My Simple Little Life

Rethinking things

I invite you to follow me here: my Tumbler page

It's pretty obvious for the (possibly 3?) people that follow this blog that I've been horribly negligent of it lately.

Also, lately, I've been trying to think of ways that I can save time (or better manage it). I've already made a few changes. I'm laying off Word with Friends (I will finish my current games) and I'm going to do the same with Draw Something very shortly. I'm DVRing a show I love that's on once a week at 11 p.m. and I'm skipping any others that are on after 10 p.m. (How many episodes of House Hunters/HH International do I really "need" to watch???) I'm trying to get to bed earlier (hence cutting out the games which keep me up later than I'd like) which leads naturally to getting up earlier - something I really love for many reasons, extra hours in the day not being the least of them. And, in addition to all that, I'm considering giving up this blog.

Gasp.

I do have a tumblr account which I think may meet my needs at this point in my life.

Why do I have a blog? That IS the question I've asked myself and here are my answers:

1.  It's been important to me to have a place where I can have a catalogue of my scrapbooking/art pages and the photo album feature in this blog - which is why I switched to typepad - very much fulfills that purpose.

2.  I love sharing photos. Photos of my family, of where I live and of what is going on in my life.

3.  I seem to enjoy blathering about my life. I admit it. This blog is not deep, controversial or very thought-provoking. Not that I don't have deep thoughts, or controversial thoughts. Not that I'm not highly opinionated about lots of things. But my choice has been to be only positive here and to be careful about venting or spewing which may offend friends or family. Don't wanna go there in public. I know some people do and I know this in itself is actually a controversial issue. For me, I have chosen to have this be a positive, uplifting place. The downside, however, is that my writing really amounts to a "what I did today" sort of diary and, frankly, it just ain't that exciting. I enjoy it, don't get me wrong. But It's not really enriching anyone else's life. I ask myself, "is it necessary (to me) to do this?".

4.  I have wanted exporsure in the scrapbooking community and I've wanted to participate in events and communities that require a blog.

And so, what happens to all those things if I give up this blog?

1. and 2. I have a "pro" (i.e. unlimited) flickr account. I can put all my photos there in nice little collections and sets. I haven't always put everything in there. But I'm going to start and I may transfer everything in there eventually. I just consider it a way of backing up all the photos that are important to me. Plus, I can share them with friends and family if there's an event - or anytime! AND - I can post all the photos I want on tumblr! :) And even some words - not tons, just some. Which leads me to...

...3. I don't need to blather. I don't have time (nor do I want to take the time anymore) to blather. Now that I'm investing time in art journaling, I can blather all I want there - OR I can express what's really on my mind - no holds barred. (and I do)  Disclaimer: I am NOT implying that anyone else that has a blog is blathering. I'm only referring to myself. And, speaking of which, I read a LOT of blogs. This is perhaps another area where I may want to consider cutting back. But not yet.  :)

4. I'm completely satisfied with the amount of exposure I've had in the scrapbooking community. I'm completely satisfied with the publications I've been in. (Like, WOW!) I don't feel the need to participate in any more challenges, blog hops or scrapbook communities. I feel like I've done that - and it was GREAT - but now I'd really rather spend the extra time in my art room creating. Period.

So, check out Tumblr if you never have. It's cool. I can very quickly add photos and even a little written content. Or videos or music. The quickness is what's appealing to me. Whenever I think about blogging, I always think I need more time than I have and, therefore, I skip it altogether. I think Tumblr will provide me a place where I can just throw something down quickly and easily.

So, if you're interested in following a more compact version of me (ohhhh, if only I could be a more compact version of me, but that's another story....), I invite you to go to my tumblr page and then "follow" me (by clicking "follow") there. And I hope you will.

I'll keep this blog open until my subscraption (ha! an amusing typo - I'll leave it) runs out... (Yes, typepad costs $$$ - one more reason to let it go.)

Blessings.

(whew! already I'm feeling a sense of pressure lifted...)

