What a Week & A Bit of Art Making

Yikes It's been one of those weeks where the days go by so fast if you stopped to take a look you got left behind!!

Today is the last day of Mazatlan International Moto Week.

This is the signal that business and tourism will slow way down. On one hand everyone looks forward to it :) On the other hand it also signals the beginning of the season of Economical starvation. :( Because we are in reality a resort town our economy relies heavily on the tourist income. Every year a number of businesses close because they can't make it till Oct. This year may prove to be an impossible one for more then the usual amount of business because of the US, & World economies.

Jackie P and I have pretty much got ourselves on a bit of a routine for her care. :) We more then likely have another week or two before they can do any kind of surgery. Then we will decide how to go from there.

I did manage to get a few things made last week. I don't know about you but I'm a much happier (& I'm sure easier to live with) girl if I can play in My Little Art Corner for even a few minutes every day :) I don't have to get a project done or even progress very far. It's that my imagination has a bit of time to come out and play.

I've noticed that a number of Mexican jewelry artists have been creating wire wrapped crosses. Oh some are soooo beautiful and oh so costly :( I had an old chunky silver and red colored stone cross, that was in a bunch of "thangs" an Expat headed north left behind. That's what I used as the base. Then at the bead store I found these ever so cool freshwater pearls?? that were in the shape of crosses. With a bit of wire and dark brown faceted beads I wrapped the pearl cross on top of the silver/stone one. Then right in the center of both crosses I wrapped a little blue heart. I know I've mentioned before that sterling silver, (which by the way is always stamped 925 on the back instead of sterling here.) is such a time consuming pain in the as... toosh to take care of. Oye! especially in the humid rainy season!! Silver will tarnish while you are wearing it!! I've gotten to the point of finding other imaginative ways of wearing pendents, instead of using a silver chain. :) Soft double sided satin ribbon is so simple and dare I use the word... romantic looking. I take a little stroll up our street and at the end of the block is a little Papelaria (paper goods store) that sells tons of ribbon in different widths, sadly no velvet. I can't find velvet anywhere in town :( I now string my necklaces on a piece of ribbon that matches my mood that day :)

I'm slowly getting things made for my "Girly Girl" room. More about a "nother" time. Jackie D passed on to me ( no she didn't pass on it's the mirror she passed on!! ) one of those very inexpensive sorta wood framed mirrors, I beat it up a bit painted 2 coats of alternating crackle medium and white paint. I found that if I do more then one layer of crackled paint it looks tons more like it aged naturally instead of the out of a bottle yesterday look. Then topped it off with my secret antiquing formula (brown&natural shoe wax) and a good buffing with LW's shoe brush. I don't think confessing this will get me into to much hot water. The shoe shine kit is a very unused item here!! :) hmmm LW?? On the mirror I sanded off spots of the silvering and and glue copies of clip art to show through the front. Added some raw umber patina to the silver hooks so they would look a bit aged.

Four years ago on the 15th of April LW and I became room mates, I made a gift of a little tag book for him. I found a package of match boxes. They are about twice the size of the smaller wood kitchen match boxes. I printed out an open book cover piece of clip art I found on The Graphic Fairy blog. Then glued, aged, fluffed, and decoupaged it to the match box. I painted the sides to look like the pages in a closed book. Gave it the title "Love Letters"

EERRGGHH why did blogger turn this upside down????

I made my tags a size that would fit into the "book" Since I have never done any kind of scrapbooking the only exposure to "tags" I had was years ago the old Victoria Magazine did a feature on Sarah Lugg and her simple collages made with tags. I have always admired them and when left to my own choice those are the kind of tags I enjoy making the most. So for LW's book I spelled out the word love, one letter on each page/tag. The cover has another piece of clip art of a love letter I think it's also from the Graphics Fairy. I never miss her little daily offerings, she has the best clip art and we are lucky she shares her collection with us :) On the inside of the cover is a picture of a pewter heart. That little heart was in the first bouquet LW gave me. Funny how these simple expressions of love are cherished and mean more then expensive elaborate gifts.

L is dried Basil leaves

O is a piece of sea glass inside a drawn heart and has on O painted on it.

V is 2 small end branches of bamboo we have on the patio

E is black pepper corns.

