Michigan Vacation -- a very wordy post

I've been vacationing in Michigan this week. We like to choose somewhere that we haven't been before -- or that one of us hasn't been to :)
We started out on Monday(after a stop to visit my parents for a day) in Ann Arbor. We visited the very famous Hollanders (not just a paper shop) and my favourite store, Found. Then we hit some of my favourite US only stores -- Trader Joes, Target and Joanne's -- we stocked up on some yummy food for our hotel room (couldn't open our Trader Joe's wine though -- no corkscrew, lol). Then stocked up on some flip flops and some basic fabric (flannel for pjs).
On Tuesday night we headed to Kalamazoo and Portage to visit with Joanne Thieme Huffman!(here we are in Joanne's beautiful yard -- picture taken by Joanne's lovely daughter Becky!)

We had great fun ( Yummy restaurants!) and visited the Kalamazoo Institute of Art (Georgia O'Keeffe exhibit), a great fabric store and yarn shop -- and visited Hobby Lobby and Harbor Freight (just like our Princess Auto -- is it related???).
Joanne and I played making Suzi Blu sketches -- I think that I'm getting better. For those of you who complain about the big eyed, crooked head girls... well..... maybe someday I'll try to make them smaller and less crooked :)I'm just loving the little girl with the freckles in the bottom picture, lower left corner.

Joanne has the most adorable little pug dog named Cookie. She is the pretties little girly dog ever!!!! I am so lame that I forgot to take a picture.

On Thursday (after Joanne graciously put us up for 2 nights) (THANK YOU JOANNE!!!) the sun finally came out so Ray and I headed to the beach and camping. We travelled an hour west of Kalamazoo to the beach town of South Haven. What a lovely town!! Some very nice antique stores-- AND I found some most wonderful Keen shoes for $40!!! (They're about $140 here) (funny, I bought my last pair last summer in Burlington, Vermont). Oh, and if anyone finds a really cool vintage children's book in a restaurant called Capn Nemos in South Haven, that book is mine. I didn't mean to leave it on the table when I left......We camped in Van Buren State Park. It was a nice park -- we'll go back. BUT I got a sunburn. I had loaded on the sunscreen. But I was wearing a dress and was reading on the beach lying down, and I guess that my dress was hiked up a bit so I am totally burned on the backs of my upper legs. ouch ouch ouch. Not nice for the 7 hour ride home.

There were lots of bugs:Some fallen trees:The walk TO the beach was fine. The walk back to camp sucked. Ray said that it was good exercise. I said that if he carried me it would be GREAT exercise.Somebody made this cool driftwood beach "installation"
We were so happy to get to the border and find no line ups!!! BUT (there is always a but) we got a random border check -- but had very nice border checking people who were very patient with me while I rummaged through stuff to find receipts. Well, they knew that I was totally cheap when they said "Oh, you bought some wine" (we had declared no alcohol). I yelped (really, it was a yelp) "No, it's empty -- I just wanted my dollar back!" Then they said thank you have a nice day. Whew, no duty on the 6 pairS of flip flops. ( totally kidding here -- there would have been no duty)
Andy was a very happy puppy upon our return. We were very happy to learn that he was a pretty good boy while we were away. He only ate one flip flop. (are you understanding now why we purchase flip flops in bulk? -- It's because some of us here forget to put their flip flops in the flip flop basket when we leave the dog home alone in the house. not naming any names.....)

My Lucky Day

School is finished for the school year. Now the summer is filled with travel, friends and art. What more could I ask for? I found the clovers on a walk with Andy. One is 4 leaf, and one is 5 leaf. Lucky me!

Jewelry Making!

I think that I forgot to show this wonderful necklace. I took a jewelry class from Ruth Rae at Artfest. It was the BEST CLASS THAT I'VE EVER TAKEN! I learned how to use a jewelers saw properly and to make my own rivets. I'm taking a class from Susan Lenart Kazmer at ArtUnraveled in August, so I'm sure to improve on my jewelry making abilities.

