Journal page 2

Connecting my "loves".
Enjoy
M. :)

Pic of the Day. June 30th, 2011

Silly pic today. Vintage wire basket with chicken wearing a broken egg, because it looks like a helmet. ( and a couple of eggs on her back, that almost look like wings )
Because we all need a little silliness in our lives from time to time...
and I am silly :)
Enjoy
M. :)

What's Blooming Now?

i love flowers...
have i ever told you that before? :)
well, just in case you haven't noticed, i love flowers...
thought it might be fun to have a "what's blooming now" post once in a while.
i mean, i have all these flower pics and
its not like i won't be noticing
what's blooming now. :)

so, first of all we have the humble coneflower
otherwise know as echinacea
thats what i always call it
dont know why as the other name is so much easier
but i always think of it as echinacea
love it
photographs so well
and bees love it too
so that makes for pretty and interesting pics
i have one i took a couple of years ago with a green bee on it
no kidding
didn't even know a green bee exsisted
but there it was
on the coneflower
and in my view finder
i was astounded
i believe i even posted a pic of it last year
will have to look up
its one of my favorites
the flower i mean
well love the pic pretty much too :)

and then there is the beautiful but under rated hydrangea
love them too
so pretty and i love the variety of colors
i also love that you can have 3 different bushes in 3 places in your yard
all blooming on the same day
and some are sky blue and some are
bright blue
and some are
lilac
and some are
pink
and some are
purple!
well,
what a fun plant is that?
you never know what you are going to get
and if you leave them on the bush until it gets cold
some will turn dark blue
and some will turn
green and some will even turn
maroon!
enjoy...
m. :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :)

Doodle Table Progress

Here's a little update on the "doodle table". Lots of empty space left, but broken down into sections, a few large objects outlined and one corner finished! Yeah!

Pic of the Day... Wednesday, June 29th

I love to see the slight breeze, blowing on the dappled sunlit leaves, early in the morning...

(Japanese Maple)

BLOG GIVEAWAY!!

I'm having my first BLOG GIVEAWAY!!! Yeah ( and its about time, you say :) ! Well, hopefully I can make up for it this summer. I have lots of ideas and plans and I think you are going to like them and you might as well try, 'cause its free! Big sigh...So I'm " Bowling for dollars", no I mean, I'm begging for followers, OH no, THAT sounds too desperate! Ok, so I'm having a giveaway...plain and simple and I hope the plan is plain and simple to you. Well, I should at least tell you what you may win, TWO of you because Amazon made a boo boo and I have TWO lovely, brand-spanking-new-hot-off-the-press-amazing-and-beautiful books!
Mixed and Stitched... fabric inspiration and how-to's for the mixed media artist  by Jen Osborn
This book is truly beautiful! Its chock full of knowledge, projects and photographs galore! Jen and I were at Brave Girls Camp together last October and she was literally finishing the last pages, June seemed SOOO long away at that point. But here it is and here is your chance to get your hands on the book of this very talented artist!
Here's what you do:
1) Post a link on Facebook and come back to blog and leave me a comment here on this post...   OR
2) Follow my blog and leave me a comment here telling me you did so... OR
3) Post this to YOUR blog and let me know with comment...OR
4) If you are already a Follower, just leave a comment here and tell me so and you will be added... OR
Do TWO of the above and be added to the counting pot TWICE!! Easy right? Next TUESDAY I will count and pick out of a hat, literally, 'cause I think that's more fun and quirky and let you know! SO GET WITH IT! You want to win, you KNOW you do!!
M. :)

I am an Artist...

I am an Artist, Suzi (Blu) says so...
and now i believe her. Wow, you wouldn't believe how hard that is for me to write. I know that for years people have said that i am "artistic", but for me to say it, to acknowledge it, is very difficult.Why? Why are we so hard on ourselves, why can't we say something that others say of us? It seems like a brag to say something good about yourself, and art is very good! Love it, thrive on it, need it, want it, acknowledge that everything i have been given is a gift, not of myself, not of my own doing, but a gift...so why would i reject that gift or say its not good enough or i'm not good enough? Thats like rejecting the Giver to me, saying He does not know how to create or make something or someone with talents... i know that i'm no Ansel Adams or Angelo, but you know what? I AM ME, and there is no one else in the whole world with my exact talents, gifts, struggles AND flaws. When i take a photograph, there is no one in that exact spot, in that moment of time, with my talents, with my camera, with my eye...So, if i didn't do it, who would?
So create. Enjoy. Keep doing it and be thankful because there is no one in the world like YOU or your art...
YOU ARE AN ARTIST...if you don't believe me, ask Suzi! M. :)

Pic of the Day...Tuesday, June 28th

Hammer it Together...
Green Barn detail

Journal page...

OK, since the table pics were so boring, I thought I'd leave you with a recent journal page. Watercolor and Sharpie...

Dried and ready for some serious doodling tomorrow! You will have to come back to see it's progress...

Painted...

Doodle Table

Here is the table I was telling you about yesterday. Getting ready to prep it for painting. Totally boring pic by the way. It's an embarrassment to put it up, but this is not about beauty here, but function. ( Hopefully will be later! )

Pic of the Day...

