Almost time for Norcross!

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I have been very busy preparing to go to Georgia.  I am going back to Norcross Art Fest this year! I'm excited to go back! Here is a peak at some of what I will have in my booth.  I will be located in booth S42 on South Peachtree Street, in downtown Norcross.  If you are in the area, stop by and see me! 

Click here is more information about the Festival:  Norcross Art Fest,  October 5 & 6, 2013. 

Do you Read Blogs?

To Blog or Not to blog...that is my question.

I started this blog to document my creative journey in 2008.  At the time, many artists were blogging and I was trying to create a presence online. I was hoping to retire from teaching one day and work full time as an artist.  So I started blogging about my art.  Now, 5 years later, I AM retired from teaching and working full time on my art (YAY!) and I am still blogging. Not as often, but I am still here.  But after 5 years, I am wondering who reads blogs and why?  Does anyone actually read this blog?  If so, do you want tutorials? or just pictures of artwork? or life stories...my life is rather dull, except the story about the raccoons in the attic, or tackling my grand dog who wanted to play chase at a bad time...but those can be saved for another post.


On an art note:
Of course I had to include a photo of some art. After all, this is an Art blog.  I have to include some type of visual in all of my posts. This is a photo of a drawing I did several years ago (2006) for an Art Class project demo.  I call it creative doodling.  These days, there is a popular thing called Zendoodles. I guess I've been doing 'Zendoodles' for about 20 years!  I had posted it on my Art Teacher blog and recently someone contacted me about wanting to purchase a download of it.  So I set it up in my Etsy shop.   Maybe I should do more downloads?  I am thinking about it, but don't know how popular that would be. We'll see. Click on the image to see the listing in my Etsy shop.  Maybe I should go dig out my 'zendoodles' from my teaching years...It was one of my favorite projects to have my students create!

I really would like to know what you think about the blogging questions.  So please comment below or on my link from Facebook.  Thank you in advance!  (Hope I'm not talking to a black hole in cyberspace!!)
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Thanks for stopping by,

Beth  ♥ 

Time Flies When You Stay Busy

July is going by so quickly! Make that, July is almost gone! It is already the end of July! I intended to

start posting more often, but I have been so busy working on commissions and working on new work to take to the art festival in October, plus keeping up with life in general.  I've always believed that time flies when you are having fun, but it seems like the older I get, the busier I get, it seems to fly even faster!  Not sure that I like that time is flying, but I am happier when I am busy, for sure!

This month, besides going to a bridal shower and wedding shopping (my daughter's friend is getting married), a family birthday get together, painting and drawing and working with clay (the fun stuff)... I have also cleaned closets, cleaned carpets, cleaned floors, cleaned drawers, and thrown away lots of old stuff, packed in boxes lots of old stuff, and painted walls and cleaned walls...wow, I'm exhausted thinking about it! We are getting closer to being ready to put our house on the market and see what happens.  Future plans will not be finalized until we sell our house, which could be a month or 6 months, or it may not be God's plan for that to happen. We'll just have to wait and see.  Right now, I just have to focus on getting my current obligations taken care of.

On another note, I've been playing around with different photo editing apps on my phone.  It's fun to turn an ordinary photo into something unique. So I've included some photos from my activities this month that I've played with and edited on Cymera, a relatively new app, for me.  I like it because it has more options for editing the filters, the frames, the effects.  It's very fun to play with.  Note the borders around the photos and I learned to make a collage with photos (see the flag photos).  I found another photo editing app on my phone the other day that I will have to play around with too.  But right now, I have a lot to do.  Back to the studio!
Have a nice week!

Beth  ♥ 

Pink Garden

I love flowers, but I really do not do much gardening anymore. We planted everything in our yard, but since I have started working more on my art and have had knee problems, I just don't do a lot, besides just maintenance.  I plant a few annuals each year and try to keep my perennials going.  But this year I've had an abundance of thriving plants with pink flowers! First the azaleas, then the hydrangeas, and now the crepe myrtles.  It's a good thing I love pink! I have other crepe myrtles. Hopefully they will bloom as pretty as this pink one.

I went out to trim the very large azaleas bushes back a little and found this crepe myrtle with all of these blooms! It is on the back end of our storage building and last time I looked at it was before it had blooms on it.  I guess it didn't get its annual trim back, so it had blooms almost all the way to the ground. The 2nd photo is before I trimmed it up some. The last photo is the top of the shrub after I trimmed it up some.  I really thought it was pretty with the sunlight coming through the neighbors trees. It's very peaceful back there.  My only wish is that I didn't get eaten up by the mosquitoes every time I go out and trim my shrubs!  They really love me! I guess I must be really sweet! Haha.   Oh and I never trimmed much off the azaleas. They are taller than I am!


