naturalist: noun

a student of or expert in natural history, especially botany or zoology. The term is particularly used to describe a field biologist.

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I am drawing in my journal a little bit for the Sketching and Drawing challenge over at the

Artist's Playroom this week.

For my drawing this week, I drew a large Nasturtium leaf. I didn't want to exaggerate the size of the leaf so I clipped one, bought it inside and traced the form...I know cheating, huh? But I wanted an actual size of the leaf and having that close gave me a chance to really look at the veining on the leaf. I used TH distress markers and pencils to color it in.

I thought I would press a Nasturtium flower into my book, and used a gel medium to fix it onto the page. Of course it faded right away, well, I added some alcohol inks to it and wow, that did a great job at mimicking the original color of the flower. I do wish I hadn't spread the gel medium out so far away from the flower though, oh well, live and learn!

As I was tearing through some magazines for Elizabeth's class over at the Altered Book Lover, I ran across this article of a couple who own a naturalist shop downtown and they are encouraging people to keep a nature journal, how cool was that? So I pasted the article on the back cover of my book so I will remember to go down there and check out their place, plus I might take my journal down there for them to see....should I?

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As always, I hope that you Pinterest peeps out there are creating away, and I look forward to your linking up with Project Pinterest!

phallic: adjective

relating to or resembling a phallus 

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warning, long WOYWW post due to all the great friends I have made here!

First, quick shot of my desk, can't get too close to it without hopping over all the magazines strewn about the floor due to Elizabeth's AB class lesson! You can see it laying there on my desk!

Now it seems I caused a little confusion last week, because I had changed my WOYWW post after Elizabeth left her comment! lol I didn't think anyone would notice but I got a few e-mails asking me..

what the heck?

so without further ado, this is what I removed last week:

"And here is one of my ATC's I made for the exchange. They all differ a little bit from each other but I made 10 of them and I don't do repetition very well ;) But they are all topped with a WOYWW cherry, where I tried to emulate Julia's button that she sent to us!

( I am entering this in Twinkle, Twinkle's, the summer of color week one challenge to use rainbow sherbet colors! ) 

My ATC's were heavily influenced by Elizabeth from Altered Book Lover, as evidenced by the book paper cone, the gesso'd ice cream and all the splattering of paint, and inks! Thank you Elizabeth for broadening my horizon!

and the back, now does that drip look a little phallic to you ladies?

or is my mind in the proverbial gutter?

Sorry for the glare :(

It says:

Enjoy it before it melts!

You know me, it's confession time!

I thought that quote was so cute when I started out but after making it 10 times I began to think it was kinda dumb! And combine that with the phallic drip and I almost didn't send them out!! lol

Oh well...consider it a sandee-ism!"

And here is what Elizabeth wrote that everyone was so curious about, I mean hey, we all admit to being nosey on Wednesdays so I should have expected the curious inquiries! I think it was hilarious and had many giggles last week! You ladies rock my world!

"Yep, it's a true Sandee-ism. And no less phallic than Julia's big yellow ATG gun the first time she laid it a certain upright way on her table.

You made out like a bandit this week. How lucky are YOU?? Way to go, dear."

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And the fun just kept coming, this is a tale of mail...

Normally mail means bills and junk unless it's my birthday or Christmas, lol So I have really been enjoying the last 2 weeks of stalking the mailman just to see if I got anything!

hee hee

Thursday's arrival hailed from the UK, from Laura of beads buttons and birds, where you really, really need to check out this creative wonder! psstt...check out her beaded seahorse, it's like wow! ya know? It took me a minute to catch how she incorporated her blog title into her ATC...see if you can!

Friday brought me a small prize I won from Frosted Designs blog hop, over the border from Canada!

Saturday brought me 2 exceptional goodies!

Th first one is Kay from New Mexico of 505whimsygirl, who sent me her whimsical ( get it? whimsical...whimsygirl?? ) lol,  hand drawn doodle bird and an adorable card with an invite to come visit her! Oh Kay, you may be sorry about that...course when is the weather not too hot down there? I might wilt coming from these cool mountains! :::waving southern fan in front of her face, sipping on her ice tea::

Go visit her blog, it's is a fun filled multi mixed arsty wonderfulness!

And an absolutely fun card from Vonny, from Australia of vonnykart! And just look at this hand painted queenly tea pot? wow! I just love visiting her blog and seeing all the beautiful underwater paintings that she creates, and I hope that you go visit her too! I'm framing that card Vonny, it just makes me smile!

Monday was just pure bliss! I received 3 in one day!

