Wordless Wednesday 11 08 31 Road Trip!

Just me for a Girls BeachWeek

Tuesday Tutorial 11 08 30 Homemade Glimmer Mist

As is said, there are a lot of recipes out there for making your own Glimmer Mist but what I liked about this one was the ease in 'using your stash.' I have also found the empty spray bottles at the Dollar store in the toiletries section.




Have fun spraying away!

AAM Monday Taking Measure

There were  two stories in the Washington Post that really hit me the other day. Here's the result.

Two stories caught my eye in the paper today - both food related. One was the 1M grant to the local food bank to subsidize the purchase of fresh food & the other was an obit for a Polish refuge. Memories triggered. When I was about 10 or so I went to work with my mother at the Library of Congress. We had lunch in the dingy old cafeteria, & I noticed a man eating a bowl of fruit. He was hunched over with his face almost in the bowl & was furiously scooping the fruit into his mouth with his hands. My girlish manners were appalled & I said so to my mother. She looked at my carefully & said. He is a refugee from ‘the war’ & he used to be starving. Even though I really didn’t know what starving was like, I was ashamed & had some insight into a life I could not imagine. This was not like ‘eating my food because there were children starving in India or China” or whatever country she used that night. This was real. This was a grownup, a professional man, who had lived something I was still too innocent to comprehend.

Today I am not that innocent. Today I have seen hunger in countries around the world, & of course now today in my own USA. I have seen the food collection boxes in libraries, seen the surplus food in charity shops, & met the people who don’t know where today’s food is coming from. I’ve seen how they look, I can only imagine how they feel.


Today my bowl of peaches had a different look to them. The look of my abundance.

Sunday Serenade 11 08 28 Hurricane Music

Another time, another Hurricane. The kind of music that made Dylan the hero he is.

Flashback Friday 11 08 26 - What a couple!

Carole Lomabard & Clark Gable

selfstyledsiren.blogspot.com via Mary on Pinterest

Wordless Wednesday 11 08 24 - Is this a war zone?

Adobe, you're not always fun to work with but does this imply you really think I'm the enemy???

Tuesday Tutorial 11 08 30 Making an Envelope Liner

This one really caught my eye when I saw it over at Melstampz blog. She really does show how easy it is to make a bit of mail really special. Go directly to that blog link to see this done step by step in larger images, and be sure to say thank you!



May all your mail look beautiful!

AAM Monday Recent Media

Lately I've been watching DVDs as fast as I could since I decided that my Netflix account was going to be just the streaming option. Since I can get so many new ones at Redbox, I figured that it's the old or odd ones that would be better served with the streaming option. So, before I lost my DVD option I watched...well all the Harry Potter flicks! Now I'm trying to decide if I can coerce my dh to go to the theater to see the final movie, or...just go by myself. I think I know the answer to that one!
Recently, I've watched

This one was really funny in a subtle way and also gave a good portrait of life in East Germany pre the fall of The Wall. I do recommend it.

The next to last one in my final trio was one I found via YouTube. Never heard of it till then but just fell in love with Joseph Gordon-Levitt. I think you will too. It's a lot more than the bit of fluff you think it might be.

Then the final one I saw - and sniff sniff..it's on its way back because yesterday was the end of my 'old' subscription... was one that surprised me and also left me in tears. (full disclosure - I was once an federal Senate Immigration caseworker and interacted directly with the old INS) I still have mixed feelings about this movie. I still feel the disturbance from this film and what our country has become.

So...goodbye half of Netflix. It's been fun.

Sunday Serenade 11 08 21 Hotter Than July

Even though it really isn't all that hot right now, this song still is. From Stevie Wonder's "Hotter Than July" the great Master Blaster.



Everyone's feeling pretty
It's hotter than July
Though the world's full of problems
They couldn't touch us even if they tried
From the park I hear rhythms
Marley's hot on the box
Tonight there will be a party
On the corner at the end of the block

Didn't know you
Would be jammin' until the break of dawn
I bet nobody ever told you that you
would be jammin' until the break of dawn
You would be jammin' and jammin' and jammin', jam on

They want us to join their fighting
But our answer today
Is to let all our worries
Like the breeze through our fingers slip away
Peace has come to Zimbabwe
Third World's right on the one
Now's the time for celebration
'Cause we've only just begun

