A new Baby in the Neighborhood

My neighbor Phebe came over to tell me that her pony had a filly. This was a total surprise as they had no idea she was pregnant.















I think she is just the cutest thing. I have never been this close to a filly before so it was quite the treat for me. She has the softest hair and a cute disposition.



















I finished up the journal pages. My idea was to take an old book and cut out the book and use the covers for this journal. I got the book apart just fine but I made a major error. The depth of pages fit the spine just fine, but I forgot about the width. The pages will stick out of the book about an inch. So now I need to go get another book the right size.






















































I am continuing with the challenge of changing some things on my blog. I tried getting the blogger file link to work again today. I tried a whole new way but it still does not work. Are there any html/blogger experts out there?
I intended to try drawing from a photograph, picked a picture, printed it out but then I never got the time to do it so I will tackle that tomorrow.














Tonight I was cleaning up my art room and found some Tyvek and thought I would paint on it. I used Golden fluid acrylics and a credit card. That was fun.










Now I am making beads out of the paper. Its pretty late so I will play with these tomorrow, maybe add some wrapping or some of the other fun stuff that Kelli Perkins did in Cloth Paper Scissors

Being Brave leads to Linda Darnell

For the Be brave challenge yesterday I took the day off. My stomach was bothering me all day and I just did not have it in me to blog or do anything scary.

Linda Darnell

Now today I went to my friend Kay's house and she did a quantum touch healing on me. She is a new practitioners and needs 60 hours under her belt so I gladly volunteer to be a test subject. Well I have this rash on my foot which is most likely psoriasis and while she worked on me I saw the connection between it and my father. When he was alive he had psoriasis really bad. So it is like this is a message from him. We have a lot of unresolved issues.

This led to a lot of soul searching and to Linda Darnell. Now my dad used to say I looked like her, it was embarrassing every time he said it. Well I never even saw her in a movie and I have no idea what she looked like. Its just one of those childhood things that we like to forget. So my challenge today was to do a search on Linda and find out who she was and so forth. She was an actress in the 40's and 50's and died in 1965. As you can tell she was one gorgeous actress so it feels weird to be compared to her. I think this is probably something I needed to do to forgive my dad and move on.

This be brave challenge is taking me places I never thought of going.

More pages

I did several pages over the weekend. First I did this woman, I had not intended her to come out Polynesian but that seem to be what she became. I am finding the surface of this paper hard to draw on. SO I moved on to collage. I have been doing the drawings with Prismacolor colored pencils and Faber Castell Pitt Artist pens.



















These are pages I started a couple posts ago, I really like how they look now. I guess they needed to evolve into what they wanted to be.


















The page on Whoopi evolved because she looked so great on this background color. I really admire her for being her own person. This page represents that part of me I want to cultivate.




















This woman I put on the page, at first she seemed to be just contemplating and then it turned into a page on depression. The flower represent a technique I use. When things are so bad if you can just think of an image of a flower and drawn that beauty to you it helps, you slowly can build on that image and expand it and help yourself out of the murky depths you sunken into.





































This page evolved almost effortlessly. First I had the woman and then the scene and the words seemed perfect, I planned to add the flower to another page but once I placed it on the page it was as thought it belonged there. Such synchronicity with this page. It really seems to evoke a sense of calm to me.



















This page just became a collage of color and pattern, it seemed to evoke the Endless Possibilities that are out there.


















Violette did this great video on how she creates a page and I thought I would try one aka her style mixed with my own.

Mail Call

I have gotten such wonderful things in the mail lately. Here is a card that Kai sent me. Don't you love its Halloween goodness. It makes me want go out and buy some candy corn.


















Then Lisa sent me my mermaid from the Mermaid Swap I was in. Just the package was a work of art. Here is the front, the back was all scaly looking and glittery but does not seem to photograph well.















Here are the mermaids and they are fantastic. The large one willhang in my ocean inspired room and the other in my Art studio. Such fantastic work, thanks Lisa.


















I also got a charm from another swap I am in. Angel sent a charm made from a snap that is all beaded. I think I will wait for all the charms to show up and I will add a group shot.


















