Pink Saturday for the Arts

It's wonderful to participate in Beverly's Pink Saturday. Participating has given me tremendous joy as I travel from blog to blog making new friends and sharing the lovely pink things in life. Pink Saturday is an event that I look forward to every week and searching for the pink in my life has become a wonderful treasure hunt!

This weekend is a creative and performing arts weekend. I have the extreme fortune of being a season ticket holder for The Arizona Opera, and this month's performance is Madame Butterfly. This is such a moving story about a women whose family lost their wealth and has the opportunity to marry an American. However, he does not take the marriage seriously and leaves Butterfly to go off to sea. After an absence of 3 years he returns to Japan, accompanied by his new American wife and she is all to happy to raise the son of her husband and Butterfly as her own. Butterfly is crushed by this, however she is willing to make the sacrifice because she is a devoted and loving a wife to this American man. This is really too much for Butterfly to bear and as she watches her son leaving with his father she becomes so overwhelmed with grief that she stabs herself and dies.
There were not many dry eyes in the house at the end of this performance as it was so incredibly beautiful. The sets were stunning in their simplicity and the kimono's were gorgeous. The audience was riveted to the stage and everyone stayed in their seats until the very end! What a wonderful performance this was.....Bravo.

A beautiful array of Pink Madama Butterfly goods. These Japanese objects are so delicate and feminine. It would be fun to decorate a room with such lovely things, it would make visitors feel so happy and peaceful. Thank you for visiting this wonderful Pink Saturday...... Please go to visit Beverly at: "How Sweet The Sound" for some more fabulous and fun "Pink"!
Thank you for visiting today and please share a comment with me while you are here.
Happy Pink Saturday!

Gung Hay Fat Choy

May fortunes of the Dragon year bring you an abundance of happiness and prosperity!

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Living The Past

Making little books has been a hobby of mine for several years, as you may have seen in past posts. I have created tiny books bound by a single staple, small books bound by notebook rings and even a few novelty books which I bound by thread and ribbon.
Tonight I cut some paper and saddle stitched these booklets for my Girl Scout Troop. I gathered some paper from my stash in my effort to "Use It Up"! The project that we are working on is "Living The Past" To accomplish this project the girls will create a female character from the past and create a journal over a week in the life of this fictional character. These books will become the journal for these characters. I promised the girls I would create a fictional female character as well and work on this project along side with them. It is a very exciting project as we discover the bounties and privileges of being a women in today's world as opposed to the past.

After we complete the journals we will be creating a paper doll of our characters to bring these girls to life. We will be crafting the paper dolls from the wonderful templates created by Kimberly Crick . If you are interested in joining us in this journey in the past you can download the paper dolls here.
If you would like a journal to embellish for your created character, please leave me a comment and I will make one send one out to you. It will be exciting to see what female character you might create. I look forward to feature the completed projects on a future post!

Pink Silhouette Saturday

Happy Pink Saturday! It's a wonderful day to be pink!
Today I celebrate Pink Saturday with Beverly at "How Sweet The Sound" and all Pink Saturday participants by sharing Silhouettes!
A dictionary definition describes a silhouette as:n.

1. A drawing consisting of the outline of something, especially a human profile, filled in with a solid color.
2. An outline that appears dark against a light background Well, what do you think....does this ATC fulfill the silhouette requirements?
   

This is the collection of Silhouette ATC's that I have created for the ATC swap that I participate in once a month with several wonderful women. We meet at the local Barnes and Nobles bookstore where we sip coffee and swap art!. This group is so fun and loving, it's a pleasure to get out and meet up.
The challenge this month is to "Frame It", so I have created a silhouette card with the sweetest B Line Silhouette Stamps and framed it with some very feminine embellishments, lace and of course the smallest amount of Stickles to add some sparkle!

To Pink up today's Silhouette celebration I have found some fun Pink Silhouette's to share!




The most famous female silhouette of all, Barbie!

Such a beautiful butterfly! It reminds us that Spring is just around the corner!

And this elegant and sophisticated silhouette that can be clicked on and applied to the computer as wallpaper.
Thank you for visiting me today, as I celebrate Pink Saturday, I have enjoyed your visit and would love to read your comments! Please head over to Beverly's Blog where there is so much more Pink Saturday celebration to enjoy!

Super Saturday!

Happy 1st Pink Saturday!
What a wonderful week this has been.
The weather has been so beautiful here in Arizona, the air has been warm and the sky so blue . This is an environment that truly fills the heart with inspiration!

This week, I participated in a large Girl Scout event, the cookie kick-off.
Yes, those remarkable girl scouts will be parading through streets searching for all the cookie lovers in their neighborhoods!
Earlier in the week I created the t-shirt bag as the sample so each girl could see what they were to make.
There were nine sewing machines set up and they were running non stop for over 2 hours! For most of the girls this was their first experience with a sewing machine.
This event was so much fun. It's thrilling to be with the girls and feel the appreciation they give you.

Emma one of the girl scouts at this event brought her latest creation to share.
Emma modeling her latest creation:
"The Lacy Jacket"
Emma is featured here in the photographs,wearing the lacy jacket she constructed herself from some lovely lace fabric. She has made the pattern and made one for herself, and an identical one for her grandmother in black. She assures me it is that it is not difficult to make and all you need is a piece of fabric and a few measurements. Emma used a spool to cut the arm holes and she measured the length of her arms and used an old sweater as a pattern to cut out her sleeves.
The finished jacket looks so classic and stunning and it can be styled into several different looks.

Emma wearing the jacket in the original classic style.

Emma wearing her jacket with the corner draped over one shoulder.