Beth  ♥

Thinking about Christmas? in July?

Usually I don't even think about Christmas until December. No, I'm not decorating for Christmas, but I am

working on Christmas orders (custom gifts) and items to sell at an art festival that are Christmas theme.  I have even purchased a couple of Christmas gifts...which is a first for me.  The last few years, I was really stressed out over Christmas shopping, or rather the lack of Christmas shopping.  But because the Fall/Christmas season is so busy (hopefully it will be again this year), I don't have much time to shop...and I do NOT like to shop!  Probably because it is hard for me to decide what to buy for other people.  But they (the marketing experts) say that many people start looking and shopping for Christmas in September! Who knew? I guess I've been missing out all these years.  It does make sense though. So this summer I will be working hard getting ready for Christmas.  My little clay houses and things can't be created at the last minute, so I have to start now to build up my inventory, along with working on other orders.

I'm also going to Norcross, Georgia in October!  I'm excited about that!  I've only been to a few Art Festivals, and I am still learning, but Norcross Art Fest is a very well organized and attended art festival. Hopefully, for me,  this one will be even better this year! I hope to be more prepared for this one.  ( See my  booth story here)  My Hubby, my assistant, and I had a lot of fun and learned a lot about art festivals. We learned it is a lot of work and exhausting, but fun...if the weather cooperates! (We almost blew away at the John's Creek Festival when a hurricane Sandy was passing by on the coast!)  I've learned a lot about what sells and what does not, and how to display my items. I've also been getting a lot of cool ideas for improvements on my display. I'll be posting some pictures of my booth later, when it gets closer to Art Fest time.  .

Since I am currently working on items for my Etsy shop and for the Art Fest, I asked some of my Facebook friends, "what type of functional items (out of clay) would you buy at an art festival?"   (If you have any suggestions or ideas that would complement my little clay houses and clay tiles, I am open to suggestions! ) Most of the suggestions I got were for more bowls and cups.


I've added some photos of the bowl that I made a few weeks ago along with the cup that I made to match.  I guess you might say it is my prototype for a new functional design that I will be making more of and with more color variations. The cup has a tree design on one side with branches that hold the little birds on the other side.
I also included a photo of the inside of the cup because I added a little leaf design on the inside bottom of the cup. I had to use a flash on the camera to get it to show up and it looks like there is liquid in the bottom, but there is not.  Anyway, I liked the effect that it gives.  I enjoyed creating the bowl and cup, but they took some time to decorate. Hopefully the next ones will go more quickly...or I will be spending all my time on glazing cups and bowls!

But if I'm quiet this summer, you know where I am!




Beth  ♥

Where did June go?

It flew by! It always does though. I love June, because the weather is usually very nice.  It's been a little on the warm side, but not too bad until this week.   When it starts to get hot, like it has this week, I stay inside and work in my studio a lot more.   I seem to get more accomplished in the studio when the weather is not good outside.

But just a little picture today of some of the clay things I've been working on. More clay owls, a house, and a couple of hanging tiles.   I didn't draw the little drawing of "Bethie".  That was done by the talented Tim Hunter.  She sits on my shelf in my studio.

Time for some sleep. I'll be posting some of these hanging tiles in my Etsy shop soon.  The owls and the orange house are already spoken for.  More to come soon.

 Love my job!

Beth  ♥    

Pink Hydrangeas Blooming this Month

 I love flowers and love to have them in my yard.  I just don't seem to have the time to baby them like I used to.  But this hydrangea is looking very pretty with a lot of blooms right now.  I love all colors of hydrangeas, but pink is my favorite.  This is the only one that I have in my yard.  After we moved into our current house, I received a cutting from my mother's hydrangea and because our house was new (17 years ago), there was no shade.  I tried to find a shady spot to plant it, but it was difficult and it was a little droopy and slow to grow at first.  But now I have some shade and I moved it to a better spot several years ago.  Now it gets plenty of shade and is pretty healthy.   I plan to try to root some cuttings off this plant, so I can take some with me, when we move...whenever that happens.
  

Hmmm...I guess I need to do some rooting technique research.  And maybe draw this one too!




Beth  ♥



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