Once Upon a Time..............Published

My goodness!! I am so far behind in blogging! I have been so busy that I just haven't been able to dedicate the time. Well, I am here finally! Thanks for being patient.

Several months ago Valerie of Third Coast Rubber Stamps was kind enough to ask me to participate in an article that was being done for Scrap & Stamp Magazine. I meant to offer her more choices but I was only able to get two to her using the Victory stamp line, which I absolutely adore! I have used these stamps a lot. I must confess that I am a rubber stamp addict and I collect plenty of stamps that have never been touched by ink (I will get around to it!) I can say that this set has seen a lot of ink. I use them often, love the dramatic images. I do have a gallery on her website http://www.thirdcoastrs.com/cindy_roland.htm

Val wrote this to me: The card you created using our "Ocean Blue" image for the Victory Art feature was published in the July 2008 issue of Scrap & Stamp Arts! Ten artists answered my call for art for the feature, and I submitted their 33 creations to the editor to chose from. They only selected six cards, but one of them was yours.

So I am very honored!

The technique that I used is colored pencils w/gamasol (oderless mineral spirits) I used mainly WorldWin papers with a few DCWV patterned papers for accents. Prismacolor pencils were used to color in the images. As you can see it is hard not to do a wonderful card when you use these lovely Victory images. Go to Val's site and check out the tons of other images she carries and let her know I sent you.

I will try not to take so long to change my blog this next time. So until next time. Happy creating!

Blessings!

Mother's Day

I created a Mother's Day card even though my mom has been gone for 28 years, I still miss her. She was the best mom. She always had a smile on her face and a positive attitude. Her name was Peggy and she stood barely 5 feet tall with beautiful auburn hair. She had a beautiful smile and laughing kind eyes. I loved her attitude, she may have been small but nobody got bigger or meaner if you picked on her family. She was loyal to the bone. I loved how she loved my dad. She may have been mad as hell at him but she kept it to herself. If one of us kids were mad at him, she would not stand for it. Her famous words were, "Your daddy is one in a million (he was) and you should be grateful everyday to be blessed with a daddy like him (we were)". I never heard either of them say a bad word about one another in front of us, ever. My mother was a wonderful cook and delighted in cooking for her family. She was in that kitchen every day for hours. She always had something cooking on the stovetop, in the oven or sitting out to cool.

She had the best sense of humor and she always kept an open mind about everything. She didn't judge anyone for anything except what they were like on the inside. She wasn't biased about anything and always looked on the positive side. She never allowed us to feel sorry for ourselves about anything. If we started to complain she would stop us and have us look at how blessed we were. I guess that was from being raised during the depression. She knew what it was like to live without and we never really had to. She never allowed vanity either, her famous words were "Pretty is as pretty does" and "Beauty is fleeting but goodness lasts you a lifetime." I told you she was a great mom!

When she did get mad, she really got mad and I would think that she was going to stay mad forever but I would go downstairs to my room and by the time I came back up she would be humming and working and always would turn around with that smile and say "Hi Honey!" She never stayed mad, and sometimes she would laugh so hard about getting mad that she would snort which made us laugh even more.

She was a great mom, and she left us early. I miss her every day and I will always be proud and thankful that I had her for my mom. Happy Mother's Day Mom, wherever you are.

I hope all of you have a wonderful Mother's Day this year. Enjoy your mom if you are lucky enough to have her around and celebrate her even if she is no longer there.

The card was made from WorldWin Cascata Lilac paper, and Purple swirl vellum. The stamp is from Magenta.

The photo is of my mom and me in 1952, she was 40 the year I was born so you might call me a surprise. She said I made her feel young again. I say I was pretty lucky to call her my mom.

Moonlight!!!

Well after weeks and weeks of waiting after the writer's strike, I was not disappointed! I forgive them for taking so long. They really made the wait worthwhile as they did an outstanding job of tying in the past episodes with this one and making room for all sorts of scenarios for the future. I want this program to stay on for a long long time. Alex O'Loughlin is a great actor besides being a total BABE. Can you tell I love this show! I haven't felt this way about a show since Boston Legal first came on and yes I still love that adorable Alan Cross (James Spader) with his delicious dry humor, sharp wit and dirty mind.

