Happy Monday!

Hello Everyone!

I have about 5 minutes this morning. I have everything organized and spread out across my work surface in prep for the More Outstanding Mini Albums submission - due tomorrow! Yeah, I know. It's a crunch but I had another deadline over the weekend and a speaking engagement. What's an artist to do?

The weather is overcast with on-and-off shower. Beautiful day to have the house all opened up - and me in the basement studio LOL Today would be the perfect day to have that backyard studio with all it's glorious breeze and natural light. Someday!

I can't post pics of the project I'm working on for Jessica's submission call, but I will pop in later today and add a pick of my project-in-progress to give you a sneak peak at my creative mess.

Until then....

Creative Blessings!

Checking In

I know I missed Magazine Monday. I've been busy trying to dig out this house. It seems like I've been trying for over a year to put it back to it's 'new moved in' organization. I think I've finally seeing the light of day.

Of course, that means I've also not been creating. For the first time in months, I can't even find my work table. Need to change that Sunday as the deadline for the OMA submission is on Tuesday. I've done pictures, sketched my layouts and know what embellies I need to shop for on Saturday while I'm in the big city. Put nothing is actually put together yet.

And somewhere between getting that sent off and the following Thursday, I need to come up with at least one (preferably 2) crib quilts in time for my daughter's baby shower. I leave Thursday for Tennessee. I'm not sure the one for my toostie pop will get done. As long as I have the one needed for the shower, I'll be okay.

Splitcoast is having their VSN this weekend -with a rodeo theme. But I'm going out with my husband tomorrow night and I'm speaking at a writers conference on Saturday.

So here's hoping everyone has an awesome weekend and that I have something to post on Monday :-)

Creative Blessings!

Squeeeee!

Whenever I am inspired by someone else's work, I try to link back to them whenever possible and drop and email so they know.

Imagine my surprise when I received an email from Jessica Acs this morning, informing me she was featuring my CD album on the Outstanding Mini Albums blog. Please check out the blog. There are some amazing artists there and I feel honored to be included!

After checking out Jessica's blog yesterday, I had trouble sleeping last night. With a 'call for submissions' for her next book coming to a close, I had all kinds of ideas swirling through my head. After pouring through her first mini albums book and discarding ideas that had already been done or just didn't seem right, I think I finally hit upon the book I need to create. So I'm off to do some photographs today so I can get them developed while I'm in town.

So what albums have you created? Post a link in your comment so we can all take a look and leave some Love!

Creative Blessings!

Magazine Monday

We're back on-line and back to normal. I really enjoyed the peace and quiet without power last week. I was off for 48 hours - almost to the minute. Rather than try to clear the desk off downstairs, I sat and read the newest book in the Sons of Chance series by Vicki Lewis Thompson. She has become a dear writing friend over the past couple of years and has guest-blogged for me a couple of times at my author blog. It was nice to actually read a book while it was still new on the shelf. LOL

For this week, I'm taking a bit of a detour. The concept behind Magazine Monday was to apply some of the ideas I find in magazines. Well, I think it also applies to those technique books we just have to have. One of my favorites is Outstanding Mini Albums by Jessica Acs. She is such a talented lady. You can see her blog, as well as a link to purchase the album HERE

I told you a few weeks about about the altered CD mini-albums I was creating and teaching a class on. So I thought today I'd show pics of the completed album. I used the poem, 8 THINGS THAT DON'T COST A CENT. I have no clue where I got it from so if you know, please drop me a note so I may give credit where it's due. First the pics, then I'll give you a couple of tips.

The ones I did for the swap, I obviously had my brain turned off. To have enough pages to fit the poem, you need to cut 12 circles. I had 5 albums to make plus mine and I cut them all by hand! When I got ready to make up the kits for the class, I was inspired to use my Cricut. The circles are 4.75". I chose flowers from Recollections that matched the 50's style DCVW slab. I printed the poem on vellum so the background papers would still show through.

I love how this turned out. It could be used for so many things and a great way to repurpose those old CDs and DVDs.

Until next time...

Creative Blessings!

Magazine Monday - delay

Happy August, everyone!

Just have a couple minutes on a borrowed computer to let you know there won't be any posts this week. We had a major storm blow through last night. I have four large trees down in my yard, one of which took out my power lines.

Good news, I don't have anything I can do today but play with stamps when I get back home. LOL

I'll get back with you as soon as I have power.

Creative Blessings!

Magazine Monday

I don't know about you guys, but it seems forever since I've been in here. I spent most of the month of July fighting to keep my internet on line. Basically, it boiled down to my HughesNet modem overheats. After three calls to their out-sourced call center in India, I finally got someone who spoke English well enough to understand my problem. A $10 fan from walmart blowing onto the box whenever it's booted up has solved my problem.

So today I'm showcasing the card I had ready to run a month ago.

I found this card LO in a Take Ten 2005 from the artist Lenita Gratz.

The medallion to the right is a bottle cap with a stamped image of a snowflake in the center. Her card is very elegant. She used a silver mat with a midnight blue ribbon against the white background. It's a beautiful card. But I'm a traditional artist so I took my Christmas card to the country.

I used the CB folder for some texture as well as a fabric frazzle strip. The bells are from Bells and Boughs (SU). I made gold paint from Metallic Gold Pearl X and Gum Arabic. Although it doesn't show up in the picture, the bells really sparkle!

One of my future projects is to create watercolor paints for all 24 of my Pearl X colors. Keep an eye here for how you can make your own Pearl X watercolors.

How are your Christmas cards coming along?