Didn't know that you
Would be jammin' until the break of dawn
Bet you nobody ever told you that you
Would be jammin' until the break of dawn
You would be jammin' and jammin' and jammin', jam on
Bet you nobody ever told you that you
(We're in the middle of the makin's of the master blaster jammin')
Would be jammin' until the break of dawn
I know nobody told you that you
(We're in the middle of the makin's of the master blaster jammin')
Would be jammin' until the break of dawn
We're jammin', jammin', jammin', jam on

You ask me am I happy
Well as matter of fact
I can say that I'm ecstatic
'Cause we all just made a pact
We've agreed to get together
Joined as children in Jah
When you're moving in the positive
Your destination is the brightest star

You didn't know that you
(We're in the middle of the makin's of the master blaster jammin')
Would be jammin' until the break of dawn
I bet you nobody ever told you that you
(We're in the middle of the makin's of the master blaster jammin')
Would be jammin' until the break of dawn
Oh, Oh, Oh, Oh, Oh, you
(We're in the middle of the makin's of the master blaster jammin')
Would be jammin' until the break of dawn
Don't you stop the music, oh no,
(We're in the middle of the makin's of the master blaster jammin')
Na, na na...
(We're in the middle of the makin's of the master blaster jammin')
Nobody told you Oh, Oh, Oh, you
(We're in the middle of the makin's of the master blaster jammin')
Would be jammin' until the break of dawn
I bet you if someone approached you
(We're in the middle of the makin's of the master blaster jammin')
yesterday to tell you that you would be jammin' you would not believe it because you never thought that you would be jammin'
Oh, Oh, Oh, Oh,
(We're in the middle of the makin's of the master blaster jammin')
jammin' 'til the break of dawn
Oh, Oh, Oh, You may as well believe what you are feeling
(We're in the middle of the makin's of the master blaster jammin')
because you feel your body jammin'
(We're in the middle of the makin's of the master blaster jammin')
Oh, Oh, you would be jammin' until the break of dawn
(We're in the middle of the makin's of the master blaster jammin')
(We're in the middle of the makin's of the master blaster jammin')

Flahback Friday 11 08 19 - C'mon You Can Do It - in 7 minutes!

Now from the clothing on this ad, it apparently is from the time when I was a child. Even though my mother and grandmother sewed, somehow they never decorated our refrigerator.  I suppose my childhood was lacking!

Don't you wonder how many refrigerators actually were clothed...in just 7 minutes???  It just boggles the mind...No wonder Valium was common and the Feminist Movement began. Really.

Life is not always..

Life is not always not always what one wants it to be,
but to make the best of it as it is,
is the only way of being happy.

Jennie Jerome Churchill

Wordless Wednesday - Uh...yes!

 

original

Tuesday Tutorial 11 08 16 Recoloring Elements

I think Kayla Lamoreaux does some of the best tutorials around. I totally love her teaching style and explanations. She is great about spelling EVERYthing out for both PSE users and CS users. I think I finally get recoloring, and it was from seeing just where she changed things that did it for me. Hope this helps you along too!



Recoloring Elements in Photoshop and Photoshop Elements with a bit of Lightroom Scrapbooking Workflow Mixed In from Digiscrap101 - Kayla Lamoreaux on Vimeo.

365 keeps on Keeping On

I had never done the 365 project, and wondered how long I would do it or be able to stick to it.  Well, I've surprised myself by hanging in there.  Here is week 32, which means that there are only 20 weeks left in this year's 365. I haven't made any decision now about next year. I mean it's August! I see no reason to think about what I will or won't do then. What I can say is that I'm still enjoying it and that's all that matters to me right now.

btw, I am loving this background paper from Lynn Grieveson over at Designer Digitals. It's called  Hansel. I don't usually buy kits but this one won me over!

Flashback Friday 08 12 11

I just read in the paper that technology was replacing the US Senate pages. Another end to an era, but apparently some parts of that era vanished years ago. This photo shows a Senate page filling a snuff box in 1937! Since Washington DC was still very swampy back in the 30s and 40s, I think snuff might have also helped clear the sinuses! Maybe we still need snuff today...

original here

AAM Frustration

Frustration was the subject for an All About Me prompt at the Designer Digitals blog recently. A thought immediatedly came to my mind and here is the layout that was inspired.

click to enlarge

click to enlarge

I hope your frustrations can be resolved as easily, with time!, as this one was. btw, I have been happily retired for 5 years now so the law is an even more distant field!

