Cut 'n Paste

Celebrate good times!

As I shared on Friday, Rick and I had an exciting weekend planned. We decided to escape to Seattle to celebrate our Eleventh Anniversary!!

I love this man of mine so much. He's my best friend and I love nothing more than hanging out with him. So I think you'll agree a celebration was in order. We planned a quick overnight trip down to Seattle to watch a Mariners game (they lost), some great meals (the Cheesecake Factory and Ruth's Chris Steakhouse) and a bit of shopping with a stop at two salvage yards and one sweet antique shoppe. The store, called Whimsical Whites in Kent was a true treasure trove. I've been looking for a store that screamed 'me' for ages in Seattle. I've found some cool stores, but not that one whose inventory  (both new and vintage) was so perfectly in line with my tastes that I wanted to take everything home. This is that store. It specializes in vintage millinery, ribbons and textiles. My budget would be in very serious trouble if the store was local to me, that's for sure. A special thank you to my new friend Tiffany Kirchner who graciously shared a list of her favorite Seattle stops with me and who introduced me to this gem.

All the photos in this post are from the store, I'll have to show you the treasures that came home with me another day.

Enjoy!

Feeling the love

Do you ever download photos from you camera and feel your breath hitch because you captured a moment so precious that it takes your breath away?

This past weekend my side of the family celebrated Rick's birthday combined with my nephew Daniel's birthday. Rick's celebration was a few months late (poor guy! trying to get the whole family together with everyone's schedule is crazy hard), and Daniel's was a week early. As you can imagine with Rick being a police officer, he is the hero of our nephews. They mimic him, ask him for police stories and are pretty much always pretending that they're police just like Uncle Rick. At one point during the evening Daniel asked to pose for birthday photos (he loves to see himself on the screen of the digital camera) after I did a few with him, I asked him if he wanted a special photo with anyone else...well surprise, surprise, he wanted a photo with Uncle Rick. The two of them fooled around a bit as I was snapping away, and I discovered as I downloaded the imaged today, this gem. It's horribly out of focus, it's in no way a good photo, but I feel it - it really speaks to me of the relationship Rick has with Daniel.

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If you'll remember a few posts back, I talked about inspiration and how I've been feeling so inspired lately, so I thought I'd share a purchase I made which has been inspiring me.

Laurie Meseroll is an artist who specializes in folk art pieces. I first discovered her work in the home of my friend Sally, and I was instantly enamored. It became a goal of mine to purchase a piece or two for my own home. A few weeks ago the site that sells Laurie's pieces, Earth Angel Toys, had a sale, so I finally began my collection. I plan to hang the painting in my studio at some point. For now it's in my kitchen.

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Before I leave, I need to let you know whose name I drew for the stamp giveaway. KIM HARTER you're the lucky winner! I'll be sending you an email for your address as soon as I've finished this post.

Have a great day everyone!

Inspiration abounds

1. Vintage White Buttons, 2. Hanoï old door and lock, 3. European Antique Market, 4. The Ultimate Shabby Chic Bowl of Thread, 5. .Reflections., 6. Shabby Chic, 7. shabby chic tri colour roses, 8. Pretty Vintage Seam Binding, 9. Fabric flower with vintage button, 10. pearlblingfind, 11. Marie Antoinette style, 12. Antique Chippy Bench, 13. Flower cupcake / shabby chic cupcake, 14. pink peony, 15. doll 3, 16. Crystal chandelier bokeh

I hope that you've each had a wonderful long weekend. As a Christian, Easter weekend is such a special holiday. For without the resurrection, our faith would be empty. Especially in spring, when the natural world seems to be waking from a season of death and decay, the power of the Easter message seems perfectly timed. I hope that whatever your faith, this weekend was a blessed one for you and your family.

For the past few weeks, I've been thinking a lot about the word 'inspiration'. As a crafter we find inspiration in so many things. Anything from visual to auditory stimulation can trigger a moment that becomes a catalyst to creating something wonderful. I feel so blessed to have a circle of creative friends who inspire and encourage me, we've been working on something special that I can't wait to share with you....we just need a wee bit more time...In the meantime I have been experimenting with the photo sharing site Flickr. I've heard such great things about it, but I haven't explored it and all its functions for myself. So I set about trying to learn about it over the weekend...Many hours later (after being sucked into visual overload) I don't think I've even scratched the surface. However, I did figure out how to create a 'Favorites' collage. So at the top of my post, you'll see the images that really spoke to me. I hope you enjoy them.

For those of you who are somewhat local to me and are looking for a fun scrapbooking class to attend, I have a class announcement to share with you. I'm pleased-as-punch to share that I will be teaching a class at Treasury of Memories in Bellingham, WA on Saturday, April 12th at 1:30pm. I look forward to seeing some of you there.

Finally, I have a little something that is looking for a home...While checking out one of my favorite thrift stores a few weeks ago, I found a brand new, in packaging x box controller. I wasn't sure if it would work on our system, but for $4, I couldn't pass it up...well, it turns out our x box is a 360 and the controller is for the older system. So, if you have an ORIGINAL XBox (NOT the 360 version) and you want a free controller, please leave a comment and this sucker will get sent out to the first person who asks for it. I will ship to Canada or the US, if you're international and would like it, I'll ask you to chip in for the shipping costs (thanks for your understanding).