It's after midnight, so technically it's Monday June 27th. But Blogger must be on Pacific Time because all posts show 3 hours difference in my actual Eastern Time Zone. Only four more days left in this month!
In case you were wondering, this pic is of: Marbles in Sprite, altered a bit, and with a cool "old" frame. Enjoy. A pic a day helps keep the blues away!
M. :)

Close up of hand detail in my messy but sturdy, first, "sewed by hand" journal. Some of the patterns are my Millande and some are my own. ( The hearts, scroll, flower, Hope, tree and dragon flies are by M. ;)

I realized that you wouldn't be able to see the details in the collage, so I'm posting a few pics separately.

I Like to doodle!

I like to doodle. I like to doodle a lot. For as long as I can remember, I've been "doodling" on napkins, bulletins, newspapers, journals, anything with a white space that just needed to be filled up! Believe it or not, I have just "graduated" to unlined journals! Crazy, I know. I've wanted to do this forever but just didn't do it. Until recently. (Ok, it took me YEARS to stop writing in my journals in PENCIL). Some habits are either silly or just hard to break. But I'm still filling up "spaces". Now doodling has some fancy names. Zendoodle. Zentangle. Mandalas. Its all still doodling to me. Fun and relaxing and if you use a blank space or a journal page, hopefully something you can keep and enjoy. Its also very good practice for DRAWING... :) I've recently gotten a little booklet call "Zentangle Basics", by Suzanne McNeill. She is very talented and her "doodles" are amazing. The little artist card on the Lady bug boot in the collage above is a practice of her patterns. She uses them on everything, journal and scrapbook
pages, shoes, hats, T-shirts...I've actually decided to Zentangle a table. Its surface was already ruined(by water) and I had painted it years ago, but its in need of a change, so...I have seen all kinds of painted furniture, but never a doodled table, so maybe I'm a "first". :) Pics tomorrow
M. :)

Collage actually gives you 9 pics of the day! ;)

Pic of the Day-Altered Engine

Just so you don't think that all I take pictures of is flowers, I thought I'd throw in this altered photo of an old tractor engine. (I upped the color and spiced it up a bit). Who knew old engines could be beautiful? I saw an Artist's work in Asheville once at a gallery and was so impressed and surprised. She had water colored old engines in the most vibrant colors and pigments you've ever seen. They seriously were beautiful and looked like oil or acrylics with their vibrancy. I'll see if I can find her name and add it to the comments. It's good when other people's work causes us to question how we usually look at things and makes us look at the details more closely. Beauty is everywhere, even in an old dirty tractor engine!
A picture a day helps keep the blues away...M. :)

Pic of the day (too!)

Pic of the day

I have a picture of her wings that I love, but I wanted you to see the sweet details of the front too. So today I give you TWO pics of the day! That should put you in a really good mood. :)
...A picture a day helps keep the blues away... M. :-)

Give me flowers...

Give me flowers to photograph and I'm happy. Any kind, even "weeds". Seriously. Ok, I'll pick them myself. I did this morning, Queen Anne's lace. You would not believe how much detail there is in a "weed". I have that in quotations because as I stated last year, I don't believe in "weeds", just misunderstood and unappreciated flowers! ;) I love to photograph just about anything really. Especially nature. Scenes and the itty-bitty details. Antiques or vintage is another favorite, jewelry, candy, eggs :), teacups, ect! What do you love to photograph?
M. :-)

If anything says "Summer" to me, it's watermelon! Yum! A picture a day helps keep the blues away...

Dragon woes...

So, if you find a dragon fly on the ground and he is already a goner, and you think that this would be a good opportunity to use your macro lens, and then decide to KEEP it because you realize that its another good opportunity to sketch it (since hes not going anywhere anyway!) Just be advised that said little D fly can get PRETTY stinky. Just sayin', you know, in case you ever find yourself in this situation, I just want you to be advised...OH! It also is not the best idea to keep said little D fly in a container, in your Vera Bradley bag... ;) M


PS. This is NOT the pic of the day...Do you think i would use a DEAD dragon fly for that?? !! ;) :)
M.

Happy Rain

Its raining today and I am wearing purple. I'm happy to be at a point in my life where I have learned that rain is as necessary as sunshine. I've always been such a "weather" person, mood corresponding to what's outside. But suddenly and unexplainable, apparently unexplainadly is not a word ;), what's going on outside doesn't matter to me. The earth and all its beauty needs rain to thrive and blossom. And we too need those rainy days to learn and grow and appreciate the sunshine when it comes again...
Ps. You won't get my purple comment unless you have read my previous, brief post...I could not locate the perfect-shade-of-green thread. ;)
Sent on the Sprint® Now Network from my BlackBerry®

Snags of Life

Don't you just HATE it when you have on a brand-spanking new cute and comfy shirt that is just the perfect shade of green and you are just going about your business and you come out of the laundry room and the door jam just reaches out and SNAGS your cute and comfy brand- new- shirt in the perfect shade of green and does some ugly damage to it? Don't ya? Was going for a world record run on sentence there. Well, I just KNOW that there is a life lesson in that. I'm a bit distracted though, so I just can't see it at the moment...i will be thinking about it, and let you know when I figure it out...excuse me, as I am on a search for some green thread...in just the perfect shade of green. ;)

A picture a day helps keep the blues away...
Summer Cherry

Do what you can, with what you have, where you are. - Theodore Roosevelt

a picture a day keeps the blues away! mvw

Changes

 so i'm trying to make some blog changes. i'm a bit tech challenged, to put it mildly, so it won't come easily. i would like to change the feel, the frequency ;) and add some daily pics. will probably have to beg, borrow and pay for help, but thats the plan...