Foosa Moon Creations

A new designer at Ahhh Scrap! You know that new stuff to play with makes me happy...

This is my husband, who is ALWAYS looking at me like this!  He has no idea I have this picture or have it posted on here for the whole world (or my 53 followers) to see. I'm totally amused! 

The kit I used is "Fall Frolic Collection Bundle" 

 This is Kelly's hubby, who NEVER lets me take his picture. Don't get me wrong - I take pictures of him all the time, but he ducks or covers his face with his hands so I have very few good ones. This one he let me take! We sent the men shopping (after we had a meeting about Thanksgiving dinner) at a restaurant supply store (my husband is a chef so he has a membership there) and this was Paul's favorite purchase - an enormous can of cranberry jelly (I say "sauce", but I wanted to be clear about exactly what this can is). Is this not amazing??

Same kit used, and also FMC's Photocentric Templates 1-4

ANOTHER ONE?

After:

Before:

You know you love me when I'm backwards!

Game Design Program at ITT Tech

Cancelled. Not just at my campus, at ALL ITT Techs across the country.

We found out Wednesday night at our final. You should have HEARD the immature idiots in my class whining and complaining about it. The man who came to talk to us about it had NOTHING to do with the decision. Zero. There was nothing he could do about it, no amount of bitching and complaining could change that. The number of times an idiotic teenager called out "That's not the point!" made me want to punch people. One kid left and came back with his mother. Five people walked out. What do they think that accomplishes? The class is PAID FOR. It was the LAST DAY. If you can't get your money back (you can't) what is the point of leaving class on the last day? Seriously, what point does that prove? It was an amazing amount of immaturity and THEN people whined about how LONG the final took. I wanted to scream "If you idiots hadn't spent an hour bitching we would have gone home a lot sooner!" but I resisted. It wasn't easy. So I'll get my degree in Graphic Design and be done with it. What's the BFD? 

Friends makin' art!

The other day this little bug had the nerve to tell me about something he'd done at HIS friend Kelly's house!! Bratty McBratster, isn't he? That's MY friend Kelly! 

Smashed cake!

It tasted AWESOME!!

A little bit ashamed

I can admit that I'm a little bit ashamed for liking the Twilight books/movies, right? You'll still love me? I'm 31 years old and I've never been a sappy, chick flick kind of chick. But there's something about the story that pulls me in and won't let go! I don't know what it is. And I know PLENTY of people out there who loved horrible movies like Titanic and Hope Floats. So that makes me feel a little better! I'm using a new journal for CTJing, I think. I'm trying it out, anyway. I LOVE my grid composition notebook CTJ but I've been working in it for three solid months and I've only JUST crossed the halfway point. And something about its size makes it seem like a bigger deal than it should be. Like if I have it on my lap during class, it's a little obtrusive. Or maybe not since it's notebook sized? Maybe I'll keep using it at school? I'm not ready to give it up, I don't think, but this is a new journal I'm enjoying playing with:

This is me with my popcorn and blue Icee when I went to see Breaking Dawn this morning alone:

(You wondered what that Twilight rant was about, didn't you??)

Only doesn't mean lonely!

I enjoy my own company. I enjoy it SO MUCH MORE than I enjoy the company of others. I can be by myself for days and days and not "miss" anyone. It's just how I am. I'm not a "lonely" person. Nor am I a "loner". I simply enjoy not having to "be" someone. Right now, I'm not a mother, a wife, a friend. I'm just that girl who hasn't showered today and is not wearing a bra under her hoodie who's sitting at the Barnes & Noble cafe alone drinking mocha frappuccino blogging after seeing a movie alone. That's it. And I'm in a GOOD mood, too. It's kind of freaky. I'll be a mother in a little while, a wife, too. I'll shower and go to school where I'll take my science final and give my friend a ride. But right now? I'm nobody. My favorite!

Angel Kits by Suzi Blu!

You can get one here!

