Saturday, January 11, 2014

Collage Class in the Style of Tim Holtz



This is Simone and Sabyl's Studio in Denver. Once a month we get together to work on a fun Art Project. This week's theme was making a collage using a dicut shape featured somewhere in the work. Tim Holtz has a lot of fun shapes and materials that were available to use in our work.






Simone shows her latest works



Simone brought her dicut machine to make our shapes

Here are some of the finished pieces:


This is my collage called Explore

Thursday, January 2, 2014

Christmas in New Jersey/Pennsylvania


Every year we have a big family gathering in Farm country in Bucks County.  We rotate between three homes . This year we had 60 people ages from 1 to 88 years. We have a delicious turkey dinner with every imaginable side dish. The Christmas cookies and fudge are the best.  Here is a pic of their porch with Nancy's canned fruit and vegetables. Her home is so comfortable.
There are so many people we sit in different rooms with our assigned places. Its great to catch up with all our second cousins and their families. Sometimes the highlight is a new calf or rabbits being born that week. 
Here is one of Lucie's Christmas outfits. It was fun to see which one she wore each day. Steve, Lindsey, and Lucie came out East via a car. The drive was over 12 hours. They arrived in NJ on Christmas eve- a day before the rest of us flew in. Lucie was enthusiastically  received by all her cousins and uncles .


Nanny asked each couple to take one night to plan, buy for, and cook a meal. Ashley was not feeling well and instructed Scott and Ian from her recipe.  Note Scott's skill with removing pomegranate seeds. Ian learned how to cut and dice a guacamole. Everyone enjoyed the Kale salad with quinoa and Pesto Chicken. 



Great Nanny got a smile from Lucie. We all had so much joy getting to take our turn holding Lucie. She is such a good baby- never a peep.


Friday we all piled into cars to head over to Manco and Manco's on Ocean City Boardwalk for the best Pizza. Even Lucie got to join in.





We headed to the beach to get our annual portrait.

A stop at Shrivers Salt Water Taffy.

Wednesday, January 1, 2014

Travel to Ohio for Thanksgiving


We had a very good reason to spend Thanksgiving in Lima Ohio this year. My dear little Lucie Pearl was born in October and we were excited to see and hold her again. I love this photo. She has the most interesting expressions at times.

Steve and Lindsey surprised us with their new dining room table and chairs. They also purchased a new couch so everyone could visit together in the living room. My whole family came for the holiday including Lucie's great-grandparents, Nanny and Poppy from N.J. It was a great time to visit and catch up. Ian flew all the way from California as well. We were anxious to hear about his job offers he was deciding on.
First activity was to get Steve's yard in shape. He hadnt done much raking of leaves, and boy were there alot! Steve bought this new contraption to help pick up the leaves. Here he is demonstrating it. I wanted to do a youtube video on this (even had the camera set up) but he ran away.
Everyone pitched in to help rake for a total of 20 large bags. Even though it was freezing cold we borrowed coats, gloves and hats to get the job done.
Uncle Scott holds little Lucie. Ashley and Scott picked Nanny and Poppy from the airport and came down on Thursday. We cooked and ate our dinner on Friday while being entertained with Steve's You tubes of harried/violent shoppers from black Friday present and past on the TV.
Steve and Lindsey's home. There was plenty of room for us and Ian to stay here. Notice the absence of leaves.

Poppy gets his turn. We cant wait to see Lucie again at Christmas in New Jersey!