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Showing posts with the label artsy-craftsy

A Painted Chair

Hello Visitors from the Blogging from A to Z April 2018 Challenge. This post is for the weekly All Seasons. You can find my posts for the April Challenge here . I'm pooped. Happily, though. I just came inside from painting that chair you see in the photo. I've been wanting to paint an artsy chair ever since I saw a bunch of painted chairs done by artists for a local fundraiser in town. That was over 10 years ago. By the time I mustered the confidence to consider painting a chair, the  group hosting the fundraiser stopped it. Last night I decided if it didn't rain today, I would paint the old broken redwood chair against the fence that has been wearing the fake evergreen bough since last Christmas. So, I did. Today is gorgeous. Sunny. A  bit of a breeze. Warm enough to peel off hat and sweater as the painting progressed. I hoped that Molly the Cat would hang out with me, but the rocking chair claimed her. That's okay, every so often a bee buzzed by to see what wa

Coffee Press Plunger Chimes

French presses don't last long in our household. It used to be we could go a couple of years before the glass container breaks. In recent years, nope. Three months, if we're lucky. Each time one breaks, we go back to using our makeshift coffee system—a 32-ounce glass measuring cup and a leftover plastic funnel from a legitimate coffee dripper that got broke who knows when. I can't bring myself to throw the coffee press plunger right away because I never know when it may come in handy. The problem is I put it away and forget where. It's not uncommon to reach deep into a kitchen shelf or open a box marked Kitchen Stuff , voila! there's a coffee press plunger. Last month I finally did something with a coffee press plunger. It so happened that I came across a  bunch of metal tubes that were once-upon-a-time chimes at the same time that I spied a coffee press plunger. Yup. The coffee press plunger chimes make a pretty sound hanging from the apple tree outside the

A VHS-Tape Planter

The VHS tapes have been staring at me in the living room for more than a month. It could even be two months. I think that was the last time the Husband and I opened a bunch of boxes from storage to determine what to use, keep, throw, donate, recycle, maybe repurpose, or maybe sell. I think these VHS tapes are ones that I thought we might be able to sell online one day. This morning I finally did something with 12 of the VHS tapes. I bound them together with duct tape to make two walls for a bottomless planter. That's it in the photo. Pretty cool, huh? The planter would've been made of all VHS tapes, but I didn't have enough tapes. Fortunately, I kept the doors of a small cabinet, which fell apart last year, for the other two walls. I figure the pretty flowers will take the focus away from the funky taping. Maybe later I'll pretty up the planter with color or simply put something beside the taped VHS-tape side. It feels good to make something! Today I'm

Not.

I'm creating a structure at the sidewalk end of our front yard. Not a fence. Just look at it. What creature could that evolving spiderness-of-a-something keep off our property? Giggle. Hmmm, maybe that's something I ought not to giggle about. I'm making this not-a-fence out of skinny branches of the fruit trees we pruned a few months ago, as well as from the second-time-with-The-Mama era. I'm not kidding. You can find all sizes of branches in our yard that I'd say were at last 10 years old. Some lie on the ground waiting for their time to become something helpful, such as the stakes holding up the boards that the Mama put around her flower and vegetable beds. Have I digressed? Doesn't matter. :-) That's my story for the letter N , this week's theme of ABC Wednesday . Click here to check out the participants from around the world. How cool is that? Thanks, ABCW team!

Awake.

Until this past week, since April 8, the day after the Mama's funeral, all I wanted to do is sleep. Sleep, to catch up with not having slept. Sleep, to not think. Sleep. Tonight, sleeping takes a back seat to playing in Photoshop. The piece above is from the top left section of this photo. I'm linking up with this week's Creative Every Day , hosted by Leah Piken Kolidas. Thanks, Leah. Now, I'll go to sleep. Good morning, All.

My First California Poppy

This is a close-up of the petals of the first California poppy that I saw this year, back in February. Dear friend Jennifer said the lines of the poppy reminded her of a Georgia O'Keefe painting, and suggested that I zoom in on the petals, crop, and play with what I saw. Most definitely! Georgia O'Keefe is one of my favorite artists. I love all of her phases, from her early years in New York to her later, and more familiar, years in New Mexico. Many years ago, I dropped everything to trek down to Los Angeles to see an exhibit of Ms. O'Keefe's works. Wowza! Here's the photo that I took of the poppy. Isn't the poppy gorgeous? Maybe one day, I'll try painting a close-up of its petals with actual brush and paints. I'm linking up with Seasons , hosted by Jeanette of St Germain's Blog, and the Creative Every Day Challenge , hosted by Leah of Creative Every Day.  I hope you'll go visit both memes.

