.
This sound bath offering is an invitation to engage in a communal meditation through waves of sound. As cello tones and electronic textures envelop the room, participants are encouraged to settle in, breathe, and allow the vibrations to wash over them. The experience is designed to foster relaxation, awareness, and creative inspiration, whether you’re seeking stillness, introspection, or a sense of sonic adventure.
Bring a pillow or mat, find a comfortable place to rest, and let the music guide you.
Sophia Deutsch is a Minneapolis-based cellist and composer whose work bridges experimental sound and classical tradition. Her music embraces a full spectrum of beauty—from the grotesque to the sublime—using electronics to enhance the subtle overtones of acoustic instruments and auxiliary percussion. As a performer, Sophia’s improvisational sensibilities and melodic creativity have made her a well-utilized collaborator across a range of genres in the Twin Cities, from drone and psych rock to experimental and techno. Her compositions evolve from live performance and improvisation into intentional explorations of new notation and form. Recognized by the Jerome Foundation and The Cedar Cultural Center, Sophia was awarded the 2022-23 Cedar Commission for Vis Vitae, a chamber ensemble piece blending traditional, aleatoric, and experimental notation. Inspired by vitalism, the piece explores the universe as a grand sonic experience—one in which we are both the audience and the composers. Currently, she is developing Pull, a dual memoir multimedia collaboration with harpist, vocalist, and filmmaker Victoria Carpenter, and looks forward to beginning her newest composition at Hypatia-in-the-Woods in March 2025.
Historical Character Workshop with Hypatia Resident Sally Bays
Where: Marmo Gallery, 217 Cota Street, Shelton, WA 98584
When: Saturday, March 8, 2025, 2:00 PM – 4:00 PM
Uncovering historical characters and making them your own
In this workshop, participants will learn how to take characters from history and turn them into literary inspiration. The workshop includes lecture, discussion, and writing components.
Sally Bays is a northwest writer currently living in Sequim, WA, with her husband and four youngest kids. She has a BA in English from Colorado State and an MFA in Creative Writing from Eastern Kentucky University. When not writing or volunteering with her many organizations, she enjoys fiber arts and napping.
Dora Lanier – Intro to Improvisation
Where: Shelton Timberland Library, 710 W. Alder, Shelton, WA 98584
When: Monday, February 10, 4:15 pm – 5:30 pm
Dora Lanier is a Seattle based actor, writer, director, and teacher. She has taught acting, movement, improvisation, and theater history to groups of all ages in the Puget Sound and UW Madison where she received her MFA in Theater.
Dora has performed as Wanda Flipplefairy, teaching water conservation to grade school students for Snohomish County PUD, and has been a member of several improv troupes in the Seattle area.
Her workshop will explore improvisation vocabulary and how to use it, incorporate play improvisation games and scenes, and discuss how improvisation is incorporated into many areas outside of theater or a comedy club.
Dora’s current writing project, Erasing Ophelia will be the
focus of her stay at Holly House this winter.
…
Meg Hayertz – How to Hug a Lion
Where: Shelton Timberland Library, 710 W. Alder, Shelton, WA 98584
When: Tuesday, January 28, 4:00 pm – 5:45 pm
Meg Hayertz (she/they) is the author of Tarot for Beginners (Althea Press). Meg holds an MFA from California Institute of Integral Studies and her fiction has appeared or is forthcoming in The Louisville Review, CALYX, Press Pause, VoiceCatcher, and elsewhere. Meg lives in Portland, Oregon.
Meg will read from a work in progress, How To Hug a Lion…a novel that includes fun/satirical/poetic worksheets where the reader can reflect on their relationship to wildness and domesticity.
To open and close the reading, Meg will hand out copies of a worksheet attendees can do for fun, if they like (participation optional). Meg will then give folks a chance to share what they come up with, if they like, in pairs and in the larger group.
How to Hug a Lion
“When Kara, an anxious millennial working a shitty job at the San Francisco Aquarium gift shop and desperate to superglue her relationship with her girlfriend back together, meets a friend’s domesticated therapy lion, she’s tempted by the possibility of becoming healed. Despite glaring ethical concerns, she accepts the gift of a lion named Blueberry from her girlfriend (a confident,
fast-talking young lawyer trying to get Kara off her back). Kara hopes to learn courage from the lion (because if she were brave, she would be lovable, she believes), but life is asking her to learn courage from failure, repair her exploitative relationships and—when her lion regains his instincts—embrace the beast of karmic justice leaping towards her with its claws out and fangs bared.”
