more on observing

it was exciting to see how i am not alone in my thoughts on living in the present. i am always amazed at how much i have in common with the women (and men) who read my blog. maybe it is an age thing, that as we get older; we get wiser about what is truly important in life. i could easily live in my past and spend my time wallowing in pity over what happened to my child. but what good would that do? who would that benefit? certainly not Tucker, certainly not me, certainly not Dillon and definitely not my friends or family. so i don't do it. occasionally i'll have a sad day; but that is normal. but typically, i try to live day to day, do what i have to do and make art!

speaking of Tucker, he is sick today. i suspected it yesterday. he had a good night but then all of a sudden around 9:30am, it was like the "cold and flu" fairy flew over him and sprinkle some dust on him and BAM! coughing, sneezing, more coughing. the type of coughing that i stay right next to him with suction ready. the type of coughing where we put a call into our neighbor/doctor and say, guess what? antibotics and steroids are on reserve and i am in KECIA RN mode. i've sat with him in his bed all day taking care of him. my back is sore, i am exhausted, but that's ok. i know how to make him feel better because i am his mom.

so if i disappear for a few days, that is why. when he is sick, its is 4 times the work that he normally requires from us (and that is a lot). it is wearing and as i sit here, hard on my body! my back aches so bad.

So, now back to the topic of observing. tuck and i watched "kung fu panda" today. have you seen it? it's very cute and a lot can be learned from it. i was delighted to hear this quote in the movie where the panda felt inadequate and wanted to give up; so the wise turtle said to him; "yesterday is history. Tomorrow is a mystery. But today is a gift. That is why it is called the present". silly me, but i found that quite profound!

So in between my frantic caregiving, what did i observe today? i observed my sweet little Kirby, who is 14 now. I watched her as she made her rounds outside. I home cook for Kirby (after a nasty seizure a few years ago, we made some changes, dietary being one of them). she LOVES her home cooking and barks at me to hurry up and feed her. she jumps up and down like a puppy and then she enjoys her meal. as soon as she is done, like habit; she wants to go outside. she goes out and walks the perimeter of the backyard. she has a routine and today i observed her as she started on the right side of the yard and made her way over to the shed, where she goes behind it and disappears for a few minutes. she reappears under the hammock and makes her way to the left side of the yard. she is so cute and i wanted to imprint that on my brain as i know that her time with us is limited and of course, that makes me sad beyond belief. but i chose today to watch and enjoy her sweet little habits.

observing

there's been a lot of talk in the last year on the subject of "being in the present" instead of getting sidetracked by what has happened to us in the past or worrying about tomorrow. We are all guilty of this; as it is easy to get lost in our past. I just brought this up with someone recently as this person tends to reside in the past and when you reside in the past, you definitely aren't focused on what is going on around you. but i started thinking about it - how do we live in the present? how do we make ourselves participate on a daily level; what is the trick? after thinking about it for awhile, i decided one way to be present is to observe what is going on around you. take it in, notice, think about it, question it, learn from it and as you walk away take something positive from it. I thought i'd start posting some random observations from my walk through life and encourage you to share yours too.

So i'll start by sharing this observation with you. i looked out my kitchen window yesterday and was shocked to see this hawk sitting on one of my feeders. i ran upstairs as fast as i could and grabbed my camera. when i got back, i got to watch him through my zoom lens and was enchanted by the beauty of this bird. the colors of those feathers - oh how i wanted to pluck one from his tail! i watched him as he looked for food. his head turning in all directions as he searched. finally i could tell he was going to leave as he leaned forward and spread those amazing wings. quick as the shutter took its last picture, he was gone. then i called dillon to tell him what i saw.

a thought for the day

(as seen on the internet)


May you have as much fun as you can before someone makes you stop.

Christmas Eve 2009

the presents are wrapped, the stockings are hung. jeff is on the phone, tuck is listening to music and dillon is playing a new video game from his nana. i am upstairs blogging, looking at all the pictures i've taken in the last few days of the snow and enjoying the quiet. it was hard to pick a favorite photo from them all, but picked this one as my Christmas wish to all. Happy Holidays!

the cutest gift i received

i was pleasantly surprised by a package the other day from my friend, Barbe St. John. Normally, i would be a good little girl and put such a gift under the tree. however, it arrived in an Amazon.com box and i was expecting something from them, so i opened it. i just think this is the most darling gift! and in case you aren't sure what it is, it's a headband that she spiffed up with a precious little doll (she knows i love my dolls!), sari ribbon, a peacock feather and some other cool doodads - but the best part is the banner the doll is sporting! so cool, Barbe - you're the best! i will be wearing it Christmas eve, so i'll snap a pic of me wearing my new finery!

memories

does this picture bring back memories or what? from left to right:
my twin brother, kent, me, my little sister, kris (she looks like a baby doll!) and my older sister, kim.

