Wonderful surprise

I checked my comments and there was one from Deb Lewis at Vintage Moon Studio letting me know that she had passed on this award to me for my blog. She is, I think, being kind in nominating me as my blog is pretty new and I so appreciate her thinking of me in this way. Deb is an amazing and generous artist whose work and blog I've enjoyed very much.




In accepting this award, I agree to:
1. Display logo and link to who gave it.
2. Nominate at least 7 blogs.
3. Add links to those 7 blogs.
4. Leave the nominees a message that they received the award.

I would like to nominate Beth at Lasting Impressions from the Heart, Jeanie at The Marmelade Gypsy, Jo Anne at Paper Cat's Page, Aileen at Aileen's Musings(also owner of Outside the Margins), Annie at In My Dreams, Rosie at Living as Rosa, and Karla at Karla's Cottage. All except Karla and Jo Anne are in the Yahoo art group which was the first one I ever joined.

Thanks, Deb!

Today's photo has nothing to do with the award, but I finally got around to taking a better picture of an assemblage piece I did previously. It's called, I Could Have Been A Cowboy, and started out life as a vintage(?) print in a barnwood-looking frame. I whitewashed the frame and then glued a map showing some of the western states, which was antiqued with some metallic glaze. Then I glued on an old photo of a dapper gentleman who just looked to me like he wished he had been a cowboy. The horse bottom was a magazine picture and then I added various elements, including a spent gunshell, rusted metal pieces, wooden scrap finds across the bottom. I pencil sketched in a doorway in the background to symbolize what could have been and also an outline of a cowboy hat on his head.

I've not had time to do any art lately. Actually I've been home very little in the last week. I did get some crafty stuff done by antiqueing some wooden candlesticks for my dd, Emily. These were some thrift store assorted sized wooden candlesticks, a pair of which have now been altered by using Claudine Hellmuth's petroleum jelly peeling paint technique with a top coat of white paint. I also made some moss-covered balls to rest on top of the candlesticks. Not taken a picture of them yet, but will before I send them on to her. We also repainted some big chunky wooden candlesticks with black paint that looked really classy, but she took them with her last time she was here and we didn't take a picture. Maybe I can get her to take one of how she is using them, with big red candles and displayed with a black matte pottery planter full of white rocks with some red votive candles sitting in the rocks.

It has taken me 2 days to get this all posted. At first I was having trouble figuring out how to do the little button for the award, so I finally just saved it as a picture, worked a long while to get it resized to look decent, and just posted it like that. It would help if I was more computer literate, lol! Also I am having a heck of a time with blogger and the internet tonight getting pictures to post! I'm sure it has something to do with dial up internet. So, Holly, who has chastised me twice about not posting, I just want you to know I've been trying. Also, my little kitty helper keeps jumping up here for some attention.

For supper tonight, I cooked the first "mess" of squash from our garden. I can't eat it, as it causes food poisoning symptoms, but I sauteed some in a small bit of butter in a skillet and dh grilled some also while he was cooking our steaks. Dh loves squash so he'll have some to eat tomorrow as well. I wonder if I could eat the squash since I've had my gallbladder removed, but am too afraid of the potential suffering to try it again.