Rebecca Holbrook – Reading and Music
Where: Shelton Timberland Library, 710 W. Alder, Shelton, WA 98584
When: Thursday, January 16, 2025, 4:00 pm – 5:45 pm
A storyteller steeped in the rich culture of the south, Rebecca Holbrook comes from generations of women with the Sight, a knowing of things to come, and other healing gifts. Her first novel, Omie’s Well, was inspired by stories about these women, handed down from her mother and aunts. In the tradition of her ancestors, she became a healer, working as an orthopedic massage therapist, and founded the Healing Arts Center & Massage School in Huntsville, Alabama. Along the way, she’s been carpenter, horticulturist, singer, songwriter, musician and poet. She lives in the Pacific Northwest with her husband, Gary, and their dog, Liza Jane, where she writes, and offers courses on empowering women through carpentry.
Rebecca will read from her first book, Omie’s Well (published in 2023) and from its sequel, The Deer Stone, which will be published in 2025. She’ll also sing and play traditional music referenced in the books.
Set in the early 1900’s near Savannah, Georgia, both books are about legacies: the gifts and challenges we inherit and what we choose to do with them. They also capture the rich flavor of the south, its humor, the strength of its people, and the challenges a changing world brings to their doorstep.
https://rebeccaholbrookbooksandmusic.com
Kathryn Frey – Lyric Poetry Reading
Where: Shelton Timberland Library, 710 W. Alder, Shelton, WA 98584
When: Friday, January 3, 2025, 4:00 pm – 5:45 pm
Kathryn Frey is an artist, dancer, writer, and aspiring cartographer of liminal spaces. Her work emerges from the intersection of movement, memory, and critical inquiry. Sixteen years of classical ballet training provided a rich foundation for exploring how bodies archive experience, while deconstructing her religious upbringing created a pathway for challenging systemic narratives.
Kathryn will be reading (and maybe singing) from a work-in-progress of lyric poetry about friendship, love, grief, death, moss, and stones.
Kathryn’s process is rooted in self-inquiry, expression, and transformation. Her work combines performance, video, multimedia installation, and group facilitation. Whether decoding the origins of cultural mythologies or creating site-specific dance improvisations, Kathryn is most interested in the spaces where personal narrative meets broader cultural critique.
She graduated summa cum laude from Parsons Paris | The New School. Her thesis, “Variations on a Theme of Butterflies,” was an autobiographical multimedia installation that received departmental honors—a project that unpacked ballet’s historical narratives through an intersectional lens. She has continued her training with numerous workshops and intensives in New York, Paris, Brussels, Berlin, and Estonia and has performed and exhibited internationally.
Along with Maile Crowder and Alicia Ralls, Kathryn co-founded Peace Tree Collective, an artist collective centered around processing grief through artistic expression, communal experiences, and spirituality. Learn more here: https://www.peacetreecollective.org/
Kathryn lives in Portland, OR where she guides one-on-one embodiment sessions, weekly yoga classes, monthly workshops, and seasonal retreats.
2024
Ame Gilbert – Cooking Memories
Where: Shelton Timberland Library, 710 W. Alder, Shelton, WA 98584
When: Monday, December 9, 4:00 pm – 5:45 pm
A reading of excerpts from a work-in-progress—an (as yet) unnamed culinary memoir. What started with pondering her mother’s recipes after her mother’s death—a “grief journal with recipes” if you will, slowly transformed into a “coming of age tale” albeit coming of age in middle-age. Throughout, food plays a key character, speaking not with words, but with scent, taste, the dance of cooking, the interaction sharing a meal. Not a love language per se—food roots us in time, place, reveals our circumstance. All the things we long for, the things we feel we have to prove, the hurts, the things withheld—these too get mixed into the batter.
Artist Statement: “I’m a artist, food scholar and cook. Sometimes I teach cooking or art or a combination. I also write poems and essays about food, and create theme based menu’s for several NYC salons. What I love is pushing meals into the realm of ideas while still keeping them delicious. I like to think of cooking and eating as a form of storytelling, and I love sharing a good tale.”
