Christmas Happy List

With some trips I took this Fall, I got a little behind in getting ready for Christmas this year. But once I got started, it flowed nicely.

1. My season started with a bus trip I took with my Mom to Michigan. We visited an enormous Christmas store called Bronner's, in Frankenmuth. Bronner's has the most ornaments and decorations I've ever seen in one place. Have you been to Bronner's? If you haven't been there yet, I would highly recommend putting it on your bucket list.

November Happy List - Birthday Month

November is a big month at our home. My husband, Dan, and I have birthdays 6 days apart. Our son, who traveled from out of town, and daughter spent time with us so that made our birthdays extra special. This year, the last of my 50's, I hosted my own birthday party with a few girlfriends. Why wait for a 60th birthday party? We had our nails done and lunch afterwards. It was called a Girlfriend Gratitude Birthday Party because I am very grateful to have these women in my life.

Girls' Weekend in Atlanta - Part 2 - Faith On The Homefront

In my last blog post, I shared with you my trip to Atlanta, Georgia, where I spent a glorious girls' weekend with Becky, Missy and Julie. This blog post is a continuation of the fun times we had where we attended a creative event called Faith on the Homefront, hosted by Rosalyn Sue and Valarie, at Neiman Marcus in the Lenox Mall.

Faith on the Homefront was Rosalyn Sue's 5th annual fundraiser for Operation Stars and Stripes. Operation Stars and Stripes is a not-for-profit organization that is dedicated to supporting America's military and their families at home and abroad. 

I cannot imagine how much time and effort Rosalyn Sue and Valarie put into planning this wonderful event. When we entered the room, we were simply awestruck by its beauty, and it took awhile for us to take it all in. It was fun snapping photos of every detail while catching up with old friends. This time the theme was Bible journaling which is a very popular thing to do these days.

Girls Weekend in Atlanta - Part 1 - Country Living Fair

I just returned from a fabulous four days in Atlanta, Georgia, with my Southern friends Becky, Missy and Julie. We all met and became instant friends exactly two years ago at an art event called Sweethearts On the Homefront hosted by Rosalyn Sue (I blogged about it here.) During that weekend in 2013, we attended the Country Living Fair at the Stone Mountain Park.

Stone Mountain Park is a gorgeous place to be. You can see the mountain in the distance from the entrance to where the Country Living Fair was held.

October Happy List

I am really enjoying the geraniums that have been on our front porch since June. They continue to grow and look beautiful. I keep thinking I should plant some fall mums, but why upset the apple cart? We have had a mild fall in Indiana. 

Have You Been to Lake Wawasee?

My friend Rose and I took a drive up to Lake Wawasee in Northern Indiana and spent a couple nights there. Since it was after Labor Day, there was less traffic thus making it even a more relaxing place to be. Lake Wawasee is the largest natural lake in Indiana and is 6 square miles in size.

Ironworks at Keystone's Fall Block Party

Ironworks at Keystone, Indianapolis' premier living and retail property located at 2727 E 86th St., hosted its first-ever Fall Block Party on Saturday, October 3rd. In celebration of its one-year anniversary, the North side development offered complimentary family-friendly entertainment, live music, food, beer and more. It was an opportunity to get a sneak peak of forthcoming Indianapolis projects from the developer. 

Halloween Ideas

My friend, Karen, who has a booth at the Logan Village Mall in Noblesville, does an amazing job staging her booth. She had been talking about painting one of the areas with black chalkboard paint and recently did just that. Note how it brings out all of the beautifully rich colors of the items that she has for sale.

Home-A-Rama 2015

Touring homes, new and old, provides inspiration for me to spruce up our home. I recently enjoyed touring five newly built homes that were highlighted in a local home show called Home-A-Rama. It was put on by the Builders Association of Greater Indianapolis (BAGI) in the beautiful neighborhood of Sagamore in Noblesville, Indiana. All of the homes back up to the Jack Nicholas Signature Golf Course. I'll show you the homes with a collage of my favorite photos of each home. I'll conclude with four decorating ideas I saw during the tour that have inspired me to perhaps use at our home. 

Home #1

September Happy List

I have to quickly get in my September happy list before the month is over! It creeps up so fast! First up, I have to say how lovely the weather has been here in Indiana. The other evening when Dan was away on business, I drove over to my friend Anita's house and we walked to a new pizza restaurant and then to the ice cream shop. She lives just outside of our adorable town square and I love the fact that she can walk everywhere. Our town square (Noblesville, Indiana) has remained quaint, and there is always something going on! It was a beautiful evening and the air was cool and just perfect!

UncommonGoods Review

Disclaimer: This is a sponsored post written by me on behalf of UncommonGoods. All opinions are 100% mine. 