Work in Progress

Some of you may recall that last month I bought an empty burlap sack , which once held coffee beans, at my favorite cafe. The sack hasn't moved from where I draped it when I took the photo of it last month. It questions me every day: So, what am I here for? Yesterday morning, as I was picking leaves off the lawn, I thought how exceptionally pretty they are. Bingo! So, I collected a few and brought them indoors to dry. By afternoon, they were in the office. Ah-ha! Within minutes, I attached a few of them to the canvas. Hmmmm. I looked down at the floor and saw the box that held stuff I used for a floral arrangement for last year's county fair. Hellllllllloooo! called some blue dried flowers. They went up on the sack. Then all went quiet. To be continued. * * * * * I'm linking up with the weekly meme, What Happened in Your Surroundings or in Your Mind This Week? , which is hosted by Pippa Koenig. To join in and/or to check out the other participants, click he

Tools for Fun

 Gosh, it's been one busy week. I apologize to the blog hops and memes that I hooked up with this week. I'm very late about visiting other bloggers, as well as responding here on The View from the Top of the Ladder . That's my plan tomorrow.  Among the things the Husband and I did today was a stop at the art supplies store so I could spend my birthday money. I purchased a lot of cool stuff for the Husband and me to have fun with—suede boards, colored pencils, colored pens, drawing pad, Mod Podge, fabric glue, air-dry clay, and oven-bake clay.  Whooo-hooo! It's great being 62-years-old.

A Blank Slate

This afternoon I bought a very large burlap sack at our favorite cafe for $5.41. (What a deal!) It once held coffee beans from India. Now, what shall I do with it? Use it as a canvas? Sew tote bags? Make a skirt? Cover a box? What? What would you create with this beautiful, very large burlap sack?

Day 82 with Tilda-Hilda

"I'd like to be under the sea in an octopus's garden in the shade.  . ." That Beatles' song was looping in my head as Tilda-Hilda and I pedaled up and down hills this morning. Over 8.5 miles in 53 minutes! Perfect song for the ride. Today, I'm hooking up with two cool memes. Click on the links to check out other bloggers. One meme is Our World Tuesday . The other is Creative Every Day . See you tomorrow with Jane Austen, Action Doll.

A Lazy Sunday

"It's 9:01!" "It is!" exclaimed the Husband, throwing the bed covers off him. As if it mattered that we got up late. We didn't have to get anywhere or have anything done by 9:00 a.m. today.  Although getting up later meant no early bike ride with Tilda-Hilda. Maybe we'll go for a spin around the neighborhood after I rake leaves in the backyard and prune some vines and such in the front yard. I wondered why our alarm clock didn't wake us up. I opened the blinds in the living room. Molly the Cat looked up from the couch. Ha! The Mama? I peeked into her bedroom. She was sleeping soundly. Yes, a perfect Sunday morning. Now a perfect Sunday afternoon. I still haven't gone outside. Those colored pencils distracted me.

Watching TV with the Daddy

Yesterday, Georgy, of Jubilee Street and Remember Freedom , wrote a post on her former blog that sparked a memory bubble. (Thanks, Georgy. ) That's watching "Bonanza" with the Daddy on Sunday evenings. It came on after "The Wonderful World of Disney." I can't recall if the Daddy watched that with me. If he did, that was nice of him to let me watch it. We watched TV nearly every evening together in our favorite spots. The Daddy sat on his recliner while I laid on the floor with my legs on the couch.  I had a good excuse for being near the TV. I was the Daddy's channel changer and fixer of the horizontal line on the TV screen. P.S. I'm linking up with Art Every Day Month Day at Creative Every Day. P.P.S. Monica, hostess of the NatureFootstep Digital Art Meme , invited me to link up. So, I shall.  Thanks, Monica.

Painting Olive Branches

Friends Jenn and Moose and the Husband and I took part in a paint party at the San Benito Olive Festival last Saturday. Altogether, there were 18 participants. Hmmm, I think the Husband and Moose were the only guys. What's up with that? Is getting guys to paint the same as getting them out on the dance floor? The Husband and Moose have no problem shaking their booties.  We did a lot of that at the festival, too. Our teacher-host was Artist/Sculptor Paul Loughridge. His robot and metal sculptures are especially trés cool. Check some of them out at his website .  Okay, back to the paint party. Being that it was at an olive festival, Paul guided us through a painting of olive branches. Having not painted since grammar school, I was hesitant about whether I could recreate his painting. Several other participants articulated how I felt. He reassured us. We were not to worry. We would be creating our own original paintings. And, so we began. He told us which brush to use, what co