I finished off the backs with copies of pictures that make my heart smile. then tied them together with a bit of old twine

That's pretty much what I've been up to lately. Gads I really didn't set out to write an epistle today but I have rambled a bit. So much for that Blog tip of sticking to 300 or less words. But then I've never been very good at following the should and must do rules. I figure that if you are tired of reading my post you are more then capable of hopping to the next one. Ya know some days you feel like a Chatty Cathy and some days not :)

So those of you that have hung out with me to the very end thanks for stopping by to see what I've been up to. :) And have a most audacious today or tomorrow depending on where in the world you are ;)

A Friend In Deed & Tid Bits

Things have been a bit hectic here. We have a very close friend who retired and moved here a few months before we did. We hadn't met before we all moved here but she and LW knew a number of the same people, because their respective professions overlapped. But as happens occasionally we have become great friends right from the start. Jackie and I try to have a girl's lunch every couple of weeks. One of the international companies that she worked for hired her for a short 3 month consulting job in Mali (Africa) So 5 weeks ago we put her on the plane for a 24+ hour trip to Mali. Last week I got a call from her daughter. Jackie had fallen and shattered her left shoulder could we pick her up at the air port the next day. Well Of course!! Next morning daughter calls and said Mom was air evacuated to Paris to stabilize her and would fly in on the red eye Friday night. Jackie is one of those amazing people that should have died at birth but has such a strong will to live that she has recovered from any number of illnesses that anyone else would have died from. And she just did it again. She has diabetes and because of the trauma her glucose levels were all over the place. Thus the trip to Paris. Well she is home now and waiting until the swelling goes down enough to do surgery on her shoulder. In the mean time she needs to keep her arm immobile. That's where I come in. "Have Nurse Friend will Travel" :) So we have been making trips back and forth across town. Well a girl needs to clean up and fru fru a bit once a day you know ;) I'm not minding a bit cuz her condo is on the eleventh floor over looking the beach. There aren't to many better views in Mazatlan!!

LW found this tid bit in the Mexico City news This is a Lenten tradition that has been done for years. Even if it means you have to spend a bit of your siesta time sitting in the corner. :)
"One of the weird Sábado de Gloria traditions, which are an excuse to break the Lenten solemnity a bit early, are water fights between housewives. With water rationing (both to recharge the dangerously low reservoirs and to repair the water system) in Mexico City, the police have been arresting people for wasting resources. While most arrests have been of people doing things like washing their cars over the three day water suspension, these Wet n’ Wild women went off to be “socially readapted” for a couple of hours… and dry out."

Hmmm makes you wonder what they gave up for Lent don't you think?? :)

Before I take off for bed, early shower call at the other end of town in the morning. No sleeping till noon and laying around eating bonbons :) I wanted to pass on the latest news about Liza's project Blogway that was scheduled for May 1st. Looks like there is a bit of a delay, which for me is a "good thing". If you haven't already joined in the fun head over and sign up to create an outfit out of recycled materials. If you have signed up the delay info is posted on the blog also.

Annalise can't wait to walk the catwalk in the creation I'm suppose to come up with.

Gads even with the reprieve that Divine Vision better hurry up and show it's self the clock is ticking as they say :) But I have been collecting some ever so chic materials, plastic grocery bags, bubble wrap, duct tape.... no way I'm not spilling any more. You'll just have to wait and see. In the mean time join the fun if you haven't already.

Have a most audacious today or tomorrow depending on where in the world you are ;)

Yikes Our Beach on Steroids

Pictures of Coney Island in the early 1920s

I hope your Easter Day was a delightful day filled with plenty of opportunities to make many wonderful memories.

We had a nice quiet day. We did our best to stay away from the beach side of town. This week is Samana Santa (Holy Week) This week is also Spring break week for the entire country of Mexico. Mazatlan is a resort town, and when people go on vacation they love to go to the BEACH. We are a quiet small city of 400,000 This weekend the population exploded to 800,000 :( We are absolutely sure that the extra 400,000 bodies were all packed along the beach side of town. I figure it's just a darn good thing we are not an island cuz we would have been in danger of flipping over if we were :)

Ha you think I'm exaggerating?? Well these are pictures of our beach (the one that's closest to us so of course it's ours) on most of the 345 days a year. So nice beautiful, calm relaxing a true slice of paradise.

This is the beach this weekend. Well at least I think it's our beach, but I couldn't swear that there is sand under all those bodies!!

