Sunday Sketches

Here is my sketch for today. I was trying to do Frida in honor of The Day of the Dead coming up, but had no pics with me but at least I got the unibrow look. I had fun writing right into her hair. Someday I will do another when I have a pic for reference.

To see what other sketchers are doing go here  Have a great Sunday.

I have been playing around with wordle.net. This is a wordle I made for The National Novel Writing Month. If you have never done one of these they are fun. Here are some more sites to try.

 www.abcya.com
 www.worditout.com
 www.deepfun.com

Here is a wordle I made for my blog. The bigger the font is due to the frequency of the words used.   It is fascinating to see what words you use the most.  Go check out one of the sites and have a little fun.

Printing on tracing paper

These are some backgrounds I made from all the NevrDull experiments.

They are scraps from several different pages. I am not sure how I'll use them. I think they are pretty just as they are.

I've had these pages done for awhile, just forgot to take some pics of them.     I really loved this leaf paper so it had to go on a page somewhere.

This has another favorite new technique.  I have heard about it many times. I just have never tried it.  The image is printed on tracing paper. I love the transparent quality of it. I just glued down three edge of the tracing paper to a piece of cardstock and ran it through my ink jet printer. Really easy and gives great results.

Thought I would try a reverse zentangle. I started with a coaster and painted it with black gesso. Then I did all the pattens with a white Uni-Ball Signo Broad gel pen.

Today I actually took the time to do a journal page in my new altered book journal. I forgot just how much fun a little collage could be. The image was also printed on tracing paper.

FOR TODAY


Outside my window... the sun is shining and it is one of those cool fall days where I love to take walks and feel my feet crunch upon all the leaves. Fall is such a special season.

I am thinking that I have way too many irons in the fire as they say and something is going to have to be let go. In November I will be blogging less or maybe have shorter posts.

I am thankful for all the opportunities in my life and all the wonderful people I have met this year.

In the kitchen Dave is making a butternut squash pie, the smell of it permeates the house.

I am wearing my black crocs and flannel pj's, my comfort clothes.

I am creating a new life with the coaching course I am taking. The lessons learned are so profound that it amazes me. I am so grateful to be able to pass this wisdom on to others.

I am going to continue to look for fun things to use to manipulate wax. The Hot Wax course I am taking is really fantastic.  I have so much to learn.

I am wondering how some women manage to do it all.  I am constantly having to revise my plans and let go of things.

I am reading : The view from the Summerhouse by Barabara Whitnell.  Its set in Cornwall, a place I would like to go to someday. Its all about returning to a piece of your past and reconnecting with it.


I am looking forward to the start of Nanowrimo on November 1st.  It will be fun to tell my Grandparents story.

I am hearing the sound of birds outside my window, most of them have left for greener pastures. I still have the house finches and black eyed juncos and occasional chickadees that hang out at my bird feeder.

Around the house everything has been dusted and cleaned.  During November I don't clean very much. All the focus is on the writing.

I am pondering those little things in life that make it all worthwhile.  Sit down and have a cup of tea with me and we'll talk.

One of my favorite things to do is have a hot bath with Celtic Sea Salts. I had one last night and the memory of it brings a smile to my face.

A few plans for the rest of the week: I'll have my first 2 calls where I am the coach this week.  I am incredibly nervous about it but know that it will be okay.  I'll do some further prep for Nanowrimo and watch the videos for the Hot Wax class. Then there are the regular activities, laughter yoga on Tuesday, meditation group on Wed and book group on Thursday.  We are reading Kitchen Table Wisdom which is an amazing book.

Here is picture for thought I am sharing... This was the sky outside my house a few days ago.

I find mother nature often gives us a spectacular show.


To see other daybook posts go here 

Sketching a character

I don't have much of a blog post today.  Its been a very busy week.  I am doing a series of sketches of some characters in a novel that I am revising.  This is the first of a series. She is not exactly what I envisioned but I will keep working at it.

I have done very little work in the wax class other than make paints and medium. I am hoping for some studio time soon.

