Becolorful

The 411 on Fabulous Hair

The holidays are rapidly approaching and if you or a friend are looking for one fabulous stylist in the Cedar Rapids area or if you think that maybe you are ready to change your look up a bit then let me introduce you to Jessica. Not only is she talented and up on all the latest trends and products, she is dependable, professional and easy to talk with. She will listen to what you want and, if asked, make helpful suggestions. Her salon is centrally located and her impressive training includes a Bumble and Bumble course in New York, Beth Minardi and Aveda color classes in Chicago, a Wayne Grund haircutting course, and Redkin training in Chicago, Des Moines, and Cedar Rapids. She was also a hair artist on the set of The Final Season and yes, she is mentioned in the credits.  She is one of Cedar Rapid's best kept secrets and I want to share her with you because I believe in supporting local talent and in passing on a good thing. I hope you will give her a call. I know you won't be disappointed.

A Creative Mind is Seldom Tidy

Yes, this is my studio that I proudly put together in thirty days this past summer and bragged about how organized it is. Actually, the studio IS organized it's just that I am not. I've known for five months that I would be putting on a sale with The Traveling Door in October, so it isn't like I didn't have enough lead time. After every sale I say I am going to be more organized for the next one. I am saying that again because this is the result of my latest round of last minute cramming. 

My excuse this time was that I needed to wait until we got Adam moved on to college so I could claim this space for myself. Then it took me the thirty days to pull it together into what I call my studio space. Shortly after that we had a a personal family set back that definitely needed to take priority over painting. Throw in a trip to the east coast and another one to Lake of the Ozarks and before I knew it I had three weeks to prepare.

Initially, I tried to keep finished projects together and lined up, but before I knew it I was working on five things at once. While waiting for the paint to dry on one thing I would start another. It snowballed and was soon out of control.

I had more projects in various degrees of completion going on out in the painting garage. I'd have so many projects going on and so many paint colors that I'd set my brush down, move on to something else and not come back to it until the brush was rock hard and worthless. New brushes will definitely be in order.

The good news, though, it that despite this horrendous colossal mess, it returned to "normal" with relative ease. The beauty of having an organized space is there really is a place for everything and it really does make clean up so much easier. It only took me about an hour to put everything away and wipe down the counters. I still haven't vacuumed. Even though I fight it, I do have that lazy side to me and I hate to vacuum. I also learned what worked well and what maybe needs to be tweaked but that will be another post. For now I am just enjoying my calm reorganized and clean blue heaven.

 

Ahhhhhhhhhhh.

Sneak Peeks

With just hours until our sale, the women of The Traveling Door are working feverishly to finish up our projects for you. It seems we all get into this last minute push to complete just "one more thing." 

I thought you might like to see just a sampling of what you will find tomorrow, Thursday October 22nd from 4-8 PM at Klik's.

Some of Kathy's fantastic door candy -

 

 

 

Sally's jewelry -

 

 

Here is something new and different; Hip Mama Calling Cards!

These fun cards can be shared with other cool moms to exchange information or schedule play dates. Wish I had had these. What great ice breakers.

 

You will find gifts for your home or for a friend =

 

 

 

 

 

or how about an earring frame for a friend.

You will want to stock up with some of Lynn's breathtakingly beautiful photo cards.

 

Of course there will be holiday treats.

 

 

This is just a sneak peek of what you will find. Don't miss this event because we all love having something that is unique and original and The Traveling Door is the place to find it.

What is Functional Art?

 This is a clock I pulled together a couple of years ago. At the time I called it altered art. Maybe the term should have been functional art. 

I like to take things and make them more colorful, unique or interesting.

This piece was a metal wall art that I picked up in the clearance aisle at TJ Maxx. I altered it by painting it, decoupaging, and writing on it. I guess that is my take on altered or functional art.

Many scrap-bookers or card makers have seen their craft evolve into altered art. My scrap-booking style is simple.I am inspired, though, by Liz who takes it to the next level. 

Maybe after The Traveling Door sale (shameless plug) and the holidays I will get back to this creative outlet. Looking for pictures in my scrapbook folder makes me realize how much I miss it.

