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I loved seeing this, here is a man finding solutions and just doing it.

 

Wishcasting Wednesday - What do you wish for your well being

The lovely Jamie from Jamie Ridler Studio's is asking the wishers out there "What do you wish for your well being" 

Today has been one of those days, the internet is  down so I came to town to get this posted.  Then as I tried to write my morning pages outside by the garden Flynn my dog was trying to do his business in my garden. In my attempt to make him stop I tripped over the little fence surrounding it. Head first into the mud and plants. Now my right foot, both knees the right side of my chest and face hurt.  Now my well being doesn't seem to be doing so well today.

Then I seem to have lost the healing bracelet I made recently.  I remember taking it off to shower or sleep or something but that was several days ago and I can not find the thing anywhere.

There are times when you have days like these and things just get worse as they day progresses. I have been trying to stop the spiral from happening.  I went and picked up some breakfast and went to the river to eat and soak up some of that great energy at the falls.  It has helped somewhat.  I also placed a few rocks  along the river for some one to find.  The words on them were peace, let go and beauty.  That felt good to jump out of my own situation and to try and do for someone else.

Which leads me to my wish for my well being.  I wish for calmness, I wish to not jump off the deep end so easily. I keep thinking I will grab that yoga DVD and start doing it again but I don't.  Or start meditating regularly again but I don't. I can't seem to get beyond the idea and in to the doing. So I guess I am wishing that I begin to do those thing that will make my well being so much more relaxed.

To see what other wishcasters are doing go here

GPP Street Team #41 Grid Lock

I usually try to do the GPP Street Team challenge earlier in the month but June seems to have slipped by. This month Michelle Ward has us working with grids. Just lay out a grid on your paper and fill it in with whatever.

















This one I filled in with papers and then did a double grid of sorts by adding small images in each spot. This is definitely a fun way to play in your journal and the results are prety pleasing, Hard to go wrong here.

On my second page, I drew a grid on a painted page then outlined it in white pen and really liked it as is.

Then I turned it around, I like the brick wall look of it even better. I had a hard time covering it up but once I started playing with paper it was too much fun.

I added paper to all those spots and then a few things on top.  I see the value of doing this early now.  I want to try a few more but since the deadline is today I ran out of time.

To see what others are doing with this challenge  go here

Estate Sale

On Saturday I attended an estate sale in Utah. My friend Martha had died in April and she had a lot of looms, wool, wheels, yarns and fiber. I convinced two friends that we should go. I had not intended to buy a loom but I have always wanted one of these.

This is what I came home with. Its a Newcomb No. 3 Rug loom built sometime between 1890 and 1930 and its in pretty good condition.

This is the back of the loom. You can see it still has plenty of warp on it. These looms were used to make rag rugs and that is what I will use it for.  These are pictures I took before the loom was dismantled for transport.  Right now its in pieces waiting to be put back together.  I love the history of this loom.  All the metal parts are made of cast iron. I even have the name of the person who originally owned it.  I love knowing the history of things.

Hope Notes

These are the cards I made to go to that worthy project that Kim talked about on her blog, check that post for details. Or you can look at Patti Digh's original post about it here.  Basically the notes will go to women who are have domestic violence in their lives. The notes offer hope and encouragement to these women. I thought it was definitely a worthy project. I had some striped paper made so I made them into cards. I will add nice quotes inside and a note of encouragement before sending them off.

Thanks to all of you who have generously offered to make me flags.  Some have not given me an email address to contact you. I do need that to send you an address. Thanks so much.

Announcing Many Lands Many Hands

I am happy to announce my artwork is finally published in a book.  I participated in a moleskine adventure on Gary Reef's ning site. We passed 4 moleskine Japanese fold journals around the world and a book was created from the experience.



If you are interested you can order the book here
Even if not you can look inside the book, the preview does not show my art but  my art is on the back cover, now how exciting is that.

Prayer Flag Request

I am sending out a call for prayer flags, so let me explain.  As some of you know I am having surgery in July, A hysterctomy to take care of uterine cancer.  You also know I really worked in my garden to make it a healing place. Its where I plan to spend most of the summer, especially when I am convalescing.

