New jewelry for me :)

Ok, time for a little story.

Let's go back to about 3 months ago.  We were moving to a new apartment and I packed all my stuff from the bathroom in a few boxes.  One such box contained all of my makeup, jewelry, spare contacts, and other random toiletries.  This particular box was stacked in the back of my in-law's truck- not tied down.  I was about to leave and saw the box and asked the packers of the truck to make sure to tie it down.

Apparently, that did not happen.  Can you see where this is going?  Yep, sure enough, the truck rounded a corner on a busy street and the box fell out.  The driver didn't see it, but another nice driver did and stopped him.  But, alas, by the time they got back to the place where the box had fallen out, it was gone!!!  In a matter of 2 minutes someone had stolen it! The nerve!  You would think if the box was in the way that someone would just move it to the curb or something, but no.  They took it!  Who takes random boxes of people's stuff anyway? 

It was a sad moving day for me.  After getting most things moved in that day, I made a late night trip to walmart to restock the essentials.  But, I've only started on replacing my jewelry.  Replacing all that stuff is expensive!

A few weeks ago, I buckled down and made myself some new bead jewelry.   I had these beads stashed away since I was 12 or 13.  I was really into making bead jewelry then.  I guess I'm going through some kind of childhood revival- haha!

 Even though I'm not much of a jewelry wearer, but it's nice to have something pretty to wear once in a while :)

 P.S. I'm getting ready to set up my Etsy Shop!  I just have to figure out how to price everything.  Wish me luck!

Watercolor Pears

Alright, I'll admit it.  I'm a little stuck on pears.  They have such interesting and beautiful shapes and colors.  I could paint them all day, but you might get sick of seeing my paintings of them- hehe! 

Here are four small studies I did the other night.  Which one do you like?  

I am right now contemplating selling small paintings like this on etsy, but I am afraid to do it.  I have this fear of failure that has kept me from really going for it when it comes to selling my art.  There are so many good artists out there.  Would anyone really want my art?  I may just take a gamble and see what happens.  You never know until you try, right?  

Recycled Glass Containers

Glass bottles have so many uses.  I'm trying to be more green and re-use them for decorating, since the recycling program in Utah is seriously lacking.

Those little glass bottles of extracts make lovely mini-vases!

The other container may be a pickle jar- I can't quite remember since I made this one long ago.  I just filled it with my collection of sea shells to make a bookend to hold up my dvd's on my bookshelf. 

Trains on the wall

Ever since we moved into our new apartment last April, the walls in my son's room have remained bare.  For shame! Poor kid- his room always gets decorated last, although  I've had some decorating ideas in mind for quite some time.  Well, I finally got myself together the other day and got it done, and wow, it was a lot of work! 

This train is made from several types of fabric and was pasted to the wall with a cornstarch/water mixture that I discovered at How About Orange.  I tried this out for the first time last year at my old apartment.  Check out this post to see how I did it.

The mixture works really well as long as you use enough of it to make the fabric stick.  And the best thing about it is that it doesn't take off your paint when you remove the fabric!  When we left our apartment, I stripped the fabric off the wall and washed the residue off with a wet rag- no holes or tears in the paint! Awesome!

A little piece of heaven

Two weeks ago I sat on a beach and painted-aaah! That was heaven to me. 

Here is the watercolor that came out of it.  Not that it captures that piece of heaven I was experiencing exactly, but it reminds me of it :)

Owl Magnets

Remember those lid magnets I was so obsessed with in May?  Well, I'm at it again.  I had to hold off a while to save up some more frozen juice can lids.   These turned out way cuter than the original magnets I made.  I need to just stick with the owls, right?! They are definitely my favorites!

In case you missed the Lid Magnet Tutorial I posted in May, go check it out and make some of your own!

Watercolor Postcards

Last week I painted on the beach for the first time- a dream of mine!  I painted two scenes on some postcards that I sent to my parents and in-laws.  I only wish I had more time there to paint postcards for everyone!

California photos

I'm back from California!

This vacation was awesome!  Just me and my husband and lots of time at the beach!  It sure did not last long enough, but we missed our little boy too much to stay away any longer.

I took tons of photos and even though I didn't have my good camera (it broke right before I left-grrr), I still got some good shots of the beach and everywhere else we visited.  

Here are a few of my favorites:

Pacific Beach in San Diego

Sunset is my favorite time of day to be at the beach.  Is there anything more beautiful or relaxing?

Laguna Beach

This place we found by accident and it was the most beautiful of all the beaches we saw!  And by looking at the houses all along the cliffs next to the beach, I'd say it was the richest beach too.

 

New Port Beach LDS Temple

 My husband and I are LDS (aka Mormons) and we love to visit temples.  We tried to see this one about 5 years ago on our honeymoon, but the grounds were closed.  This temple is beautiful!  If you want to know more about LDS temples, visit LDS.org

A gorgeous little plant I found at Balboa Park in San Diego.  We just can't grow stuff like this in Utah.

Restaurant at San Diego Harbor

Me and my Honey!