Here is the journal page I did this morning. As you can see I am continuing to try and draw faces. I plan to do one every day and by the end of a month I am sure I will be better at it and I will be more comfortable doing it.

Be Brave Challenge: I decided to continue on with all this computer things that I want to learn how to do but haven't. I wanted to put a link in to information about the book I am writing about my grandparents. I needed to find a way to store a file so people could click on the link and see the information. I could put in a blog entry and just link back to it but I thought this might work better. I still have not worked out all the kinks yet but I will.

I was not that successful with the banner yet. When you finally see a banner picture on this blog you'll know I have conquered that obstacle.

Quote of the Day: "Each one of us has a fire in our heart for something. It's our goal in life to find it and to keep it lit." - Mary Lou Retton

A visitor in my backyard

I walked out in the backyard with Flynn and I saw wings flying by and look what landed in one of my trees. He wasn't that big so I think he or she was born this year. I thought she was a Great Horned Owl right away and Dave kept ssaying it wasn't. So we got out the scope to look at her and I was right. This was kind of cool. I usually have to drive somewhere to see them. I know we have owls around here since I can hear them Hooting late at night, but its hard to see them in the dark.

Trying to be an Artist

Yesterday I worked on some journal pages and really became frustrated. I have all these pre done backgrounds that I am trying to do something with.


















I was happy the way this turned out. I really don't like pink so it was a challenge to come up with something that worked.














Then I worked on these 2 pages, I was trying to dra a small person and it really came out looking like crap, it ended up being covered up by the bunny picture. These 2 pages have been painted over several times. The right side one needs something else and I think I will let it sit for sometime.



















Then this morning I was looking at blogs and seeing all the beautiful things people do and I thought maybe this is not my thing. Maybe I should go back to drawing or something else. You know how it is when your confidence level sinks it is hard to bring it back up again. Anyways I tried again and I like this so much better than what I did last night. I am finding it hard to draw on this paper, its so textured that materials are sometimes don't act the way they do on smoother paper. Although I enjoy these pages I am looking forward to being done with them. Then I can get to Moleskine journal which has this great smooth paper. My goal right now is just to keep practicing in my journals and see where it leads me.

Be Brave
For the be brave challenge I have been eating breakfast all week so that is good and I am still trying to figure out the video thing. Today I am looking into putting a banner in the header of my blog. I did some research this morning and found this great site. If you want to do anything to your blog and don't know how to do it check out this site They have tutorials on everything you can think of.

Quote of the Day: "If you hear a voice within you say "you cannot paint," then by all means paint, and that voice will be silenced." ~Vincent Van Gogh

Utube

The video saga continues, I realized I could also use my digital camera to make videos. So I tried making a video of the heart book. It ended up being 458Mb long and utube's limit is 100mb. So I guess I will redo it in much smaller increments. Now I tried something much shorter and it is still way too big. It was only 50 seconds so maybe I have a setting wrong on the webcam or something. I guess its time to go back and read the book.



I found this book at the library about 2 weeks ago and it is excellent. I just picked it up to look into. Violette this is your fault, with all your videos, now I want to do them too. I also found there is an editing program right on my computer. Its nothing fancy but I ought to be able to do simple things. The book tells all about everything and where to get free software and so forth. I think I will have to buy a copy now.





















Here is a page I did on Sarah last night. She was supposed to come home this weekend and I was really looking forward to seeing her. It got canceled and now I am disappointed. This is an old picture of her but it is still nice.

I have been sort of manic about art lately, if its the end of the day and I haven't done something even minor I can't go to sleep. I think thats why I have been doing these simple journal pages. They fill that void somehow. I want to do another painting, I think I am hooked on that now.

