National Holidays that Should Be

I saw this on my favorite magazine and website Real Simple.

I love the magazine and think it's hilarious to invent holidays to get the day off of work. The managing editor was watching so much tv coverage of the Presidential Inaugaration that she defends that she got little done at work that day. Here is her blog post:

http://simplystated.realsimple.com/adventures_in_chaos/2009/01/national-holida.html

Here is what she came up with for potential NEW national holidays:

--the day of the Oscars, and possibly the day after
--the first day of school (would have to be a rolling day off, varying by region)
--the day after you get a really bad haircut (customizable national day off)
--Black Friday
--any royal wedding day

I personally think the day after the Super Bowl should be added if YOUR team is in the game! wink wink! (and you are hosting a Super Bowl Party :)

Any ideas you would like to offer up??? Surely we can think of an art related cause?
~Dawn

Funny Mail

So yesterday I was blogging about the mail.

I got this in the mail a few months ago and meant to do a post about it. It made me laugh the day I got it. Really hard. I do have a Dept Store credit card, I do live in Scottsdale, I do occasionally buy some Lancome at Macy's and Dillard's and well...who the heck is Beenie Rancich?

If you can look closely at the scan of the mail.... I know we are the second homeowners to my current home. So I know that no one by that name ever lived there.

The same week I got the mail for "Beenie" reminding me about the gift with purchase at the Lancome counter....

I got a package back in the mail with the above sticker on it.

Did you know that there is a new rule since 9/11 that if your package is over 16 ounces and has stamps/postage on it, that you must hand it to a mail employee? You can not just drop it in a mailbox. I did not know about the rule til it happened to me.

Funny Mail I tell you...

~Dawn

Art in the Mail

Wow, somedays you really need a pick me up. I had a rough day dealing with something. I have already had a glass or 2 of my favorite Chardonnay (Rombauer if you are asking...)




My dear friend Karen spoils me endlessly with packages of fabulous art supplies. After my gift back to her this Christmas, she said " forget diamonds and roses, give me art supplies and ephemera any day" So...





Audrey spoiled me today with the best goodies and totally made my whole day. Seriously! I sent her a package way back during Halloween and today she returned the favor. So I say to you what Karen said to me..."forget diamonds and roses, give me art supplies and ephemera any day!!!"


Did you see the cute art that says Friends! How cute is that?



Do any of our spouses really understand the depths of which we love and covet this stuff??? I ask you....

The whole package was stellar.




I love this cute little book she made.


















I have been totally addicted to Cabinet Cards since Maija introduced me so many moons ago.

<--------------------I had no idea that they also came in this new diminutive size. What the heck is it... a mini-Carte de Viste Cabinet Card??

Love it. Oh we all should have such dear artsy friends that know exactly what we like and how to make our day!

I see on my buddy Maija's blog that she gets stuff like this all the time...now I know how she feels.

Thank you from the very bottom of my art inspired heart dear Audrey! You are so talented... and fabulous too!

A grateful friend,

~Dawn

Herb Update

You know we can hardly even believe this. We "planted" these herbs on 12.26 and now it is hardly a month later and the basil already went on a pizza last week.


The Aerogarden rocks! It is called aeroponic gardening. I am not sure what that means. It tells you when to add water, when to add the fertilizer, and it grows aggressively due to 16 hours of light per day with the light bulbs. Organic too!!!!



I posted originally on January 6th, so compare the photos from then to now!




We had to move the top of it up one notch, cause the basil is almost touching the light bulbs.

Cool huh?

~Dawn

AZ Cardinals going to the Super Bowl

WOW, at the beginning of football season I definitely would not have guessed this. I live in Sunny Arizona, and our team... the ARIZONA CARDINALS are heading to the Super Bowl. The hubs is a huge NFL fan, so over the years I have watched a lot of it.

I so appreciate that our quarterback, Kurt Warner is such a nice family guy, happily married, big family, long career, will be 3 times to the Super Bowl, and such a nice representative of the NFL. As opposed to the long list of players in trouble with wives, girlfriends, and the law. He is not bad to look at either! SO Kurt, please be very careful over the next few weeks. Don't walk on any freshly mopped floors, maybe you should employ a bodyguard just to keep you healthy!

In addition, growing up in Wisconsin being a Packer fan is my birthright. So my Brothers and Father were always talking football.

Lastly, my oldest brother once told me that he can only remember how old I am because I was born in the year of the first Super Bowl. One that the Green Bay Packers won by the way over the Kansas City Chiefs! (Yikes, that means I am 43 years old later this year. ) So hubs is from Kansas and was a season ticket holder back when he still lived there.

