Simply Neutrals #15 Sea Urchins and a Bed Make-over

 It's time for Simply Neutrals Tuesday - except it's Friday here. I'm on school holiday time!

I thought I'd share with you my bed makeover. It was a pine country style, and we couldn't afford a new bed, so I decided to paint it...




Here's the bed as it was before...

The first coat was flat white, then I distressed it by rubbing it in parts with sandpaper. Then I wiped it over with Porters Black Antique Wax, which was later polished off, leaving a satiny creamy finish. The roses were plaster casts bought on eBay.

It really changed the whole feel of the room to light and airy, and the bed doesn't seem so solid and heavy-looking in the lighter colour.

This week has been hot here on the South Coast of NSW. Today was 33 degrees Celcius, and I took my children (11 and 13) for a swim and snorkel at one of our favourite local beaches. The tide was out and the waves and rip was gentle, so we ventured out to our favourite wonderland which we call "The Valley of a Thousand Sea Urchins". The children have not seen it often as the conditions need to be safe. They were amazed and didn't want to return to shore after an hour in the colder water. My back was sunburnt! 

I wish we had an underwater camera! I have borrowed a couple of images to show you.

The left photo comes from a local blog:

https://morselsandscraps.wordpress.com/tag/seaweed/

It is like one we held, but ours had a fuzzy layer that waved under the water. It felt strange, and attached to my thumbnail gently. We put it back safely. 

The right photo comes from:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/earth/earthnews/8224831/Sea-urchin-could-lead-to-knives-that-never-need-sharpening.html

This is what the scene looked like, but our sea urchins were black. 

Interestingly, they have self-honing teeth that can cut through rock! They are considered a delicacy and are expensive to buy. I've not tasted them.

These are some dried sea urchin shells I have found on beaches locally:

To finish, an inspirational quote in a lovely simple frame...

Thanks Wen for hosting the Simply Neutrals Tuesday. You can join in the fun at Wen's blog AppleApricot

By the way, I have just managed to add Google Friend Connect to my blog if you would like to follow me that way.

Have a creative week!

Jesse

Bears and Roses for Simply Neutrals # 14

Happy New Year! I wish you loads of creativity and time to enjoy arty expression and just 'be' in the present moment... that's my New Year's resolution - to be where I am in each present moment and enjoy it.

Here's a little hat I made recently for one of my bears using scraps of doylies, lace, flowers and beading. The band was cut from an op shop top, and the embellishments were hand-stitched in place.

Here's Edwina in her new hat. The frame is from Angela Wolf of JoesSistah.

Now for some of my glorious Spring roses. They are mauve, but I've 'neutralised' them with a textured background I purchased from 2 LilOwls.

I then added a frame from The Coffeeshop Blog. 

I added another texture as a frame, too.

I'll showcase more of my rose photos from this year soon, but for Simply Neutrals, I've played in Photoshop to 'neutralise' the vibrance of their colours, which is subtly beautiful, too. I've used the same Coffee Shop frame with a texture from Jerry Jones. The rose is called 'Climbing Cinderella', one of my favourites.

This next rose is 'Champagner', textured with a texture from Jerry Jones.

Now for a little mobile phone fun using an app called Kaleidoscope. Watch out, it's addictive! It's a great activity when you are waiting around somewhere or on public transport with kids in tow... It uses a photo on your phone or you can take a shot to play around with.

An inspiring quote for the New Year...
The background texture is from http://farfarhill.blogspot.com.au/

Happy creating!
hugs,

Jesse

Thanks Wen for hosting the Simply Neutrals party. You can see more neutral beauty at AppleApricot .

P.S. A little hint for those new to blogging (like me!), I've noticed that when I return to past Simply Neutrals posts, some of my links didn't link back to the actual #post on Wen's blog, or to my own #post, so make sure you click on the post title to get the specific link address to use, rather than the main address of the blog. Otherwise you have to search manually for it and others who may be browsing our blogs can't easily find the posts.

Welcome Fellow Travellers on the Creative Journey

This blog started as a diary of my artistic journey for the year-long course (Beyond Layers) with Kim Klassen.

Two online courses I did previously with Kim (Skinny Mini and Art of Texture) have given me some tools to play with and I've been using what I've learned to embellish some of my images. I loved Kim's kind and inspiring attitude to life and learning so here I am back for more depth and to push my boundaries, hoping to get over that block that makes me apologise for my art: 'I'm artistic, but not an artist.'

I've dabbled in all sorts of creative activities over the years - photography, singing folk songs, quilting, nesting (home making), teddy bear making and card making to name just some. I've spent time and energy on creating babies, too! My life is busy with 3 children, and I work together with my partner Terry making Irish flutes in our home workshop http://www.mcgee-flutes.com/, as well as volunteering in our local Rural Fire Brigade, and in a year-long project writing weekly educational articles for my children's primary school newsletter which is available online here: 

http://web1.broulee-p.schools.nsw.edu.au/groups/mallee/

The weekly educational articles are a joint venture on the part of Broulee Public School and a few volunteers to help us all realise the intense educational value and critical importance of the first three years of a child's life for setting them on the best path for learning and becoming all they can be. Our aim is to help parents think about and improve the educational experiences and life outcomes for their children. I contribute a reflective and practical segment on each topic, along with thoughtful images. 

I'm pulled in so many creative directions and I don't have enough time to do everything in the depth I'd like, and so often the urge to do something perfectly gets in the way of brave action. I have always known that my spiritual renewal was tied to my creativity, and made it a priority to give myself some time to lose myself in something artistic, trying to touch the inner core of myself in timelessness, in producing an expression of beauty, a reminder to my heart to feel gratitude for life and the moments of beauty that come my way.

Life happens so fast sometimes that I worry about missing the deepest connections with my children, my partner and the rest of this grand universe and I want to communicate and record some of my feelings and observations on my story.

Art enables us to find ourselves

and lose ourselves at the same time.

Thomas Merton

 My goals for this year of artistic exploration are:

• to learn more about my camera, to have it with me more;
• to see with new eyes, from new angles and vantage points; 
• to improve my use of Photoshop Elements 9;
• to be inspired by other people's creative endeavours and see that my own artistic expression is just as valid;
• to learn about blogging, linking, and presentation of my thoughts and artworks on line and join in the discussions and sharing;
• to value art as a personal expression of attitude and thought;
• to dream more, and make some of my dreams real;
• to enter deeper into the emotions behind art.

So now, onwards - to being caught up more in the 'present moment' of beauty captured by photography, and enhancing my pictures with Photoshop Elements...