Friday Flowers and Faces

    Hi everyone. Happy Friday. Another week has sped by, hasn't it? 

    Today I have a bunch of random garden photos to share. I'll be linking  up to Friday Face off over at Nicole's blog and also Friday Lunch Break over at Gillena's blog. And just an FYI- this is a photo heavy post

                                        

     I'll start with these faces on these wild turkeys. I haven't seen them around for a while. I want to say "They're Back!" 😁

   Do you see the grape vine growing over my arbor behind the turkeys? Usually the new growth comes off the old woody vines, and this spring there were none. I thought I'd lost the plant. Then we had a couple days of actual rain, and after that, new shoots came out of the roots. And look at it now. No grapes this year, but the plant certainly wasn't dead. 

     How about the deep red of this lily flower?

A dragonfly hanging out on a tomato plant.

  This year I bought a few plants for a tiny spot next to the deck that usually just filled up with weeds. One plant I bought was a Black Eyed Susan, a favorite plant of mine. It's very happy there and looks amazing right now. Plus there's a face in one of these next photos of the flowers too.

    OK, I guess I got a bit carried away with black eyed Susan photos. 😉 Next up some golden-rod with another face, and then another favorite of mine which are now blooming.

Zinnias ❤

    The other day I noticed 3 Great Spangled Fritillary butterflies on this one bunch of zinnias at one time. I only captured a photo of 2 of them because one flew off as I walked over in that direction.

   These tiger lilies blooms have seen better days, but I still think the flowers are very interesting to look at.

Here's another face on some milkweed.

   This first dandelion photo is slightly out of focus, except for one seed that is breaking away over on the left.

   You can still see the dandelion break away seed here, but it is not so dramatic.

  I visited my daughter the other day, and my son-in-law pointed out this swallow-tail caterpillar that was in his garden.

And to wrap up this post, the son-in-law's sunflowers look AMAZING! 

   Have a wonderful Friday and start to the weekend everyone.

Thursday Fashionable Art

   HI everyone. Happy Thursday. I hope your week is going well.

   Today I have a couple of pieces of art for a couple of challenges. First I have a summer inspired journal page for my In The Good Old Summertime challenge over at Art Journal Journey. Then I another tag for Pinky's Fashion challenge over at Tag Along (and ATC's too).

    Here's my page for Art Journal Journey.

  I call my  journal page Beach Wear. It's definitely some vintage styles. 

 I started my page by using 2 small sheets of 6x6 (inch) summer paper that is blue and covered with some boat/sail flag designs. I used that to cover the white base page I was working off of. Then I used a second sheet of paper that was black and white and covered in summer fashion. I cut that page apart to arrange the fashion on my page. I finished by pulling out my Ciao Bella junk journal book and fussy cutting the girl in her swim suit as  well as the colored swim/beachwear pieces. I think the pops of color not only added to my layout but also enhanced the black and white images.

   To finish, I outlined the page with a Sharpie. I did not add a quote, even though I thought about it. This is one page in a small journal I made, and since the page was already full with fashion and some fashion "quotes", I decided not to add anything else to this page. Plus I really like the quote that was printed on the paper right at  the very top  which says "You're In The Swim".

   And here's my tag.

   This month Pinky's theme at Tag Along (and ATCS too) is fashion. If you don't like fashion you can go with Anything Goes. In the last several years it seems that fingernails are also becoming high fashion. Some women have very pretty nails not only with them painted but also with all kinds of nail art added. I don't do my nails because I don't think they would last more than 5 minutes between me always getting my hands covered in paint, dirt, or assorted other messy things.

   My tag today is titled hand fashion. 

   I cut the tag using an AALL& Create tag die. I used a punch card for the base. This punch card is the kind you would use if you were punching in for a job. After I die cut it, I used an ink pad to color it. Then I took a bottle of Hero Arts liquid watercolor and added some drops of neon pink ink. After those drops dried, I took and orange ink pad and added a bit of color to the tag's edges. I was really hoping to get some good drips from the liquid watercolor, but I had a hard time getting it to run. At least the drops certainly work.

