soartful Challenge --Wine, bread and thou

Here's my (very late-again) entry for Soartful Saturday's challenge. Who can resist the idea of wine, bread--I'd add some dates and a bit of cheese--and a picnic with your love [sigh] These two look like they are enjoying this spot in the grape arbor.

Thanks to Playingwithbrushes and the Graphics Fairy for the backgground pieces, Collage Images Flickr group for the young lovers, Google images for the grape vines and Jeanette for the inspiration piece.

Three Muses Challenge-Steampunk

Ahhh...Steampunk. Don't you love to look at it, explore it's intricacies, try to figure out what it means. I do, but to create a piece in the steampunk style is a challenge for me. I don't know why, but it's hard.
So here's my attempt, with lots of help from Cindy Powell and Cecelia Swatton,both of whom have produced Steampunk digital kits available at Digiscrapstation, and other places too--lots of great elements. I also thank Scrapbook Flair, Google Images, Dover and the Graphics Fairy for help putting this together

4 x 4 Friday--Guardians

I know, I know...this is Monday night and I am days behind...
This Friday's challenge at 4x4 Friday is cemetery angels. I love to look at them, they have such a range of emotions on their stone faces. This angel seemed a guardian to me, not a mourner, so I began to create the ranks of Guardian Angels, coming from heaven to meet their newborn charges. They look strong, fearless and so kind to me.

The angel is freebie from Gaby Braun, altered by her, and again by me. The background pieces are from T4L, other bits from The Feathered Nest and Google Images. The original background layer, to fill in the white spaces around my angels was painted with a set of watercolor stroke photoshop brushes.

Pandora's Box

I've recently signed up for a digital workshop on one of the Yahoo groups I belong to. I'm very excited to be learning more about how to use the powerful tools in Photoshop Elements to improve and enhance what I create. The classes don't begin for a few weeks yet, so the instructors gave us a theme to play with to "warm up".

Pandora's Box

I've loved this story since I was a little girl--I loved myths and legends as soon as I began to be able to read them, and still do. I think the world is a more interesting place because of Pandora's curiosity. Imagine a world without all the "evils" let loose from the box. Paradise, yes, but not very challenging. If Pandora hadn't opened the box, you know someone else would have. We can't help ourselves--we HAVE to KNOW!

It is rising to challenges and conquering our fears and dealing with adversity that make us human.

And never forget that HOPE was also in the box. And that is the "saving" grace. Hope is what keeps humanity going- more than any other virtue we may possess.

This collage is made with images and textures from Suzee Que's Flickr site, Google, Digital Whisper,Graphics Fairy and Textures for Layers. It is comprised of 14 layers, including text and brush layers.

Sunday Postcard Art--Sea Voyages

Here is my postcard for this week's challenge. My inspiration for this is that as I type, my sister and her husband are sailing up the East Coast from Florida to Mattapoisett, MA, on a boat not much bigger than this one. If I hadn't heard all the stories of cold and heat and rain and bugs and broken engines and no wind, I'd say "What a Life!"

I'll still say it..."What a Life!"

The original image is one of my own photos, altered with artistic filters andd duplicated for the second boat. Background textires are from Cottage Arts, Scrapbook FLair and Cindy Powell's Painted Silks collection.

4 x 4 Friday--Solstice--Midsummer Morn

Here is my homage to Midsummer. My favorite time of the day, when the risen sun begins to penetrate the early morning mist. Everything is just so beautiful then, sparkling and warm. It's magical.

These are the Callanish Stones, a cross-shaped setting of Standing stones erected around 2000 BC, one of the most spectacular Megalithic monuments in Scotland.
Local tradition says that giants who lived on the island refused to be converted to Christianity by Saint Kieran and were turned into stone as a punishment.
Another local belief says that at Sunrise on midsummer morning, the "shining one" walked along the stone avenue, "his arrival heralded by the Cuckoo's call."
This Legend could be a Folk memory recalling the astronomical significance of the stones
With thanks to Suzee Que, Dover, The Feathered Nest, Google and Textures for Layers Flick Group

ACF 79--The Winemaker

The little man that was provided for the Art Creations Friday challenge this week seems so jolly...I thought he must be a little olde winemaker. So I set him and his little winery in a grape arbor, and he seems very happy there.
Thanks to Google Images for the wine bottle, label and grapes and to Scrapbook Flair for the house. The Background textures came from T4L, from mbgrigby and les brumes.

Three Muses Challenge-Buttons & Bows

Here's my entry for this week--and it was an interesting challenge. For a while now I've been looking for a theme to go with this old photo of sisters with very large hair bows. The first time I saw it I just knew that the younger girl was thinking "HERS IS BIGGER!!!"
So I made it even bigger. She'll have to get used to disappointment...

