Wednesday, July 27, 2011

Project 64 {29/64}

Wisteria

When I looked around, I found lots of contenders for Wisteria. A little deeper than lavendar - it seems to be a color I favored heavily back in the sewing/quilting days.


And I love the bits of Wisteria in this pretty larger-than-life selection of seed beads - used these a lot when I was crazy quilting - ahhh, all that hand embroidery and quilting! Now I doubt I could see to  get the needle through the holes!

And here's my "entry" for the week!  The candle already made an appearance during sea green week, but it definitely fits for wisteria!

Find lots more wisteria here.

Tuesday, July 19, 2011

Project 64 {28/64}

Macaroni and Cheese:

an interesting color choice - the total food coloring yellow-orange of boxed macaroni and cheese. It may taste good, but in my opinion it looks sooooo fake! But here's the color in a pretty presentation - the camera strap for my little point and shoot. And I took these photos with said point and shoot while the strap was still attached!

Saturday, July 16, 2011

Picture Inspiration {21/52}

This week's prompt was to shoot "from the heart". I coupled that with this week's Mother Load photography prompt which was "self portrait" and took this.

The necklace was a gift from Jay for my 50th birthday.  It is from the "Open Heart" collection at Kay Jewelers. So the significance of shooting "from the heart" is knowing that this necklace was truly a gift from the heart... something he knew I would like, without really even knowing why (after all, he doesn't really consider me a jewelry kind of girl).  The fact that it is a butterfly has personal meaning to me, so that makes this a "self portrait" that is more than skin deep!

Friday, July 15, 2011

About Smash Books

E.K. Success Smash Books and Fancy Pants Brag Books seem to be all the rage this Summer!  But the idea is certainly nothing new... I think the big companies are just cashing in on something scrapbookers were already doing on their own.  In fact, Tangie Baxter posted a series of videos on You Tube on how to create a Junque Journal back in January of 2010.  I picked up on the idea from Kai and created my own back in March of 2010 and blogged about it here.

My own Junque Journal:
has become the repository for the ephemera of every day life that I wouldn't normally create a scrapbook page about.

Such as Happy Mail, ticket stubs, stamps...

More Happy Mail, thank you notes, quotes that move me, etc.

As you can see, my pages are often very simple and bereft of embellishments.  I don't put things in order ... I just open up to a random page and add stuff. And I don't worry about mixing stuff on a page either! Which makes it even more eclectic and fun.  And this little gem is great to flip through when I need a quick pick me up. When you start adding happy mail and such... it gets quite fat quickly!

Thursday, July 14, 2011

Thank You

First, my thanks to everyone who weighed in on my class decision. FUN ended up being the order of the day (it really was so obvious once you all pointed it out!) and I signed up for Creative Color... hope some of you will join me!  I'm sure I'll be missing out on some really good stuff with the other two, but both time and finances dictate that I limit myself right now... and you have NO IDEA how difficult that is for me!

Second, a belated, but very heartfelt thanks to all of you who have kept my mailbox (and me) feeling happy, uplifted, and remembered lately:
I had two from Beverly at BeGlorious.  Absolutely wonderful!  Thank you for thinking of me Beverly!
And a postcard from Rinda at Gallo Organico.  This is the second time Rinda has favored me with a bit of her art and I just love the saying on this one... "Art is an adventure that never ends."  So me right now! Thanks Rinda!

And Mel at I Speak Melsh, sent me this little pillow ... one of her inspiration pieces from the book "Where Women Create" which just happens to be in my possession right now!  Thanks Mel!

Tuesday, July 12, 2011

Help Me Decide

Confessions of an online class junkie.  Hi, my name is Cheri and I'm addicted to online classes.  Right now I am enrolled in:

1. One Little Word - a year long class at BPC with Ali Edwards exploring my word for the year - "Happy". I have been keeping up with the prompts each month and LOVING how this class keeps my word in front of me all the time.
2. Picture Inspiration - another year long class at BPC with Tracey Clark - with a weekly photographic prompt. Admittedly a little behind again.
3. Project 64 - a weekly challenge blog, choosing one crayon color a week as a photo prompt.  Happy to report I am up to date with this challenge! :)
4. Finding Photo Freedom - at BPC with Stacy Julian. This class runs June 1st to August 10th and I'm enrolled as an alumni, so I already "know" the system. I had really hoped to get digi under control this year, but with the computer virus, loss of my ACDSee program and all my tagging done in May, and having to purchase and learn Adobe Light Room, well, I'm hopelessly behind and won't even be attempting to "catch up" with the class - I'll be doing this on my own as time permits.
5. The Mother Load - at BPC with Lain Ehmann. This class runs June 29th to September 28th and culminates with a layout a day challenge for the month of September. Right now I'm completely on track and the hard work doesn't begin until September 1st.

Here's my problem.... Right now there are three classes out there that I'm totally drooling over and would LOVE to take! So much goodness... but all three run in the same time frame... and money IS an issue.  The contenders are:

1. Advanced Portrait Editing - at JessicaSprague.com. This class will run for two weeks - July 18th to 31st.  The regular cost is $40 and it is on sale for $32.00 for this first run of the class.  Pretty much everything I know about scrapbooking in Photoshop Elements and post-processing of photos, I have learned through Jessica Sprague classes and they never disappoint! One of my weakest areas with post-processing is portraits. Which probably explains why I still haven't processed prom pictures! So I would definitely view this one as a skill builder and filling a gap for me.

