Now It Is Officially Spring

Oh Monday is here again. I am not really in the mood to start another week of work but what can you do? It was a beautiful weekend, especially Sunday, and today is suppose to be the cream of the crop, the best.

So yesterday was really the 

official start of spring in my neck of the woods.  Why do I say that? The phoebe was back under the eaves of my husband's shop, twittering its name in that lovely scratchy voice. They always seem to arrive when real spring weather begins. So maybe (I hope) that real spring weather is here. This week looks like it.

Big big smile.

It was so nice yesterday we actually pulled out a couple chairs and sat outside.

I also got out for a fantastic Sunday morning walk. I didn't need for than my fleece , no jacket. Oh yes. how gorgeous.

 The snow is just melting away quickly (big smile) and the buds are getting so large.

Oh yes, did I mention today is the Red Sox's opening day? Baseball means good things are a coming.

Since it is rather late arriving  this year, I am ready for real spring.

Just not ready for this work week yet.

Hope you feel prepared for your week.

And thanks for stopping by.

Road Trip

Yesterday I went on a little solo adventure.

It picked up my spirits and recharged the winter weary gal.

Not exactly a spring like beach day. I needed my winter hat and scarf. The wind was strong but the sun was a little warm. Not too bad.

Enjoy the rest of your weekend.

My Friday Night

I'm sitting here on a Friday evening watching Suvivorman:Bigfoot on TV and waiting for when my husband gets home from his evening dialysis. Survivorman is one of those shows where there's a guy who goes into the wilderness and lives in all kind of wild conditions-in case you aren't familiar with this series.

OK, I find this Bigfoot thing rather interesting, though like those ghost shows (which I also find interesting), I'm not sure they ever show any real evidence. Of course not. They hear things you don't hear or see things but their cameras aren't turned in that direction. But they do make good Friday night TV when you're tired after working all week and don't want anything mentally challenging.

And we can all use a little mystery in life, right? Even if its not ghosts or Sasquatch or anything else like that.

Remember these tags?  I know, I've post tons of tags over the last 2 month. OK, so I started putting them into the tag album I recently made.

I decided they deserved pages that were fixed up so the book is becoming more of a journal with my tags are the centerpieces.

On this page I put 3 small tags. The tags all started with with small blue tags that I had, so I put them together.

Here's the cover to my homemade journal these tags are going into.

So any big weekend plans? I am not sure what is going on today, whether my husband is going to be around or whether he is going to open up his mother's house. His mother has been living with my husband's sister for the winter and is anxious to move home. So if he does go open up her house, I think I will head out and find myself a little adventure...since it is suppose to be a pretty nice day. And if my husband is around, who knows what we will do.

I shall see.

OK, my Friday night brain has said enough.

Thanks for stopping by my blog.

In Progress

Wow-it is Friday already! This week has flown. Its been an interesting week for me. Lots of little mini-adventures in day to day life.

So last Saturday when I met my visiting friend for lunch, I discovered this cool orange house.

It inspired me to start my next piece.

I don't know why, but I find this house really interesting.

My painting is a slightly different view from the photo.

Still have a lot of ideas for the rest of this piece. I am going to take some artistic license to finish it off. I've got a few little things to fix  (the cream colored border on the right side of the house-its too fat  now) on this piece before I start adding the other details.
In my art life, I really focused on this painting all week. I've spent a lot of time working on it. I'm not only having fun with it but I am learning a lot too.
But there were some other fun little adventures too.

 I had this cute little visitor to one of my classes at school.

We learned about goat and other ruminant digestion. This little guy named Rocco was a huge hit.
And he was awfully cute too.

And I went with my kids in Asian Culture club  for a Japanese lunch.

We had a lot of fun. It was the first time I'd been to a restaurant where they cook your food right in front of you. 

I also got my car fixed (ugh the price tag),  and I went to the dentist for a teeth cleaning.
Busy week.

And I told you earlier this week I had started this book, and it has only gotten better as I read more of it. If you have any interest in birds, you might really enjoy this. Its all about training a hawk the way you train a falcon. But it is also about loss and life too.

