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Monday, April 26, 2010

Monday Muse.

Today’s muse is from an amazing author who’s book I have been feasting upon slowly and deliberately.

Meet Patti Digh



She is magnificently aware of what is missing in our hurried and unmindful lives…

She wrote this book:



You can buy the book here.

Have your own deliberate feast…

So…today’s muse is from her equally magnificent blog…it’s a beautiful and honest story about what we might miss if we don’t live mindfully.

Its called Say hi to Yaron. GO HERE and have a read.

Now…here is the muse:

What would you have missed in your life if you hadn’t said hello?

I personally would have missed a husband, and two beautiful children!!!

What would you have missed?

Happy Monday and Peace, ya’ll!

Tuesday, April 20, 2010

Please Bear With Me...

I got a new computer...

And a new printer...

Not that either of the old devices were broken...it was just time to upgrade.

And I've been preoccupied with getting them set up...

And spending time with my kids...

Oh, yea...and working...

But I'll be back very soon...I promise!

Monday, April 19, 2010

Monday Muse - Quizzes

There is nothing like a quick quiz to get you in touch with something you didn't even know you wanted to know!

I found a lovely page while surfing the internet this week: Quizopolis

There are tons of quizzes to take...

Among my favorites:

Which TV Witch are you? Turns out I'm Samantha's mother Endora (from Bewitched) played by Agnes Moorehead.


Which Muppet Are You? I am Miss Piggy - no surprise there!


What is Your Most Lovable Quality? Mine is supposedly cooperation - although I'm not sure my husband would agree!


All harmless enough questions to answer quickly...or better yet have somebody ELSE answer for you. You can even make up your own if you so choose!

What would you ask? What would you like to know about somebody else?

And how could you incorporate what you find out into your art?

Peace, ya'll!

Tuesday, April 13, 2010

Fun with Monday Muse

So..this week’s muse is variations on a THEME…

To explore this , I thought I’d just throw out a couple of themes and see where it takes us…

For example, what if I chose the theme “alphabet”? (Random, I know, but useful!)

I found this canvas from Alphabub. This one happens to be boy-themed.


PS…did you notice the grid and the blue and the yellow??

I also found this alphabet placement from Alphabet Love.


And this wildly creative felt play set called “Alphabet Soup” from Play to Learn


In the scrapbooking realm, I found this great modern alphabet paper from We R Memory Keepers called Alphabet 72:


This October Afternoon Paper called Ducks in a Row:


And this super cute Sassafras Lass paper called Phonetics:


Oh the things I could do with an alphabet theme!!!

Lets switch gears…what if the theme is a color scheme? Like green and turquoise…

That yields objects like this green and turquoise vintage daisy brooch from glamourama:


And this print from HJM Art (By the way...I’m sensing a tree theme in my life also!)


Photographer Irina Souiki has done dozens of photographs in a theme she calls “Abandoned Places.”


You can see more of her work HERE:

What if the theme was Upcycle?

PS Its In the Details has envelopes made from recycled pottery barn catalogs:


She also has these birdies form magazine pages, vintage books paper and paint chip tags:


How about this necktie cocktail dress from glamarita.


YAVA Glass has a brilliant shop full of unique upcycled products, like this night light and these Boylan Soda Bottle Glasses.



What themes do you notice in your art? Your décor? The objects you collect? The places you go?

Monday, April 12, 2010

Monday Muse – Veering off track

Today’s muse is a combination muse and a topic – variations on a theme.

Sometimes we find a theme and we just cannot get it out of our heads.

Maybe you are stuck on the letter A or the color green or the shape of a triange. You see it and feel it everywhere you go.

When you find a theme appears over and over in your life, I believe that is when we should just blow all the way through it and let the theme be the guide for our art.

Perhaps it will lead to a collection…or perhaps just to a wonderful array of projects that happen to share the same theme. Who says you should change up your theme every time you create something?