Ame is an independent food consultant and writer in Brooklyn, New York. She was co-founder of Communal Table in New York City, where she developed and implemented themed performance events using food. She was also curator at Umami Food and Art Festival.
Ame studied Art, Ceramics, Glass, and Sculpture at the Rhode Island School of Design. She earned a Bachelor of Fine Arts at the Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art, and a Masters of Liberal Studies from the University of Wisconsin at Milwaukee, with independent study in food and art,and received a culinary certificate from the New York Restaurant School.
Nina Burokas Reading plus Poetry Open Mic
Where: Marmo Cafe & Gallery, 217 W. Cota Street, Shelton, WA 9858
When: Saturday, November 23, 5:00-6:30 PM
Photo credit: Blue Whole Gallery, Sequim, WA
Nina Burokas will be reading poetry from her chapbook, Wintering, the ekphrastic anthology Inspired by Art and current work under development.
Nina is a writer and educator living on Quimper Peninsula, the ancestral home of the Chemakum people in Washington State. Her poetry appears in Port Angeles Fine Arts Center’s Webster Woods Sculpture Park, The Madrona Project No. 7 anthology This Machine is Made for Earth, Inspired by Art and her chapbook, Wintering. She frequently writes book reviews for Raven Chronicles, with a focus on poetry of place/presence. An adjunct business instructor at Mendocino College in California, Nina has been a contributing author/editor for five digital business titles.
Artist Statement:
I consider Terry Tempest Williams’ meditation on the question of how to live (How shall I live? // I want to feel both the beauty / and the pain / of the world we are living in….”) the essential dilemma of our time – of any time, perhaps.
My interest is the human condition, with particular attention to our interaction with/impact on other living elements in a complex system. I’m interested in our perception of self – of being and becoming – on an intimate and the broader societal, national, human impact scale. I’m particularly curious about nature as a teacher: what we can learn about living (and dying) from individual species such as salmon or trees and the dynamics of systems such as forests and bioregions. Can we learn/evolve fast enough to prevent extinction?
I’m a writer, first; primarily, a poet. However, I’m also interested in expressing ideas visually and exploring opportunities to collaborate on the creation of art and meaning. I find inspiration in a muddling of ideas, of cultures and methods of expression – enjoy experimenting with layering text, weaving in a favorite Italian phrase, the refrain from a French nursery rhyme, an excerpt from a poem in Spanish, a word with a distinct “foreign” history. I think of writing, my voice, as I do cooking: complex, evolving, distinct. One of the primary objectives of my residency is to find the thread of my voice as expressed in various forms and mediums and to weave that into a coherent body of work that will become my first full-length manuscript.
Artist: SandraRosa Bryant
Where: Shelton High School (Not open to the public — student activity sponsored by Shelton Timberland Library)
When: Tuesday, November 12
Young Adults Writing Workshop
On November 12th, writer and Teen Services Librarian SandraRosa Bryant will be offering a writing workshop at Shelton High School, sponsored by the Shelton Timberland Library. The workshop will include analyses of scenes in Middle Grade (MG) and Young Adult (YA) novels and writing exercises. Bryant’s passion for MG Fantasy combined with her work hosting and interviewing authors, make her an ideal presenter for aspiring young writers!
SandraRosa earned a Bachelor of Arts in English from the University of Puget Sound and a Master of Library and Information Science from Louisiana State University. She has worked in libraries since she was a teenager and became a librarian in 2016.
https://snappynewday.wordpress.com/
Artist: Holly Settoon
Where: Shelton Timberland Library, 710 W. Alder, Shelton, WA 98584
When: Thursday, November 7, 4:00-6:00 pm
Playwriting Workshop
A series of writing exercises inspired by the teachings of the playwright Maria Irene Fornés.
Holly Settoon is an actress, playwright, and screenwriter from southeast Louisiana living in Brooklyn.
Holly’s work has been featured at HERE Arts Center, The Secret Theatre, and Ensemble Studio Theatre. Plays include Greek Play, Hospitality, and Grand Isle. As a writer, she is interested in exploring the crossroads of femininity, ambition, and small-town life. She is a current member of Youngblood, the OBIE-winning playwright collective for emerging writers at Ensemble Studio Theatre. She received her BFA in Theatre from Southern Methodist University.