Last summer my glitters sisters; a group of artists I met online all made prayer flags for one of us who was dealing with cancer. They were fun to make and something one could do to offer support so far away.  So I thought it would be wonderful to have more flags from my friends.  I have asked a few friends locally to make me one so I thought I would open this up to anyone who reads my blog who might like to do this. If you do leave a comment with contact infomation and I will send you my address.  My surgery is July 30th so I would like them before that, but if its later than that is ok too. I will just get Dave to hang them.

So if you want to do this you may be asking what do I do.  Most of my flags are 9 x 9 made from fabric,  you can make that size or any size you want but square works best.  You can decorate in anyway you want, even just write a word or phrase with a sharpie pen. You don't have to hem them or anything I will put them together when I receive them.










These are the prayer flags in my yard. The set closest were made by my glitter sisters and the others are traditional Tibetan Prayer Flags. If you go to this post you can see the glitter sister flags close up.


Some views from my garden










I invited my friend Kate over for lunch to see the garden.  Doesn't our food look lovely. We had Fettuccine Alfredo, a wonderful salad, ice tea and Mountain Huckleberry ice cream for dessert










Here is a plaque of the moon that I have added to a fence post.  I am so in tune with the moon that she had to have a place in my garden. It is comforting to see her there.

These are some pink daisy like flowers that I planted a couple years ago in honor of my friend Daisy Lupin.
 











These are yellow daisy and were planted last week.

This Dahlia is so gorgeous I am thinking of getting some more. Right now as we speak a mourning dove is walking through the garden just pecking away. Its like I am creating this space for me but all of nature is enjoying it.

Another cool thing that happened is I have discovered I can take my laptop outside and still access the Internet.  I couldn't do that with the old service we had.

Collage Swap

My friend Janet is hosting this 6 x 6 collage swap. It was really fun to participate.














I was paired with my friend Judi and these are the collages she made for me.














Here is the second one she made for me.  I love how she added glitter to the robe.  The beads on the side also include a key. I think these are both really beautiful.














And these are the ones I made for Judie.














She really likes birds so I had fun making these two bird inspired collages.

Creativity Boot camp is over with now but I never showed my last journal page. The prompt was smile. This little two week exercise was lots of fun. I am glad I participated and also happy that I was able to do it all. Sometimes a sense of accomplishment is all you need to keep going.

Something to share

I just saw this on twitter and just loved it.  I had to share it here.  link
I just love how someone else's story can really brighten your day.

Summer has Arrived

I would have to say we had our first summer weekend. Three full days of sun and warmth. I spent most of that time working in my garden.

Once more the owls that have graced our property have left me some gifts. I was working in the garden yesterday and found this beautiful feather. It is the biggest one I have seen so far. It almost looked luminous in the grass where I found it.













When you look at it with all the other feathers you can see what a range of sizes we have found in our yard. Dave found most of the small ones while he was cutting the grass.

A sneak peek into the Garden.

This is the small table I got  for my garden.  I love all the different colors of stone.  I am having trouble finding a chair to go with it. So for now its just an old cheap plastic chair.










and this is the Buddha who sits and guards everything.  He seems to give the garden a peace about it. I'll post more pics later, its pretty windy out right now. Tonight I am having a bonfire for the summer solstice, it should be fun. How are you welcoming summer?

Creativity Boot Camp Days 10-12

Time to play catchup and  post my entries for the last 3 days of boot camp

Day 10 
Maegan had us really pay attention to our senses.  I spent most of the day working in my garden so I had an influx of beautiful things to awaken my senses. She asked the following.

Which ones stand out in your mind as being the most pleasant?  Hearing all the birds sing.

Were there any that were repulsive? picking up dog poop

Did any bring back memories from your past? other times spent outdoors

Did any motivate you to do anything particular? to spend more time outdoors

Did any of these sensations inspire you in your creations? yes

If you were to try and capture creatively any of these sensations, how would you do it? Paint birds, landscapes, flowers.

The prompt was full bodied and I really did not know what to do with this all I could think of was beer and wine I actually thought about this for days and then finally gave up.  Then I found this image of a wine maker and it seemed fitting.

Day 11

Today we were to make a time line of our life using this format.