We had our Nanowrimo kickoff tonight and the response was amazing. 40 people showed up and the library had put us in this tiny room. It was fine but crowded and great to be with all these wonderful writers.  I am looking forward to the frenzy of November.

I hope you all have a great weekend.

I'm in Love

There was some excitement here last Friday. I had been anxiously awaiting this package. It did not come until 4:15 pm. Now what could be in this big box.

It turns out it was something pretty expensive and pretty small in comparison. I decide 4 months ago that I was going to get a smart phone.  With a new version of the iPhone on the horizon I waited for it to be released.  I ordered mine on the first day along with millions of other people.

Just look at her, doesn't she look beautiful. It was love at first site, unfortunately I couldn't get her to work.  I had to go down to Verizon the next day.  It was something to do with being stuck in the app that was transferring my contacts. She is all happy now.

 I don't know if its really possible to be in love with your phone but I am.  Its my first smart phone and it really can do amazing things.  I am just amazed with Siri the new voice activated feature of the iPhone. I was playing around with it yesterday, you can ask it to send a text, play a song, check your calendar and the weather and so much more. Then there is the camera, its an 8 megapixel camera and then lens switches around so you can do self portraits, you can even edit photos on your phone. About the only thing it does not do is wash the dishes. Oh you can also make calls with it just like any other phone. Have you ever been infatuated with new technology.

This afternoon I found out I won a spot in this class from the lovely Kylie at Blissful Pumpkins. I am so excited, I wanted to take the class but with the holidays coming up I didn't know how I was going to be able to do it. So I am so grateful to have won this class.  As I was thinking about this I thought here I am in small town Idaho and I won a class from a woman in Australia who will be teaching along with 14 others organized by a Dutch woman who lives in England.  All this is possible due to the internet.  It is such a magical world we live in.

To find out more about Life Book head on over to Tam's site Willowing. I think this is going to be an awesome class and its such a groundbreaking idea.  I have had a class with Tam before and she really is wonderful

I have been working on this cardboard book that I started in Katie Kendrik's class.  In her sample she used mica to cover the cut out window but I didn't have any of that.  So I found some plastic and I think it works just as well.

I put this scrapbook paper on the inside cover. I will be adding something to it later on.

There are only 3-4 pages in this journal.  This page was textured and stamped.  Images were embellished with charcoal.

On this page I found this plastic silhouette and when I put it over my painted cardboard I thought the tear I had made in the cardboard looked like her spine.  How fun is that. I really wanted to have this journal finished by today but alas life doesn't always work as you planned.

Today this class started. I think it will be the first on line class I have taken that I really know nothing about.  I became intrigued with encaustic in Katie's class and really wanted to learn more about it. So here came the perfect opportunity.  So it looks like I'll put the cardboard book away for awhile an play with wax.

National Novel Writing Month

It's getting to be that time of year again. Its almost November, so writers and would be writers from all over the world are contemplating doing NaNoWriMo.  This year I'll be doing it again.  My sixth time for all the insanity.  Why do I do it?  Several reasons:

• There's a deadline.
• Its Fun.
• It gives you the opportunity to do it with others, misery does love company.
• You get the chance to explore writing in new ways.
• It helps you become a better writer.
• There are write-ins, and parties.
• You meet all sorts of fun people.
• Did I mention its fun
• Ah the parties, well there is the kick off party and then the Night of Writing Dangerously(an all nighter) and the TGIO party at the end.  It stands for Thank God Its Over, otherwise known as the celebration party.
• It brings families together.  I know of several families who have several members doing it.
• Ah the junk food, you do have permission to have all the junk food you want in November.
• The satisfaction of completion, even if you don't finish you end up writing way more than you did in October.

I know you want to do it.  Maybe this is the year you join us.  At the end of our lives we don't regret the things that we did, its more the things we didn't do.  Maybe writing your story is one of those things.

This year my novel will be a fictionalized account of my Grandparent lives. I will use their letters as a base, but I am still working out what form it will take.  

To sign up for this go to nanowrimo.org