Silver and Gold

 Hi everyone.

Today Rain's Thursday Art Date has a theme of silver and gold. I'm going to interpret that topic as things that are beautiful and valuable. And since it is the last day of June, how about some beautiful and valuable (at least to me) views from June? And no, I don't equate valuable with lots of money either.

My Queen Elizabeth rose has 3 huge blooms. Sorry, I need something for scale in the photo so you can tell how large these flowers are, but they are as big as my hand.

In fact, this is the time of year my rose garden looks amazing. Although a few bushes aren't quite there yet.

And my husband and I had a nice day out on the water when we took his boat out for this season's maiden voyage last week.

We are wondering when this newly refurbished historical life saving station will be opening for tours; which it will be. Hopefully we can visit it some time this summer. 

And below, even though it was hazy on the horizon, you can still make out the  Isles of Shoals, which is 6 miles off shore.

And how about all the lobster traps so somebody who likes lobster rolls can have another one at some point this summer.

And this trip down the Piscataqua (Pis-ca-ta-qua) River took us past lots of large ships in port.

The bees have had lots of hatched additions to the hive as well as having had some great pollen collecting weather during June also. The hive is filling up with capped brood cells that will soon be more worker bees. 

And the bees have made lots of golden honey too.  I never had this much honey in the hive last year.

That’s all for me today.  Thanks for visiting.  I hope you had a great month of June and also have a nice start to July. But can believe we are just about starting July already?  

Swimming in the Tank

Hi everyone. 

June is just about over, which is hard to believe. Here in New Hampshire we've had many wonderful weather  days this past month, not too hot, not too cold. I certainly wouldn't mind if July was more of the same.

Today I want to share a journal page about fish that is not part of my Little Book of Fish. I was thinking about aquariums, both the small ones you can have at home and also the large museum type of aquariums that you can visit and view their tanks of fish and other water creatures.

This is also my last page for Mia's Fish challenge at Art Journal Journey. Thank you Mia for this fun challenge. And thanks to all of you who joined Mia and shared some fabulous fish pages.

This time I played with a set of Dyan Reavely stamps I own, some blue inks, my paint pens as well an old book on aquariums.

I wanted to use this set of fish and ocean creature stamps at least once this month. After I used some inks to color my background, I stamped 2 of the images multiple times. Then I used some paint pens and drew in the sea grass. I also used some regular  writing pens to outline them. Finally I cut out the fish and the title from a book I brought home from my classroom and recently, while going through my art supplies, almost threw out.  Glad I didn't do that. 

 Finally I added a few clear bubbles.

I left all the stamped fish uncolored because I was thinking of the schools of fish that swim by you in a big tank that it is sometimes hard to pick out one fish from another. Although I did think about not only coloring them but giving them some google eyes-smile.

And that's a wrap for this month's Art Journal Journey art for me.

Thanks for visiting.

Here Comes Summer

Hi everyone.

June is winding down, and for those of us in the northern hemisphere, summer has arrived.

Here Comes Summer

  is the theme for our newest challenge at Try It on Tuesday.  

And I don't want to forget to say thanks to everyone who joined our Recycle challenge as well as to Tracey who was our host for the Recycle challenge.

When I think of summer I think of lots of places. Maybe you go camping or take a summer vacation with family or friends. Perhaps you visit the mountains or have picnics outside. And barbecues are always fun too. One thing I definitely like to do is work in my garden. I also think of spending days at a lake or at the ocean, which is the topic of my page for this Try It On Tuesday's latest theme.

I began by stenciling waves and the sky on my sheet of watercolor paper. I actually just used gesso as the wet medium with my stencil. Once dry I inked the areas of my background with ink pads, and then I colored the sun (itself) in with a yellow marker.

I used a TH vintage photo of the ladies at the beach. I also used some turquoise mulberry paper as well as some  tissue paper printed with seashells. Along the middle of the page I also used a piece of wave image chipboard, that I inked and used some glitter glue on. At the tops of the waves I used some white ink and Sharpie to add in some details.  I added some sticky "pearls" along the photo as a splash, and I doodled in the seagulls. Finally I added the sticker letters to make the title on my page.

You have 2 weeks to join this challenge, and as always, we welcome any kind of art.

And don't forget to check out the other design team's art also. There's lots of inspiration to give you ideas. 

Thank you so much for visiting my blog, and I look forward to seeing your art at Try It On Tuesday.

 

T Stands for a Day on the Dock

 Hi everyone. It is time for T again. I hope everyone has had a nice week since our last T day meet up. 

My week was busy, but not with too many chores for a switch. Hurrah!

This past Saturday we had some gorgeous summer weather. My daughter and her fiance were visiting too, and we spent a nice afternoon on the dock at my MIL's house on the lake. Not only was my MIL there, but one of my SILs, her husband as well as one of her daughters along with the daughter's husband were there, so we had a fun little get together for the afternoon.