For instance, can you see how if you had never have done _____, then you would never have met _____, who inspired you to do ______, where you suffered _______, which ultimately made you _____, which turned out to be the best thing. And then because you had to ______, you started doing ______, and that’s how you got here! 

This is a process for much longer than a day so I chose a short portion of my life.

If I had not sprained my ankle severely then I would not have had all that time on the internet, I would not have found Danny Gregory or Violette, which led me to decide once an for all that I was going to try to become the artist I always thought I was.  This in turn led me to changing the focus of my blog, actually doing some of the projects I saw in magazines, developing a community online, to taking many classes, to falling in love with Art journaling, to meeting Jamie Ridler and having her coach me, to having new ideas for a book I want to write, to joining wishcasting which has been powerful indeed. I could keep going on and on here.   
This is a fun exercise you should try it.

The prompt is HUSH......  I chose this image because it seemed like there was a hush around the area as this man showed these children this magazine. He appears to have the rapt attention.

On day 12 Maegan talked about dreams and how they seem to get away from us.  She suggested coming up with some baby steps to keep your dream alive. This is something I have been doing all along. but it is a good reminder to break thiings down smaller so the task does  not seem so huge.

The prompt for the day was smooth and I thought of Dolphins right away. Some of these prompts have been really easy and others quite challenging but then that is what htis is all about to challenge yourself.

What do you wish to nourish

 Jamie asks us today What do you wish to nourish.  Oh that is a juicy one and I feel so appropriate for me.

• I wish to nourish myself, my soul, those parts of me that are so neglected.

• I wish to nourish that artist in me that seems to be just bursting with creativity lately.  I don't want to lose that as I nourish other parts of me.

• I wish to nourish the writer in me, that my words will continue to flow and that I will find the writers voice that I so desperately seek.

•  I wish to nourish those relationships that are near and far and continue to connect with others worldwide.

•  I wish to nourish all those  things that I cannot think of right now.

What would you like to nourish in your life?

To see what other wishcasters want to nourish go here

Boot Camp Continues

This is the last page in my paper bag journal. I feel great to have finally finished it.  I plan to make a slide show of all the pages sometime this week.

More Creativity Boot Camp














On Day we were introduced to morning pages. Well that was not a new concept for me and its something I already do everyday. So off to the prompts.

For Day 7 the prompt was Fly, a very easy prompt, I decided to switch from birds to butterfly's.  Instead of painting  the page first I glued down the image and worked from there.  I used PanPastels for the background and stamped blue butterfly's using Rangers Adirondak Denim.














Day8's prompt was Ornament and could be interpreted as beauty or grace but I chose to do the page literally. I found this page of vintage ornament wrapping paper and just wrote between the lines. I tried embellishing with my gold pen but alas it was a strikingly different shade of gold.














On day 9 Maegan had us go back to when we first started making art and to regain that sense of play.  The prompt was drizzle so I made a fun funky background with a credit card and added this image and then tweaked the background to extend the image.  This was fun and I enjoyed the play aspect of it all.

Time in the Garden

I have been working hard the last three days in my little flower garden.  It had really become a garden of weeds. I decided that I wanted to spend time there this summer and the time to deal with it was now.  After a lot of weeding, digging, clearing and such I manage to plant things in the half that get some sun.  In the shady half I am adding a little table and chair so I can sit there on those hot summer days and have a glass of lemonade . It will be like a little nook where I can escape the heat.  I still have a lot of work to do but it is heartening to see some progress.

Come Join the party

A Surprise in the Mail

Look what I received in the mail today. A surprise gift from my sister Marianne. Now I have some of Kelly Rae's art, how cool is that.

Boot camp day 5 we were to listen to the old music tapes of high school years.  I started thinking of the music of my era, Beatles, Stone, Moody Blue, Turtles and so forth.  I didn't really listen to the music as I would of spent some time doing that and I had other pressing things to deal with.  I did remember those songs and the diversity of all the musician and the wonderful music.  I'm still singing the Turtles Happy Together. 

 Our Prompt was GROW and I decided to take a different tact by focusing on the garden. The letters were cut out with my Cricut machine with the Wild Card cartridge and writing was done with a Zig writer pen.

