Be Brave

My challenge today was to make a Dr. appt to get a rash looked at. I have this big fear that its psoriasis. I had excema as a child but outgrew it and this looks different. My dad had psoriasis really bad so I certainly don't want that. I have been using cortaid and it helps a little but not enough. So I call the Dr. and they put me on hold forever and I finally hang up. I then talk to my friend Ginger who tells me about some other remedies I might try. It was like the Universe set that up so I wouldn't make the appointment. I think it was important that I made that step and faced that fear. Another thing that going on is I stopped going to physical therapy. I have either done too much or something as I am having lots of pain again. It may just be a bad muscle pull or something like that. I decided to take a couple weeks break to see if it got better. Well I just learned a friend took a Quantum Healing class and needs someone to practice on. So she is going to work on me this afternoon. I hear that she can do amaziing things now. I am ready for that.

Trying to make a video

My be brave challenge for the day is to try and do video. This new laptop I have has a built in webcam so that is what I will be using. I will be honest I don't have a clue what I am doing so bear with me as I figure it all out. I seem to be able to make a video but am having trouble uploading it. So perhaps this will be a challenge for a number of days. There is no documentation foe the webcam so I am just guessing on how to use it.

Its later now and I still haven't figured things out so I will be spending time perusing bloggers help screens. It may take a couple days but I will get something up here for sure.

So artistically I thought I would try making some of the faux polaroids from Journal Revolution It was only after I had glued them all together that I realized they were upside down. Oh well they just have to stay that way now as I am not going to redo them. Here is one of my mistakes.

Imagine Peace

Its October 9th the anniversary of John Lennon's birth. Today Yoko Ono will unveil the IMAGINE PEACE TOWER on Videy Island, Reykjavik, Iceland. Dedicated to the memory of her late husband John Lennon on what would have been his 67th birthday, the IMAGINE PEACE TOWER will shine as a beacon for World Peace.

Sponsored by the City of Reykjavik, the Reykjavik Art Museum and Reykjavik Energy, the IMAGINE PEACE TOWER will be surrounded by more than 495,000 PEACE WISHES from people worldwide that the artist has collected since 1981 as part of her interactive Wish Tree exhibits.
The wishes will be stored in capsules and buried surrounding the IMAGINE PEACE TOWER.

You can go to the website and give your own wish for peace.

This is a huge tower of light going out to the Universe with wishes for peace. It looks really awesome. Go check out the for pictures of this amazing place.

For my Be Brave challenge, the idea sposored by Jessie. I continued to push myself in the area of Art. I have had this moleskine watercolor journal for more than 6 months. It was time to start doing some watercolor drawings in it. I took up the Everyday Matters challenge that Danny Gregory hosts. Here is my little lantern. I drew it with Caran d ache watercolor pencils and then added some water. It is a start on using that medium again.



















Todays challenge is going to be this, I am pledging to eat breakfast every day for a week. Now you are thinking what kind of challenge is that. Well when it is something you don't do and want to but something is holding you back then I think that is a challenge. Sometimes I just don't eat and other I eat inappropriate things like junk food so I am going to do this for a week and see how things go.

Quote of the Day:
"Imagine all the people living life in peace." - John Lennon

Trying new things

Thank you all for the comments on my painting. You are encouraging me to continue and that is what its all about anyways

I found Lu at SuziBlu's blog and she has a great site. She did this one challenge to get a photo of yourself and put a quote over it. I really like the quote she used so I did the same. I don't have photoshop but a program called Paint Shop Pro. I would always have Sarah help me with this kind of stuff before. It is one of the fears I listed to make myself overcome. So I decided there is no time like the present so I used that as my Be Brave challenge for the day. I wanted the lettering bigger and so forth but it turned out I can not access the help menu of the program since I am now on Vista. So I did what I could just by trial an error. The quote says "Be yourself, the world worships the Original". The page need something else but it will do for now. I took this picture in the car before I went in for my physical therapy appointment. The idea was to do a series on my typical day but this is all I have done so far.






















I did this next page on my issues with food. It was done on heavy hand made paper so its hard to read. So I will translate: It seems like Food controls me; why can't I make better choices. Healthy easting is something that I can do to nourish my spirit. This picture looks pretty bad, it was hard to capture it.






















