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...

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.....

Some photos from my week...

 

 

 All this sun shining

lending magic to moments

small snapshots of time

 

 

 

I have had a busy week.....mostly not creative but I HAVE managed to  work on a custom order of 30 small rocks. I am painting them with symbols that a family has requested and plan to put on their fathers grave. I like doing orders like this that I know will really mean something to the people who will hold them. And I love how we all individually or as families have symbols that are our own...

 

The last one I did was for a woman who planned these because her mother had passed away. Makes me think about what symbols I would put if these were just for me... I guess I need to make a bowl for myself...

Happy paint party Friday , and Haaiku my heart!

shameless promotion

here's the latest rocks that I added to my etsy shop.....

Natasha had a good idea for coming up with something to post about everyday in Blogtoberfest... she's having people ask her questions and she answers them in a post. Her question to me was what's the wierdest dream you ever had? I have a long answer so I will type it tomorow but if you have a question for me, leave me a comment. also I will draw a winner of my TINY giveaway from saturdays post... you will have to watch the video to see what it is if you don't already know....

Whats on your workdesk wednesday

Since I am blogging daily in October it gives me a chance to enter all the groups and challenges I know.... here's a photo of my desk for all you WOYWW people...I will try to get around to visit some of you after work...

This is actually at work so i leave the rocks to the side till my break or pull out a mandala to work on during lunch some days, not lately actually. Lately I have been walking. But I have been doing lots of rocks so here's a few more photos of some.....

Fairy Tea

welcome to a fairy tea party....

 

 the fairy ring made especially for the mushroom loving woodland fae...

 

The tea table....

 

 

 

the tea party menu....

 

 

the table setting waiting for the food to be served....

unfortunately the fairies gobbled up the clover candy and the acorn scones so fast i didn't even get a photo of the food.....

 

 

 

and a quick sketch of the fairy who served the cakes and poured the hot tea...

 

 

when i came back later to clean up after the festivities, i found this lovely offering left by the fairies for me in appreciation ...

 

 

It will be the perfect speciman for future sketches don't you think?

 

 

 

 

Go to Inspiration Avenue for more fairy tea parties... and linking up to sunday sketches too!