The boys were enjoying the water. Pete was looking at me because he likes to swim with me, and he was ready to go back into the water- again. This is his 'it's time to swim Mom'  face.

The "kids" (although they are all 30 so not really kids) were busy planning a trip together to Florida for next winter.

Even my MIL was assisted down to the dock. She didn't do more than sit in her chair, but it was good she could join us.

And eat a cookie that my mooching dogs wanted a bite of. (And that they got too.)

We had a mid-afternoon picnic. 

And here's my drink photos for T over at Bleubeard's and Elizabeth's blog.  I enjoyed an Old Brown Dog, a brown ale, before starting to drink a Diet Coke. I never finished the soda before putting it back in our cooler for another time, and then I switched over to some water which was more refreshing.

It was a nice way to spend a summer afternoon. 

Of course, on every sunny day a little rain must fall. It didn't actually rain, but it was later discovered my MIL's septic was having issues and her first floor toilet and tub were filling up with discharge. EEEWW!  That night they had to pack up my MIL and bring her back to my SIL's home in Maine until it could be pumped and the problem diagnosed. This is how I spent much of my Monday morning, at her house while the septic people came. At least it was just me and the dogs (since I brought them along) so I could read and take it easy. Too bad it was stormy so I couldn’t take a morning swim.

I hope you have a wonderful T day and week ahead. Thanks for visiting my blog also.

More Fish for AJJ

 Hi everyone. Happy new week to you.

Before I show you my fish art, let me share the first fish caught this season when my husband and I went fishing this past Friday on my husband's boat. After yours truly caught him/her, we put the fish in the boat's wet well for a few minutes, mainly so Maddie and Pete could watch him swim around. The dogs are really fascinated by that, and I think they could sit for an hour just watching fish swim.  Then my fish went back into the ocean to spend some more time swimming, eating and growing bigger.

And if you aren't familiar with a wet well, when you turn it on it pumps in ocean water and keeps recycling it through so you can keep fish or other ocean creatures alive.

And eeeew, the boat looks so dirty.

OK the fish  is just a tiny pollack,  but at least I caught something, which was more than my husband did. Well he did hook onto a lobster buoy, but that doesn't count as even if there was lobster in the trap, you legally can't take them. Smile.

Today I want to share  some more pages from my Little Book of Fish. I hope you're not too bored with my little journal project  yet, but if you are, this is the last views from my mini project.  I am linking these up to Mia's fish challenge at Art Journal Journey. There's still a couple more days to join in if you're interested. 

A fun fish stencil and a black Sharpie on a page is all that was needed.

A fish from my old classroom poster (left), some fish images off of a collage sheet (that I copied first) and a green fish from the old aquarium book I had,  make up the images on this spread. I used my "just keep swimming" stamp on the left hand side, only I put some tape over the "just keep" words while I inked it. Then I could pull off the tape and only the swimming word would stamp. I also created a border on the left side with a piece of aquarium book page and some washi tape.

On this next page I used the fish stencil and the same stamping technique to get the word swimming. I also added this chipboard fish. I inked them orange and doodled on the details. I also included a little sticky gemstone dot for the eye and as well as adding some thin washi tape to both pages. 

And then there's this page that is a little different from the rest. I added a bit of paper (do you remember 7Gypsies supplies?), some stenciled gesso, some glitter glue as well as some little sticky gemstones. Finally I stamped the quote, and then went over it with a black marker since it didn't stamp very dark.

I hope you enjoyed  not only all of the fish, but my little book that I've been sharing all month. I have one more fish post before we wrap up June, but this is the last of my Little Book of Fish. If you can't tell, I really enjoyed this fish challenge. Thanks Mia for this fun topic.

Hope you're having or have a great day!

Sunday Fish

 Hi everyone. Happy Sunday. I hope you are having a nice weekend. 

The summer heat is here, and it's been  a busy weekend as my daughter was around for the early part of it. Friday my husband and I went out in his boat too. He's been pretty stressed at work, and he's been acting like he's missed the whole summer of boating, even though I keep reminding him it is still June.

Today I have a few pages from my Little Book of Fish to share with you. Mia's challenge at Art Journal Journey is winding down as the month reaches its ending in a few days, and I want to finish sharing my fish pages.

Hope you aren't tired of fish yet.

This first page is more textural.  I wish I didn't stamp the black fish as I don't like them peering through the netting, but I guess they have been caught in a net.

These next pages used an interesting piece of printed paper as background. 

I added the Slipper Dick fish to this ocean view page. This page makes me smile because I didn't know the slippery dick was an actual fish until I cut up the poster. We have a fishing lure called a slippery dick in the tackle box, and I guess it wasn't just the name someone gave it.

