RED ALERT!

RED ALERT!!!!!

Jane has some ATCs published in this book which is hot off the presses!!! Please see page 135 for her totally great art work!! I have not really looked through the book yet, but Mike and I flipped through it and he found Jane's name!!! How cool!!!! So, run, don't walk, to your nearest store or go to the website to order one of your own! I predict this will bring on a resurgence of ATC trading!

Congratulations Jane!!!!!

Saturday Night

- Reading Entertainment Weekly
-Reading my current book
-Watching TV with Mike
-Listening to my Ipod on my fabulous Klipsh speakers (Rod Stewart, Ramones, Paul McCartney, Flatt and Scruggs, Celia Cruz, REM)
-Working on the Faux Family Album project to send into Somerset Memories magazine
-Petting cats
-Taking a nap

I LOVE SATURDAY NIGHTS!!!!!!!

Club!

This past Saturday we had Club!! Above pictured are me, John, Bertha, Patti, Stan, Joyce, and Trish in the front. 20 years ago (that is an obscene amount of time!) we all worked together at Ingalls Hospital in the Psychiatric Unit!!!! Oh, the fond memories we have!!!! Anyway, we started meeting once a month or so and called it club. Now we are lucky to get together two to three times a year, but it is always such a joy when we do. Together we have been through the deepest tragedies that life has to offer and we have also celebrated all of life's joys. I would be lost in a world without these people!
On the work front my new job is going very well. It is only the end of day #2, but I am enjoying it so far. Jane is a great teacher, and it is so wonderful to work in an office with a bunch of nice people and no Crabby/Debbie Downer types!!!!

What Am I Going to Be When I Grow Up?

Well, I am back in the ranks of the employed. It has been three weeks, and I kind of hoped I would have several months off, but that was quite unrealistic! My dear friend Jane (of Stop, Drop, and Crop fame) got me a job in the law office where she works! I shall be her Gal Friday! Helping, assisting, and learning legalese! We are going to be working side by side, and for those of you who know us personally, that is going to be quite a hoot! Seriously, though we plan to run that office like a tight ship!!! There will be no ringing of the dysfunction junction bell! I will have a ton to learn but I am very excited and grateful for this opportunity! I am even going to have to wear "dress up"clothes! At least that is what I am calling clothing other than the scrubs I got away with wearing to the hospital.

I felt like a total "career woman" today as I wore my fancy pants and shoes and clicked around those wooden floors! Click, click, click....hear me roar, I am a professional career woman people!" This might lead to daily mascara wearing!!!! Yikes! Not to mention under eye cover up!

This all got me to thinking of what I wanted to be when I was growing up:

Ballerina
Stewardess (there were no flight attendents then!)
Barbra Streisand
Nurse
Police Woman (ala Angie Dickinson, remember her cool pantsuits??)
and more recently...
Librarian
Reading Specialist

Since those last two require more schooling, I have opted to jump into the law office gig!!

I start next Monday.

Pray for Jane..........

CREDIT INFORMATION: The first two images were found in Google and are from Soule Mama's blog.

Double Dose of Happy

This is a card I made at Stamp Camp last week. I sent it to my Mom! The stamp I used is from Stamping Up and is owned by Lorie. I think I need it!

My scanner is broken and in the shop! So, no scanning for about two months....I will have to become more proficient at picture taking! I would have loved to scan something I got in the mail today from Nan of Letters from a Hill Farm! She sent me the coolest stickers from Cavallini and Company. They are the Bird and Nest Stickers! Absolutely gorgeous and the coolest thing is that they have been on my "want it" radar for some time!!!

AND IN ADDITION TO THAT, Nan listed my blog for the Thinking Blogger Award!!! Okay, I am not sure of all that this entails, but the most important thing for me is that she listed my blog and what she said about it.......oh, it made me so happy! She described me in ways that I don't usually think of myself.

When someone lists your blog, you are to list five of the blogs that make you think and bring you joy for the same award. Five blogs that have not previously been chosen for this award.

The participation rules are simple:

1. If, and only if, you get tagged, write a post with links to 5 blogs that make you think,
2. Link to this post so that people can easily find the exact origin of the meme,
3. Optional: Proudly display the 'Thinking Blogger Award' with a link to the post that you wrote.

Here are five of the many blogs that I love that make me think:

LOTUS READS: Oh, how I love this blog! It is so exciting to find a new entry by Anjali! She is so smart and well-read. She is so well-versed in so many areas. She is a great reader and gives excellent book reviews. She sees interesting movies and talks about those. And really smart people leave great comments on her blog. Plus, she is a peach of a person!!

STUDIO STUFF: This is a blog by a very talented artist!!! I love her artwork and I love reading about her children/grandchildren. This blog never fails to inspire me and get me dreaming about things I could make.

WEE WONDERFULS: This blog makes me want to learn to embroider right this instant! Always full of eye candy and great ideas, and such a lovely feeling of comfort found right here!

