Category Archives: Self Improvement

A Charming Day!

Good evening!

I wanted to share with you the jewelry class I was fortunate to take yesterday! 😉 I spent the day up at the Tarte store up in Aurora, Oregon. The shop is ABSOLUTELY DIVINE!! I could LITERALLY purchase EVERY SINGLE THING in that store and decorate my house with it! EVERYTHING is my style to a T!!

The room that we had our craft class was EXACTLY the way that my craft room SHOULD be!! 😉 I have thought about how to describe it to you, and words just could not describe how girly glam this room was!!! The room was basically draped with an indoor tent for grown up girls, and there was a gigantic chandelier right in the center of the room, dripping in beads.

Here are a couple of pics:

This is a large parachute that they sewed tulle to. Isn’t that INGENIOUS?!?!?!?

Do you see what I mean?? You just couldn’t help but feel the girl glam vibe that was in that room! That was P-R-I-C-E-L-E-S-S!!

They had a place setting for every one of us women, there were 15 of us. These were just soooo charming, and I now want to work from a silver tray from now on! What do you think??

So chic!! 😉

The lovely, Terri Brush was our instructor, and the first thing we learned how to do was to design, etch and form copper bracelets – this is a good project for working your arm muscles!! There was SO MUCH POUNDING going on!!! WHEW!!! 😉

Next, we got to play with solder!! Using some old keys, we coated them in solder and played with some letter stamps! That was fun!! (Just in case you can’t read these, they say “Dream Big” and “Inspire”)

What came next were create mini collages to place inside of charms that we then got to solder!!! This was my FAVORITE part of the entire class!!

Here are the backsides of my charms, the previous picture was a view of the front of the charms! I literally could have done this all day!! They are short and sweet, and HIGHLY gratifying!!! 😉 I am planning on using these to make a couple of charm bracelets!!

and last but not least! I got to play some more with the letter stamps, and I decided to make one last charm for my bracelet! but, this one ended up being MY FAVORITE OF THEM ALL!!!  This is my sweetie’s and my initials, and the date of our wedding!! I LOVE that the letters and numbers are all catty-wompous! It just seems to make this one all the more charming!!!

They left us at each of the place settings, it is a, dare I say it, a charming box of chocolate!! It is decorated so chicely, that I have a feeling that this little package will NEVER be opened!! 😉

I have ALWAYS wanted to learn how to create these charms and I am soooo THANKFUL that I have finally acquired this skill!! Terri is a gem, and this class was really a fun way to learn all of these fun jewelry making techniques!! I would highly recommend this class to anyone fortunate enough to be able to take it!!

Have a FABULOUS evening! 😉

A Really Late Post!

Good evening!

I just wanted to make sure that I touched base before I climbed into bed this evening! I am soooo tired!!

I had an hour and a half long belly dancing class tonight by a substitute instructor, and she REALLY kicked our heinies!!! 😉 No, she did a FABULOUS job, but she worked us out from HEAD TO TOE, so I am gonna be ONE SORE MAMMA in the morning!! Scratch that – I AM SORE NOW!!! 😉

This pic is of me striking a pose!! Paula, one of the other students, was very sweet in offering to take my picture, and I just HAD to jump at the chance! I would have taken more pics, but our class of 6 has somehow managed to dwindle down to a class of two. So that is a bummer, but I am still having a blast.

My focus in class has changed from “Let’s see if I can be brave enough to do something scary”, to “Let’s see what else my body will do if I practice!” It seems like a minor change, but it has really made me stop and think about EVERYTHING that I demand of my body, and what I DO and DO NOT do to take care of it! I have to remember that this is my soul’s vehicle, and it will only last so many miles, so I have got to start taking better care of my engine, er…uhm…so to speak!! 😉

I stopped at the grocery store on the way home this evening – I was craving cheerios with a sliced banana for dinner, and I wasn’t sure if we had any of that so, I made the mistake of grocery shopping on an empty stomach. NO, an empty stomach that had just worked out hard for the last hour and a half!!! So, let’s just say I may have gone a little crazy, and bought a little bit of EVERYTHING!!! 😉 The good thing is that after belly dancing class, I am on an adrenaline high, and I ONLY WANT to do or eat things that are healthy, so ALL of my food choices fit that bill!! I am now contemplating doing our weekly grocery shop under those conditions EVERY time I shop!! LOL!!! I wonder what my sweetie would think of that??

NOT TOFU AGAIN!!! 😉
(I really do LOVE that man of mine!!)

On that note, I am taking my happy, but exhausted self to bed!

Have a FABULOUS evening!!! 😉

A Wednesday of Art Class!

My Homemade Business Cards!!

Good evening!

I know tonight is Chunky Dunker’s night, so we can still chat in the comments section after I post – is that alright for everyone?? It so too difficult trying to come up with a health related topic when right now my life is revolving around art and being creative!! 😉 So from now on, Wednesday evenings will be the same kind of posts that I normally post, my life’s journey to creating my dream life, and Chunky Dunker’s will “meet” in the comments section!

On to my day!!!

I spent the day over at The Art Department, in downtown Salem. I was taking an art class being given by Sharon Geraci, who, BY THE WAY, is PHENOMENAL!! She is talented with a capital T!!

Here is part of the class description:

Rev up your collage experience with an expanded repertoire of materials and techniques. Work on wood or canvas as a support, with an assortment of gels, household materials, and alternative methods of attaching objects and materials.

DOESN’T THAT SOUND AWESOME???

