American Idol concert

Tuesday was a very exciting day. I was surprised by my dear husband with two tickets to American Idol. He had no desire to go so I got to take a friend. We took the 2 1/2 hour drive up to the Tacoma Dome and it was such a fun day. The lights in the arena were low and we were far enough away that the flash was not going to work so the pictures are not very good. But I bought a program with amazing pictures of all the idols and these photos are just to prove I was there.

Here I am with the on-stage screen in the background. The last time I went to American Idol they had a huge cardboard cutout of the idols so that you could get your picture taken in front of it but this time there was nothing like that. I was a bit disappointed about that. As we were standing in line, waiting to get into the arena, this expressive young man came running up to his friends next to us and said he could just die because he had hugged and smelled Adam. People are so funny sometimes. Who would have thought smelling your favorite singer was a highlight?

Danny was so great. He made me cry as he was talking about following your dreams, even if it is the worst time in your life. His wife died 4 weeks before he tried out for American Idol and he said he pushed through to follow his dream and it changed his life even though it was the hardest thing he has ever done. It was very encouraging. Sometimes we put our dreams on hold until life settles down and then we never do what we were meant to do because life never does settle down.

Allison was her cute rocker self on stage and did a great job too.

Of course, Adam was amazing. You would have thought he was the winner by the crowds response. When he came on stage the audience literally exploded with cheers. It was deafening.

Every one of the singers did an amazing job and it was a very good concert. Each of the singers sang songs in their style of song and I was very impressed. I think they even sounded better than when they were on the show.

Give yourself permission

I feel like I am on a roll now. This ezine class by Teresa McFaden is wonderful. She has given us the challenge to give ourselves permission to use our best stuff in this journal and to experiment with products we might not have used otherwise. So far I have used some of the vintage buttons I bought the other day and with the watercolor inks. The other items I have used before. This is such a fun class so far. On these pages I used a style that I am not normally drawn to which is Asian. But the contrast of the modern ledger paper and the Asian seems to work. I sketched the design by looking at some paper I have and colored in the images with watercolor pencil and markers.

A Journal of Interest

I signed up for Teresa Mcfaden's ezine - A Journal of Interest. Oh my goodness, it is fabulous. I took her class last year and it was great too. I just love her style and she has some great ideas. I made the journal cover out of cardstock and bound the inside pages with ribbon. The pages are made of watercolor paper and hold up nicely to the abuse I am giving them. Quite awhile ago I found watercolor inks for 25 cents a piece and decided to try them out on these pages. I think the color is so wonderful. I only have four colors so I may have to invest in a few more. Between the strapping tape on the binding and edges and the many layers of paper on the inside, this cover is pretty sturdy. The gal on the outside cover is copied from an old vintage postcard I bought in Paris. I think she is lovely.

I spent my 4th of July creating this journal and playing in it. I have been feeling in the dumps about things lately and this just perked me up. I had so much fun working in this journal and I can't wait to see what our next assignment is. I must remember that when I am in a slump that doing something that I love to do and learning something in the process will give me the boost I need. I have one other page in the works so I am off to get it finished up.

Vintage Sale

My friend Karin invited me to go to a Vintage sale (Tarte) with her and I got some very nice things. You can see photos at the link above. To find some things from Paris was awesome. I ended up getting the extended postcards of places that I went to in Paris such as Hotel de Ville, La Basilique du Sacre Coeur, L Arc de Triomphe. I think I am going to frame them for my art room. I am missing Paris so much. I was watching a suspense movie this week that took place in Paris and tears just popped into my eyes seeing the lovely buildings and hearing the people talk in French. I never expected that going to Paris would result in such deep feelings of connection there. If I believed in past lives, I would say I used to be French. Actually, there are some French relatives in my lineage. That must explain it.

Back to the sale. I bought some old buttons, which is really exciting since I have none at home and needed to start building some stock. I also got a beautiful pink pearl, three strand necklace that I can hardly wait to wear. The clasp was broke but I will attach a pink ribbon and tie it around my neck that way.

There is another flea market sale on July 18th in my neck of the woods by the same people so I think I will definitely be going and checking it out. Oh, I can't wait.

Goody Giveaway by Michelle Allen

Michelle over at Allen Design Studios is have a goody give-a-way. Go and check it out because shes got some pretty cool stuff that she will be giving to some lucky winner.

Wreck this Journal - 2

This journal is so addicting. You do a page and then you want to do another one and so on and so on. I have to say though that I really hate to trow anything away. OK, this can get to be a problem in other areas of my life but we won't go there :) On the page below I was to cut out strips and make a chain. Of course, I could not throw it away so I stapled it back in on the instruction part of the page. It makes the journal not close so well but that adds to the charm if you can say this journal has charm after spilling, spitting and smearing your food all over it. I love this page with all it's circles. What a mindless, fun exercise to get my creative juices flowing.

I didn't follow the rules too well on this one. I saw the instructions about draw fat and thin lines and away I went. When I was done I noticed it said with a pencil. Oh well, we will just cross that little detail out and make our own rules for this page. he,he!

I don't know how it happened but I actually like the coffee wrings. It reminds me of the coffee I love to drink every morning. Wouldn't it be fun to have a tablecloth with coffee wrings already printed on it so you wouldn't have to worry about spilling your coffee ever?

OK, this page was down right scary. I grabbed a match and thought I would start the flame going and then blow it out. OH NO! That flame was not going to be deterred from my tiny little puff. In fact, it was encouraged to burn faster, YIKES! Good thing I was standing in my bathroom where I was able to throw it in the sink and turn on the water. I suppose I could have stomped out the flame but when you are trying to react quickly you grab the first thing you see. Besides, this isn't the last time this book is going to see a little water. I still have the shower session to go through.

New journal

It has been sparse posting around here lately. I have just not been in the mood to blog. There is just nothing to be done about it. I can't even make myself. Too much going on lately that has all my attention I guess. I did want to pop in and give you a peek at what I have been up to though. I started a journal recently with only had drawn images and journaling and here are few of those pages. Most of them were done with watercolor pencil or water soluble pastels.

This page was done from a quote I read in the book, A Pearl in the Storm by Tori Murden McClure.

This page is still in process and was inspired by a journal prompt I ran across, the truth is...

Conflict at home brought this one to life and that is all I can say about that.



This page chronicled some goals I had on what I want to accomplish this summer. It is actually the first page in my new journal. This process of only drawing and writing has been challenging but really good too at the same time. I think it has made me tap into my inner creative soul more. I'm enjoying it for now anyway. OK, that's all for that journal. I have another journal to talk about but I will do that in another post.