Linking this post to Paint Party Friday. Stop by and check out all the creative and talented people's latest art.

And thanks for stopping by my post too.

Have a great weekend.

Snow

I woke up to snow this morning! Ugh. Luckily it is only an inch or two and by Saturday we are suppose to be back into the spring warmth. That means it won't last, which is great because I am still watching the snow melt around here.

This was back on Easter. It had melted a lot more this week, but right now it is dirty looking and I really want it all to go away so I can get out and rake. And play in the dirt! I have garden fever.

Think I can figure out how to ship all this snow someplace they might want it?

And here's still another tag! Stamped images from Hero Arts and Deep Red. Postmarks by Tim Holtz and PSX.

Have a great day!

4th Quarter

Today the last quarter of the year begins at the school where I work. Wow. I think because our spring has been so cold it just doesn't seem like it is that time already.  I think of fourth quarter as being warm and spring like, and usually it is. This week we've had April showers (at least not April snow) but its been cool slowing down this spring arrival. With this lingering winter it is still hard to believe that in around 10 weeks my summer vacation will be beginning.

Harder to believe that in 3 weeks I have a week off for spring vacation. Not sure yet what is on my agenda for that week, but I have lots of things stewing around in this old brain.

This journal tag to show you today. Lots of layering at one end of the tag. The black splotch is actually a die cut that I layered with black paper. Its from a new Sizzix set from Tim Holtz. Pretty cool. I added the die cut word which I purposefully ripped into 2 as part of my tag theme.
Stamped background is an old Hero Arts postmark background stamp. And the words come from a fun little set of mail words. It is also pretty ancient and I think was put out by PSX.
I used to stamp postage related things all over my art work and think I might get back into that again. I cleaned out my postage items and think its time to use them more. (You know, it is always good to take a little break from things after awhile.  Then when you use them again its like you have all these new things.)

That's all for me today. Hope your day is fabulous and thanks for taking a minute to visit.

Pink and Purple Party Girl Cake

So this past weekend I was back at my baking. With it being Easter I thought I'd try making this yellow cake and decorating it up all fancy.

The recipe is on the back of a bag a caster sugar from King Arthur Flour. It was  easy to make and quite tasty.

I decided to make my cake fancy Easter colors. Pink and purple. I used some neon food coloring gels.

I marbleized one layer pink and one layer purple.

This looks kind of messy but what I did was slice each layer in half. This cake baked up pretty high.

Then I made a butter  cream frosting that I also made pink. It is such a pretty pink.Almost like cotton candy color.

Then a added some mutli-colored sugar on top. Now it just needed a little bit of final finishing touches.

Pink and purple edging.

 I think most little girls would love this cake. Hence its name, the pink and purple party girl cake. And it wasn't dipping on one end but this photo makes it look that way.

The cake tasted delicious and looks pretty but didn't remind me of Easter in any way, shape or form.

 Have a great day!

Just Me Chatting About The Past Weekend (and a Tag)

Hope everyone had a nice weekend. If you celebrated either Easter or Passover I hope you enjoyed your holiday. My Easter was quiet. My husband, daughter and myself had a nice meal at home and spent a good chunk of the afternoon watching Finding Nemo on Blu-Ray. It was that kind of day, and I really enjoyed it.

Also this past weekend Outlander started up again and I was very excited.  I enjoy that series. Next week Games of Thrones begins and it'll be nice to have some tv shows to be invested in for a little while. 

Yesterday there was an article in our local paper about my husband's kidney issue. You can check it out here if you'd like: newspaper story. We're trying to take a proactive stand and also make people aware of organ transplants.  There are so many people out there waiting for a new kidney (or other organ) than there are donors. I was never really aware of that until my husband got sick, but what a life giving thing organ transplant can be,

And I started reading a new book which I am really enjoying it so far.

It is all about a woman's journey into training hawks. Helen Macdonald was a falconer, but when her dad passed, and she decided she needed to try something challenging to bring her out of her sadness.So far I highly recommend it. She is an excellent writer. This is a subject that I really don't know anything about either, which makes it an adventurous and unusual read. 