Thus LW quip about our beach on Steroids ;) But you must admit that it's a perfect description ;)

This is the traffic on the Melacon (the sea wall) headed north to the resort area of the town!! No it's not a parking lot !! This is early afternoon headed north just reverse the picture come sundown when everyone heads back to change so that they can spend the rest of the night doing the promanade. Down one end around the sheild monument back up to the other end around Playa Bruja's turn around and down we go again :( Woo Hoo and Motor Cycle week (translate one of the largest cycle gatherings in Mexico) starts Thursday. Oye I can't hardly wait!! That is until we have our quiet little city back to ourselves!!

Have a most audacious today or tomorrow my Bloglandian friends depending on where in the world you are ;)

Sniffles

We have a good case of the sniffles here. LW woke up this past weekend with a silly cold. Because we tend to share things at our little casa, I woke up a couple of days ago with yep that silly cold. You know in a healthy human a viral infestation (cold) is not life threatening. There also is no cure for the common cold and it last 7-10 days. Knowing all that still doesn't make me any more willing to share my body with a bunch of rapidly multiplying ungrateful squatters!! :(

I'm sure this is rather a lame excuse for not accomplishing much this week but that's just the way it is. But since I have been sitting here at my little desk not making anything I have been doing a bit of site exploring. I love hopping over to the Scandinavian countries in Bloglandia. You can find a number of my favorites listed under Beautiful Visual Noise there on the right. I think there must be a rule that you must have the most beautifully decorated homes and you must be able to take amazing photos, in order to have a Scandinavian blog . Some of these gals blogs are nothing short of amazing!! Besides that they always seem to have the most wonderful simple, comfortable decorations. Old rusty crowns, rather beat up chalk boards, speckled eggs (we won't dwell on the fact that there are NO eggs other then the ones with chicks in them here in Mazatlan), tarnish, rusty bird cages, old linens, market baskets, well you get the idea. :)

So as I'm blissfully blog hopping I find a referral for the most AWESOME web site. This is soooooo amazingly cool, beautiful and I want that and that and that oh and that !! The name of my new found Nirvana is "Mothology" do you guys know about it?? Probably I'm usually the last one to find these little gems. Well if you don't you just have to fix yourself a nice cup of tea or pour a lovely glass of wine and sit down for a wonderful visit. I would recommend you leave your visa in the hands of a very responsible person who will not give in to all manners of begging, tears, promises or threats!! :)

All pictures courtesy of the Mothology Web Site.

Have a most audacious today or tomorrow my bloglandian friends depending on where in the world you are ;)

There is a Very Tall Building Some Where...

...in Mexico that is filled from the basement to the upper most floor with copies of forms official forms ;). Anything that is official, should or could be official, wants to be official, or even looks a bit official and you most certainly will need at least 3 copies of said forms :). I have asked my Mexican friends, especially my hermanita Martha who is always dealing with different departments in the government where oh where do all these copies go. Their response is always the same, a shoulder shrug followed by an eye roll and an I don't know. This just goes to prove my theory: there is a huge building somewhere in Mexico full of all the copies and carbons of all the forms that must be submitted in multiples. :)

Once a year we must renew our visas. We have FM3 visa. If you come to visit you fill out a tourist visa good for up to 6 months. Our FM3s are renew once a year, at that time we take copies of our current FM3s US passports copies of our last 3 bank statements, electric bill and any other papers they might think they want to see. Everything goes to the immigration office in triplicate, along with a letter of request to renew our visas for another year. You pay the required fee at the bank, which issues a... you got it a copy of your payment :) That you take back to immigration and present the whole packet to the clerk who looks it over if they approve they stamp the date your renewed visas will be ready for you to pick up (usually 2-3 weeks in the future) When it's ready you pick it up and you are good for another year.

The date written on ours for pick up is the 23rd of this month. But I am still no closer to finding an answer to "Where do all the copies go??"

Sorry can't help myself I just had to share this little elfin picture with you :)

Have a most audacious today or tomorrow my bloglandian friends depending on where in the world you are ;)

Spring Cleaning My Little Art Corner

I guess I knew it was time to hog out My Little Art Corner when I caught LW on the patio trying to teach Rubi and Charli (the Chihuahuas) how to be search and rescue dogs :)

My Little Art Corner in reality comprises two inside corners and maybe 1/4th of the Sun room. This is the room we do 80% of our living in. It's a wonderful huge room on the second floor with the west wall being all windows. That allows us to get a bit of the ocean breeze and the windows are frosted so that cuts down on the heat a bit. Our computers, all our books and magazines, an amazingly comfy couch and chair to sit and read in, even a little table to eat at. What else? Oh yeah the ipod and a CD player what more could you want?? A TV you say, hmmmm sorry no TV didn't have room in the 5'/8' trailer for one when we moved down 3 years ago and have been way to busy to go buy a replacement :) LW has his computer set up in the opposite corner from me. This way we each have our own little space but still be able to spend time together.

