I love Vera Lane Studio………can ya tell?

If only I could go back in time…………...

I found this wonderful little gal's blog and I just love going there. She does the things I would like to do but now I am too darn old. At my age I can't be running around with green hair ya know. I have this aging thing going on now and it wouldn't be becoming on me, but it sure is on her!

She has tattoo's and has brilliant colors  in her hair. The healthiest head of hair that I have Ever seen. It shines like diamonds.   She dresses so cute and girly.  Has a wonderful dog and a couple of cats and I just love fellow animal lovers. It is a bright spot in my day to check in and see what adventures she has had.  She has a wonderful collection of things as well. I love fellow collectors. (I. get. them!) She collects teeth and skulls and globes of the world.  I have to squint when I get to the skulls 'cuz they make me weak in the knees…and not in a good way. :-)  She is a fascinating young woman to me.

She rides a bea-u-ti-ful bike on a regular basis and finds fantastic places to take pictures of it. I love that idea.  She gets to see a lot of graffiti in her city.  I know a lot of older folks don't appreciate that kind of thing but I saw it as art and I love it…not the really foul stuff…..but good art.  Language doesn't bother me but I have seen some really bad stuff and it isn't for public consumption.

She and her friends visit and photograph deserted bldgs. and places and I find that most interesting as well. I think my favorite was an old planetarium. She took beautiful pictures there. It reminded me of a photograph I took that everyone loved. It was a church still in use that was covered in ivy or something. Just the red door was free of it.  I wonder what the congregation thinks of it.  Anyway, it is most unusual considering it is still in use!

Well, I have to do better with this blogging thing………I love to write so I wonder why this is so hard for me.  Maybe it is because I write everything in my journals and don't have much else to say in this place.  Maybe I am just lazy.

Isn't it wonderful when you find someone you really admire?   I admire the heck out of you Kayla.

Kerry is Sadie Sadie Married Lady!

What a good day for a wedding.

My best friends daughter married her long time boyfriend today. They have been in love for 12 years. (No one can accuse them of jumping into this marital bliss thing!)
Her friends used their cell phones to take pictures for those of us who couldn't attend. (Lovin' this 21st century!)  I met her mother (and much needed best friend back in 1985) It was the height of Princess Diana  and the Paparazzi's total love affair with her.)  We were working in the church library together at that time. I called her and told her I couldn't come in on the wedding day because I was getting up at 3 a.m. to watch all that was happening over in England.  Oh how I loved the whole thing. All the pomp and ceremony……and that first public kiss.

Many years later, I sat on the fountain in front waiting for the opportunity to see the Royal Family(Diana was separated from Charles) come out to greet the public.  We waited for hours out there. I saw the Queen! (and all the lesser Royals) Diana's boys were so young back then. The Queen was turning 70 at that time…………

Anyway, I digress, Kerry was always with her mom (and other adults) so she was a kid in which you could sit and have a real conversation.  We called her my adopted daughter.  I remember when she got her first bra and she will kill me when she reads this!  She gave this grown-ass woman her very first Barbie Doll. :-) I introduced her to the Ballet and we both collected our favorite dancers toe shoes. Then we would get on the phone and discuss the shoes and try to figure out where the injuries were. They would leave pieces of brown paper toweling in the toes of the shoes and other things used to make them more comfortable.  Oh those were the days……………….We LOVED our worn out toe shoes.

I took her and her BFF to one of the Disney movies that they were bringing back to the theater for a brief time, and before the movie they were showing R rated previews that were totally unsuitable for little girls of 10. I read the management the riot act for doing that. It didn't make sense to me because it was a theater filled with little kids!
Anyway, I just wanted to  acknowledge her special day………I wish you nothing but joy my friend. I miss your mom but I know God lifted the curtain up there and gave her a chance to see her little girl on her big day. God is love, and he would want her to see her daughter, I just know this in my heart.

I'm late, I'm late, for a very important date!  

Since it has been my responsibility for 26 years to get the cards and or letters out I accept all the blame for not getting it done for Christmas or New Years.

I can explain, honest!

