feeling fallish

I don't know about you but I am longing for fall. Here in CA it does not come in gracefully with gradually changing colors and dips in temperature. It just suddenly seems to turn brown and this year we are having a bit of "Indian summer" which means that temps have soared compared to the extremely mild summer we've had.

I see blogs filled with golden leaves and pumpkins, pine cones and Halloween fixin's but I am simply not feeling it yet. It doesn't seem right to be bringing in pumpkins (plus they will cook on the front porch) and fall leaves yet. I long to fill up a basket with gourds but we just haven't gotten that snap in the air signaling us to go...

When it does, this is my inspiration for a fall table.

Source: centsationalgirl.com via Heather on Pinterest

I love the simplicity. Likely I won't be setting for a feast but this will inspire a centerpiece to be displayed in our home and bring on the sites and smells of fall.. I long for it. Its my favorite season... what's your favorite season?

in which I have nothing much to say...

Hey all, just popping in to say.. not much. LOL The little goes back to school Monday (finally) so we are trying to enjoy our last few days of "summer". Big shake ups at the family business have me back in the office trying to sort things out and handle some day to day things. In another week and a half I will be teaching two days a week. Excited but a bit nervous. Just anxious to get going. I am also anxious to get back in the studio more regularly. It will require a bit of a clean sweep to make some work space but I did start making some new mosaics for the gallery and also a craft show I agreed to do... that's about it for now. Hopefully I will have more to share soon. What have YOU been up to?

randomness in bullet points

You know how your To Do list grows and grows and you feel like you have SO MUCH TO DO that you just run around in circles?? That's me this week.

Actually, I was sick most of the week with an icky head cold that made it hard to concentrate on much of anything so a bunch of stuff got pushed off to the stack of things to do for next week.. Ha ha!

Today I was feeling much better which was good because I had agreed to watch my daughter's friend all day as her Mom had to work and she is not back in school yet. I love H because she is such an agreeable kid, one of those kids that will go off with mine and I won't hear a peep from them for hours as they just play. So nice and a nice mental break for me ;)

We had the little optometry appt today. Happy report her vision is perfect. We had a few concerns at the end of last year when she complained of blurriness when reading. Probably just fatigue doing some heavier reading at the end of the day. Oh well.

Afterwards we headed out to check out a new stable. We have been looking for a new place to ride since shortly after the new year. A bunch of stuff transpired at our stable when we were out due to health/ funeral reasons so we haven't been riding for months! I miss it and Han is ready to get back in the saddle. She will have her first lesson/ assessment next week. Hope it works out as I was pretty happy with the place and it will be more convenient to after school riding.

Han doesn't go back to school for 3 more weeks! I feel my "work" stack getting higher. Its so hard to concentrate on stuff when she is home and needs attention. I am chiseling away at the little things I needed to finish up so maybe I will be ok.

"A Little Bird Told Me"  mixed media journal

One of the things on my To Do list is to get more stuff listed in my Etsy shop. I DID list some comp. books (SALE) and a journal the other day but I have a few more journals I have recently made to list too. I am not really happy with the pictures I took but they might just have to do.

Joleen took this, see? Fab!

Joleen has a couple of my journals for sale (and much better pictures) on her blog. Plus you can see lots of great eye candy there too. I swear she is getting exponentially better every day.

The "z" key is broken on my keyboard.. I had to cut and paste this one.. Its annoying. I always want to type "amazing" and then there is no "z". I better check on iFixit.


OK, I bet this is really annoying.. I better go to bed...

better days

Its been a BUSY and emotional day.

Joleen's car was broken into last night during a rash of break ins and in the process the a-holes stole a box containing her vintage cameras, hard drive with 6+ years of pix and my Canon Rebel which I had loaned to her. Mostly, it sucks because her space was violated and I worry about that and her driving to GA alone.

Even despite the crappy beginning to our day, we made the best of it and Joleen did 3 photo shoots. Plus, we squeezed in an 8 yr old b-day party :).

Tomorrow is the last day of the Garlic Festival and then Joleen heads off on her adventure while I do laundry and pack for our upcoming trip to MN. Gotta get the pets all set for the house sitter and my POST G-Fest pedicure (much needed) squeezed in there too.

No pretty pictures to share today... I left my camera at the festival (with my Mom) yesterday so those will have to wait...

Here's to better days...

The ART of purging

So maybe it isn't really an art.. its just getting rid of stuff but I understand for many of us (myself included, it is difficult) I am getting better at it though and so I thought I'd just pop in here to lend a word of encouragement to those of you who may need help in this area.