Holly says: “The most rewarding aspect of being an artist for me is connecting with other people and feeling more connected to the world in general. I grew up in a really small town where art was not very pervasive or celebrated, so the fact that I get to do it at all feels very special and crazy to me and I feel very grateful that I have found a community that I get to share my work with! It just means so much to me when someone tells me that something I wrote or performed in affected them in any way whatsoever.”
Her plays are available on the New Play Exchange.
Artist: Josephine Ensign
Where: Shelton Timberland Library, 710 W. Alder, Shelton, WA 98584
When: Wednesday, October 30, 4:30-6:00 pm
Way Home: What Works for Preventing and Ending Homelessness
Josephine Ensign is a professor of nursing at the University of Washington (UW) School of Nursing, where she teaches health policy, public health, and health humanities. She is an adjunct professor at the UW School of Arts and Sciences, Department of Gender, Women, and Sexuality Studies. Her scholarship focuses on health and social inequities for people marginalized by poverty and homelessness. Her essays have appeared in Front Porch Journal, Pulse, Silk Road, The Intima: A Journal of Narrative Medicine, Electric Literature, The Examined Life Journal, Oberlin Alumni Magazine, and theJohns Hopkins Public Health Magazine. She is an alumna of Hedgebrook, Centrum, The Community of Writers, Mesa Refuge, and the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts.
Ensign’s medical memoir, Catching Homelessness: A Nurse’s Story of Falling Through the Safety Net, was named the American Journal of Nursing 2017 Book of the Year for creative works. Her second book, Soul Stories: Voices from the Margins, was published in July 2018 by the University of California Medical Humanities Press. Ensign’s third book, Skid Road: On the Frontier of Health and Homelessness in an American City, was published in August 2021 by Johns Hopkins University Press. It was named a finalist for the Washington State Book Award. The paperback, Skid Road: On the Frontier of Health and Homelessness in Seattle was published in February 2023 by the University of Washington Press. Her book, Way Home: Journeys Through Homelessness, comes out in November 2024 by the Johns Hopkins University Press.
Ensign received a BA (Biology and Religion) from Oberlin College, her masters in primary care nursing from the Medical College of Virginia, and her doctorate in public health from the Johns Hopkins University Ensign has worked as a nurse and family nurse practitioner for the past forty years, providing primary health care to homeless adolescents, families, and adults.
Artist: Melissa Duclos
Where: Shelton Timberland Library, 710 W. Alder, Shelton, WA 98584
When: Monday, October 21, 3-4:30 pm
Start Telling Your Story: A Writing Workshop
Whether you’re interested in telling stories from your life or your imagination, this 90-minute generative writing workshop, facilitated by novelist and essayist Melissa Duclos, will help you bring your ideas to the page.
Get inspired by writing prompts, exercises, and opportunities for feedback, and leave with suggestions to create a regular writing practice. This workshop welcomes teen and adult writers at all levels of experience. Please bring a notebook and writing implement.
Melissa Duclos is the author of the novel Besotted. Her essays have appeared in the editing anthology Feminists Reclaim Mentorship, The Washington Post, The Offing, and Salon.com, which awarded her Best Personal Essay of 2015. Learn more about her work at melissa-duclos.com.
Melissa has an MFA in fiction from Columbia University and studied nonfiction at Tin House. She has more than a decade of experience facilitating writing workshops through Write Around Portland, Clackamas Community College, and Portland Community College, among other venues.
melissa-duclos.com
Artist: Katherine Cusumano
Where: Shelton Timberland Library, 710 W. Alder, Shelton, WA 98584
When: Thursday, October 17, 2024 4-6 pm
Tree Guy: Inside the World of Competitive Tree-Climbing
Each summer, arborists from across the Pacific Northwest gather for the annual Portland Tree Climbing Competition. They compete in events meant to simulate the perilous day-to-day work of tree care, racing up the dizzying heights of Douglas firs and swinging between boughs. In this reading and craft talk, journalist and essayist Katherine Cusumano immerses readers in the high-octane sport of competitive tree climbing — a process that resulted in her climbing more than a few trees herself.
