New Territory

Sorry for the long blog absence, but I was away for a few days. My husband and I and our younger son and his wife went on a trip to South Carolina to visit my older son and his wife. They have only lived there a little over a month and so this is the first time we've been to that area. The first day, we went to Hunting Island which is a nature preserve. I understand the several movies with jungle scenes have been filmed there. It was wonderfully lush and green and the closest thing to a jungle that I've ever been in. We walked through sprinkling rain to a beautiful lighthouse that was completed in the 1880's.

One day we sent the guys off to fish and the girls and I went to Hilton Head to an art show. There were lots of very talented exhibitors and I met a mosaic artist whose work I have admired for years. Steve Terlizzese calls himself the Mosaic Guy and lives in Chattanooga, Tennessee. It's strange that I had to go to South Carolina to meet an artist from my home state.
On the long ride home, I played in my sketchbook. This is a mixed media collage using some of the materials that I picked up along the way.


I have managed to make a little jewelry since I've been home, but I keep wanting to do something a little different. I think I will start on a painting for my hubby since his birthday is next week.

Something Different

This is a waterfall coming out of our hillside. We don't always have a waterfall, but when you get over 6 inches of rain in 3 days this is what happens. Wouldn't it be cool to have a waterfall like that year round? Even though we didn't see the sun for almost 6 days, I am thankful that now we won't have to be so careful with our well water this year. We have had so much drought that many people locally had their wells go dry.

Rainy days make good creative days.

Sometimes I want to branch out and do something a little different. I had bought these shadow box frames a couple of years ago and hadn't really come up with a use for them until now. I was inspired by the shadow box creations of Stephanie Rubiano on her site: So I Gathered. The first one is my mom when she was little. I am not implying that she was a "smarty pants" but it just seemed to go with the school theme.

The next one is some long forgotten ancestor whose photo I found in my aunts photo collection. I have no idea who she was, but I hope that her expression was only temporary and not how she looked all of the time.

Thank You Cloth Paper Scissors and Thank You Dad!

Well....I didn't want to say anything prematurely, but...I got something published! A couple of months ago, Cloth Paper Scissors magazine sent out an email call for works that were Mother's Day or Father's day related. I had this altered tie that I did as a tribute to my dad and so I emailed them the picture. They emailed back and asked me to mail them the original and...the rest is history. I just got my issue today in the mail and I was so excited to see that I got an entire page! I thought I would be just included in a group on a page.

This was the first time that I ever submitted something and was not very confident that they would be interested. That just goes to show you... you never know. Give it a try! Take a step of faith. It could be you next time.

So...run, don't walk to your nearest bookstore and get the May/June issue of Cloth Paper Scissors Magazine.