Tag : Marvin

38 posts

What a wild ride at the beginning and end of my winter break. We’ve had snow storms that bookended the time off.

Winter break started two hours early with an early release due to weather. Now we are having our second snow day in a row! That just doesn’t happen!! Can’t say I’m sad about two full weeks off.

Leading up to break we did a couple fun things at school such as winter week theme days, treats and even pancake breakfast cooked by our administrators.

We each got a mug to fill with treats. I decided to add a my signature flower as well as my name to my mug.

Our special education team had a week long secret Santa exchange…this was day 1 for me.

I also made a bunch of Gnome ornaments for work friends. I’ll do a separate post on how I made those.

Christmas is a favorite time for Marvin. He loves a good box.

And bows!! Bows are his favorite. We actually save them so he can have some to play with all year long.

Mini-me got him this very special bow. He LOVES it!

The whole family was off work between Christmas and New Years. The company Mr. G works for generally closes that week and J took the week off so he could move. Yep you heard me…he moved out. He is living in a house in the neighboring town with one of his buddies from high school. Of course with the crazy horrible weather yesterday, we went and picked him up from work and brought him here for the night. None of the roads were plowed and his little sedan would have never made it. Thank goodness for four wheel drive.

New Years Eve we went for brunch at Hell’s Kitchen and enjoyed some great live music.

And a massive Bloody Mary! I couldn’t eat more than a couple bites of my meal after that. Lucky for me, I had a good leftover lunch the next day! 

I’ve been doing a bit a creating as well such as this card from scraps laying around my desk. There are a few journal pages as well but that will be a different post.

Hello and welcome to another edition of T stands for Tuesday.

It’s been a pretty standard week for me…work, home and errands keep me busy. I was tasked with a project by Mini-me though. She has been playing Minecraft for 10 years now. If you’ve never heard of it, here’s a very basic explanation…it is pixel and block based building game so everything is square but check out the link if you want to know more.

She wanted to make the windows in her room look like glass blocks in Minecraft.

Out came the Silhouette portrait machine. We fudged the blocks slightly so that they would be attached for easy placement. Something you’d never notice on the final product unless I told you.

My crafty neighbor had gifted me with some white vinyl a while back, I wasn’t sure how it would work but Lord knows I kept it just in case. It actually worked perfectly!

 

Look at the fun shadows it creates as the sun sets.

I can’t leave without sharing a sweet photo of Marvin on Caturday Saturday.

And this is just a photo of Marvin being very helpful as Mini-me works on her classes.

I’m totally loving my new mugs with one minor issue…I usually bring a cup of coffee with me to drink on my way to work. My new mugs do not fit in the cup holder of my van. Yes, I use really mugs with open tops in the van. I’m a nut, its okay, I’m good with it.

What are you doing today?

I feel like I should have a virtual loading bar on my activities. I have many things in progress and I’m excited about all of them!

Journal progress

I gutted a book from the 50s that I knew would never hold up to the abuse that I would put it through. I liked the orange cover and mid-century motif but it was a bit damaged on the back. I decided to cover it with some Tim Holtz tissue and go from there.

I used some transparent pink paint over top of the tissue for a little better color once I had picked out the inner spine fabric and end pages. Pink is a favorite of mine. I’m so not a girlie girl but I do love pink.

I stitched in my signatures….

and now I need to take it back apart…ugh. The book no longer sits nicely. Is it fine? It would work but it would bug me every single time I used it. I should have left more space between the signatures.

Plant babies

My seedlings are doing quite well. I’m just about ready to transplant the tomatoes into larger pots.

The nasturtium seeds I saved last summer are baby plants now! I started a few more plants just last week. So excited for those. I’m planning to try the leaves and flowers in salads this year. I’m also going to save some of the blossoms for tea. I have no idea if I’ll like it but I’ve heard it good.

Maybe I’ll use these fancy little cups that I can’t seem to part with. They are so pretty.

My radishes have  sprouted…unfortunately its been cold and there is snow in the forecast.

They are all tucked into bed now…so punny.