That concludes my little NFL story of the day.

GO Cardinals!!!

~Dawn

Blog Award

Wow, I received a blog award from this very nice reader who likes my blog (and the Twilight Series, too)

I am humbled that people email me and tell me that they enjoy reading this lil blog and really like my artwork. So I will follow the rules this time. I am SO routinely a rule follower by nature.

I am supposed to list 7 things I love, and 7 people who also recieve the award.

1} I love my hubby, Roger. I am grateful and blessed for the life we share. Next month is our 10 year Wedding Anniversary.

2} I love perusing through bookstores to ultimately find something that will make me settle down and relax for a few minutes.

3} I love to learn. I enjoy taking classes of all types. I believe it is an investment in yourself. Whether learning spanish, an inspiring art class, or just about anything.

4} I love my family and my circle of friends. I am exceptionally blessed to have a few people in my life that are my own personal therapist. I don't know what I would do without you!

5} I love eating outdoors on a patio somewhere (whether restaurant or my own home) and looking out at a palm tree, enjoying our beautiful Arizona sunsets. I love living here in Sunny Scottsdale. Where our local joke is "Today it is supposed to be 72, but we are hoping it is gonna warm up" I grew up in blustery Wisconsin so don't tell me I don't appreciate winter!

6} I love receiving ART in the mail. It brings an instant smile to your face when you open the mailbox and receive some fun along with all the those bills. Email has stopped the time honored tradition of a personal note or thank you in the mail.

7} I love blogging. It's my personal journal and it is artistic. I am gonna promise to blog more this year. Too many days in between posts!

7 CREATIVE PEOPLE:

Lisa Dalke

Stephanie Wright

Maija Lepore

Kristy Christopherson

Karen Witte-Elkins (soon to have a blog too!)

Audrey Hernandez

Debbie Bick

Thanks my artsy friends for always providing me inspiration!

~Dawn

My Day with T!M

Hmmm what a great day I had yesterday. I spent the day at Frenzy Stamper, my fave local place run by the fabulous Debbie and featured here with her awesome hubby Jeff.




My day was creative, inspiring, fun, and most of all I learned some new terrific stuff.

My art is a hobby, but so much more. It completes and fills my soul.


I have learned over the years a lot of great stuff that I use all the time in my artwork.


Tim Holtz is a fantastic teacher. {He really is the nice guy you may have heard he is}. He is humble, a true artist, and knows how to teach. Some artists do not make such great instructors, despite how fabulously talented they are. That is not the case with Mr. Tim Holtz.
So this is T!m and me yesterday.




















There were 2 classes offered at Frenzy. Debbie was celebrating 6 years in business on Saturday. We got lots of loot, here is the pin Rosie made for us who were there.
















The first class was assemblage. I had not done much of that before really.

Here are T!M's birds...


















Here is my bird




















the second class was a canvas made with grungeboard and called "words of muse"



This is Tim's canvas...

Here is mine:

and now for the goodies!


I felt like I was on Oprah's Show!!!!!!!!!!!

{seriously!}


I was one of the winner's of the hourly prize drawings and I scored all this loot from Debbie:

She gave some of us that made purchases a little extra goodie and it says LOYAL CUSTOMER OF FRENZY STAMPER. you got that right! I will be loyal to Debbie forever.

So to continue the Oprah like feeling..when we started the second class... since it included Tim's grungeboard and we needed to make up our favorite words... he handed out 2 full packages of grungeboard alpha's!

I told you it was like being at Oprah's Show.



and when you take a ANY class...it is all about learning something new and of course an addiction to some new product that you absolutely must jump up and purchase before you leave the store. and T!M made me so extra happy with this purchase ....

{Now I know why I asked Santa for my NEW Cuttlebug this Christmas}









I also bought this after seeing it for 2 classes in a row ....

Note to self...this little baby holds 8 handles and you only own 6. Run back to Frenzy .....sooon......



I also fell in love with not only T!M but his new sanding grip...

What a great experience. {Seriously!} If T!M Holtz comes anywhere near a town near you...you owe it to yourself to take a class with him. He is neck and neck with Kelly as my all time favorite instructors!!!

I also want to mention, Mario his super awesome assistant. Mario was the greatest too!

oh, and get this...one of the people that was there was from Montana. Her husband surprised her with the T!M classes, hotel, and airline tix to Arizona. Apparently, she is a huge T!M fan, I suppose he does not teach much in Montana, and her hubby must be a wonderful guy. That is incredible.

~Dawn

HomeMADE decor...Tassels!