For example, I like grids when I scrapbook. I often find myself putting grids in all sorts of variations in to my layouts:

Here’s a grid in one corner:


Same layout flipped horizontally:


Here, flipped once again:


Here’s a grid to fill an entire page:

You get the idea…

Remember this Monday Muse from March 29th?


It never got a chance to actually play with it…

And its been on my mind…

I keep running into beautiful things in yellow and blue...its a visual theme for me at the moment.

Like..oh...say the pictures that this shot came from:


So…I’m bringing it back…today’s muse is fun with a different muse.

These are some of the scrapbook supplies I found to go with my beautiful blue and yellow muse:

As always, I started with a cardstock. This one is Bazzill Basic’s Grasscloth Texture in Great Lakes:


I would augment this blue tho…maybe with this Fancy Pants paper called Mia:


I love multi-taskers and found this two-sided Pink Paislee called 365 Degrees (appropriate considering the sunny gorgeous photo that started all of this):


The name on this next one should be a muse all its own! Its called Bodacious Banana Heatwave and its from American Crafts:


Anna Griffin has a contender also:


And one of my favorites, Cosmo Cricket has two that I might like to add to the mix:



Now…lets add some orange American Crafts Thickers in Apricot:


And subtitle in this tiny type by Cosmo Cricket:


And a cute little tag from Creative Café:


And finally some buttons…either these custom made El Sol buttons from Tess Ann:


Or these little button embellishments from evalicious:


I love daffodils and found this little daffodil basket made from a paper bag at Martha Stewart:


And this gorgeous Mother’s Day Table designed by Eddie Ross
:


I found this print at Leslie Art:


This bucket beanie and matching purse from Lovely Knits is fantastic if you have a little girl:


How about these unbelievably sexy shoes from Marc Fisher?


And finally, photo sets from Paris in yellow and blue from Little Brown Pen:



(by the way…I was originally attracted to those Paris photo sets because of the grid image while browsing…I can’t help it!)

So…what theme do you find in your work? What themes are attractive to you?

Thursday, April 08, 2010

Similar

One of the biggest joys of being a scrapbooker is when you start to notice patterns and similarities in your photos.  Its like you locate the string that ties your life to itself and to the lives of those who have come before...

Its tangible...something you always think is there, but don't necessarily see.

Awhile ago, my mother in-law shared some photos of my husband as child. I noticed right away that I had shots of Jayden doing exactly the same things as the photos of his dad - sitting in a toy box, holding a hammer to fix something, climbing in the cupboards, etc. I started to see the string...

As you recall, I asked my mom for family photos for Christmas last year.

She was kind enough to get me a lovely box of amazing pictures...I started tying the strings together the moment I opened that box.

It has been fascinating to me to look at these old pictures and see how the fabric of our lives is so tightly woven.

Fast forward to last Tuesday, a photo shoot with my friend Kat and her gorgeous kids. We did a bunch of group shots, but also great shots of the kids together...we got this picture of Jay and Noah:


And I remembered a very similar photo, right down to the yellow outfits, of my sister and me taken at very similar ages:


I've always thought that Jayden looked just like his dad.  But in this shot, I can see that he and I look VERY much alike. And as I was searching for that photo in the box of old pictures Mom brought to me, I found this one of my dad and his older brother:


And I notice...Jayden, Dad and me all share the same nose and brow line.

PS...all you photographers out there...this is a pose that has been used for children for 63 years? Seriously? I guess you don't fix what isn't broken...

We also managed this shot of Noah. (Believe me, not an easy task.  He was a very serious fellow for this photo session!):


And I remembered a startlingly similar shot of me just a touch older than he is now:


Look at that ear!!! We have that same floppy ear!!! And again the nose.  We have always wondered where Noah got his pronounced little chin.  If you look, it appears I had it once...who knew!?!?!

Its remarkable that we live in a time and place where we have the joy and luxury of comparing photos like this, of seeing ourselves in our children and our parents or grandparents.

How about you?  What do you see in your own shots? What in life ties you together?  Do your kids eat Oreos the same way you do?  Or put on their socks the same way?  What have they learned being a part of your family?

Peace, ya'll!