Studio Friday/Happy Birthday

Studio Friday theme this wk is aged/antique, so this is what i took a picture of in the art room~
vintage rubber stamps.
Today was also my birthday~Started the celebration at midnight w/an amaretto sour. (actually had lunch w/gary's mom thurs, so i guess i started then)
went to scrapbook warehouse in the morning for my discount day.
Gary & I had lunch at Buca di Beppo (mmm ravioli) and chocolate cake...

Got a piece of jewelry from gary-saw this when we were at cottonwood a few wks ago. I had 2 picked out and had him chose which one for me-this one is called "inseparable" it has two figures and hearts~the artist is from Santa Fe...but no website.
We also saw "The DaVinci Code" which we enjoyed. M Night Shymalan has a new movie out

this summer-look forward to that-and Pirates of course! #1 on my summer list.Didn't make it to lowe's as planned today, but will do that tomorrow for paint-next project is "nathan's" bathroom.
Dinner at Anamia's w/mom and dad. Mom got me some vintage photo's when they were out of town last week. They came in to see the dining room re-do. (and visit the grand dogs)
Had wonderful emails, phone msg's -(sorry i missed some of your calls) and cards from friends~thank you all~it was a very nice day.

Cannot seem to get a good picture of the pendant-will try again tomorrow.

Demolition

Looked outside on wed-and the house behind us was close to being torn down. They had been salvaging since last week. We went out in time to see 1/2 of it still there, then the other 1/2 demolished-guess by the end of the yr we will have new neighbors. Went to a mtg thurs w/the civil engineer for the city and the developer-looks like after some inconvenience later this summer, we will get a new back fence when it's all said and done. Yea.
It's weird looking behind us now-nothing to block the view to Davis Blvd now. And now for some current art projects:
Finally finishing up on the box i started at Artfest. Don't know what will go inside-girl is just there to show the inside-but the box construction is now done-finally. Will post the neptune girl box when i put the back on it. Ok-i lied-here she is w/out the back-can't see the girl too well due to the flash, but you get the idea.

More Art & Soul notes

went to vendor night sat w/margo-and met up w/traci...

some cool stuff to be found tonight. I got the cutest spoon art from Nikki Zigler. Old spoon w/little girl cut-out and blue-ish "sugar" in the bowl of the spoon-it's going in my newly colored dining room.

Mon was my class w/DJ Pettitt-really enjoyed it and the process of the books that we made.

this is one of the samples that we worked off of.

fun class-would recommend her to others.

Art & Soul

Took my 2 classes on thurs with Traci Bautista-Wonderlust and Child's Play ( www.treicdesigns.com)
Had alot of fun just playing with paints/stamps and making our own art supplies.
here is my book-almost finished, and signatuare pages. Nala wanted to get in the act fri morning-she missed me since i was gone wed night thru thurs night... she had "Paris in her Soul" too (the art & soul theme)

What i'm working on...

Finally, i am posting some art on here. Actually it's a teaser-a picture of my
table while i'm working on some art. First picture is the 'egg' thing i did at artfest.
I really like the colors in person. i've also color copied sections of it too -
next is table w/stuff in the works-boxes. later i'll post close ups when i get more done
on them. I have 3 in the works and a wooden 2-d house.. OK-my pictures were blurred. so i'll post that later. off to do ART!~


here is what i worked on this evening. my "house" also posting a glimpse of the boxes i'm working on-and one partially worked on one.

Storms and Guests

Been really stormy the last few nights. I love the rain-always loved the thunderstorms too-watching the lightening and the smell of the wet ground. Gary called me late (2:30am) to tell me nasty weather (hail)coming our way. I was NOT getting out to move the car somewhere. Back to sleep to be wakened by a noise at 4am...thought someone was pounding on the front door-turns out it was scratching at the garage door that leads into the house. opened the door-thinking it was one of our dogs-although Mia was in and Nala was w/gary. I looked down and said "you are at the wrong house" as MO walked in (he had tags) well, he got to spend the night in our doghouse. couldn't leave him out in the stormy weather. He ended up spending the day til his owner's got home from work. Mo has been sad all yr-his "kid" went to college this yr and he is lonely. (kind of ugly too w/that underbite)
Got the dining room textured, sanded, painted and glazed this week. i'll post a picture of the work in progress, but until i put furniture back and hang stuff, it just looks like a wall. Not that a picture online can really give you the full effect, but i can say that Mo's mom was impressed with it. I'm also toying w/the idea of whitewashing over the glaze to tone it down a bit. But want to wait til i see the room all done in full daylight-not cloudy light as it's been.
Had a sad thing happen this week. Nala went out back to do her business, and ran into the house making a beeline for my room-i knew she was up to something-then i saw fur in her mouth. Just knew it was a rat. It wasn't. It was a baby bunny. I yelled and she put it down. I think she thought it was a toy. It hopped around and i picked him up and took him outside. It was VERY little-fit in my hand. Was afraid parents wouldn't take it back w/my scent-but put it out anyway. Figured i would check on it a little later and if it was still there, we could care for it and take it to the local vet in the am that takes wild animals. Sorry to say the little guy didn't make it. I was really sad for it. He is now buried in front-where he'll have a special marker later and i'll know he was there. So now, we are back in the habit of making sure no bunnies are out before we let a dog out.

