Marsbarn Designs...

Going to the Guild Shows (I had to!)

Tomorrow is the big show put on by our local ceramic
guild at our convention center.  Actually, there will be
several art shows,  in various media (metal work, beads, 
glass, weaving)  each run by the appropriate guild, 
and they are all free to attend. 

And I wasn't going to go.  I don't have money to spend
this year, so I was going to stay home and get some
stuff done around the house. 

Until I realized my mom was going to go alone,
well that's not right.  Big E offered to go with her,
so I could stay home (Ya, you two go, have fun,
look at all of the things I love, and I'll do laundry.),
but that plan was immediately quashed. 

So, I am going to the meeting of the guilds, and we'll 
see if I can leave empty handed.  It should be a lovely
day. 

Mr Fuzzypants and the New Trick

 

 

Perhaps the world was a safer place before I started figuring out how to use iMovie.
No doubt there are better things I could be doing with my time, but....
well... I thought the dishes could wait. 

(Now, although I can make little movies (of questionable value or purpose) I can't figure out how to format the blog's screen to show the entire width of the screen.  If you click on the movie itself, you'll go to my Flickr account where the entire screen can be viewed.) 

There's too much to do to do anything

I remain stuck in that place of Not Getting Enough Done.
My goodness.  What's a girl to do?

It's like it was Christmas, and then Birthday Palooza
in January and the beginning of February,  followed by
Valentine's Day, and then Little e's birthday and Easter.
I guess there was March in there, somewhere.
What did I do in March? Oh right, I was sick.
Then, wham, bam.. hey look the year is a third of the way done, at which point it will start over.
When do I get stuff done?   

Happy Easter!

Wishing you a very happy Easter and fabulous spring!

weathered wood and marigolds

This photo makes me happy.
This is from a project Little e and Sweetheart G
concocted during the birthday weekend. 

I just love those dirty, pollen covered fingers.
They remind me that she isn't big, and she isn't little anymore.

The girls busied themselves for hours collecting the heads from dandelions. There were yellow smudges on hands and faces.

They lined up the blossoms in between the boards on the picnic table.

The effect reminded me of marigold garlands at an Indian wedding. 

Such a lovely project.

A good day for a birthday

It is good to see Little e putting her own twist on the family's chocolate cake. 

There has been quite a bit of bickering between the 
girls recently.  It was good to see them able to work
together.

Little e had a lovely birthday.  There were pumpkin
chocolate chip muffins for breakfast, a quick lunch
in a restaurant, a movie in a theatre, and a family
dinner with a big chocolate cake studded with 3
different kinds of M&Ms (plain, pretzel, and dark chocolate peanut).

Little e turns 8

For Miss Little e's children's party, we had mini cupcakes,

and fun papers.  She asked for a collage party with 6 of her friends.

At our local art supply store, I found matt board bundles 
(it's the scrap left over when a matting frame is cut) 
which we used as a background for the collages. 
The scrap was inexpensive, and had a lovely bevel.
As an added bonus it didn't warp with the glue.

It was a good party, and one of the few kid parties
that didn't leave me feeling like I'd been in a bouncy house afterward.  

My new dice bag website

I made a website for my dice bag business.
I'm so excited to share it!

www.marsbarndicebags.com 

Big E drew the critters!  And I love them.
This was a bigger project than I thought
it would be, but I'm so glad to have
all my dice bag information in one place. 

It's true of children too

They look so sweet and innocent when they are sleeping,

even when they are sleeping in the middle of the clean laundry that you're folding.

A dilemma of oatmeal chocolate chip proportions

Can you see the problem?

I made a cookie that was too big to fit in the cookie jar.
What's a girl to do?