The online New York based store, UncommonGoods, invited me to review some of their products. The offer was to choose from their gifts for men and women collections and write a blog post about them. Since I am trying to be more health conscious, I chose this green Bike Tote from their gifts for women, and this attractive Define Fruit Infusion Bottle from their gifts for men. (I think I've mentioned before that green is my favorite color - and the olive green shade of the tote is just right!)

Barktember

The other day, I observed something really precious - "Barktember," which is an annual September dog event where dog owners can bring their four-legged friends to the waterpark for a dip in the pool. As many of my readers already know, dog lovin' is something quite new to me. Our daughter Ashleigh invited me to join her and her dog Tangerine at the event.

There were dogs with and without leashes everywhere. The place was fenced in so it was a nice opportunity for doggy parents to relax and watch their doggies make new friends. It reminded me of the playgroups to which I took my kids when they were little, well, kind of...

My Cincinnati-Cincinnatian Trip

We traveled to Cincinnati, Ohio, to attend my 40th high school reunion. While we were there, we stayed at the The Cincinnatian Hotel. Did you ever wander around your downtown area and wonder what some of the old hotels are like inside? Well, we had the opportunity to do just that on this trip. 

The Cincinnatian Hotel, built in 1882, has an interesting history. It is a small luxury hotel, also referered to a "small boutique hotel." We found it quite charming. I took some photos to share with you.

August Happy List

August has been a fun month, I think...I saw the dentist and had my annual physical. Well, the happy thing about that is that I'm good for 6 months before I have to do it all over again, right?! 

Anyway, we took what is becoming our monthly trip to French Lick in Southern Indiana. It is so beautiful there and it makes Dan and me happy when we visit.

December Daily Journal

Have you heard of a December Daily journal? I discovered it on Pinterest awhile back. For several years now, I have wanted to experience writing in a December Daily journal during the month of December. Until this year though I had waited too late in the year and then just let the idea go. But this year, I'm going to actually do it! Hurray, it's only August and I am ready!

I made this junk journal (below) last year too close to Christmas and felt rushed to use it (I blogged about it here). So to add to the assurance of using it this year, I made some holiday colored tabs to use in it for fun. I adhered them to the pages with glue dots. (On a side note, I have great respect for glue dots as an adhesive. Recently, I was looking for an adhesive that would attach glitter cardstock to regular cardstock and I found that glue dots were the only adhesive that held them together!) 

I'm Happiest When...

Here's a different take on my monthly happy list. The other day I had thought about the fact that I'm happiest when I'm working in my art studio. My creative spirit flows and gives me a sense of satisfaction. I am constantly working on new products for my Etsy shop and adding them keeps the shop fresh and interesting. Corresponding with Etsy customers from all around the world is so much fun! And these days it's easy to communicate, sending pictures of custom projects as they come to fruition so I can get feedback. That way I can make sure I am sending exactly what my customer is looking for. I had a neat exchange with a lady who wanted summer words cut out for her scrapbooking project.

June Happy List

Father's Day was so much fun! Ashleigh and her dog, Tangerine, came over for the afternoon.

Photo courtesy of Ashleigh Antle

My Trip to Kansas: Karla Nathan's Birdsong No. 5

I felt honored to be a part of Karla Nathan's Birdsong art retreat this year. This was my third major event (I blogged about the first two here, here and here.)  If you haven't met Karla, you can read about her on her blog, Karla's Cottage. Caution: only go there if you have a big chunk of time because you won't want to leave. I was most excited to see Karla's art studio firsthand. As her studio has been featured in many magazines, I wanted to see it for myself and feel the presence of all the vintage goodness. I wanted to know if it was beautiful as in the publications - and YES YES YES it was!!!

Karla likes fairies which are abundant in her art studio. And she lovingly refers to her granddaughters as "grandfairies."

The Bahamas No. 3

This was our third trip to The Bahamas. Our first visit was in 2006 when we accompanied our son during spring break of his senior year in high school. Back in our day, we went to the Florida coast for our spring break, but our son and friends chose The Bahamas. Imagine that...we told him that we would gladly be chaperones for the trip! We had such a great time on Paradise Island! We stayed at the Atlantis Royal Towers when they were brand new. The Reef and the Cove hadn't been built yet. The last two times we stayed at the Cove Atlantis. I wrote about our last trip in 2013 here.

This mosaic of photos were taken from the cabana where we met up with our friends and spent most of our days at the Cove. It rained the first three days on and off, but that was okay with me. One of my favorite parts of the trip was looking at the gorgeous colors of the water in the ocean. Another favorite was how well the staff pampered us.

May Happy List

Besides Spring that brings sunshine and flowers, there have been some other things to add to my May happy list.