don't you love the matching outfits? us girls in our pretty fancy white tights and ruffly collars (hey, how come kris got red shoes?) love kent's socks and bow tie -real nifty!

my favorite though are our bangs! kitchen bangs we called them. kris and kim's look pretty straight, but since i have a widows peak my bangs were always crooked and practically at my hair line! (although, kent's is pretty short too!)

here's a cute little pic of Gracie playing in the snow. she is looking at her ball (hidden in the snow) and waiting for me to throw it to her. Pepper is standing behind her waiting patiently as well. (not for the ball, but for Gracie to run, cuz then Pepper will leap at Gracie). guess Pep plays her own games!

snow through my eyes

(click on photo for enlarged version)

our first snow of the winter!

girls day out

Today i took my friend, Michele out for her belated birthday. (it was in May and we had this same day all planned out and i goofed it all up, so it didn't work out). first we went to the flea market, which was absolutely FREEZING! we got a few things, but not much. one fun thing i got was a vinyl record of "Rocky Horror Picture Show". the graphics are really cool. i thought it'd be cool to frame and hang up in Dillon's room as art. also on the free table i got a whole bag of vintage Christmas stuff. too much to take a picture of. i guess some vendor tried to sell it today and then decided it was too cold and left it all on the table. it was like a feeding frenzy at the free table!

then we headed up north to meet Jane in Montclair. We wanted to go shopping at Parcel and then go check out Urban Outfitters and Anthropology. Parcel was so fun! friends have been telling me to go there for ages, but i rarely get up North - but i am so glad we went. my special purchase today was the darling little pink stocking in the top right corner of the collage.
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and how lovely is this little doll? my husband gave her to me yesterday as a KK. we have a tradition that started in my family years ago, called "KK", after Kris Kringle. in my family what we use to do was pick a family member name and then you were their KK. that meant that you bought them a main gift, but you also left little gifts for them throughout the season. another version of Secret Santa, i suppose! anyway, we do KK in my family now, but we do it where we give out little gifts now and then to anyone in the family. (like i recently KK'd Tucker with a cool blanket). it's a great way to let each other know that we are thinking of them. Jeff always gets me a Starbucks gift card at the beginning of December as a KK so that i can go get my eggnog lattes whenever i want to!

Acceptance

here's a doll i just finished that is going out as a gift for a fellow artist. i'd like to see this artist get a little break from the hardships she has had to endure lately.

my sweet little doll tree

In September, when we were driving home from Country Living Fair, we took a break from driving to get coffee and do some antique shopping. we found this unassuming little hole in the wall antique store that was chocked full of stuff. And in the back room, it was ALL vintage Christmas! i was in heaven, digging through boxes and boxes. i started a little shoe box of my treasures. what i bought mostly were tiny little Christmas decorations, such as tiny snowmen, little bottle brush Christmas trees, a pink flocked deer, tiny little glass ornaments, darling mini candy canes and more. so when i started decorating for the holidays i dug this all out, but was kind of afraid to decorate with it because it was all so tiny. i was afraid it would get lost in the shuffle during clean up time and i wanted it to all stay together. So the other day i was at Marshalls and saw these silver Christmas trees with bells all over them. i thought they looked like the perfect form to create a body with. So i added a Charlotte doll head, removed the bells and then started decorating it with my tiny little treasures. I just love how she turned out.

Christmas in the air

(hummingbird photo by my mom, Patricia J. Stark)

I couldn't believe my eyes today when i looked outside my window and saw a little Christmas magic right in front of me.

Holiday soldering class today

Today i held a holiday soldering class here at the house. it was a small class due to my Christmas tree taking up several spaces in the room! it was intimate and really fun. their kits were so cute, i put them in these awesome vintage stockings i found at the flea market. the kind we got as kids with that material that oranges use to be bagged in. A fellow etsian, Kelly, came. We've been online for several years now, so it is always fun to finally meet face to face. and she was so sweet to give me the most incredible polymer clay Santa as a gift.
Also Jenny Heid and her sister, Melissa, came! that was very exciting, as Jenny lives very close to me and we've never quite been able to meet up. Jenny and Melissa had the sweetest camaraderie. i took the cutest picture of them working together and helping each other. Jenny brought me a candle with one of her images on it. so sweet - thank you girls! Jenny and i are both teaching at Art Opera in April. Check out the classes if you have a second to see what we will be up to!

in the bottom picture, i took a picture of myself to show where i put a fun streak of blue in my hair. I'd wanted to do it for awhile and bought a bottle of the color at Hot Topic a few months ago, but promptly misplaced it. i found it last night in with my glues! (well, it looks like a glue bottle....) again jenny, again, sorry for the name lapse; typical kecia move!

any chance you watch Dexter? the season finale was on tonight and i have to say that i am in SHOCK over the ending.

blog giveaway- winner!

