Some Photos and Other Things

Happy weekend everyone. 

The heat and humidity has arrived. Just in time for July.

Or not to ignore June- for a couple of days at the end of June too.

The flowers seem to love it, especially after the good soaking they got on Thursday.

This is a page from calendar journal. I am linking up to Try It On Tuesday for their things with wings challenge. I am also linking up to Moo Mania and their challenge of your favorite colours. I actually think the more color the better . :) What I don't like about this page is how I tried to blend the the background colors using my markers. As they were water based I thought they might blend better with a damp brush, but no. That didn't work. But the beauty of a journal of any kind is that you get to experiment. The paper in my calendar is pretty flimsy so I just left it as is with my scribble blending.

And the bottom quote is not so crooked but there is a slight bend in my page. Oh man, maybe I shouldn't have posted this page. :)

And many of you mentioned the other day (in your comments) that you wanted to see more of Inari Shrine in Kyoto, Japan, so let me show you some more. If you missed the first round of photos and have any interest in those photos you can link back here: Inari Shrine

 As I mentioned Inari Shrine's animal is the fox, so you can buy this white wooden faces, draw your face and then writing your wish on the back.

 Even the ground I thought even the ground was pretty.

 And the higher you climbed (as this shrine is on the side of a mountain) it became more wooded. And way less crowded.

 Near the entrance.

 You are supposed to wash your hands, and mouth, if you are asking the Gods for any favors. Now I don't understand or know much of anything about the Shinto religion, so I really don't know if there are actual gods or if it is spirits  of passed people you are asking help from.

The mossy rocks are my favorites.

Hope everyone has a wonderful weekend. And stay cool if you are in the heat. (And stay warm if you are in the cold.)

Thanks for visiting. 

Inari Shrine

Hi everyone. I have been busily wrapping up my Japan Travel Journal this week. Still not quite done, but I am really getting close. So today I have another inspiration page for Gill's challenge at Art Journal Journey

On the left is the wrapper from a bag of mini chocolates I decided to try out. They were kind of like   Kit Kat bars (which are extremely popular in Japan-they have whole Kit Kat bar stores) which is a flavored cookie wafer  dipped in chocolate. I liked these mini candies quite a lot and decided to save the wrapper. On the right page is my sketch of the Inari Shrine in Kyoto that we went to. It was a great photographic place, especially as you walked up the mountain and got away from the crowds. I would have liked to make it to the top as my 2 friends and I were 3/4 of the way up, but then time ran out as often happens when you are on a group schedule.

I did notice I need to widen the black walkway a bit towards the front of the temple gates on  my page, but I will go back and do that today.

I haven't shown you any Japan photos recently so here's a few photos of the shrine.

 As I understand it, each gate is put up by a company. This is a shrine for business success. The animal theme here is the fox.

 You can see the difference between higher up the mountain and down by the bottom where the entrance is located.

 And there were all these cool chains of origami peace doves.

 If you verved off the main trail, there were all these small shrines. I really loved these-with their mossy rocks and candles and flowers.

 Here's the entrance. Look at the crowds.

 And here's some views when you get off the beaten path at the small shrines.

Ihave a whole lot more of photos from this shrine if you are interested just mention it in your comment and I will show you some more.

It's a rainy day here today. 100% chance of rain they so, which is good as the rain is needed but it is dark and dreary.  I guess that means I can have a little art time-as well as working on the daughter's bedroom closet some more. I finished emptying it yesterday and now I need to finish my sorting of what we store and what is donated and what is trash. So far there are 4 bags of trash and two bags for donation and a bunch of doll things for storage. But the good news is it is almost ready for me to move my clothes into which is great as my bedroom closet is tiny and the hubby is so excited to get more space for himself. :)

Thanks for stopping by.

Summer Bounty

One thing you've got to love about summer is its fruit and veggie bounty. Maybe if you live  someplace warm where your growing season is long, or longer than ours here in New England, you might not get as excited about fresh produce. But seeing I come from a place where our nice weather is limited to a few short months, and since I love gardening (it's those farming genes I get from my dad's ancestor's I guess), I like to take advantage of all the yummy things to eat that summer brings.

And right now it is strawberry season in my area. So yesterday was my favorite kind of day (low humidity, warm but not hot) and I went strawberry  picking at a local farm. 

 Seeing I arrived at the farm at about 8 AM, there was quite a few other folks picking already.

The picking was fantastic.

And boy do they taste good.  I got ambitious last night and did a bit of baking.

And that tasted good too. Hee-hee.

And I'm working away on my Japan Travel Journal. I'm about 90% done and ready to be finished with it. 

These 2 pages make up a spread. The top page's background is some type of shipping form. There was whole stack of them in the lobby of a hotel, so I snagged on. It has several layers, so I used some of them to make the background. Then I added a postcard, a bit of stamping, a postage stamp and a painted title. Oh yes, and one of those cute dog stickers.

And this bottom page is started with some black and white striped napkins and then one of the Geisha napkin images. You might remember I used one of these before. But if you don't, that's not an issue.

So I  added a few assorted bits of paper and then stamped some Japanese texts-but who knows what they actually say.

Since my beautiful Japanese lady has butterflies I am going to link up to Try It On Tuesday and their new challenge which is Things with Wings. And I am also linking up to Gill's challenge at Art Journal Journey which is Inspired By. These pages are inspired by my trip back in April to Japan. And no, I am not obsessed by Japan and am ready to move forward. That's why I am working away on my trip journal like a crazy woman.

OK, I have babbled on way too much. 

Thank you for visiting. I always appreciate you stopping by.

T Stands for a Beer, Ramen and Some Inspiration too

 Happy T Day Ladies.  Time for sharing a drink related post and let me add a little food to my post too.

We're back to Japan for part of today's post.  My first part f the post is my inspiration for Gill's June challenge at Art Journal Journey. Her theme is Inspired By, and I was certainly inspired by my snacks in Japan, 

First of all soft serve ice cream is very popular in Japan, and we had a lot of it. A popular flavor is Matcha Tea, and I tried it in the swirl variety with vanilla.

This is actually one of the students showing me her cone. I will say I wasn't crazy over Matcha Tea but I did like this swirl ice cream.  I also tried cherry blossom and some chocolate-both delicious too, as well as vanilla one day when my taste buds were feeling boring. That was all good.
And I showed you a photo of my bean paste filled fried  pastry before, but here it is again.

You can see many of them here. It was a popular snack also, but only in the cities.

Another  popular dish is also Ramen and we went to a restaurant that served many different varieties of the dish.

 I had mine with a beer.

And we were in Tokyo when I had this.

Funny how the flavor was roughly similar to the ramen we used to eat in our poor college days when you could get 4 packets for $1.00 and you made it by adding hot water.  But this was so so so much better. Certainly not a 4 for a $1.00 quality.
And the beer was pretty good too.
Stop by Bleubeard and Elizabeth's blog and join in the T Day fun.
So I had some art time today,as well as starting to clean out the daughter's closet, that is jammed pack with things. She moved out almost one year ago and even though I've asked her to clean it out about a million times, she hasn't done it, so now, she is at my whim what is kept and what is gotten rid of. But that is not my point. The point is I made
a tag for the Gemini challenge at Tag Tuesday.

That's all for me.
Have a great T day everyone.

Lush and Green

View from my walk and my gardens today. 

Everything is lush and green right now. Summer!

Don't know about you, but I love this. 

Happy new week!