solstice: noun

 either of the times when the Sun is farthest from the equator, on or about June 21 or December 21. The summer solstice falls in June in the northern hemisphere but in December in the southern hemisphere, and vice versa for the winter solstice.

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I decided to spend summer solstice out at my favorite place, the Biltmore Estate. I was wondering what it would look like in the heat of summer and I was delighted by the show. This is going to be a 3 day post because it will be too picture heavy for one showing. I am starting at the beginning of my walk, which begins at the conservatory and moves up through the walled gardens. Tomorrow will be the Italian Garden which has all the water lilies!

Biltmore Estate has acres of formal and informal gardens, designed by America's foremost landscape architect, Frederick Law Olmsted. Come stroll the gardens with me :)

The lower terrace of the walled garden is all roses. This first one was by far the most fragrant. It was pure heaven.

 hmmm..need to remember to get my toes out of the picture :)

 You will see more insects in my pictures, I was really enjoying including them. This little honey bee was head first into this rose, I think he was enjoying the flowers as much as I was!

Next level up is a little bit of everything. I was very happy to see such a wide variety of flowers!

 Here is a little lightning bug/firefly enjoying a double ruffled lily.

 I have no idea what this plant is, but I was uber fascinated with it. I had to reach out and touch it's lovely purple flower stalk, it was softer than I thought it would be.

Up another flight of stairs and beginning my winding walk up through the shrub garden , which begins by walking under this Weeping Blue Atlas Cedar which evidently originates from Algeria, Morocco.

A backward glance at the walled gardens that I just left...see how far I have travelled already?

Tomorrow, pictures of the water lilies! I hope you come back and join me :)

sakura: noun

is the Japanese name for the cherry tree and its blossoms

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Over at Die Cuttin Divas, they are having a red, yellow, and orange color challenge!

Challenge #70 Summer Colors

and Crazy Amigo Challenge: also Summer Colors, red, orange and yellow!

Paper Trimmings cartridge

I can always rely on being inspired from watching Tracy's Monday online video,( you can watch it here ) and she used a great quote that she found on Pinterest. I altered it a bit, by changing the fonts, and the wording a little.

I cut a butterfly border and 2 butterflies from Paper Trimmings, used up some American Crafts ribbon from my scraps and some Sassafrass paper. I printed out the quote on yellow card stock using various fonts from my Print Artist Gold 21. I wrote over the title and bottom with a Sakura Glaze pen in red.

And now it hangs in my craft room!

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Pinterest inspires a lot of different people in different ways, and if you found a pin that inspired you then share your creation with us!

Project Pinterest

funky: adjective

unconventional: offbeat, creative, and novel

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Hi WOYWW friends, how are you doing?

My desk is clean, so instead of showing you a boring clean desk, here are some shelves, lol I love baskets and boxes, it's easy to grab a ribbon box, or a bead box and take it to my desk to work, then when I'm finished I take the box back to the shelf!

And why sandee is your desk so clean you ask? Well, I am glad you asked! I was taking pictures of all the lovely ATC mail for you to enjoy!

Sarah sent me these super cute ATC's which she calls vintage chic...sarah honey, I was born in the 50's and the 50's ain't vintage...ahem...lol....call it retro chic! Vintage is....errr...old, I am not vintage! lol But oh so cute...and hey, that's me! hee hee ;) But she is getting ready to debump, so all is forgiven!

Anne sent me this adorable retro collages ATC, and everyone knows how I love my funky glasses! isn't she just adorable? ( the ATC's are too ) Anne makes such great projects and I highly recommend following her blog so you don't miss out on anything!

Ali sent me this cute hand drawn ATC and card, but she didn't write her blog addy so I don't have a link up for you. I love the doodling and the black and pink colors!

So what's on your desk, closet, drawer or floor...nosey inquiring minds want to know!

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and please don't forget that I have a Project Pinterest link up, so if you pin and create something then we would love to see what you've done!

lightning bug: noun

Lampyridae is a family of insects in the beetle order Coleoptera. They are winged beetles, and commonly called fireflies or lightning bugs for their conspicuous crepuscular use of bioluminescence to attract mates or prey. Fireflies produce a "cold light", with no infrared or ultraviolet frequencies. This chemically produced light from the lower abdomen may be yellow, green, or pale-red, with wavelengths from 510 to 670 nanometers.
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for me, especially as a kid,  lightning bugs = summer

Sometimes when I am inspired, it's like a vague swirl floating in my brain, and I'm not even sure how to act on it, but it just swirls and floats in my "creative" center until the right moment, when I go aha! That's what happened when I read BJ's post about using the Summer of Color Event where every week we are given an ice cream color prompt to use anyway we want basically.

This week we were given mint chocolate chip, now I just happen to love mint chocolate chip ice cream so I had planned on making a jar votive candle holder using that color prompt. A friend and I headed to the park where we painted jars various colors, yellow, pink and mint green. Then we came back to my place to get creative:

Wendy used wire to wrap around her jar, as hers will be hanging and then added some pretty ribbon, here she is hard at work:

Now, remember that swirling inspired thought in my head? Well, I had finished my mint chocolate chip jar and was contemplating the pink colors when it hit me...that aha moment! Wouldn't that pink jar look great in the sherbet colors? What if I made a jar each week from the ice cream color prompts!???! AHA! lol OK, so it was a little moment I had with myself but now I have 2 completed jars, one in mint chocolate chip and and the other one in sherbet colors!