With thanks to Songbird Avenue and Ms. jordan for the papers and buttons and bows and belts.

SPA--Roses

"Roses" is our challenge this week at SPA. Roses are in full season here in the northeast, their scent is in the air and their gorgeous colors are bursting everywhere. It's really the most beautiful few weeks of the year here, and everyone's soul is uplifted by the warm, sweet breeze.
Here is my rose postcard, with thanks to Rubyblossom, Cottage Arts, the Graphics Fairy and others for the images I worked with, and to Photoshop, the incredible, powerful tool that allows me to create these little bits of beauty.
Thanks for visiting.

ACF and 4 x4 Friday--Mirth and Laughter

I decided to combine the two Friday challenges this week--going away this afternoon for the weekend--YAY!. I'm afraid the lovely fabric background provided by the ladies at ACF got greatly altered in the process.

4 X 4 Friday's challenge is Shakespeare. I love the sentiment of this quote from The Merchant of Venice. What a great way to look at aging!

Images from google (faces, music) and Dover (moth) other texture from Encounter_Laura at T4L, And my own Bunnie Photoshop brush.

Thanks for visiting.

Three Muses--Little Green

One of my all time favorite Joni Mitchell songs,

Little Green
Born with the moon in Cancer
Choose her a name she will answer to
Call her green and the winters cannot fade her
Call her green for the children who've made her
Little green, be a gypsy dancer

He went to California
Hearing that everything's warmer there
So you write him a letter and say, "Her eyes are blue."
He sends you a poem and she's lost to you
Little green, he's a non-conformer

Just a little green
Like the color when the spring is born
There'll be crocuses to bring to school tomorrow
Just a little green
Like the nights when the Northern lights perform
There'll be icicles and birthday clothes
And sometimes there'll be sorrow

Child with a child pretending
Weary of lies you are sending home
So you sign all the papers in the family name
You're sad and you're sorry, but you're not ashamed
Little green, have a happy ending

Just a little green
Like the color when the spring is born
There'll be crocuses to bring to school tomorrow
Just a little green
Like the nights when the Northern lights perform
There'll be icicles and birthday clothes
And sometimes there'll be sorrow


With thanks to The Feathered Nest, Dover, Scrapbook Flair and, from T4L, Rubyblossom, and PlayingwithBrushes

SPA--Art Nouveau

Here is my entry for Sunday Postcard Art's challenge--Art Nouveau, a period when art drew from natural forms in an incredibly stylized way. It is both sleek and opulent at the same time. There's never been anything else like it, and it affected not only "art", as painting and sculpture, but everything from furniture and home decor to architecture and advertising.
With thanks to Shadowhouse, Dover, the fabulous I. Forget for the postcard overlay and stamps, and to Alfonse Mucha, for the beauty.

Just for fun--Rainbow bees

I came across a wonderful texture-y photo of a honeycomb, by Freebees, on a Flickr site, Almost Totally Free to Use Images, and knew right away I had to explore it. (WHOA, lot of commas in that sentence!) I also have this great bee illustration from DoubleM at Totally Free Collage Images, another Flickr group. I've used it before as a background element but never starred it.
A couple of texture pieces from T4L, yet another Flickr group--I LOVE the talented people here who enthusiastically share their art--these pieces are by JFreznel and LeslieNicole, along with a rainbow gradient from ScrapbookFlair and a photoshop text brush made it complete

4 x 4 Friday--Sparks

The 4x4 Friday theme this week is "Eclectic" I take this to mean anything goes. This piece is based on an ATC I made a while ago for a Paris swap.
The cat is from a photo of a garden sculpture by btacey (the photo, not the sculpture) that was a freebie somewhere. Background textures by Termin8er and TKSwayze at T4L, and from a free set called Aqueous Suntextures, that I think is on Bittbox. The Eiffel Tower is from the Graphics Fairy and the wings are from Collage Images Flickr Group.
The Lightning is a brush set by Stephanie Shimerda.

ACF # 77--Isabel

This week we were given a pretty image of a little girl and her dog having a "time-out." Since she looked as if she REALLY didn't want to be there, I made sure she could not escape her fate, at least until the time-out was over. I'll let her out soon, I promise.
With thanks to Cottage Arts, Scrapbook Flair, Ms Jordan at DigiScrap Station, Dover and Google

Three Muses Challenge-Time

Here is my piece for the Time challenge. When I first saw the theme, the words of the song, "Who Knows Where the Time Goes" by Sandy Denny came into my head--and wouldn't leave. I knew I had my theme.
Thanks to Norma Frances from T4L for the background and Google for the clock images. I don't remember where I found the lady or the rose.