Info

When i check my blog, one of the days keeps coming up w/tiny font. It didn't look that way when i first posted it. To make the font larger so it is readable,
you can hit the CTRL botton and turn the wheel on your mouse to enlarge~

Spent the weekend taking classes from Sandra McCall-(www.arthouse525.com) she flew in fri and we got to bum after setting up at tricia's- Sat and Sun were spent with friends learning new fun stuff! Also got to play with the emb powders that judikins developed
for sandra (www.judikins.com) cool stuff! made metal charms, fresco's, played w/the powders and played w/toilet paper...oh, the things we do for art! As promised, i am posting a picture of the CLEAN art room-yes, i can even see the floor now~
Today i got sandy off to the airport-then went to curves and was home before 8 am! got started on the texture process on the dining room walls. Will post pictures when that is done later this week. Don't plan to spend much time outside this week-after a beautiful cooler wkend, looks like the heat is here again.

Notes from ArtFest 2006

Almost a month later, i'm finally posting notes on ArtFest. Got in on tues-met up w/joan-and hit a few favorite stores. Daniel Smith (www.danielsmith.com) paper zone, archie mcphee, 1/2 price books-food-(Halibut). Wed we got up and packed up cars and headed to the ferry. Got to Port Townsend and walked around town after eating. Went to the fort around 3:30 to check in...
Got to my room after getting my key and packet. This is what i opened the door to..
yes-this was the view out my dorm window-fabulous! on sat it was so clear i could see land across the way i've never seen before. My classes this yr were 1)Albie Smith (book) Jane Wynn-shrine/box and Anahata Katkin. (www.papayalicious.com)

Here is a picture of the book i did in Albie's class. we made color gesso color washed pages/paste images over that. My friend Jill was in there with me~

Fri was the jane wynn class. LOVED it. We measured, cut (power tools-yea) nailed, painted, patina'ed our own boxes. I loved the whole process. Since i didn't know i was going to AF this yr-it was really last minute, i didn't have a "special thing" to enshrine, so i improvised. will post a picture of what i did as soon as my stinking patina's that i ordered APR 6th arrive-they assure me they are now on the way...anyway, have already built (started) 2 more boxes since i've been home. This has so many possibilities-maybe i'll find a niche for now!
Day 3-this was more a "process/thinking" class. we went to the beach-others built shrines on the beach that had meaning-i gathered cool stuff to use in boxes like i made in jane wynn class! all i could do was gather. I'm the one who didn't "get it" for sure. anyway, we did a piece of art based on the beach stuff. mine were eggs. will post picture later. we gessoed, walnut inked, sumi inked, drew, oil pasteled, learned to draw things out or make them recede...
anyway, not my normal kind of class, but i found fun stuff-and like my end result. Really meant alot to get to go this yr-since we did the ins work, i didn't get to do any art and felt so deprived and blah...so it was good to just go and create again. have many ideas of things to make-AFTER i finish the projects around the house that aren't done yet... and here we head back to seattle...beautiful day!

Day Three on the road

We were heading home today, but decided to stop in Alice and Orange Grove. I went to 1/2 of 7th grade in OG-and 7-1st semester of 9th in Alice. Have happy memories of the town. Gary wanted to see where i lived back then. What a nostalgic blast from the past. Alice has changed-but not nearly as fast as a big city. They are just now getting a Chili's-the only big place other than pizza hut. The space where my mom managed World of Fabrics is now a rental place. There is now a 4-theater movie theater at the edge of town-when i was there we had Rialto downtown and a 2 screen newer place-We drove out to Lake Alice, our old house, the jr high and middle school-the church, and the airport where my dad worked. My old street seemed so much shorter than i remember. The house is the same white brick w/brown trim, but the big tree is gone-Will save the rest for family-who this all has meaning for~we stopped in orange grove too-it has new HS and elem-but the old bldg's are still all there and used. our old street is paved-and the mobile homes that were there are gone and houses built where we lived. Rest of day was spent driving home-ate late lunch and made few stops for nala breaks. Time flew but it felt like we spent most of it driving. Time to go somewhere and just 'veg'
Gas prices were lower in the south-2.83 pictures are of spoiled nala, alice and orange grove. Oh yea, alice now has a walmart!

Road Trip Day 2

Today we hit Denny's (excellent service-had great service everywhere down south) then headed out of town towards Corpus Christi on 35. We passed through Angleton-some of you know of this city-i see why my friend MD gets SO much done-there is NOTHING there-we even passed her road~hi mel! We got into Corpus-checked into the hotel-which DID take pets with no sneaking-she was happy not to be snuck in! We then headed to Padre Island. Gary had never been and i used to go when we lived in Alice. Nala's first visit to the ocean-she was leary, but seemed to take to it finally-
Pictures here chronicle our beach visit-The beach was quiet-only a few people there-we walked around quite awhile-back to hotel to clean up-then dinner at olive garden.
and if anyone knows how to move pictures around on blogs so they aren't all at the top-let me know!