   The reinforcer around the tag hole was cut from the tag material scraps and also from the same ALL&Create die set as the tag. I did not color that.

    Finally I went for some bits and pieces on my work table. The 2 hands come from a hand die set made by Impression Obsession. I used a pink marker to color the nails. I added the 2 cloth flowers (from some yellow trim) and put  small confetti pieces in the center of each. The filmstrip is from a TH roll that I've had forever. And the quote is from an old Flourishes clear stamps set. (Flourishes is another one of those long defunct companies.)

   That's it for me today. I hope you enjoy my art view. And thanks for stopping by my blog too.

Time for a New Challenge

    Hi everyone. It's time for a new challenge once again over at Try It on Tuesday. 

   But first, Thank you Leslie for joining us as a guest designer for our Make It Colorful challenge. And thank you everyone who joined us. It's always fun to  see how people interpret a theme, especially one that's as open as color.

  For our new challenge, we're asking you to be Inspired by a Song. 

   I always have a hard time picking songs because I want to pick one that most people know or recognize. My inspirational song (which might be obvious) on my page is Lemon Tree.  I know the Peter, Paul and Mary version, but I'm not sure if they were the other version but I think there's been a few.  Here's the chorus, which is the part most people might recognize.

Lemon tree very pretty and the lemon flower is sweet
But the fruit of the poor lemon is impossible to eat
Lemon tree very pretty and the lemon flower is sweet
But the fruit of the poor lemon is impossible to eat

  

   To make my journal page,  I started with some printed background paper. I then fussy cut the lemons from a sheet of very large paper that I've had for a long time. In fact, I bought this sheet (along with a couple of others) back in 2005 in a paper shop I happened to come across while walking around Rome, Italy. I definitely needed to make my page feel warm and sunny because I clearly remember it was a warm and sunny day when I bought this paper. 

   The lemon tree part comes from a clear stamps set, which I think is from an old Hero Arts set. I stamped, colored and fussy cut it.  The window comes from a  Ciao Bella ephemera and junk journal book, and it is a clear sticker that I fussy cut. To finish my page, I used some blue ink and stamped the quote.

   Don't forget to check out the other song examples from my design teammates. As always, this challenge at Try It On Tuesday runs for the next 2 weeks and we accept any type of art.

   It hope to see your  song  choice inspired art over at TIOT. 

  I'm also linking up my journal page up to my In The Good Old Summertime challenge at Art Journal Journey.  This challenge runs until the end of the month, and please remember we only accept art journaling (of any kind). 

   

  

T Stands for Pickings from the Garden

  Hi everyone. Happy new week to you, and hello to everyone who stops by Bleubeard's and Elizabeth's   blog for T day.

  So what's new with me? By next T day I will have had my first physical therapy session, but I must say since I've been resting my shoulder, it is improving. That is good news. 😊 Hopefully in another month I can go out and do some heavy duty yard projects that were on my agenda for this year. But if it takes longer to feel better, it takes longer. Getting the shoulder/rotator cuff improved is the most important thing.

  This past week I went out fishing one day (didn't catch a thing), went over to Maine to go to Costco, and rested my shoulder. Luckily we had some beautiful weather so I was able to do a lot of afternoon resting in my hammock with a good book, and maybe, but I'm not 100% admitting to it, I also took a couple of nice naps in between pages of my book. 😉

   I've also been picking lots of things from my garden, including a whole lot of cucumbers and zucchini. I made 2 loaves of chocolate zucchini bread (sorry forgot to take photos- I gave one loaf to my daughter and have frozen the other one), and I also did some pickling.

    My first pickling project was to make some chunky sweet pickle and onion relish. I halved the recipe for the cucumbers and onions because I didn't need jars and jars of relish. You can see in this next photo the pre-soak with some salt. If you aren't familiar with pickle making, the salt pulls out the excess water, which you then drain before you finish.

   I wasn't sure how much pickle juice I would need with my chopped veggies, so I made a full batch. I actually only needed about half of this, which make sense since I only made about half a batch of chopped cukes and onions.

 I decided instead of wasting the extra juice, and since I had more cucumbers, I would make some bread and butter pickles.

