What's Happening in My World

I saw this meme on Rinda's blog and then on Cheri's and since I found the questions interesting I thought I bring them over to my blog. I don't do memes anymore on a regular basis, but every now and then I find some good ones - like this one - and then I play along.

What’s the title of the last book you read?

“Lakota Woman” by Mary Crow Dog. It was a very interesting and also emotional read. I often got very annoyed and mad about how Native Americans have been treated in this country. This book was written in 1990 and I have no idea how much has changed – I hope a lot!  I have visited some of the places Mary Crow Dog describes, like the Pine Ridge Reservation and Wounded Knee. Both places had a feel of desperation and sadness about them and this I could also feel while reading her autobiography.

What is the last thing you cooked at home?

Yesterday I cooked cut up Nürnberger Rostbratwurst (the famous bratwurst from Nuremberg) with left over spaghetti (cut up as well), green cabbage and egg – all sautéed in a large pan with a little bit of salt and ground caraway. The entire family loved it.

What is your favorite thing about Fall?

The colors and the light.

Share one thing that challenged you at some point over the last week.

I received an email that was a bit harsh and I had to think carefully how to respond to it. I have learned to sleep a night before responding to things that upset me, and I’m glad I did. My response the next day was calm and thought through, and the following reaction to this from the writer was nice and sweet.  

List three hobbies that you actively pursue or want to pursue.

Photography is always my favorite hobby – I recently took some lovely autumn pictures at the lake one morning. I love knitting and do a lot of it right now. Reading is another favorite hobby and I’m always looking for book recommendations. I love to go to the thrift stores, buy books dirt cheap and, when I’m done reading them, bring most of them back. Curling up on the sofa and getting lost in a book is the ultimate comfort for me.      

What is the most recent sporting event you watched?

Don’t laugh – it was the World Cup in the summer of 2014…    

 

Besides watching "live TV," what service do you use to watch TV or films (netflix, on demand, etc.)?

We use Amazon Streaming or rent DVDs from the library. We don’t watch much TV except for PBS and are fans of Masterpiece – wonderful British shows!

Have you started Christmas shopping yet? 

Nope. But I’ve finished knitting a hat that I want to give to a friend’s daughter for Christmas. Since she doesn’t read my blog I can post it here. Unfortunately the colors in the picture are a bit off – the yarn is a rich flecked green and delicious! The pattern was much easier than I thought - I knit this entire hat in three evenings. I like the lacy look in the leaves.

Do you have any upcoming trips?

Unfortunately not.

Do you remember your dreams?

Some of them I do, some I don’t.

A Photo a Day

For this year I had planned to take a photo a day - at least one photo each day of the year, no matter what it is. I even joined some groups on flickr for this purpose because I thought that would keep me motivated.

Well - seven weeks later I have to say that I haven't quite followed through. At the beginning I did take at least one photo each day, but as the year progressed I couldn't catch up anymore. Instead of feeling guilty, however, I did give myself permission to take it easy and that it is perfectly okay if I have only three or four photos for an entire week. Although the challenge of taking a photo each day was interesting and, yes, a real challenge, it took out the fun of photography for me - and that is simply too high a price.

What I will do, however, show you my favorite photo of each week on Sundays - starting today with my favorites of the first seven weeks.

Week 1 - the magnolia in my neighbor's front yard, shot on January 2nd.

Week 2 - yummy red wine

Week 3 - pink waves at the Northern California coast near Jenner (Goat Rock State Beach)

Week 4 - California Towhee

Week 5 - tree trunks

Week 6 - planting pots in my garden, drying out

Week 7 - a detail on one of the bunkers along Conzelman Road on the Marin Headlands, just north of the Golden Gate

Are you taking any photo challenges this year?

A Big Leap

Photo by the Geek

A week ago I opened my Etsy shop. That was a really big leap for me, something I was scared of and excited about at the same time.