Katherine Cusumano is a reporter, essayist, and editor whose work focuses on the intersections of culture, gender, and the outdoors. She is a regular contributor to the New York Times for Kids and W Magazine, and her work has also appeared in Outside Magazine, Climbing Magazine, and Bon Appétit, among others. She is also a writer-in-residence at Portland Public Schools through Literary Arts’ Writers in the Schools program, teaching nonfiction to high-schoolers across the city.
Her work has been supported by the Bread Loaf Writers’ Conferences, the Spring Creek Project, Hypatia-in-the-Woods, and the Oregon State University President’s Commission on the Status of Women. She holds an MFA in nonfiction from Oregon State University and a BA in comparative literature from Brown University. She is working on a collection of essays about the intersections of performance and the natural world, from which her reading is drawn. In “Tree Guy,” she enters the niche world of arborist competitions, exploring how one athlete’s career in the trees touches everything from assumptions about labor, class, and capitalism to climate change.
https://www.katherinecusumano.com/
Artist: Michelle Ross
Where: Shelton Timberland Library, 710 W. Alder, Shelton, WA 98584
When: Thursday, September 12, 5-6 pm
A Flash Fiction Reading
Michelle Ross will be reading flash fiction from her most recent book,They Kept Running,as well as from a work in progress.
Michelle is the author of three story collections:There’s So Much They Haven’t Told You(2017),winner of the2016 Moon City Press Short Fiction Award and Finalist for the2017Foreward INDIES Book of the Year Award for Short Stories; Shapeshifting,winner of the2020 Stillhouse Press Short Story Award (2021);and They Kept Running,winner of the2021 Katherine Anne Porter Prize in Short Fiction (2022).
Her fourth book, Don’t Take This the Wrong Way,is a short story collection she coauthored with Kim Magowan.It’s forthcoming from EastOver Press in early2025.
Her fiction has appeared in Alaska Quarterly Review, Colorado Review, Epiphany,Electric Literature’s Recommended Reading, TriQuarterly, Witness,and other venues.Her fiction has been anthologized in Flash Fiction America; Best Small Fictions 2021and2023; Best Microfiction 2020,2021,2023,and2024;and the Wigleaf Top502019and2022,among other anthologies.Her work has been spotlighted inBest Small Fictions and received special mention in the Pushcart Prize anthology.
She is currently on the staff of 100Word Story.Before that,she served as fiction editor of Atticus Review for about eight years and was a consulting editor for the2018 Best Small Fictions anthology.
A native of Texas, she received her B.A. from Emory University and her M.F.A and M.A. from Indiana University. She lives in Tucson, Arizona, with her husband and son.
Artist: Janet Rankin
Where: Shelton Timberland Library, 710 W. Alder, Shelton, WA 98584
Monday, August 26, 5-6pm
Seeing the Elephant: Women’s Voices from the Oregon Trail
Janet Rankin is a professor and cultural historian at Oregon State University – Cascades in Bend and her academic focus has been telling the stories of “the rest of us” – especially adding women back into history. When Janet lived in the foothills of Northern California, she studied and presented on the women of the California Gold Rush.
Now that she’s in the PNW, Janet’s curiosity has her delving into the women who uprooted their lives and wrote about their experiences along the Oregon Trail. Their journals provide a unique window into the lives of certain mid-19th century women (albeit those brave or foolhardy enough to embark on the journey). Previous scholarship has focused on geography or chronology, but Janet is taking a thematic approach, focusing on the commonplace and curious journal entries. Janet will read from her work in progress.
Artist: Megan Riggs
Where: Shelton Timberland Library, 710 W. Alder, Shelton, WA 98584
Thursday, August 15, 4:30 – 5:30 pm
“In My Bones”
Megan is a home-educating parent living outside of Seattle with her husband and three children.
At the age of 40 and with a nursing baby at home, she was diagnosed with Acute Myeloid Leukemia, a rare and aggressive cancer which occurs most frequently in people over 65. Megan writes about the intersection of parenting young children and being a partner just stepping into middle-adulthood while living with a sudden and life-altering health crisis.
Artist: Heather Hawk
Where: Shelton Timberland Library
Thursday, July 25, 4:30 – 5:30 pm
“What Is Still Wild: A Memoir”
Heather Hawk is a long-time community activist and volunteer with a graduate degree in Women’s Studies. She spent ten years working in violence reduction, intervention, and trauma-informed care. She writes from her home in the Pacific Northwest, where for the past ten years she has also run her own wellness practice (zenshiwellness.com). Her work has been published in Off Our Backs, Northwest Women’s Journal, 5×5, 100 Word Story, and elsewhere. What Is Still Wild was selected as a 2023 finalist for the Barbara Deming Memorial Fund. A personal essay related to this project is forthcoming in Zone 3 literary journal.