Mick St. John has made me a lover of vampires! I will no longer think of Bela Lugosi when it comes to blood sucking creatures of the night. The storyline is so great and the chemistry between he and his mortal love, "my Beth" (as he refers to her to his friends-so sweeeet!!). Well, just go to the link on the title of this blog entry and it will take you to all the goodies you will need to know to get hooked on this show. He is awfully pretty to look at too! Hey! I may be getting old but I ain't dead yet!

OK, besides at looking at my new boyfriend (he is younger than my son for cryin' out loud!) I did make up a whole batch of thank you cards to send out to the nice people that send me toys to try out and play with. I am forever making different backgrounds playing around with my plentiful inks and colorwashes. I am a compulsive webbing spray user, I would take a 12 step program for it but I really don't want to! Webbing spray is just too darn fun to play with and it makes the plainest old paper look so dramatic! So, I needed some quick solutions. I took some of my background papers, some trusty black ink and the closest stamps to me and started stamping out all my frustrations. I cut them all up, edged them with my Krylon pens (another constant staple for me) and attached them to cardstock. In a matter of minutes, cards were done! My guilt is alleviated for now! I know there will be something else to replace this with another guilt in no time but one more notch in my lipstick case!

Now there is a huge pile of laundry that is calling my name.........Wash me Cindy, please wash me! If you don't, you will run out of underwear and then you will be sorry. Ooooops, better go! Another guilt trip awaits! Enjoy your day!

Happy Earth Day!

Today is a gorgeous day outside. After the long hard winter we have experienced it is so nice to see the flowers blooming, the squirrels, bunnies, birds and other outdoor creatures scurrying around looking for food for their young families. Everyone is out doing yardwork, planting and just spending time enjoying the fresh air and sunshine. What a great day to celebrate Earth Day. We all can do our part! I am a big believer that if we all commit ourselves to do something to save our planet from wastefullness that all those little things add up and make this a better place to live for us today and for generations to come. Every little effort adds up. The paper company that I do design work for is very aware of the effort to save our planet. They have a great website to visit to learn more about their efforts http://www.thepapermillstore.com/ make sure to sign up for their newsletter and our Design Team Blog as well.http://thepapermillstore.com/papercrazy/ Lots of inspiration and we have been on a real "green" kick for the past month as well as this month. Check out our contest too. Who doesn't want to win paper? I will share more inchies today as well as some pictures that were taken in my own backyard. I hope you enjoy them and I hope you are inspired to go out and make the most of your Earth Day, today and everyday!

Inchie fever is still burning

Well, I still have the fever and I just had to make a couple of pages of these babies for my nifty little book. They are so fun! Big art in a teeny tiny square!

I have been dinkin' around with my 'puter all day trying to iron out a technical problem and I may have a handle on it. It has taken time away from my inchies and the other gazillion things I was planning to do today. Anyway, so much for my silly whining.

Just thought I would share them before I hit the hay.........again (I was napping in my chair for most of the evening!)

I also made my 26 "C's" for the inchie swap on the SSR zine http://www.ssreflections.com/ group list http://groups.yahoo.com/group/SSReflectionsezine/ I swear it only took me about 45 minutes to make about 30 of them. That is how quickly they come together. If you belong to the group and want to join in, there are just a few letters left to sign up for. Hurry up and sign up! You can be the owner of 26 little works of art!

Well, I am off to the land of nod. See you all in the morning! Sweet dreams!

