I still have so many photos to edit. Photos from camping, and from the rose garden. Tonight I'm off to watch my boys race their dirtbikes. Summer always seems to speed by.

Through the rest of the week, I'm offering an additional 50% off my clearance section in my etsy shop. I can either change a price prior to purchase, or refund the 50% through paypal afterwards.

At work today I'll be writing in my friendship journal. The one that two of my bestest online friends and I are passing around across the country. There are 3 actually. We're all on our 2nd group of pages in our 2nd book... This one started out in Long Beach, California, now it's in Oregon, then it will go to Connecticutt and end up back home in California! What an amazing journey these journals are going on, and we're adding bits of our lives to them as we go.

All in all, life is good. Must still remember to put the force fields on high when around certain people, but I'm getting there. Thinking about coating myself with teflon so none of the negativity can stick! Getting to the point where I'm strong and impermeable... one step at a time.

I hope life is wonderful for each of you... and if you're like me, you're already looking forward to the weekend!!

Seeking New

I have been seeking out new things lately. Seeking organization, patterns, routine. Yet, at the same time, seeking a way to be more random in my art. About a month ago, I was asked to make a custom journal. No problem, I told her and asked what she had in mind. She told me the specifics. And one of her requests was to put fuzzy strings on the binding. And I could picture exactly what she meant. Like, tons of these fuzzy strings, a few inches long, loose, hanging there. And my mind fought and fought me as I did it. In the end, it had order, it looked neat. And it wasn't what I was going for.

So this week, in my friendship journal, I will be getting out the crayons. I will be meditating and trying to get in touch with that inner child. The one that's never really been allowed to play.

I'm doing my friendship journal with 2 online friends. Each journal has 6 signatures, so we have 3 journals out there, and we each fill in 2 signatures on each one, then pass it along to the next on a certain schedule. A signature is a group of pages, by the way. We will end up with the journal we started with. So far, each one is at person #2. I can NOT begin to tell you what a bonding experience it has been. I know beyond any shadows of doubt that I have made friends for life with these 2 lovely women. And I know that before it's all over, we will laugh, we will cry, we will play, and we will pour out our souls through these books.

And who knows, perhaps there will be another set down the road :-)

What a Weekend!

In the past weeks, I have just not been feeling the photography thing. I've listed some new photos here and there in my shop, but they were ones I already had stored on my hard drive. Sunday, however, a trip to Newport, Oregon remedied that! I have an online friend who wants to collect photos of all the Oregon lighthouses. So, lighthouse hunting we went! The one pictured above is called the Yaquina Head Lighthouse. It is the tallest one in Oregon. There is another one in Newport as well, that's a lighthouse on top of a house, and it was decommissioned in 1874. I have several of the Yaquina Head Lighthouse in my shop now. The ones I took of the Yaquina Bay Lighthouse (on the house) will be in my shop soon. The really pleasant surprise was that the house had been restored to the time period, and I got pictures of different things. You can see the beginning of my series "From Days Gone By" in my shop now. More to come as I edit them.

Right down the beach from the Yaquina (pronounced ya-kwin-ah) Head Lighthouse is a huge tidepool area. We spent an hour there, and I snapped away! My love of photography has been reaffirmed!

I listed 7 new photos last night, and there are many more to come. Please let me know what you think of them! I also listed my friendship journals. And at least one other journal will be listed today, then hopefully another tomorrow. It sounds like I've been busy. Well, I have, but the kind of busy that makes me happy and keeps me alive. I have re-discovered my bliss. What a feeling! I wish the same for all of you!

Working on a New Idea

Yesterday I did end up calling in, and I slept for 8 hours. I must have really needed the rest! I got up for a few hours (after 2pm), then went to bed at my normal time. Not sure I'm back to 100%, but it's Thursday, so only today and tomorrow left for the work week.

Now... to my idea :-). I'm working on a 'friendship journal' idea. I've really been inspired by some amazing online friends. I've connected with a few, and came up with this idea. Let me try to explain it. In my handbound journals, there are 6 signatures. A signature is a group of papers, that's folded and sewn on the spine. So... I am going to make 3 blank cover journals. I'll mail 2 to friends. Once they're received, we'll all proceed to fill 2 signatures with our thoughts, drawings, ramblings, collage, etc. Then we'll mail them to the next person. And we'll repeat. At the end, they'll get mailed again, this time back to us, so that everyone sees what everyone did in all of them. And we'll keep the one we started with. Blank cover, so we can decorate that as well.

Sometime within the next week, I'll be finishing these and getting them in the mail. I think it's a really good concept. At some point, I may be adding 'friendship journals' to my shop. Any thoughts? I'd love to get all the input I can on this one. I think that especially with long distance relationships, it's so important to be able to hold onto something tangible.

And guess what?? As of this morning, I'm at 49 sales! I am so in awe and still squeal with delight at each and every one :-).