From What is Still Wild: “In the U.S., about 80% of women will develop uterine fibroids by age 50, Black women at three times the rate of women of other races and ethnicities. Yet little is known about fibroids, a chronically underfunded area of medicine. At thirty-three, Heather Hawk is diagnosed with a massive uterine fibroid. Her desire for a child collides with her body’s failure: she looks and feels pregnant but isn’t, a sorrow compounded by her husband’s affair resulting in twins.” What Is Still Wild chronicles Hawk’s personal story of grief and three-year healing experience while navigating betrayal and divorce. Opening Hawk’s personal story onto larger social issues related to the body—menstruation, virginity, female agency, pleasure, and violence—What Is Still Wild is a kaleidoscope turning the question: “What does it mean to listen to and trust a body that lives in a world that doesn’t listen to women?”
Hawk will read from her memoir, What is Still Wild.
http://www.zenshiwellness.com/
Artist: Aimee Mattila
Where: by invitation only
Tuesday, July 9th
Hapazome and Monoprinting Workshop
Aimee Mattila is an extremely talented and versatile artist from Portland, Oregon. She presented an outdoor botanical printing workshop to Hypatia board members and volunteers on Tuesday, July 9th. She shared two techniques for botanical printing on paper…Hapazome and mono-printing.
Hapa zome, literally meaning “leaf dye”, is a Japanese printmaking technique where the natural pigments of plant specimens are transferred onto fabric/paper creating varied designs…fresh leaves and flowers are arranged on or between layers of paper and the dye is transferred by pounding with a hammer. This can be used as a stand alone print or as a background to mono-printing. Mono-printing is accomplished by painting the botanical specimen with acrylics or poster paint and then pressing on or between two pieces of paper.
Artist Statement: “Art is a way of life for me and life is an art in itself.” The true value of any piece of art is the special relationship you as an individual develop with the creation you have chosen and the artist who created the work.
Each piece of art Aimee creates reflects her ability to capture a harmonious balance connecting fortuitous experimentation, intellectual exploration and spiritual wisdom with her innate sense of design. Flexibility during the creative process allows for a natural spontaneity and rhythm to the flow of her artwork. Aimee’s exclusive creations express her perceptive eye for detail and dedication to quality craftsmanship. She is a highly skilled and unique artist that expresses her talent through the diverse mediums she utilizes.
Artist: Pamela Mitchell
Where: Shelton Timberland Library
Saturday, June 22, 5-6 pm
“Finding Lost Pond”
Pamela Mitchell is a retired nurse, poet and full time author who lives and writes in Bend, Oregon. She grew up in the Adirondack Mountains of northern New York, received her RN from SUNY Upstate Medical Center, Syracuse, and her MFA in Creative Writing from Goddard College in Vermont. She has lived and worked in New York, Seattle, and Bend. She taught writing at SUNY Adirondack Community College, Albany Institute of Art, and Saratoga Community Hospital (with patients). Pamela’s current work, upcoming memoir Bequeathed, is a book of essays about her work for Kitsap County Health Department in founding the AIDS program and winning an award from the local chapter of NOW in the 1980s.
Pamela will be reading from her first book of poetry, Finding Lost Pond, which was published in 2021, by Finishing Line Press. Finding Lost Pond has been awarded 2nd Place for Book of the Year Award 2021 in Creativity by The American Journal of Nursing. Finding Lost Pond is the story of a nurse’s life as she is bearing witness to and holding, the suffering of her patients, her parents, and her own life. As she moves into her elder years, the deep sustenance of wilderness and the innocent trust of children renew her spirit, becoming a benediction.
Artist’s Statement:
“I write about the interface between my nursing work and the wild places which sustain me.”
https://pammitchelldotblog.wordpress.com
Artist: Ahavani Mullen
Where: Shelton Timberland Library
Thursday, May 30, 4-5pm
“Imprinting Paintings with Vibration”
Employing a range of materials such as various paint media, transparent textiles, aluminum, copper, and sound vibration, Ahavani constructs paintings, sculptures and installations that have evolved from silence. Rooted in a long-held daily contemplative practice and study, she allows this perspective to inform her studio practice, creating a kind of bridge between the inner and outer worlds.