And a couple more pages, starting with these colorful fish.

I stamped these fish and colored them in.  And on this next page I used another unique and interesting fish from the poster.

These 2 pages form a spread at the end of my Little Book of Fish, but I still have a few pages left to share (since I haven't been showing them in order).

This book ended up being bigger than I thought once I actually got down to picking out photos for blog posts. 

Thanks for visiting my blog and enjoy what's left of your weekend!

The Last Friday in June-How Did that Happen?

Hi everyone. Time is certainly flying by, and I feel like June should be just beginning instead of starting to enter wind down mode. Today I have some art to share.

First for Mia's fish challenge at Art Journal Journey I have a couple more pages from my Little Book of Fish.

Mia's Art Journal Journey challenge runs through the end of this month, so you still have time to join in if you're interested.

On the left page I added a fish and it's info from the same old poster I have been using all month. I also used a watercolor crayon to create the wiggly wave lines, and some stickers to add the word discover. ON the right side I added the fish which is cut out from an old book about aquariums. I stamp lots of the little fish as well as the quote. I also added a scrap of paper along the top right side and used a Sharpie to make the dotted lines.

I also want to share a page for Nicole's Friday Face Off. I still have some faces in my drawing pad that I made back in 2008 when I participated in a drawing class and group.  I have never posted these on my blog, so even though they are not recently drawn, I'm not re-posting. This week I think Iris will like my faces.

Mom isn't looking too happy in this piece. I used a photo in a wildlife book I have as my model. I didn't get the eyes quite right on the cub's face, and I have to smile as he looks rather cute being cross-eyed. 

I am also linking up to Gillena's Art For Fun at her blog.

Have a great start to the weekend. 

Purple Lupines

 Hi everyone. 

It's time for Rain's Thursday Art Date, and this week her theme for  Colorful June is purple. 

In my town there is a  group that maintains the snowmobile trails that crisscross town. (In fact you could snowmobile from my town and connect to trails that go all the way in Northern New Hampshire, Northern Maine, Vermont or even Quebec.) At a couple of spots where the trail crosses the state road, there were these gorgeous fields of lupines that I think are on state property. Many are purple, but I'm loving the other shades too. I stopped at one a couple of weeks ago  when these flowers were at their peak and snapped a few photos.

Lupines always remind me of this children's book.

Here's the little write up about it on Amazon if you aren't familiar with the story:

"Barbara Cooney's story is about Alice Rumphius, who longed to travel the world, lived in a house by the sea, and wanted to do something to make the world more beautiful. This story has a timeless quality that resonates with each new generation. The countless lupines that bloom along the coast of Maine are the legacy of the real Miss Rumphius, the Lupine Lady, who scattered lupine seeds everywhere she went. Miss Rumphius received the American Book Award in the year of publication."

 It is a lovely story.  Real lupines are beautiful. I actually didn't know about this book until one of my English teacher friends introduced it to me on a camping trip we took in Acadia National Park several years ago after school let out for the summer. I loved the story, and  I had to buy a copy for myself.

One of my other friends has been editing her gardens and invited me over to see if I wanted any of the plants she needed to remove. She said she couldn't dig them out to just let them die, but if someone wanted them that would help her out.  She had oodles of purple lupines. Of course I'd be happy to take a few, even if I needed to figure out where to plant them. But my problems could be a lot worse!!! 

 I actually made space for them in and around the new bee garden I am still setting up. The lupines worked perfect in there as I don't want anything that looks too formal. I hope they seed into the space so next year I have some pretty flowers. 

My friend was also taking out some day lilies, and I said I'd take a couple.

Ha ha. "I really don't want any of these." She said as she kept digging them out. Now I have about 15 new lilies, which I planted here and there around my yard. Hopefully they will all take, but lilies are pretty tough plants.

Enough said. That's it for me today. I hope your week is going well. And thanks so much for stopping by my blog.

Wednesday Art And Art Space

Hi everyone. Happy middle of the week. Let me share some art with you today. 

I'll start  my post with the center spread from my Little Book of Fish.  I am sharing this because for the next week the theme at Art Journal Journey is Fish. And the lovely Mia is our host.

I also want to mention how too many sharks are needlessly killed for their fins (for soup) or mainly because people think they are all evil killers.  They are predictors, but they do play an important role in the natural ocean ecosystem. Most sharks have very little interactions with humans.

The shark image and the blue ID comes off my fish poster scraps (that I've mentioned before), and the fish jars are from another collage sheet I purchased  way back in the day. The background, like all the pages in my book are watercolored. This time I also stamped some writing. The page is titled with some stickers.

 I also wanted to join Valerie's challenge at Tag Tuesday . This time the challenge is use a die cut.

