Happy Thanksgiving

I am so looking forward to pumpkin pie. I put the pumpkin pie in the oven tonight and forgot about it. Fortunately my husband smelled it just in time and it looks so amazing. Whew! The table is set and decorated, the house is clean (well almost), the dog is fluffed with a bow in her hair and the refrigerator is full of food just ready to be cooked and eaten. Mmmm. I hope I can sleep tonight. There will be 10 of us tomorrow and I hope for a nice intimate time of sharing, eating and making memories with my family. Realistically, you get 10 family members together and who knows what will happen but we will make memories, yes we will.

There is so much to be thankful for.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Be Thankful - Day 2

What five things am I thankful for today?

1. A massage to work out the last of sore mussels.

(She worked on me pretty hard so hopefully I'm good now)

2. Creative time with my niece

(we made Teesha Moore's Amazing 16 page journal)

3. Dinner as a family.

(since the kids have grown older we find it harder and harder to have everyone home at the same time and hungry)

4. A call from my daughter, just because.

(she enjoyed the New Moon movie so much she called to tell me when the next one was coming out and that we are going to the midnight showing this time )

5. Trimmed hydrangeas and escalonias.

( They had gotten so big I couldn't see out my front door.)

Now I am off to clean the house, bake pies, run the dog to the groomers, grocery store errand and pick up my son from work.

Have a thankfully beautiful day!

Be Thankful

I wanted to share what I read this morning in my quiet time.

Always be joyful

Keep on praying

No matter what happens,

always be thankful

for this is God's will for you who belong to Christ Jesus

1 Thessalonians 5:16-18

What good timing this is since it is Thanksgiving week and also because I have just gone through a few days of feeling sorry for myself. A good reminder that there are always things to be thankful for no matter what your circumstances. I remember a few years back, Oprah suggested to everyone to keep a thankfulness journal. Everyday, you write down five things that you are thankful for. I think since it is Thanksgiving week that I will do that. Get my focus back on what is good and brings joy to my life.

One thing that I am thankful for is all of you who come and visit my blog and leave such encouraging comments. I appreciate you so much and hope that you have a wonderful week filled with blessings and thankful moments.

Love and hugs to you all!

2. Sunshine

3. a good book

4. Coffee in the morning

5. Good times with family

A really bad no good day!

I pulled a muscle in my back on Thursday and so I haven't been able to do much. I think it would have gone away in a couple of days but I made the mistake of going out for a quick errand and then doing a load of laundry. Now my back is so bad I found it hard to breathe. Today, I think I will just lay around and watch movies and read. I have already missed out on some really fun stuff because I couldn't move and so I want to get better so I can get back to life. I decided, while I was doing this page that I really don't like Copic markers very much. They bleed through my pages unless I have a lot of acrylic on the page. I didn't with this one and it messed up the page below. My Pitt brush tip pens are much better.

Thursday, before the back problems started I went to meet some friends at Starbucks but no one came. I had woke with a really bad headache and really wanted to stay home myself but faithful is my middle name and so I went anyway. I worked in my journal for about an 1 1/2 hours , drank some coffee and then went home. It turned out to be one of those days you wished that you had stayed in bed and pulled the covers over your head. As I was trying to get in my front door, and carrying too many bags of heavy stuff, that I tweaked my back. Only after the fact, did I think it would be a good idea to make a second trip. Now I am suffering the consequences of my foolish decision. UGH!

I was playing round with my watercolors the other day. I kinda like the effect. It is like looking at clouds and seeing shapes. I see a whole landscape behind the girl and so I decided to leave it plain. The quote is from a TV show I was watching and when I heard it I grabbed my journal and wrote it down. It says, "I am kind of nostalgic for when things weren't quite so interesting."

This was another page where I was playing around with watercolors. The concentrated watercolors that I have can get very intense and I love it. I always thought watercolors where only pastel.
The Christmas peak the other day is getting out of control. I find myself thinking and looking forward to the holidays with much anticipation. I am even listening to Christmas music already. YIKES!

November Journal pages

I have been promising journal pages and so I thought I had better get going and take some pictures. My new camera is not as easy to use, so I find myself resisting the process. So I downloaded some new music and now I am sitting at my computer rockin out and

editing photos and blogging.

Anyone a David Cook fan? His new album is pretty good. Definitely his unique style.

I did these pages while I was at the beach last week.

I showed you these pages when they had no color on them. I mostly like to sit down in one sitting and finish a page but this one I have been adding a little here and there. It still is not done but pretty close.

I got together with a friend and worked on a couple of pages. I have been wanting to try cutting a shape out of one of my pages and so I went to work. I have debated with myself over doing some journaling on the daisy pedals. I like it the way it is but they are just sitting there calling to be journaled on and I can barely hold back. I don't want to overdo it though. Any thoughts?

