Speckled eggs, peat pots & my lovely new hair color ~

An egg print for you....
I scanned this a few years back ~

Lovely poem too....

You know I love giveaways, right??
I won a sweet one from Karla of Karla's Cottage!!!
Her altered peat pots are so precious and
I won one!!!
She custom made this for me....and IT'S GORGEOUS!!
Look at the beautiful feathers she added too ~
Thank you so much Karla!!!!
I just love it all!

And do you remember how much I love junk?
I love old lace, old buttons, smushed baby shoes...
wonderful speckled bird eggs,
nests, and everything at Michael's and Hobby Lobby, right?

I will buy any of the above,
in the blink of an eye...of course it has to be a good price
or have a coupon but still
I love spending money on anything old or arty.

What I don't like spending my money on is hair maintenance.
So, I get my hair cut as inexpensively
as I can and still
not cry.
And L'oreal does my hair, in my bathroom.
But this time, right before the sweet Southern Belle gathering,
the color I chose reminds me a little of this:

Oh well, who cares....a girl's got to have her priorities straight!!!!




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Shellagh of Ticking and Toile is having a Cabbage & Roses giveaway HERE!

Rebecca of Miller Campbell Designs is having a sweet giveaway HERE!

Have you been wanting to have a giveaway?
I just want to say, it doesn't have to be humongous.
It doesn't have to be expensive.
It doesn't have to be 42 items.....
Just the thought of sharing with others is beautiful ~
remember that and enjoy having your own giveaway,
you meet so many sweet new friends!!!!

Wishing you a WONDERFUL Friday dear friends ~
hugs and love,
Dawn

Why does making stuff feel so good??

I don't know exactly why, but it does! Maybe it's that creative spirit we have within us and when we actually listen and act on it ~ it's truly satisfying!

I've said many times too that creativity doesn't have to be just cranking out artwork. It's making a tasty dinner for your family, creating a beautiful, inviting home or even being a wonderful gift-giver and know what someone loves. You can be creative in so many aspects of your life!

I started on my giveaway gift ~ My son, Brad, had given me several of these beautiful boxes that are shaped like books. Well, you know this was my very favorite with the egg print on the outside! I've made one of these before for a giveaway and thought it'd be fun to make another.

I'll turn the inside into an assemblage and it will be hiding inside of the book!

It had a velvety type liner inside and I just ripped that right out. I gave the inside a quick coat of white gesso to give it a bright backdrop for my sheet music lining.

I used old pages of sheet music and cut them to size to cover the entire inside ~ just measure, and use one of those sliding paper cutters ~ that way you get a nice straight cut. I dry fit it all to make sure that everything is the right size.

Next I've coated the inside with a coat of acrylic matte gel medium and adhered each piece one by one. Then I coated over top of the music as well! It dries to a nice matte finish that I love.

I'll share the next few steps in my next post as I do them!

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I ran across this beautiful old photo album that I've had awhile ~ now I want to make it into something! It's such a wonderful size ~ I would love to turn it into an altered book/journal of sorts. Don't you love the font that is used on the work Photographs?









A precious cupid image for you :)





My goodness, the comments that you all have left me on the giveaway post are just AMAZING!!! Thank you so, so very much for each and every kind word ~ I know 800 posts is alot in just 2 years but it's because I've truly enjoyed the cycle of inspiration that is found here in blogland. It's also why I encourage so many others to blog as well. To show their talents and be lifted up, to comment on other bloggers creations and just to join this sweet community of friends.

I guess there's so much negativity and bad stuff in this world today that it's wonderful to find such goodness here in blogland ~

Wishing you a very happy Tuesday dear friends!

xxoo, Dawn

Oh my goodness . . .

What angels you all are!!!! Thank you so very much for each and every sweet comment you've left me.....
YOU are why I blog.....

I have to talk about this amazing blogging world we have now. What's so wonderful about it is, that it operates on the beautiful principle, "give and you shall be given", don't you agree? It's like you get so much joy from sharing ideas, tidbits, creativity and inspiration and the payback is?..... more joy, tidbits, creativity and inspiration. And on top of it all, encouragement and friendship!

And please know this, I'm so excited about my artwork being published in such an amazing magazine, but do you know what?? Your artwork can be too!!! I can remember a couple of years ago, reading blogs and seeing all the beautiful artwork and that these artists were having their work featured in magazines! It just amazed me....who knew??

My wish for you, if you so desire, is to create what you love and mail your work in ~ I can't wait to see it in print!!!

A little egg print from me to you, right click and save ~

The quality is not the best but maybe it's OK for collages:

A few glimpses of my creating this past weekend ~
Did you know you could quilt sheet music?? :)

Thank you again for your sweet comments!!

Happy Wednesday dear friends ~

xxoo, Dawn

A thoughtful friend ~ and free images for you!

Blogger has been very bad tonight!! I keep getting a message from internet explorer when I try to view my blog but have seen that many of you are having the same problem so hopefully they will get this worked out.

Oh well, at least I can post!!

UPDATE: I finally researched in the Blogger groups and it seems a counter link that I had on my blog from SITEMETER was causing this glitch. I've removed it and it seems to be fine now!!

UPDATE ON MY UPDATE: I've added SITEMETER back to my blog layout to count my visitors and now all seems to be working great, yaaaaaaay!!

I have to share something with you. A friend of mine that I have known for about thirty years now, is a flight attendant. She flies a lot of international flights and gets to shop at some wonderful places. Judy has an incredible knack for getting the BEST prices and finding the most amazing things. Well, she returned to Atlanta and brought me a little gift . . . a thoughtful, "I know she will just love this" gift. And she was SO right!!!!

This small book is precious!! The plates in it are just beautiful . . . I had to scan a few to give you. The colors didn't turn out quite as good as I wanted but maybe you can use these in your artwork!

Oh Judy, thank you so very much ~ you are always so thoughtful. I can't believe that there you were in a little shop in England and you thought of me and how I would love this. I will treasure it always!!

(Remember to click to enlarge and then right click to save to your computer!)

I hope you all have a great Saturday!!!

xxoo, Dawn