I had been dreaming about my Etsy shop for quite some time - way too long, actually, before I finally started to make it happen. Even before Kelly Rae's "Flying Lessons" did I know that I wanted my shop, my own little space where I hoped to sell the pieces I created.

Why did it take so long? In the end, it certainly was fear. But I think it also was being sick for such a long time without knowing it. When your body isn't healthy, it lets you feel that without you realizing it. You're tired all the time. Your energy level is extremely low. Your optimism shrinks quite a bit. There are times, sometimes several days in a row that you feel downright depressed. You're the worst company you can imagine.

Since my surgery almost three months ago I do feel like a new person - just as my surgeon had promised. I feel healthy, energetic, optimistic. These days I have more energy than I had for a very long time - I've almost forgotten what it feels like to be healthy. I will never ever again take that for granted.

With this new energetic me I've felt confident enough to deal with my fears and see them as a challenge. I told myself that opening my own Etsy shop really does not carry a big risk - I can't lose anything, but I can gain a lot instead. So why not try it? In the worst case I am not selling anything. That would hurt, of course, but it is nothing that would ruin me. And I can tell myself that I tried and it didn't work out. Still better than not trying at all because I'm scared.

With these thoughts on my mind I set up my shop and finally opened it last week. I only told a handful of people. Of course I feel like a complete newbie which I am, but everyone at Etsy once was a newbie. I'm slowly making my way, finding connections, building up my "circle" and just getting familiar with the Etsy environment.

Yes, it is scary. It is also exciting and exhilarating. It's discovering new things every day.

It makes me feel ALIVE !!!

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Breathe

So far, Inspiration Avenue's challenges often were a real challenge for me or at least quite a stretch. This week I thought "I can't do it".

The theme is "Breathe". Oh jeez. No idea, my mind went blank, and I already thought that I'll miss this challenge. But somehow my subconscious wouldn't let go, and I remembered a picture of my daughter I had taken when she was only two and we were visiting the Garden Exhibition in Graz, Austria. Fortunately I had scanned all those slides and it didn't take long until I found it.

However, the picture was crap. Real honest crap.

But... hadn't I just taken an excellent Photoshop class with Kim Klassen? Hello?? Now was the time to see what I could do with that crappy photo.

The first day was just frustrating and I decided to give up. Did I mention my subconscious? That little bugger was not in any mood close to giving up but kept haunting me at night. When I remembered that Kim had talked about vignettes... So today I grabbed my notes and started anew, played with hue and saturation and those fantastic blending modes and finally added my vignette - of course it took forever, but I was so so happy when I was done, and also a little bit proud.

Please note the young lady's pinky.

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Two Tuesday Challenges

Over at Kard Krazy the challenge for this week is to create just the background of a tag because often a background is beautiful in itself. So true. I've chosen a snowy background - I'm really getting in the Christmas groove. I guess it's about time.

I put snowflake templates on the tag and then sprayed it with Glimmer Mist in frost, then stamped a snowflake (Paper Candy) in silver metallic randomly all over. As a finish I added a white snowflake embellishment that I tied to the ribbon.

Tuesday Taggers wanted to see the word Love, Peace or Joy on our creation. Here is my little ornament - gessoed first, than painted with garnet metallic acrylic paint. The angel (Tin Can Mail) is stamped on a piece of cardstock that I distressed (mustard seed, tattered rose) and colored a little bit. Some patterned paper glued to the star, topped with the angel panel, the letters for the word "joy" and a poinsettia.

This is my 100th post!

Happiness is...

I just discovered Inspiration Avenue less than 24 hours ago. They have weekly challenges that sound tempting and so I decided to join. Since they close on Sundays at 12:00 EST I knew that I have to post by tonight - and my design is clean and simple, the way I like it best. It's a card I think cat lovers would like.

