Bits and Baubles

I made a couple of little graduation gifts last week: one for my daughter and one for her BFF.  I love the look of rosary-style beading, and I had some ready-made pearl chain to start with.  I wanted an eclectic mix of beads, using what I already had in my stash.  I don't do a lot of bead work (you'd never know it, by the number of beads I have hoarded away!), so it was a bit of a challenge picking and choosing, as well as figuring out how to do all those wire loops!

My daughter loves aqua, and her best pal loves pink (kind of obvious by the photos :-)), so I pulled out all of the beads I had that might work.  I added a tiny bit of pink to the aqua one, and vice versa, for little remembrances of each other. 

The pendant is a floral bit of antique lace in a soldered frame, with a little rhinestone cross charm (the two girls had been very active in Young Life together all through high school).

Well, the girls seemed to love them (I never know for sure if they are just being polite, or if they sincerely like them.  The last few years have had most of my suggestions and choices met with eye rolls, so I've begun to doubt myself! :-)).  Anyway, I like them, and who knows?--I may even start to do more beading.

Time Slips Away

I just finished this ATC, for a swap I'm doing with Kimberly.  I think it reflects how melancholy I've been feeling lately about how quickly the years have flown by as I've watched my daughter grow up.  Her last day of high school was yesterday.  The big awards ceremony was today, and of course, I got a little teary-eyed.  She's ready to spread her wings and fly the coop, but some days I wish she was still my little girl playing with her dolls.

Swap Project!

I wrote about participating in Kimberly Law's "Fabric of Nature" ATC swap, here.  I made this little homage to the sea, all out of fabric (no paper allowed!), per her swap guidelines:

She challenged us further, once we received all of the other artists' swaps in return, to figure out a way to display them all together.  Wanting to keep with the 'Nature' theme, I envisioned some sort of twiggy frame to house them.  I planned to go out in the yard and gather fallen branches and wire something together....and then I remembered I had this twig house-shaped planter out in the garage: PERFECT!

I arranged them all together like a tiny patchwork quilt and fastened them to the frame.  Amy's more vividly colored felted creation (it's awesome!) is in the eave at the top, and the darker green signage I'm adding at the bottom balances the color.  The rest, mainly in creams and ecru with little hints of color, are grouped together in the middle.  I just love it!  And I LOVE all of the beautifully crafted little treasures... each so detailed, each so different.

Here's a closer look at the scrumptious, tiny 'Nature' creations that were sent to me:

Top: Karla Jackson.  Middle: Terri Heinz, ArtfulAffirmations.
Bottom: Liz Waring, LuluLizInLaLaLand.

Top: Becky Swartzlander, RebeccaRoseDesigns.  Middle L: Marlene, UniquelyElla.
Middle R: Kimberly Laws,  ArtJoyStuff.  Bottom: Marsha Mees, TatteredChick.

Top: Amy Bauer, on Flicker.  Middle: Jewels Welsh, JustTickety-Boo.
Bottom: Carolyn Huber.

Thanks, everyone, for a great swap!

Proud Mama!

Last week my daughter had her h.s. senior photos taken.  Most of her friends had theirs done in the fall, so I scrambled to find a photographer that could fit her in before school is out, wanting to include photos with her graduation announcements.  I literally googled "Senior Photographers, Portland" and pawed through page after page of possibilities....none of whom impressed me that much, or their prices were so astronomical I quickly moved on.  About 5 or 6 pages in, I stumbled upon a gal who just started her business fairly recently, and the photos in her relatively small online gallery took my breath away!  I thought I'd take a chance, knowing no one who had used her before, and booked an appointment.  OH MY GOSH....SOOOO happy with the results!! (do click on these to view larger; the texture and light are so pretty)

 

We met her at a beautiful forest-y park in a nearby town (Canby), and she took the most scrumptious natural-light photographs.  I wanted her to capture my daughter's beautiful light-colored eyes....and, uh, YEAH, I think she succeeded! They positively GLOW.  We've only seen a few images so far; she is still editing them.  

I am one proud Mama!  I think my little (??) Gretchen looks gorgeous!! (and I am very, very biased!!!)

By the end of the shoot, our darling photographer, Erika Scott (The Red Barn Photography), even got a little teary-eyed and emotional over the images she was capturing.  It was just such a fun, positive experience ...and felt like kismet that we stumbled upon her, out of the blue, and took a chance.

Love it when that happens!  

Be forewarned: once we receive the whole edited package, this proud Mama will be posting more photos...kind of like the neighbors who make you sit through their vacation slide show :-)!!

Baby Steps

If you are visiting me here again, thank you for stopping by, and for your patience! It has been a long time since I did a blog post....I've been in a melancholy funk for a while now, and it became even more pronounced after my mom passed away.  I'm taking baby steps to get back in the swing of things, and one of those steps was to join in on a fun ATC swap.  I hadn't done a swap for a long time, and came upon this one that Kimberly was hosting on her blog, and thought it was the perfect one to get me back in the studio.

The challenge was to create ATCs using fabric, and no paper, for Kimberly's swap, "The Fabric of Nature".  The participants needed to work with the theme "Nature", in any interpretation we wanted, as long as we made the Artist Trading Cards using only fabrics as our substrate. I had just been to the beach, and used that as the nature inspiration for my little art pieces: ...

the view from our hotel:  the boardwalk and Pacific Ocean at Seaside, OR, last month

...the quiet colors of beiges and blues, and peaceful beach-combing when the tide is out (perfect, since we were also instructed to keep our colors "soft, faded, vintage-like").

I'll let my photos show my process...

the back side...

whew!  TWELVE of them...it was a big swap!

ready to ship off to Kimberly!

So I sent off my twelve little creations a couple weeks ago, and yesterday got all of my swaps back in the mail!  They are so wonderful, and I'll share them soon!

It was good to take a little baby step and have some fun!  So glad you stopped by :-)

Bragging

My daughter is eighteen, about to graduate from high school, and I am so impressed with her talent that I had to brag a little bit.  Look at this piece she created, just finishing it late last night:

It is a wonderful tribute piece of my mom, her grandma.  I posted pictures in my last post, right after Mom died last month.  My daughter used one of the photos for reference and drew this portrait of Mom in charcoal on vellum  She cut around the image and stitched it over a collage: a swath of Mom's handwriting, a photocopy of of her as a little girl, some old doilies, all on a crumpled paper bag.  I think it is just beautiful.  I'm such a proud mom, and also touched that she honored her grandmother so sweetly.  My daughter is preparing a series of 13 portraits, for a portfolio she hopes will earn her an AP Studio Art credit for next year.  She'll be a freshman in the school of design at KU, in Lawrence, KS in the fall----so FAR away from us in Portland.  I'm going to miss her like crazy.

So glad we'll be able to Skype!!

Saying Goodbye to my Beautiful Mom

My adorable mom passed away on Monday night.  We knew it was coming, but saying a final goodbye is so hard.  I look at her pictures through the years, and remember such a vital, compassionate, spunky, kind, funny woman...and am so thankful for her and for all the wonderful memories.  I'm heading to Lincoln, NE for her funeral, and to see my three sisters again.  The last time we were all together, was almost exactly a year ago, when my sweet dad died.  I'm 'busy', tying up loose ends here before I go, but feel like I'm in a fog. 

My, how we both changed!

She was on this earth for 96 years, 2 months, and 22 days.  I was so blessed to have her as my Mom.

This was my last visit with her, a year ago, after my Dad's funeral.     My precious mom.