GRID!

Look what Kelly helped me with! She has the best paper stash, but even so when it was JUST papers I was like "gross". But I brayered and stamped and now I sort of like it! Every time I look at it I like it a little more.

 I'm still kind of confused by the "want to keep everything in one journal but can't make myself write my grocery list in my 'good' journal" mentality...working it out by trying NEW journals. I just got a new Moleskine and a small sketchbook that I'm using as a slap journal. Maybe. 

Sometimes I feel like I'm not quite a whole person

Everything matters

This makes me sad

My son is a beautiful child with an amazing smile. BUT when I'm taking his picture, I NEVER make him freeze and smile because the result is something like this:

I wish the photographers would just let him look natural. I LOVE how expressive his face is and would much rather see him with some kind of natural expression on his face instead of this. I'm especially partial to this one:

Pangea!

My science teacher tries SO hard to make boring stuff fun for us and I love it!! (Yes I'm a 31-year-old who goes to school at ITT Tech and we spent this lab time cutting and pasting!)

Who knew??

That thing peels, cores AND slices the apples into thin rings. Then Kelly gave them a chop and tossed them into the crust for apple pie. Who knew such a thing even existed?? I love tools, it was good times. I got to try it, but I F'ed it all up, of course. I'm talented like that!!

Layers?

It's just a "spread" in my journal. Here's my issue: what NEXT? I don't want just layer after layer of nonsense with no focus. So I usually just don't do anything else and I feel like it's incomplete.

Cost vs Value

This is an empty bottle of Glimmer Mist. It cost me about $3 (a little less, actually). It's a tiny bottle that came in a sampler pack, and I had a 30% off coupon for Archiver's. 

This is an empty Copic marker. I took it out of the trash to take this picture for you. I paid $7 for it.

Now, I have friends who have that "I can't use it, it's special" mindset. My husband is always "saving" things for "a special occasion". I don't do that. At all. 

Something is only expensive until you guy it. Once it's in your hands, you determine the worth of something. If it sits on a shelf in perfect, pristine condition, it's worthless. My Moleskine journal: $17.95. The smoothest, prettiest watercolor paper: $6.39/sheet. Prismacolor colored pencil: $1.95. If I leave that Moley in its plastic wrapper, then it's worth EXACTLY what I paid for it and nothing more. The instant that I crack it open and it becomes my journal, it's priceless. It's my comfort, my companion. It holds my hopes and dreams and fears. I carry it in my backpack and I reach for it when I need it - it's always there. That Copic marker - I used it all for a ridiculous journal filled with cartoon drawings of my every day life. It makes me smile when I look through it - that makes it worth every penny. I'm practical and I'm cheap - I tried all the other markers first. I resisted going Moley (because you can never really go back). I did a Paper Research Project before picking a paper I loved. So if I'm going to spend $7 on a marker, I'm going to USE it. I know there are so many people who don't want to use their "good" supplies but I don't get it. There is no more special occasion than today. Right now is all we have.

Angel Kits, part 2

Using Photoshop, I turned her into a template (it's a long boring process, you don't wanna hear abut it, trust me) and then I used last year's Christmas collaboration from Ahhh Scrap "A Christmas Whim" to make her into a Christmas angel! It's she pretty?? I'm totally proud of her!

And here she is as a CARD! I don't know if I'll send Christmas cards, it's pretty unlike me, but it's possible!

Angel Kits!!

A new Suzi Blu kit!! She's an angel, obviously, and it wasn't until after mine were done that I realized they aren't Christmas angels!! I had Christmas angels on the brain while I was working on them, but they just aren't Christmassy at all! 

Still, I love them! I'm going to work with the angel some more - see what I can do with her. I'm thinking Christmas cards!!

Aw, dang!

That's what Mater says at the end of the movie, after he's found his hood ("I ain't seen this thing in 20 years!") and he puts it on and sneezes and it falls over the cliff again - "Aw, dang."