Emma and Donny looking gorgeous in their stunning Lacy Jackets.
I want to thank Emma for letting me share her beautiful creation for this Pink Saturday post. For more luscious pink, please visit Beverly at How Sweet the Sound!
Thank you for visiting.......
"Be Happy" and create something Pink!

In With The New

Creating art is so much fun and can be very rewarding.
However, looking at a blank sheet of paper can be quite stressful until you are given a challenge for inspiration.
For several years I have looked forward to The Created Byhand Tuesday Challenges and would participate when time allowed.
This is the final Created by hand Tuesday challenge, so I had to dive into the stash and create something special. It began with some layered die shapes in solid colors and prints. After inking these pieces and layering them on the card, out came the stamps and the collage sheets. Several of these pieces were glued on to the ATC and embellished with Stickles. Color was added with pencils and a little ribbon with the tiniest bows finished the card.
I shall miss the Created Byhand Tuesday Challenges, however, I am sure Quitfire will have something new and inspiring to take us into the future.

Going Green

It seems that the buzzword for the new year is sustainability.
We have been talking about it in Girl Scouts for awhile now.
A few years ago the troop set out on the "Get Moving Journey", while on this journey we explored different types of energy and we touched on the subject of sustainability. We also began to think about recycling and giving new life to used objects or re-purposing. The girls decided that they wanted to learn to sew, so a simple project was planned. We headed for our closets to get our old T-shirts so we could remake them into tote bags! This is a wonderful project for the first time sewer, as it only requires one seam! (To make: 1. cut off the sleeves just before the seams 2. using a paper plate as a guide cut a half circle at the neck 3. turn inside out 4. sew the bottom seam with a reinforced stitch 5. turn)
This is such a great project for the girls, so we will be doing it on Friday Night at our Neighborhood Girl Scout Event!
For all of you who know me really well, I am a really girly girl, so of course I had to cut an extra strip from the bottom to create a bow on one of the handles!


If you want to create some fabulous fashions from used clothing there are several books which can give you a great start:

So clean out the closet, grab your sewing machine and get the girls together and "Resew"!

Happy New Year

Here's to making 2012 the best year in history!
I hope you join me in striving to fill each day with rewarding experiences to enrich the relationships within our communities, our families and among our friends.
My wish for you is to have an abundance of creative moments infused with love, joy and prosperity not only for the next twelve months, but forever.
Happy New Year!

Holiday at Who-ville

Happy New Year to all my friends and family.
I hope that this holiday season was extremely joyous for you!
As part of the tradition here, I was fortunate to attend The Grand Canyon Baha'i Conference at the Marriott Desert Ridge Resort in Scottsdale, Arizona.
It was wonderful to see and visit many friends and family members
and make many new friends,
listen to fascinating talks and listen to amazing musical entertainment.
One of the major attractions for the holiday season at this resort every year is the Holiday Gingerbread Village on display in the lobby.
This year the pastry chefs were inspired to make a cookie version of Who-ville.
It was outstanding and as seen here, the children found it hard to keep their hands off the various cookies and candies that were within reach for their taking!

The top photograph was taken by my sister and it was hilarious taking her to see the cookie creation for the fist time, as it had been signed by this visitor who thought the cookie crumble should be a guestbook...

......however, she did not notice the autograph until it had been pointed out to her!

This house was so beautiful and big!
It was fascinating to see the train circle not only around this ornate building,
but the entire festive fantasy village!

Santa ready to visit all the children who live in the shoe!

A wonderful house complete with decorated trees!

And of course "The Cat In The Hat"!
If you look closely you can see the hand on the left side of the picture,
it's holding on to yummy candy canes for good girls and boys!

Thank you for visiting my blog today and through out the past year. I hope to have many wonderful adventures in the upcoming year that I can share with you! For more wonderful holiday cheer please visit Beverly for this wonderful holiday Pink Saturday!
Happy New Year!

Holiday Art

Trading art is so much fun that it's very difficult to turn down a swap, especially if it's a fun challenge with players whose art is wonderful!
When the call for a holiday tag swap was announced, I new I had to participate. The requirements were to alter six manila tags each with at least one Artchix image in a holiday theme! How fun it was to create these tags.
Images from 3 college sheets were used all from the Artchix holiday collection. They are so much fun to use- the images are so colorful!
To begin I selected the images that were needed for the six different tags. I used a variety. Girl's, Santa and and postage, all quite vintage looking. The images were then mixed with various holiday papers, some stamped images, a little coloring with markers, a little glitter and glue~voila the tags are completed.

For more fun holiday posts visit Beverly's Pink Saturday, where there is a mix of pink and holiday posts that are so delightful!
Please leave a comment about your holiday artistic creations, I would love to read them!

So Grateful

This is a wonderful time of year, a time when we spend time reflecting on what we are grateful and thankful for. These ATC's, created for a live swap held every month, are a brief, although important expression of the tremendous bounties in my life~ Faith, Family and Friends. There is so much to be grateful and thankful for an ATC could not hold it all.
On this special day to celebrate all that we have to be thankful for, I share with you a special quotation from The Bab:
"I give Thee thanks for all Thy goodly gifts and I render Thee thanksgiving for all Thy bounties." The Bab
May all my friends and family be united in loving thoughts as they give thanks for all the wonderful bounties we enjoy! Happy Thanksgiving.

Happy Halloween Swapping

The month has passed us by so quickly.

It seems just a short time ago we were planning the Spooky Halloween activities,
tonight we celebrate!

I put on my costume and took my little poochon "Trick or Treating"

He loves to see all the children and get scared with their costumes!

The treat I received was the terrific haunted houses from the Artchix sister group.....and here they are:

Have a Haunting Halloween!