Inspired on Sunday

Tania set the challenge for Sunday

today, i want you to tell me about your creative process.

• do you always start with the photos?
• or a story to tell?
• does product drive your creativity and lead your journey from start to finish?
• an inspiration piece in the form of an advertisement?

And again I was thinking eek "creative process" I don't have a process let alone am I creative with it!!
But today (I'm pretending it's still Sunday) the extent of my creative process was the continued clean up of things which was my art journaling stuff and my scrap booking stuff./ stash.
How does one accumulate so much in so little time. Sue was also wondering this as I spent hours sifting through all the stuff I had and tossing/recycling and replacing things. It took all afternoon and she (Sue) valiantly put up with the crackling of yet more bags of hidden treasures while she watched the golf on the TV.
I have been through this process before this photo is where I scrap and it was where I sorted this time.
And I have did make a page about tidying up my stash using some of these photos.
And so to answering Tania's challenge-

• do you always start with the photos?
• or a story to tell?

I usually start with photos and since taking the class with Debbie I don't keep with the chronology of an event but often go with themes or stories. Sometimes the event that I have photographed gives me the page I want.

• does product drive your creativity and lead your journey from start to finish?

I was really unsure about doing things differently to begin with so I used the pake kits from A Page in Time and followed their patterns and processes really closely but once I had classes at Get it Scrapped I felt much more confident to try my own thing.

• an inspiration piece in the form of an advertisement?

Particularly with Art Journaling my inspiration comes from the casual glimpse of something or I look more closely at how things have been created eg. at lunch we were at our usual Japanese place across the road and they have new wrappers for the chopsticks. I was looking very closely at them and Sue asked if anything was wrong and I replied that I was trying to work out how they created the image of the cherry blossom on the wrapper and it was only with a couple of red dots really.

Talk about creative !! I've managed a whole post about nothing!

Snahshops from Saturday

The challlenge is getting close to the end and one last Saturday snapshots for August. Katrina set the following (she too has a class, photography class at Get it Scrapped)

Week #5! I hope you've been enjoying these. I thought we'd try an old favorite again! Scavenger Hunt time! Wander around today, see what you can find.

1. Red
2. Sweet
3. Four

So you could take a photo of four strawberries and have this one covered or you can stretch and find three unique things! Whichever path you take, enjoy! (oh, and for extra challenge fill the frame or try a different angle as you shoot)

The decision for me was to trawl through my photos or use the challenge as a different way to look at my day.

We spent much of the day indoors watching Ted Kennedy's funeral- what a wonderful tribute to the man and his family. We couldn't stop watching!
So pottering around and then continuing to clear out heaps of stuff from the apartment. I think the purging of the family home helped me in the quest to de-clutter here somewhat. Still more to go but the process has been started.

Then we met Margie in the foyer and headed to the subway and our dinner at One a restaurant in the Meatpacking District. And so to something red in my day.

The subway journey involved going to 14th Street and the exit sign like this is only at a couple of stops in Manhattan. I took my personal GPS that walks and talks and shares my apartment, ie Sue (well to say I took her is possibly a misstatement as we went together with Margie but why ruin a good story with accuracy) and she helped us find our way through that tricky part of NYC. Anything out of the grid that is Manhattan I get lost- to be perfectly honest I get lost coming out of the subway on many occasions- I just get turned around and directionless hence the need for the personal GPS (Good Person Sue).
Our purpose in going to One other than to indulge ourselves was to celebrate Julia's birthday and this is where the sweet comes in. I completely forgot to photograph our dessert which is what I planned to do, silly me! So I decided the sweet was the gift we gave Julia. A silver brooch from Santa Fe

The silver Sharman brooch based on Bill Worrell's work

It was a great night spent with four friends who have traveled together in more ways than one.Annie, Julia, Sue and Margie

The food was great, the service good and the walk back to the subway and then home very pleasant- it didn't rain, it was warm not stifling and in all a lovely Saturday night.

A bit of fun on a Friday...

Jane's challenge had me searching my photos and many don't meet her great examples
However her challenge was/is....

It's my last Finding Fun Friday and I thought we should make this one memorable.
We see them everywhere, you catch a glimpse of them out of the corner of your eye, they suddenly appear around corners, they seem to crop up when we least expect them. What are they? Funny signs.

