Mitchell Grafton Ceramic Art
Filed under ceramics
A Bit of Progress
I am FINALLY making a bit of progress on my efforts to lose the lard. My new goal is to try to lose 2.5 lbs each week. That should be doable. I am concentrating on eating controlled portions and not snacking in-between, drinking lots of water and staying active, moving as much as possible.
I was working a lot outside, trying to get my veggie garden going, so I haven’t been ‘exercising’ as I should. I will try now to get back into my yoga practice.
I’ll plan to bring you a ‘progress’ report or two. Fingers crossed.
Filed under DIET!, exercise, getting the lard off
Creativity with Corks
Filed under Creativity with Corks
Bryony Jennings Fabric Art 3
Bryony Jennings Fabric Art – myowlbarn.com
Filed under Embroidery/Sewing Art
Vicarious Sunrise on the Beach
Thanks to my SIL, who is vacationing with friends, we can share the gorgeous sunrise this morning.
Filed under vicarious enjoyment
Remembering
Filed under Childlike Fun, Encouragement, memories
Sometimes
Filed under Favorite Quotes, Poohisms
Monday
Good morning. I’m not feeling very energetic this morning. No problems, really – my get-up-and-go just got-up-and-went. :0)
I harvested a lot of spinach yesterday. I still had some in the fridge, too. After watching a YouTube video on storing fresh spinach, I’ll take mine out of the gallon bags. The guy recommends using plastic containers and paper towels. I’ll store some that way for salads. I’ll chop up the rest and freeze it.
It hasn’t started to rain yet, but it’s supposed to today. In fact, it’s supposed to rain all week. I’m actually looking forward to it because I won’t have to feel guilty that I’m not out in the yard working. :0) I really want to start playing with the new art stuff I received last week.
I have materials to try an ‘acrylic pour.’ The Internet defines this as, “Acrylic Paint Pouring is a fluid painting technique used to create art by pouring acrylic paint onto a canvas. … The Acrylic Pouring technique allows artists to apply colour in puddles, pools and marble-like patterns. Pouring results in a smooth, glossy paint film that is perfectly even and blemish free.”
A lady did a beautiful demonstration of using some leftover “pours” that she did on a piece of plastic, transferring that to a piece of wood. She used a material called, “crackle gel” to add texture, and then rolled on gold paint to highlight that texture. The resulting piece looked like this –
This makes me drool, and itch to play. So Mother Nature, please bring on the rain so I can give myself permission to play in my art room! :0)
I hope that you are safe and happy this Monday morning. Have fun with your day!
Thing Two
I may have mentioned (griped) that, starting about 6pm this evening, we’re supposed to get rain every day through the 27th! So Thing Two on my list today was to harvest some of our veggies from the garden.
The garden has gone nuts. I filled my basket with spinach, then went back and harvested lettuce. By the time I got everything washed and stored, I was too tired to go back and harvest more.
The thing I’m MOST pleased with is that I grew an actual head of lettuce. Just like one you can buy in the grocery store.
It’s about 4pm here now. I’m going to get a cup of coffee and enjoy my book for awhile, now that I have finsiehd Thing One and Thing Two. :0) I hope your Sunday has been a good one.
Thing One
I’ve been trying to get to cleaning my aquarium for the past week. I TALK a good game sometimes, but am not always terrific about actually following through. I just finished finally DOING it as one of my two projects for the day.
Everything is squeeky clean for them now. They didn’t SAY anything, or do back flips, but they HAVE been checking out the huge shell in the tank, swimming the length of the opening over and over. They are too big to actually get inside, so they can look to their heart’s content.
I only have two fish, but they are goldfish – notorious for needing a lot of care to keep their tank clean. I have found a combination that works really well, after a lot of trial and error. I’m using a filtering system called AquaClear. It has a three-part filter consisting of foam, a layer called, BioMax that filters out bio ‘stuff,’ and finally a carbon filter. This worked pretty well, but I was still getting a lot of algae pretty quickly. I found a product call No More Algae. It’s a tablet you put into the tank after you clean it. It says not to use a carbon filter with it, so I paid attention. Now I can go a month or more before even thinking about having to change the water.
