Colorful

The painting in my last post that I embellished isn't the first one of Great Grandma V's paintings I've 'collaborated' with her on. The one above is another that I added something to, and that was one of the very few times I have ever worked in oils. (Can't stand the smell of turpentine...)

You see, the painting came to Bob & I and just wasn't our style at all. It didn't look like this photo, tho - it was incredibly faded, filled with washed-out colors in gloomy tones of browns, grays, and blacks. Even the green grass was brown, and the trees had no leaves, The whole painting gave me the feeling of a cold, dreary winter day. Add to that the fact that the little girl in the foreground used to have a frown on her face, and you can maybe see why it stayed in a closet for years!

Well, one day, I ran across it, and something inside of me woke up. This may be TMI for ya, but at that point in time, I had been battling depression for quite some time. For the year immediately preceding this event, I had been on medication and going through counseling. I had started a new job for the first time in many years (after working for myself), and so after a year of absolutely no creative activity at ALL (and that means no decorating either) one day I opened a closet, found this, and I decided to paint. I looked at this sad painting and decided that it expressed pretty much how I had been feeling for years, and I was ready to change that.

So I bought some oils and brushes and turpentine, set up my easel, and just started painting. I was listening to Vivaldi, my favorite composer, and I just began to add color and life to the painting - much like I wanted to add color and life to my own world again. I added a green wash to the grass, and planted blooming daffodils and white snapdragons in the field. I placed green leaves on the tree branches and then sprinkled in white lilacs, and reflected them in the water. I repainted the sky with clear blue and let a few fluffy white clouds in. I took the same blue and changed the dirty brown water to blue, and put in ripples so it looked as if the water was flowing down the stream. I repainted the sheep's wool and the little white cottage white (they had been dirty brown). Then I added rosy cheeks and a smile to the little girl's face, and bright colors to her dress, and added my initials to Great Grandma Venosdel's in the bottom corner.

It was as if I was recreating reality...good metaphor there, huh? I can honestly say that the music and the paint and giving myself the freedom to create something really was healing. Every time I look at this painting, I remember where I was then and where I am now, and I breathe a prayer of thanksgiving to God for bringing me through it. And I see this painting many times a day - it hangs in the entryway to our bedroom, along with another of Grandma V's compositions that I haven't touched and love to bits!

I've loved this red barn since the day I first saw it...

There are other paintings... some landscapes of mountain scenes that need new frames, and two portraits of girls. I like the 'pink rose girl' that is hanging in my office now - she reminds me of a lass overlooking the Irish countryside. Bob has loved 'the fountain girl' since he was a child. It is his very favorite painting, so I put it in the media room where he can enjoy it.

I love that there are many kinds of creativity running through our families, and that we can add layer after layer of our own talents into that history. And of course, I love that art is cathartic and healing and an expression of emotion. It has saved me over and over again.

Just before I began painting that picture, I found a quote in a book that I felt perfectly described me. I wrote it down in my journal, and I remember every word to this day... "It was as if her life was a watercolor painting left out in a rainstorm, and all of the color had run out of it." Luanne Rice wrote that in her book 'Home Fires', a paperback romance novel I had picked up at the library. When I read that sentence back then, I fell apart. When I just typed it
now, I teared up to think that I had been that lifeless. And I thanked God for handing me a brush and some paint and leading me to add some color back into my world....

About Me

 

If you're wondering just who this crazy blogging addict gal is, here's a bit about me... I'm a California girl, born & raised. I grew up just miles from Disneyland, and it influenced my life in more ways than one. I'm the oldest of five siblings - two brothers, two sisters, and me - and the first of seven grandchildren. I'm a Rebel, a flag chick, an artist, a Blue Ocean thinker, and a born-again Christian.  (However, I define myself as a 'Person of Faith' because for me, it's not about religion or church.)