I decided another of my new year's resolutions is...to make better use of my craftiness for things around my house. Things that are useful, serve a purpose, and are artsy and pretty to boot. You know how most people we all know don't "get it" and look at your art with puzzlement??? Oh come now, I can't possibly be the only one with a relative or friend that said to you...but why? or ...you made that???

ummmm, yes as a matter of fact I did.

Recalling back to my years as a dept store visual merchandiser...I had some tassels on my towels in my spare bathroom that fell apart before Christmas. They have been hanging up by my desk for a month now. I decided to fix and re-do them. For heaven's sake, I only own the world's largest supply of yarn and fibers. I don't even know how to knit, but don't tell anyone! I also own tons of fabric and don't sew, but that is another topic for another day. (I prefer the too pretty to actually wipe your hands on.. type of display in my guest bathroom. ) that being said here is my new oh so pretty tassels...

yes, I tend towards contemporary, and yes, the artwork does in fact match the towels.

I digress.... So aren't they cute if I don't mind saying so??

I actually ran out of a couple of the ribbons I used before all 4 tassles were done. If anyone can figure that out while in my guest bathroom....well then they are spending WAY too much time in my bathroom. Hmmmm... I notice here this one has two less off white satin ribbons....{yeah, right!}

I am hosting a wine tasting tonight from a club we joined. I wonder if anyone is gonna mention the tassels???

I hope someone who reads this blog "sacks up" their towels like this. Old dept store thing...so easy! Coated wire (like those extra long twist ties that come with new appliances!) underneath a rolled washcloth with a safety pin. The rolled up towels inside the sacks are very easy to remove use and redo. Voila!

~Dawn

Literally make up your mind

I saw this great post on a blog today that I like about new year's resolutions. So literally make up your mind on her cool phrenology head template. here...

http://dsharp.typepad.com/files/your-own-phrenology-head.pdf

or go to her blog to see what she did...

http://dsharp.typepad.com/

If you think I have lost my mind, well maybe I have. At least now my resolutions are in pen and ink, and on my mind. What more can you ask for?

Organizing sort of tops the list. I think it is the patron saint of all resolutions in January. My desk is so covered with stuff, I can't even see my desktop. I read somewhere online "do less laundry and wear more deodorant" that made me laugh...seriously. So I had to add that. There isn't enough room on that little head for all of it, but it is a start. Happy 2009 to you.

~Dawn

Organic Herbs

Hard to believe I haven't been making some art...but I continue with more food.

Hubs bought me an "Aero Garden" for Christmas. Aero tells you when to water, when to feed nutrients, it grows rapidly (due to the special lights that actually are a beacon in the kitchen 16 hours a day) there is no dirt (so no fungus gnats and bugs yippee!) and it is completely organic... What more could a black thumb gardener ask for? It does all the thinking for you!

I LOVE me some fresh herbs for cooking. I love basil in omelettes, quiche, frittata, pizza, italian bruschetta and etc. I dig (no pun intended) fresh chives in chicken salad, potatoes, tons of things. So excited for the new herbs to appear. We "planted" the day after Christmas. The caps have come off of the ones that have sprouts already. YUM!

I will keep you posted if it works. You know the classic..."think of all the money we will save on herbs at the grocery store!" You don't even want to know how much $$$ this guy cost. Hubs surprised me with it, cuz we looked at it at Sam's Club (yes it is available there too) and then decided against it...hmmm maybe he was planning this all along.

~Chef and Gardener Dawn

juicing lemons

Ok so the list of new year's resolutions is long. Getting to all of them may be impossible.

I interrupt that statement (cuz I am good at that) to YES...juice lemons. They may look like oranges. But they are Meyer Lemons from a friend that has a tree in the backyard. They are in season right now in AZ. Her tree is LOADED and practically tipping over. So was oh too happy to gift as many as we wanted to take. Cuz, the hubs and I cook...a lot. Plus ...

we use fresh lemon juice a lot. (marinating, on broccoli, on chicken, in cocktails, do you need more representation?)

This is the hubs juicing the lemons in the old retro Sunbeam. It belonged to hubby's Mother,

Jessie. She would be proud we still have it, we still use it, and despite nearly 50+ years of use... it still rocks the juice out of lemons.

Hubs was laughing at me taking photos of this. He was grimacing "quit bringing me more lemons!"

Cuz we had more than we thought.

The kitchen smelled so great all afternoon.

My friend with the citrus trees makes their own lemoncello, orangecello, and limecello. If you have not had it; totally yummy after dinner liqueur originally from Italy....buy some at your local beverage mart. YUMMO! makes killer martini's, ask Danny DeVito if he likes lemoncello... He made quite a stir in the news last year about it.

~Dawn

New Year New Attitude