In desperation I have looked back over my photos from a range of events and none of my photos of signs match Jane's ones nor are they as funny as hers however....
One can expect funny and strange signs in Japan so here is an example of one mildly funny one from my trip to Japan in October last year...

Route 66 was bound to provide interest... this sign was from a park in Arizona...

The in 2208 on Route 66 in the panhandle of Texas we saw....

Thoughts provoked on Thursday

Just when I thought I'd got the hang of the challenges Sherry comes along!

This is the first time she has challenged us and soon she it taking a class at Get It Scrapped

Her challenge went this way...

Naturally, I want to challenge you to scrap your Lemon photos. One of my favorite tricks for working with lemon photos is to balance the lemon with something sweeter. Try this trick. If you have a couple of photos from an event and a few didn't turn out as well as you had hoped. Pair that with your best picture from the event. The focus will be placed on the properly exposed photo but your flawed photos will support the story.

I was thinking this is all very well Sherry but how do I get this in my blog when I haven't created the page so scrolling through my recent photos I found some "lemons" no surprise there, but how to do as she did ..... to use a good photos to distract from the lemons and give the whole story without having created the scrapbooking page!

I uploaded my photos still in my camera which were the last ones from the road trip. And remembered the wonderful day when we saw the hummingbirds.

Our road trip back to Albuquerque took us along the Turquoise Trail and into Madrid. We were so lucky in number of ways first to see these gorgeous creatures and as it rained just as

we were leaving the town we realized we would have missed the stroll along the main street and the splendor that in the hummingbird if we had been a little bit later.

Feeders for the birds were set up under the trees and it was as I was coming out of one of the stores that I spotted the hummingbird having completely missed the bright red feeders under the trees we had walked past on our way into the store!

The reason I called these photos lemons is that they are from behind but you can get an idea of the speed of the wings and then the focus photo I thought to use to distract from the blurriness etc is this shot

The subject just did the right thing for me!

Thank you Sherry... and thank you Barb for all your comments and following of these mindless meanderings, I hope you get stuck back in to your blog soon!

Wednesday can be wacky

Sharyn outlined the challenge which was...

to take a photograph today with a card in mind. Share the photo today, if you can - and the card when you get it completed. I'd love to see the end result.

Sharyn you'd be waiting a little while for that to happen cos I am not that good/focused on making my own cards- I'd probably save a fortune doing them or maybe not given that I'd want to find just the right paper etc.... but I figured given that the day has been dedicated to settling back in to NYC and finding where I safely stored my precious items while I was in Australia. Now that was a challenge... I have finally found my pyjamas and some of my summer clothes and I have reduced almost completely that pile of mail! How does one get off mailing lists!?! We get so much junk mail and catalogues- some I enjoy skimming but there have been forests decimated to provide me with that small pleasure. One goal is to find how to and to get off the mailing lists so the mailbox is less full and the environment is saved.

Given Sharyn's challenge (and I don't want to ignore it) I thought I'd have a look back at some of my photos that I could use for cards....
I love the variety of images and effects we get on the windows of the Crown Plaza which is just outside our dining room window.
A friend gave us these beautiful roses they were just asking to be photographed

Tuesday is technological

Checked out the challenge for Techie Tuesday which should be called eclectic music Tuesday as Tami gave some great instructions on how to get a playlist on my blog and now you'll have the joy of the strangest concoctions of music playing while you browse here however if it's all too much just turn the sound off and keep reading.

What a day it has been traveling back to NYC a list may be the best way to cover the events...

• packed successfully- Sue left the keys to the car in the room which was the only "hitch" in our exit from the hotel
• Sue's sense of direction is so great that we didn't need direction finding ducks (obscure link to an idea of Leunig's) got to the car return, onto the bus and into airport
• all met up and traveled in comfort to Denver then pretty well straight on to NYC La Gardia
• large cab for large quantity of bags and shopping from Santa Fe
• home to a clean apartment and a quick relaxing trip to the pub over the road
• collected the mountains of mail. opened and sorted the mountains of mail- the biggest and longest job of the day
  
• to bed to sleep perchance to dream.....
  

Make a list Monday arrived again.

Michelle set our challenge...