We REALLY started to think seriously about purging last summer when faced with moving our friends who have SO MUCH STUFF. Some of my Facebook pals may remember that last summer was also when we decided to turn a bay of our garage into my studio, so that required not only purging the studio but also the space where it would end up. There was stuff in there that was there when we moved in here.. it came with the house. Yeah, pretty bad.

Anyway, fast forward to this past January and the "saga." Once Greg's Dad passed away the family was faced with disposing of 40+ years worth of stuff from his house and cabin! Wow! Of course there were bits and pieces that people wanted but for the most part a lot of the stuff was just junk that we had to get rid of. I guess what I am trying to get to is that we and Greg's sister were really faced with 2 things...
1. we do not spend enough time together and that is more valuable than STUFF
 and 2. we have TOO MUCH STUFF!

So, we struck a deal where we'd take turns visiting each other's homes each month and helping each other purge. Its been going great. July was our turn and we tackled this covered area off the garage that had accumulated a bunch of things that could mostly be gotten rid of (yah). It REALLY helps to have the moral support of other people with you when you try to get rid of things.

Today I tackled the residual bits that were waiting from when we purged the living room for our redecorate and the extra room where my studio WAS. There were some bins waiting and one of them was full of odd things, like artwork and knick knacks and candles and just stuff.. I know I hadn't really dealt with that stuff because I didn't want to deal with the GUILT of getting rid of art.

I guess this is the whole point of this post and the motivation behind writing it. I have outgrown some of this art. There, I said it. Some of it was mine, some was gifts and some was received in swaps. The thing is, I have changed and so have my tastes. I feel the need for calm and quiet and less being the more I want in my life right now. So I had to make the decision to just be ok with letting it go. It will go to one of the two independent thrift stores here in town in hopes of someone else becoming enchanted with it.

As for me, I saved a few things that I don't know if I can ever part with.. like the special crown my friend Holly made for me, or the photographs from Joleen or my handmade angels but mostly I saved myself.. by just letting go and that is an art in itself.

zig zag

I feel like I am all over the place these days. I am zigging and zagging, doing a little bit here and a little bit there. In the midst of redoing the living room I get inspired to do something else. I have such a short attention span. LOL

As I mentioned in a post before, my bestie, Joleen, is coming up to visit SOON. I am so excited but it also means I need to clear out her room from all my painting supplies/ tools and the various totes of things I have packed up from the living room. Some are easy to put away for the holidays and such, some are harder. Like the tote full of various artwork and knick knacks. I am learning to let go of some things but I am struggling with what to do with some of the art I have "outgrown". Do I donate it knowing it might just get tossed rather than sold? decisions...

I have gotten back into the studio and it was looking pretty organized thanks to a few more shelves my honey put up for me. "WAS" being the key word because today we tackled the covered area off the carport and all the various totes and boxes there. I managed to throw a bunch of stuff away, set aside stuff to sell at our yard sale in Aug. and fill 4 boxes to donate. BUT I also located some missing totes that belonged in the studio. I need to go through them and toss more stuff but its HARD. As a mixed media artist I see potential in so much but I also know I only have so much time to do it.

Sorry for the rambling. I never manage to find much time to blog except late at night and then my mind is going in a zillion directions :)

in which I share a lot but suck at posting pictures...

Its been a BUSY couple of weeks since we got back from Oregon/ BlytheCon and I know I still owe pictures. I have them, but they are STILL in my camera and I have been too lazy to upload and edit them. I suck like that.. just other things occupying my time and I haven't wanted to spend much time on the computer as of late. I owe big apologies to Kathy and Jenn for that.. I know I still have odds and ends to do for your blogs.

Dresser before- After pix coming soon!

Anyway, in between "summer fun" and TRYING to get some work done with a small person home all day, I have been in mad cleaning, purging, redecorating mode. I finished my "project" dresser and turned it into an entertainment center to house all the yucky looking electronic components that accompany our new FLAT SCREEN TV (woot). In addition I have moved out a bunch of unwanted furniture, scrubbed our hardwood floor, turned a side table into a coffee table, painted chalk board paint on a kitchen wall, rearranged, cleaned, purged and generally driven my husband crazy (he doesn't deal with all this change very well) although he is being such a good sport!

