Journey

On Wednesday, 8 September - I got on the train and sat down. I sat in the first seat in the carriage and looked in front of me - there was a piece of A4 paper - with a poem on it called Journey - wow - how random and how cool.




Thank you "The Poet" - it was a lovely surprise on my journey to work!



In the train home we contemplate zero with the shape of our faces.
The scenery rushed past slowing down to offer us
a few more black trees, different from the last ones but the same also.
We look and decide against them - where you do not live you
are not
   alive
we want to say.

Another dark sky breathes on us, a strip of name is photographed
and we move on, inertia-scrolled to some moment
when we will meet the rain
and avoid the eye of home.

Janice-inspired necklaces

When I was in St Louis in March, Maggie showed me Janice's jewelry that she made - it was incredible - amazing!  I was lucky enough to be given a green dragonfly ceramic piece that she had in her collection and knew I would sit down and make a necklace inspired by Janice!

I went through my supply of charms, etc this weekend - bought in Chicago, St Louis and here in Sydney - I'm pretty excited how they turned out!

Coffee helps...

Now that HSC trials [I'm not sure if "HSC" stands for High School Certificate or High STRESS Certificate] are finished - and Grace and Emma have handed in their major art works - I get my "craft room" back [aka kitchen] and have been doing some art. 

Here's a page for my ongoing Art Journal - although I don't put sugar in my cappuccino - I love the colourful packets and decided to incorporate some that I have collected.

I was inspired by this sketch I saw in a magazine called Notebook.

Yes...coffee does help...especially beautiful working warriors!

A Little Clue

Rosie O'Donnell [aka Becky] in Sleepless in Seattle says "It's cute. It's like a little clue." 
I'm reminded of this quote when I see words when I least expect them...sometimes they appear at just the right time - when I'm trying to figure something out - need some worldly advice...

"you are my everything" - spotted on a sidewalk near my GP's office.

"Learn to Understand...Chill" and "Be Content" were in the streets around West Ryde.

Look around...you never know what messages are out there for you!

Train Ticket Art

A good friend told me about a NinetoFive mag contest to alter a travel ticket - winner wins a year's free travel.  I'm up for a challenge - I sent in my creation but it didn't get picked [oh well].  The winner and top 10 are pretty cool!

I used bee's wax to encase a photo I had taken of a train pulling away from West Ryde station and of course, had to include a poem of sorts [using words cut out from CityRail brochures]...and an arrow!

Amy won a contest recently - maybe her luck will rub off on me one of these days! ...keep going!

Mad for the 60's

I was reading on Emily's blog about her new hairstyle and Mad Men (Jon Hamm aka Don Draper is a St Louis boy)!  Series 2 has just started on SBS and I must admit, I'm kind of hooked.  I decided to go back and watch Series 1.  As I was watching it - the talk of advertising...etc, it reminded me of my parents - my mom and dad after all met at work.  My dad was a young exec at Procter & Gamble in Cincinnati and my mom was a secretary...hmmm.  My mom years ago put together some photo albums for me and I was looking through them...this is my mom circa late 1950's looking very glam!!  My mom told me that my dad took the train to New York to see the Ad Agencies back then - I think one episode of Mad Men mentioned a trip by train from NY to Cleveland took 9 hours.  I love the stories my dad tells us of his time at P&G - the new products (cake mix, nappies [diapers]) - could be some Mad Men episodes in there... 
As I was looking through the old photos I remembered an online art challenge I did a few years ago - I had a weekly prompt - and was required to alter a playing card - here's the one from the prompt called "Parents".  My mom and dad look awesome - 4 kids at that stage - we were vacationing in Florida. 
Love the sunnies!

End of Season

Sadly, my football season has come to an end.  My team finished in 2nd place in the comp - up from 3rd last year (that's me in goals)!!  We just finished the round robin for the Championship - and have been knocked out by losing in our first game 2-0 and we drew 1-1 in the 2nd.  I'm so proud of my team and of me for playing 16 games!!  Go Rovers!

I have been the team manager for the last 2 years (Russell coaches) - and I love it!!  I made key chains for my team - one side of the key chain was a smaller version of this post card - which I altered - the "Come Play" is for the campaign to bring the World Cup to Australia!!