I sprayed the background with Glimmer Mist in sweet clover and patina, then stamped the birds at the birdbath (Inkadinkado) with Distress Ink black soot.. The cats (Inkadinkado) were stamped on cardstock that I had inked with Distress Ink in wild honey. Finally I tyed the words, inked the paper with Distress Ink in mustard seed and shabby shutters and ahered to the card with foam tape.

Fast and simple. A fun challenge.



Two Challenges

It seems I'm back to some of the blog challenges!

First, Kard Krazy's Tag Tuesday - this week's theme is "Front and Back". 

Here's the front of my tag:

All the stamps used on this tag are by Artistic Outpost, "The Outpost" and "A lovely day".

Tag was sprayed with Glimmer Mist (sunflower and oriental poppy) and stamped with Distress inks (spiced marmalade, barn door, mustard seed, fired brick) and Stazon (timber brown). The punched out maple leaves were stamped with the tree, using Distress inks.

This is the back:

It was fun to work on both sides of the tag, and I still am not sure which side I like better.

I think that tree looks really good.

On to Tuesday Taggers, theme "Taste of the Orient". I decided to make a Chinese card:

If you go to Kard Krazy and Tuesday Taggers you can see way more fantastic pieces of art.

Coffin Tag

It's been some time since I participated in any challenges. But when Louise at Kard Krazy's newest Tag Tuesday challenge was "black and orange" I knew that I had to make a tag. I got the idea for the shape from Lou and Mel at Scrap-ology.

I had so much fun with this tag that I decided to make more and give them to my guests at our upcoming Halloween party. Here's an entire coffin full of bats and skulls.

Stamps are by Inkadinkado  (skull) and Zimprints (bat).

Yes, I can!

Today I want to share some exciting news with you. Recently I was invited to join Vision and Verb, one of my very favorite blogs. It is a collaboration of "women of a certain age" and its collaborators are a pretty international crowd. Back in September I wrote my very first guest post for V&V. Shortly after that Marcie Scudder sent me an email asking me whether I'd like to join.

This was the first time that my reaction was not "I can't do that" but instead a loud and clear "Yes, I want to do that!". Yes, it is a challenge for me and I'm a little bit scared, but at the same time I'm mighty excited.

One thing is sure: Your support has helped me a lot to get here. I was pretty intimidated when I started the whole blogging thing (thanks Kelly Rae!) back in July (only three and a half months ago, can you believe it?) and you came along with your openness, kindness and friendship.

My hope is that you will visit me at V&V (I'll be there every other week or so, starting this coming Saturday) and love that blog just as much as I do. And of course you will always find me here at my own blog.

Have a wonderful week and enjoy the autumn colors!

Tuesday Challenges on Friday

The Tuesday challenges are still pretty new to me. They tend to turn into end-of-the-week challenges because I never succeed in finishing anything before Thursday. I have no clue how the other artists create all these wonderful tags and cards in such little time. I am a little bit envious... but I also like the process, and that just takes time.

So, the first challenge is for Tuesday Taggers. This week's theme is "It takes all sorts".

This project shows what I really like to do - use my photos to create cards. It is so much fun, the possibilities are endless and I just love to play around and see what I can create. I love to surround my photos with some artsy stuff.

The second challenge is for Tag Tuesday at Kard Krazy. The theme is "Banners". This is what I came up with:

Funny that both challenges resulted in an ocean theme for me. I do love the ocean, so it seems only right.

If you want to see the fantastic projects of the other wonderful artists, just stop by Tuesday Taggers and Kard Krazy.

Another Tag Challenge

I do love tag challenges - tags are so much fun to experiment and play around with. Louise's Tag Tuesday Weekly Challenge on her blog Kard Krazy features a different theme every week. This week's challenge is "school days". You can hop over to her blog to see more beautiful tags.

Halloween Diamonds

It seems that I'm sticking to the "Halloween Cats" theme this week since I'm currently designing my card-making class of the same name that will run in October.

