mixed media: gratitude is enough

hi all!
ugh monday.  i am feeling like a monday day today.  not motivated to get my work done AT ALL! so monday's chores went by the wayside 8-)  but i had plenty to do anyway because we were camping all weekend again so i had laundry from that and unpacking and such.  this afternoon we are going to a nearby restaurant for emerick elementary open house to meet her teacher and the new principal.  i have huge hang ups about school from my own childhood so i try to be as involved as i can manage even though it freaks me out.  we moved alot and i felt like the only kid there with a single mom (early 70s it was not nearly as common as now), plus a mom who never got involved in any part of it other than back to school night and school supply shopping which she hated every minute of and made it very clear she did :P  (my mom is great now don't get me wrong but growing up was rough).  on top of that i was just a weird kid and probably not nearly the outcast i felt i was.  the pezza apple did not fall far from the tree.  SO i am back to square one AGAIN.  had a one year break from school shenanigans after the two boys and we are starting all over.  but this time i think it might be better because i am better.  for one i am not a very poor single mom and we have not moved at all - with my boys i repeated some of my mom's patterns and so i was still always the "new kid" with no friends at parent stuff.  unfortunately i will be doing this with bright turquoise hands (front AND back) after an unfortunate tie dye incident earlier..........but hey they may as well see the real me from the get go since i usually have SOMEthing on my hands most people don't!

we headed to gettysburg this weekend with the camper.  man i love that thing!  gettysburg was wonderful - wish we had more than one day.  i might have to go up there for the day and get some pictures of the old houses.  i am obssessed with old architecture, especially houses.  my dream career was to become a restoration specialist for old houses BUT that did not happen.  instead i have toured loads of them and even worked as a tour guide in the plantation where they filmed all of the outside scenes for interview with a vampire (and yes tom cruise was a D bag even back then).  now i dream of making dollhouses like the old homes i love.  having grown up in the south though, i am used to the flambouyant houses and architectural styles down there and find northern stuff to be very austere.  however we toured one house in gettysburg, the shriver house, and while it was still somewhat austere it was the first tour and tour guide i have liked up here.  the ones in williamsburg are horrible and the one plantation i have been to here was not all that good either.  not terrible but.....anyway - i thoroughly enjoyed that.  we also hit pezza's first hands on children's museum and she was in heaven so next week i am going to take her to the one in baltimore and let her play all day.

now on to why you are really here - something crafty!

this is an art journal page we do in my mixed media class on Color Me Creative.  if you have not signed up but are interested in getting into the whole mixed media craze then what are you waiting for??? 

this first class is a technique class.  so i teach you all about the many many supplies and mediums used in mixed media and how to use them effectively.  then in september my project classes will debut - three different ones - mixed media for cardmakers and scrapbookers, mixed media and art journaling, and mixed media off the page.  do you have a lot of patterned paper scraps you need to use up or old pads that still have pages left?  this is a great way to do it!