It's Friday... again...

My sweet DH and I were talking the other day and it seems that every time we turn around it's Friday... I reckon that's what happens when you begin to get old.. :) 

I've spent the last hour looking at photos to see if I can find something to paint.  Today is one of those days that seems to fly by with nothing happening.. lol   My brain is on autopilot and seems to be stuck in neutral.. no decisions made today..  :) 

I was over on YouTube.com the other day and watching a video by the frugal crafter Lindsay Weirich.  She was talking about all the uses for glycerin in the craft room.  One of the uses is for adding glycerin to inexpensive watercolors.  So... I ordered some and have been adding it to my watercolors.  It truly does make a big difference.  

Two weeks ago I decided to put together a cream that might be good for face cream.  A friend of mine is fascinated with the process so I told her I would make some and see what she thought of it. So I put together a recipe using Kukui nut oil, borage oil, Tamanu oil, vitamin E oil and .. believe it or not... Crisco and it is wonderful. Definitely needs tweaking... got too much rose absinthe in it and you can smell it across the room..lol  .. but it is a wonderful skin softener.  I used distilled water with a bit of beeswax with a tiny bit of borax for the emulsifier.   

In case you are wondering about the Crisco... Crisco is made up of soybean oil and palm oil.  The soybean oil is relatively neutral on the skin, but does help your creams hold their consistency.  But the palm oil... a true wonder for the skin.  It's been used for centuries as both an edible food and as a skin moisturizer.  And it's been right there in your kitchen all this time... :)  

The rain has arrived.  Thunder boomers into the night last night.  I haven't looked out to see what's up today, but we are supposed to get this rain into the weekend... and that's a good thing.  Loving the cooler temps.  

I've decided to paint my Christmas cards this year.   With the price of postage going up so much over the last decade or so, Christmas cards seem to be going the way of the dodo bird.  And that's just sad.  

I have no plans whatsoever for accomplishing anything today except to finally be able to spend the day at home and cuddle our puppies.. lol  I may do a marathon watch of Benedict Cumberbatch and Martin Freeman in Sherlock Holmes .. you never know. 

Have a wonderful day today.. :)

The Neighbors are Moving

Our neighbors are moving.  At least one of them is...  I suppose it's a story of the effects "progress" has on all relationships. 

It's a middle aged couple.  He is an immigrant from another country who is well educated, speaks several languages.  She is a bit younger and they are both very ecological minded.  It seems they have lived here for years and enjoyed their life on the outskirts of town... away from all the traffic, noise and emission pollution.  And then we came along.....

Our builder bought this adjoining property and the original proposal was for 4 homes on it.  There was quite a dispute about it from all I've heard.  In the end the homes were cut down to three and the garages changed to open on the front of the house instead of the back.  Our home was built 4 years ago along with the house next door.  The house next door sold this year and the last house began to take form a few months ago.  And... there is now a very large church across the street.  And... there is now a Wal Mart about to open on the corner.  There is small group of professional building down at the curve,  a small housing development across the way from us.  Progress has arrived...

I have to admit that I feel very sorry for them... and for anyone else who is feeling the pinch of society moving in at a speed that is almost impossible to comprehend.  One day all is quiet and peaceful and the next day you are having go to the end of the block to make the turnaround just to get into your own drive.   Suddenly 7 foot fences block off all the sunlight from your garden and dogs are barking at your cat.  Watching the sunrises and sunsets are a thing of the past because you can no longer see them for the buildings.

I must say that I love our home... our dogs Sam and Katie... our 7 foot privacy fence.  But I am also sad that the changes occurring around us are having such an effect on the lives of the people who have called this area home for many years.

Today in my Life... October 20, 2015

Today is Tuesday, October 20, 2015.

I woke up this morning:  very, very early... got up at 3:45 am  and stumbled into the office... fell into my computer chair and prayed for cooler weather.  These night sweats are killing me.

I am hearing:  the fan click as it makes those orbits around that fake golden hub up there.  However.. with the night sweats, I do believe I don't care if it's fake or not as long that cool breeze continues.   My sweet DH is up and clicking his coffee cup in the kitchen... The day begins.. :)

As I look out the window:  I see the new WalMart across the street has cleared all the rubble and trash from the site.  It is beginning to look like it's been there for a while... sod going in, parking lot finished, all the heavy equipment gone.  Won't be long now.

I am thinking:  that I really need to carry a notebook... perhaps I should buy some kind of everyday apron with pockets that I can wear everywhere... that would make keeping a pen and paper in my pocket really easy...

The current book is:  a re-read of the James Patterson book Cross ... for about the 4th time.  I really need to find some new authors.. (she says for about the 100th time!)

Creatively:  doing watercolors.  I took some photos of the new plants when we put them in the flowerbed last weekend.  I also bought some cyclamen that were on sale for $1.00 a piece... LOVELY!!  So I got out the water and brushes and did a couple of florals, but also found an easy Wilson Bickford tute on youtube.com that I did in watercolor instead of the oils he was using.  Didn't turn out too bad.




This is the Wilson Bickford tutorial for painting a chickadee... All I did was change it to watercolor.  He is one of my favorite art instructors on YouTube..  There are couple on there that really make it easy to follow their lead.