I also had to share my thrift store score. I got all of this paper for under $5. Stacks and stacks of good sized scraps and three paper pads. Crazy! I’m looking forward to making a bunch more cards.

Fan favorite- Marvin

This picture was just too cute not to share. He is laying on his “security bag”. It’s a reusable shopping bag that he immediately claimed. He gets upset when I move it to vacuum. So we have a bag that permanently lives on our living room floor. He’s not spoiled at all. But who could say no to that face.

What are you doing today?

I’m not really sure where to start so I think it would be best to start with a fan favorite…

Marvin being Marvin.

Taking up the most amount of space in the most inconvenient place at the most inconvenient time. Good thing we love him so much because he’s kind of a pain in the @$$.

Creating routine

I’m slowly starting to get a minimal routine of crafting/creating. It seems to happen during laundry time since I’m in that zone anyway. Whatever works right?!?!

I thought the word sticker was perfect for a journal page…especially one that I actually wrote some thoughts down upon.

I journaled about getting my first COVID-19 vaccine dose, creating and doing our taxes. Can you guess how I’d rank those from best to worst?

One of these was in order at the end of a productive weekend that also included some shoveling. I was super impressed that my arm wasn’t that sore after my shot. I did heard from co-workers that had their second dose (of the same vaccine I got) that it has some definite side effects, good news, they are short lived and bonus…you know that its working…your immune system is fighting! Not going to lie…it makes me a little scared but not enough to skip it.

New growth

Lets not leave it with the big ugly, loud noisy, unwelcome elephant in the room…lets talk about new growth.

Sorry for the awful photos…I originally took these to show a couple friends what the heck I was talking about. instead of trying to capture my sprouted avocado seeds in better light I got lazy.

I’m so impressed that they are actually growing roots. I cannot even tell you how may times I have tried unsuccessfully to sprout an avocado pit. Some days it’s the little victories! My goal is to put these together in a low vessel like a console bowl to set on the coffee table. Time will tell if I succeed.

I have my typical Tuesday ahead of me…
What are you doing today?

It’s certainly been a while since I have joined in on T stands for Tuesday. So much, yet so little has happened.

This doodle is from before Winter break. Since I have had the same class over and over, I tend to doodle while waiting  for my small group time to begin. I never realized how often I doodle until distance learning began.

Winter break started a bit early for me…similar to last year. My back was giving me trouble from all the sitting. UGH! At least we found out that we are going to back to hybrid in-person learning mid-Feb. Since all the sitting is really hard on me I tackled making a new table for the treadmill.

It still needs a bit of work as it now tilts backward a bit which is kind of uncomfortable to type. But now I have the ability to slowly walk or just stand when I need to and still work. I’ve been working from school some days as well to change things up.

Christmas was a quiet one. We had a blizzard on the 23rd that lasted into Christmas Eve. Not a big deal when you aren’t going any where. The drifts were crazy in places…these were just cool!

We had fondue and played a couple board games…a nice and peaceful day.

Marvin always enjoys posing in front of the tree for me. He’s kind of a diva.

And what self-respecting cat wouldn’t crawl into a present box. Of course he’s huge and didn’t completely fit.

Since I hadn’t been creative at all for what seemed like weeks I did a page in an art journal to start off the new year. I don’t love it but that ok. Just trying to start the year off right.

Speaking of starting off the year right…I have chosen the word Strength for my Word of the Year.

You can check out the post by clicking on the image in the sidebar.

And if you were curious how I did with last years word: Mindful…be sure to check out that post as well.

I’ll leave you with a my breakfast and my fortune from last evening.

Today has me working from home.
What are you doing today?

I’d like to apologize in advance for this long post and the excessive number of photos. Thankful most people these days are on high speed internet…if not…you may want to return at a later date. You have been warned.

Where to begin… Well let’s start with a journal page I had slated to post last week and never got around to it.

It’s a page in my wonky junky journal.

It started its life as this…two different sizes and textures to work with. A challenge really.