When I checked what this week's challenge at the Tuesday Taggers will be, I found out its theme is "Diamonds are Forever". Now - how well do diamond shapes work with Halloween? They seem to be made for each other.

This is my contribution to the challenge:

Stamps I used are by Cherry Pie Art Stamps and Rusty Pickle.

I absolutely love the cat with a hat stamp by Rusty Pickle. Years ago they also had scrapbook paper with the same cat - you can see it here. I bought tons of it that time and saved it over the years. I'm still not very generous with it! Do you happen to have art supplies that you only use VERY sparingly, like favorite papers?

Tag Tuesday - Butterflies

I was looking for a new crafty challenge in blogworld, and finally found Louise's Tag Tuesday Weekly Challenges on her blog Kard Krazy. I've been rather late, but it seems to fit.

This week's theme is "butterflies". I sprayed a tag with Glimmer Mist while masking some butterflies that I had punched out. Three of those butterflies I also sprayed with Glimmer Mist, adhered them to the tag when they had dried and bend their wings to give them a 3-D look.

WOYWW - Tuesday evening

It's another Wednesday - well, Tuesday evening - so it's time for WOYWW.

As you can see, it's all turquoise - I'm currently working on this week's color for the Creative Color Challenge. Turquoise is a relative new color for me, I haven't worked with that very often (I used "laguna" often or teal), and first I felt a little bit lost. I didn't have any turquoise paint, so I headed to the craft store only to realize that there is no acrylic paint called turquoise, but several different ones, some more blue, others more green. I finally went with "Desert Turquoise" which reminds me of the sea as well as of Santa Fe. Sounds good to me.

I'm in the middle of the challenge and still don't really know where it will take me. But that is the fun of it. I'm sure that it will be some sea theme, I already have stamped some shells and mermaids, they will be used in the collage, I just don't know yet in what way.

If anyone wants to join in the "What's on your work desk? Wednesday" you can stop by Julia at Stamping Ground to get more information.

Raspberry Red - CCC

Earlier this week I told you that I decided to participate in Louise Gale's Creative Color Challenge. This week's color was raspberry red and this is what I created:

I first painted the canvas with berry red acrylic paint, glued some scrapbook papers onto it, adhered the photo that I wrote about here and finally stamped shapes and letters using shades of the same acrylic paint. For painting the lighter colors on the bottom and in the upper right corner I used for the first time the paper towel technique that Kelly Rae talks about in her book "Taking Flight" (at least I think she mentions it there). I love this technique!

This was a very interesting challenge since I was only allowed to use one color including its shades and only add black and white. I loved it and I really enjoyed the process. I hadn't been creative for quite some time (pretty much the whole of summer break), so this was just wonderful. It took a few days and occupied my mind a lot, I loved mixing colors, going through my stash of papers and the stamps. I liked it more and more whenever I came back to my work table.

Creative Color Challenge

Yesterday I decided to join Louise Gale's Creative Color Challenge. Every week in the month of August we're creating with just one color (plus black and white) in all its shades. It sounds really interesting and after I had looked at all the wonderful art work of the "Sunflower Yellow" challenge I decided to join.

I haven't done a creative challenge for a very long time. There was always this "I'm not good enough" feeling that stopped me from joining any kind of challenge. But yesterday I thought "what the heck can I lose?" This is supposed to be fun!

This week's color is Raspberry Red - a great color, and one that I love on top of that. My mind is busy with exploring the possibilities. Since I couldn't stop thinking of it I tried something new yesterday evening.

I started out with a photo of my daughter that I took a few weeks ago.

And then I converted it into black and white.

In a final step, the word "Love" turned into (raspberry) red.

No idea yet whether I will use this photo for the challenge, but it was a lot of fun to work with Photoshop. The Geek is a Photoshop expert and walked me through every single step of the process. I'm not sure I could repeat it right now, but I'm going to practice this with more of my pictures. I really like the result!