LW's corner always looks like this, and the rest of the room remains picked up.

Then there is My Little Art Corner :) Bless LW he never ever says a word no matter how much visual noise there is over here. Not even when the visual noise morphs into visual chaos!!

In Feb.we bought a friend's cheap chip board cupboard to put art supplies and my ever growing stash piles in. It has a set of doors which on one hand is very nice but on the other you can't always see what's in it. But it does cut down on the continual assault of the BLACK dust that sticks to everything.

It took me a whole day but I got it cleaned and organized :) I'm feeling mighty good about it actually. In this little 6'/10' space I have my vintage ceder desk, computer desk (which has my lap top and sewing machine on it), copier sitting on a Rubbermaid storage tub, our old dresser, the cupboard, the chihuahuas' crate, a side table and the gooshy orange reading chair. Less I forget the most important piece of equipment the osculating fan!! Anyway I'm sure you would agree that's a whole lot of jun..mmm valuable equipment in one little corner. I do everything here except cut out patterns. For that I use the little dining room table on the other side of the room.

Well there you have it, my clean Little Art Corner. It's not ever going to make the pages of Where Women Create but that's okay. Now the next project is to have LW make a cork board so that I can quit putting holes in the wall with all those little pieces of inspiration you collect along the way :) Have a most audacious Sunday or Monday my Bloglandian friends depending on where in the world you are ;)

PS
I'm sorry I didn't get this posted last evening as planned. I wasn't staying on task very well and time seems to have gotten away from me :( I'm sure you remember that yesterday was Saturday, and Saturday is always Date night for us :) Well we are still in the Spring Time of our love for each other!! Saturday, is our time to ourselves, we shut out the rest of the world and focus on us. :) Soooooo any way I ran out of time and had to put you on hold till today. But I'm back and will get a few pictures uploaded and get this puppy posted.

Woo Hoo She Passed :)

Remember a couple of months ago when I explained the contract we were going to set up with Dulce?? Dulce is our little 17 &1/2 year old house keeper. LW cleaned up a friend's computer so that Dulce could buy it at a very low cost and on installments.

We were hoping it would be an added incentive to remain in school. Part of the contract states she must remain in school until her 18th birthday. Well I'm happy to report that she loves her new computer, and has been using it to study with. She makes a weekly payment of $100 pesos (<$10US) and has 4 more payments :)

I thought I might just share her accomplishments this year. When she started cleaning and spending time with us she began to see that with an education she doesn't have to settle for the same life as the other women in her neighborhood and family have. She and I have a mutual admiration for each other. She has learned from me how important an education is to opening the doors to your dreams. I have learned from her the strength of character needed by a young woman to obtain an education here. Dulce had missed so much school that it wasn't until spring 2007 that she graduated from Primary School. It was fall of 2007 that she started Secondary (jr high) Last year was exceedingly difficult. All her girlfriends where dropping out of school and having babies. She was stuck in classes with 11&12 years old that continually assaulted her self esteem. None of us were sure (not even her) if she would go back this year. But she did :) And she started taking after school classes so that she could challenge the secondary school curriculum. Then came the all day test to challenge courses. She use her computer to study for the last sets of tests. With each set of challenge tests she became a little more confident in herself and her abilities. At Christmas she announced that she intended to challenge the entire secondary curriculum this spring, so that when school starts in the fall she will start high school!! She intends to study and challenge as many HS courses as she can, then apply to University at the Naval Academy!!!!! Last Friday was the last set of tests, and she was really feeling the self doubt creeping in. So we came up with a mantra "I can do this I will do this I AM INTELLIGENT!!" We all sweated bullets..... DO you want to know how she did????

SHE PASSED EVERYTHING!!!!! SHE ACED IT ALL!!!!!! She will start high school in the fall

Will I stop worrying about her finishing school now??? No way, she still lives in a society where higher education is frivolous and unnecessary. It's very likely that she will fall in love with a young man who works in the trades and sees no reason why she would want to go to school. But you know what? If that is want happens that's okay. She has already learned that you can dream big and if you want it bad enough and work hard enough you can make your dreams come true.

"The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams" Elenore Roosevelt


Have a most audacious day or evening my Bloglandian friends depending on where in the world you are ;)