She is my hero...

  For years she has been my go-to for inspiration, my muse and I have been her dedicated stalker (wink!). Today, I was so pleased to see the relaunch of her website and discover that she has a blog that magically combines her art and beautiful sense of humor.

She is also the featured artist in this months Somerset Studio magazine. Pure eye candy!

Please enjoy her new website here. And her beautiful blog here. (Charm pictured can be found on this page).

A little eye candy

If you're like me, home decor is just another facet of creativity that you love to explore. I thought that today I'd share some links with you of three creative women who generously share their home decor with their blog readers. So grab a cuppa tea, coffee or hot cocoa and enjoy their sites:

First, I'd like to introduce you to Sara of Sadie Olive fame. Her blog combines stellar photography with a super store and personal stories. She also builds blogs/websites as a business. Here is a little taste of what you can see on her blog (photo by Sara):

 

Next, I'd like you to meet Paige Knudsen and her blog Simple Thoughts. Paige has been a regular reader of my blog for some time and I was blown away when she posted photos of her holiday decor. This gal does shabby chic in a simple country way. Love her photos and her home is so inviting. Here is a peek at Paige's home. Head on over to her blog to see more!

My final introduction for you is Corey from Tongue in Cheek. Corey documents her life in France through pictures and stories. She shares the passion (obsession?) for flea markets and antiquing that many of us have and posts the most beautiful photos of her finds. Not only that, but she recently announced her home is being featured in the January issue of Victoria magazine. So don't worry about bringing your passport, just click on over and see how one woman lives a life of creativity in France. (Photo of santon which is over a hundred years old, courtesy of Corey)

Be sure to say 'hi' if you visit them and let them know how you found their blogs...and, if any of you have favorite home decor blogs that you visit regularly, I'd love to hear about them.

(And remember to enter the Winter Cheer Giveaway #4 if you haven't already!)

Inspiration

I think I may have spoken too soon on Monday when I said that I thought I had successfully fought off a cold...looks like I'm on the losing end of the battle as each day I have steadily been feeling worse. Ugh. I'm trying to get lots of rest to fight it off, but I don't know if it's working...In Canada we celebrate Thanksgiving this weekend, so I'm crossing my fingers that I'll start to feel better.

One of the bright spots in my week has been some pleasant interactions I've had with designers whose work I've admired. It's always nice to discover that those whose blogs, or work you've enjoyed are as kind as you imagined. I wanted to share with you one particular artist who has such a distinct look that I can pick her work out anywhere. Her cleaver use of vintage ephemera, color and traditional scrapbook products is SO inspiring. And....she has her first book, The Art of Personal Imagery: Expressing your life through collage coming out on October 11th. I absolutely can't wait to purchase it.  So, I invite you to visit Corey Moortgat. She is so generous with sharing images of her artwork on her blog (and she also shows her simply  charming studio space). Enjoy her site, if you're like me, you'll spend hours devouring her artwork!

   

Into the rabbit hole...

Do you ever feel like this whole world of blogs is a bit like the rabbit hole in Alice in Wonderland? You can follow links from one blog to another, to another, to a store, to an editor, to a ???  It's magic. So much inspiration, eye candy and pretties that make the heart skip a beat and tempt the pocket book.

Today I wanted to share with you a few of my recent discoveries while going down the rabbit hole of the blog world.

You may remember when I did the contest on my blog that Dawn was the winner. As any good hostess would do, I always try to visit the blogs of people who comment on my blog, so off I went to visit Dawn's site. While there, I followed a link to the incredibly talented  Chez Fifi's blog. She is a stylist who works with many of my favorite magazines. I know that several people have linked to her recently, but if you haven't visited her site yet, take my advice and head right on over. It's over-the-top beautiful. I think it would be such a blast to shop with her some day, she has quite the eye. Now, remember what I said about that rabbit hole? Well, at Fifi's I followed a link to a fabulous store The Cat's Meow. This is a fabulous shabby chic store based in Florida. They are currently moving their store and are clearing out some of their inventory. I was absolutely thrilled to buy a Rachel Ashwell Shabby Chic Duvet from the store for 50% off. I was so excited to find it and it's just gorgeous, it's the one pictured above. I had it delivered to the hotel I stayed at in Portland so that I didn't have to pay duty on it bringing it home (I stayed in the states long enough to be able to bring $250 home duty free - Yippee!) If you are also a fan of the Shabby Chic line, the store has one more duvet and sham set for sale and it's about 67% off. I actually have the sheets in the same pattern as this duvet and they are beautiful. This is an absolute bargain. The pattern is Sugar Plum and it's on this page: scroll down a bit. If you no longer see it, then it's probably sold as they do update the site regularly.

I have two other sites I wanted to share with you. One is the blog of mixed media artist Sandra Evertson. Sandra is an accomplished artist and she posts some beautiful photos on her blog. The other is called One Woman's Cottage Life this is the online journal of a lady who is renovating her home. It's a wonderful peek into the challenges, struggles and triumphs of renovation. I found it a great read.

Enjoy the rabbit hole ;-)