In addition to retail, I've also worked as a ride operator at Knott's Berry Farm (Parachute Jump!), taught art to gifted elementary school kids, sunday school to elementary, junior high, and high school kids, and colorguard/flags to junior high & high school kids. I've organized & produced craft shows and band & colorguard competitions, am a trained crisis counselor, and sang in a trio at church for most of my childhood.

 

I am also a retail visual designer, speaker, and writer. For over thirty four years, I have worked in the retail field as a display stylist & store designer, studied interior design and marketing, and consulted with businesses to assist them in presenting themselves and their products more effectively. My seminars, videos, articles, and blogs provide tools to help independent merchants build better businesses. And I have three unwritten business books in my head!

I'm married to the love of my life, Bob. We met in junior high and, actually, we hated each other then. ;0) We met at work a few years later, while we were in high school, and it was kismet - Cupid shot us both! We married one year to the day after our first date, and have spent the last 30 years together. He is my best friend, my partner, and my soul mate, and I am blessed to have him by my side every day in life, love, and business.

I am mom to four: Jeni, Bethany, Joel, and Brianna. This picture is of all four of them, plus Joel's wife Ashley and son Jameson. Jeni's hubby Joel (yes, that gets confusing!), Bethany's hubby Jason and son Troy, and Brianna's hubby Brandon weren't here for this photo. They are all my favorite people, and I love watching them grow and discover who they are in life. It's been a lot of fun being a young mom to this crazy crew of Kennedys. I am so very proud of each of them!

I am grandma to two: Troy Michael is our first grandchild - he's our daughter Bethany's son, and lives half an hour from us. We love spending time with him and watching him grow from a baby into a little boy! Troy Michael has an older step sister named Hope... she lives in Texas now. We are grammy & grampy to her, too, but we don't get to see her. Hopefully we will someday....

Jameson Ward is our second grandson, and he's our son Joel's boy. They live in San Antonio Texas, which makes it a bit harder for grammy & grampy to get some cuddlin' in. We see him as often as we can, and always think he's grown incredibly.

I live with my darling hubby on a farm on an island in Washington state. We've been here a short time, but after moving a lot for ministry and jobs, it is the only place we have ever felt like 'Home' in.  It's a simple beach house and farm buildings, in sight of the ocean - a lifelong dream for us. I'm big on seasonal decorating and change things here all the time! We have big plans for this place and our business....

 

We call our businessRetreat. We design & manufacture furniture and home accessories, using recycled-reclaimed-redesigned materials like salvage and junk! We sell our products through boutiques and at vintage-style shows, like the Farm Chicks and BarnHouse in Washington state. The best friends in my life are the amazing and fun women and men who inhabit this industry of antiques, vintage style, flea markets, shops, and booths....they truly inspire me.

 I blog because I love to write, I love to share inspiration, and I love to make friends. I started blogging after my friend Amy Powers of Inspire Company suggested that I jump in, and I'll be forever grateful for her help in setting up my first blog. Since then, I've learned a lot more about HTML, coding, images, and links than I ever thought possible - I've even designed & set up blogs for other people!

I've made so many amazing friends all over the world through blogging... social networking and blogs have opened up huge windows of opportunity for creative women to connect with one another, and that is a great thing in my book! We all have so much to offer one another, so much to share and connect over. I'm so thankful that you are visiting my blog....  and I thank you so much for sharing your day with me.

A Creative Play Day!

I shared yesterday that I had been inspired by this book to get into creative mode... well, here's the first project that resulted from the book's inspiration and my mind running all night! I got up this morning and went out to my barn to find the previously mentioned ugly painting. You have to SEE this 'before shot' to believe it:

Dear Great Grandma Venosdale, we love you, and your talent is amazing, so we have to ask ourselves WHAT were you thinking here, hon? This just screams "1970" to me! But with inspiration, even really tacky art can become...well, really creative art! ;0) Caveat: I do not think this method would be able to help those paintings on velvet. I may be wrong here, but for MY purposes, I'll not be attempting that. No 'Velvet Elvis' paintings from Deb. Nuh uh.

