Category Archives: Beauty

What a Difference a Day Makes!

Good evening! Really! Good evening!

What a difference a day makes, check out the view from my beach front condo:

MAN, OH MAN!!! My sweetie has brought me out to the coast with her sister and our niece and nephew! We are HAVING A BLAST, and I am tempted to never o back to town again!! If only I could figure out how to swing that!!

Anyway, we have had manicures, played all over the beach, in the ocean, in caves, tide pools, etc. etc. etc.!! OH man!! Truly, what a difference a day makes!! This is exactly what my spirit needed, I really appreciate that my husband knows exactly what his wife needs!! I really OWE this man!! πŸ˜‰

I will have a ton of pics tomorrow, but in the meantime, I am going to spend some more quality time with my family!!!

Have a FABULOUS evening! ;-)

Happy Birthday Party to Me!

Good evening!

Tomorrow is my 36th birthday, and my sweetie surprised me today by baking me some homemade cupcakes and having a mini party with my sisters. He also surprised me with some Sephora nail polishes that really made day!!! It really was such a sweet and thoughtful gift!

It really is the simple things in life that brings so much joy!!

I am excited about my birthday day tomorrow! I decided to treat myself to the day off so my sweetie and I are going to spend the day together doing whatever we want!!

FUN!!!

I am not sure what we are going to do yet, but we will see!! πŸ˜‰ I will keep you posted! πŸ˜‰

Have a FABULOUS evening! ;-)

Dreaming of Fall!

Good evening!

I am dreaming of Fall! Scrumptious grey rainy days, sloshing around in puddles with the kiddies, hot cocoa and mini-marshmallows with friends, thick feather comforters and a lovely good book, fuzzy-warm slippers on a crisp and cold morning, snuggling with the ones you love on the sofa after a long brisk walk in the chilly afternoon.

Sounds absolutely fabulous!!

While I continue my evening of dreaming about Fall, I would LOVE to hear your favorite thoughts about Fall.

Have a FABULOUS evening! πŸ˜‰

A Friday Night Short Post!

Good evening!

I am in the middle of crocheting like a fiend – I am really wanting to get this blanket done for my sweetie! I have already crocheted 4 skeins worth in the last two days, and have 5 more skeins at my disposal, thanks to my sweetie!!! πŸ˜‰

This picture is the color of variegated yarn I have chosen, chocolate, tan, and baby blue!! I like it because the baby blue is the color of my sweetie’s eys, and the brown is the color of mine! Even though it will be his blanket, he has agreed that the best place for it will be on our bed in the master bedroom! Which is just PERFECT, because our walls are a very beautifully coordinated blue color, and everything else in our room is either white, or a beautiful chocolate brown.

I would love to hear your thoughts in the comment section! πŸ™‚

I am crocheting this blanket like one GIAGANTIC granny square, that way it ends up in a very large, simple, but lovely blanket that should cover our bed very nicely! πŸ˜‰

I did promise that I would share pictures of it with you, but I am determined to get it done and THEN I will share pics with you!!! I guess you should probably know, I am just stubborn like that! πŸ˜‰

Anyway, as I get back to crocheting like crazy…

Have a FABULOUS evening! πŸ˜‰

A Granny-Squarin’ Fool!

Good evening!

I almost forgot to blog tonight – EEK!! That would have messed up my goal of posting 365 days in a row. My sister, Alice, taught me how to crochet granny squares this past week, and I have been a granny-sqaurin’ fool ever since!! She also helped me fall in love with variegated yarn, which I have used a lot in the past, but only for crocheting scarves. So, I picked out some cute yarn, and I have been just crocheting away!!

I have been down and out the past two days, only venturing out today because of a dentist appointment I couldn’t afford to miss, but other than that, I have pretty much been stuck in bed or on the couch!! Long story, but crocheting my little granny squares seem to have helped me pass the time, and not move around too much.