This one is from Sandra, from Serendipity who did a beautiful gesso stencil, it has such wonderful texture to it, so glad I unwrapped it from it's plastic cover to check it out...::innocent look:: She made 28 of them and called it easy! ( hey Sandra, would love to know more about this technique! )

Then from Ros, from Paperchase, who sent me this amazing folding ATC, stamped and collages with all things wonderful about Australia! I don't know about you, but this is like getting 8 ATC's for the price of 1!! Isn't she clever?

The front:

The back:

...and then there is BJ's ATC. My lovable friend BJ from ccraftcorner. lol

OK, so we have this running joke about her playing badminton ( I visualize white outfits on a lawn of green, sipping ice tea between games in the UK) she assured me of no such thing, but in my head that's what I see! She made this up just for me! Now I do have to figure what to send back to her! Toooooooooo funny!! I love the whole concept girlfriend, great job...you errr....hit this shuttle cock ( it's back to being a phallic post, hee hee ) out of the court!

and then there was Tuesday which brought me a great card ( and an idea for my AB, so bonus! ) from Ann of Ann's Stamp Pad, where she created this tasty little sea foam morsel, which included a new technique for me to use with my Mermaid altered book! Yay!! Thank you sooooooooooo much Ann, I totally love it!

 Thank you ladies for making my week such a fun one!

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and don't forget to link up your Project Pinterest Project here, you have a whole month to play along with us ;)

opulence: noun

wealth, riches, or affluence
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When is an envelope not an envelope? When it's a gift wrapping! Or something like that ;)

I went to a party last night at Barbara's which she had to introduce us to 2 of her Japanese friends that were visiting the states.

Kanta and Mari.

So I went bearing a gift, ( pun intended, you'll see why ).

"The Japanese love to give gifts. This habit is not practiced only on special occasions, but it's widely accepted as giri - a social duty and obligation." 

Now I am acquainted with the art of Japanese gift giving, if you are not then please this visit this web site to learn more about it. My friend Barbara, after many years of living in Japan, practices the art of  Furoshiki down to a tee and amazes of us at all functions where we bring things wrapped up on paper plates with cellaphane, aluminumin foil or tupperware containers, her's are tied up in cloths.

This is my gift for Kanto and Mari, a bear magnet.

 It is suppose to represent the North Carolina mountains that they visited. The size of the gift is important, it is suppose to be small, not to suggest opulence in any way: read above website, but the wrapping and thought behind it are monumental! I actually enjoy the whole thought process that is involved here.

 I used my Cricut to cut out the envelope using the stitched setting on the Don Juan cartridge. I used jute to sew through the holes leaving a loop to slide over the tree branch for closure.

I applied a rub-on of a local bird from our area, the American Goldfinch. I signed and dated the magnet and it fits perfectly into this little envelope, which happens to be a Japanese paper that Barbara gave me when we first met. The colors are muted, and I used natural elements. So my wrapping theme goes hand in hand with my gift, nature.

Since this includes sewing, as an "off the page project", I am entering it into

Frosted Designs, Fabulous Friday challenge - stitching

and a gift for the hostess :)

I removed the flowers from their plastic pot and wrapping. Punched a hole in the bottom of a tin can
( recycling ! ) Added a cup of soil to the bottom of the can, and then put the flowers in. Wrapped the burlap around the can and secured with a hot glue gun. The frog was one of the book marks I had made that got published in the Cricut magazine; so I cut off the long flap and it fit beautifully over the edge of the tin. Added 3 strips of ribbon and finished it off with buttons that matched the color of the frog.

I'm entering this project in Unique Crafters Challenge #4 Buttons

Kanta does story telling, or a Rakugo, which is like a a sitcom with one person playing all the parts! He told us very funny stories using only a fan and a cloth for props!  He was very good! This is part of his Samari story, who are not being allowed saki in the castle.

He also did these skits called his 'magic carpet", now this one is a North Carolina 'ha ha', lol You may not understand why we are laughing but it a short video of part of his entertainment  and it's still fun to watch:)

http://www.facebook.com/?ref=home#!/sandee.setliff

Mari made us Sakuramochi, which was delicious. I admit I am the first person to eye suspiciously anything wrapped up in leaves but I tried it and it great! Barbara also served us green tea.

Kanta and Mari also had lots of little gifts for us!

Barbara in her "summer" kimono, doesn't she look great?

Lots of fun, thanks Barbara, Kanta, and Mari for an enjoyable evening!

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and don't forget to link up your Project Pinterest Project here, you have a whole month to play along with us ;)

Brown Thrasher: noun

The Brown Thrasher is quite chatty. It's able to imitate the songs of other birds, just like a Mockingbird. 