Road Trip Notes...

Got a late start (there's a shock) but finally got on the road after a trip to walmart and gary packing. Decided to take Nala-those eyes were just begging us to take her.

here she is in the back seat. We got into houston around 2:30 and hit Auntie Chang's. THE place that got me to eat chinese (if you want to call what i eat chinese!) then on to Texas Art. Picked up a few things and headed south. We took Nala to a park so she could walk alot. I dropped them off at Clear Lake park. I went to check into the hotel. They supposedly took pets-but found out it was 10# and under in a carrier. (that's not a pet, it's a rat) so we had to sneak her in later when we went in for the night. We went to have dinner at Tookies (burgers-somewhere we go everytime we're in houston-gary used to eat there alot when he lived in the area) I had a brush w/infamy while there.

The tables have benches-the benches butt up against each other-i was facing the door when a man, woman and child came in-i immediately realised who he was-Rusty Yates (as in Andrea Yates) They sat right behind us-his back brushed mine. (twice) i told gary someone "famous" was behind me-wrote down who. I couldn't see them but he could observe-and i could hear some conversation. Anyway, we looked up the recent wedding picture of him online and gary said he had the same sunglasses sitting on the table as he had in the picture.

On to the hotel after dinner~had to sneak nala in the window-3 times since she decided to go to the bathroom several times-i got a bit stressed over that-just knew they would throw us out~but all was well-she finally did her business and slept. (as did we)

Quick Note

Getting ready to hit the hay-Gary and i are heading to Houston and Corpus for a few days
just to get away...
we got most of the yard stuff done yesterday that we started. (picture later) yea-that's my quota for the yr now-no more yard work til fall or winter :)
Got to hang w/some art friends today at our bander meeting~always a nice thing. won't post what i did cause it wasn't good. like SOME people's. well that's it, as i said, quick note. when i return, will have to post musing of Arfest-better late than never...

Short Friday news

OK-so news isn't exactly what it is, just info. worked in the yard again~(this is big for me-hate yard work) anyway, i have 2 pictures here-one is the 'done' side of the planter area in back and the other is what i have left to do tomorrow. oh boy. no more weeds or monkey grass.

Rain, Art and yard work...

here i am troweling... and over here we have the before wall-it's now white.


First we had record heat early this week (99) then thurs EARLY am (like around midnight)
we had massive rain and 77 mph winds. Woke up thurs to much cooler weather and clouds. But that didn't stop gary and i from heading out to the Ft Worth Main St Art Festival. Saw lots of cool art as usual-ran into Traci H and Carol. Had mini cakes w/them at Corner Bakery, browsed a bit with them-than after almost 4 hrs, headed back home. Since the ground was wet, it was time to get out in the yard and actually pull some weeds and monkey grass i've been putting off. only did a bit before it began to rain.

Around 9pm, i decided it would be a good time to finish layer one of joint compound in the dining room-got 1/2 wall done in 20 min. then had to sand layer of bumps off the sponges/stenciled wall. so finished around 11.

as you can see-i still don't know how to get the pictures where i want them-so for now, bear with me~

Art Room and other

Been working in the art room-this is the 'before'. don't worry, it looks MUCH better than this now. put in alot of hrs getting it ready for a guest next wkend.
We took Nala to the lake yesterday-she has never been around water like that and wanted to
see how she liked it. She liked wading and would have swam off if we had let her. Next time we
will bring a long rope to let her try.
Waiting to see if it rains. It was sprinkling when we took nala for her walk tonight.

Easter

Gary and i went to Panera for sm breakfast~then did stuff around the house before time
to go to mom's. Mom, dad, us, suzanne, ty, travis, patrick and "dwayne" joe were all there for
lunch. we held off on the egg hunt until keith and sandra could arrive (they were at her mom's)
by that time, dad had left for Indianapolis for work~yep-more storms.
anyway, DW just watched while the "Moody" kids and spouses battled it out for the money eggs.
Gary, still rusty from just sitting at work all day, only found 3 eggs-too slow. but $7+ was to be had. I found 11 for $9.21. won't mention what the others got, but it was more than our haul...
will post a picture as soon as i can figure out how to get it on here. duh, not too comp. savvy yet. at least not w/this stuff~
dj

Easter

World of Joy

Easter Eve

It's Easter Eve...anticipation for the upcoming easter egg hunt at mom's.
the adult hunt that is. the one w/money in the eggs that we push and shove
for. I'm thinking of spiked wristbands this yr-
will post tomorrow how it went-and add pictures as soon as i figure that
feature out~till then...

Second Post

Happy Birthday Suzanne!