Mother's Day was very enjoyable, spent with our daughter, Ashleigh. She came over bearing flowers, a framed canvas of my granddog (her dog, Tangerine) and a Michaels gift card from our son and family in California. Dan joined us for brunch and then Ash and I got our nails done and we shopped at Old Navy. We were surprised when we saw that the nail salon was jammed with clients. They said it's like that every Mother's Day. Who would have known? 

Later in the week, a friend of Ashleigh's came to her house and gave us facials. Besides the facial, it was a delight to watch Ashleigh interact with her friend: two beautiful young women who value their friendship.

Tea Anyone?

My friend, Anita, and I attended our third fabulous Downton Abbey tea in Kokomo, Indiana. It was hosted by the Howard County Historical Society & Kokomo Public Library, and was held at Elite Banquet & Conference Center on Lafountain Street.

Sewing Paper and Cloth Banners

How are you doing? I've made a couple of new things lately and didn't make the connection until I started writing this post that they are both banners that were made with my sewing machine. 

Actually, the first one is a garland. I've seen die cuts sewn together and have been wanting to experience making one myself. I haven't sewn paper very much with my sewing machine so I was a bit skeptical about the results of this project. I started with two different shades of pink card stock, then punched the butterfly shapes and finally stitched them together at a 3 inch interval. I was pleasantly surprised and happy with my butterfly garland! Here they are strung on an old lamp base for you to see. 

April's Happy List

It's time for another happy list. 

1. I'm starting off with Ashleigh's latest commissioned charcoal drawing. Her work always makes me happy and I know the mother of this beautiful baby is happy to have it. It always amazes me how she captures things like blankets and hair.

Girls' Weekend in Fairhope, Alabama

I just returned from a girls' weekend in Fairhope, Alabama with my southern friends, Becky and Missy. Becky, who lives in Fairhope, invited Missy and me to spend a few days with her so that we could make some neat things and attend the annual Fairhope Arts & Crafts Festival.

The three of us met two years ago at an art retreat and have kept in contact via Facebook. Becky and I had gotten together a couple times to create things and were very excited that Missy could join us this time.

We had a blast. We named our visit "Fairhope Fun" which was an appropriate title. I made journals for everyone so we could remember all of the fun things we did. Becky and Missy LOVE the colors pink and aqua so I used these graphics for the journals. 

Irish Vignette

I have a little spot in our kitchen where I like to place seasonal vignettes. I was happy to find this vintage doll dressed in a shamrock dress and the little guy playing the accordion.

My Happy List: California, Spain & Indiana

1. Having a husband who has business in California and a son and family who live there is a good thing - especially during the month of February when it is very cold back in the midwest! I got to travel there while Dan did his business and visit with our family. Our little grandson was just adorable and entertaining! Good times! We stayed a few nights at the Ayres Hotel as it is close to Dan's office. I wrote about this hotel last year here.

Out and About with Anita

My friend Anita is always up for an adventure. I can call her anytime and she is ready to go! It's so nice that she lives close by so there is little travel time needed to get where we want to go. We usually stay close to home because there is so much to do in our town! For example, the Goodwill (GW) store closed and reopened a couple blocks down the street (even closer to me now, though it was close before!) We attended the grand opening and it was very crowded with people and stuff to buy! Everyone was so excited to be there!

It didn't take long to fill my shopping cart. We had these yellow dishes in our home several years back and I gave them to a friend. I never had the serving pieces though and couldn't pass them up.

Valentine's Day Heart Challenge

My friend Becky invited Missy and me to accept a mixed media Valentine's Day challenge. We were to decorate a heart. Her inspiration came from the Artsy VaVa blog here. I wanted to use this photo of my dad and his sister for my masterpiece.

February Hearts

It's that time of the year when we see hearts all around us.

Cards & Journals

I made some cards with the St. Patrick's Day die cuts I listed in my Etsy shop. I added embellishments and glitter to the die cuts, and ribbon to the card on the bottom right. The shapes were cut with an electronic cutting machine.

My Happy List: Creativity

1. My 2015 Etsy banners were put to good use as photo ops to bring in the new year. We took one banner with us for a party at French Lick and another adorned the mantle of my friend, Anita.  

Florida Horse Show

This seems to be my year of animal appreciation. I've blogged before about the traumatic dog bite I received on my face when I was five years old. After that I didn't have much use for animals in my life. But recently, opportunities have come my way that have allowed me to take a closer look at animals and learn about the joy they bring to people.

First of all, last May my friend Anita invited me to drive with her to her former home to attend her daughter's baby shower. Her two dogs, Bogo and Lenny, were very well behaved while they rode in the back seat of the truck 12 hours each way. I learned about their personalities and observed how important they were to Anita.

Then, my daughter Ashleigh purchased a rescue dog and named her Tangerine. I must admit it didn't take long to fall in love with Tangy because she is adorable, loveable, and makes Ashleigh shine. Besides that, she is my granddog.