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I did not know that. Had to go find his call, you can listen to it here.

Did a little weeding out in the common area on Saturday and this immature Brown Thrasher seemed to be appreciative of the newly churned up dirt. :) He doesn't look like he has any eyes but he was busy foraging in the leaves and his face blurred a bit.

A little better picture ( considering I'm up on my balcony ) of him amongst all the creeping Charlie that I AM going to eradicate this summer!

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and here are my pages for my Mermaid AB, that I am doing via Elizabeth's class over at Altered Book Lover. Lesson 9 was on making your own backgrounds.

While I feel somewhat comfortable making my own backgrounds, the purpose of this class for me is to stretch myself, to learn something new, so I was happy to try out this technique. Cling Wrap Backgrounds was a lot of fun to play around with. It was so much fun that I did 3 layers of it on this page, the first one in light blue, then dark blue and then back to light blue acrylic paint. I did pull up the cling wrap too early and yep, Elizabeth did not exaggerate when she said it would pull up the paint from your book! But that just created more texture in turn, so it's all good! Of course I added a healthy dose of paint splatters, drips and doodles to finish her off. I also learned that Sakura Glaze pens holds up well to water spritzing, my metallic pens do not! lol

I also created a little mini background by applying a layer of acrylic paint and then dropping Alcohol Inks onto, I love the way they spread out on their own.

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And now I hope you will excuse me, it's lunch time and I am going to go make myself a big fat juicy tomato sandwich with Miracle Whip, nothing says summer like tomatoes! But before I leave ya I want to remind you to link up your Project Pinterest Project here, you have a whole month to play along with us ;)

 

Hope your day is as wonderful as you are!

Charles Chips: noun

the best tasting chip ever made delivered right to your door!

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please bear with me today, as we are burying my father, so I am a little nostalgic...

history behind Charles Chips

"1942- Effie Musser began making potato chips as a means of creating additional income for her family. Her husband, Si, was a farmer. Effie took her chips to Central market, Lancaster, PA on Tuesday and Friday mornings to sell at stall 151.

A snack distributor in Baltimore, MD heard about Effie’s good tasting chips and contracted with her to supply bulk chips delivered to him. He repacked the bulk chips into his branded tin can, Charles Chips, named after Charles St, Baltimore, MD. He had financial issues and since Effie was his largest creditor and he chose to sell his assets to her rather than go bankrupt. At this point, the potato chip business was generating more revenue than the farm was, so Si joined Effie in the business and hired a tenant farmer to do the farm chores.

By 1946, production had grown from their small residential kitchen to a 50 foot by 250 foot cement block building. At the time, Si and Effie were producing private label potato chips for Fritos and A&P while building the home delivery concept with Charles Chips. In the late 50’s Si and Effie expanded the Charles Chips brand to include Charles Pretzels and Charles Cookies and in the years ahead developed a Christmas Holiday Gift program. In 1962, a new plant was built in Calhoun, KY to service the mid-west and south."

Above is a picture of the trucks that delivered the chips and cookies right up to your door. Each man, like the one pictured, owned his own truck, established his own delivery route. My dad is the one they purchased their chips from, and in turn my dad purchased the chips from Musser. This was such a novelty as chips had only been sold in bags. Back then, this was a whole new concept! I use to love these trucks! The good ole' days! I was quite a potato chip snob too, which cost me my modeling career as I turned down a job with Lays. I was only 15 at the time, but once you turn down a job, well, you no longer had a job! But I was OK with that, even though I loved being in ads and the occasional commercial.

I'm always on the look out for any Charles Chip product as my dad owned several franchises in the south. Ah, the memories of chips, cookies, etc. in the pantry. The cans were always special and there are people today who still covet their CC cans! So when on Pinterest I ran across this bird house, my mouth dropped open!

I think maybe its a bank? I know the cans were round so really not sure what they have used, but the Charles Chip logo is undeniable! I am always discovering new merchandise that they "gave away" as promos back then. My dad didn't keep any of it! The horrors of it! No one would ever accuse my dad of being a hoarder for sure! 

And this project made me think of the few tins I had found years ago when I first discovered Ebay. ( A place I am afraid to go back to cause it's very addicting, but I really enjoyed finding the Charles Chip items that brought back so many delightful childhood memories!! ) Now I have had these tins for years, and they aren't in pristine shape so I wanted to find a use for them that I would see and appreciate every day.

