Isn't it beautiful?!

I had the priviledge of teaching the caterpillar class the other night and one of my students - Genvieve Crabe - sent me a picture of her completed bracelet. And it is just beautiful! I love the caterpillar bracelet! It's so luscious and tactile and bold! Thanks Genevieve for allowing me to show off your gorgeous work!

On another note - tomorrow is the last day of school for the summer for my girls. So I get to have them at home for two months to play and swim and smile and create! If you hear less of art and more of motherhood, don't be surprized! It's me doing what I love - being with my family!
Cheers, Denise

What The He## Do I Do?

I was curious. So I went on line and started goofing around with the colours on my blog. I wanted to figure out how to make and put a banner in. Well I sorta figured it out. It's kinda cool how much mischief I managed to get into isn't it? I was tempted a few times to just reset the whole template because it was looking so weird. I'm not happy with my side bar, but I know it's because of those maps. Setting margins seems to be tricky so I'm working on that. I am having fun though. I haven't figured out how to make the banner bigger though. I made it into a picture, uploaded it to the blog so it would be made into a picture but it's the large size and I haven't figured out how to change it's size. If anyone wants to rescue me in the HTML Sea of Confusion, please feel free!
Cheers, Denise

Art Dolls

I thought while I was working on my current projects, I'd show you some art dolls that I made quite awhile ago. The Garden Doll is mine and I think she is fabulous. She feels so good in my hands and I used my favourite beads and flowers on her.





This doll was made for my very first swap and is owned by a friend. She turned out beautifully with that full rainbow of beads around her head. She came from a form pattern from Ronda Kivett. It's a hard form to sew and get all the points to line up but I like beading it because the point are fun!



I made a bracelet today. I'll take pictures tomorrow and show it to you. My friend Calinda came over and we worked on them most of the morning. I finished it this evening while watching a movie with my youngest. The rest of my family has gone away for the weekend so it's just me and my baby hanging out! She wants to go play in the artroom tomorrow so expect some great art!
Cheers, Denise

Where Have I Been?

I found this map site from another blog and thought it would be fun to play!
So here is where I have been in Canada:



create your own personalized map of Canada
or check out ourVancouver travel guide

And here is where I have been in Europe:




create your personalized map of europe
or check out our Barcelona travel guide

And here is where I have been in the States. Of course, I think it is - we've driven through them a couple of times and I can't exactly remember all the states I've been in.


create your own personalized map of the USA
or check out ourCalifornia travel guide

I've also been to the Dominican Republic, which wasn't on the list. My darling Husband is really a world traveller and has been to many more places than I. We both hope to continue our travels as we go - Even the kids like to travel!

So Where have you been?
Cheers, Denise

I got bitten!

By the crazy quilt bug. So when someone on one of the forums I belong to shared a link to a crazy quilt doll, I had to do it. Now the one that she shared with us didn't have any arms or legs and while I can live with no legs - it looks like a skirt, I have a hard time with that armless thing. Just a personal preference. So here she is in all her glory. Not beaded yet but that is next. I am so totally thrilled with her! It was sure cool to make her and where you may see something that looks not quite right, that's because it isn't and I can bead there and no one will see anything they aren't supposed to see.






And while we are at it - I'm including the finished beaded crazy quilt needle case. I had actually finished it but I posted the before picture because that's all I had. I took a picture of the finished needle case when I took a picture of the doll. So here it is. Good to have things to practice on eh?


Cheers, Denise

What am I working on?

I'm working on my needle case. I took a crazy quilt class to learn the technique and I made my patch into a needle case. What have I learned? There is a reason for people like me in class to be made an example of - what not to do! By the end of the class people were saying - "Oops I did a Denise!" Good thing I knew many of these women! They won't soon be forgetting me either!
Another thing I learned is that there is a quarter inch seam allowance for a reason! And now you know that while on the surface, it may look okay, in reality, there were a couple of seams that didn't take - because I made them too thin. I'll remember for next time. Not a whole lot of good reasons for doing all that work just to have the seam pop.
One other thing. I need to practice the tension on my embroidery. I've pulled too much and the material is buckling. Practice. We all just love to practice don't we?
So, without further ado, here is the needle book - not finished but a work in progress. I love the colours!!!

I'm being very brave

I'm showing you where I create. I don't call it a studio, I call it the art room. I'm happy there, it's messy and it's not very organized and it's full and I've got work to do on it but it's my space and I can find things and it's fun to go down there. I like hanging things up, painting on the walls and keeping the tv on for noise while I work. I use the desk for homework sometimes and there is a daybed in there for sitting on and relaxing. I sleep down there in the really hot nights when upstairs is just too hot.