I die cut several circles as you can see. I also used a scrap of textured paper for the background, an image cut out of a pretty chopped up pattern book, as well as a scrap of pattern tissue. I completed the tag by adding some pink metallic flowers with a dot of white paint in the middle, as well as a quote sticker. 

I've still been very busy trying to set up my new art space. Actually what is taking all the time is going through items and purging/cleaning them out. That and  finding out I need to change something because what I set up isn't working as well as arranging it some other way. We did get the rug down this weekend as well as setting up my new art desk though.

I love the rug and all the color on it.  Even better, it's also an indoor/outdoor washable rug. Another Costco special. It's the only thing other than construction materials I bought for the room.

 Maddie tested it out, and it passed her nap test. Smile.

The table adjusts in height and has 2 big drawers  that will be great to hold scissors, pens, etc. The table was my birthday gift from my husband back in March. Actually he bought it at Home Depot in January, which I knew because when he saw it he sent me over to decide if I would like it. It's been sitting in the box at our house ever since.  It's good to have it set up, although I'm not sure exactly where on the floor it is actually going to sit yet. 

And I have way too much "stuff" as you can see in the photos. I've purged a lot, but when I'm cleaning I have moments where I think I should just get rid of about 90% of it. Smile.  I've filled and taken 8 garbage bags  to the dump/ recycle center that have  junk in them like dried up paints, paper bits I thought I would use or very chopped up magazines. I also have several bins of items like paper and stickers, etc. that I am going to do something with (sell or donate), and I have cleaned out my stamps and purged a few, but I'm disappointed I haven't cleaned away more of them. I'm having a really hard time cleaning out my rubber stamps. It's an addiction, that's for certain.

Thank goodness I have the room. When and if I ever need to downsize more than I have with this project I am going to be in BIG trouble. Smile.

That's it for me today. My daughter informed me she and her beau are coming not only over the July 4th weekend but this weekend also. I don't feel her old room needs to be perfect, but I do need to finish picking up some items  in there also. Luckily there isn't a whole lot left to go through. At this point, I will be glad to get all this cleaning and organizing finished.

 I hope you're having a great week and start to summer.

Thanks for visiting.

T Stands for Last Week This and That

 Hi everyone.

T Day has rolled around once again, and it is time to catch up on life and share our drink related posts over at Bleubeard's and Elizabeth's blog . And it is the first day of the actual summer season if you read this on Tuesday. The longest day of 2022 is here or just about here. 

While some of you are in the heat and humidity, last week we had some wonderful summer weather. Most days weren't too hot or humid (around 75 or so   degrees F or around 24 degrees C) , so over the week I spent a lot of time in my big perennial garden doing some  plant editing. I've had this garden for at least 25 years, and every few years I need to edit. If the weather hadn't been so beautiful I would have let it go, but it was perfect weather for being outside. The garden looks better now that there is a little space between some of the plants. Of course I forgot to take a pre-editing photo, but  you'll have to take my word that it was just one solid jumble of plants before. Much more overgrown than it is now at least.

I have never been any good at getting a lot of color at once, but there's a few things blooming that don't show up here as they are not big and flashy.  Just the greens and textures are pretty though.

And this past weekend it was chilly with highs only around 59 degrees (around 15 degrees C), so it was also a good time to clean out the bee garden that is still in progress. This is a new garden I started at the end of last summer.

My side yard has been taken over by ferns, as has the bee garden.

 The garden is the area  in the bottom right of the above photo, just above the bees. I needed to pull out a lot of ferns so the plants I put in can get enough sun to grow.

After I pulled out the ferns and some weeds,  it looked better.  Don't look too far because beyond this garden is a mix of tall weed grasses and more of those invasive ferns.  I wasn't being super fussy  weeding because I don't want this garden to be formal. In fact, if it ends up looking like a field of flowers (instead of a field of ferns), I'll be happy.

And as I mentioned in a post last week, I also spent a little time trying to get the new art space organized. Actually the organizing took less time than the cleaning and purging that went with it. 

 

It was a busy week, and I accomplished a lot. By Thursday I wanted to do something different however; so I decided to go pick some strawberries. 

Picking was excellent, even though the early berries are usually a bit on the smaller size. These berries were  yummy though. 

This year the strawberry farm has a couple of new residents.

Mrs. Peahen was tucked away behind a tree, but Mr. Peacock was sitting out for all to see. He is a handsome guy.

The farm I visited grows many kinds of fruit. A few years back they opened a bakery and cider mill where they sell fresh made cider donuts and their own cider. 

Maddie was at doggie daycare that day, but Pete was at home waiting for me. I thought he'd like a few bites of a still warm cider donut for a mid-morning snack. Hee-hee.

I had a small glass of milk with the pieces of the donut that Pete didn't eat. Smile.

This is my link to T day this week, and also the end of my post. Thank you for visiting. I hope you have a great T day and week ahead.