Create - I'm all about it

My unsatiable appetite for creating in my art (formerly "scrap") room continues raging on. (I do want to mention that just because I'm now calling my "scrap" room an "art" room doesn't imply at all that I'm not scrapping anymore. I'm just doing "more" than scrapping!) Having said that, I must admit that I haven't scrapped much this year. But I want to! I have several photos sitting on/near my desk - out of the way of flying inks and paints - waiting for my attention. And I'm participating in True Scrap 3 this weekend and expect to be overflowing with inspiration from that!

But, right now, I just can't stop feeding the mixed media monster! And I'm okay with that!  :)

I want to re-post the tags I've made so far in Tim Holtz's Creative Chemistry 101 class. The previous photos weren't all that great. But first, let me say, this is a class chock-full of hard core in.for.ma.tion! I have learned SO much about things that I've owned and have used (or haven't) but of which I didn't really fully comprehend the possibilities because I didn't really understand what I was dealing with in these products. (I'm talking distress inks vs. archival inks, alcohol inks, blending solution and so on...). I can't recommend this class enough! I'm almost hoarding the lessons because I want to be able to give them my absolute full attention. I actually had to replay two entire videos for one lesson because I was rather distracted when watching them the first time. Well, okay, it was more like very tired. But, whatever. I watched again so I could really absorb. And the nature of the class is that you can come back and do the lessons all at your own pace. Love that.

So, here are the 6 tags I've made so far. Tim has provided convenient printable labels to adhere to the back of the tags you make so you can recall the technique used to make said tag. Awesome!

blended distress inks with water splotches. Cool!

making a "watercolor" image with stamp(s) and distress ink

inking a non-absorbent surface (like a craft mat), spritzing with water and then picking up the results onto a blank tag.

stamping with archival ink over blended alcohol inks. wow! this was my first time really playing with (and understanding the potential of) alcohol. Amazing! The photo doesn't do it justice...

archival inks with distress inks - I so get it now!

this was to be about reverse stamping with embossing folders, but I didn't have any reverse stamps. But I got the idea anyway - and love the results. i also extended the technique a bit by sanding the embossed image a bit to make it stand out more.

I'm so excited about adding these techniques to my arsenal. I see possibilities for both art journaling and scrapping and card making.

Speaking of art journaling, here are the two latest spreads I've completed:

All my tendencies to be wordy are very apparenet in this spread! To make the background, I cut a bunch of squares and then cut them in half to form triangles and then lined up a few rows of triangles and sprayed ink/mist over them. Then I carefully lifted them and moved them on across the page, spraying a different color of ink/mist. After a while the colors began to blend and bleed it made a very interesting background. I ended up using a few of the sprayed triangles on the pages. I then did some doodling in the triangles at the far right, as well as masked and inked a clock image several times.

And here's the latest spread I completed:

For this spread, I marked off lightly with pencil a grid of approximately 4"x4" squares across the page. I used acrylic paint and stamps on the left side to fill in a bit and then watercolored each grid with a different color. I then filled each square with either journaling or I made a mini-canvas, sometimes overlapping two squares. I doodled in some faux stitching between the squares.

I've started another spread now, of course, and I decided to go with the black gesso background again. This time I'm painting in little houses all along the bottom (haven't left a ton of room for journaling, actually) and I'm going to play with each little house, decorating it with doodling and paint and little details. Should be super FUN!

Since I have a free afternoon before me (yay!) I'm going to go for a walk and then MAKE myself sit down and take an hour to read. Chris doesn't get home from work til 8 p.m. and I'm making a glorified chicken caesar salad for dinner, so I've got LOTS of time (double yay!) for that and playing in my art room. I really should continue the purge I started in there. In fact, I was talking to my sister-in-law this a.m., who spent the night last night, and she thought it would be an awesome idea to donate my purged (all good) items to the arts/crafts room at the retirement village she lives in. I was wondering what to do with it all. I didn't want to toss it and so much of it is really beyond my granddaughters and I didn't want to mail it (holy postage!) so that seems like a wonderful solution that would help us both! So, I must get to work on that, as well. But, probably not today...

Finally, I leave you with my two favorite photos from Easter. The whole set of photos can be seen at my Flickr site, here.

heaven.

