Art Supplies, Art & Some Cooking

Saturday I went shopping to get my supplies for the class I am taking at Art of the Carolinas (is anyone else going to this?)

and for a class I am teaching this month - Meditative Drawing for Adults.  I ended up coming away with some stamps too because they were on sale:

I am going to use them to make Christmas cards and I might let the kids use them in my Holiday Crafts Class too!

I came home to find this cute card in my  mail box:

My mom is awesome!! 

I then did some art journaling:

And made a post card:

After I posted the picture to my Facebook account, a friend of mine said she wants me to frame it and she will buy it!

And Sunday I made Beef and Broccoli:

It was my first time to make it - it came out good, but WOW high calorie and high sodium.

So, lots of stress at work lately and I think it will continue until at least the 9th.  I just hope the weekend events I have planned will be enough to keep me happy!

I hope you all have a great Monday - thanks for visiting and come back soon.

Kids Art Journal Class Complete

Thursday was the last day of my Kids Art Journaling Class.  It was a lot of fun seeing how they worked and what they came up with for each project.  This last class we did collages.  I asked them, once again if they had anything in their books that they wouldn't mind letting me take photos of.  So, here is what I got to photograph:

Out of these 8 photos, only 2 of these were done in our class times!  The rest were the kids playing in their art journals at home, which is exactly what I wanted to happen!!  I had a great time teaching them and I hope to get to do more art journaling with kids in the future! 

Tuesday I start Holiday Crafts with kids - it should be lots of fun!!

WOYWW 26 OCT

Hey guys, happy WOYWW!  Right now I am working on  two Art Journal pages.  This spread:

It will be my first attempt to document the month in my Art Journal - Art Every Day Month is the perfect opportunity to try it out, right?  I am still going to add color to the calendar so that its pretty!

I am also working on this collage:

The hope was to finish it before my kids art journal class tomorrow because I want to do collages with them tomorrow.  So, I will be working on it more later when I get home from work.

If you want some more peeks at what people are working on, go to Stamping Ground!

Sadly, I am out of time so I have to go...have a great day and I hope you come back soon!

Credit Card Uses and Tea

Hi there!  Just wanted to share with you a few backgrounds that I finished lately.  I've been having a lot of fun playing with old gift cards - you know, the kind that look like credit cards:

The one on the left is a gift card from last Christmas that I used all the $ on, and the one on the right is from a credit card offer I got in the mail!  

I have been squeezing paint on the pages and then using the card to scrape it all around and make backgrounds:

A good technique if you no longer like a page and want to paint over it.  Or if you scribbled something random down and no longer need that info.  If you look VERY close you can see on the next photo where the underneath part is showing through.  I had used this page to learn some Zentangles and so in some spots they kind of show through the paint.  I think its cool.

Not sure what I am going to do with the other side yet - probably more writing when the mood strikes. This photo doesn't do the bright colors justice either - that tape is HOT PINK!

Also I tried a new tea today:

Its a green tea - typically I don't like green tea but this one was good.  Very mild.  Not so sure that I actually taste the sugar or caramel but it was a pretty good cup of tea.

Ok friends, that is all the time I have for now.  Have a great day.  See ya soon!

Old Roomie

I recently went to visit my old roommate from my very first unit in the Army.  She recently moved to NC and is only 2 hours away.  So, I drove up to where she lives and I spent the day with her and her kids.  We went bowling:

Then we went to eat and to see the Three Musketeers.  It was a good day and I am glad I got to meet her kiddos!

I hope you all have a lovely Monday.  "See" you tomorrow!!

Art Fun

The other day there was an Arts & Crafts Open House on base.  I was there demonstrating tangles and art journaling and just talking to people about taking art classes.  In between people this is what I did:

When I got home I played around in the art room and made a mess:

Here are some of the post card backgrounds that came out of that art session:

They are neat looking in person - not so sure the photos captured it accurately.  The other stuff I was working on needs more layers so I will be doing that later. 