The Inchie Bug

OK, it hasn't quite bit yet but I am preparing myself for the onset! I wanted to make a little book with my Bind it All and since I signed up for my very first alpha inchie swap. This was a good excuse to make one to put my anticipated alphabet inchies in. I recently made a friend an atc using a reflection theme for an atc swap on one of my atc groups. I loved it so much, that I had to make another one just for myself. It was a good reason to make myself one and use it as the front cover of my little inchie book. The image is by one of my favorite rubber stamps companies, Third Coast Rubberstamps http://www.thirdcoastrs.com/ and it was a perfect one to make a reflection on vellum. All the paper and cardstock is by WorldWin Papers (Ruche, Vellum and Treasures) and the rub on is by Melissa Frances. Anyway, since I needed to practice I made my very first inchies. I have a lot to learn about them. These are pretty primative looking but hey, I gotta start somewhere! Inchie world, here I come!!!

Damn the Flu!/Technique Junkies guest DT Member

Well, I have been lagging on this blog as well as everything else I am supposed to be doing, something fierce this last month. I was bragging that I had not come down with that damned flu bug but I was sadly mistaken. I have been sick with it for half a month now. It seems to like to come back on you when you think it is going away. It is the gift that keeps on giving. Oh Joy!

I was honored and pleased to be asked to be a guest Design Team Member for Technique Junkies this month. If you ever wanted to be inspired daily, this is the site to do it on. Not only do you get the best newsletter and website but they have the most dedicated Yahoo group that daily adds all sorts of inspiration to the wonderful techniques that Pat Huntoon cranks out with each and every newsletter. Well worth the small change she charges. Do yourself a favor and join! I have been lucky enough to have a couple of my techniques in there. First was the Veined Marble which has remained very popular and this time was my Color Collage and I am thrilled with the entries that the members have come up with so far. http://www.techniquejunkies.com/ So join us for the fun and make sure you tell Pat that I sent you! :)

Here are some of the techniques that I have played with so far. There are hundreds and hundreds from past newsletters. Enough to keep you busy for a long time! Happy creating!

Easy Watercolor flowers

Lately I have been on a kick of using this nifty little stamp from Stampendous that is a single image. The lines are simple and it lends itself beautifully to stamping multiple images and making great backgrounds because of the simplicity of it's design. I have a lot of requests as to how I made these crazy little watercolor cards. I managed to really get into some color. (Those of you who know me, know my passion for using color!!) Besides, this is my contribution on making spring come just a little early this year.

First take a stamp that has a lot of space for adding color into it and stamp it onto glossy white cardstock with permanent ink. I prefer WorldWin High Gloss as it takes on water so beautifully and Black India ink by Stewart Superior. Allow a few minutes for the ink to dry on the cardstock. Next grab up a few watercolor pens (again my preference is Marvy Markers by Marvy/Uchida) in complimentary colors pick at least 3 and as many as 6, no more than that or they will get too busy looking. Now get your watercolor brush (if you don't have one, you need to buy one of these-I don't know how I lived without it!) and touch it to the side of the marker tip to pick up some of the color. Start filling in the flowers randomly with blotches of the different color markers until the flowers are filled up. Do not take your time. This should be done quickly with little thought. The beauty of the technique is the spontaneity of the color washes. Once you have the flowers filled up and the centers washed in go ahead and do the background in the same manner but only use one color (for example use blue and use a lighter and a darker shades, maybe a little lavender but don't make it too busy) Now go back and choose complimenting cardstock and embellishments. Oh! Don't forget to add a little bling to your flowers by adding a touch of Stickles (or other glitter glue). A little bling never hurt anyone.

I hope you give this a try. Maybe if we all break out our watercolor markers the snow will go away for the rest of the season. It won't hurt to try, will it?

Happy Creating.

Sunday Morning chatter

It is Sunday, the wind is blowing like crazy and I have heard birds chirping for the last few days...........so folks, we may be heading into spring. It has been a long, hard, cold winter and I am so ready for any signs of spring, no matter how minute they may be! Anyway, I haven't got much to chat about today. I just wanted to add something a little spring like to this blog. I made a few little Easter ATC's and since Easter comes early this year I figured I would put them up. My way of encouraging spring to peek out. Enjoy your weekend and I hope you all are busy creating. Oh by the way, if you would like to see more ATC's, puzzle pieces or whatever, make sure to visit my Webshots pages. The url is on the right hand side of the page over here. Just click on it and you can see plenty of artwork. Thanks!
Link: http://www.alteredpages.com/

I am sooooo lagging!

