My First Crusade ~ Make It Your Own

I adore this lady. I love her passion for art & life. Michelle is quite inspiring. She's been doing these crusades for some time now, this is 31. I don't know why it took me so long to get on board. Lots of them called out to me. This particular one did & the stars aligned & here I am.

A couple of years ago I started to feel really good about my art. I even blogged about it here. It was mine, it was personal & it was me. When I first started making jewelry, I was so intimidated by everyone else. While I was intimidated, I knew this was a true passion for me. As time went by, I became more comfortable in my craft. I tried all sorts of mediums in jewelry making. One of the first clues that jewelry making was my calling, was looking at other artists. I could look at a book, magazine article, or blog & use it as true inspiration. I didn't need or want to copy. I know my style is all my own. It's a bit eclectic & I believe everyone has their own special eye for things. You just have to listen to that inner artist in you.

My first inspiration is from Jewelry the Zine. I can't stop making these crocheted necklaces. Oh so fun! It goes really quickly & I LOVE to play with color combos. I have a bunch more to take pictures of, but the weather has been kinda crappy in FL. Gotta love the afternoon rain here! By the way, check out some eye candy from the zine authors Catherine Witherell & Deryn Mentock. I first blogged about crocheting here & it just keeps going :)

The second piece of inspiration that I Made My Own is inspired by Laurie Lenfestey. I first saw her work in a Country Living article & fell in love with her work. It is this page of rings that became my inspiration. I loved the idea of layering buttons, rhinestones, cameos, cabochons, filigrees & brass stampings.

Thank you to Michelle Ward for all her inspiration & the crusades. Be sure to take a look over at the crusade blog GPP Street Team. There is so much to look at. You have 31 crusades worth of eye candy to look at!

Pink Saturday ~ June 20 2009

Happy Pink Saturday! Hopefully this post is up on Saturday. I'll be traveling back to MD after a short stay in Charlottesville.
For today I'm showing my newest crochet necklaces. I used pink c-lon thread & pink seedbeads. The one on the left is a pink strawberry pendant with rhinestones. I picked up that cutie at Studio Baboo in Charlottesville. The one on the right is the pendant I made with Jane Wynn at the Art & Soul retreat. There's a better picture here. The weather hasn't been the greatest here & I don't have my computer to do the photo editing.
Be sure to say hi to Beverly, our hostess, & check out her blog How Sweet the Sound for the list of pink participants.

What I've Been Up To

Summer has been at varing speeds for us; sometimes slow & relaxing, other times at the speed of light. We FINALLY got our orders. Hurray!
The background of the picture is this sweet handmade journal made by the oh so talented Tara. I've been a fan of hers for awhile now & couldn't resist this journal. I'm filling it with memories of this summer.
I've also been a beading crochet fool. I can't get enough of these cute necklaces. I better start listing some in the store. I have a feeling I'll be overrun with them very soon, although, I may be there already.
My laptop is in for repair again! (As Josh asked, "Why is it broken again? Why didn't they fix it the first time? Yes, my questions exactly!) I haven't been able to respond to everyone who's visited my blog yet, but I promise I will. I'll also be posting on Pink Saturday :)

Current Inspirations

Catherine of Happy Day Art did a fun post about what writing down the things that describe you at this time. I thought it would be a fun exercise. It's a great jumping off point for journaling as well. You can take a look at her original post here & an additional one here. My list follows with a wordle cloud, as well, & some pictures. Thanks to Catherine for such a creative tag.

Anthropologie

Silhouettes

Chandeliers

Crowns

Pink
Aqua

Crochet
OOAK

pendants

Swirlies

Doodles

Vintage

Old treasures
Damask

local
New adventures
journaling

Art with the kiddos

Purpose
Nature
Birdcages

Bling

Right now my world is in a state of flux. I guess you might not be able to tell by all the fun pictures up top. Our family has moved every year for the last 5 years straight. We've moved cross country, we moved to the neighboring state, we moved down the coast, we moved from old base housing to new base housing. Last year around this time I was shuttling the family & our belongings among 3 states. Right now we're preparing to move abroad. We literally just got our orders yesterday & it's been a long wait since March with lots of snags. I'm just happy to have them so we can continue our adventure. There have been 2 things that have helped me keep it together family & friends & art. I would have never had the chance to take those pictures above or create the art that I did without those moves. Some were really rough but I grew & my art grew.

If your interested in playing along, I'm going to quote directly from Catherine's blog. To me this was a great brain dump exercise to get some creativity flowing.

What are you about right now?
Write down as many things as you can until you can't really think of any more.
Tag as many people as you want.
Link back to the person who tagged you so they can see what you wrote.
Write a comment so people can go see your list. No pressure. Let's
see what this will bring. I am curious as always...

Happy Birthday Pink Saturday ~ June 6

I'm sharing the rest of my tags for the Sweet Sentiments tag swap hosted by Mary Ann. She is hosting another tag swap & 2 itty bitty book swaps. Quite a few of my tags had a pink theme. This was so so fun :) You can take a look at the group pool here.

Make sure you visit Beverly to see who else is participating in Pink Saturday.

Please Don't Make Me Leave...

I've been splitting my time between preparing the household & getting as much of Charlottesville into my system. Today my little man & I visited the downtown mall. I went to say goodbye to my beading friends at Studio Baboo.

I went to another store today for the first time, The Artful Lodger. It's a wonderful furniture store that has some great gifts. Look what I got! A Jill Schwartz shadow box. I'm in love :) I chatted with the store owner for awhile & really enjoyed it. Charlottesville has opened my eyes to "buying local". Being an artist myself, how could you not? This beauty is going in my art room in the new house. Looking forward to having a room vs. a corner this time around.