The images I used are from an elementary music book. these two reminded me of a Romeo/Juliet thing…only with a happy ending…it is elementary school after all.

It’s not my favorite page but at this point, I’m just happy to be creative.

Another page I finished was this one…which I believe I posted a WIP shot the last time.

 

Making time to craft and create is a priority for me but as you know, life sometimes gets in the way.

Enter exhibit A:

Do you see what I see…? This image was texted to me simultaneously with a frantic phone call from Mini-me.

Lets back up a little for context shall we…

We had inadvertently left the garage door open a few inches overnight which was an obvious invitation for a mouse to waltz on in looking for a snuggly place to overwinter. Marvin clued me in to this on Friday morning by laying in front of the washing machine, diligently peering underneath. Since there was nothing I could do to help him with his task, I went back upstairs and proceeded with my morning. Made lunches, brewed coffee and had just sat down on the couch to enjoy my cuppa before moving on with the day.

As I sit taking my first glorious sip of coffee, I hear Marvin make a sound somewhat like it would be if you were trying to say “mouse” with a sock in your mouth then proceeds to bang around on the stairs with his giant paws. In an instant, I realized that he had caught the mouse and was bringing it to me…but decided to “tell” me about it…therefore releasing his jaws and the mouse. Marvin is cute but does not have a big brain. He lost track of it and I determined that it had gotten behind the baseboard and into the wall. Crud. Off to work I went with Marvin staring at the fireplace.

Now lets get back to this photo above…the mouse was on the mantle…he can climb bricks.

♫ spider mouse. spider mouse ♫

*shall we now collectively shudder*

My kids have now discovered the mouse on the mantle…send me a photo…call me… Yeah…I’m working…good luck kids. In turn I messaged Mr. G telling him the tale. I got this image back from him with what I can imagine was peals of laughter.

Image credit: Great Outdoors

Long story short…they did not get the mouse. I did late Friday evening with their help in corralling said mouse. Saturday was spent cleaning…everything… *shudder*. Gross.

Marvin was thoroughly exhausted from staying up for almost an entire day. Didn’t get his 18 hours of beauty sleep.

We did have some fun too…movie night at the neighbors.  Chicken Run was on the projector.

I got my vote in at our county election office.

I also made a knitters wreath that I have had rattling around my brain for a while. Finally made it happen after all the cleaning and purging of things. Funny what you uncover like a wreath base.

Time to settle back with a lovely glass of red wine by the glow of my salt lamp. I don’t drink much red wine or any wine these days. It tends to make my joints hurt…I think it’s the sulfites.

I had to snap a photo of this sign at Goodwill…it made me laugh.

My kids have dubbed my cocktail of choice, gin and club soda, “spicy water” after inadvertently taking a big gulp of it when they were younger.

That about sums it up for me… my life is chaotic. But its good.

One more thing! Mini-me got accepted into both the universities that she applied to. We now need to make one more visit to cement her plan. Her college of choice is even giving her a yearly scholarship. Not full ride mind you but hey, every penny counts.

What are you doing today?

My plan for the morning was to go for a walk immediately upon waking…the weather didn’t cooperate. Instead I made art.

The page on the right was the inside of a security envelope…I decided to do a gradient of color from light to dark blue. That, honestly, was my only plan or inspiration.  Next I added some random stamping to the background.

By this point I was starting to get an idea of the direction I was headed.

The gradient blue represented standing at the edge of the unknown…like the edge of the ocean. Nothing certain…endless possibilities. The branches are what I’m holding on to…my support. My stability.

I cut a tag from another chunk of masterboard. This piece had a scrap on which I had tested a compass stamp. It seemed fitting. There is guidance but really we just need to navigate our way through.

My current journaling has been really helping me express my feelings leading into the coming school year.

It’s all so unknown…uncharted…unpredictable and frightening. But here I am…standing bravely…ready to go support my kiddos at school the best way I know how.

Marvin gets credit for his supervisory role in our photo shoot.

Linking up with Art Journal Journey again for Alison’s theme of  Pockets and Tags.

Art Journal Journey
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