For today, we are keeping it simple and straight to the point two short lists 1) What I have gotten done today 2) What I still need to get done today

What I have gotten done...
Packed my suitcase and didn't forget anything in the house in Santa Fe
Spent time being a tourist along the Turquoise Road to Albuquerque
Selected and purchased two new fetishes in Santa Fe
Spoken with friends on my phone
Caught up on emails and my blog
Unpacked in Albuquerque
Been a tourist in Albuquerque
Checked my list of work allocations for the beginning of the year

What I still need to do?
Check out my schools and make contact
Repack for NYC flight tomorrow
Not much else!

Scrap Sunday?

.. I don't think so- neither do I want to get rid of it ie scrap it nor am I able to do any scrapping on this particular Sunday.... Tania challenged us at Get it Scrapped in this way

I'm challenging you to blog about one of the following----OR all three!

*snap a picture of a current scrapbooking project in the works, or

*tell me (and/or show me) how you store your scrapbooking scraps, or *show me where you scrap!

In order to meet this challenge I'm twisting it a little to show what I did during the day and share an idea for a scrapbook page about it.
We journeyed out of Santa Fe today in search of Georgia O' Keefe country... and we certainly found it.
The views from the car and at various stopping points sent our minds back to the paintings by Georgia O'Keefe that we have seen in Santa Fe and elsewhere.

“To create one's own world in any of the arts takes courage.”

Georgia O'Keefe

We didn't see her flowers in the desert but did see sunflowers...

Nobody sees a flower really; it is so small. We haven't time, and to see takes time - like to have a friend takes time

Georgia O'Keefe

I found I could say things with color and shapes that I couldn't say any other way - things I had no words for.

Georgia O"Keefe

The colours here are all wrong but they are so reminiscent shapes found within her landscape painting.

And so my plan is to scrap a page about the journey in Georgia's country.... you'll have to wait a while ... until in the next week or so, I return to NYC ,

Katrina has set the challenge of filling the frame for our Saturday Snapshots and this worked in well with my stories of returning to NYC.
She said I want to see details! So show us something up close. Zoom right in or take a few steps closer than you might normally!
And so to do just that and share my journey to my second "home" the apartment in NYC.... I'll use a photo from yesterday....

Birch trees against an adobe wall

We were sitting waiting for the cars to return from up the top of Canyon Road and glancing across the road I saw these lovely trees highlighted by the adobe wall behind. I could only see three from where I sat so walked a little further down the road and all four gave a lovely contrasting composition and it filled the frame I hope to your exacting requirements Katrina.

Part of the joy of being in Santa Fe is that we are here at the time of the 88th Indian Market which was a joyous surprise for us coinciding with our stopover here. Today we headed out earlier having had a sleep in in an attempt to recover from our jet lag and travel.

What better way than to shop... so we walked around some of the stalls for 2 hours and I bought this lovely pin- it caught my eye because it is green and made me think of a kimono so a couple of links and pulls on my purse strings and then in looking at it close up it has little birds on it which appeals greatly. So obviously I have bought it- the tuft in the middle is horse hair. It was really difficult to get close up even on the "flower" setting. Katrina I need to go through my lessons more to work out how better to capture it.

Brooch from the Indian Market- 2"x2"

Was that all I bought? No, no no but relax Michele no paintings this time although it was a near miss with one yesterday.

We stopped for a long lunch in Ore House and then headed back home up "our hill" to relax and have an evening at home admiring our purchases and relive the things we let go.

Following are some more fill the frame entries but from other days... Decoration on a house wall in Santa Fe 6"x6"
Succulents in my mother's garden

It's Friday so I'm having fun!

The challenge for the day from Jane was ...
I thought we should all get to know each other just a little better. So I'd like you to each to list 10 random things about yourself on your blogs - can be good, bad or downright ugly, but list things we may not already know; things that you probably haven't divulged openly (No we don't want any family scandals or closet secrets) just some fun things so we can get to know the real you.

Gosh Jane you don't really want to know that much! was my intitial thought and then I decided to ponder it a little more and try to make this challenge my own soooo here goes with the random or not so random list of 10 things about me...