I sometimes refer to what I do as creatively going green. Like repurposing these boring letter holders.

I like looking at the mundane with new eyes and thinking how I could make it something unique and worthy of notice.

This one of a set of old bar stools I painted up for a show.

I try to visualize something with a new coat of paint, some stripes (usually black and white) or maybe some polka dots , or often times,  both. I also love to add quotes or words to my work whenever possible.

 

 More than once I have found something at the store and when I go to check out I am forced by my need to feel cool to try and explain to the sales associate that I will be painting this lamp, clock, vase or whatever . Forget saying I'm going to alter it. They usually don't know what I am talking about nor do they care. I wish I didn't care but I must admit I don't want them to think that I am so taste deprived that I would take this ugly butt purchase as is and put it in my home if I didn't think I could make it into something noteworthy. 

Last week I bought some trays with Betty Boop on them. I apologize to all the Betty Boop fans but really, I'm a grown woman with a mortgage. I couldn't buy that tray without trying to explain myself. 

So now when I try and convey to people what I do I guess I will be using the term functional art. To me found art sounds like I went through people's garbage. I think I like the word functional better. So functional it is.

 

In trying to scour up examples of switched up pieces I went back through my photos. I rediscovered the pictures I used in this post. These are pieces I did a couple of years ago for our first Traveling Door sale. It is fun to look back and watch my style evolve. I wonder where I am headed next?

I am grateful for artsy friends and an inspiring daughter and an also creative and supportive mom. They all encourage me to try new things and to take a leap of faith because in the end the worst that can happen is I have to paint over it.

Linking up this post with the Time Travels at Brambleberry Cottage. I hope you can follow me there.

Light It Up

I've always believed that one of the easiest ways to make a room feel welcoming is with lighting. I love the glow that the house takes on at Christmas time with much of the lighting coming from the lighted trees and wreaths. Because I love it so much I figure why just Christmas?

These grape lights stay up year round above the windows in our breezeway. I love to sit here with friends on a summer night without any other lights on but these.

When I do my switch over from summer to fall I try to think of ways that I can decorate with lighting. So I string lights through vases of leaves. After I took this picture I also put a string of lights under the green scarf.

I look for Halloween flair with lights.

 

 

A lighted wreath and candles in front of a mirror gives off a magical kind of lighting.

 

Whenever possible I string lights on Puck.

 

This year I bought some of these great stems with the L.E.D. lights on the tips.

 

But in the end I guess nothing beats plain old candle light.

 

 Send me some of the ways you like to use lighting to make a room sparkle. 

 

 

Less Than Two Weeks

With less than two weeks to go before the next Traveling Door art sale I am beginning to panic. I do this every time. The Traveling Door is a group of five women and I am lucky enough to be one of them. We get together weekly to inspire, laugh, and create. We call our get together day Therapy Thursday. Then twice a year we pull all of our creative endeavors together and put on a sale. I always think I will be so well prepared but I am a master procrastinator and every time I end up about three weeks out from the show and I realize that I am once again way behind schedule. So I end up putting the rest of my life on hold and I go into manic paint and design mode. 

This was the first piece that I had completed for the upcoming sale. Well, actually, if I am truly honest, I originally did this wall hanging for my laundry room but when I realized how far behind I was for the sale it became Traveling Door artistic effort number 1. 

Our next show will be Thursday October 22 at Klik's Photography from 4-8 PM. Yes I am realizing that is less than two weeks away. I hope to have fifty items for sale. So with that in mind my blog posts will be brief. Hopefully knowing that I have put that fifty piece goal out there will be the motivation I need to stay focused and to keep me designing and creating.

 

Bringing Oz Home for Halloween

 

 

Republishing this Halloween post from last year at Sunday Favorites.

I thought it was timely one year later.

 

I'm not exactly big on decorating for Halloween but I decided to try adding a little something different to the mix this year. I don't like decorations that take up a lot of room because I don't know where to store them and I don't like to spend a lot of money on these types of things but I had this hat from my "Blinging Witch" costume a few years ago and when I saw these shoes at a consignment store last week the idea bulb went on in my head.

