Happy St. Patrick's Day.....

We are about to head over to the Warwick Firehouse to have Corned Beef and Cabbage Dinner with the kids.  Chris and Heather are volunteering for the event. It has become a tradition.
15th Annual St. Patrick's Day Dinner - Excelsior Hose Co. #1

Today at 3:00pm

Warwick Fire Department in Warwick, New York

You may have noticed the Countdown gizmo on my side column. I will be retiring in the middle of this year and my daughter kindly put the counter up for me to track the days. I am getting more and more excited. One of the outcomes of retirement will be more time for crafting and writing. Another will be possibly moving to someplace a little warmer.
As we get closer to the end of June, I'll start writing about the trip we are planning to look for a good spot for our new home. Right now, the hubby and I are doing our research.

Just wanted to wish all of you a great day.

St. Patrick's Day Memories...

I'm excited. I am submitting a piece to the Got Green Blogfest 2.0. I just happened to have a piece about my Irish Grandma and this seemed like the ideal place to share it. I'm looking forward to seeing the other entries. Thanks for visiting.


St. Patrick's Day brings up thoughts of my Grandmother, Catherine Chapman, who was born in Ireland in the late 1880s. She was a feisty lady who lived with my family from when I was seven. She often told stories of coming over on the boat and working as a domestic; she was an excellent cook and baker. As someone who creates scrapbooks now, I wish I had kept a diary of her best stories.

My fondest recollections of her are from St. Patrick's Day, HER Holiday. My sister and I would come home from grade school in the afternoon. Mom and Grandma would have the parade on the television- Channel 5. Jack McCarthy would be announcing the marching bands and joking with New York City's Finest in Blue as they passed in review.

Grandma Chapman would make us cups of hot tea and bring out hot cross buns with butter and those bakery cookies shaped like shamrocks with green icing or sprinkles on them. We'd watch the parade together and soon Grandma would talk of relatives I'd never met and of the Ireland of her childhood- which sounded less romantic than you might think. Afternoon would slip into dinner time; I'd eat my corned beef and cabbage with her stories dancing in my mind.

As the years went along, life got busy and it wasn't "cool" to watch a mere parade with my Grandma- teenage things you know. Grandma continued her tradition without me ( maybe with a little Jamison's in her tea).

When my children were old enough, I tried to instill an interest in the tradition but it never seemed quite the same. Although my kids liked the cookies, without my now departed Grandma, the magic was gone, that special feeling she created. Perhaps Grandma sprinkled leprechaun dust on those cookies or it was her ties with the "Old Country" that warmed a dreary March day. Whichever, I dearly miss my "Wild Irish Rose" of a Grandmother.

A Wednesday note....

March is sliding by and I am falling behind.

I am starting my  writing for Blogging A-Z Challenge; I need 26 entries for that. I am working on art for my Letter Love 201 class; got about 10 more pieces to do for that. Got some birthday cards to make, several poems to write for the Library Newsletter due by next week. I am also planning two short and one large trip between now and June.

As you can see, I am writing here instead of doing any of the above.  What's wrong with this picture?

Letter Love 201...

Hi, Everyone. I got home from work a little early today and finally took some photos of the work I have been doing in Joanne Sharpe's month long on-line class. This has been the most challenging set of lessons yet. Not only are you lettering but you are creating art to go around and through the letters to make the letters part of the art. I only have about a 1/3 of the lessons done, so my creating will flow over into the month of March which will be great.
The work is done with permanent markers, watercolors, acrylic paints, bling, and coming up, gel medium, gesso, modeling paste and tissue paper and canvas. Wow, my head is spinning when I list all of that.
I am hoping to take a live class from Joanne at the end of June when she is going to be a guest of Donna Downey in North Carolina. Both ladies are fast paced teachers who use vibrant colors and spontaneous writing to create their art. I am excited.

Enjoy the photos-

 Cover, done in a 9 x 12' watercolor journal. Pitt Pens and watercolor paint. Alphabet soup.