So, anyway, I took grandma's ugly poppy painting and used white paint to neutralize those hideous orange colors. Oi. I covered up the poppies and the pot and part of the 'table', and then drybrushed some white onto the 'barn boards' background. I highlighted some of the branches and leaves and small flowers. It was gettin' better already! Then I cut shapes from sheet music that turned the pot into an urn, covered the pitcher, and also added in a snipped of music and a few seed packets. I left some of the corners unglued so they added shadows and dimension to the piece.

I cut a motif out of some vintage wallpaper and added that to the urn. Then I tore some pieces of the wallpaper, and glued them on the 'barn boards' behind the arrangement.

Then I placed moss at the top edge of the urn, and started gluing on flowers... silk & fabric flowers, ribbon flowers, bejeweled button flowers, and flowers made from vintage crepe paper. Millinery leaves and some velvet ribbon ended up in there, too. I was so excited at this point, watching the effect of this bouquet as it came to 'life':

This sideview shot shows how dimensional the piece is becoming... and below, some close-up details:

I decided that it needed a little more contrast, so I used a black artist pencil to scribble, edge, and smudge some black into some areas. It really added to the 3-D effect.

And as a last touch, I added fine glitter to the beads in the tiniest flowers, medium glitter to the urn itself, and big chunky glassine glitter to the stamens in the poppies. The photos don't show it very well, but this baby just sparkles!!!

Gotta' tell ya, I had more FUN working on this today! It was like Kindergarten all day - paper and glue, me humming and dancing to my MP3 player tunes and fueling up on Vanilla Coke.

And, as often happens, while I was thoroughly engaged in this project, my brain solved a few challenges on other projects that I've been stymied by. Amazing how that works, huh? Creativity is a river - it chooses it's own path. And this path is leading me right into a buncha' new products! Fun Fun Fun... (BTW, this particular painting is not for sale, since my hubby's great grandma painted it. It's staying right here in my studio)

Reading Aids

We stopped by the used bookstore today, and I found a 'new to me' book that just jumped off the shelves and into my hands. It's 'Beautiful Bedrooms with Ribbons & Trims' from Tinsel Trading Company. (Links below) And THIS is what happens when Deb gets a hold of a book with creative ideas in it, my friends. Can't see it? Look below...

I read books with a notepad, a pen, and a stack of stickynotes at hand. And my glasses. sigh. By the time I am done, every third or fourth page is marked with a Post-it note (thank you Remy & Michelle! ;0) ) or two, or three, scribbled with ideas that rush into my brain as I view photos of fabulous creations. This whole darned book is sporting flaggy things out the top and side now, evidence of the power of the stunning photos and ideas to jump-start the creative side of anyone's brain!!

This one, for example: Marcia Ceppos (TTC proprietress and creative director/designer, and author of this book) took an old painting and collaged it, using faux flowers & leaves, ribbons, and whatnot. I have in my possession one of the most hideously colored paintings of orange poppies you've ever seen. God love my husbands' great grandma...most of her paintings are stunning (and we have LOTS of them). But THAT one? Notsomuch. I already sold the frame that it was in, but am stuck with the painting. Now I know what to do with it! (And I am so excited that I very nearly went out to the barn in the dark to get it and start tonight...but I'll wait...)

More ideas in there have me imagining all kinds of lovelies for our upcoming Spring Garden Party Retreat themes, and of course our booth at Farm Chicks. I've long admired the visual merchandising & display of Rosemary Warren, TTT's 'visualist' (LOVE that term!) and she has worked her magic again in the pages of this book. Just beautiful!

(You know, I really shouldn't read stuff like this at nine PM....my brain will be running for HOURS now.)

Available on amazon.com

Meet My Grandson!