Now I finally have happy, clean fish who are pleased with the addition of the shell to explore.
Filed under Family, Housekeeping - Maintenance
Happy Sunday!
The predicted rains haven’t started yet, so I will try to harvest some veggies today. I’ll post some pics after I wash and bag them. Happy to live on top of a ridge line right now. We may need a boat by the end of this…
I sold this tote on Amazon Handmade last night. The image doesn’t show how sparkly it is. It will go in the mail tomorrow. :0)
My SIL and some friends are renting a house on the beach for a week for lots of peace and relaxation. She took this photo this morning, pre-sunrise. I am so happy she can get away and soak this up! And WE can enjoy her vacation vicariously!!! :0)
Yesterday the postman delivered a big box with the things I ordered to try a couple of techniques new to me – acrylic pours and crackle paint. Here is the link to a YouTube demonstration if you’d like to watch
Here is the URL is the link above doesn’t work for you – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5RTCTlsXtdQ&list=RDCMUCYOO4iZpEqJxTv4_ItyTQSw&start_radio=1&rv=5RTCTlsXtdQ&t=0&ab_channel=MiiPaintings
I will wait until we get some rain to play in my art room.
Have a fun Sunday!
Nice Day
It is a wonderful day here so far. It’s overcast, but not raining. I have two main things to do:
THING ONE – get a haircut this afternoon
THING TWO – finish planting flowers.
Yesterday we went to the local nursery to get two flowers that my husband likes – impatiens and wave petunias. We’ve cut back on what we’re planting this year as kind of a leftover from the pandemic. We had already checked several places for flowers. This year I would have been content with planting any number of flowers we saw. Finally, it came down to the fact that my husband wanted wave petunias and impatiens, and was willing to drive to Ft. Smith to get them. Happily, we were able to find a bright orangy impatiens for the front porch and other shady areas in front of the house, plus wave petunias in a gloriously deep purple.
This is the color of the impatiens I planted yesterday. It should spread nicely, filling a couple of shallow round faux terra cotta planters on the porch, plus I dotted them in the brick planters that line the front of the house.
This is the color of the wave petunias we found. I’m cleaning out 4 large terra cotta pots that live up high on the railing of the deck, plus some other planters on the floor of the deck.
I’ll take pictures when the flowers start to look nice.
Tonight the rains are supposed to start. (My mouth dropped open when I saw this. I may still look like a gaping fish. )
Partly cloudy early with increasing clouds overnight. A stray thunderstorm is possible. Low 63F. Winds SSE at 5 to 10 mph.
Sun 16
79°/64°PM Thunderstorms50%SSE 11 mph
Mon 17
76°/65°Scattered Thunderstorms51%SSE 9 mph
Tue 18
77°/66°Scattered Thunderstorms51%SE 9 mph
Wed 19
74°/66°Scattered Thunderstorms57%SE 11 mph
Thu 20
79°/67°Scattered Thunderstorms45%SE 10 mph
Fri 21
78°/68°Scattered Thunderstorms44%SE 10 mph
Sat 22
83°/67°Scattered Thunderstorms37%SE 9 mph
Sun 23
82°/65°Scattered Thunderstorms38%SSE 8 mph
Mon 24
82°/65°Scattered Thunderstorms41%SSE 8 mph
Tue 25
82°/65°Scattered Thunderstorms36%S 9 mph
Wed 26
82°/64°Isolated Thunderstorms33%W 8 mph
Thu 27
83°/65°Isolated Thunderstorms31%SSW 7 mph
Looks like we’ll be dodging a lot of raindrops until further notice…
Filed under Favorite Things, Gardening, Mother Nature, Thoughts on a ________
Jurgen Lingl-Rebetez Art
Jurgen Lingl-Rebetez uses a chainsaw to make these!
