End of the Week

 Hi everyone. So this week was the only week in July and August I had nothing on my agenda. Low and behold about 10 things came up.  About 1/2 good, 1/4 neither good nor bad and a 1/4  of those things that were hassels to deal with. One of them was the 2 days this week my computer decided to spend the day updating. Once again. Yesterday I had a scheduled post, but if you wonder why I haven't been by yet, updating is the reason.

So Wednesday I had the day home, and I went through my scrap paper bin which was a disaster zone. I threw out about 3/4 of the scraps and saved these you can see below.

I am going to try to use up most of these by the end of the year and take an idea from Valerie and toss out whatever is then left.

And I also found this small bin of bit and pieces. This bin was a find.

I found some good "stuff" in there like some wine bottle labels, some tags and some die cuts. Yet I definitely need to weed even this pile down also. 

To do that, I started one collage mini-journal this week  I actually found this miniboard book in the scrap paper mess.

Here's the pages I have done so far in this mini-board collage book. I'm not sure if I am done with these pages  or not, as all I have done is ripped and glued down bits from these 2 bins.

I did do a bit of outlining to give some definition.

And I do have another inspiration page for Alison's Pockets and Tags challenge at Art Journal Journey 

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I used my blue Dina Wakely journal and some Gelatos to color the page. Then I used a baby wipe to mush the Gelatos into the fabric. I taped down some book scraps and a long paper scrap. The tag I made with some stamps and the girl is out of one of my Art By Marlene/Studio Light punch out books.

That's all for me today.  Wishing you a good start to your weekend

Summer Fairies

Hi there. Today I have a page for Alison's Pockets and Tags  challenge at  Art Journal Journey.

This is a page I made for my challenge last month, but never got around to showing you. And since it had this tag and works for this month's challenge, here it is.

The tag is made with a background stamp, a butterfly stamp and a stamped quote. The page I attached it to is made with a background stamp, some spray ink,, some paper tape, and some faces from an Art by Marlene punch out book, although I did give some of them gold paper crowns and TH wings.

Every garden needs a few fairies to help create the beautiful magic right?

Thanks for visiting. 

Have a great day!

 

So Far This Week

 Hi everyone.  My computer has seemed to finally reset itself and seems to be back working smoothly again, at least for the moment. Hurrah for that.

My page today is from my garden journal. I spent a lot of art time on Monday, and this is one of my favorite pages I made. The chair is stamped with paint and foam stamp. It gives the chair a little more umph than the images I stamped with ink, but they work together well I think.

It's been hot here but the other late afternoon I sat on my deck stairs watching all the pollinators playing in a pot of flowers. I shouldn't be, but I am amazed at the variety in this one cluster of flowers.

 

And hopefully my grapes aren't spoiling. Some of them are getting a slight touch of purple. All I want is to harvest enough to make even a jar of jelly.

The blackberries on the side of my driveway are starting to ripen. I have a little treat each morning as there is not enough to pick and make anything with, so I figure I might as well enjoy their summer sweetness.

And I made a batch our sourdough bread this week since it's almost too hot to be outside. 

This has been my best batch yet, but I think it might be the new recipe I tried.

And that's all for me. Today is going to be another one of those lazy days of summer in the heat.

Thanks for visiting.

T Stands for a Computer with some Issues and Some Normal Things

 Hi everyone.  

First I need to grumble for a minute.  My computer went through a major  update yesterday. It took all day to update, and I had no internet while it updated. Now it is telling me my fan is not working, and it may shut down at any moment. Hmmm. Hopefully I can write this post in completion. I know this is a small issue in the things of life. Especially with Elizabeth's on and off internet  which makes my small computer issue not even worth mentioning.  

It is not posting correctly so please ignore the one that says Bleubeard and Elizabeth. I had to post for her yesterday evening on AJJ and even though I changed the name back to mine, it  posted differently. I'm not sure if this is from the update/my computer or the new blogger being finicky.  

Sorry to complain, but sometimes it just feels good to get it off your chest so  thank you for "listening".

So although not technically late for T, I am late for me. Stop by Bleubeard and Elizabeth's blog to share your drink related photo

Onto the good things.

So last week I ventured out a bit.  When my daughter was home on Tuesday we went shopping, in a selective manner. We wore our masks and picked stores that weren't too crowded, and if we went  in and one of us was uncomfortable we left. We were just in our local area so there weren't too many stores to pick from, but we did go to a fabric store and get some fabric. My daughter is making us some new masks, seeing the ones she made before are with Christmas fabric which is what she had on hand. When I get mine I will show you the new collection.

And Wednesday after my allergy shot for my hives (thanks to all of you who wished me well-still having good days and bad days), I met up with my friend Deb for lunch. She lives halfway between my home and the allergist. We went to a new place I had never been before, and  we sat outside to eat.

This is the front of Harvey's Bakery in downtown Dover, New Hampshire. 

They had some tempting dishes on their outdoor sign.

But they also had a special on their lunch menu, and I know some of you have been waiting for me to post one of these. (hee-hee).

Yup, I finally had my second of summer lobster roll. The last one was Mother's Day.  You can just make out the water I had for a drink the background. I have to say this lobster roll was $5 cheaper than Pop's and came with a bakery dessert too. (I took my slice of  pie home and my friend didn't want her dessert so I took hers home for the hubby.)   Maybe not quite so much lobster, but  still plenty.  You can tell Harvey's Bakery is not in a touristy area like where I live.