Thanks to my daughter, 'Aunt Jeni'!, here's a video of my sweet baby grandson, Jameson Ward Kennedy, from Texas. Now do you see why I'm so over the moon in love with him?!

Oh, how I wish I could just reach in there and touch those chubby little chipmunk cheeks!

A 'Working' Weekend (and I use that term lightly...)

We had a visitor this weekend... isn't he regal? (I am still trying to figure out how this HUGE eagle balanced on that tiny treetop!) After watching him for awhile, we headed off for an evening at Willows Lodge, dinner out, and then the Seattle Gift Show... and OH was it a treat to not be creating displays or speaking this time.

Lord help me, I love Lollia's booths at shows! For SO many reasons. They just rock visual design and merchandising, lemme' tell ya'. The sweet petite gal working the booth told me that she set it up mostly by herself, since her crew of 'big brawny men' kinda' cut out of there early. (Isn't that just the way of it, though?! We women, we make the world go 'round!) She did a STELLAR job - Women just stand in front of this and sigh.

Ok sorry but in my opinion, the show wasn't 'all that'. At all. There were a few really great booths, a few new products that stood out, but overall the highlight was Lollia. And of course, running into friends: Lisa, Columbia Winery's former ('retired and loving it'!) buyer, Gary and Darlene who work at the show, Dian - sales rep for Jennifer Osner's FAB.u.lous textiles (and I got my hands on the last snippet of that gorgeous French organza pleated trim....thank you, Dian!), Kimberly from Faded Elegance, and Kim & Claudette, the Flutterby Girls! They came from Yakima to shop, and we met up for a quick lunch. SO much fun, these two spunky sisters who really have a handle on retail (but not their blog....hmmmmm....we talked about this....I'm trying to figure out if I can help them). I met the girls at Farm Chicks last year, and filmed one of my video segments in their booth. And can you even believe that me, miss 'I am SO blogging this', TOTALLY forgot to have Mr. Deb take a picture of us together?? I get so distracted, I swear.... Kim and Claudette, thank you for sharing your time with us!

The funniest part of the day was after we left the show. We decided to stop into our fave Ballard haunt, ReStore, but didn't find anything. In the store, that is. We drove out of the lot and right next to us was their waste bin....

Do YOU see that? Well, I did! I screeched and Bob stopped and then, bless his heart, he got out of the truck and dug thru that waste bin to snag the cut-up bits of old wooden gutter that were in it. (And he was all dressed up, too! Whatta' guy!)

On our way to the freeway, I spied something else: (I can't help it, my eyes are constantly scanning for cute shops or thrift stores...or junk on the side of the road)

A desk, sitting on the sidewalk. Free. You know where this ended up, right?! Bob flipped a U-ie and we loaded it up into the truck. It's in perfect condition, too...that's just a fuzzy-because-I-took-it-fast-as-I-was-jumping-out-of-the-truck-in-heels photo.

Who needs a gift show when you can shop like this?!!!!

Oh yeah, yesterday we got another table off of Craigslist. I love this business!
That desk is now a gorgeous silky black, joined by a round pedestal table that Mr. Deb made from parts. There's also a low tea table and a new lamp that are white - all going into Faded Elegance today because we sold a bunch in there this weekend. The Craigslist table will be painted white and held for the new Retreat setup going into Faded Elegance in a few weeks. A very relaxing and yet productive weekend!

Drumroll, Please...

OK, girls, it's time to bestow the pretty pink prize!

There were so many lovely comments from so many sweet friends - some long-time readers and some who just found me - and a little bit of begging (just a little!), which made it absolutely imperative that I was impartial. Sooooo, I asked Mr. Deb to help out by choosing a number.

Without a moment's hesitation, he chose number...

And that makes our winner Christine, the seventh commenter!

(Well, I'll be darned....if that isn't the Universe's way of rewarding her for random acts of kindness, like giving away her whole collection of Victoria magazines, I don't know what is!)