Which made me think of my favorite place, the balcony, so I took a chip can and a pretzel can and stacked them together, using some cork board in between the 2 layers for stability and now use it as a plant stand. It's not the biggest project out there in Pinterest land, but it is making use of something I collect instead of it collecting dust.
Plus it makes me smile when I look at them.

a view of my corner of the balcony:

and a close up of the cans:

Here are some other memorabilia I have collected over the years:

The large truck is from my childhood. Dad gave one to me and one to my older brother. His is kinda, well loved aka as trashed, but then he played with his as a boy where mine was forgotten until I found it after my mom died in 1999, which is when the obsession to collect Charles Chip stuff came about.

The photograph is something I made for the party table for my mom and dad's 50th wedding anniversary. The photo on the left taken at their wedding and then the latest "church" photo on the right.

You can't tell, but these 2 photos were pictures of my dad's bussiness and warehouses back when he first started out. And below, in the black velvet box is a deck of playing cards that I use to LOVE when I was a kid. The matches were kind of a joke gift one year for my dad, we all had CB's back then and his handle was landlord, mine was daddy's girl ;) Are you old enough to remember this fad?

"The 1970s saw an explosion in the use of CB radio. The radio equipment technology had become smaller and gained in popularity among truckers. Since the national speed limit had been lowered to 55 mph (90 kph), truckers began to use CB radios to alert each other when they saw speed traps set up by the police.
CB radio popularity also took off in the 1970s thanks to films such as Convoy and the Smokey and the Bandit series. Television shows such as The Dukes of Hazzard also helped the device gain popularity. These films and television shows depicted truckers and good ole boys outrunning the law with the help of their CB radios."

Oh yeah, we had them!!

Now I have to figure out a way to display all my goodies again now that I am in a new place. Thanks for indulging me in my trip down memory lane, this was something I didn't get to do when he died. 

Darrell Setliff August 26th 2011

nowadays: adverb

in the present, or in the times in which we are now living, usually in contrast to the past
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Well I did make some money from my garage sale and drove as fast as the law allowed to Michael's to spend it on more T!M HOLTZ stuff! lol This is what I got:

and I made his June tag, which coincided with what's going on in my life currently.

Let me explain:

Tomorrow I am driving down to South Carolina to finally bury my dad. I say finally because he actually passed away last August. He was cremated and his memorial is being held on Sunday. ( Don't even ask me for the details on why so late, loooooooooooong story. )

But I have been reminiscing all week about him and 2 weeks ago my cousin posted a picture taken of me and my dad back in 1967, so this June tag was perfect timing. I think because it meant so much to me that I had a really hard time making the tag. I printed the picture 6 times in all, ( the fifth time, things went flying across my craft desk, can we say bad temper? ) so the 6th time I decided to not try and color the picture itself and left it as is.

I did try and follow his other steps though.

And yes, since it was taken at Christmas I did add some red to it. I have an entire collection of old newspapers and magazines in a hope chest from my mom, and there was a magazine from the year 1967! Bonus! Since it had a damaged front cover, ( like as in none ), I didn't feel too bad cutting an article from it to use. I found this old airline ad where they talked about serving steak, baked potatoes etc. ( like wow, you really use to get such good service, not like nowadays, lol ) and since my dad was notorious for eating that meal every night, it just seemed fitting!

I also found this little TV with the year 1967, and just had to cut it out, and added some glossy accents to the screen part, isn't it cute?

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Project Pinterest

Begins on the 10th of every month, so join the party by linking up what you created from a pin that inspired you!

:)

survey: transitive verb

to do a statistical study of a sample population by asking questions about age, income, opinions, buying preferences, and other aspects of people's lives

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I was asked by Paper Crafts Magazine to do a survey of their magazine.

They sent me 8 issues, at first I was so excited. I read each magazine cover to cover, taking my time to make sure I was being a good surveyerist ( is there such a thing? ) Anyway, I have to admit to you that by the time I finished the questions for the third magazine, I was totally BORED with the whole process. I'm not allowed to tell you the questions or my responses because I signed a confidentiality agreement, but I can tell you I was extremely happy for it to be completed and over with.

It's short and sweet today ladies, I have been feverently working for the past couple of days and I have just finished 2 sumptious projects for submission to Cricut and while I cannot show the completed projects, I am going to share this before and after picture. It's part of one of the submissions but since it doesn't have anything to do with the Cricut, I think I am OK in showing it :)

before Dynamic Auto Painter:

and then after:

I just love the softness about it, it does look like a water color rendering. The strip you see on the bottom of the picture is because I haven't bought the program, but I am giving it some serious consideration! They have tons of effects which I am loving! So you can download it for yourself to play with, enjoy!