And lucky the end of last week wasn't quite so hot and humid, which we are back into today.

And on Sunday my husband and I had our ice cream for lunch, our new Sunday activity. This week I had lemon berry shortcake.

And once again I apologize if I have made anyone hungry.

And finally I have a collaged page for Alison's Pocket and Tag theme at Art Journal Journey

Can you see the TH "dog tag" style tag I added? 

That's enough for me. Wishing you all a happy new week and hope your Tuesday is going well.

A Friday Walk Photos

 Hi everyone. Hope your weekend is going well.

This past Friday was a gorgeous day. and one of my work friends and her sister were coming my direction to walk some of the Wolfeboro Rail trail. The trail runs 12 miles or a little over 19 kilometers between the towns of Wolfeboro and Wakefield, New Hampshire.  I've walked some of it before, and shown you photos too, but  always in either spring or fall. When they asked me along, they didn't have to twist my arm to go.  We ended up walking over 5 miles round trip ( over 8 km and over 15,000 steps for me). I had to head back as it was Friday, and I was going boating with my husband that afternoon. They'd decided it was lunch time so they turned around with me and the 3 of us walked back.

I know many of you are familiar with rail trails. If you're not, they are old railroad beds turned into walking, biking, running, cross country skiing trails. Almost all of this trail is a nicely paved and flat walking surface. And this rail trail  passes 3 lakes so the views are really nice too.

The first is Back Bay in Wolfeboro (where we started), which is a little bay on the Big Lake/Lake Winnipesaukee.  The jump on the right is for a local water ski club. I'm not sure with social distancing if it's getting used this summer.

And in that section you pass a few "developed" spots.

This is the third lake, Lake Wentworth.  This one of the town of  Wolfeboro's  beaches, Albee Beach. I had never been here before so we checked it out, and it is a gorgeous.  There were lots of trees so you didn't have to sit in the sun and the swimming area was really sandy.

More of Albee beach.

Past the beach the trail becomes the Cotton Valley Rail trail, and I loved this mailbox set up.

Not much of a photo below, but this red flower jumped out at us. It looked like a phlox.

More of Lake Wentworth along the trail

And the middle lake is Crescent Lake. I must admit the people in the water made it look tempting to me to jump in too. I snapped this as we were on the way back.

And this pretty patch of lily pads in bloom, though my photo isn't great as I was using my phone.

And on part of the trail there are these wonderful benches if you want to rest. I love the quote from the famous poem  on this one.

And if you like to read placards, there are also some of those. I learned a bit this time because we stopped to read them.

I'm ready to go again.  Too bad this week is suppose to be hot and humid again. I think this fall when the tourists vacate and the days are cooler I will try to make an effort to get back more and walk.

That's all for me today. I am taking an art break.

Thanks for stopping by!

No Moon for Me as It Is Cloudy

Happy weekend everyone. The clouds have arrived, and we're having a bit of temperature relief before the heat and humidity return  Monday.  Looks like (if the weather folks are right) we'll be back into the 90 degree range again.  That's around 32 degrees C.

Now if only we could get some real rain. It gets cloudy but that's about all. 

So today I have another page for Alison's pockets and tags challenge at Art Journal Journey

I created my page using a star stencil and some soft modeling paste. And then I used blue, silver and gold spray inks to color the background.

The moon is a stamped and fussy cut addition.

I thought owls would be perfect for a starry night page.

My tag is actually just a piece of wood looking paper that turned into a tag. It came out of a package of stickers I had sitting in my stash. I layered this with an edge scrap of paper (better than throwing it out) and some owls I cut off of another tag. 

The quote is one from Paper Artsy and one of Alison Bomber's images. Not to confuse the Alison's mentioned in this post. (smile)

Not sure what my weekend adventures will be.  Maybe not much as the weather is questionable with these clouds and cooler temperatures. I have some weeds I need to weed whack down and maybe I will do that. Or finish spray painting some bathroom window shutters I am working on. Or neither of those things might happen. 

Hope you weekend is great!

Flowers

Happy Friday!  Hope everyone has had a good week so far. Mine has been busy but in a good way. My daughter was home for 4 days. I can tell she has been working from home  and wants  some different company and a change of scenery. Since she hasn't taken any vacation time in over 7 months, she took a day, and even though we wanted to go out to a state park, the tropical storm came through. But we still had a fun day,  and  we've planned a couple of more days later this month too.  And it is nice to have her home.

So a couple of weeks ago I was invited to a bridal shower for a niece of my husband. I didn't go as I thought there might be more people than I want to be in a group with, but I did send a gift. When I went to wrap the gift (which I bought on Amazon) I realized I didn't have a bow, so I thought, why not make something?

So I die cut a bunch of pieces from the few 3D flower dies I have.

And then I put them together, mixing and matching pieces, to make a bunch of flowers.

I thought it made a cool bow replacement.

And I had a lot of fun!

I guess I've been inspired by all the flowers blooming.

We've been having dry weather (actual low level drought here) so some flowers are growing well and some have stayed pretty small.

But my potted annual plants on my back deck are doing great, but I do have to water them each day.

I do love flowers! 

Thanks for visiting and have a great start to your weekend!