Fun Things that Get Me through the Day

I have pretty good survivor skills. I have a terribly stressful day, I buy a pink feather wreath, hook it onto a wonderful green metal bird hook (both from The Pink Cabbage) then add an INCREDIBLE piece of collage art by Paper Cat Designs which I "stole" from her on eBay (when time permits THAT story will be told), and bottomed off with a sweet pink heart from Bayberry Cove then voila! you've really got something to hold on to! Just so you don't get the wrong impression, I'm not a constant consumer. I buy quite a few art supplies with the money I make after shop rent, etc., but I'm not the "bored housewife shopper" that some of my posts might allude to. I don't want to be obtuse or a tease but last week ended badly and I was unhinged. I'm just sharing this because when things return to somewhat stable that's usually when I collapse and then I look to those wreaths with beautiful fairys to remind me that there are fun, perky things around for me to look at instead of focusing on the negative. That's what I hope my art does, that's one main reason I do it...hopefully to keep someone a little more up when things are down.

Above and below are a couple of little items I picked up at P.C. today for less than a venti frappachino each. Above is a cup and saucer glued together pretty flowers coming out of it. It can be layed down flat, propped up straight or, as I did, hung by a (too long a story for now) pretty ribbon. Below, the little pink rose topiary, also from The Pink Cabbage (gag me with a spoon yet?) I had to embellish (well I didn't HAVE to but I have a hard time leaving things alone) with an Amy Powers paper flower, a Mel Lobdell fancied-up optician's lense, and a black and white of a brother and sister in the back yard.

Take my word, skip Starbuck's just a couple days a week and you too can have these permanent perk-ups in your world too. And count your blessings every moment you have them.

False Promises to Myself

I promised myself that, after spending the three days painting the bedroom and hallway, that I would spend the day today in my bedroom enjoying the new, beautiful color and look and feel. What I had envisioned was an hour or two doing Etsy, read a few mags, read the paper and do the crossword puzzle, then take a nice, long nap. I ran some errands this morning but was in the bedroom with my laptop, newspaper, and mags by noon. And here I am at 9 p.m. and just finished up listing all the things I'd been putting off for a few weeks and updating my blog. But I WAS in the newly pretty painted room even though I didn't look up many times to enjoy. I'll clean again Sunday night and try for Monday. Here are a few of the things I put on Etsy today. I actually have about 35, I think, listings...I told you I'd been saving up and procrastinating for a while. I did major purging in my studio work room and am listing packages of things mostly to just "pass along" things that I've forced myself to let go of because of overload. All us artists are alike when we get together and complain that we can never find anything in our studios because we've got too much stuff so I'm trying to rectify that plus list some of my new art that will be more appealing to the broader-minded, artistic customers on Etsy.

Catching Up...Last Week

Last week was all about "making". I had a week when I could spend almost every day (until Matt comes home) making art, so art I made. Pea Pie, above, and the collage below I have listed on Etsy. I gotta give all the people what they want, harrrrrr. The tag art at the top went in and out of The Pink Cabbage pretty quickly.

Below are items I took to the shop...

...I think we've all got spring fever 'cause everyone at the shop is all over Valentine's Day and Easter as though we can force our cold January and February along as fast as possible. Here are some of my profferings...

...the high Sunday was 25 degrees.

Catching Up From Way Behind

A couple of weeks ago I was doing a drop off at Goodwill (GW Boutique according to Nene) when I spied the above perfectly good shelf unit sitting next to the dumpster. I went over to investigate then back up and tilt in. It didn't look as perty as it does here as it was just your generic plastic wood bookcase with only the stationary shelves intact. I tilted it into the house and gave it a splash of cream paint and voila! Then I took it to The Pink Cabbage, forced Nene to put one of my dressers in her space, and began a major musical chairs spruce. I've always used my real estate to the hilt but when, a few weeks ago, I discovered a woman in the doorway of my room leaning over with her head between her knees and she explained that she had gotten dizzy from claustrophobia when she entered my room, I felt really bad. Stuffing is one thing but stuffing and tunneling is not for everyone. So, that's when I started my obsessive cycle of sprucege.

My mamma's monkeys chillin' in the stroller...they say, "Hey, dude, come in and see us!".