Falling Leaves

Falling Leaves

Isn't that what fall brings?  With all the leaves floating down to earth also comes a great opportunity for play!!!  Remember being a kid and that great feeling of jumping into a big pile of leaves that your dad just raked only to have him get flustered - but there was always a little smirk on his face as he probably remembered doing the same when he was a child.  To this day I love taking a walk in the fall and shuffling through a pile of leaves....I love to hear the crunch and watch the leaves scatter about...there is that inner child in my that would love to jump right in.  But as we get older we are more unlikely to through caution to the wind as we did as children.  My grandchildren had no fear of anything this fall afternoon and used the occasion of my husbands efforts of raking to  foster some old fashioned play.  I then had to run for the camera.   I had almost as much fun watching them as they did finding a new outlet to expel some energy.....

Niko diving in...

How did you find me in here?

Mahina swimming in the leaves...

One, two, three  

GO!

Look how many I have?

Nonno and his helpers...

Now Sandy blew through earlier this week [thankfully without much fanfare in my neck of the woods] and all the leaves are wet and yucky.....a few days of sun and maybe another romp through the leaf pile before we start building snowmen!!!

Happy Leaf Jumping...

Scrabble Tile Art

Scrabble Tile Art

Two gals, Beth and Doris, from one of the art groups I belong to, In My Vintage Room [which you can find on Yahoo], are hosting a "Halloween Gathering" at the end of the month.  I thought it would be fun to gift all the gals attending with a scrabble tile pendant in the spirit of Halloween.  I had found directions on how to make them on the Internet.  There are many sites that will give you the all the info you need but I found one that has very easy steps to follow.  You can find the instructions and what supplies are used here.   I purchased the collage sheet, scrabble tiles and aanaraku bails from different shops on Etsy; very easy to find if you do a "search" on Etsy.  They are a fun little project to do.  I think I'll do some tiles for the Christmas Holidays, too!

 Halloween Collage Sheet 

Scrabble Tiles - Images - Aanraku Bails

Tiles with Images

Tiles with edges painted black

Adhesives

Tiles after Diamond Glaze Dried

Tiles with Aanraku Bails attached with E6000

Finished Tile Pendants

Steampunk ATC & Watercolor Flowers

Steampunk ATC Swap

I received my ATC's from Maura a few days ago.  I really can not tell you how impressed I was with all the little pieces of art that were created for this swap.  As I mentioned in my previous post, I had a hard time getting my head into "Steampunk" and had a difficult time coming up with ideas for my ATC's.  After seeing what was created I only hope that the gals who received my ATC's were not too disappointed.  I tried, really I did!  Check out all the artwork here at the "In My Vintage Room and Beyond Blog".

I have been busy with my grandchildren these days as my DIL has been traveling for work and haven't really had too much time to create.  I am working on the witches hat I posted in my previous post and also planning 3 ATC Christmas Ornaments for the exchange I am hosting over at In My Vintage Room and Beyond in November.  I have managed to squeeze in some Halloween scrabble tile necklaces to give as gifts at the end of this month and will soon post pictures of them.  Here are a couple of watercolor's I had painted a while ago and just framed.  These will be gifts; one for someone who is always very giving and the other is for a friends mom:

These are both watercolors

These are in my comfort zone - I love doing these little watercolors.  These are a result of a You Tube video I had seen a couple of years ago from one of my favorite artists Martha Lever...check her out, she is amazing and very witty!!!

Hope everyone enjoys the weekend although the weather people are calling for more rain.  I guess the rain we didn't get all summer is coming now - all at once.  

good wishes . . . 

Steampunk & Halloween Art Swap

Steampunk & Halloween Art Swap

I have been working on two art exchanges this past week for one of my art groups  inmyvintageroomandbeyond.blogspot.com- trying to get things "in" before the day after the deadline.  One of the challenges was to create a Halloween themed Little Fat Book Page, [a 4" x 4" chipboard based "canvas"]; and the other was to create 3 Steampunk ATC's [artist trading card - a 2-1/2" x 3-1/2" chipboard based "canvas"].  Halloween was not too much of a problem - but, although I love Steampunk, my mind has a hard time creating Steampunk!