Bragging

Three days later, I'm ready to brag about my county fair ribbons. For some of them, I don't know if I would've won if there had been a lot more competition. Don't get me wrong, I'm happy for all of them—four blue and one red ribbon in flower arrangements, one blue and one yellow ribbon in photography, and a white ribbon in wearable art. Whooo-hooo! My most unbelievable win was the blue ribbon for my dry floral arrangement in the Country Road Treasure class. You had to use objects found along the road as containers or accessories. I found a broken piece of PVC pipe with jagged edges along the road while the Husband and I were walking home. It was perfect. When friend Kathy saw my arrangement, she described it as modern minimalism. I was told that the arrangement received a lot of comments. Good or bad, I didn't ask.  You saw my Eiffel Tower martini glass arrangement already. If you haven't, click here .  These were my other flower arrangement entries.

Le Voiçi -- L'Eiffel Tower

On Monday I told you about my dry floral arrangement for the county fair. The photo shows my final result. How did I do? I won a blue ribbon for it.  Yup, yup, yup. You still can't see them, but there are tiny fake pearls, with red and green glass beads,  in the Eiffel Tower martini glass. They cover black stones that keep up the dry flowers. Tomorrow, I'll tell you more about the fair. I'm pooped.

Finding Order in Chaos

Yesterday afternoon, procrastinating me started thinking about my flower arrangement entries for the fair, which are due on Wednesday afternoon. I opened one of the kitchen cupboards and staring boldly at me, obviously begging to be in the fair, was an Eiffel Tower martini glass.  "I'm for the A Touch of Glass dry floral arrangement," it proclaimed.  "Okay," I said. "Let's go." We went to the office where I set the Eiffel Tower martini glass on the drawing board, into which the poor Husband keeps bumping as he goes in and out of the office. Before I knew it, the dried green moss called out from its basket on the floor, "Hey! Hey!" Bammm! A handful of moss planted itself in the glass, draping itself whatever way it wanted. The tiny blue straw flowers I bought the other day made a noise, "Me! Me! Me!" Bammmm! The tiny flowers stood proudly in the moss. "Yoooo-hoooo!" The fake pearls waved from its box.

Skull, Tilda-Hilda, and the County Fair

This afternoon, I shut the car door while I kinda stood between it and the car. The edge of the door jarred my jaw on its way to its destination. Kinda made the nerves in my skull sizzle. I'm very talented. Fortunately, nothing other than a tiny bit of pain in the jaw for a few minutes. "I don't like it," I said to the Husband as we drove to the produce stand. "You wouldn't like being a boxer then," he said. DAYS 47 to 60 with TILDA-HILDA Did you wonder if Tilda-Hilda and I had stopped riding for the year? Not at all. We're been doing things a bit differently. Three Saturdays ago was the the last time Tilda-Hilda and I went out on the back roads.  Since then, we've been sticking to our neighborhood and an occasional ride to downtown, as my left knee recuperates. Most of our riding had been pedaling three blocks back and forth to Godmother Pat, once or twice a day. She had a horrible accident in July that resulted in the loss of t

Summer Domestic Diva Challenge -- Two Down!

Hurrah! I completed item#1 on my list of seven things to do before the summer ends. The Husband has his second tunic. It sports a couple of boo-boos. One pocket is lower than the other. And, there's a triangle of fabric missing in the interfacing. I cut it out as I was sewing because the fabric was overlapping in the oddest way.  I should've had more faith in what I was doing. We'll see how the tunic holds up with each washing. The blue print on the pockets and on the sides looks weird. What can I say other than it brings out the happiness of the shirt. The Husband is so cool.

A Thrilling Moment

I took this photo of this stunt biker a few weeks ago at the Hollister Airshow. The biker, not at this particular moment, raced a monoplane. The biker and pilot started and ended at the same point on the tarmac. The biker turned at the midway point before the pilot could lift off, but the pilot managed to fly to the finish line before the biker. But, just barely.

A Tuesday Ramble

In 1969  I saw a movie called If It's Tuesday, This Must be Belgium starring Suzanne Pleshette, who was a bus tour guide in Europe. I recall only two things about the movie. Pleshette's character fell in love with someone to whom she had an immediate disliking (of course) and one of the older American tourists took toilet fixtures from the hotels where they stayed as his souvenirs. I also remember wanting to become a tour guide after seeing the movie. So, what got me thinking about that movie? Well, it's Tuesday. I'm not in Belgium, but the Husband and I are about to drive over to Freedom (yes, there's such a town in California) to purchase cat food for Molly the Cat. What we will do for that cat. Big, BIG Waves Have you ever dreamed of ocean waves higher than the tallest buildings in your town coming towards you? I had one of those dreams a couple nights ago. The waves came in two or three times. Each time, I was able to find shelter and hang on.  One of t