On day 6 we talked about creative style and doing things in the same way all the time.  Oh I am guilty of that.  I usually paint a background and then look for an image or paint one and then think of a theme to go with it.  So for this page I knew the prompt was fluid so I picked an image that covered almost the entire page.  I had one spot on the end so I took some unspun wool fiber and made a trim out of it by  making little loops and sewing it down the middle right onto the page. I wrote with a Uniball Signo white gel pen over the whole page instead of just the empty spots.

This page has had the angel on it for months, didn't know what else to add.  I found this quote in my file of words I have cut out from calendars and magazines. I like what it had to say.














 I have always wanted this chair and ottoman.  I have never seen any in stores here.  Maybe I have to take a road trip.  Are there chairs like this in your town?

 Another multi layered page.  I liked this image and imagine all sort of reasons why this woman is up on this ladder.
What do you think she is doing?  I hope you all have time for some art this weekend

Boot camp day 4

Its Day 4 of Creativity boot camp. I am really having fun doing these exercises. Our exercise today was to take our camera out in nature and just play. I haven't done that in awhile so it was great to get out there and shoot just for the fun of it.  These are some of my favorite shots of the day.

One of the pansy's in my flower barrel. This reminded me how much I would like a macro lens for my camera.










This little guy is peeking out of the other flower barrel.

Some wild mushrooms that popped up in my flower garden in the backyard. I liked all the lines that are on these mushrooms.










Flynn was running around with me so he had to get a photo too










 These white lilacs smelled so beautiful.














Dave planted this foxglove just a week ago and it is looking lovely.  We are hoping some hummingbirds are attracted to it.















The prompt for today was heavy metal and here is the page I did for it.  At first I had a hard time coming up with an idea till I remembered these armor pages I had. I ended up layer copper lumiere paint over a burgundy Luquitex,  the color looks wonderful in person.  Then I added stamped images in silver.  It was a fun page to do.

This a page about a trip to see hummingbirds being banded.   I have been planning a post on this but I just ended up doing a journal page instead. I like having a nice record of an event that was so much funn

What leap do you wish to take?

Its  Wednesday and I have missed wishcasting the last couple weeks with so much going on.

This week  Jamie asks this great question.


What leap do you wish to take?


Oh what a great question.  My wish is fairly simply in idea but perhaps not so much when putting it into action.  I wish to leap over all the obstacles that I feel are holding me back from my creative dreams. I write about things a lot but I don't seem to make plans or follow through. I'd like to leap to the other side where everything flows easily and I am living that dream.

Creativity Boot Camp Day 3

















Today we looked at Creative buzz killers, those things in your life that stop you when you just get going or prevent you from being as creative as you would like. Our prompt for the day was multi layered so I did a textured page and added the buzz killers for me. Then I changed the words around to make them more powerful for me. The page has tissue papers, paint, stamping and more paint and stamping.

More Journal Pages

I am still doing a couple journal pages a day trying to finish up the book. This one is just some random scraps and when I threw the heart up there I thought of Kim and her Big Love which led to writing about slogans.

















In this one I had multiple layers of paint and stamping and I really liked how it turned out. Then the image seemed to be the exactly the same color. I like how they matched so well. I ended up journaling about a new situation in my life. Since some of you will enlarge and read I guess I had better just tell all.


I had my surgery follow up yesterday and yes they found something.  It is an early uterine cancer and they believe a hysterectomy will take care of it.  I will be having surgery next month. Now this is not what I hoped for but if you are going to get cancer you do want it in the early stages so its easier to cure.  So I am grateful for that at least and whatever other lessons it has come to teach me.  I may have to postpone my trip to Ireland and I am not happy with that but it is what it is. It doesn't mean I won't go but perhaps not at the time I had planned.

Kim had sent me some of her Rock My World rocks to pass around on my adventures but I think I will keep this one for myself.. I am sure she won't mind.

Then I went for a walk in the backyard and found this. A gift from the Universe.

When you compare it to this other owl feather I found its really small although it could have come from the adult bird I like to think it is a feather from the baby.  If I go out at dusk sometimes I can see the owls again.  It feels great to know they are still out there soaring and living their lives.