I'm an Artist

At least, I feel like one. I have greatly neglected my blog and I'd said that I was going to blog more often. Well, there's only so many hours in the day, so many days in the week, right? After I've done the essentials around here (i.e. granddaughter care, personal quiet time, managing committments, meal planning/prep, exercise - most of the time - eating, sleeping, personal grooming, etc.), after all that, I sit down to take one of the several online classes I'm in and/or to hideaway in my art room to do "homework" and whatever else we artists like to call "work" but, in reality, is the most wonderful, joyful kind of play. Ah, I'm in love. My head is swimming... And I don't mean to imply that creating art is not essential. For me it is. But, I don't live by myself on a secluded dessert island, so I must practice balance. :)

I've now completed Julie Fei-Fan Balzer's "30 Days in Your Journal". If you are at ALL interested in art journaling, I can't recommend this online class enough. Julie has such a fabulous laid back (and often humerous) teaching style and makes everything easy and do-able. And I love the fact that this is NOT a huge investment of time each of your 30 days (and I did NOT do 30 consecutive days - another great thing about the class is that it's self-paced.) In fact, Julie emphasizes trying to get your art journaling (using her technique which involves journaling for many days on one progressive spread - like in my photos, below) done in 10-15 minutes a day. You will learn a LOT and you'll embrace "the mess" and toss out the idea of making "mistakes". You can find info on this class on her blog, here.

So, as I said, I've completed her class now and I'm art journaling ON. MY. OWN. Wow. I feel like I'm flying! I'm so thrilled. I will definitely continue using her technique of journaling (about 5) days on one spread - at least until I fill up my current book. But I also feel totally confident (so MUCH more so than pre-class) about going back to my faith journal now and doing singular spreads there. In fact, I'm really looking forward to doing that. So, yes, I will be joining the ranks of those who have more than 1 art journal going on at a time. I'm an artist, I tell ya!

Well, here's the last spread that I did "in the class". Julie started us on the first day of it and then we were on our own after that.

Just a note: I don't have any earth-shattering private stuff in there (it's just blather about my simple little life, ya know?) but I don't show these pages with the intention of anyone actually reading the content. It's about the visual.  :)

I was so happy to take my journal with me when we went to visit M&M in their new home in North Carolina (YAY!!!!!) last weekend. I just packed a few pens, number stamps, a tiny ink pad, a few embellies and a glue runner. All that fit in a little box about the size of a regular business envelope. Sweet. I loved being able to work on it everyday. (The key was to have the main focal art already in place beforehand - that would be all the stuff at the bottom in the spread you see above.) I added the photos after I got home and printed 'em out.

So, I'm also doing Tim Holtz's Creative Chemistry 101 class. It's also self-paced (I don't think I'd do it any other way anymore...) and I'm just now getting into the meat of it. I did the first 3 "technique" tags today and I LOVE them! (They're so much better in person.) I learned SO much just in this one day's class. Wow! So I know I'm going to love this as well.

Here's a peek at my tag homework:

I'm still working through Joanne Sharpe's Letter Love class. There's lots of homework and I can see that it's all going to be about practice, practice, practice. At the same time, I'm finding myself already putting to use stuff that I've learned in that class, as well. Here's the latest little piece I did for that class:

Last, but definitely not least, I joined the 21 Secrets Community. It is a whole community for art journalers and there are 21 teachers offering 21 workshops from April 2012 through January 2013. They're all available from day 1, so you choose where to start and then dive in - again, at your own pace. I'm SO excited about working through these workshops - my head is spinning! There's a gallery and chat rooms - like I said, it's a whole community. I haven't plunged yet, but will soon! After I decide where to start!

So, yeah, I'm feeling like quite the artist. And I'm loving it. Since I'm exercising regularly now and eating well, my energy is abounding. I even re-organized my cleaning system. All to say I'm not really going to neglect the other things in my life that are important. But I'm definitely onboard for feeding all my creative desires and dreams. And livin' up to my word this year - create!

Now, off to bed so I can tackle a new day tomorrow!

Happy St. Patty's! | Stuff to Share

I'm so happy that it's a glorious sunny day! My heart just needed it today. I'm expecting a granddaughter or two to show up any minute now, too, so happy times are ahead! :)

But I wanted to take a minute to share what I've been working on lately.

