Happy Halloween!!

Happy Halloween from the AZ desert! 

a Halloween treat from my sister Judy-
a cute cupcake paper owl and brooms
made using Twizzlers and SB paper.
(I think she's been looking at Pinterest for craft ideas- lol!!)

my jack o lantern. using the stem as a nose is more difficult
than it looks-- I have a newly found appreciation
for people who do pumpkin carving professionally!

Tom's jack o lantern, all happy to see Halloween
finally here. (little does he know, he's only going to last
a day or two in this high 80s heat!) 

labor day weekend (so far) in pictures

hanging out at the Honda dealership, getting new tires put on my car.

(it was sort of an emergency- this was not how I was planning on spending Saturday afternoon!)

Sunday afternoon: Labor Day barbecue with our dear friends Mike and Billie Nejedly.

Roasting vegetables on the grill- yum! Tom cooling off by hanging out in the pool . (approx 88 degrees: bathwater!)

barbecued ribs, corn, and roasted potatoes-- tasty!!

our gracious hosts-- hanging out by the pool, talking, at the end of the evening.

quick trip to the grocery store on Monday afternoon

(check out the letter "O" in the word Patio)

closeup of the O: they're almost out of room!!

roasting chile peppers: this is one of the best smells in the world!

waiting to be peeled, then added to grilled chicken-- a great way to finish off the weekend.

Hope you're all having an enjoyable long weekend!

random photo catch-up post (lots of pics)

I finally did some photo editing from the past couple weeks... here you go! (they're not exactly in order, because Blogger loads them backwards, and I don't feel like dealing with moving them around.)

Prescott is already about 9 months old; where does the time go?!? He's filling out and starting to get his adult coat; I can't wait to see what he looks like when it all grows in! (he looks rather like Sedona in this pic, which is somewhat bittersweet.)

...contentment... oh, to have a life as simple as this!

this is Tom's "look of fear" for how he should tackle this burger... LOL! We had lunch at a local restaurant recently; this burger is Teakwoods' "Touch 'em All" burger, with three kinds of cheese, guacamole, bacon, and two kinds of peppers- he said it was delicious, and it actually made 3 meals altogether.

This is an average level of weekend traffic on the highway out of town. (keep scrolling, and you'll get why I took this shot.)

and this is what you can sometimes see next to the highway, if you're lucky! I love seeing the wild horses; it sort of makes me feel like I'm in "the Old West" when I see things like this.

Prescott and Bisbee, having a heckuva good time... when they really get going, the only thing to do is keep out of their way!

this was taken over Memorial Day weekend, making use of our new fire pit. Smores were made, marshmallows were roasted, cigars were smoked, and a good time was had by all.

Last Sunday we went here (Gammage Auditorium, at ASU... designed by Frank Lloyd Wright, by the way) to see this:

Les Miserables is touring for its 25th anniversary-- Tom and I have both seen it before; I saw it at least 10-15 years ago, and for Tom, it was closer to 20 years ago... they updated the staging for this tour, and of course, the music was wonderful. (I love this musical so much; I have the ultimate soundtrack, and pretty much know the songs word for word.)

altogether it was a pretty nice couple of weeks! And, I'm in the process of cleaning off some desk space in my craft room; once I print some photos (including some of the ones above), I'll be making some scrapbook layouts. (hopefully, that is!)

scrappy goings-on

yes, I do still use all the scrapping supplies in my craft room... not always for SB pages, but I have gotten some photos printed, and am slowly getting my scrapping mojo back... it helps to have great photos of some really beautiful scenery, too! (you can click on any of the photos to see them larger.) this is a 2-page layout that evolved over the course of a couple weeks-- I just love how our photos of the San Xavier del Bac mission turned out; it's such a beautiful place, I don't think you could get a bad photo! We visited there when we took a short trip thru SW Arizona last Christmas... it was started during the 1600s, and was finished in 1797, and sits in the middle of the Tohono O'odham (which means Desert People) Reservation just outside Tucson. I've never even been inside anyplace that old before; the history of the place was astounding to me. (it's still a working Catholic church, even today!)

This 5x7 photo was my first inspiration; I really love how the photo captured the glow of the whitewashed adobe, and the sandstone carvings on the facade. I wanted to show off the photo, but also do something a bit "artistic" with the page. I started with a page layout sketch I found on the internet (I think it was from the Pencil Lines blog, but I'm not sure, since I lost my notes), and changed it up a bit. Since the "nickname" of the church is The White Dove of the Desert, I decided to use a chipboard bird accent. The brown patterned paper was chosen to bring out the sandstone color on the building, and I really liked the look of the fabric on the page. At the bottom, I used some really small sticker letters to spell out "San Xavier del Bac Mission" across both pages- they're only about 1/4 inch across, so they were a bit of a pain to put in place, but I like the look.

Here's the second page of the layout-- it has another chipboard accent, a bit more of the fabric, the same patterned paper, and more rickrack.

This 2-page layout is photos of the interior-- the inside of the church is chock-full of paintings and statues, all the way up the walls and ceiling. There's so many ornate carvings, statues, and paintings that you couldn't possibly hope to see all of it, or take really good photos of some of it, but we tried.