Ok, I have been meaning to add so much more to this blog and I haven't been very motivated to do much of anything. I did manage to avoid the flu this year as my entire family was dropping like flies around me, so I do feel fortunate about that. I also cannot use it as an excuse. I am just in a dry spell, creatively. You might say I have been really lazy, maybe that is my problem. Yeah, I am really lazy and I just don't feel like doin' nuthin'. I will snap out of it soon, I just need my muse to get back and inspire me. I think she has taken another extended vacation. She can be so selfish.
Hey, I can share something with you though. I made this for WorldWin Papers booth at Winter CHA 2008. Yvonne wanted another flower and I had to come up with something a little different that the past flowers. We went through a flood in our basement where my studio WAS, a horrific ice storm, a blizzard, lost our power for three days, numerous plumbers, clean up people, insurance adjustors all the while I was in the middle of this project which was teetering on the edge of the deadline. I did manage to get it done though. I had to cut out leaves by the fireplace with a camper's lamp next to the fireplace during the power outage.
It wasn't as elaborate as I would have liked to have had it but I did get it finished. TaDah!!
The wreath measures 15" across and is made entirely of WorldWin Doublemates paper. I hope you enjoy it. Thanks for looking!

These small children........

are my dad and his siblings. He is the cute little towhead in the middle. They had an interesting life. They were born in Claremore, OK at the turn of the 20th century and were children of the Great Depression and the Oklahoma dustbowl. Their parents divorced about the time my dad was 10 years old. The depression hit a few years later. My grandmother worked managing resturaunts and my grandfather worked in water districts plants so they moved from one town to another trying to make ends meet. At one point my dad and uncle had to go live with a farmer for room and board because their mom couldn't afford to feed them and their dad was working in another town. They didn't like that too much so they set out on an adventure and rode the rails along with the hobos looking for odd jobs and some adventure. They were 13 and 14 years old at the time. At one point they ended up on the corner of Hollywood and Vine selling oranges for spare change. Their "boss" took all the money and deserted them. They had no choice but to contact their mother and she wired them enough money to get them home. They no more than got back to the farmer, they took off again, riding rails and staying with the hobos in hobo jungles. This time they ended up in Flint, Michigan. They shared a coat that a kindly conductor had given them from the lost and found and it saved them from freezing to death. They tried to get work at the man camps working lumber, my uncle got hurt and made his way back to Topeka, KS where he met and married his wife at the age of 16. Dad stayed a while longer and enventually made his way to where his brother was and settled in Topeka also. He met and married my mother nearly 8 years later while working as a donut maker at the local dimestore. My aunt went back to Oklahoma, married a lawman and settled down near her mother after a little escapade with a rodeo tramp at the tender age of 15. (We were never allowed to mention this when she was alive.) They never talked about these times as being a hardship, they spoke of them as adventures.

They never were famous, they all grew up to be productive members of society and they used their pasts as an example of what it is like to have nothing but one another. Family was the most important thing in their lives and you can understand why. Here is the journeling, in case you can't read the page.

These moppets were the Sutton children. Grace Elaine Sutton was born Dec 8th 1913, Richard Arden (my dad) was born Feb 2, 1915 and Henry Alvin was born Feb 22, 1916. Times weren’t always easy for these stairsteppers. They experienced a broken home and many moves with one or both parents seeking work in the dust bowl days of the Oklahoma depression. Grace ran off with a rodeo rider at the tender age of 15 and Dick and Henry (he named himself Jimmy) rode the rails with the hobos from one end of the country to the other after being farmed out while their mother worked restaurants and their dad found work in water district plants. Always vowing to keep in contact with one another, they kept that promise. They left letters in general post office boxes and would check in when they could. They would meet up whenever and wherever they could. Their parents would wire them money to get them home when they had money to spare. They all married, Uncle Jimmy and of course my dad having children of their own and Aunt Grace decided never to have children. Through it all, they stayed very close to one another until the last one died. Uncle Jimmy, the youngest went first, followed many years later by Grace. My dad at 89 was the final sibling and the last word that he uttered before he took his last breath was Grace.
I know that they are all together again. That is what family is all about.