1. I have smelly feet- yep ever since I was a kid.

2. I spent half an hour each night while at Aireys Inlet soaking my feet in a bucket of tea. A friend said that the tannin in the tea strips off something that causes one's feet to smell. So for 7 nights I filled a bucket and subjected my sister to the to the aroma of tea while we watched numerous videos. Spencer wasn't too sure about it either.
3. Today walking around Santa Fe and the Canyon Road area my feet were put to the test! I still have smelly feet and now I have tannin coloured toe nails!
4. I love the colours of the Australian landscape and find links with those in Santa Fe and other parts of New Mexico and Arizona.
5. I was athletics champion in my high school years and resent getting the puffs climbing the hill on the way to our rented house in Santa Fe.
6. I love the colour green- if you asked me my favourite colour I'd say green but most people would say my favourite colour was purple as I tend to buy purple clothes, glasses, slacks, slippers so perhaps purple is my second favourite colour. I find green restful and calming.
7. Spencer Tracy was my favourite old time movie star hence the name of the gorgeous spaniel.
8. My favourite place in the world is ...... my bed- I can fall asleep at the drop of a hat in fact this girl can and does sleep anywhere. It is one of my greatest skills. On the plane traveling back the umpty-dump number of hours it took us to get here I had the most sleep out of all of us ... well Margie had some "drug" assisted sleep but I managed 5 hours straight then another three hours so maintained my reputation!
9. My friends know that if I begin to get querulous or make less sense than usual that I need to eat. I am mildly hypoglycemic and found out years ago- I don't have the blood sugar drops nearly as often and it was a great relief to know that the mood swings weren't a personality disorder!
10. I am hopeless at making decisions although I have improved over recent years- like deciding to move with a job to the US for a few years.... you may well ask how can a principal of a primary school (which is what I was for a number of years before coming to NYC) be hopeless at making decisions? It is decisions that matter and some that don't- I just want ot be sure that others won't be hurt, offended or want to do something else.


So making the decision to go to Canyon Road was a good one today- we parked one car at the base of the road and then ferried us up to the other end- the uphill end (see point 5). This meant we strolled downhill and roamed in and out of galleries. A tad fraught for me (see point 10) as I was making sure I was with those who might want some help in deciding on what to purchase and what not to purchase. Be thankful Michele I was able to resist Bruce King's work and make a decision not to buy.

It took us three hours to make our way to the bottom of the road and then came home here to rest and have a night in. A bit of TV and then to bed.

Thoughts on Thursday

I'm sorry Doris the thought provocation just didn't work for me today! Doris asked:

Do you have any amusing anecdotes or words of wisdom to share about the ways of children?

Perhaps I could answer ... No... or perhaps if I was back at work I could think of some but it was beyond me really however our first full day in Santa Fe was an interesting one.
We started the day with breakfast at on of our favourite little cafes. Paris Cafe in Burro Lane where we had a full breakfast fueling ourselves for a day of touring.
We left our little home and ventured around the town looking at shops and our favourite places.
A rest for lunch a bit more shopping and then return the car home so that we could have drinks at the bar on top of La Fonda and then dinner at La Cantina. A leisurely if oxygen deprived walk back to the house and then end of a lovely start to our holiday in Santa Fe.

Whacked on Wednesday

Sitting in the Red Carpet Club in LAX waiting (hours) for our flight to Albuquerque and drive to Santa Fe.
I am now back in the time zone of Get It Scrapped to a certain extent. Although my brain is mush and still working on Melbourne time- 6am Thursday... hence the feeling of being whacked!

As to the challenge Sharyn set:

Today I want to know where you go. Where do your computer journey's take you?

In my mushy brain state the things I can think of are all my "favourites" on my toolbar.... so here goes....
1. Initially my hotmail to check if anyone wants to talk to me- it is my lifeline between homes... Melbourne and NYC.

2. Next like others my work email to check if there is anything I need to act on or react to.

3. Is Get It Scrapped to check out conversations and if I am in the middle/ beginning/end of a class the gallery to hear what others think of my contributions.

4. My blog- to either create and entry or to see if others have noticed my witty entries or life's desperation

5. Friends blogs via my own blog hoping to leave comments and hear the day to day in mates lives.

Techie Tuesday

Tami set an amazing challenge which is taking me a little while to figure out what and how to do it but here goes...