   Here's all my finished canning after I put them in jars and then processed them in boiling water.  

   Before I filled any jars I took a photo, and I happened to get my mug filled with some homemade ice tea. Here's my drink for T day this week. 

   I'm letting my pickles and relish sit a few weeks to really flavor up, and then I'll be having some. I can't wait to try the pickles especially. Usually homemade pickles beat the kind you buy in jars at the store.

   That's all for me. Wishing everyone a happy T day and week ahead. 

 

Some Adventures in Gelli Printing

 Hi everyone. Hope you are having a nice weekend. Today I am off to a gender reveal get together. It's the first time I've ever been to one of these types of parties. More about that in some other post, but this party might mean I get a bit behind (once again) visiting blogs.

  Today I'm joining Nicole for her SITAR/Sunday in the Art Room and also Gillena for her Sunday Smiles.

  After several very busy days, finally in the middle of last week I had a couple of days to myself. 😊 I love having days to myself, but then again, I like to do things too. In the big scheme it's nice to have a bit of a balance. One thing that always gives me balance is having some art time. And one thing I've been wanting to do for a while is pull out my Gelli plate and do some mono printing.

   Since I had the day to myself, it was time play.

   It's been quite a while since I last printed. Maybe even close to a year. Not that anything was stopping me from doing it. Sometimes I just get into the swing of something, and I have to practically hit myself in the head 😏to move onto something different.

   It actually took me  several pulls to my technique back. I love to layer images over other images when I Gelli print. However, my first few pieces just ended up all brown muddy YUK. I must have forgotten how to layer I guess.  😉 However, no page, however a mess, is really a waste. I'll show you how I fixed those further down in this post. But first, here's a few prints that I like.

   I brought in a few squash leaves from the garden. I also pulled out a sunflower mask I had. Mostly I played with those items, as well as some ripped up paper and a couple of stencils.

   This next one is just color but I really like  how it came out. The fine lines are from a plastic roller I have that is striped. It's meant for working with clay, but it also works great with a Gelli plate.

   And now for the muddy brown ones. On these first 2, I used the sunflower mask and then I pulled out some bright paints which really popped off the mud. On the last one I managed to get some muddy brown textured sunflowers, and then I added the bright pink sunflowers.

    I can't say I'm 100% happy with the muddy brown ones, but they are growing on me. And at least, if I decide I don't want to use them as they are, I can cut them up and use bits and pieces. 

    That's all for me. I hope you have a great rest of your weekend and start to the new week. 

How About These Faces?

  Hi everyone. Another week has flown by, at least it has for me. My husband's favorite thing is to say in the summer is that there is only one month that goes faster than July, and that's August. It certainly seems to be true this year. 😉 (Unfortunately too. They're predicting a tough winter ahead...😞)

  Today I am joining Nicole for Friday Face Off and Gillena for her  Friday Lunch Break. Here's some assorted random summer faces I've recently come across.

    I took this photo (above) because I really liked how this table was made from an old workbench. Then I noticed there are a few faces on it too.  

     The next 2 photos are a couple of other yard ornament faces from this same little shop.

   I took this beach photo when we were out cruising on the boat one day. I was actually going for the umbrellas because I loved all the colors, but with all the people, there are lots of faces too. 

  Here's one day's worth of mackerel that we caught when out fishing. They are swimming around in the boat's wet-well. The faces are a little blurry, but you can see them.

And here's a cormorant flying by.

     Next I have a couple of views of a metal flying raven that I splurged on and bought for my garden this summer. (Actually it was on mark down and not all that expensive.)  I don't know if he's easier to make out in the first or second photo.

Next, a metal mosquito sculpture at my local botanical garden. I'm so glad the real ones aren't as big as this one.

And here's a carved wooden dog face also found at my local botanical garden.

   And finally, ha-ha, the other day I came across this oldie of me and my husband at someone's wedding or dress up event. I think this has to be back in the 1980's.  I can't  ID the people to the right of my husband, and I can't remember the event either. Hmmm.

   That's all for me today. Have a super Friday and start to your weekend.