pamgarrison

scenes from saturday

chore-ing

noticing

exercising (and feeling the pain)

indulging

challenging

returning

enjoying

viewing

being

reading

working

thank you-ing

reflecting

cleaning

playing

It was a lovely Saturday, for those of us that live at home, and away at college. I'm glad to have stopped to notice thanks to Ali's  Week In The Life. Hope yours was lovely too!

 

 

 

 

 

new original paintings over on my etsy

Painting, painting, painting, it's all I seem to want to do these days.  I finally have some fully completed pieces

and have listed them for sale over on my etsy shop!

Here are some bits of them:

Here's an instagram of them all in the works:

Oh, how I love color....and pushing it around on the paintings!

oh, it was so lovely

Ahhh, it was so fun to be at Mary Ann's casa Moss! After numerous emails back and forth:

me: Sorry I am a snail today, will see if I can push the boys off an hour or 2 tonight. So what do I need to bring?

her: nothing! yes, the boys need time together, push it back, it's perfect out back in early evening.

me: ok, i'm bringing journals, laptop, papers for students, what am i forgetting?

her: nothing, I will set up our table out back

me: last chance, getting in the car...

her: throw some little paint bottles .... Bright ones.  In a bag.  No more than 10!!!

her: GET IN CAR.  That is an order.    Do not take the 5!!!!!

her:   are you in the car?

She knows I sometimes need to be told what to do, makes it easier for me to streamline and get moving!

I finally arrived. And it was so very fun, as always. We always start with an exchange and examination of each others journals with exclamations and questions and interruptions and tales told. It also includes photos taken like these I took of some of her pages:

In depth discussions about shapes and colors and papers and thoughts.

And then, after we'd feasted our eyes and imaginations and could stand not one minute more of stimulation without participation, we moved out to the perfect painting patio.

Mary Ann snapped this photo of me, but sadly, I failed to pick up my camera again after taking the photos of her journals above. It seems I never ever learn that lesson.

I was instructed to assume a position and do. not. move. I obeyed, after all, I knew genius was at work.

We took turns drawing each other.

After taking a quick break to eat, Mary Ann then tortured me by showing me how she plays on her iPad. I have wanted one since they were first developed, especially after seeing her digtal journaling:

Not sure how much longer I can resist the siren song of the ipad...

We  moved to some PhotoShop demos and "how do you do ____? oh, I do it this way..."  and and and. Then she turned her back and I raided her paper drawer, she caught me,  but let me have the bounty anyway, she's generous like that. She appreciates, but does not hoard. (That must be a nice feeling, hahaha.)

And suddenly, 8 hours had passed. Always too quickly. But we've already made plans for more adventures, and next time I will be sure to take photos of her in action too!

 

what are you working on?

I was reading Ali Edwards blog and when I read the quote by Harry Callahan  (that she saw over on Meredith Winn's blog,) I was struck by how well the quote applies to any medium, not just photography. Here's the quote:

To be a photographer, one must photograph. No amount of book learning, no checklist of seminars attended, can substitute for the simple act of making pictures. Experience is the best teacher of all. And for that, there is no guarantee that one will become an artist. Only the journey matters. - Harry Callahan

So on the journal page I was playing on today, I left the words pertaining to photography out. Go ahead, put in what you are artistically working on, any word, painting, journaling, quilting, illustrating, etc. and see how it holds true.

 

{Here's an  instagram of the page top when I was just getting started. I was at the batting cages with my son. I have to say, the iphone 4 sure does take nice pictures, I mean, the close journal page, the net, the moving bat...}

Anyway, back to the quote. It reminds me of a story the awesome Lynne Whipple once told to the students in her class. She relayed to us that she had an art teacher that said, "you have 10,000 bad paintings in you, you better get busy and get them out of the way." 

Yep. Same concept. So let's get busy doing that which we want to be, practicing the art form, and enjoying the journey. Getting better at it will be icing on the cake.

A pretty rose I couldn't resist taking a photo of when I pulled in  from the bus stop this morning. For those of you that miss all my garden shots of yesteryear (yes, you H!), and are tired of journal of kid shots. I could tie it in with the theme, blossoming and all that, but seems a bit over doing it :). Have a great weekend, I'm going up to see the Butthead to my Beavis, (I'll explain that one another day.) Rest assured, we'll be experiencing one art form or another, hope you will too!! xo

a lot of painting going on lately

Every since I spent the weekend painting with Jennifer Mercede, I just don't want to stop.

And I haven't, pretty much off and on, with many painting supplies left out in the family room amonst all the other living that goes on in there.

Painting on wood panels...

        Everything within range gets paint on it...like journal pages...

On this page I was writing about how I feel like I have so many many ideas but spin round and round and have a hard time gaining any traction with my ideas.

My friend and fellow journaler Hope , recently asked me some journaling questions for her column over at the lovely Ripple Effect. You can see more of my journaling pages and answers to her questions here. And boy, the quote by Maya Angelou on today's Ripple Effect post is pretty much sums up where my thoughts are. The need for change, yep, so I don't feel stuck like the thoughts on the journal page above. Working on it!

 

And even though I've left the supplies out and use them frequently, occasionally I try to pick up at least a little, which included cleaning off my paint palette. The dried paint peeled up easily and struck me as so pretty, that I couldn't resist sewing it down on another journal page. Which then turned into a creative to do list instagram:

 

 Off to tackle something on the list, hope you have a great day!

is your private information too easily accessible??

I recently learned about a site www.spokeo.com that says, "Spokeo is  a people search engine that organizes vast quantities of white-pages listings, social information, and other people-related data from a large variety of public sources."  They have tons of your personal information available, either for free or for a very small fee. Information like family memebers names and ages, income, home phone, and if you scroll down on your info page, an image of your house and surrounding streets etc.  While I understand that they are just culling information from public records (such as birthdate, home purchase price, taxes etc.), this site in particular makes it way to easy for others to access in my mind, and for who knows what use.

Here's how to remove your information if you don't want it there:

1.go to www.spokeo.com

2. enter your name and search

3. once you have found your page, copy the url in the browser window

4.scroll down to bottom and click on tiny light gray "privacy" link

5.scroll down to bottom and paste your url, enter email addy and security code word

6.go to your email and approve , your information should be removed pretty quickly.

7. you may need to do this a few times for nicknames or other addresses, you can only do 2x per email, so if you have more than two listings for yourself, use a different email.

That's it. Do you know of any other sites like this? Please let us know in the comments if you do!

 

new etsy listings

I've listed a pastel version of the You Are Loved print over in my etsy. Thank you to those who have asked and been patiently waiting for it.

I've also listed two new embroidery sampler patterns printed on cotton. One is the pattern made for Meg's Craft Weekends, and one that I want to embroider and make into a pillow for my desk chair.

                 This is the chair I'm envisioning the pillow on. They both have a similar retro feel to me.

I've had another computer move again, can't quite get it right yet. In this latest move I brought the desktop computer out to the family room vs. the office. I needed a real office chair if it was going to be on this taller table I will use as a desk. {You can see the little children's desk I just got from a friend on the left of it.} I searched on the internet and liked this one,  this one, and this one, and then decided instead to go scrub the one I had in the garage that I brought home from my Dad's office when he was closing down his company. I think he's been using it at various offices since the 60's or 70's. Those I share the house with weren't too fond of it, so I took the instagram above to get quick feedback from people whose taste I trust, just to make sure the nostalgia of it wasn't clouding my decision to override the nay votes here. I got a thumbs up from instagram friends, so I'm going with it and am continuing on with moving my focus out here. I can't wait until I get a system that really works best for me figured out and am not wasting time on it!