WOYWW 19 OCT

Hello and happy WOYWW!  Today I forgot to take a messy desk picture, but here are the projects I worked on:

Do you guys like my child-like attempt?

They are for my Kids Holiday Crafts Class that I am teaching in November.  I wanted a test-run before I try to teach it.  I also think it helps to have an example to show the kids.  I definitely learned some things doing these two projects so its good that I did them early enough to adjust. 

For more work desks go over to Stamping Ground.  Have a great night everyone and thanks for visiting!

Hamsas

Hamsa basically means hand.  Here is a website that gives a lot more detailed information, but I will try to give you a short version.  Hamsas are religious/spiritual symbols of protection.  A lot of the time they have an eye in them for protection from evil or negativity.  A lot of cultures/religions use this symbol.  I thought this might be an easy project to do in my kids art journal class next week.  So, I wanted to have something to show them and therefore I did my own Hamsas:

There are two common types - one is with uneven fingers like a regular hand out be, and one is with equal fingers.  The hand can either be fingers up or fingers down, but the hand is an open right hand.  So, for the uneven finger version, I used my own hand.  I used a printed hamsa for the equal version.  I added the eye on each hand but using a different style.  I also decorated them differently.  I really hope the kids will get into this project  because I am sure they will come up with some very creative things to put inside of the hands.

Next up is trying to work out the kinks to the craft projects for my November Kids Holidy Crafts class.  Fingers crossed!

Have a great evening everyone, hope to have some stuff to show you tomorrow!!

Volksmarch and Josh Turner Concert

I was super busy Saturday.  I worked the pumpkin decorating area at the 4th Annual Fort Bragg Volksmarch.  Here are some photos from it:

It was fun, but messy and a lot of work.  Working with kids is always a good time, though.

After that I went to eat lunch/dinner at Cracker Barrel - my favorite restaurant.  Then I went to work the Josh Turner Concert with BOSS.  It was also a lot of work, but tons of fun.  Here are the photos from the concert:

I didn't get home until 920ish and I was exhausted! 

Hope you guys got to do something fun this weekend too! 

Kids Art Journaling (Week #2)

Hi guys!  Last night was my 2nd week with the kids teaching them about art journaling.  It is very interesting to me how different they all are!  Some of them can entertain themselves and art journal with little to no instruction and some of them need  step by step projects that last the entire class!  Last night we did color mixing - I used this

to teach them.  Then I only gave them primary colors and to get anything else they had to mix their own paint.  I wanted to do this because a lot of the time kids will mix and mix and mix and end up with brown which they often don't like.  Speaking of them not liking things, I have one student who seems to dislike everything she does!  Last week she wanted to tear out pages and throw them away.  I tried to convince her to wait and paint over them with white so she could start over, but she ended up tossing them.

Other than color mixing, we made backgrounds with one color and then used bubble wrap to add another color on top!  I think they had fun doing that!

I had 2 boys in class this time which was interesting.  They both seemed to be quite creative and very interested in what I was telling them. 

I asked the class if anyone had any work they wanted to show me or that they would let me photograph.  Some of them did, so here are some photos:

I know some of the other ones did some work over the weekend, but I guess they are shy about what they added to their journals because they didn't bring it up to me to show me (I saw when they were showing each other!) 

I have absolutely no idea what project to do with them next week.  I really hope I will think of something soon. 

Have a great day everyone!

WOYWW 12 OCT

Hello and Happy WOYWW!!  This week my work desk has some started by not finished art journal pages!  I made this one:

You can flip open each picture to read about the bug on the back.

These little things came with the small chocolate squares that I like to buy when I visit my local health food store.  I anticipate having a few more pieces to put on there before I leave the area.

I also started this page:

I am going to put all of those little things with smart sayings on them.  So far the end of a tea bag and the fortune from a fortune cookie.

If you want to check out other people's work desks, blog hop on over to Stamping Ground.  Have a great day everyone.