More from Niagara

I only took a handful of pictures, so I had to wait until everyone else had posted their pics so I could borrow them -- and you've likely all seen these from the other girls blogs, but here are some of my favourites.
The little gifties that I made -- candy buttons and pincushions (you can buy the candy button molds at Bake it Pretty -- and download the packageing images too!)
Gifties from Nat: (there was a stress relieving bath set too and a yummy yummy bath bomb)Earrings from Viv:Sachets made by Sandy (they are our blog banners!!!!!!)Us holding the dollies that Maija made for us:M is for Martha and Maija:
Maija holding the journal cover that she made in our bag class:At a yummy Greek Restaurant:The drowned rats at the falls:

Happy Fathers Day!

This is my daddy holding me when I was just a few weeks old. Thank you Dad!!! I wouldn't be here without you. You've taught me so much - everything from patience to power tools. See you next weekend!Ray and I thought that we'd spend the day out on the Toronto Islands -- just hanging out. Well, due to public transit hell, and thousands of people in line for the ferry, we just sat on the grass at the waterfront and looked at the islands. Compromise. My life is all about compromise lately.

Sew Somerset 4!!

I'm in here again! Yay! Isn't the art journal on the cover brilliant? It's by Jane Eileen (fabulous blog! -- go and see her work!) This time I have 2 articles. One is a how-to on purses collaged with images of your own art. I wasn't too thrilled about the photos of my purses
(sorry -- for some reason blogger will only publish these photos sideways, lol)

(but I guess that I couldn't do any better at photographing them) and the other is an article about my found and gathered ATCs that I made last summer:

Girls weekend out!

I managed to get away from report cards for a weekend, and have a fabulous time with 4 other wonderful women! Maija, Natalea, Vivian, Sandy and I imposed ourselves on Niagara-on-the Lake (well, perhaps the imposition was high in the sky above Niagara Falls....)
Here are our gifties (so fun!!!)This is the softie that I made for our softie trade (I'm just loving bunnies)Here are all of our softies together(and did I tell you the one about the teacher who was teaching a purse class and her sewing machine dies? I didn't? Oh good.... because that was me)

These are some of the pincushions that I made for the girls -- not quite finished in the picture.
more pics coming soon....

Hangin' with the five year olds.......

The conversation went like this:

"Hey Ms. Brown -- you have lots of grey hair"
"Thanks for pointing that out, Jack."
pause......
"Ms. Brown, are you old?"
"Just a bit older than my teeth."
long pause.........
"Ms. Brown -- you're funny."
"I know."

What do you see when you close your eyes?

That was the theme for Peggy's book. Easy for me to answer -- I see Lauren, beauty, the future... The scan does not do justice to the multi layered background -- there are many layers of paint -- pthalo blue is so luminous -- and then I've sewn on 3 different colours of tulle.

finishing up loose ends

I've been behind with everything -- I only create on Saturday and Sunday mornings -- and my weekends have been full lately. And then my muse was being difficult.......

I finally finished the Twilight series of books! The fourth book was THE BEST! I read it almost straight through in a few sittings. Very suspenseful. Like the season finale of Greys Anatomy. That almost killed me. But now I can catch up on my DVDs -- I'm just finishing the first season of Carnivale (Twin Peaks meets the circus and the church....)

These circle pages are for Megan's book. It is actually a front and back of the same page. I have been working on it for over a month. I absolutely love polka dots, but I just cannot work in the circle format. I was in a circle fatbook once that almost drove me to quitting any artmaking at all. This was close. Because I was doing a front and a back, I didn't have to make the pages relate to each other, like you do in a spread. I'm so happy that it's finished. Sorry that it's so late, Megan!!!!

Rowing

Last weekend, instead of making art, I learned to row. Lauren was running an Introduction to Rowing at her boat club and I decided to support her the best that I could. I kind of thought that I'd be making cookies or providing band aids to blistered hands. But no, she expecting me to squish my butt into a very narrow and tippy boat, and be a team player.(I'm third from the left in both pictures)
(also: we were short 2 people so we have 2 empty spots in our "eight")
(click on the pictures to really see my bad form)

Do you know what "catching a crab" is? Well, I caught two. And that's not a good thing. But at least I didn't fall out of the boat! "Catching a crab" is when you take a stroke and your blade is not completely on the square so your oar gets stuck in the water. Here is a clip from the US rowing safety video on how to catch a crab:
http://www.row2k.com/video/view.cfm?vid=2499

I think that I'll stick with making art.... or kayaking or canoeing. I'll post some kayaking pictures of me later in the summer. Lauren can be the rower in the family. She needs to be better than her mommy at something, LOL. (that comment was totally tongue-in-cheek -- she is better than me at almost everything... not that I'd ever admit it....)