The focal point of the lefthand page is the main sanctuary of the church facing the altar; it was decorated for Christmas when we went. I decided to use blue and red, to accent the photos-- I also used a patterned paper that looks like peeling paint to play up the age. I used a few chipboard shapes painted gold, to match the pattern on the red paper. I also decided to write my journaling with gold pen (which may not have been the best choice for this page, since it's kinda hard to read).

The other page of this layout-- more of the "peeling paint" paper as a border, and a bit of the red and gold scroll paper used as a photo corner. I cropped some close-ups of statues, and had them printed as 2x3 wallet sized photos, which I lined up on the border. (The gold writing looks tons better on the dark blue, doesn't it??) I also used the teeny letter stickers to identify my photos for journaling purposes. I have tons more photos from the mission, but they're just going to go into a regular photo album, I think. Now, I just have to work on layouts from our visit to Tombstone, AZ and the ostrich ranch. (yes, I wrote ostrich ranch... check it out here. Ostriches are kinda scary close up, but it was a hoot to see the place!)

Spoiler alert!! Valentine Mail-Art

I forgot about President's Day (no mail, darn it!), so some of my Valentine mail may be really late in getting to its destination, but I can't wait any longer to show my postcards to you!! I started them out with a large piece of corrugated cardboard and peeled off the outside layer to expose the wavy insides (every once in a while I go thru the recycle container at work, looking for cardboard boxes... not every box is the same type of cardboard- some tear apart easier than others).

After I exposed the corrugated layer, I painted the whole piece with acrylic paint and gesso- dry brushing gesso, red, pink, light blue, and green over the entire thing. Then, I cut 4 x 6 or 5 x 7 pieces for the postcards, and went from there. (fyi, these pics were done using the scanner, not the camera, so the colors definitely look better in person.)

For these two, I used a Stampington rubber stamp (Scroll heart) with heat embossing in pirate's gold... The paper and stickers are all from the Basic Grey Sugared line... I love the look of Basic Grey papers, but for some reason I've always been afraid of using them- maybe because there's so many patterns, it scares me a little. I really like the way it turned out on my postcards, mixing it up with the paint and the rubber stamp.

The tickets came from my favorite store, Frenzy Stamper. Debbie has rolls of blank tickets on tons of colors; since they're blank, you can stamp anything you can fit onto them! (Frenzy Stamper is definitely one of those stores that I can't go into without spending money, but she has such good stuff, I can't help it!!)

After getting the basic design elements together, I brushed gold paint on the edges to finish them off. On the reverse, I glued watercolor paper for writing the sentiment and address... (since some of the cardboard still had the box company logo on... I figured that wouldn't really add too much to the romance of the design.)

I also mixed it up on a couple of them with manila shipping tags, ribbon, fibers, and more of the Basic Grey stickers. These tags caused some consternation for the postal worker at my local PO... she looked at them, made a face, and said "ooooh, this isn't good..." What, I can't mail them?? Everything's glued! "oh, but these small tags aren't secured; they'll get torn off- wouldn't you like to tape them down with scotch tape??" Heck, no, I wouldn't! I spent all this time making them, and now you think I want to plaster scotch tape all over them??

And yes, I know I was taking my chances, but I have faith in our Postal System... thru rain, sleet, snow, dark of night, and all that, right?? I think they can handle a few little cardboard postcards! (PS- please let me know if your postcard got to you in one piece, so I know whether or not my faith was justified!! LOL!!)

thankful 2008

okay, so this is a Thanksgiving weekend post, not a Thanksgiving Day post, but I'm still just as thankful...

for my family- for my Thomas (I can't put it into words without sounding sappy, so I won't even try); for the furry companions we share our lives with, both canine and feline; for my family members all across the midwest (even though we don't get together very often any more); for my friends, both new and old... companionship of all sorts makes this journey through life sooo much more interesting!

(Bisbee is sacked out on the couch next to Tom... she's the funniest dog ever!) Sedona, patiently waiting for me to take her picture, so she could get up... I never knew I was a "dog person" before we got her; I'd only ever thought I was a cat person, but dogs are so much more sociable than cats... one's not better than the other, it's just different. Plus it's just a riot, watching Sedona and Bisbee play together (there's no way I could get pictures of that, though, so you'll just have to trust that it's hilarious)!

I'm thankful that we have a comfortable home, decent jobs, medical benefits, and the means to have the things we like in order to to be comfortable... (this is the "Before" picture of our Thanksgiving Day spread, which included roast duck, a wonderful bottle of Shiraz wine, sweet potato casserole, a relish tray, and homemade bread). I'm also thankful we live in such a beautiful (although seemingly inhospitable) part of the country, and that I have a chance to see Nature's majesty every day when I drive through the desert.

I'm thankful that I have a creative personality, and an outlet for all the ideas that float around in my head... every once in a while I talk to people who have pursuits that aren't creative/artistic at all, and they give me a weird look when I tell them that I like to spend my time painting, cutting, and pasting. I can't imagine NOT being like this!!

(I'm also thankful that both our employers gave us a 4-day weekend, and that we don't have to get up early tomorrow!)

go west... Northwest, actually

We're off! Tomorrow (eeeaarrrly- ick!) we're heading to Seattle for the weekend- yay!! I've wanted to see Seattle for ages... Tom has been there twice for work, and it's one of the cities he looks forward to visiting, even if it is work-related. We're looking forward to a whirlwind weekend full of of sightseeing, exploring, and fresh seafood. See you next week!