Awake again at the wrong hour...

Well, here it is 1:30 am and I am awake!!! Grrr!
I fell asleep round 9pm on the recliner, but woke up at midnight and now I am so awake as if I'd slept 8 hours.

Ah, the joys and curses of a nap too late in the day. Later today, I have classes at 9am and 3pm. So I really hope I get tired soon. I also need to get back to my early morning walking regime; which has suffered from my up too late times. A return to the walking would probably help my daytime energy and get me more restful sleep.

It was a productive day with painting color studies. Its so great to get back into paint again. Maybe I will take pictures from the cell phone tomorrow and post for you to see....maybe....I'll see how I feel about it when I look at them again.
Did I tell you we are doing a series of self-portraits? The 3 of us in the Painting II class, is the "we" I refer to. Its very odd painting yourself...there is a constant battle of wanting to correct the "flaws", guess its really an ego thing. Trying my best to be humble as I paint so that its emotional and as accurate as possible without arrogance.

Well, off I go to attempt the winding down....hope the sleep fairy finds me soon.

Welcome to Monday

Today is Monday, I cannot in any amount of honesty tell you I enjoy the thought of Mondays. I don't know if I ever have. I will find joy, beauty and enjoyment in today but not because of the name of the day. For me, Mondays always meant the end of family time as a child and now it means the end of unlimited hours with my husband.

Today also marks the end of an era of television. LOST is over. The last episode aired last night...what a last episode! Nothing like the utter disappointment that was the Sienfeld finale. I will miss the suspense and the guessing and the gorgeous Hawaii panoramas.

During the episode, I also worked on some homework for tomorrow's digital graphics class. We are working in Adobe Illustrator right now. The project was to replicate a photo of a bowl of cherries. I tried to upload it, but for some reason its not working. Maybe I will try again later. The class is a heavy load of work, but I know I will learn a lot. Unfortunately, I got carried away and by the time I realized the time there was no point in going to bed. I do have supplies and color studies to do for tomorrow morning's painting class as well. Its going to be a busy day - but I will rejoice and be glad in it.

Hope you all have a great Monday!

Back at SPC for the summer

Busy week this week. Taking two classes at SPC this summer, and the session began this week. Looking forward to this semester - I am taking painting (just to keep my hand in traditional art) and Computer Graphics (we're learning Adobe Creative Suite 4).

Its going to be a busy semester for both classes time-wise. Summer sessions are shorter, but you learn the same amount as you would when the class is held during the fall or spring sessions. Painting, just because it takes a while and our section of the class is focusing on self-portraits (not really looking forward to that...ugh, staring at myself hours on end).
The digital graphics class will be a lot of work in a condensed time. Don't get me wrong, I am not complaining. I am truly looking forward to becoming more proficient in the Creative Suite programs.

So the adventure continues. Hoping I can still keep up with this blog in between classes, homework and projects. Really enjoyed the spring session that ended about 2 weeks ago...would have been nice to have a little more than 10 days off, but that's OK. Onward!

Meet my little friend from the park...

Here is little friend squirrel who romped around us during our walk at the park last Saturday.

Sorry the picture quality isn't great, it was taken with my cell phone. Figured since my afternoon class was canceled for the day, I would catch up on a little blogginess.

Through the eyes of a preschooler...

Its amazing to watch a preschooler and for a moment take in what they're saying and see the world through their eyes. Sometimes the thoughts don't follow a logical sequence, but there is a delightful whimsy and their own logic to it all.

Today, I had the privilege of picking up my friend's little girl from preschool and spending a couple hours with her till her Mommy came home. It was too cute, when I arrived at the preschool to see her excitement not only at seeing me but getting to ride in my car, then her discovery that it was "just us" (as she put it) and also exclaimed "I like it when its just us, because its like we are buddies!" So cute!

How quickly we leave behind the simple joys of a child. Remember how helping mom clean could be fun? I'm not a mom, but do have my own place to care for, and I wish I could reignite that joy again for my cleaning times now. I wonder if we took a moment to take joy in the littlest things, if that would trickle over into the rest of our days and make our burdens a bit easier to bear.

Hoping you find joy in the everyday! If you need a little help check out Cute Overload - an awesome blog ready to fill your senses with cuteness and joy!

Jam Packed Saturday

Today began with going with Dave to the chiropractor; so he could get adjusted. Then off to a lovely breakfast at Cracker Barrel. After breakfast, we stopped at Saw Grass Lake Park and spent a little over an hour there. We walked the entire time and I think we covered the whole park! It was a very warm Florida day (as its supposed to be now that we are in the middle of May), but the breeze helped refresh us now and again. Tons of dragonflies there! I tried to take a picture but none of them would let me get close enough with my cell phone to snap a proper picture of them.
We did see an alligator in the water, a few squirrels and there were many birds out too. They also have a momma owl who has a nest with a chick in the trees near the main education station. It is amazing how much better one feels after a good walk in the good ole outdoors. This time together was so dear to me, we don't get to do this very often, but I do hope we can maybe make this more of a habit and explore all the county parks.

Hope you all had a terrific Saturday! God Bless!

Thankful

Very thankful today. Well, I try to be always thankful, but like any other human being on the planet I often forget gratitude.

Today, I met up with an old friend from my days at Lakeside Christian School, and he was a great help with this newbie Mac owner. I have seen him since our school days, and we keep up with each other through facebook, twitter and my friend/his cousin Donna. We had a nice visit catching up on things and chatting about the greatness that is Apple.

So very grateful for good friends. Where would we be without them. Indeed the best of friends are those not afraid to tell us when we are making mistakes and show us where we need to set ourselves straight for the betterment of ourselves and in turn our families.