2. Creative Color - with Christy Tomlinson at Scarlet Lime. This is a one week class running July 25 - July 29 at a cost of $19.95.  Having taken both She Art  and Three Hearts with Christy, I know that her classes have TONS of videos and material and are worth every penny! Christy's classes gave me the foundation for my Art Journaling which is really like therapy for me. I'm certain this class would build on that foundation and would be so much FUN!  Cause let's face it, color and art journaling just make me happy!.

3. Explore - this is Shimelle's newest class. Four weeks running July 18 - August 12 at a cost of $16.00.  I don't really need another mini-album with stuff about myself (I have plenty of them... remember Reverb 10 and iScrap?).  But, hey, this is a SHIMELLE class and who can resist?

And just to complicate things - Ali Edwards is running her annual Week in the Life challenge the week of July 25th to 31st. I haven't decided if I'm up for it this year... and am considering saving it for September when I'm doing the LOAD challenge in Lain's class. But it's there and I wouldn't want to leave it out of the mix!

So... can you help me decide??? Which of these classes do you think I should sign up for? Are you planning to take any of them?  Which one(s) would be most beneficial at this time?  I'm so torn... I want to sign up for all of them, but I know I can't!

Chocolate Tasting - Coming Full Circle

The chocolate has finally been fully consumed.  Well.... at least to the extent that I intend to consume it! There are a few bars with quite a bit left. Some will eventually make it to the trash bin, but it is up for grabs if my kids want it. If you want the full back story, you can read more about my chocolate tasting here, here, and here.  I finished out my chocolate adventure through Europe with these three:

#7.  Wales:

Although claiming to be  about 54% cacao, the Wales bar was bitter and chalky.  No sweetness or creaminess at all.  In fact, it tasted a bit like baking chocolate.  Definitely not my cup of tea, Wales gets a 5.

# 8.  Rome:

The label on this one says "extra bitter chocolate."  But it is 50% cacao and actually among the sweeter ones of the dark chocolates Sarah brought home.  Okay melt/creaminess. Good taste.  I gave this one an 8/10.  I didn't share either!

#9. Paris:

As the final contender for my affections, I tried this one from Paris.  The most expensive bar Sarah bought, possibly because she picked it up at the EuroStar Terminal when exiting Paris (she nearly forgot) or possibly because it really deserved to be the most expensive.  This one claims 61% cacao.  The taste was perfect - not too bitter, not too sweet. And it was the only bar from Europe that actually tried to melt in my mouth! It was creamy, not as creamy as Dove, but a close second.  I gave this bar a 9/10 and relished every last square.  Which means for my personal taste, of all the European chocolates I tried, the ridiculously expensive chocolate from Paris wins.

But in my heart, none of those fancy expensive European chocolates beats this:
Oh yeah, I'm a Dove Promises girl all the way.

Monday, July 11, 2011

Project 64 {27, 26, 25} Catch Up

Week 27, Sea Green:

My sea glass collection.  And the cute little legs on the candle holder in the background.

Week 26 - Red. The patriotic version. The shot itself was difficult as I was shooting right into the sun. But I definitely had fun with post-processing on this one to give it that warm, timeless feel.

Red - the non-patriotic version. This one really gives a truer sense of the crayon color.

Week 25, Goldenrod. Caught on a walk around the block.

Friday, July 1, 2011

One Little Word Blog Hop - July Edition

Hello and Welcome to the One Little Word Blog Hop! If you came here from Jamie's blog, welcome! You made it to the right place.  Grab a drink and stay awhile! I love visitors!

If you are a regular reader, you already know the drill! ;) The entire hop goes live at 8:00 a.m. Pacific (11:00 my time) so if you are early, just check back later to catch everyone!

My one little word for 2011 is "happy". I am focusing this year on what it means to be happy, what makes me happy, how mindful I can be about choosing happiness.  June was a difficult month and I'm happy to be in July now! :)

Here's my One Little Word Album page for June:
Since I've really just gotten into mixed media art, I had a lot of fun putting this month's page together.

The quote is from the Close to My Heart "Treasure Life" stamp set and reads:  May you have enough happiness to make you sweet, enough trials to make you strong, enough sorrow to keep you human, and enough hope to make you happy.

I googled the quote hoping to be able to attribute it. I discovered there was more to the quote than appears on the stamp, but did not find an origin.  I do think it is very appropriate for a focus on the word "happy" though - don't you think so?

While I was busy playing with the mixed media, I also got this background page going in my art journal:
Haven't yet decided how I'll finish it off, but I had fun trying out some new techniques that I learned  from the Life Journaling class over at The Paper Life.  

Thanks for stopping by! Your next stop on the blog hop is Nikki's blog  and here is the entire list just in case you get lost:
Margie http://xnomads.typepad.com/blog
Rebekah http://istampscrapcraft.blogspot.com/
Kelly http://kellyxenos.typepad.com/
Julie Ann http://julieannshahin2.blogspot.com
Jill http://jillconyers.typepad.com/
Jamie http://jmpgirl.blogspot.com/
Cheri http://cheriandrews.blogspot.com  <-----You are Here
Nikki http://www.inkyart.com.au/  <------- Next Stop
Amanda http://scrappnbee.blogspot.com
Melissa S http://blog.mshanhun.com
Monica B http://questtoperfectimperfection.blogspot.com/
Lisa A http://backtoallen.com/writers_blog/
Sam http://learncreatedo.wordpress.com/
Karen http://womenontractors.blogspot.com
Lynn www.crafty-creativity.blogspot.com
Jenn www.studiojenn.blogspot.com
Kathryn http://www.katlodesigns.com
Cindy http://seriousplay.typepad.com