Sunday, October 25, 2009

A Little Randomness on this glorious day

Good morning on this glorious Sunday morning. Since the weather changed to fall/winter mode, Florida is a great place to live. Yesterday when I talking to my son on the phone, he remarked how alive he felt and how much he looked forward to the cooler weather - his word for the 6 months of summer was "brutal." As you can see from the above photo, I snipped the rose bud this morning and brought it into the house - so beautiful and I can see it every time I walk through the living room.
Sunday is always a quiet but busy time for me - Dan always plays golf and I am alone in the house usually doing laundry, putting the roast in the crockpot, having a cup of tea, just living. I was raised going to church and Sunday school; and during my adult life, I have gone through periods of attending church and not. After returning to the US in 2001, I began attending a church and really looked forward every week to going - I felt so inspired and peaceful after the service, and the pastor was just so inspirational. Then he was moved to another church and the new pastor was much more hellfire and brimstone, and I left church feeling unsettled and even unhappy. I decided to quit going and to find God myself, and I think it was a good decision. I smell God in the fresh laundry drying on the clothesline in the sun, I feel God in the bread dough that I am kneading, I taste God in my tea and cinnamon toast. Anyway, I hope you are having a glorious day or night no matter when or where that you are reading this.
I have had a lovely birthday week, and the reason it was a week is because I admit to being a little paranoid about putting out information on the web so I have listed my birthdate as different dates and/or years on different sites - close but........ Anyway, it's been fun receiving greetings for several days AND yesterday I received in the mail a beautiful postcard of a painting by Dutch artist Marjan van Zeyl called The Pink House, and some fun Dutch scrapping supplies and paint brushes from Marit, a friend from SIS and Harlee-Quinnz. Thanks Marit, it was so fun to open the happy mail!!!!!

Yesterday Tara Anderson had a little blog celebration on her blog the Pink House, where she asked some fun questions and had a couple of challenges. The above photo is a 4 inch square piece of art - the background is actually a photo of my watercolor palette from yesterday afternoon - I loved how the colors had run together and mixed so I snapped a pic. The Bouchon card is from a fantastic French restaurant in downtown Asheville. Absolutely divine food!!!!!

Another challenge was to create a tag, and this is mine. I started with a piece of Prima packaging, added a Target tag, some fabric, ribbon, buttons, and metal frames. It's sort of a baby boy theme as that's what the packaging says - softly boy buttons - so I will save it for a shower present or use it on a layout with a baby pic of Brian. I began to get some ideas for Christmas tags but I have a couple of DT assignments to finish first and some painting to finish for my class on Wednesday so the tags will have to wait a few days.
For my birthday this past week, Dan and I went to my favorite Mexican restaurant and then afterwards he took me to TJ Maxx for a little shopping spree - I got some new towels for my bathroom, some fancy teas, and a few other little things. My house is done in pales - whites and creams - and I change the accent pieces for the seasons. Both bathrooms are done in white and cream - white towels in mine and cream in Dan's, but my new towels are the most delicious shade of pale aqua, and they have stylized embroidered flowers in espresso, caramel, and white near the bottom - so luscious and beautiful. I put out bottles in the bathroom that are in those shades and the room looks totally redone. Happy happy happy! It's so funny and synchronitic that http://www.shopevalicious.com/ just had a posting on Friday about aqua.
And before I close, I have a little favor to ask - please vote for Jenneke's layout on http://lotuspaperie.blogspot.com/ . She is a fabulous scrapper and is on the TAAFOMFT design team (speaking of, get us your layouts on your fav time of year - we have received such fabulous layouts but we want to see yours too!!!) A couple of months ago, she and I were finalists the same month and I was fortunate enough to win so this time it's her turn - she so totally deserves it - her layouts are always so alive, so colorful and filled with fun and unique elements.
Well, this is a pretty long post and I need to check on the laundry. Have a fabulous week filled with beauty and creativity!



8 comments:

Tara Anderson said...

yay Chris!! Thanks so much for spending part of your day with me!! I l.o.v.e. your small art piece and all of those lovely little layers! great job rupurposing packaging to for the tag!! xo~ Tara

Julie Tucker-Wolek said...

loveeeeeeeeeeeeeeee the tag u made.....and FINALLY the chris birthday mystery is solved!!! lol!!! sarah wishes u happy birthday earlier this week and then i see it on sis being yesterday!!! lol!!! now i get it!!!!!! sounds like u have had a fab fab fab week! :):):):):):):):):):):):):):)

Jenneke said...

What a wonderful post this is, Chris!
So good to get happy mail, isn't it? And I'm so surprised to hear that you have a bathroom for yourself!! Is that 'normal' in the USA, to have one bathroom for the woman of the house and one for the man??? This makes me jealous...lol!
Thanks so much for those nice words you say about me! And thanks for voting!!!!

Wishing you a wonderful week!

XXXJenneke

BTW, I love your new blog layout and banner!!

Anonymous said...

Yeah...now I get it..I thought well Chris has a lot of birthdays lately..LOL!
Love your tag..so very beautiful!
So sweet to put the words out for Jenneke!!I voted all ready!
Have a wonderful day!

Amy said...

So nice getting to know you a bit in this post....I had a few minutes to catch up on some blog reading. I have enjoyed my visit and absolutely love your painting. I have a photo of an old cajun house tucked back in the trees it reminds me of that photo. Love your tag, too. Sounds like you had a relaxing Sunday...I was able to take a nap...It was a nice change.Hugs, Amy

Deana said...

Beautiful water color painting, Chris! Sounds like you had a really nice weekend, with great weather, too!

I ♥ your projects you made for Tara's blog party! Soooo adorable! :-)

Glad you had a fun birthday WEEK! I say stretch out the celebration as long as possible! :-)

sarah said...

G
O
R
G
E
O
U
S

work!!! :) sounds like you had a great week. glad to hear. here's to another amazing week!

hugs,
sarah.

Hanneke said...

WOW where do I start, love to read this post!!! Glad to hear the weather isn't that hot anymore!! Fall is really gettings it's grip overhere, it's windy and cold and all the trees have almost lost all their leaves! They say it is going to be a cold winter overhere, we'll see!! Love that tag you made it's wonderfull!!!Great colors!! Can't wait to see the ones you will make for Christmas!!
Hope you have a great week!!!