O Joyous Day

I've been blogging the day away (doing other things as the photos uploaded), but what should have been my first post if I was doing them in chronological order, is my last. Why? Because it was the most fun and brings me the most ART joy (I almost typed the greatest joy, but what would that say about my recent post about my grandson turning three!??!!).

So what is it that brought me such joy? And continues to bring me joy? A photo shoot with my art friend Shelby. Shelby has already blogged about it, but didn't give away too much except for one photo of me (she's waiting for me to blog before she unveils more of the photos she took). Here is a link to Shelby's blog, Love is an Institution, and the post she did about our photo shoot. Shelby is NOT your mother's photographer. She brought an old suitcase full of vintage clothes, hats, and props. She even let me 1) wear my tap shoes, include some of my dolls, and wear my wings. Here is a sampling of the photographs Shelby took.

And here's a sampling of some in black and white photographs.

During our photo shoot, Shelby grabbed a poetry book from our living room. As I flipped through the book, a poem written on lined notebook paper slipped out. It was a poem I had written in high school, entitled O Joyous Day. It was a horrible poem (it was schmaltzy and contrived), but it gave us both a good laugh. Shelby even used the poem in one of the photos she altered digitally.

You like the altered photos, don't you? Here are a few more.

The Ancient Art of Encaustics

I treated myself to a class on Saturday at the Salem Art Association. I've been doing a lot of teaching lately, and I needed to sit back and be on the other side of the table. The class was taught by the talented Deanna White, who works in a variety of art mediums, but one of her favorites is encaustics. So here is a glimpse into how I spent my day!









Even the debris was colorful and fun!

Introducing: Perfect Pairings

I met my beautiful friend, Susan, at The Beanery last week so we could celebrate the launch of her business, Perfect Pairings for Conscious Singles, and so she could pick my brain about maintaining a blog. Here she is getting her computer set up so we can get down to a little work.


And here is Susan vibrant and glowing.

All of this is so exciting because Susan took my Artist's Way course a year ago when this business idea was just a seed of a thought. Susan took my Artist's Way again this spring and I was able to watch her idea take form and become a reality. Susan's services include coordinating fun social events for singles, relationship coaching (she's a certified coach), and in the not-too-distant-future, she will be offering matchmaking. An article about Susan's new business was featured in the May issue of Salem Monthly, so if you want to know more about Susan's business, click here.

Way to go, Susan!

Mandalas on Vinyl

Thursday night: Artful Play.

Location: Salem Art Association.

The project: Mandalas. On record albums.

Idea for project: Christine Claringbold of Eye Pop Art.

Ready to go.

Hands, lovely hands:

The (nearly) finished mandalas:







And Joanne took her mandala home to finish so I didn't even get to post a preliminary photo . . .

Emmett Begins His Third Year

Okay, I'm a grandma, so I'm entitled to post photos of my grandkids now and then (I show remarkable restraint, believe me!). Last Tuesday was Emmett's third birthday, so Amy and I took Emmett out for birthday pancakes at our favorite new breakfast place, Word of Mouth Neighborhood Bistro. Amy reminisced about what an easy birth Emmett was and how cool it was the he was born at home (and I got to be there!). Here we are celebrating.

He Saw the Water Monkeys . . .

Altered Board Book Round #3, this one hosted by my friend Destree. I received Candace's book this time around and for my pages, I used techniques I learned in Karen O'Brien's Artfest class: Myth and Mystery. It was fun using the techniques I learned, and having a reason to use them!

I now have Shelby's book, and I want to do something completely different. Ummmm, wonder that will be.