Ahavani will share details about her current work and process, which explores the ways in which subtle, ephemeral vibrations can be given form on a canvas, using energetically-charged paint to create fields of color, light, and texture. By directing audio into her raw materials, she captures the energetic imprint of specific sounds and texts, absorbing their vibration and distilling their qualities into the work.
Ahavani has been awarded many fellowships, grants, residencies, and solo exhibitions around the US. Her work can be viewed at: www.ahavani.com
Artist: Jennifer Badot
Where: Shelton Timberland Library
When: Thursday, May 23, 4:30 – 6:00 pm
Jennifer Badot is the author of A Violet, A Jennifer (Lily Poetry Review Books, 2022). A Pushcart Prize nominee, Badot’s poems and reviews have appeared in the Boston Globe, the Boston Phoenix Literary Supplement, Studia Mystica, the Lily Poetry Review, the Poetry is Bread Anthology (forthcoming) and elsewhere. She lives in Massachusetts.
Jennifer will read from her book A Violet, A Jennifer and from new work and then host an open mic.
Sign-up for the open mic will begin at 4:00 pm. Poets who read a poem with a flower in it will receive a signed copy of Badot’s book.
All are welcome.
Artist: Julene Tripp Weaver … Psychotherapist and Writer
Where: Shelton Timberland Library
When: April 29, 3:00 PM
Topic: Julene will be reading from her new book of poetry, which will be published in June.
Julene is a poet, author, and medical case management counselor.
Julene Tripp Weaver, a psychotherapist and writer in Seattle, has three prior poetry collections;Truth Be Bold: Serenading Life & Death in the Age of AIDS (Finishing Line Press, 2017), which won the Bisexual Book Award, four Human Relations Indie Book Awards, and was a finalist for the Lambda Literary Awards; No Father Can Save Her, (Plain View Press, 2011); and a chapbook, Case Walking: An AIDS Case Manager Wails Her Blues, (Finishing Line Press, 2007). Slow Now with Clear Skies will be available by June.
Her poems have appeared in many journals including: HEAL, Autumn Sky Poetry, Oye Drum, Poetry Super Highway, As it Ought To Be, and elsewhere. Recent anthologies include: Rumors Secrets & Lies: Poems about Pregnancy, Abortion & Choice; I Sing the Salmon Home; Writing Through the Apocalypse; The Power of the Feminine I: Poems from the Feminine Perspective, Volume 2; and Nerve Cowboy, Selected Works: 2004-2012. Find more of her work at www.julenetrippweaver.com
Artist: Kripi Malviya
Where: Shelton Timberland Library
When: Friday, April 26, 2-3 pm
Kripi Malviya is an existential psychotherapist and poet from India. Her work has been published in the World Literature Review, the Sky Island Journal, Muse and the Black Warrior Review. She is the winner of the 2017 Rhythm Divine International Poetry Chapbook contest for her first poetry collection ‘ale(theia)’. She runs an emotional well-being organization ‘TATVA’. It specializes in therapeutic residencies for international artists and creative communities, combining psychotherapy, nature therapy, social justice and cultural immersion together with creative exploration, emotional awareness and self-care. Kripi is also a co-founder of the Poetry Therapy Society of India.
Artist’s Statement:
The distinctive features of how, why and what thoughts, feelings and images are seized by my consciousness and deemed urgent enough to be the start of a poem; has to do with cultivated vulnerability. Its almost assuredly always in instances of self exposure and allowing myself to be changed by my lived experiences that I have ever produced what can be called a poem. Unshielded – ness or disclosure are one of the most significant forces behind my writing; unrelenting attempts to decipher and face all aspects of the emotional landscape . There is a constant flow in my identity as a poet and as a psychotherapist; with often no clear boundaries dividing my practice in both; hence they merge with each other seamlessly.
www.kripimalviya.com – www.tatvacenter.com
Artist: Lorelle Rau … Artist and Art Consultant
Where: Marmo Gallery, 217 W. Cota St., Shelton, WA 98584
When: Friday, April 5, 1-3 pm
Topic: Collage Workshop (limited to 20 particants, registration required, see below)
Lorelle Rau is an independent curator, art consultant, and the founder of Lorelle Rau Studios, an art consulting firm that offers a full line of services; through which artwork reaches beyond the artist’s studio to connect with its audience.