There were six of us in class, not including, Sharon. There was Sandra, Marcia, Cheryl, Brigitta, Linda and myself. Everyone besides Sandra and myself had already taken classes from Sharon, so they already knew what to expect!! Here is my workspace:

Each student had an ENTIRE 8 FOOT TABLE TO THEMSELVES, which is a REALLY good thing because collage is a VERY W-I-D-E art form!!!

This class, was a collage techniques class, which was formatted much differently than the kind of collage class I took last Saturday. Not to say that one was better than the other, but to say that they were different. This class was much more educational in feel, with A LOT of demonstration time. After leaving the class you didn’t really walk away with a finished product per se, however you did walk away with a TON of samples, and a very clear and practical understanding on how A LOT of cool techniques worked!

That was VERY EXCITING!! The fact that I now know to do SO MUCH MORE in creating interesting and creative AND ARTISTIC collages!!! 😉

Here are some of the techniques we learned, and some pics from the samples that I had made:

We learned how to make acrylic skins, which is something that can be used to lay over the top of and enhance your collage design:

This one was inspired by the next collage that I am wanting to work on.

I wanted this skin to be a little more earth tone and nature-inspired. This one I actually used mica flakes (the little shimmery things)

This one is clear and is meant for the sole purpose of adding something sparkly to one of my next projects! This one utilizes the mica flakes again, and then who couldn’t use some glitter???

The next technique we learned was the foil technique!

This project was really cool because we got to try out a lot of different kinds of professional grade acrylics, and then we got to try out a heat sealing iron, and iron on foils, that was a lot of fun! I can see how THAT could be VERY ADDICTIVE!!! 😉

The next technique was called, for lack of a better term, TSqeegee Method of decorating paper!!

I just loved the blues and greens that I was able to create in this one, and I think the whites in this just really makes everything else pop!

Here is another blue-centric design (I had Jason on my mind a lot today, and blue is his FAVORITE color!! On this one, Marcia had just shared a technique that she found cool, which was using a painters comb to swirl loops – so I “borrowed” a variation on her technique to come up with this on water color paper! This one is my favorite, and there is NO WAY that I am going to cut or tear this one – I think this one is ready for it’s frame!

Here is another blue sample, using different sized combs – this is the one that I actually use in some of my later samples.

Then we learned a couple of more techniques for making backgrounds, and we got to play with making some of our own:

This one is a yet to be finished board, it is missing something that will tie it all together!! (Do you see any of my papers?)

This piece is a finished piece! I think the embossing really finished this one up for me! I LOVE It!! (Do you see any of my papers in this one??)

W learned SOOOO MUCH in this one day of lessons! WAAAY MORE than I have even itemized out here!! This is an art that I can see has ENDLESS possibilities! and I am JUST SO HAPPY to be able to be a part of it!!!

Thank you, Sharon, and all of my class mates for such a FUN day!!! I look forward to next time!!

Have a FABULOUS evening!!! 😉

Art Studio Reality Check!

Good evening!!

Wow! Where do I start??? I have a lot going on, right now, but I wanted to share about an EMBARRASSING secret that I have been living with, that is becoming a bigger and bigger obstacle on my path to to my creative self!!!

This evening I spent a little time in my “Art Studio”. I say art studio in quotes because my space that can become my dedicated art space AKA Art Studio! Well, let me show you some pics:

I am ABSOLUTELY MORTIFIED of this CATASTROPHIC MESS!!!

(Click to enlarge)

and just take a gander at my work table!

(Click to enlarge)

How the heck am I supposed to get any CREATING done in this HEAP of a room!!

AAAAAAAACK!!

My craft room has become a problem for me, as you can see from the ATROCIOUS pics above!! So, I have decided to host my own makeover intervention with myself!! This whole transformation is being brought on because I have been spending some time reading the latest publication of Where Women Create. I want to have a room comparable to one of these women’s FABULOUS art studios!! With interesting and fun storage idas, everything organized with their own style stamp on their spaces!! I just know it will make any art I create that much sweeter!! Ok, that might be wishful thinking on my part, but it really would make it be a space that I would LOVE to spend time in, and not a space that I cringe to!!!

So, more to come! I will definitely keep you all posted!! 😉 Over the next week or few, depending on how long it takes I am going to be taking some progress pics to show you what progress I am making on turning this room into a place of BEAUTY and CREATIVITY!!! This may take a while!! 😉

In the meantime,

Have a FABULOUS evening!!! 😉

A Late Post!

Good evening!

I am sorry this post is getting to you so late! I completely lost track of time this evening!! 😉 I was playing in my craft room with my friend, Cicily! We were both collaging our little hearts out! I can’t wait until we get to do it again!! 🙂 I will have to take a moment sometime tomorrow to take pictures of our newest works in process for you to peruse!! The funny thing is, that we were sitting on completely opposite ends of the room, and our color schemes are almost identical!! TOO FUNNY!!!

Well, I am ready for my class on Wednesday, and because of lack of class space, I am going to have to find some kind of alternative activity for Saturday, since my encaustic class will have to wait until the next round!!! HOWEVER, I picked up all of my supplies this afternoon after work, and I am ECSTATIC!! I truly can not wait!!!

Oh! and I am excited to say that I am going to take a Zumba class next Monday evening! My first Zumba class ever!! I am all about making movement fun, and I have heard nothing but GREAT things about Zumba, especially one of the classes that is offered a few blocks from my place! I will give it a try for one week, and then I will decide if it something that I can commit too!! I will keep you posted!!! 😉

As for me and right now, I am zonked!! It is so far past my bedtime that all I can do right now is tell you G’night…and

Have a FABULOUS evening!!!