After begging and begging for a 'kitty' for all the years we have been married. Luther just resisted it firmly. It wasn't worth breaking up our marriage over it but in  my heart of hearts I really, really,  wanted one!  On Dec.6th it was our 26th wedding anniversary and he asked me what I wanted.  I said something alive!  Now there is the pitter patter of LOTS of feet around here but I knew that he knew I meant a kitty.

On Dec. 6th he went down to the Humane Society and picked out the most perfect little ball of fluff! (Amen, prayers answered!)  It is a little female that is ginger and white....mostly white with red on her head and tail and a few little spots of it on her body. She has peridot green eyes and did I say she is Perfect?  Her name is "Rosey Toesy". (Because of her coloring and the fact that she is polydactyl. This girl has so many extra toes! She looks like she has catchers mitts on the end of her legs.)  Well the reason I am late is because I have not been able to think of anything else since she arrived.  Don't get me wrong, I adore my dogs but the ones we have just aren't really cuddly and the one we do have that is very cuddly is a 84 pound yellow lab and she crushes the stuffin's out of us.  So I have been fully engaged in being a new mommy to a precious kitty and journaling all about it.

I was going to get 'round to it  in doing cards and letters.  Well, obviously I didn't and I am sorry I failed in my duties as a wife but I am a happy new mom and hope you will forgive me.  

Not too much going on with us. We have slowed down a bit.  I do art all day and night and Luther works when he can and when he isn't I have a long list of 'Honey Do's' on a list.

For his 67th birthday we went on a cruise to St. Thomas, St Martin and on to the Bahama's.  I didn't really enjoy it because it was too hot and humid. I am a Minnesota gal after all these years and frankly I like it nice and cold. (Who would have thunk it??) :-)

Luther liked all the heat so he was good to go but he had to drag me off to places. What I really did enjoy was Magen's Beach in St Thomas.  I floated in that gorgeous water for 2 hours. We both enjoyed that. You can't sweat and suffer the heat if you are in gorgeous water. 

Luther had surgery on both of his eyes due to cataracts.  I am really squeamish when it comes to eyes and I a begged him not to have them done if he didn't really need to but he was determined. He said it was painless and didn't complain at all and I was able to put the drops in his eyes  without falling into a dead faint. His big blue eyes are as gorgeous as ever.  I feared he would look so different with plastic lens in them. Like I said I have always been a bit squeamish on all things eye related that is why I still wear glasses.

And.................

After going a full year on a meatless diet and our blood work proving the advantages of such,  I went off the wagon with a bite of hotdog and took him with me (shades of Adam and Eve,yes?)  and we ate hotdogs every dang day for 2 weeks.  It was the only meat I craved the whole time. (A hotdog for gosh sake!)  We are both back on meat and both scared to go in for our physicals. I know our cholesterol has shot through the roof.............Well we both love the Lord with all of our heart and we know we are not getting out of here alive so there you have it. I for one am not leaving this planet eating like a rabbit!!  :-)

Gypsy

First Gypsy face

This is my first prisma  pencil / blender face drawing that will be applied to a canvas and then the details put in so that she becomes a gypsy. :-)  I used layer upon layer very slowly. This is for my mixed media class.

Introducing……..

Introducing…….

This is Mrs. Fortesque……or Miss Puss….or sometimes CAT!!     For our 26th Wedding Anniversary my sweet husband went an adopted a precious kitty for us.  He outdid himself he did!  She is a Ginger and white kitty just as I have longed for for over 30 years.  Prayer to God worked, (In His own time, of course!!) because the hubby's heart softened and on his own went down to the Humane Society and filled out the paperwork and the next day brought her home to my hopeful, waiting arms.  I loved her at first sight and we are bosom buddies.  She sleeps right beside me all night long.  Her hobbies? Sitting up in the loft area looking down upon the 7 dogs and driving them into a frenzy.  When she gets bored with them, she runs down the staircase and through the bars of the baby gate and straight to her mommy's arms. My hobby?  Kissin' her on her punkin head.   She is such a JOY to me and Lord knows Luther made me wait a lonnnnng time for her.

Amen, I have everything my old heart could desire.
Happy, Happy 26th Anniversary.
P.S. Her name has been changed to "Toesy" because she is polydactyl.  So she is my "rosie toesy"