This is a workbench that I use for an art desk. I like to stand at it which is good because I move around a lot but if I need to sit, I can grab a stool from the kitchen.
My desk. It's so messy right now. I do want to clean it off. I like doing homework here too.

Originally this was a library. I had this loaded with books and now some of these books are redundant and I need to clear more room for more of my art supplies. It's a work in progress.

I have some of my atc's here and chubby books. This is fun for me.

More later. Dinner now!
Cheers, Denise

My dog Springer

My family wasn't too happy to see that I had a great picture of Cole on the blog and poor Springer was stuck in the screen room. So here is a good picture of the boy, lying on his bed. He loves his bed. It is quite funny to see how much he really does love it, he needed to be coaxed onto it for the first month before he finally decided it was a good thing. When we were camping in the trailer for the first time, we were all sitting at the table inside and he wouldn't settle. He sat beside the table looking up at us. I looked at him and said outloud "look at how well I know our dog."
I got up, took a towel and folded it in half. I put it down by the door. Springer got up, went over to the towel, stepped on it and circled around the way dogs do and then tucked himself down onto the towel. He was so cute!
So here he is, in all his cuteness!

Summer Celebration and Stuff

It went well. Summer Celebration was fun. It was a cold day and cold days make people eat! We sold all our hamburgers and hotdogs and had lots of drinks left over. Much easier to store drinks than left over burgers and dogs! The new popcorn machine was a hit too and the young kids at the candy floss machine made mixed colours of floss - I thought that was cool!

A few people were showing off their blog lists so I thought I'd show you all a few that I love to read and follow. Some of them because they are friends, some because of their art, some because they are just plain interesting!

http://www.boobyfish.blogspot.com/ - Heather is a great Californian Friend that was instrumental in my obsession for mixed media! I met her in Washington and we communicate and play on a yahoo group together.

http://www.astitchintime.blogspot.com/ I've never met Debra but she makes me laugh, gets me curious and has great talent. We've conversed and she's great at posting nearly every day. I'm impressed with that.

http://textilegoddess.blogspot.com/ Helen Cowans was the subject of an article in Quilting Arts. I love the texture she brings to her work and the elements of colour and design. She has had studio built on her property and is a very inspiring woman. I like watching things come together, including her studio.

Two more:
http://artsymama.blogspot.com/
http://tryittuesdays.wordpress.com/

I have these two under techniques because they are teaching me tons! I'll be said when the book of dreams is done but my book isn't done so I'll have lots to create.

There are many more blogs that I visit regularly but that's enough for now.

Cheers, Denise

Paint

I love paint. I love to paint. I love all the colours and how it glides on and I don't even mind the smell. I love the colour and my house has lots of colour! You really are only a coat of paint away from a new colour, a new look.
The problem? Paint and I don't get along. I'm a terrible painter. I'm messy, I streak, I can't get an even coat to save my life. I get put into closets. My friends have taken pity on me and painted my house. I'm constantly amazed at how bad of a painter I am!
So when I agreed to make a 4foot by 4foot ball toss, I don't know - I mean really don't know what I was thinking! I'd have to paint it! I just can't believe I said - volunteered to do it! What was I thinking?

Here it is - my ball toss game. I designed it, my dh cut out the holes and then I painted it! Me! All by myself! This is a major accomplishment! I'm so impressed with myself! I can't believe how well it turned out - I mean paint and I just don't get along.

So if you have any compliments on how wonderful I did, I could sure use the praise! I'm sure praising myself!

What have I been doing?

Tickets?

This one is my youngest daughter's favourite.

There were eleven all together.

These are for our schools summer celebration. They needed their ticket boxes decorated. I hope they like them! I'm hoping they will last more than one year. I'm modge podged out for awhile!
My other two projects are to paint a bean bag toss. I'll show you the picture when it's done. I also took the old cans that we knock down and repainted them but they are simple - spray paint red, yellow and blue.
Last weekend, I was at my last mom and me camp with my youngest daughter. I have gone to mom and me camp 5 times! I'm so experienced, it's not funny! It was a good time and I wasn't really needed my youngest who is now a brownie!
When summer celebrations is over this Saturday - I'm with food! - I'll work on my art quilt. It's the class that I took. I'll tell you more about that later. Gotta go paint!