Miss Christine, I'll be emailing you shortly to arrange for delivery of your Pink Package. Congratulations!

And thank you to everyone for entering! I'll have more giveaways in the months to come... there's more where that came from, so stay tuned!

Working Girl

I've finally had time to get my office/studio organized(...yeah, you know, the cleaning part you have to do before you can get to the FUN part of decorating?!!) It took two days of some heavy-duty overhauling, due to the fact that when we moved in I was basically just stuffing things into drawers and closets and shelves. Now I can actually find stuff in here! Then I armed myself with a buncha black & white things I've been collecting to spiff up the room, and spent a day making it look like a designer might just actually work here. sheesh.

No, that is not my entire stash of books & magazines - I still have to add all of the copies of Victoria that sweet Chris gave me, and all of my personal reading material is elsewhere! Lay of the land: From this vantage point, the door is to the right, the window to the left, and the computer to the left. Directly behind me when I took this photo is the big wall o' mirrors that makes my office look huge. (However, it also makes any mess look twice as bad...catch 22!)

I'm right here on the computer, right now. (If you look to the right of my monitor in this shot, you'll see two photos of the two most adorable boys in the world...my grandsons!) When I'm not here, I'm working at the black stand-up worktable, creating something like stylesheets or products made from vintage goodies. The window overlooks our front yard, the neighborhood, and if I stand up and look out to the right, I can see a peek of the bay between neighbor's houses. And the shutters (funky, I know, to not have them match, but I'm just that kind of girl) keep me from feeling like I am the one on display - but I can still see lots of blue sky above them. When the fog clears, that is. (The fog WILL clear someday, wont' it???)

OK, a few detail shots, and then I have to get to work!

The sweet little butterfly vase was a gift from my client & friend Fran, and I can't wait to be able to fill it with daffodils! I have more decor to add in here, like a suitable valance on the window...I'm just not sure what that will be yet. I do have an idea to create a little black & white striped awning of sorts, with kind of a Bistro feel to it. We'll see how that goes!

Well, it's time to punch the clock! I need to get busy on Retreat stuff.

Meanwhile, have you entered the drawing for my Plethora of Pink Giveaway yet? Bettter hurry, I'm drawing a name tonight! And I found a few more treasures to add to the stash, too...

A New Day

For all that has been said, for all that it means to so many, for all that has passed in History...

From here, we go forward

A Sweetheart of a Giveaway!

In the spirit of all things pink, pouffy, and sweet, I am giving away a plethora of pink prettiness - just in time for Valentine's Day decorating, crafting, and gift-giving!

This is the motherload, my friends... I was digging thru boxes and bins as I cleaned out my office/studio this weekend, and was absolutely stunned by the sheer amount of things I had stowed away and forgotten about! I want to share the love, so most of it went into this avalanche of pink to be passed on for enjoyment by one of you very special girls!

Just how much pink, you ask? Take a peek:

(BTW, the sweet vintage apron has five heart-shaped pockets!)

It contains the aforementioned vintage apron, miscellaneous paper sheets & scraps, note cards, paper & satin ribbons, seam bindings, buttons, red & white bakery twine, cards, stickers, bows, silk & velvet flowers, velvet leaves, fruit, thread, pompoms, sheet music, stenographer's tablet pages, flower seeds, pink plastic balloon cake decorations, pencils, a diminuitive pink velvet 'FooFooFauxFood' cake made by moi, and a fuzzy little pink bunny. (And I may find even more to add in, you never know...) You can click on the photos to see more details!

So, my dears, would YOU like to have this perfectly pink package delivered to your doorstep? If so, please leave me a comment telling me how you found my blog, (following a link, via a search for - and please tell me what you were searching for! - or however you found me) and I'll enter your comment in the drawing!

I'll be chosing a random winner from all of the comments with answers collected through 8 PM PST on Thursday, January 22, and will announce the winner here on Friday, January 23. I wonder who will be Tickled Pink?!!!!