Jurgen Lingl-Rebetez
Chainsaw Art
From Article by Hidreley of BoredPanda.com
Jurgen’s website is lingl-sculpture.com
Filed under Chainsaw Art, When Wood Comes Alive
More Beautiful Faces
Delightful Art from Found Things
Filed under Art From Found Things
A Walk Around the Yard
My husband brought a couple of blooms inside so we could enjoy them in here, too. :0)
I love it that this rosebush shows all different stages of this wonderful rose at the same time. It starts out in a tight yellow bud with dark coral edges. It blooms into a bright yellow bloom with coral accents, and then finishes with the whole bloom coral.
Filed under Favorite Things, Gardening
More Indian Hills Punnies
Filed under Funny Signs - Humor, punny
Garden Progress
The forecast is for thunderstorms EVERY DAY between the 17th and the 27th. I’m going to try to get a nice harvest in, either today or tomorrow, before all the rain starts.
Art from Found Things
Filed under Art From Found Things, metal art
Many Faces of Creativity
Filed under Creativity
Diet Discovery +
This morning my husband and I ate breakfast at one of our favorite restaurants in Greenwood, The Dari. We did this (1) to celebrate a stellar report from the dental hygienist for both of us, and (2) we always have breakfast out when we have to get blood tests at the clinic for a doctor appointment.
So my diet is pretty much blown for the day. We are having a portion controlled frozen dinner of tortilla crusted fish this evening, so maybe that will make up for the truly delicious, rare breakfast with all the fixings. I have to say that my emotions are like a yo-yo lately. I go from being really serious and sticking to my diet, to thinking I’m getting older and the world seems to be going to Hell in a hand basket so I might as well enjoy one of my last meals. Until I can get my ‘yo-yo-ness’ under control, I foresee very slow, if any, weight loss for me. :0(
I’m trying to get into the mood to get and plant some flowers in our deck planters. We will probably go to the local nursery tomorrow after Lunch Bunch to see if we can find some wave petunias and periwinkles. We’ve checked a couple of other places, but can’t find them. I hope our luck is better at the nursery.
We are about to start more monsoon weather. It’s a lovely, sunny day today, and we’re supposed to have another nice day tomorrow. I couldn’t believe the weather website, though. Starting Saturday, we’re supposed to have rain EVERY day from then, through the following Saturday, AND through the following Thursday. (Saturday, the 17th through Thursday, May 27th.) REALLY. I need to get out tomorrow and harvest more veggies.
I hope that your Thursday is a nice one.
Grateful, but Unhappy
Getting ready to leave for the dentist – our twice-a-year cleaning.
I’m a weenie about this.
I’m grateful that we have a truly compassionate, excellent dentist. My husband went to many in the Marine Corps that made him VERY serious about finding good dentists ever since. That doesn’t mean that I like it. In fact, I can never sleep the night before we have to go.
My mom died of oral cancer. That’s one concern. I never think of it except when I’m at the dentist’s office. So far, no sign of anything, but I always breathe a huge sigh of relief when I’m cleared for another 6 months.
I had braces when I was a child. The results of all that didn’t last and my teeth are as crooked as they were when we started, even though I wore the retainer for a long time after the braces were removed.
I have never had anything else done except cleaning. No cavities. No teeth pulled. And yet my fear has remained.
Last year this record suddenly changed. A wisdom tooth broke off causing a LOT of pain. I was a basket case when we got to the dentist. Even though he doesn’t normally do ‘oral surgery,’ he took pity on me and removed the tooth. He sedated me with something that made me cooperative with the procedure, but alleviated the pain and made me forget afterwards. I love that stuff!
The last teeth cleaning, they found my first cavity. WHAT!!!!! Yes. I had to have it filled. Again, since I’m such a weenie, he agreed to partially sedate me. The procedure was done, and my husband didn’t say a word about my weenie-ness, even though he may have had lots of thoughts about it.
Here’s hoping that today’s visit goes smoothly, with only good information. Fingers – and all other appendages, including my eyes – crossed.
Filed under Challenges, taking care of yourself
creativeartworksblog 