 This is a cyclamen, but not one of the ones I bought this weekend.  This is a tutorial by Lindsey Weirich The Frugal Crafter showing how to draw the cyclamen and then blend sharpies to color it. Well.. I changed it to watercolor, but followed how she drew it.  She has many, many tutorials on a multitude of things so make sure you run thru her videos.  There may be something there you would like to try.













This is done from a photo I took of the pansies that we planted this weekend.  I just know that if I keep at this long enough I will get somewhere in the ballpark of good at it... lol







I am thankful for:  telephones and old friends.  I finally got up the nerve to try one more time to find an old (sorry Billie..lol)   friend from high school.  When I looked up the telephone number for her brother I was stunned to see that it was the same number I had dialed about a zillion times in my 8th grade, freshman and sophomore years.. It seems that he now is now living the family home and just decided to keep the family phone and same number.  Talk about deja vu..lol  We talked for about 45 minutes or so and then I called my best friend from high school... I must admit to being a little nervous.. What if she has forgotten who I am???  But not... it was as if no time at all had passed. What a lovely way to spend a couple of hours...

Planning ahead:  hmmm... personally I'm not sure I should put this up here..lol  I do plan ahead on occasion but must admit that seldom does it turn out without at least a little zig in the zag.  Anyway, the Basil I planted out back is seeding so I'm gathering those tiny seeds and putting them in envelopes.  Last year I actually made tiny seed envelopes to put them in... this year an old letter size plain jane works just fine.  Also have marigold seeds.  All the ones I saved from last year were viable and put on a real show until the water stopped.. More on that later... :(

Have a great day today...  :)

Fower Bed ReDo ...

I've wanted to re do the front flower bed for a long time.  There was one privet that grew exceptionally well, was totally beautiful and completely blocked the water from the sprinkler system from hitting the rest of the bed.  Every time I asked to have it moved, the landscaper who mows and cares for our lawn would find a multitude of reasons why it should not be moved... we can always raise the sprinkler heads... etc... etc..  Well, the sprinkler heads were raised and it still didn't help.  Guess what... that privet is NO LONGER THERE!  

It will take about a month for the bed to fill itself in and look like something other than a mess, but I can wait.  :) 

Son John worked like a Turk all day on Saturday and then we finished up with the mulch on Sunday morning.  Looks a little sparse for a while, but that will change.  :)

John works for Midwestern State University in their horticultural and grounds maintenance department.  He was telling me that an alumnus left a chrysanthemum to the University that was over ONE HUNDRED YEARS OLD!  I had no idea they would even live that long!

There will be stepping stones added in a couple of places to make working the bed easier... and stop the walking all over my creeping phlox.. :)  I cannot wait to see it when it is all mature... (telling self to BREATHE... lol)

Do so enjoy having the kids home.. Just seems there is so little time...

Another of the paintings I have done lately...

This is the side view of the house my father's parents lived in when I was small.  My brother and I would spend hours playing on that stump.  I am trying to find a  few pictures of the front of the house... but since my photos were all destroyed first in the tornado in Wichita Falls and then again in a mistaken trip to the trash.. sigh... I have to rely on the goodness of someone else's heart to get them.. :)

The weather is cooling off,  being out during the day is wonderful now.  I'm sure that since that little ditty was said out loud the North Texas weather gods will laugh out loud, snort and bring the temps back into the 90s... but we'll enjoy it while we can... lol

Have a wonderful day... :)

It's Saturday!

Have my youngest son here this weekend.  Even makes the coffee taste better.. if that's possible.. lol We're going to totally re-do the front flowerbed.  It's been quite a mess for the entire year and the fact is ... I'm tired of it!!!  Haven't the faintest idea what it will turn out to be, but it certainly can't be any worse than it is.. 

I don't know if I've mentioned my rash...  I've had it since February of 2014 and it seems quite content to set up housekeeping and stay until it retires.  The only reason I'm mentioning it is that I've totally set aside all the wool and fiber things to see if I can find the culprit that is causing it.  So.. I have taken up watercolors.  

I realize that I will never take the place of Picasso or Michelangelo...lol... but I do enjoy the process. So for the time being this will by my passion.  Not that I won't be doing some knitting or crochet or sewing...  I just won't handle the raw wool for a while.  (She says that and somewhere deep inside a voice is snorking... )  Well, I'll try to stay away from the raw wool... :)  

I had another heart cath a couple of weeks ago... results wonderful.  Dr. says will not have to have another one for years..  Now to work on the bradycardia.. slow heart rate.  I think this definitely is caused by the meds I take for familial tremor but I've tried 2 other meds and they didn't work so this is my last option... I think.  We'll see.. :)

Every year I say the same thing... can't believe how the year has passed so quickly.. but... Here we are at nearly Halloween and the holiday season is upon us once again.  All the heat from the summer will be gone and we'll be complaining about the cold...lol   Personally, I think we just like to complain.  :) 

I suppose I should get busy if I plan on accomplishing anything, so I will just say ... I hope everyone has a wonderful day.  I know I will.. since every day spent with my children is a day worth it's weight in gold.