Okay after some fiddling I THINK I have done it.

Yep it works my pic of the Empire State Building is a link to the Empire State Building website!

Make a list this Monday

Michelle gave us our assignment for making a list
Today's assignment is to share a few choice family "isms". My family, the Weaver clan, has a group of things that we say that no one else really gets that we think are hilarious. For today list a few things you and your family say regularly that put you in stitches and let us in on the joke. It still may not be funny to the rest of us but it will let us in on the story behind the words!
It was hard to think of relevant things and then I thought ah yes "The Grey Scrubber". That's what I am known as in the family. I am really good at tidying and cleaning (possibly my major skill) and this has been put to good use over the past month or so in getting the house at Bruce Street clear for sale. In 1980 (the title has been around that long) my mother wrote to me while I overseas and in this particular letter she was again telling me the details of her daily life and how during the week she needed thing tidier and cleaner and she "missed her grey scrubber". The name comes from a great trilogy by Mervyn Peake- The Gormenghast series.
An excerpt ... "The walls of the vast room which were streaming with calid moisture, were built with gray slabs of stone and were the personal concern of a company of eighteen men known as the 'Grey Scrubbers'.... On every day of the year from three hours before daybreak until about eleven o'clock, when the scaffolding and ladders became a hindrance to the cooks, the Grey Scrubbers fulfilled their hereditary calling."
I have made a page about this but it's in my apartment in NYC so posting a picture will have to wait until I get back there later in the month.

The next thought of sayings used amongst friends and family arose from an incident when trying to purchase a bagel on Staten Island on my way to work. I went into the store and ordered my bagel and in opening my wallet realized I needed to get more cash as I'd used the last of it the night before paying for my taxi. So I said to the woman at the cash register 'I'm sorry I have no cash do you know where there is an ATM?" (You need to remember I am Australian and according to Americans have an accent- it's them that have the accent)
The woman looked at me as though I was odd and sought to clarify what I'd said by asking
"An older man?"
Me- No an automatic teller machine
She- Oh an ATM!
She (yelling across the store) Do you know where there's an ATM?
Me- It's okay, I'll be back in a minute.
I walked out of the shop across a lane and into the supermarket, I asked where the ATM was (they understood me) and accessed some cash.
Returning to the store, as I paid for the bagel, the woman apologized and I told her it was fine she gave me the biggest laugh for the day. And subsequently a great story and saying .... when I need to get cash out I always look for an "older man" ...... And I'm always on the look out for an older man with money!

I'll need to ponder further the other little isms our family uses because there are plenty I know but just can't think at the moment.

Sunday in the middle

Tami set the challenge to write about the day to day stuff that is happening at this mid point in the month.

My Sunday was hardly day to day it being the end of the Aireys Writers Festival or Festival of Words.

Jude and I started the day with a workshop on short fiction. I actually don't like short stories- I get frustrated with them- they finish too soon for me usually so why do the workshop? It seemed like a good idea and it worked out quite well but what it really pointed out to me is that if I am going to do some serious writing (as in writing to be published) I need to be more disciplined and to actually write something..... soon perhaps.

After the workshop we all met up (Michele, Sue Jude and I) at A La Greque a great restaurant in Aireys that is closed over the winter, I usually miss having a meal there. It was a great meal and Allan Campion a food writer was the speaker and provided great insight into his experiences as a chef and writer. So in all a great end to the weekend.

Now it's back to a little more reality with getting last minute things done- like washing and packing and seeing the last groups of people who have booked me up before flying back to NYC via Santa Fe, on Wednesday.

Saturday snapshots?

I've been doing so well keeping up with the blogging but having challenges given in another time frame has been going against me- why do I set myself up like this! But I will catch up now I hope and then as they say "build a bridge and get over it!" Actually it's not that big a deal just me giving reasons as to why the weekend got in the way of blogging.
The Saturday challenge was find a subject, any subject at all. Put it in great light if you can. Capture it three ways. Three different views, three different feelings, three different angles. What does each say to you? Which appeals to you most? Which tells the story you want to tell most effectively?

And so the challenge for me was doing this after the event due to the Festival of Words Weekend taking up all my time and the time lag between getting the challenge- soon there will be no excuse- I won't be able to blame the International Dateline for the lag an backlog as I head back to the US on Wednesday.... hmmm.