Now while they look pretty in the day, I am looking forward to adding the candles to them and lighting them up tonight. I am also writing on the bottom of each jar the "name" of the ice cream:

Every night I have a lighting bug show outside my balcony. Because I live by a creek and the woods, I have tons of them. I wish I had a better camera to capture what I get to see each night, but now I have a little show of my own to add to their brilliant display!

entering this in PanPastel's challenge 323 Summertime

and a close up...should I cut out more on the pink one, it doesn't illuminate as well as the green one :(

and a picture of a fire fly all lit up in case anyone is not familiar with them:

( stock picture )

and when I was a kid we use to catch them and put them in jars like this:

( stock picture )

what brings back memories of summer in the back yard to me as a kid?

The sounds of a pulsating water sprinkler, catching fireflies, the smell of Southern magnolias and gardenias, a slice of watermelon and spitting seeds, playing kick the can until dark, standing under the neighbor's muscadine vine and eating them one after another with my mom....

to be a kid again...

how about you, got any favorite summer memories to share?
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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!

here's your sign: comic routine by Bill Engvall

signs for stupid people

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OK, I am not stupid, only mildy obsessed with paint splatters! After an intense art session the other day I happen to see that my grunge scissors.... ( I call them that because they are used for distressing, popping tops off jars, cutting tree branches, that yes I keep small tree branches in my craft room, don't you?, and any other abuse that I wouldn't put my good scissors through )....have this glorious pattern on them...

now have I gone over the altered art edge, because this just makes me happy?

here's your sign:

and here's your sign on mixed media:

hee hee, enjoying my own sense of humor

:)

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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!

session: noun

a period of time during which people are involved in an activity together

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I missed Tracy's online party art session on Monday night because I was at Barbara's party, but since she records it, I was able to watch it on Tuesday, and was leaving comments on Tracy's page as I watched the video, much like I would be doing if I were chatting away with everyone during the class. The best part was that Tracy was also online and commenting to my comments, loved that! Thank you Tracy, that made it a lot of fun!

Anyhoo...I usually always walk away from Tracy's art sessions feeling inspired. And this is what I made, and although it may not look like Tracy's, it was inspired by spending time with her and by watching her create something and evidently by following her on Pinterest, because when I went to get the source for the inspiration ( not provided btw ) I saw that it was a repin from Tracy's boards! HA!

One of the techniques I tried was using gesso through a stencil and while it was still wet, spraying mists on it, LOVE the way it reacts with the gesso! And because I was using my finger to apply and pat the gesso onto the stencil, I have this extremely cool texture!

I layered the owl's wings on cut him out using my Paisley cartridge, and the limb from my French Manor cartridge on background paper I had created. I adhered my text book paper to card stock and then painted, sprayed, stamped with paint, gesso'd...you name and I was throwing it on there! He really has a more rustic feel to him than the picture shows.

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So just like I did, if you use a pin from Pinterest, and would like to share your idea, then Sarah and I would love to have you link up with ( here, with Project Pinterest ) and share your creations! Then we get to see what everyone is doing!!

scrawl: noun

messy or hurried-looking handwriting or drawing

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CPS - Card Sketches: CPS 269

Inspiration Avenue: Chickens and Roosters

I knew I wanted chicken art...after all I have a chicken kitchen!

First task was to establish the location in my kitchen and the orientation of the piece. Once that was decided, I next had to dig through my hoarded stash....this is a special stash...mmm...what to pick....ohhhh how about this glittered embossed feather paper from American Crafts. I am showing you the paper in it's original state because I now consider this "plain"....lol, oh how I have changed!

Next I added a masking tape border, then splattered it with alcohol inks, and ink sprays, giving it a good mist of water to blend it all a little bit. ( You can wipe off the sprays or let them dry on the masking tape if you want a clear strip...I let everything dry on mine, then used a wet cloth to remove the sprays but left the AI splotches. ) Then I added detailing tape ( get it from your local car shop ) I went to town with "doodling", adding dots with my quilting tool, dots and dashes with my vellum writer ( since it was on masking tape and I didn't want it to smudge ) and faux sewing on the word strips. And yes, even used my own handwriting too, what better doodle than your own scrawl? lol :0

Then since I was following the CPS 269 sketch, I cut out a square from some wrapping paper that Barbara had given me and thought to myself....too plain little chicken, you need some sprucing up!
ta dah! a zentangled chicken!

I used a quote that I saw on Pinterest, I get so many great ideas there, and would love for you to link up your projects on my Project Pinterest ( shameless plug, sorry....well not really sorry, lol ) I loved the quote but didn't realize until later that it's a 'quote representation' from some one's famous words. Can you guess from whom?

And the quote ( term used loosely ) around the perimeter of the piece says:
And God said unto the chicken,
Thou shalt cross the road.
And the chicken crossed the road and
there was much rejoicing.

 Figured out the source of the quotes yet?
The first was adapted from one of Martin Luther's speeches and the second one from the Bible! HA!

And last but not least, the finished piece hanging up on my kitchen wall!

and I love, love, LOVE it! Hope you do too :)