Wordless Wednesday 11 08 10 - If it's hot where you are...

Toronto December 2001

Synchronicity

I happened to look at the Moon Phases one day to see what the actual time of the full moon would be. Low and behold I saw it exactly 12hrs before it happened and was quick enough to get a screen shot. I finally got around to scrapping this.

Watch and Marvel

MOVE from Rick Mereki on Vimeo.

Sunday Serenade 11 08 07

Here's an all time classic for you...for these lovely sultry days of August.



What a match! Louis Armstrong and Ella Fitzgerald. Lush lush music.

OLW Blog Hop - August Edition

While I have been keeping my OLW, One Little Word, of  LEARN in my mind over the past couple of months, a lot of serious travel has kept me from keeping up with the monthly assignments Ali Edwards gives us. I know they are only suggestions of ways to keep that word present in all aspects of our lives but sometimes life does get in the way.  Even really good life. It is what it is, so maybe I'll get back to the assignments, maybe I won't.  You can't fail if you don't expect 'perfect'.

July's aspect of looking at that OLW was through music. This one really appealed to me as I had not made time for music in my life recently. Sadly, if I want to listen to iTunes, I can't be in PSE at the same time unless I want to watch the computer 'gears grind slowly', so to speak. I could listen via my iPod or iPhone but the earbuds don't really fit my ears well, and I spend more time shoving them in than being zoned somewhere by the music. But enough whining. I knew July meant I could also get up from my computer and do some straightening up and cleaning of my studio. That meant music could play! and iTunes could have all the memory it wanted, greedy beast that it is.

I also found that I could listen to one song which would make me think of another song and find the original version on YouTube where I could download the video as an .mp3 file. Woohoo! I spent one morning culling my list and there were old favorites as well as a new one or two. I like to listen to NPR All Songs Considered and BUTR, Bands Under The Radar, podcasts for exposure to a variety of music. That way I can - learn - new ways of hearing things in ways I had never imagined.


So what did I pick for my 9 songs?

paper - DHD-GenniferBursett-Gidget

Foo Fighters - Learn to Fly; Commodores - Easy; Sheryl Crowe - Every Day is a Winding Road; George Harrison - My Sweet Lord; Eric Clapton - Layla; Creed - Higher; Fitz & the Tantrums - We Don't Gotta Work it Out; Van Halen -Jump; Mungo Jerry - In the Summertime. I also picked a part of the lyrics that really hit me in particular this time.  Well, all except Layla - that song just gives me chills for the sound of anguished passion. Shiver me timbers!

Did I 'learn' something about me, my word, music - anything? Oh yeah, you betcha. I learned that I NEED music in my life, and that it's important to find the time for it. I don't have to justify what my taste in music is to anyone, and neither do you.  The other thing I learned was something that had been below the surface this summer. I needed and wanted to make/have a deeper spiritual connection and the music summed it all up in just a few lyrics. Insights can come to me/us in so many channels.  After completing the image above, I burned a cd of the music but did something so I'll try that again. Even better to me was that later that week I was told about another spiritual circle, another book, and reconnected with someone- all things that really compliment all that I want in my life.   Amazing Grace, isn't it!

Now I'm sure you want to see how others dealt with their One Little Word in July. Happy Blog Hopping!

AUGUST 1 OLW Blog Hop Participants

Margie               http://xnomads.typepad.com/blog 
Nikki                        http://www.inkyart.com.au/
Monica B            http://questtoperfectimperfection.blogspot.com/
Cheri                         http://cheriandrews.blogspot.com
Jamie                        http://jmpgirl.blogspot.com
Jill                          http://jillconyers.typepad.com/
Monica B1            http://Scraplifters.blogspot.com
Lynn                        www.crafty-creativity.blogspot.com
Melissa            http://blog.mshanhun.com
Sam                        http://learncreatedo.wordpress.com/
Jenn                        www.studiojenn.blogspot.com
Maureen   (me!)         http://cookingmylife.blogspot.com
Chrissy            http://getcraftywithchrissy.blogspot.com/
Jan                        http://mysimplelittlelife.typepad.com
Kimberly            http://foreverdaisies.blogspot.com/
Kathryn            http://www.katlodesigns.com
Lisa                        http://backtoallen.com/writers_blog
Amanda            http://scrappnbee.blogspot.com
Cassie            http://craftycassiescorner.blogspot.com/