PRAIRIE PAPER AND INK: Here is total inspiration for the card maker!!! Everytime I visit I am so excited by the great combinations of colors, stamps, and paper that Amy puts together!!!!!! She also has a lot of tutorials on her blog that are so helpful! Smart cookie!!

BLUHM STUDIOS: Here is the blog that really got me going! Heather helped me figure out some blog stuff and she also makes my totally cool banners for me! She puts out a zine, Portals, that is so smart and chock full of ideas and inspiration. Always inspiring, and always ready to lend a helping hand, such a sweetie!

There are many more blogs that I could list, really all the blogs on my blog roll fit the bill! Please visit as many as you can!

Viva la inspiration!!!!

Stamp Camp- March 10, 2007

Yesterday we had a very special Stamp Camp which included some very special people!!! Above pictured are Trish (the lone adult in this picture), James, Christopher, and Kathryn. Trish is teaching her project in this shot.

See, once a month we have Stamp Camp. We get to go to Lorie's house where we relax, laugh, eat, and create!!! It is a blast! Lorie is a Stamping Up demonstrator, but more imporantly she is one of my very best friends! Oh, she also happens to be Mike's aunt. That is how I first met her, but through the years we have become friends more than anything else. Lorie is the person who introduced me to stamping and got me hooked!!! At first I told her I did not need another craft, boy was I wrong!!! I need to stamp!!

Our stamp camps are usually adults only, but yesterday we had a treat because Lorie's grandkids and their lovely Moms came over too!! So we each "taught" a project. The kids had us make something that they made up and visa versa. It was a total blast and so darn cute!
Here is Christopher working on Trish's card!
DANCE BREAK!!!!! Here are Lorie and James dancing to the Arthur Godfrey Orchestra's Slowpoke!! That is one of Lorie's Dad's favorite songs!
Miss Kathryn is an accomplished dancer and here she is delighting us with one of her routines to Born to be Wild!!!! Action shot!
Darling kids with cool finished projects!!!
Miss Trish and Miss Laura had to horn in on this cute picture!!!! Please note that the very cute Mr. Sam (aged 2) could not be pinned down for any pictures (nor could Susan or Jaime the very lovely mothers of these kids!) . Great day people!!!!

Tootfest 2007!!!!

We had a fabulous time this weekend at Tootfest 2007!!! We all beat the weather odds and made it to the hotel.......which was fabulous mostly for the big table in our room. We were all able to gather around and create! Pictured above is Beth working on a journal cover. She showed a really cool way to cover the journal with precisely measured scraps of paper. Totally great!
Jane made this wonderful collage and then covered it with beeswax per the wonderful Kim!
Here are some of the most wonderful projects done by Trish (AKA Trixie). These are gorgeous!
Here is a picture of our table in use!!
Here Kim and I are going through our many vintage pictures that give us inspiration!

We had a perfect weekend of bonding, eating good food, drinking good drinks, making cool art, shopping for antiques and supplies, and just generally girlfriending!!!! Perfect weekend!!! I am ready to do it again!!!!!!

March 1st!!!!!! New month, new life!

Artwork by Kim of Art Dog's Life This is SO gorgeous!!! Thank you Kim!!!!

Thank you everyone for your invaluable and supportive comments! You all helped me so much. I am not clear on what my new path will be yet. I am slowly working on it, but also taking in a healthy dose of relaxation. The cool thing is that Mike is between jobs too, so he is home for a couple of weeks. We are finally getting some much needed time to do house repairs and generally getting our life in order.

However, first order of business is TOOTFEST 2007! Okay, this is the scoop, Julie and Kim were going to be in Chicago this weekend......so we decided to hang out....then Beth could also come down, and of course, Trish and Jane live here....so we decided to rent a suite with a conference room table in the room so that we could have a pajama party and our own little art retreat!!! So the plan is on Saturday we are going antique shopping and then back to our room to hang out and create!!! Do you all remember that a toot is the coin phrased by Mike and I to describe a day of doing all the stuff you love the best (mainly for us it referred to going to multiple bookstores!)?

Oh, I forgot to tell about the opera!!! Well, it was fantastic! I started out my solo trip to the opera with a two block walk from the opera house to Starbucks!! As you may remember, I have recently found the joy in drinking a latte!!! Then back to the opera house to sip my latte and people watch prior to finding my seat, which was perfect! Dress Circle, right above the box seats, clear view..........the house lights dimmed and we were off! The music was amazing! (Poulenc). The story (as most opera stories are) was convoluted and strange, but the singing and the staging were amazing!!!! If you ever get a chance to see an opera, try it......Here is a list of some of my favorite operas:

The Magic Flute
La Traviata
Gotterdamerung
Cosi Fan Tutte
Rusalka
The Ghosts of Versailles
Aida
Don Giovanni

Today my Mom is coming over so we can stamp and work on our art journals!!! That will be lots of fun!!!!

Yesterday we had to run errands and we ended up at Barnes and Noble. In our new frugal era we each were alloted one book.....this is the one I ended up with. It looks so totally interesting, it is a memoir about a family from Vietnam who came to live in America in 1975.