Break Over

I unintentionally took a break from blogging. What can I say but life happens! Even though it's been a good three months, I have missed creative time.  

In October, hubby and I RV'd out to Tennessee where we visited the Tennessee Aquarium in Chattanooga. An interesting jellyfish glass art exhibit was on display right alongside the real, live, peacefully drifting jellyfish. Jellies are such intriguing creatures! I thought I'd share a couple of photos with you.

Sorry these pics aren't better.

I hope you can read it.

A side view.

The ones with the big circles remind me of 

space aliens, especially the red one in the back.

Very cool!

Here are some real Jellies!

To me, they're one of God's 

truly fascinating works of art!

May Your Day Be Colorful & Bright,

D~~~~

Apron Love

I took a class at Willetts Sew and Vac in McKinney to make this cute artisan apron. Fabric selection was a blast and so was the class!

  

It includes pockets for markers or pens, a phone, money, receipts, notes, etc., as well as a zipper pocket, a business card pocket, an underneath pocket accessible on either side, and two clips that can be used to attach other necessities.  The apron can be used for working an event or show as a vendor, hosting a garage sale, managing sewing and art supplies, keeping teaching tools close at hand, and lots more!

I love it!

I used a pattern from Molly Made which can be found on Craftsy here or on Etsy here.

Until Next Time, 

May Your Day Be Colorful and Bright,

D~~~~

Penelope Handbag

I recently took a class at Willett's Sew and Vac in McKinney, Texas to make this Penelope Handbag by Michelle Dorsey.

I didn't have time to shop for fabrics 

because I signed up at the last minute. 

Thankfully, I have a pretty good stash 

so I dug into it and used these batiks.

I have never sewn anything 

like this before so it was fun! 

I've mostly created art quilts in the past.

For a first handbag, this 

was probably not the easiest. 

Nevertheless, I enjoyed making it!

I really like it but 

I confess that I do not love it. 

It's much too serious for me! 

I prefer brighter, happier colors 

that evoke a bit of whimsy! 

Or a lot of whimsy! 

LOL  

Perhaps I'll use it as a tote 

for carrying supplies to classes.

  

May Your Day Be Colorful and Bright!

D~~~~

Machinery Joy and Color Glee

My wonderful and very cool hubby purchased 

an embroidery machine for me for my b'day!

Truth be known, he's
 interested in embroidery too.

It's the Janome Memory Craft 15000

Obviously, it embroiders...

 and of course, it quilts and sews too.

Yay, quilting!

A couple of weekends ago, I went to an embroidery event in McKinney, Texas.  While there, I had the joy of purchasing an array of Glide embroidery thread. 

I filled one box and when I called hubby...

He suggested I fill another.

Well, twist my arm!

There are two spools of 

Robison-Anton in this box.  

Can you spot them?

As a color lover, it was a 
blast picking them out.

The yumminess of these cheerful 
colors created a lot of smiling!

And outright happiness!

Giddiness could be detected for miles around!

So very delicious!

They're currently perched in their permanent home on a shelf behind the embroidery machine where they sit right out in the open for all the world to see (which is mainly me).

I've been sewing quilts and what not with Coats & Clark embroidery thread for many years now. I love the sheen of embroidery thread, so of course, I'll be using these Glide threads for quilting too. Oh yes, embroidery threads are suppose to be for embroidery but I don't exactly follow the rules when it comes to quilting. Not if I can help it! 

May Your Day Be Colorful and Bright,

D~~~~

The Answer My Friend is Blowing in the Wind...

I'm taking some online watercolor classes with Gina Lee Kim. Her work is gorgeous and makes me smile! After downloading her four lessons, "Red, Blue, Green and Yellow," and watching all four vids, I decided to start with the green. 

Here it is.

It was a blast to create!

I didn't have all the exact supplies that Gina used but I used what I had on hand and then some. My watercolor supplies were pan and tube watercolors, Twinkling H2O's, Cran D'Ache Neocolor II watersoluble crayons, charcoal sticks, drywall tape and a Pitt pen. I also used batik fabric for my flags instead of washi tape which Gina used in her video.  

I ordered some of the supplies that Gina uses from the Dick Blick website and received them the other day. I'm inclined to do the yellow lesson next, and I think I'm going to use fabric in it too.

Click HERE to go to Gina's 

colorful and delightful blog!

Hope your day is Merry and Bright!

D~~~~

Think Totem Pole!

See this thing?

Would you call it a beam?

Or a Pole?

It's in our living room.
Near our dining room.
And it's square.

Architecturally, I think it's more likely a beam. To be exact, I'm pretty sure it's a support beam because I often feel emotionally and financially secure when I'm around it. Good job support beam! Nevertheless, after giving this a good five minutes of hardly any thought, I've decided to call it a pole because it seems to fit perfectly with where I'm going here. 

Think totem pole!

According to Wikipedia, "Totem poles are monumental sculptures carved on poles, posts, or pillars with symbols or figures made from large trees, mostly western red cedar...". 

Our pole qualifies as a "post, pole or pillar," and even though we will not be carving any sculptures into it, it's apparent that underneath all those layers (and there are many) of fancy schmancy, semi-gloss paint and typical, boring drywall is part of a tree, probably not western red cedar, but let's not be picky here. With this in mind, it qualifies as a totem pole!

In addition, Wikipedia states, "Totem poles serve as important illustrations of family lineage and the cultural heritage of native peoples who live in the island and coastal areas of North America's Pacific Northwest, especially British Columbia, Canada, and coastal areas of Washington and southeastern Alaska in the United States."

