Thursday, August 13, 2009

Photo Collage



This is a photo collage that I put together in the last two days. I copied the photo from a friend in Colorado. The little boy pictured is her dad. I was captivated by the photo and knew immediately that I wanted to do something with it. A year later, I finally figured it out. I first printed a copy of the photo which was very light. Then I printed a transparency of the same photo.


Using watercolor pencils, I colored in the copy and used a blender pen to smooth the color. I layered the transparency over the colored in copy and was really pleased with the depth this process brought to the photo.


I framed the layered photo with paper and then pieces of wood that I had inked with green ink. My friends dad was a weatherman, so I printed the weathervane on a piece of river birch bark. I added pine needles and feathers tied with the "Remember" ribbon. A glasine envelope was added at the bottom with various ephemera on which my friend can write memories of her dad.


In the lower left corner is a transparency with "time" on it, an old clock, and the definition of time. Old trading stamps and the 1931 (date of the picture) were added. I used beads strung on a pine needle for her dad's name. A strip of wood was added top and bottom for stability. The branch at the top was collected on the road near our place (and also my friend's place) in Colorado. A small piece of quartz, a key charm and a clock charm finish out the piece on the bottom.

Life Unscripted



Here is a little journal that I made a few months ago.
I started with simple chipboard pages that already had the scalloped edge. I painted them with Lumiere paints and then stamped and embellished them.
I also used a white pen to add doodles and lines for journaling.
Most of the stamps are Tim Holtz stamps. "Little Ledger Girl" is by Queen's Dresser Drawers.



















Sunday, March 29, 2009

Iced....and Forgiven

You never know what Kansas weather will do....70 degrees one day and the next day....wham!!

This is a picture of our River Birch tree taken from our basement window after the blizzard departed. It left behind ice and snow and lots of difficulties for many people in Kansas.

This morning at church I was asked to be the computer coordinator--in the absence of the assigned person who apparently was still snowed in. Now this is a job I do on a regular basis. I enjoy it...and I'm USUALLY pretty good at it. In fact, I get rather irritated with other people who don't do a good job of advancing the songs quickly enough so you don't know what the next line is. However....

This morning...the whole program seemed sluggish....but I did just fine until after the sermon....but then, no matter what I tried--double clicking, hitting the space bar (overandover), double clicking on every conceiveable place--it just sat there....and the crowd turned around....and the song leader waited...and finally the preacher rushed down the aisle to assist. Well, about that time...it came unstuck....and whipped through about the next 100 slides....ok....the next 5. So then I had to back it up. And by then....I, who am so proud at how well I generally do this job, am so flustered and mad at myself for not getting it right--that I promptly mess up the next TWO songs as well. ARGHHHHH!

And then a small still voice said....forgiven.....and I managed to calm down and do it right again.

And I thought about the ice on that River Birch tree. How the weight of it bowed the branches down to the ground. And how the wind whipped it and some of the branches broke. And I thought...you know....when we beat ourselves up for something (big or little) we are frozen. And then we can't even do what we well know how to do. And not only that, beating ourselves up can affect others (like not knowing what line comes next). But if we listen...."forgiven"...and then continue on....we are like the tree set free from its icy prison--free to do what it best knows how to do...stand tall and erect and sway gently in the wind.


"Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already arrived at my goal, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me. Brothers and sisters, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus. --Phil. 3:12-14

Same tree, taken from the same window...this afternoon after the ice melted off of it.

Thursday, March 26, 2009

Where the Deer and the Antelope Play

We definitely live in Kansas.....where it has been in the 70's for the last week...but we're expecting blizzard conditions by day after tomorrow.

....where they burn the pastures.....and often at night...because the wind finally dies down.

I was thinking about that tonight as I was driving to Bible class. Why do we burn? To get rid of all the dead grass...and more importantly the weeds. Sometimes the fires get out of control...and they burn up more than they were intended to. But I drove past one of those areas where a fire had gotten out of hand...and you know....that is the greenest area of any around. And isn't that how God works in our lives...He sometimes uses "fire" to burn out the bad and make way for the good green pastures in our lives.

He is God...He is good....all the time.

Blessings.