I think I've mentioned that I'm taking a fabulous art journaling class. It's called 30 Days in Your Journal. Wow. If you have any interest in that realm at all, I can highly recommend this class. It's been everything I've needed to get comfortable experimenting with different medium and techniques because I'm learning that you can't be too messy and you can't make mistakes. I tend to be a perfectionist in so many areas and I'm happy to report that I'm leaning away - far away! - from that tendency in my art journaling of late. Because of this class! Thank you Julie! Right at the moment, I just finished day 27 (out of the 30 lessons) and I'm going to be so sad when it's over...

So here's a look at the last spread I completed:

I have to say I was a wee tad intimidated by the suggestion to draw a figure. Julie gave great general instructions (in her typical laid back and humorous way) and I just went for it. And, I have to say, I'm pretty pleased with how it (she) turned out. Here's a closer look at that right side:

I ended up going sort of off on my own by the end of this spread (which encompassed 5 lessons/days) and I know Julie would be so proud. Just as parents we want to teach our children to spread their wings and be themselves as they go out on their own into life, a good teacher (such as Julie is) wants the same for their pupils - and especially in the area of art. So, I feel great that I got to a point where I felt really comfortable doing that. Yay!

I'm also taking a lettering class from the amazing Joanne Sharpe, who I just discovered in Stampington & Co.'s Somerset Studio. And she was also just featured my most favorite publication of theirs - Art Journaling. How timely! She's now teaching her very first online class called "Letter Love". This is another area that I've really been wanting to work on, so I was thrilled to discover the class. I'm only 5 lessons in and have already learned so much.

Here's the first little project I did:

(Wow! I did that?)

Joanne is a WEALTH of information. I also highly recommend!

And, rather serendipitously, my last spread in Julie's class (30 Days in Your Journal) involves making a whole alphabet! It must be the northern lights or the early breakout of spring or something, but I love it when stuff like that happens! Here's a sneak peek at the spread in progress:

 

That's all for now. My windows in the living room are open letting in the gorgeous FRESH air - my spirit is beginning to soar! The girls will be here soon. Gotta go put away the cookies I baked!

Happy St. Patty's. Speak with an Irish accent for the rest of the day!  ;)

A Quick Share

We're heading up to State College today to visit Chris's sister and her husband. I'm mostly packed. But just wanted to take a minute to share what I've been working on lately. I've still been able to get in my art room most every day. The urge to purge is getting stronger and stronger. Not because I hate what I have. But because I have SO much and it makes it so much easier to create when you have LESS to choose from - especially when you love everything you have. And, right now, I don't LOVE everything I have. I also find it tons more inspiring to have just what you love surrounding you and in sight. That's key for me. So, when the urge to purge hits its peak in a few weeks, then I will also be at my motivational peak to get my room all sorted out and reorganized. It's coming soon, because the thought of it is becoming very exciting to me!  :)

I'm so thrilled to say that I'm still finding time most every day to get in my art room and CREATE! (Create is my "word" for the year - and it is fulfilling its purpose already!). I know that this online course that I'm taking - Julie Fei-Fan Balzer's "30 Days in Your Journal" has been instrumental in getting me in there. Because I just can't wait to watch the class video each day (that I can) and then get in there and play in my art journal. And getting me in there is the main thing. Once I'm there, I don't wanna leave! And I'm also beginning to scrapbook again! Wheeee!

So, first up, is my latest scrapbook page. I haven't done anything digital yet this year. But I think that's because I'm getting the Studio Calico kits every month and now I just can't wait to play with all that yummy stuff!  :) This layout is based on a recent SC sketch:

This page features a photo strip (that I cut apart) from my PhotoBooth app on my iPod. I just love these pics and it reminds me of what a fun time I always have with my friend, Teresa. Love her! (And love the play on a word in the title...)

And here are some pics of my most recent art journal page ("page three" I like to call it, because, well, it's the third spread in my journal...)

Here's a little close up of both sides:

I just realized that I haven't yet posted  "page two" of my art journal. Here are some shots of that completed spread:

If you'd like to see all my pages in one place, you can access my flickr set here.

Well, the phone just rang and a rush of panic went through me because I thought it would be Chris telling me he's done at the office and on his way home. It IS a little early for that, but I panicked because, well, I am NOT ready! Mostly packed really means NOT packed. So, off I go to get that done!

Happy weekend!