Our totem pole's important illustration, will slowly be filled with extra-special, current and favorite, 5" x 7" photos of family and friends who live in North America's Southwest, Texas and the Gulf areas, other parts of America, maybe the entire world, and possibly the universe if we can make it happen. All photos will be in wooden frames, whimsically painted and/or collaged, and embellished (by me) to funk them up, further making our totem pole akin to the totem pole from days of yore.

Wikipedia further states that, "...nearly all totem pole making ceased by 1901. Twentieth century revivals of the craft, additional research, and continued support from the public have helped establish new interest in this regional artistic tradition." 

Our totem pole should be considered a Twenty-First century, modern revival of the craft. My Wikipedia research, and continued support from... uh, well, no one, have helped me establish a new interest in this artist tradition. Kind of.

With that in mind,
our totem pole is officially being named:

The Whimsical Photom Pole

Below is the first frame being whimsied up. It was brown as you can see at the bottom back. I didn't take a "before" pic but do you really need one? After all, it's a brown wooden frame. You know what they look like. 

It was covered with gesso and then painted.

The Sea Breeze shade of paint was selected because it would perfectly accommodate the horseback riding photo taken on our recent trip to the Cayman Islands. 

We loved the horseback riding and the picture!

Here it is looking all spiffy in it's 

"Pole Position" as they say in NASCAR.

I did this frame before the Photom Pole idea came to fruition so it may need further embellishment at some point. I love dots though and they are whimsical so we're good for now! 

For the most part, I'm not going to look for photos from the past to add to the Photom Pole. Any photos added to it will be ones taken from here on out but there may be a few exceptions. 

To read the entire Wikipedia article, click here or any of the other links above. 

See you soon.

May Your Day be Merry and Bright,

D~~~~

This Store is a Work of Art

Last Thursday, we took our RV over to Canton and camped out so we could attend First Monday Trade Days. Before going to the flea market, however, we stopped off at a store right down the street that I have been anxious to go to for a long time--LaurieAnna's Vintage Home!  

I snapped a few photos of the store for my friend Faye because I knew she would love this place. It just occurred to me to share them here too because this entire gorgeous store is a delightful work of art!

I hope you enjoyed the trip!

Click here to visit her blog.

May Your Day Be Creative and Bright!

D~~~~

Where on Earth Have I Been?

Yes, it has been an unusually long period of time since I posted. Two and a half months to be exact! It's as if I tumbled off the end of the earth but I would NEVER EVER stand that close to the edge because I have a horrendous fear of heights! 

Truth is, I have NOT had much creativity going on for one reason or another, and boy, oh boy, have I missed it.  Here's some of what's been going on:

First, a precious new grand baby arrived.

It's a boy and his name is Nicolas.

Of course, we are smitten!

He's grand baby #3. They're all boys.

Next, I'm beyond sad to say that our sweet and much loved Mini Schnauzer, Sally, passed away. We had her for 14 years, and she was truly my BFF as they say these days. There are no words to tell you how much I miss her.  It's been two months and the pain is still fresh. I want a do-over starting from the time she arrived here at only five weeks old. 

I wrote a Tribute to Sally on my SFMM blog.  

To read it, click here.

We also took an amazing trip to the Cayman Islands!

Oh my, what a fun time!

I shared the trip on the SFMM blog.  

Click here for Part 1.  

Click here for Part 2.

Not long after the Caymans, I had my gallbladder yanked right out of my innards! Picture the doctor steadying herself by applying one foot to my liver while she grasps my gallbladder with a big ole pair of pliers. With beads of sweat flowing from her brow, she yanks and yanks until my stony gallbladder pops loose and she's able to jerk it right out! Ta da!

Ah yes, modern science.

With all of that out of the way (amongst other things), I finally have some creativity going on around here. 

I decided to paint and collage these birdhouses.

I drug out all of these supplies and changed

my mind about using most of them!

It happens.

After collaging both birdhouses with pages 

from the Farmer's Almanac seen above, 

I decided to focus on this birdhouse only.

For now.

Then, I added acrylic paint...

...mixed with glazing medium.

This is the way it looks right 

now as a work in progress.

It has a long way to go.

I've also used Washi tape and a Pitt Pen.

I'll share it again once it's finished. I've never done anything like this before so there's no telling what it's going to look like by the time I'm finished. 

It might scare off every bird within a 25 miles radius.

And me!

See you soon.

May your day be creative and bright,

D~~~~

Forgotten UFO

Do you have UFO's?  I think many quilters do.  

I dug through a few the other day 

and found these four house blocks.

I'd completely forgotten about them.

These four quilt blocs were supposed to be part of a quilt sporting 12 house blocks, one for each month of the year. These four blocks represent January thru April. I can clearly see that I didn't even finish the April block before putting the project to the side. You can tell which block is which month, can't you? 

I'm pretty sure that this quilt was on an episode of Simply Quilts about 10 years ago or more. It was when I first started quilting and it seems like I printed out the directions from the internet. If so, they're probably long gone by now. It's highly likely that I tossed them into the trash during a cleaning frenzy and that's fine by me.  

I can see that I've changed a lot since then! If I started this quilt today, it would be more colorful. I also see a lot of things, I'd like to change and embellish. I will certainly do that if and when I finish it. For now, it goes back into the UFO pile. I suspect it's going to linger in my mind though because it would be fun to complete.  

Tootles for now,

D~~~~