Catching up....

I have been down for a while. I had surgery and I will elaborate on that later but I have had quite enough medical lingo for awhile so let me just share some of my "Me" journal that my friends and I have been working on. Of course, I always like what they do with their's, better than my own but such is life.

Since I last shared, I have managed to crank out two more topics that were assigned. I am still a tad behind but not too bad for being post-op. The first one is a simple one. We were supposed to comment on our age that we are right now. I remember that annoying song by Sammy Haggar titled "I Can't Drive 55!" and I can remember that the song was loud, I really didn't like the 55 mph speed limit but I never ever even thought that I could really be 55!! That had to be nearly 30 years ago and being 30 yrs younger, it seems like such a long way off. Surprise!! It is here! Sheesh! Where the hell did it go?? Anyway, I was feeling pretty puny so I made it very easy. The sun is a wallpaper border (thanx Kathy L!!) and I just purtied up some chipboard 5's and added a little bling and stamped words. Easy peasy!

The second topic is Quirks. I never realized how quirky I am until I actually started listing them. I guess we are all nuts in one way or another. I feel right at home with all of my friends. LOL!

I will list them here, so the world can see!

Musts
• Make a written list when I go to the store or I cannot shop.
• Make a mental note of where I put things before I go to bed (glasses, purse, phones)
• Have at least one cup of coffee in the morning or nothing else will go right for me.
• Have all of my things in MY order or I cannot function properly. They make look out of order to everyone else but as long as I know where it is kept, then all is well in my world.
• Wear socks with shoes. I cannot stand the feel of my bare feet trapped inside of shoes except sandals.
Must not
• Have ANYTHING in my coffee or tea. No sugar, milk, whipped cream, sprinkles or any flavoring, nothing! Just the pure taste of the rich elixir of the God’s!
• Eat anything that burns my taste buds and sinuses before it leaves my mouth. I love spicy but not torturous. I like to think of my food as a pleasure not a sport.
• Have any feet touching me on any part of my body unless it is under the age of 10. I cannot stand to have anyone touch my feet in return.
• Have any part of anyone’s anatomy especially wet tongues stuck inside my ear, never, not ever! Total turn-off!
• Let anyone poke me to get my attention. I cannot tolerate it.

OK, that is enough sharing for one day.

Hope you all are having the best day ever. Until next time.........

Published in Altered Arts!

I had come up with a little inventive way to make my own canvas board with my wonderful and durable WorldWin Paper. I thought maybe someone else would be interested in how I did it so I sent it to AAM. Well, they were and they asked me if they could have it for their mag! How cool is that?

My friend Lori is a designer there (check her out on my favorite bloggers list)and if you are familiar with her work, you know that they have some wonderful art going on! You gotta buy this mag! To top it off, MaryJo McGraw is also in the Jan/Feb issue. She is my idol..........Love MJM!!! Well, here is the page with my Faux Heirloom wall hanging.

More journal stuff

As I mentioned before, I am working on a "me" journal with a group of my artist friends and so far the two pages assigned were my goals and my name. Well, I have finished both. My goals page is not as good as I like artistically but the goals are what I want to focus on. My name page turned out pretty good.
The picture includes a photo of my mom and me, and a small jewelry box with a gold baby heart charm from my parents and my birth bracelet. The rest is pretty self explanitory so I will shut up and let the scans do the talking. Until the next time, happy creating!