Quote of the Day - "Art is your personal diary where you may color your thoughts and emotions on a page." ~Sara, Los Cerros Middle School, 1999

The Painting

Well I finally did one and I think there are a million things wrong with this but I said I would post it so here it is.
























Things I learned.

1. Don't promise you'll post a painting at the end of the day if you haven't even started it.
2. Don't put a figure in a background that is skin colored.
3. Don't do a 3/4 view face until you know what you are doing
4. Buy a hand model and practice so you don't make alien hands again.
5. Drawing and painting are totally different, just because you can draw an ear doesn't mean you can paint one.
6. Some colors are transparent so they really won't cover other colors
7. I learned a lot about mixing colors
8. Next time draw a big face so you have room to explore its features
9. I need practice doing fine lines.
10. That I really can paint if I try and I can only get better at it if I keep doing it.

Supplies used. Water color paper 140 lb. cold press, Golden heavy body acrylics, Portfolio water soluble oil pastels, faber castell pitt artist pens, pencil.

Womens movies

It seems the weekend for womens movies as I saw 2 and they were both wonderful. Right now in the theaters you can see The Jane Austen Book Club. You don't need to have read all of Jane's books to enjoy the movie. It is interesting to go see a movie that you know nothing about. This all began because the power went out yesterday. I live out in the ocuntry and when the power goes out it means several things. First no electricity, which means the pump for our sepric tank does not work, the heat is off of course, no internet of course, the blower on the fireplace does not work and so forth. I had been just about ready to finish cleaning my studio so I could work on my painting. Not enough light down in the Art room to do even that. So what does a gal do, I chose going to a movie. Dave was deep in the thralls of a David Balducci novel so I called my friend Amy and we went together. I really enjoyed it, the acting was great, the gal who played the French teacher has her part right on. Its definetly a feel good movie.






















The next flick is wonderful, I missed it when it was a t the theater so I was delighted it was now out on DVD. I had read Susan Minot's novel so I was well versed with the story. It has an incredible cast of characters. At once I noted that Natasha Richardson plays one of the daughters and she is Vanessa Redgrave's daughter. What I did not realize until I saw the special features section of the DVD is that Mamie Gummer is Meryl Streep's daughter and they play the same character at different times in her life. This movie was just beautiful, the setting the story the acting, it is definetly one I will want to buy.

Since I did not manage any Art due to the power being out hopefully today I will be able to do so. The power was out for about 6 hours and by then it was too late and my momentum was gone. Last night I did finish cleaning the studio and getting all my supplies ready. So today I have no excuses.

Quote of the day: "Creativity is allowing yourself to make mistakes. Art is knowing which ones to keep." ~Scott Adams

Snow is coming down like its November

This is what I woke up to. I took this pictures out my windows. It was supposed to rain all weekend, so this is quite s surprise. My grass is now almost covered and the trees are heavily laden. It looks pretty from the inside. The flakes are starting to get bigger now. It doesn't usually snow like this till about the second week in November. This is so strange. Happily I don't have to drive in it.

This morning as I tried to sleep in I thought what is it that I want to do for the Be Brave challenge. The premise is to do one thing that scares you every day. I decided I will do a painting. I'll be using the techniques I learned from Misty this past summer. I have a history of taking classes and then when I get home I don't do it again. I have used some of these techniques in journal pages and ATC's but nothing of any size yet. So that is my goal today and I will post the piece later today.

One thing that I want to start developing is my own style. I think that is what I admire about Misty, Violette, Judy Wise, and others. When you look at their work you can get to the point where you recognize their work. They all have unique ways of doing faces. I often wish I could do what they do but then I do realize that I have to my own thing and that there is something in me that needs expression. I think the beginning has to be I just need to start painting and sharing and my style will develop all on its own without any conscious effort on my part.

I know I have talked like this before but I do find talking about it and doing and feeling it in your soul are two different things. I think that is why this One Thing challenge is so powerful. I use it as an excuse to do things I might not have the courage or drive to do otherwise.