Throughout her early career, Lorelle worked closely with a number of important mentors. Having a mother as a sculptor, she experienced firsthand the challenges and rewards of being an artist, which motivated her to study art management at Appalachian State University. There she gained experience working in the college galleries and quickly moved up to curatorial assistant at the museum working closely alongside the curator. It was in these quiet, contemplative spaces in galleries and museums that she discovered a love and appreciation of art that grew into a lifelong passion. She continued on course towards an art career, building professional experience and connections through working for the Corcoran Gallery of Art and several commercial galleries. She later earned her master’s degree in arts administration from the Savannah College of Art and Design. Before long, she established a niche working for a corporate art consulting agency. Realizing that she could turn this into a viable, fulfilling career, she set out on her own.
This workshop will use cut paper and appropriated imagery to investigate concepts of nature, place, and the environment. The substrate for the collage, collage papers, and some glue sticks and scissors will be provided. Participates may want to bring their own tools and materials.
Contact Marmo Gallery (isa@marmogallery.com) to register.
Artist: Caroline Holm … artist, nature poet and author
Where: Shelton Timberland Library
When: Thursday, March 28 … 5:00 pm
Topic: Poetry Reading and display of paintings from her debut book of poetry and prose.
Caroline Holm is an Oregon-based artist, mother, poet, printmaker and state-licensed psilocybin facilitator in support of healing. In 2022, she wrote, illustrated and published her first book of nature poetry and prose, Woodland.
Caroline is in the process of writing and painting a cohesive collection of work for her second book of poetry and prose which she hopes to complete during her residency at Holly House. For more information about Caroline’s previous work, check out the following web links: https://www.carolineholmpoetry.com/ or Carolineholmstudio.etsy.com
Artist: Liz Jones … author, journalist and creative writer
Where: Shelton Timberland Library
When: Friday, March 15 … 2:30-3:30 pm
Topic: Immigration Stories of the Pacific NW
Part of Liz’s memoir is based on her decade as an immigration reporter at KUOW Public Radio, including coverage in various rural NW communities. She will be talking about some of that reporting, ongoing local issues with a segue to open mic for Q&A.
Liz has consistently won top journalism awards while working at KUOW from 2005 to 2018 stating that “the greatest reward is when someone at the center of my stories tells me they feel seen and valued. It’s powerful to see how stories can make our world feel a little more connected, or help us grasp that potential.”
Liz’s current project is a memoir told through a collection of essays, weaving together themes from her Mexican-American heritage and her work as a journalist. For more information about Liz and her projects, check out the following web link: https://www.kuow.org/authors/liz-jones
Laura Busheikin, Shelton Timberland Library, 710 W. Alder St., Shelton, WA, Sunday, February 25, 2:00pm – 4:00pm
Laura Busheikin is a writer-for-hire and a creative writer exploring the many subgenres of nonfiction. She is fascinated by the power of stories to connect us, delight us, move us, and unsettle us. In particular, she loves to write about the places she calls home—the Comox Valley, Denman Island, and the land cooperative she is part of—and to explore the rich complexities of human relationship to place and community. — The Collective Magazines
2023
Blogging with Jennifer Stoever, Shelton Timberland Library, 710 W. Alder St., Shelton, WA, July 11, 4 pm – 5 pm.
Jennifer Lynn Stoever is Associate Professor of English at the State University of New York at Binghamton. She is co-founder and Editor-in-Chief of Sounding Out!: The Sound Studies Blog
Botanical Printing with April Sproule, Mixed Media Textile Artist. Shelton Timberland Library, 710 W. Alder St., Shelton, WA, July 29, 2023, 10 am – 12 pm.
April Sproule will present her process and progress for her mixed media textile art piece, The Olympic Peninsula, A Sense of Place, created during her artist’s residency at Hypatia-in-the-Woods.
After a short discussion about her work, a demonstration and mini workshop on botanical printing will take place. Participants will create their own beautiful botanical prints on paper or fabric using plants of their choice. All supplies will be provided for a 9” x 12” print suitable for framing or using in other projects.