The way the challenge's work are to create however many pieces of art the hostess request for a certain challenge.  For instance, Doris is the hostess for the Halloween swap asked for one for one LFB - so each participant will mail her their LFB and she will exchange one LFB for another and send it back through the mail.... the same for the ATC's.  Maura is the hostess of the Steampunk swap and she asked for 3 for 3 ATC's and whoever participates in the swap will receive three ATC's in exchange.  Let me tell you, this group of gals is so very talented....if you check out the blog [link is above] for pictures of the Steampunk ATC's after the 30th of this month you will see some amazing work.  The Halloween swap is not due until the middle of October but if you go to the above link you will see other excellent  creations from this talented group from past challenges.  There is a list of upcoming swaps/challenges on the right sidebar.  This group is always welcoming new artists to join in with us and share their talents.

With all that said, I'll share my exchanges - hopefully the gal who get's one of my "canvases" will like it.....

Front of the Halloween Themed LFB page

Back of the LFB page

Steampunk - ATC

Steampunk - ATC

Steampunk - ATC

I'd like to add that there is a group of us from In My Vintage Room who are altering this paper mache witches hat....the reveal will be at our October Halloween Gathering Party on Oct. 29th - I'll post pictures after this event.  The blog has a post of ideas on Altered Witches Hats....here is the "naked" hat.....

good wishes ......

Annual Family Camping Trip - 2012

17 of my family [not everyone was able to camp this year; it's usually about 23; my niece's Amanda, her husband Robbie, kids Gianna and Cameron, my niece Christina and her boyfriend John were not present] and 5 "extended" family members descended upon the Adirondack Mountains near Lake George for our annual pilgrimage to "close out the summer".  The kids, ages 4 yrs. old to 17 yrs. old,  had a wonderful time swimming in the lake, fishing, boating, playing cards and making s'mores by the nightly campfire.  The men also have a wonderful time doing about the same thing with the addition of few alcoholic beverages [women as well] after the little kids were bedded down for the night.  The gals took a trip to the Lake George Outlets for some shopping and my sister-in-law Cynthia [visit her blog] and I worked in our art journals one afternoon.  We had several visitors who stopped by on different days for visits.  I am so happy to announce not one disagreement among us [that is a bit unusual when all of us are gathered together over a long period of time!!! You know, Italian families and all!].  The owner of the camp grounds is always happy to see us come in but I am sure he is even happier when we leave....we are known to be very loud at times!

Let me explain one thing here, I say camping and it is camping as were are in the Adirondack's among the trees and all, however we stay in cabins [small ones I might add] that have a private bathrooms, running water, electricity, heat, microwaves, stoves, refrigerators, beds with real mattresses [some more comfortable than others] and air conditioning....this is about as rough as I can manage.  These little cabins are right on the lake; there is a beach and two docks with paddle boats and row boats for our use.  It really is a great place.....

Although we had a ton of fun, it is always sad to see this trip come to an end as it represents the "end of summer".   I'll share some pictures:

Sunrise on the Lake-picture taken from my cabins kitchen window

Sunrise after the "Blue Moon"

The red building is my cabin-sleeps six

My nephew Jonathan, his son Brandon, my husband in red jacket and my grandson Niko

Niko

My son Anthony and my brother Frank "taking it easy"

Playing cards

My granddaughter Mahina with my brother's dog Oliver

My family 

All the 2012 Campers

Grandnieces Lexie in middle, Gabby on right and my granddaughter Mahina on left

Mahina on the beach

Brandon, my DIL Moani and nephew Levi

Lexie and Brandon making s'mores

My grandnephew Brandon, who caught the biggest fish this year, with my grandson Niko

Until next year......

Long Sands Beach, York, ME

My husband and I took a short trip to my favorite vacation spot - York Beach, ME!  We hadn't been there in several years and I was yearning for a sunrise walk on "long sands" beach.  Of course we did the tourist things like a visit to Nubble Light House, walked the mile long [twice] Marginal Way and ate at our favorite places - Orweeds at Perkins Cove [the BEST New England clam chowder] and Fox's at Nubble Light House.  We also brought home 10 beautiful Maine Lobsters to share with the "kids" and special neighbors.  Following are a few shots of this beautiful, beautiful part of the world:

Just after the sun "woke up" - 6:30 AM Long Sands Beach

Nubble Light House - there were divers at the Light House searching for ???...

Marginal Way - look closely at the last picture - it is of what I call "rock pile art" that people were doing or did create in certain areas along the Marginal Way - they were amazing!

Children's "sand art" along the beach...