Now I am trying to do the little stuff, like more purging and putting the room back together. HOW do people HIDE the everyday cluttery stuff? Where do the people whose blogs I read on decorating, etc stow their mail/ keys/ shoes/ kids stuff? Is everyone REALLY more organized than I am? I are they all just hiding it for the pictures? I am tired of living with clutter. I am TRYING to get rid of stuff but I don't want to get rid of everything. This part is hard. I don't expect to live in a Pottery Barn catalog but the clutter must go...

ok, I am going to end my rambling rant here and share some of the some fun projects that I still want to do:

- make new pillows a la Charlotte Lyons! (I did one of her samplers.. and am working on one of Pam's)
- make some silhouette art for the wall!
- finish painting the hidey spot that I uncovered with the furniture rearrangement

and I have to go through the bins of "stuff" I packed up fro the room. They are in the extra room right now and need to be cleared out before the 25th when my bestie comes to visit for a WHOLE WEEK!! and I need to finish straightening up the studio because we are going to want to hag out in there and I will need a place to work on the projects on my list.

Anyway, I guess that is enough rambling for today. I promise to take pictures soon!

a little sweetness

I am enjoying this short school week, the last day of school is tomorrow and the three days that there is school are minimum days. Its not worth driving back home just to be there a couple hours and drive back again so I have been coming to "work" at Barnes & Noble. I have discovered the joy of Starbuck's raspberry scones (yum) along with my iced mocha, and its quiet here early in the day and I am surrounded by books and magazines which makes for GREAT breaks. :)

I have been working on the graduation program for our ceremony tomorrow and I have a new blog client who is pushing me a bit by wanting a simpler, cleaner look for her blog and requested black/ grey/ white. Its been fun to play with that combo and I am really pleased with the drafts I sent off to her today. Maybe one day I will actually get more stuff up on my blog here, whatdaya think??

I don't have anything very new in the way of pictures or projects but it occurred to me that I have never shared my "Get Well" pages with you. I made this page for a mixed media book that my Facebook friend Cris put together for our mutual an eternally sweet friend Holly, after her back surgery.

I wanted to use "the good stuff" because Holly is such a treasure to me. Here is the front:

I used a vintage cigarette card layered over vintage papers and handmade lace and the whole collage was sewn onto a flocked wallpaper background. Its nice and soft :)

On the back I used more vintage wallpaper and lace along with velvet ribbon and millinery. The poem is from an old magazine that Greg brought back from MN out of his Dad's attic. It seemed like the perfect place to use it and it was fun to use original paper and lace. I wrote a sentiment on the page in pencil which is hard to see.  I think you can see the other pages ( which are soo lovely) in our Flickr group. Be sure to pop over and check them out because the girl did an amazing job and it all flows together so seamlessly.

random ramblings...

So here's the thing. I feel like blogging but don't really have anything new to share in the way of photos. I go through phases where taking a picture and uploading the picture and then editing the picture all seems like such a nuisance. ( I totally blanked and had to look up how to spell that right now.. lol)

Anyway, I guess there isn't really anything wrong with a blog post with no picture but it always seems a bit incomplete. So, I guess I will just post some random shots that really have nothing to do with anything I am writing.

First off, I want to say Happy Birthday to my soul sister Martha! I love you Martha dear and I miss you so much. It just plain stinks that we live so far away from each other and I think we need to try to REALLY plan to hook up at some point in 2011. Ok? deal...

(our new rescue kitteh.. Sophie)

Next, I have been falling on the job with my journaling. I am not sure why and I feel I must get back in between the pages.. I'll let you know how that goes. Part of me is hurting because 2 people that I care very much about are going through very rough patches in life. One seems to be heading into the light but the other one is rally reaching into that black pit with reckless and dangerous behavior and just general crappity crap going on around her. I wish I could do more than lend an ear and check in on her from time to time. I worry, and I carry burdens that are not mine and I need to remember that I cannot do that. I can be there in spirit but I can't handle the actual load. Anyway I am sending out some good thoughts for these friends today and really everyday lately.

And on another subject entirely.. I am obsessed.. obsessed with this blog that Adair told me about. I am not sure whether to thank her or curse her but anyway, I am obsessed with Knack Studio. I stalk her blog and when I see a new post I am giddy, I have been reading the archives and following her segments on design*sponge, I have been wishing I lived in So. Carolina (told ya I was obsessed). Check out the super inspiring furniture updates and her funky cool decorating style. I am getting some real inspiration for my living room! I even bought a cool old dresser to revamp a la "knack" but that is fodder for a future post.

Until next time...