This is the backside of the daisy. The little elf is compliments of my friend Michelle. She gave me a black and white copy of one of her designs and I colored it to match my page. I am going against my own personal rules of experiencing one holiday before moving onto the next. I used to not even look at magazines for Christmas before Thanksgiving was over. I think I got so excited this year I joined the push of commercials, stores and everyone else to take a peak ahead. Please don't hold it against me :)

Sunday night

I am realizing that the days are flying by and so much seems to be getting left undone. My days are filled with disjointed conversations with my kids and grandbaby. Not a bad thing but at the end of a day I feel unsettled that I can't point to a project or chore that made it's way from start to finish. I have a feeling it may be this way through the holidays when everyone is inside because of the weather and wanting to create that homey feeling in their hearts.

Yesterday my middle son moved back home. That seems to be a story I am hearing more and more from my friends who have grown children. Transitions have been hard on my family and now we are in another one. I really am leaning into God and prayer to make this one easier than previous ones. I have more peace than I have had so that is good. We went to church and heard Margaret Feinberg speak. She has a few books out but she was speaking on her newest book, Scouting the Divine where she talks about wine, sheep and honey. All these subjects are all through the scriptures and she explains some things that made the passages come alive. I bought her book and had her sign it and got to talk to her for a few minutes. She is very sweet.

Today I did move some things around in my art studio and start the organizing process. Now if I can just do more organizing than messing it up, I might get ahead. The other thing I did was to take my youngest son to see the movie 2012. What a whirlwind, breath holding, nail biting movie that was. At points in the movie I had both hands over my mouth in fear of what I was seeing. OK, I'm a bit of a baby but it was scary to see the natural disasters happening right in front of your face. OH, so good. I want to take my husband and see it again. Then I came home to my daughter baking a pumpkin cake and the house smelling so yummy. What a fun day today was.

Seaside Oregon

I spent a couple of days down at the beach. I was expecting stormy weather and it ended up being gorgeous. I opened the patio door to hear the ocean and seagulls squawk and sat by the fireplace. It was a great time. No major emergencies at home so I was able to relax and dream a bit about some art goals and projects I want to do.

I got a couple of journal pages done which I will share tomorrow. Nothing too exciting. I am counting the days and anticipating when I get to sew my last signature in my new journal. I have a feeling that the next 1 1/2 months is going to go by quickly.

Smile

One of my paintings was used in a SMILE collection on Etsy. I was so shocked and amazed and thrilled to be apart of the grouping. Check it out here.

The Week

Not much to show for my week. My grandbaby was sick and couldn't go to daycare so I watched him. We had lots of snuggle time and watching Elmo. I learned something in the process, hours of Elmo gives me a headache. If you try and substitute with Sesame Street or anything else all you hear is Elmo, Elmo, Elmo until you turn it back. Since he was sick I obliged.

I only got a couple of art journal pages started. Mostly because I was so tired and not feeling very creative and the rest of the time busy. I will add color to the pages this weekend, hopefully. That may be a dream and have to wait until Monday since we are moving my husband's office. In fact I had better get going on out there right now. Have a great weekend everyone.

Etsy has arrived on this blog

Well, I did it. I opened my Etsy shop. It was a heart pounding, long time coming event that I am glad is over. I will continue to add to the shop but I don't think it will be as scary as the first time. Whew! Fell free to follow the link on my sidebar and check out what I have in there. Here are some journal pages too. The October signature has moved to the big journal and I am working on Novembers.

I love the new stamps I got and I'm sure they will show up on other pages this next month.

I like this page so much I might just try and paint it on a canvas. Have to think on that one.

This page was left over from my trip to Canada.

The Winner is.....

The winner of my first give-a way is Connie over at She Dreams Big.
Whoo Hoo, Congratulations! I think you will be very surprised at the amount of stuff in this package and I hope you will be able to use it to create beautiful and fun art.

I have to say that I was very excited to have three brand new ladies sign-up for the give-a-way. Because there were only three of you, I would like to send the other two of you a little something too just for signing up. If each of you will email me your mailing info I will get your packages out this week.

Lots of bloggy love,
Teri Leigh

2009 Journal assembled

I have been trying out a new system for my journal. I make a signature each month and carry it with me. The first page is always my goals for the month and a list of things I need do or buy. The rest of the journal I make notes in it, I write stuff I want to remember or things about my day or sometimes I paste things that I pick up onto the page. When I am home I go back and add color to the page with my watercolors and doodling of course. It has been a good system for me so far. Then when I am done with the month I bind the signature into the journal. I just started this system this summer so I only have four months worth but I wanted to show you my progress.

I am considering putting some beads on the hanging strings but I don't know yet. I painted the cover with acrylic paint on canvas and then stretched the canvas over chipboard. On the inside I pasted torn pieces of old book pages and did a color wash over that. It is a very sturdy cover. I have two holes set aside for November and December. I can't wait to have it all done. I am really liking how it is coming out.
For next year, I am debating about doing two volumes with six months worth in each book. I could do a whole year but it might be very large and look a bit odd. What do you think? Should I do one or two?