And so to the subject from different views- she's going to kill me for this one!

I looked back over my photos and these ones of Michele gardening in Aireys struck me as being slightly different views and and slightly different angles... but the feeling part I couldn't quite manage but perhaps will try some photo shoots in the future to achieve this.

Why is she sitting on the blue box.... saves the knees but more importantly sames the back which at that time was in a delicate state.

The second angle/ view is off the blue box and venturing further- her hands a blur of activity!

The final view is close up and really getting into the weed pulling- clenched jaw helping wrest that nasty weed from under the unknown tree.

Why resort to such photos and commentary? We were at the Aireys Festival when the challenge was put on Get it Scrapped so rather than completely ignore it I tried and will try better next time.

Our day was filled with a late and leisurely breakfast, a game of scrabble, a lovely lunch of pumpkin soup (made from scratch by Michele) and then a walk to the community centre for more great book discussion and meet the authors.
The afternoon session was
Jacinta Halloran- Dissection
Nick Gadd Ghostlines
Sonia Orchard The Virtuoso
Sophie Cunningham Bird

They were all really interesting. I've only read Nick Gadd's books and perhaps will manage a couple of the others but not before I head back to the US-I am a really slow reader besides which I couldn't read three books in three days!

The late afternoon.evening session were comedian Denise Scott who has written a book All that Happened at Number 26 followed by Shane Moloney talking about his series of Murray Whelan. It was a laughter filled evening and a good way to fill a Saturday- pity we could n't get out into the warmth of the day but it was lovely spending it with friends (both literary and real) and Michele.
So that's a bit of a snapshot of Saturday!

Finding Fun on Fridays

According to Jane who set the challenge...

This one is simple.

Not for this little black duck! But I thought and read the challenge again...

I want you to find a funny picture from amongst your huge collection of photographs. We all have them - bald babies, sleeping husbands, amusing pet antics. I'd like you to post it on your blog and give it a caption that is a well known (read famous) line from a movie (don't forget to tell us which movie it is and who delivered the line)

Be blowed if I could do any of this so I trawled my photos and then I trawled the quotes of movies and had the following idea for the use of photos of my niece Kate and nephew Nick. The lines are not all that famous but the movie is and it means I could share what clowns these two are, just like their dad.
The lines are from Blazing Saddles.

“Where ya headed, cowboy?”

“Nowhere special.”

“Nowhere special. I always wanted to go there.”

“Come on.”

But I guess I did find some fun both with the kids and the photos and have managed to use these photos that I may not have.
Friday was fun anyway because we headed down to Aireys Inlet again and settled in for the weekend and the Aireys Inlet Festival of Words. We just walked up the road to the Community Centre to the opening. Sue and Jude came to stay for the weekend so it was bound to be fun. The opening speakers really set the scene for the weekend giving great readings from their books and keeping to time!
Cate Kennedy was the keynote speaker sharing her new work yet to be released, The World Beneath she was great and the book sounded so good got a copy and got it signed. The mayor opened the weekend- you'd reckon people would get the title of the events they are opening correct she kept inserting a "the" in the title of the weekend festival making it The Aireys Festival of the word" slightly different emphasis there!
A gropu from the Anglesea Performing Arts Group present Peter Handke's Self Accusation which was confronting and amusing, playing on words. I thought I'd google him and it, both he and it I had never heard of... turns out it is controversial and has been performed in a range of ways. Is there nothing that is not on You Tube?
After all of this we walked over to the pub and had dinner and then walked back home to the waiting and anxious pooch, Spencer. It was very dark walking home but warm and dry.
Now all I need do is catch up on other blogs and blog entries!

Thinking on Thursday

It was a little too late for me to really get organized so back dating these page means I am completing the blogging challenge even if a little cribbing is going on here and there.

Doris set the challenge on her blog "What inspires you to create?"

So here goes..... some of my recent scrapbooking pages.....

Everyday things and aspects of my life in both NYC and Melbourne

Places I love in NYC and Melbourne- anywhere really!

The bird and plant life of Australia that is so rich and abundant even in the times of drought

Issues and events as they affect my life and the life of those around me
Life just going on as I'm exploring my art journal