Lesson 2- Lots of fun fonts and watercolors on wiggly lines.

Lesson 4- Alpha Vortex. The "S" in the center is the first letter I drew, all the others are letters placed "above" or "below" by careful placement of lines. That's Gary, Rob, Pete, Heather, Chris, DJ and my name.

Lesson 5- Word Play Collage. The letters had to touch in some fashion and we had to change the angle of the page after each set.

 Lesson 6- Shape it up. Made our letters into overlapping shapes, then colored in some of the inner spaces. Copic markers and some Twinkling H2Os on the flowers.

 Lesson 7- The Good Negative. Painted big blotch. Used one word then added sayings or words to describe and highlight what you meant by your word. In case you can't tell, I used Change- my word for the year, Create and Time- all which mean a lot to me right now. The white letters are created with a white Signo pen.

 Lesson 8- the Cluster Composition
Believe it or not, these words are clustered into an S shape around my cat picture. Words can flow throughout your art, not just get tucked in a corner or written across a straight line.

 Lesson 9- Op Art Outlines. I'm not into Op Art but I did my best.

Lesson 11- Brush and Letters. Not liking this one so much.Using a paint brush to create your lettering. You know I want it all to turn out perfectly..... Not so much.














Lesson 14- Lettered Love. This was created on Valentine's Day. Integrate hearts into our lettering. Joanne, our teacher, is a big user of hearts in her art. This was fun.

I have many more lessons to complete and a few I don't think I'll do, but on a whole I think this was an excellent class helping me find more of what I like to do and develop a style.

I'll post more as I finish them.

Thanks for stopping by.

Tuesday...

I got so much done on my 3 days off. I reorganized my side of the utility room and scrubbed the floor back there from the small flood we had. I cleared out and reorganized the Harry Potter closet under the stairs in my craft room. Took Gary to the doctor for a foot infection that sprang up over night (that happens when you are diabetic). One day on antibiotics and it is getting better.
None of that sounds all that exciting except I do love to clean and organize so it feels acomplished to me.

I worked on some of my art assignments for my online class with Joanne Sharpe. That was my creative part. Felt good to have large chunks of time to concentrate. Lots of lettering.

Also spent considerable time wrestling with my retirement demons, the little ones that sit on my shoulders and argue with each other through my head- "leave now"... "stay to June" for hours at a time.

Will post something creative here this week. People will start visiting for the Blogging A-Z and be looking for interesting content.

Thanks for stopping by. Suz

What Am I Doing?....

...That's what I just asked myself. I am already busy with home and work and trying to create art of some sort everyday and getting ready to retire sometime soon, why on earth would I sign up for the Blogging A to Z Challenge again this year?

That is a good question, guess I'll have to try to answer it, if not for you, then for me.

I signed up for another Letter Art class with Joanne Sharpe for the month of February. Each day she shows a video using creative lettering to make an art piece. You make your own with similar but your own ideas. I'm a little behind but happy with my progress. Get to use some of the various pens, inks and paints I have been collecting. Working in a 9 x 12" watercolor journal- bigger size than I am used to so I have to stretch my lettering. I've taken all of her online classes but specifically signed up for this one because February flies by when I am working on these projects. Will post some photos here.

I think I signed up for the Challenge for the same reason. I want to keep busy with outside of work things so I don't dwell on how many more days I have until I leave. No, not because I am brokenhearted about going. I have picked a date 3 times and I have pushed that date further away. The first, no one at work wanted me to leave. The second, I was a little afraid to let go of the money, I wanted to pay off a few more bills before my income takes a big dip. This third date is much more firm; I am so ready to go.

Anyway, I figure if I work on my entries in March, that will make March go quickly. I plan to write a continuing story, flowing from one day to the next using a plethora of that day's letter words. We'll see how that works.

Won't you join me.

2013- This will be the year.

Hi, I'm here again. Starting over for the New Year.
After a very rough Fall, I am creating again.  And that is enough for today. Love, Me