Marie Antoinette

I made this "bits and pieces" canvas for Mary Ann -- it is part of the Marie Antoinette Collage Swap hosted by Maria at The Junk Drawer. I've never done anything like this before, but we were supposed to use an 8 1/2 x 11 canvas and put 12 squares with collaged bits and pieces on it. Well, I've never seen an 8 1/2 x 11 canvas, so I used 9x12. I painted the background and then made squares that were 2 1/2 " square. Some people did them with bigger squares, with no canvas showing in between, but I wanted my canvas to show. I used a bit of glitter too (I know that Maija would say that I didn't use enough glitter, LOL)(mary ann, feel free to add more glitter!!!)

Pole art!

I took the knit-up down -- it was looking a bit tired. I was feeling a bit possessive about "my" pole (what if someone comes along and puts an ad on it? Yikes, better get out there right away and re-claim my space!). So I had to make some art to put up. I covered a piece of bristol board with acrylic paint (to seal it) and then rubber stamped a few images and a message. Then I taped it to the pole and hoped for the best. I put it up on Sunday, but the camera battery was dead so I couldn't photograph it until Tuesday (today). And it poured rain all day today. I don't know if you can see, but it is a bit puffy. There is a lot of water between the sign and the post. So it's all squishy. We'll see how long it lasts out in the elements. I have more too (different words, different colours) but I can't decide if I want to put them up around the city, or just save them for my pole. My pole. LOL.

Oh, and just to let you know -- I really am happy to share my pole with anyone who wants to share the space. Just in case you can't find a pole of your own. Like, in case all of the other poles in the neighbourhood are full of posters and art, I won't complain if you want to share mine.......

What if........

the Hokey Pokey really IS what it's all about? I love that thought. I made this canvas for my friend/partner in "crime" aka teaching partner, Debra. I am really enjoying working on canvas. I have a few more canvas pieces in the works.

Finally, Spring!

So I made a spring apron! I made this apron for Sabina in "The Mother of all Apron Swaps" -- A Canadian art swap group. I love making clothes that don't involve fittings or alterations........
The weather here in Toronto was fabulous today! It is Lauren's birthday (how did my baby get to be 22?), so we went downtown to buy her some Birkenstocks, then we walked home in our shirts, NO COATS! Hurray!
I have taken down my knit up (it kept slipping down with the spring rains) and I will put up some new public art tomorrow (or possibly Monday, as is is supposed to rain all day tomorrow). Stay tuned!!

fort worden knit up

Charms

These are large pendant-like charms -- also great for embellishing books. They are made from bamboo tiles with an octopus image on one side and some stamped text on the other. Then I used some kind of black wire (I don't know what kind -- it said binding wire) to make the wire wrapped loop. I thought that they looked very yummy in this bowl....

journal folder

I like working on unbound pages, yet I like the idea of a journal. I made this journal folder with some super heavy interfacing inside, and I padded it with polarfleece scraps. I'm going to embellish the cover quite a bit more. It's a work in progress!

Another day, another octopus bag

Do you see a trend? I made this one for Heather. I put the chair in the garden to take the picture. When Ray came home later he wanted to know why I was sitting in the garden facing the fence. I told him that I was trying to get a sun tan on the back of my head. I think that he believed me. Really. I really must stop with the smart alek answers.

jellyfish!

Isn't this just the cutest jellyfish? I've been drawing lots of jellyfish lately and I had to make a t-shirt. I'm a bit squinty -- it couldn't be helped.

More bags, more octopi

I made this tote bag is for Ruth and I liked it so much that I made myself a sling bag with a longer strap for myself. I can't wait until it is finally spring and I can stop wearing my winter coat. Octopi and winter just don't mix.