So, I have a couple of journals that I play in on a regular basis and this one is my CTJ. I freaking LOVE how these pages came out and wish they were in my good journal!! I also have this odd need to put something on this background. Kelly thinks I can just make backgrounds for the sake of backgrounds, but I don't think I can. I need to have a foreground, too. What will go here?

OR, I might rip the pages out and put them somewhere else. Maybe angel backgrouns? OO! Maybe this could be the background for my Christmas cards!! 

"Mommy, look at my rainbow!"

Grief

I find death so confusing. My best friend's father died and I have no idea how to help, what to say. I hate how people keep saying things like "I know just how you feel because..." or "I lost my father, too". These are not helpful statements.

I have no IDEA how she is feeling except sad and hurt. The world feels different after someone you love is gone. And you wonder "Where are they? Can they see me? If I talk, will they get the message? Do they still love me?"

She knows I'm here. If she needs to lean or cry, I'm that shoulder. I wish we weren't half a country apart so I could be more helpful. I'm just babbling, I guess. Sorry.

I have the song "On Eagle's Wings" in my head. It was sang at my grandfather's funeral and it brought me such comfort.

RIP Daddy Blu

Cartoons?

I've been in such a negative head space about my cartooning lately, but this app I got for my phone has TOTALLY made me happy! How silly are these?? I love them! Maybe this is where I want to go with my cartooning? Cartoon portraits? Colored with copics? I'm coloring them right now!

CTJ

Doodling in my CTJ while skyping with my peeps. It's so funny what will come out when I'm barely paying attention to it, and sometimes when I work really hard and I get crap.

Not a morning person.

Kelly texted me "Good morning!" and I sent her this. That's how I feel in the morning!!

Mixed Fruit

This is the first real digital kit I've ever been a part of! It's $5.99 at Ahhh Scrap, or free with a purchase for $10 or more. Originally, I thought we were all going to post the mini kits we created on out blogs for people to grab, but instead it's all mixed up in a collaboration.

Here's my part:

It's just a small part, we were all to use one color and the neutrals to design our parts. I LOVE what I did, I'm SUPER proud of it. I hope people buy it or get it free and enjoy it.

Perfect Game

This kit is called "Perfect Game" and it's by Kat's Creations. Aren't the colors awesome?? Technically it's a bowling kit, but I don't have any bowling pictures and look how fabulous it works WITHOUT bowling pictures!! I love a kit with great colors and great papers. 

You Suck Monday (on Thursday) - Brain Dead Journaling

Also known as "art-a-long". Here's my paper:

Step one is just slap on some color:

Step two is a darker shade around the edges:

Here's a couple of steps combined, oops! Texture, stamping, etc.

Drippage:

Some more stamping and I'm done!

I inked around the edges, too. It's hard to tell in the picture. Also, the first layer is SUPER shimmery, and some of the sprays I used are glimmer mists

Unit 8 Lab

I don't know why, but I am completely in love with this project I made yesterday in design class. It's not one of the "big" ones or anything, we do some kind of lab every week. But they're usually sort of lame.  not useless, it's always to teach us something. This one was working with layers and blend modes. Usually we just randomly take pictures from the Internet (I got the brick walls from photobucket) but I absolutely hate using other people's pictures in my work. I just hate it. So I emailed this pic of me (that I took yesterday on my phone) to myself and downloaded it. I upsized it AND all the brick walls so they would print OK...you don't want to hear ALL the details but I LOVE that the bricks on me are a different size than the brick wall, and I totally love the graffiti font I found for the quote! I think I'm going to put this in my portfolio. 

More paints!!

I made a BUNCH more paints today!! This is really the most sun ever. AND - I don't know if I already told you this part - I'm completely in love with the finish. It's satin and the mixture is half paint, half satin glazing liquid. I LOVE the way it dries. I can write over it and then it completely erases (unlike gesso or most paints). They really make me happy!