Thanks to David Banther for all the Mac info!

Hope everyone has a blessed weekend.

Crazy, Amazing Day

Today's post will be brief. I've been awake for over 32 hours.

Today was full of the joys of friendship, reminders of God's love, and the craziness of daily life when an international package goes missing and yet, the man at the package place was so kind and dear that there is no anger.

Joys of friendship:

• I made it to Bible Study today and got refreshed with the fellowship of the lovely ladies.
• My dear friend, Donna, started back to work today and had an amazing day, I am so filled with joy for her. You know her as The Obnoxious S.A.H.M and you can read about the start of her new adventure.

Reminders of God's Love:

• During my morning walk, the beauty of nature once again overwhelmed me. If I can, tomorrow I will try to capture some pics for you. There was a lovely tree with fern-like branches and tiny flowers emerging, amazing white and grey birds with red eyes, kind of short and stubby, and some other things that my sleep deprivation is not letting me remember
• More dragonflies today! :D
• After the craziness of the package coming to light, as I headed to my car, there was a small, bright shiny blue iridescent flying bug that brought a smiley to my face with its shimmery-ness.
• A kind customer service guy who helped track down the package and hopefully it will reach my dad by Monday the latest.

Well, goodnight friends. The yawns are taking over, eyelids are getting heavy, and I'd better move before I fall asleep sitting here.

What is True Beauty?

To me, True Beauty is the beauty that is within and the more beautiful you are as a person the more that beauty will shine through to the outside no matter what the outsides are in reality. Today's culture has overly focused on the artificial beauty of the outside, to the point I often wonder have we lost sight of what is truly beautiful? That natural beauty we all possess but tend to mask with makeup, the beauty of the natural world around us that we avoid with our gadgets and comfortable air conditioned homes; nothing wrong with makeup or a/c - I live in Florida, so my a/c runs almost continually from mid-April through October, nothing wrong with the gadgets either, as long as we don't let them rule our lives.

Its amazing to see how dismissive people can be to both those they would see as sloppy and those they see as extremely beautiful. A friend of mine, since our middle school days, is the most stunning person I know personally. She is that perfect outer image of beauty, blessed with perfectly straight, non-frizzy hair, taller than me, thin, doesn't sweat (yes, I am serious), and always well put together. Some have said "Oh she's a snob.", when in fact she's extremely introverted and shy, so she's not a gabber till she knows you, and even then a gabber would not be an apt description. Then she's not a hugger, and never has been, but endures my hugs because she has to (she's got no choice in the matter, she's had to endure my hugs since she was 13). And the funny thing is, the times I see her with hardly any makeup are the times she is the most stunning. To me, because I know her so well, the person she is on the inside further eclipses the person the world sees. Her kindness, goodness, encouraging nature, patience, and industriousness inspire me always. Many of my other friends do too - and they are all beautiful to me, whether the world views them as super models or super moms.

We all need to be more generous to our fellow human beings. Are we looking down on them to make ourselves feel better about our own shortcomings?

How often we complain about the weather, the sun being in our eyes, etc. Yesterday, after a very hectic day of running errands for my dad and to gather supplies to usurp the rats in the attic, I was feeling very stressed. As I walked up the sidewalk in front of our condo, and my woefully neglected garden cried out of attention but was ignored again, a beautiful green dragonfly lighted upon the bannister in front of my front door. In this moment of taking in that little bit of dragonfly beauty was like God just said, "Look at this that I created, do not worry, you are in My hands." I immediately felt more at peace than I had all afternoon.

I do consciously try to take notice of the natural world around me - even in the managed nature of a suburb. Nature makes itself known. Sometimes even in the weeds that sprout up in the cracks in the sidewalk, or the dandelion that appears in the green carpet of grass. These weeds may be annoying to the landscaper or the gardener, but they do still have their own beauty.

So if I don't have time for an afternoon in the park, I use the time as I drive I try to take notice of that which is beautiful around me: the peanut grass in the medians is bright green now with little yellow flowers, even though the sun can be blinding at those certain angles, those same angles create amazing rays of light shining through the tree branches, the shadows crossing the road have an purple cast to them, I take a breath, life is actually pretty good. Have you ever noticed the light outside around 5:00pm? The way it hits the trees, even buildings, it makes it seem like the world is all aglow. Look for it next time, if you remember. Why do we make it so hectic, negative and insane? How often our own negative thought life plays the biggest role in if we view our lives as happy.

I guess the insanity of our daily lives is all a part of this human experience, but as we grow as people, we should take a second to look up from our gadgets, turn down the radio and open the blinds and hear the birds sing. There still there, the natural beauty is still there, all waiting for us to enjoy and to be refreshed by their design. Maybe by refocusing ourselves we can be better individuals, more compassionate to others and be stronger for our families.

First Post

Here it is, my very first blog. I don't know very much about this media, so you will have to hang on as I iron out the kinks in my blog knowledge and we will learn and grow together.

I am hoping this blog will be a place of encouragement, uplifting thoughts, sometimes just something pretty to brighten your day, while other times it may be a thought to ponder and help us grow. My goal will be to not focus on the negative, but to remain in the light of the Lord. You may initially think of me as the Polyanna of the blogosphere. I will always take that as a compliment. I do my best to remain grounded, logical, compassionate and passionate about art.

Who am I, you ask? Well, I am married with 2 cats. I've been artistic for as long as I can remember. My mom will testify to the fact when I was around 2 yrs old, I colored a 4 ft diameter smiley face in multicolors upon the brand new white living room wall. I am back at college for the second time (yes, I did finish the first time) due to being laid off and discovering to stay in my field, I really needed to add to my skill set.

Thanks for reading, and I hope you enjoy the journey...