Quote of the Day: "It takes courage to grow up and become who you really are." ~e.e. cummings

It's my Anniversary Today

Its our wedding anniversary today, 22 legal years, 25 if you count living together. I picked up a bunch of flowers and had them delivered to Dave's office. They were fall colors and really quite pretty. I should buy some for myself now to just have at home. We'll probably go out to dinner or a movie tonight to celebrate.

My Do One Thing Challenge for the Day is just a little phone call but its still is scary so it counts. I called our local hospital and talked to the volunteer coordinator. I thought I might like to volunteer to go and read stories to children who are in the hospital. It turns out they don't really have a program like that because their enrollment of kids is not consistent. They do have a book cart that they take around to all patients. So I guess this would give me the opportunity to read to kids or adults. So I have started the process, there is an application to be filled out and references to be checked and so forth. This turns out to be more involved than I thought but that is fine.

I did my writing exercize, I have been posting my thoughts about doing that here. No Art yet today but the day is young and I did post twice yesterday so I am off the hook for now.

Self Portrait

Be Brave- My fear for today was to do a self portrait in my journal. I am scared to do this cause when I see other peoples work it looks so easy. I always think mine never measure up and I have never done one in paint. It seems like everyone else manages to capture faces in fun and playful ways. I have always had difficulties with faces. When Suziblu's latest video was on self portraits in your journal I figured I would to the face the fear and do it anyways. I will say that I really don't like it but I will continue cause I think practice makes you better at anything. Now the real fear is posting this, so be kind. I am glad I really don't look like this. I think she is just a tad bit stern

I started by gessoing a page in a moleskine journal. I did a rough sketch in pencil and then started with Delta Ceramacoat craft paints, then added Portfoilio water soluble oil pastels, I also used some prismacolor colored pencils and Faber-Castell Pitt Artist pens for the fine lines.

I had to stay home because there was a guy coming to install dish network. So I made a pot of split pea soup and a big bowl of scalloped potatoes with ham for dinner. The whole house smelled wonderful. The satellite guy said he had to hurry and leave since the smell was making him so hungry.

Then my computer arrived by Fed Ex. At first I still couldn't get the internet to work so I was annoyed. The ended up replacing my hard drive and my wireless card. I had it fixed pretty quick. Now I am just downloading all the things that I need, to get things back to normal. I am so happy to have my computer back.

National Poetry Day

I found out that it is National Poetry Day today since my friend Denise from across the pond is having a contest and sharing poetry today. So I thought I would follow suit.

So Much Happiness

It is difficult to know what to do with so much happiness.
With sadness there is something to rub against,
a wound to tend with lotion and cloth.
When the world falls in around you, you have pieces to pick up,
something to hold in your hands, like ticket stubs or change.

But happiness floats.
It doesn't need you to hold it down.
It doesn't need anything.
Happiness lands on the roof of the next house, singing,
and disappears when it wants to.
You are happy either way.
Even the fact that you once lived in a peaceful tree house
and now live over a quarry of noise and dust
cannot make you unhappy.
Everything has a life of its own,
it too could wake up filled with possibilities
of coffee cake and ripe peaches,
and love even the floor which needs to be swept,
the soiled linens and scratched records…..

Since there is no place large enough
to contain so much happiness,
you shrug, you raise your hands, and it flows out of you
into everything you touch. You are not responsible.
You take no credit, as the night sky takes no credit
for the moon, but continues to hold it, and share it,
and in that way, be known.

Naomi Shihab Nye from Words under the Words

I first heard about Naomi from Misty Mawn who has quoted her poetry often. It was not until I met Elise at the Artnest retreat this past summer that I saw more of her work and then purchased the book
Words Under the Words Its a volume of her poetry that is fantastic and I highly recommend it.

Be Brave

You might notice a new icon on my sidebar. This project now has an official name. Be Brave. Check out Jessie's blog for the history and details. I had been calling in DOTTSYED and that is a little wordy so Be Brave is what it will be from now on.

Well my Be Brave idea for today was to start doing some magazine research. I am planning on writing sn article on the Thread Project and really wanted to know what was out there besides the traditional choices. So I am at B&N at the cafe. I ordered a scone and had them heat it up they way over cooked it. I thought to get up and ask for another but I was afraid to do so. I thought this could be my thing for the day but then I thought no its this magazine research I put off. Well I never got up a requested another scone but the Universe gave me another chance to stand up for myself.