Nice thing while you're watching the snow melt day by day. And waiting for the spring flowers to appear. 

Dreaming of that!

(Our snow is down to about 6 inches right now. Last week we lost huge amounts, so I am hopeful that by the end of this week most of my yard will be bare...I m hoping at least. Not going to be a very warm week-so far April is still feeling a lot like late March but at least we are making progress into spring. Its about time!)

And here's a tag I recently made. Now that's its up online I think I might go back and add a few sequins to the upper left. Give it a little more finishing touches.

Hope your Monday is a great start to your week.

Today, Just Some Photos for You

Thought you might enjoy just looking at some photos.

I took these over the last 10 days. Food and spring and puppy dogs.
A few other things too.

I discovered this orange house. I am fascinated by it.

Maybe because it is so orange.

Can I show you more of that orange house?

Until next visit then. 

Tag Inspired

Last week I showed you this tag I made. It inspired me enough that I started this painting.

Yes,  it is not done yet. I am pretty slow to finish paintings.  I need to add a bit of shadow and depth  because the table looks kind of flat to me. But the light in the photo is very helpful to see where the shadows will be going. And then I will finish it off. But you will have to wait to maybe next week before you get to see that.
So this week we've been having a lot of snow melt (yahoo!), but since I live in the woods there is still a ways to go.  But today is suppose to finally be in the 60's (Fahrenheit) so I suspect a lot will disappear. Or at least I hope!!!
I am being optimistic though and put away all my heavy sweaters, wool pants and winter boots last night.  packed them up and put them in the attic!
Oh that feels so nice!
And I took out a bag with a few cotton sweaters in it. I am going to wash those today so they will be ready to wear for work next week.
Oh that feels so nice!
Busy weekend ahead too. I get to see a friend of mine who's coming north for the weekend. Plus  its Easter, although mine is going to be a little non-traditional, which I am looking forward to.
Have a great weekend, and if you celebrate Easter, Happy Easter to you.

I am linking this to Paint Party Friday. Thanks to Kristen and Eva for hosting. Stop by to see the work of some talented people.

A Little More Bunny Hopping

One last Easter styled tag to share with you.  Bunny's, chicks, and spring birds- all those kind of Easter icons. I didn't go pastel colors though. Had to do something a little non-traditional. Not that I am against tradition. Especially spring traditions. Got to love spring especially when you aren't having much of it in your home area. YET.
I am so desperate for green. I never have felt like that before, but man oh man.  To see bare ground and some green leaves. Some colored flowers would be over the top. I don't know how soon that is going to happen here. But it will happen. At some point.

I also recently picked up this book and read it all in one night. I found it a very positive, encouraging book and well put together. It also it got me to rethink some of my art habits. Although the focus is for people who want to do art but don't do art, I think there is still plenty to get out of this volume if you are someone who does a lot of art. It is really about drawing and watercolor, but even people who don't 100% focus on sketching and drawing still have to sketch and draw at times. Plus Danny's drawings are fantastic.
Makes you believe even your bad pieces really aren't so bad. Oh those little evil forces in our brains that allow us to put ourselves down!
Writing that just gave me an idea for a journal page or another tag!
Anyhow, enough chat for me today. Thanks for visiting my blog.

Wahoo!

Wahoo! March is over! Now it is April (obviously), and here in New Hampshire our chances getting real spring weather has increased a lot while our chances of snow have decreased  a lot.  But I may be jinxing it the way this winter has been.
It snow flurried all day the other day.
E-gads!

 How about a little more spring tag playing to celebrate March is done with?

Cutesy wootsy Easter playing. Not my usual style but when you're literally aching for some spring weather and green-how I long for green, you start getting a little crazy.
The images are Hero Arts, Flourishes and Technique Tuesday stamps. They're all pretty old images. But  its so much fun to play with the oldies but goodies.
I like the stripey background.
And all the colors.
Leave me a comment if you like anything or feel like writing...
But I do appreciate you stopping by.