5 things that make me happy.......

1. starting a new hobby that the whole family wants to get involved in....
creating walking sticks....
can't wait to get started now that we have the proper tools...
carving, woodburning, painting and staining...
so many ideas...

2. an abundant harvest from my small little raised garden....
 gathering what we have grown....

 3. Canning and pickling and making jelly and salsa with  our own vegetables....

next year I will get more creative with my labels...

4.Walking with my son on the dike around our town....

and searching for bees...

5.photographing old and  new rocks for my etsy shop.... I plan to add them little by little this week and next...

5. things that make me happy

1. My kids helped my husband and I make some raised beds and I am excited to be able to plant soon.....We built them 4'x4' and 10 inches tall.  We lay down newspapers over the grass, (well this one has cardboard instead of newspaper), then added a layer of old leaves, then compost mixed with just a little vermiculite and one bag of soil for all so actually very little soil added in. We have a huge compost pile that has been unused for years so we had enough for 5 squares and two long beds. 

 In between the squares is going to be flat rocks surrounded by gravel eventually I think...

2. My youngest didn't help but he was good and didn't try to run off the whole time we worked! and that is a wonderful thing, truly. He's on a 3 week good streak in his autism classroom at school. (If only we could figure out why, and make sure we keep doing what ever it is that turned his behavior around....)
I talk about him as if he was litttle, but as you can see he isn't anymore....

 

3. I have been having fun sketching and planning where things will be planted...

4. Making painted rock herb markers...

 I draw it on using my regular tip gel pen, then I add thickness along the edges...

woodland guardians

watching over my artwork

 judgmental  critics?

Then I spray them with a varnish, i have tried all different kinds, any will work.

5. My daughter is back home from New Mexico and excited about helping plant as well!

mY plan to focus....

My plan was all but impossible, no way can I stick to just one creative outlet. I wanted it to work, but I just keep going back to other things.... hopefully I focused a bit though as I did get some of what I set out to do done, but then new ideas come up, and new requests. My oldest daughter put 5 stars on only one item on her Christmas list: a painting she requested of the Syracuse basketball logo guy,Otto; a unicorn; and a velociraptor. She requested it last year and I said I didn't see it happening, then she stuck it on her list again this year so I pretty much have to give it a shot. I'll let you know how it's going next week. Here's another mandala I started as well.... I have a copy saved that I am putting on etsy as a downloadable digital coloring book page.

 A friend of mine is taking some of my rocks and pendants to a local craft show for me....
here they are in progress being spray sealed on newspaper....

and since I have some bee rocks, here's just one bee photo from this summer. bringing in some color to my dark post....

Bee love last summer

remembering their constant

hum and busy flight

I may shoot for a Christmasy post next week, maybe.

Update:

 I just posted to Haiku my heart and saw the sad news that Joe Spado  of the Round Circle blog passed away on December 3rd. He was known to many of us in blogland and I am lucky enough to have traded a painted rock for one of his dream catchers. He and his encouraging, thoughtful comments will be missed.....

Virtual vacation

I haven't been to Cape Cod in years, or the beach at all actually. I miss it and have felt in need of a vacation so I am taking a virtual one. I googled CapeCod spots and here are some picks I took from the internet. I think I may have been in these spots, they seem familiar...

 

 

 

 

 

This lighthouse is in Provincetown, we probably were there as we went to a lot of lighthouses...