 

I apologize to the person that bought them thinking they were cute and then I use them as witch shoes... yikes, hope she doesn't read this blog. :)

I thought it would be fun to have a little vignette that looked like the Wicked Witch of the West had set her things here so I added some Halloween socks and placed the three items on this table. It still wasn't working. I decided the hat needed height so it is on a wreath stand that is wrapped with a gift wrapped paper towel holder.

 

There was still something missing. I knew what I needed was a snow globe, but where would I find one of those that had a Halloween theme? I had an Ah ha moment and remembered that in the scrapbooking department at Hobby Lobby they had empty globes that you are supposed to put a picture in.  I couldn't decide - a picture of the witch or her words. In the end I went with the quote from the story.

So there it is an easy to store and unusual Halloween nod for less than $25.00.

 

It's Miller Time { We Had The Time and They Had the View }

This past weekend we went down to the Lake of the Ozarks with some great friends, the Millers, and this is the amazing view off of their ginormous, must- be- seen- to be- believed deck. Now a girl could get used to a view like this. Plus, what a perfect vantage point for the Fourth of July fireworks that are fired off on that little island out in the center.

We've been trying to get down to the lake and the Miller's place for about two years but it is difficult to get four people as busy and as important as we are all together at the same time :) 

What was bittersweet about this weekend was it would be the last weekend for the Millers at this condo that they have owned for eight years. Their family is growing and the condo is not so they sold it earlier this summer and are now looking for a bigger place in this area. Mike and I made it our mission to help them find that picture perfect dream home on the lake. 

After fortifying ourselves with dinner - and a martini of course- at J.B. Hook's on Friday night,

 

 

 

 we set out Saturday morning determined to meet our real-estate objective. I don't know if it was the full moon or the black cat that crossed the driveway at our first stop, but we fell short of achieving our goal. There were some great houses but apparently no "warm fuzzies" for the Millers.

So we decided to regroup. The guys went to play golf...

 

and the girls went shopping. I'd have to say the shopping went better than the house hunting.

 

I even came across this little beauty at the Coach Outlet. Instyle is saying it is all about the colorful handbags so not one to be shy I decided to go big or go home and went all out with purple!

 

We topped off the day with dinner at Docknockers. This place could be a post all on its own.

 Usually we would have gone there by boat but it was unusually cool so we opted to drive over. I loved it here. From the nautical dive bar decor to the humorously designated facilities this place was a study in eye candy.

 

 

 

 

Haha! You've gotta love it but the real reason to come here is for their amazing crab legs. They are served in a bucket with a wooden mallet to break open the shells. I guess I got a little over zealous with the mallet  (sorry Annie) but hey I was a newbie and maybe it is an acquired skill :)  

 

The crab meat was flying but it was also delicious - as were the steamers.

 

 

Good friends, good food, good Miller Times

Thank you Dean and Annie. Can't wait to do it all again.

 

 

 

All Dressed Up for Autumn

"Delicious autumn! My very soul is wedded to it, and if I were a bird I would fly about the earth seeking the successive autumns"  ~ George Eliot

 

Reposted for The Tablescaper link party Sept. 25th 2011

 

It is nearly the end of September and I am just getting around to changing out summer decor for fall. It isn't that I'm not excited to do this, I love doing it. It seems like there is always something impeding my progress lately. My family room is one of the more difficult rooms for me to change over for fall. Probably because it has windows on three sides and is full of the bright colors that I love; reds, greens, and yellows and of course my trademark accents of black and white. 

This room was made for spring and summer decor.

 

 

Fall flavoring is a little more challenging. I started by removing the valances. They came with the house when we bought it eleven years ago and I am so over them. Then the easy stuff like switching out the pillows  quilts and table cloths. Then I substituted the Easter Bunny for a witchy looking vase full of fall leaves.

 

 

A new piece from Sticks -

... and of course I always have to dress Puck for each season.

 

Happy October. I wish it could always be autumn.