Art Journaling

There are a few moments on a slightly cloudy morning in the frigid winter when we get awesome red color through the trees. Okay, the color wasn't this bright, but it was beautiful and it became this after I played with it. This is looking east from my front porch. The ocean is about a quarter mile as the crow flies.

I bought myself a copy of Somerset Studios latest Art Journaling magazine and I love it.

http://stampington.com/html/art_journaling_w09.html

The one thing I have taken from it already is to use my own pictures. I get lazy and never print out my pictures, but I'm making a concerted effort. The picture above is my fish, colorized and otherwise futzed with with Photo Impact Pro. When I went to print it out on my favorite matte photo paper from Sam's I ran out of some ink so I threw it back through the printer the other way. Then for kicks I printed another pond bottom image over the whole thing. Running out of ink made a neat effect. I pasted that picture in the journal and will add that photo later.

I'm trying to commit to some art every day. So far, so good.

Hmmm..maybe if I committed to more blogging more people than just Sam would read it. :)

Subway Pinball

Pinball
Originally uploaded by FarStarr

This was tucked in the basement of the second antique store in NH. It wasn't in love with it at first, but now that it is cleaned up and works..pretty cool!

Very early in the history of pinball, just after legs were added. The coin slot was missing, but the others we've had from this era were nickel games.

Belding Bros.

Belding Bros.
Originally uploaded by FarStarr

What do you mean? Buy presents for other people on black friday?? We had intended to do Christmas shopping and half the stores we usually go to in NH were closed. Oh well, had to buy prizes for ourselves..hee hee.

We had a small square of floor space left in the living romm and Andy had just mentioned that we needed somewhere to put the slot machine (when he fixes it). There it was, in the first antique store we checked...a perfect multi-drawered spool cabinet. see? and it's functional too!

Clean for Thanksgiving! Success..kinda

We actually got the dining and living rooms clean enough to have company on Thanksgiving! Of course I can't locate most of my art stuff as it is now in piles in the sewing room and new guest room...good thing no one wanted to stay over! There are still a few piles in the dining room, but just along the edges..hee hee...
Elaine came through again with her awesome smoked turkey and duck! We had tons of leftovers with only 9 people for dinner, but that's okay. Andy has had turkey sandwiches and piles of mashed potatoes every day since.

The living room...clean for a brief moment. Since then we've brought down all the Christmas boxes and put up our tree. Ugh, I know that chair is ugly, but I haven't gotten around to slip covering it.

Andy and I took our usual black Friday trip to NH. Most of the stores we used to frequent are gone. There are only 2 out of the 7 or so antique stores we used to go to that are still open. I'm glad I'm not trying to buy and sell antiques in this market. We did make a couple of dealers happy though. Since the other stores we frequent were closed we ended up just buying a couple of prizes for ourselves and coming home early. I'll put up the pictures of our prizes next time.

Red Fish ATC-Heads

Red Fish ATC-Heads
Originally uploaded by FarStarr

My first try at blogging from Flickr doubleposted. Let's see if I can get just one post on with this picture..

I started the red ATC's by simply fishing (hee hee) through the scraps and pulling out all fabrics that read as red. Then I remembered that I had printed out the fish from Dover on fabric ( miracle of miracles, I was able to find it)...a marriage made in heaven.

I love this one and really don't want to give it away, but it was for a swap-bot swap. I hope teh recipient loves it as much as I do!

Red Fish ATC-Tails

Red Fish ATC-Tails
Originally uploaded by FarStarr

Busy day today. I was able to get some art done. I love sitting in front of the sewing machine with my buckets of little bits. A little of this, a little of that, voila! ART. Unfortunately I make a HUGE mess when I'm doing it..hee hee

Only 21 more days until Thanksgiving...Hmmmm..

Progress!!.. and only 32 more days until Thanksgiving!

This was the ugly little guest room before we started fixing it up. Well actually this was after Andy removed it's contents. The room really is tiny at only 8 1/2 by 11 1/2, but we haven't had an actual guest room for guests in forever. The first step was wallpaper and disgusting carpet removal. We had installed that wallpaper 16 years ago and I never got around to adding the chair rail border that I had planned. Did I mention that I am the queen of procrastination and half-finshed projects? Since Andy is the king of almost finished projects it's a wonder that this one has gotten done.

Look! New white paint! It looks better already. After the paint, Andy put hardwood floor in the hallway and closet to match the real hallway upstairs.

Yeah! Carpet! and the first of five, yes five! tall bookshelves. Hmm..did we just buy the same carpet color as before? Some things never change.

The picture below shows some of Andy's decorating. We have more advertising tins than shelves these days and it seemed like the perfect opportunity to use up some wall space.

Next, the brass bed that I used as a kid got a brand new mattress (the last one went up in flames...long story). You really can't see it well, but the end table is an antique metal refrigerator complete with ice holder in the top. Like the ugly lamp?? That did not go back in the room but I am keeping it for assemblage...of course.

We have slowly been trucking all the books up from the dining room floor to the new shelves. I haven't filled them yet, but then again the dining room isn't clear yet either! Only 32 more days until my family will expect to eat turkey (and smoked duck) at the table.

The bureau was out in the garage in our Brimfield stuff that hasn't been looked at in 7 years. I guess if we're not going to sell it, we should be using it. It's actually kindof nice.

We went to two different HomeGoods stores this weekend for the boxes up on top. They still don't have anything in them, but they are pretty. We also got 2 underbed storage boxes for my rusty bits. Those are a little heavy to store in cardboard boxes over my head!

Christmas Tree Shops had these empty glass lamps. I realized that I do not like lamps at all, but these are okay. We thought for sure that it was going to explode as Andy added the marbles, but it was okay. Can you believe that I had almost enough scrabble prices to fill the other one?

So there it is-a little bit of organization. I probably should put the new sheets and comforter on the bed, huh? That will really make it look finished.