Last post of 2007

This year is toast! It seems like it just started and now it is over already. I think this is a sign of getting older. I can remember as a child, I was always looking forward to tomorrow and time seemed to drag. It dragged when school was letting out for the summer, when school was ready to start in the fall. Christmas seemed to take forever to come around. Kids have a warped sense of time. My mom used to tell me when I started complaining about something taking too long that one of these days I would wonder where that time went. Well, that day has arrived and the days go more quickly everyday I am here on earth. Reality bites! I went from being a member of the youngest generation of our family to being a member of oldest generation in what seems like a blink of an eye. Parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles and a few of my older cousins are all gone now. Our time here is so minuscule and insignificant in the realm of this vast universe. Take a hold of every minute that you are here and live it to the fullest. That is my only New Year's Resolution for 2008. I have felt this way for a long time but the quicker time passes the more important it becomes. I can't make my loved ones see this but I hope they can allow me to lead the way for them to see that life is short and the things that we think are so important aren't really important at all.
OK, enough of my rambling. My first project for the new year is a ME journal that I am doing with a group of artist friends. I am so glad that Tracey made us do this as I really needed the push to get out of my rut. I have had a hellashious month (I will talk about that later!!) and this is a nice treat for me to do this for no one but me.
Well, in case I don't get a chance to do it before midnight on the 31st.........HAPPY NEW YEAR everyone!!

Dan Fogelberg has left the building.

We lost a musical genius yesterday. Dan Fogelberg was one of my all time favorite musicians. He touched my heart and my very soul with his wonderful songs and heartfelt words. I loved him the first time I heard him and I am saddened by his passing. He is in the hands of God now and suffering no longer but I will miss him. I am sure he is singing among the angels tonight. Rest in peace dear Dan. You gave so much while you were here and your music will live on in our hearts as long as there are ears to hear it.

It's Ornamental my dear!

Where has this year gone????? What has happened to all my good intentions of having everything prepared and ready ahead of time? Down the tubes again. Alas, another Christmas with half laid plans and no extra time. It seems to get worse every year. Oh well, the road to hell is paved with good intentions or so they say. I hope that is not what is happening here! I am just paddling as fast as I can for now trying to stay ahead.
I did make a few little ornaments. One for my WorldWin DT entry and one for a swap. The big one I did with a hand cut flower but the little one was done with a small laminate sample and little bits and pieces of stuff. They are easy to do, just make a flat chipboard or other piece such as a laminant sample or a domino and add little bits of whatever you have on hand, lace, ribbon, pretty Christmas paper and of course some glitter and glitz. What would Christmas be without the sparkle?
Hope you enjoy your season no matter if you are prepared or not.

ATC, a small wonder of big art

When I first heard of ATC's, (artist trading cards for those of you that might have been living in a cave for the last 5 years) I wasn't really too excited. I was thinking that what kind of art could be expressed on such a tiny canvas. Then I started looking at fine pieces of jewelry, tiny locket portraits, plus other tiny pieces of art. I guess it could pack a lot of art and boy do they. I have seen some real beauties and some really not so beautiful ones but each one means something to the artist that created it.
The rules about them vary from person to person and group to group. I have read some mighty heated conversations in groups, on what should or should not be on them and of course the biggest argument being they should always be traded and never sold. Well, if someone wants to pay me a healthy sum of money for my little artwork, I say, end of debate! Sold!!! Come on, let's not carry the starving artist gig any further than is has been carried so far. I really think that rule was made up because the people who started them didn't think anyone would be inspired enough to purchase one and since they are called trading cards, well that's my theory. Think of all those boys back in the 50's and 60's that clipped Mickey Mantel's rookie cards on their spokes or traded it for some now forgotten pitcher's trading card. Doh! It the atc moves you, then by all means buy it from the creator! You can both ignore the rule. :)
There is only one rule, it must fit into a trading card sleeve, 2.5 x 3.5 inches. Notice I didn't say the finished card had to be that size......I once made some cute little atc dolls that folded into a size suitable to fit inside of a trading card sleeve.
OK, that is enough about atc's. On with sharing, I am going to share some of my faves with you today. I have made so many that this is going to be hard but I will manage. Cheers everyone! Happy trading!