And the winner is:

Through a random number generator, i was able to pick my blog winner. Congratulations to Debra, of "It's all Good". Thanks for playing!

busy, busy, busy!

Sorry, Santa and his helper have been quite busy! i'm a little tired from the weekend and will be teaching a soldering class today. i will be picking my blog giveaway winner tonight when i have a minute to relax! lots going on, so i apologize for the delay!

Photofunia

I found a new photo editing website that is really fun to play around with. It is called PhotoFunia. i got carried away in making examples to blog about, but, i was having a good time! you go to the website and then just pick an effect to try. it will have you search for a photo on your computer and then you just hit "next". it is that easy. some of the effects are looking for "faces recognition" meaning you should pick a certain type of photo to fit into the effect. it'll say up top which type of photo works best in the effect. give it a try and let me know how you like it. you can check them out here. (and it is free!)

p.s. it's been 29 years ago today that John Lennon was murdered. Rip John.

only a few more days to enter my blog giveaway

Come see me in Manasquan this Saturday

I will be doing a soldering demo as i am taking orders for soldered anagram pendants this Saturday at Squan Dry Goods, in Manasquan. she is an upscale consignment shoppe for women and teens. the shoppe is fantastic and 2 floors of very reasonable, gently used clothing and accessories. her new venue is the jewelry room, which is where i will be at. stop by if you can and say hi!

so funny!

(As seen on the internet)

Greg sends along this DIY FYI:

"Good news is that I truly out did myself this year with my Christmas decorations. The bad news is that I had to take him down after 2 days. I had more people come screaming up to my house than ever.Great stories. But two things made me take it down.

First, the cops advised me that it would cause traffic accidents as they almost wrecked when they drove by.

Second, a 55 year old lady grabbed the 75 pound ladder almost killed herself putting it against my house and didn't realize it was fake until she climbed to the top (she was not happy). By the way, she was one of many people who attempted to do that. My yard couldn't take it either. I have more than a few tire tracks where people literally drove up my yard."

fun weekend

this weekend i taught a private jewelry class and then had my friend, jane over. Jane and i spent our late afternoon making a 16 page art journal, a La Teesha Moore. I set up 2 tables in our fireplace room in front of the Christmas tree. We listened to Christmas music and drank eggnog and brandy. now that is the way to do art with a friend! It was really fun and very easy. After making our journals, we got out our collage supplies and started working on some pages. Here are the 2 pages that i started. We stayed up til 1:30am in the morning working on them. Today after showering and getting our acts together we headed out to do some Christmas shopping and hit Anthropologie, Urban Outfitters, TJMaxx and we went to our new Barnes & Nobles. We had a late lunch before saying our goodbyes. it was a nice time.

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Earlier in the morning, before Jane arrived, I taught a private jewelry class for my client, Jamie and her daughter, Gabrielle. Jamie booked the time for Gabrielle' s birthday. i had them bring items that they might want to turn into a necklace, taught them wire wrapping, some component soldering and then we set out to trouble shoot how to take their items and turn into a necklace. it was a great time and they both left with finished pieces.

A December day in New York City

illegal photograph i took after the show was over (shhhhh!) they were doing a fund raiser for "Broadway Kids" and they were auctioning off the shirts they wore in the show. each shirt sold for $4500 each, plus they were autographed and the buyers got to go backstage, meet Jack and Daniel and have photos taken! the show was amazing and the acting superb! we were in awe at the drama that 2 actors and 2 chairs could make in 90 minutes. the show ends on Sunday.

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we couldn't get a cab at the end of the day, so ended up taking a rickshaw cart from 57th to 34th! it was fun though! this was our cute driver.

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awesome windows at Barney's
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not sure of the building here, but loved the snowflake that looked like it was just dangling freely in the sky!
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dillon thought this might be Trump Towers
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as seen in Henri Bendel's
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Dillon and Alana in "Candyland" at Toys-R-Us
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NYC/Times Square street scene!
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the ferris wheel at Toy-R-Us
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Rockefeller Center. See the tree over to the left?

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Dillon, me and his friend, Alana went into NYC today to see the broadway play "Steady Rain" with Hugh Jackman and Daniel Craig. it was really good. we had a great time. Dillon was quite shocked that Alana had never been to the Toys-r-us store in Times Square, so we put that on our list to do today. We also took her to Rockefeller Center to check out the tree. Since tonight was the tree lighting, we couldn't get too far into the tree area as it was all blocked off, but we could see it from where we were standing. we were there around 4pm and the ceremony wasn't until 8pm and we just didn't have it in us to stand there for 4 hours! we did some window shopping, saw some amazing window displays and beautiful NY city holiday decorations. it was a wonderful day!

if you've missed my previous posts about my blog giveaway, you can enter here.