Ever since I read some poetry by Billy Collins at Nina Bagley's blog Ornamental, I wanted to get one of his books. Oh but which one to get, I intuitively picked out one but it was wrapped in cellophane. So I opened it to see if I liked it and I did so I put it in my pile of things to get. Then I go look at music and other stuff but I forgot the price of the book so I had the music clerk scan it for me and she says 14.00. When I left the area I remembered the plastic in my pocket. So I look at it and it says the price is 12.95. When I check out I give her the plastic sheet but she scans the bar code on the book. When she gives me my bill, I wonder to myself is it worth the 1.11 difference to speak up and I thought yes, here is an opportunity to stick up for myself so I did and got the amount refunded. As I thought about this a little more I thought perhaps I can not plan what I am going to do for this project, perhaps the Universe has other things in mind for me. By the way a heads up Moleskine has raised the prices on the large sketchbook to 16.95. Yikes, being the sneaky person I looked for one in the back of the pile in hopes to find an older price and was rewarded. I know its only two dollars but still that is a big increase.


















This is the page that Ninnie sent for my small journal that JudiRedhead sent me. I love the Goddess and all the inspiring words, thanks Ninnie


















This is the ATC that Banna sent me. She made it with Ninnie and its really nice. I think Banna needs a page in my book too. So I am going to add her card to a page and add a little decoration to the background. She is after all a Jr.Glitter Sister.


















I have been trying some things from Journal Revolution and this little fake photo strip was fun. I just used pictures I had lying around but I think I need to print some others out and do it up right. They also have a template to make a fake polaroid which is also fun.

Sign ups for Nanowrimo Begin today!

Don't you want one of these great icons on your site? Join the foray into novel writing. Isn't this the year you are going to write that book! If not now when?

DOTTSYED Do one thing that scares you every day. Today I spent part of the morning writing letters to art supply companies requesting free supplies. You might not think that is scary but to ask for something like that is difficult for me. I am sending letters to Ranger, Golden, Moleskine, Portfolio and Faber-Castell. If nothing comes of it that is ok, I at least made the effort and that is good enough. I would just love to see the Art supplies come rolling in.















Last night after getting home late and then watching the Heroes episode on tape, I made this.



















This is the page I did on Fear.

A week or so ago I discovered this used book store, well they have new books too. I never thought of going there for art books but I found these two gems that had to come home with me.


















I have checked out this DaVinci book from the library so I will be glad to have my own copy that I can read.














I want to improve my lettering and I have a pen and some nibs so this book looked very straight forward and easy to follow. I don't have a clue when I will have the time to play but at least it is there when I am ready to.

October begins

On Friday we took a trip to Market Lake and were rewarded with some great pictures.

















This is the baby owl all grown up.














This Red Tailed hawk posed for pictures. He stood on the post for some time and I was able to get lots of shots, this being the best one. We also saw Pelicans, Coots and Stellar Jay's.
So much starting today.


DOTTSYED Do one thing that scares you every day. I had plans for something today but when I started the write fling this morning with butterflies in my stomach and knew in my heart there was nothing to be afraid of I found I was afraid so I just ignored the feeling and just did it. I guess there was some fear involved but under the surface. So I was able to do something that scared me along with my first requirement for the Write Fling.
















Over the weekend I bought this. Its full of great ideas just like their first book Visual Chronicles. I like the idea of a fake filmstrip and fake Polaroids. They are easy to do and have fun applications. If your journaling is at a stand still and needs a lift I recommend you check out this book.

The only thing I would like to see them do it to move beyond simple supplies and see what they could so with Shiva paint sticks, watercolors, or any of the other countless things that you can use on a journal page.. One thing I have never done that they focus on is to use particular lettering to show the emotion on the page. I usually use whatever I have or my own writing but I can see how the use of lettering can have an impact on the page. So they have lots of new things I will try.