I am thankful to report, that I should be back up and running/ or at least hobbling along as carefully as possible, tomorrow!! Which is great because I am THE WORST patient EVER, just ask my sweetie – God bless that man and all he has to put up with. I honestly don’t know how he manages to put up with all of my hub-bub!

Anyway, I will try and remember to take pictures of my squares, and blanket that I working and share them with you tomorrow!! πŸ˜‰ In the meantime I am going to do just a little more crocheting before I have to go to bed for the night!!!

Have a FABULOUS evening! πŸ˜‰

A Relaxing Saturday!

Good evening!

I am having a very relaxing Saturday at home with my sweetie! I wanted to share some more pics from my weekend with my sisters with you this evening!

I found these two FABULOUS vintage train cases, that looking at them now, I am sick to myself that I did not pick these up! I may just have to call my sissy, and ask her to pick them up for me!! HEE! HEE! πŸ˜‰

There was also this little chi-chi red and white striped purse. Can you say A-D-O-R-A-B-L-E?????

I also love these little goblets. I am not sure if it is the cut of them, the fact that they are nice and heavy, or ifΒ  it is just the scrumptious blue!!! I LOVE these!!

These pictures were right up my alley!! Pic 1!

Pic 2!! πŸ˜‰

This is my dream vanity!! I have always dreamed about having a sexy place to get all dressed up!! DREAMY! πŸ˜‰

 

These boxes of music rolls were so interesting! At first glance it reminded me of Olivander’s shop in Harry Potter! πŸ˜‰ But I just love decorating with these kind of historical trinkets that are just GREAT conversation starters!!

Alright, I am going to call it quits for this night and spend some more quiet time with my sweetie and the girls!!

Have a FABULOUS evening! πŸ˜‰

I Made Something!

Good evening!

I am happy to report that I am still hotelling at the coast. It is our last night here and we are LIVING IT UP!! Well, as living it up as two old married people can do with two skittish long-haired chihuahuas!! Ok, so we aren’t actually “living it up”, we are having fun watching the tele, listening to the ocean, reading, and I am very happy to announce that I have finally finished another piece!!! YEAH!!!

Creative block is officially over!!!

Who knew I would have to stay at an inexpensive hotel at the coast to get my groove back!!!

Anyway, this piece is 7″ x 7″ acrylic on wood, and I am calling it “Irreplaceable Coco!”

I would LOVE to hear your thoughts on this in the comments section! I am have a couple of other pieces in the works, so I am hoping to be able to share some more completed pieces soon!

Anyway, we are on our way home tomorrow, but just long enough to get all of our laundry done and our camping stuff put away, then we are heading down to Roseburg to spend a couple of days visiting with my family!!! That should be fun!! I know it will be nice sleeping in our bed tomorrow evening!! SWEET BLISS!! πŸ˜‰

Have a FABULOUS evening! πŸ˜‰

Wowza!!

Good afternoon!

I wanted to share quickly with you that my sweetie has caught himself a fish!! He is so dang proud of himself, seeing that he hasn’t been fishing in something like 10 years. I know this fish may not look very big, but my hubby is about 6’8″ so it really is bigger than it looks!! LOL! Jason named this fish George, and he did end up cleaning him, and wrapped him up putting him on ice, I am still wondering if he will be able to eat “George” though!! Gosh this man really makes me laugh!! But, look at that happy face!! I am just so glad that if it were even for a brief moment this trip has given him THAT MUCH JOY!!! πŸ˜‰

Anyway, I have officially started my one-woman-artist-retreat last night. I started things out by playing some nice music and writing in my journal for an hour or so – I am not really sure because we have made all time irrelevant while we are out camping, which has been fun. I did some more writing this morning, went for a walk, took a nap – I think I am fighting a little bit of a chest cold – Jason thinks it might just be a residual of my normal life stress that I am working through, and he is probably right! Anyway, I wanted to share some pics with you of some backgrounds I have been working on. These are all just random backgrounds that I am learning about it a book that I am reading, Collage Discovery Workshop.

So, with this first board, I just want to show you what I am starting with. This is just really inexpensive plywood that has been cut to the size that I am wanting to practice on, which for this week’s purposes is 7″ x 7″.

Next comes a liberal coating of white Gesso.

Then each board is ready for whatever background I have chosen to give it. This one is called a colorwash, I have used two different colors to get this effect.

This was is a torn paper background, made using brown paper bags, and then I paint with two different colors of acrylic paint.

This background was a little trickier, but I may like it the best. I have used a thick coat of Gesso to “draw”Β  textures into and then once that has fully dried I have used two colors of acrylic paint to give the piece some depth.

So, the hard part will come next, deciding what is going to go on top of each of these backgrounds, but I have decided that I am just going to have to take them one at a time, and just make it happen!! So, hopefully I will have some pictures of that to share with you tomorrow!!

Have a FABULOUS evening!! πŸ˜‰

Getting In Touch with the Inner Me!

Good evening!

I don’t know exactly where to start, but I had the opportunity to take a Soul Collage class and I am so VERY GRATEFUL that I did. First of all this class was given by the FABULOUSLY GRACIOUS Glenda Goodrich, AKA GG! This was a full class ofΒ  9 very different ladies, all different ages, coming from very different backgrounds, each with different life perspectives.

It is very difficult to describe this class; more something that you need to experience to really understand, but if I had to try and describe what it is to you I would have to say that this is a class that uses imagery to help you tap into your inner self to help you answer questions and guide you throughout your life. It is kind of like a process to help you build your own deck of personal cards to help you look at anything you have going on in your life with new eyes.

Here are the three cards that I had made, and what they symbolize to me, (please note: these images are not mine and may be subject to copyright laws):

This card represents to me Womanhood.

I Am One Who embodies happiness, wisdom of myself to come, am comfortable in my own skin, and able to live my life in my own way without worry about what others might think of me, while living generously, and with compassion for others .

This card represents Vanity:

I Am One Who looks through a skewed looking glass, I am my inner critic, constantly judging and critiquing and never quite feeling like I measure up, and reminding myself that I never will.

This picture represents Compassion:

I Am One Who loves boldly, deeply, richly, and with my full self. I am the nurturer, the comforter, the nurse, and the protector.

Are you still scratching your head? Well, I was confused too until I actually made a couple of cards, and then did a “reading” for myself using them. A reading is where you look at your card, and you tell yourself what you think your card is trying to “tell” you – AKA what was trying come through to you from your subconscious? During my self-reading of my first card I had quite the emotional breakthrough, which was embarrasing, but also quite surprising, in a very good way. Anyway, while I was describing what I felt my firstΒ  card was saying to me, and for some reason I realized that every quality that I have been so envious of in others were actually qualities that were already there in me, and I just needed a way to tap into those feelings. Well, I started crying and wasn’t sure if I was going to be able to finish. Thankfully I did, but what I realized afterwards is that I was crying tears of amazement, happiness, and joy. Not what I expected to get out of just another art class. No, that is NOT what this class was.

I know I have said this before, but I just can not say it enough, I am so thankful that I was able to take this class. I highly recommend anyone interested in taking this class, to do so. For me it was eye-opening, and I believe will ultimately be life changing and healing for me. Soul Collage cards are a going to be a great resource for stopping and listening to what my authentic self is trying to say. What a GREAT and extremely helpful resource to add to my already growing artist repertoire.

GG, I know you didn’t invent the technique, but I thank you for being brave enough and generous enough to pass on the technique! I am grateful!! πŸ˜‰

Have a FABULOUS evening!

This card represents to me womanhood.

I Am One Who embodies happiness, wisdom of myself to come, am comfortable in my own skin, and able to live my life in my own way without worry about what others might think of me, while living generously, and with compassion for others .