Creating and design:
The painter has finally started in our house today after 20 days have passed since the fire. Our patience has been wearing thin. In the meantime I decided to rip the wall paper off the one wall in our bedroom and paint all the walls there. Insurance is paying for painting in the kitchen, living room and back entrance. We have decided to paint two of the bedrooms and the main room in the basement as nearly everything is out of the house. It's quite scary in the basement especially as we had SO MUCH STUFF there. I had many of my vintage books which I recently acquired as well as many magazines and also most of my cardstock. Fortunately my main studio which was recently completed has not been affected. Big sigh.



I won't show you colours yet. We are in process of getting ready to move back to our house on Friday. The painting will not be finished but Greg's Mom has a big birthday celebration happening on Saturday so out of town family are coming to stay. We will be very glad to move out of the basement here after 19 days. We were SO LUCKY to be able to move in temporarily as the hotel would just not have cut it for this lengthy time period especially with a teenage daughter and all of our special food needs. I really dislike restaurant food at the best of times and if I'd have to do it everyday for every meal - YIPES.

So we'll kind of be camping in our own home for awhile till the kitchen is finished (could be a number of weeks yet, but, we'll try to enjoy it. Kat has been fantastic with the whole thing. I actually had a meeting with her teacher this morning to do wrap up for this year and make plans for next. I was so impressed with how attuned the school has become to our daughter and her needs. Teacher also commented on how terrific Kat has been doing. THANK GOODNESS FOR ALL THE ANGELS AND FOR OUR CHRISTIAN FAITH WHICH HAS GOTTEN US THROUGH MANY CHALLENGES.



And so I've been buying numerous magazines and borrowing many from the library to help me through this difficult time.


I've been trying to do designing on a budget to help myself with the design and colour choices that insurance is not covering. Unfortunately our flooring is in really bad shape as is our bathroom. We'll have to wait. Other things have been priority.



It's now Thursday. I want only to say about the painting that I walked past our house at 10 p.m. last night. The painter was still there with his bright lights shining. I am SO impressed with his concern and time commitment. So many people have NO CLUE what it is like to not be in your home for an extended time period, without having planned to do so.

I'll quickly share a link to a blog that I absolutely love. the photographs, the designs, the colours. lafifole.blogspot touches me, and I think many others, at many levels. Take a moment to check Anne's blog if you are able. You may fall in love with it just as I have. I know numerous of my friends will enjoy the most recent photos from teatime.

Angels be with you dear friends in whatever adventures you may be finding.

biding time:
I'm working on a new video but until that is done I'll share this celebration of a wonderful young lady who directs our St. Peter's Chorus. She celebrated a special birthday a couple of weeks ago. We surprised her with a song for her birthday at our spring concert. Greg was able to videotape it and one of our members put together this video for youtube. Please watch to the very end to see the photo of Max taken at her actual party



I feel especially proud to know Maxine as she too has faced many challenges in her life.
Happy Birthday Maxine.

The people who make a difference are not the ones with the credentials, but the ones with the concern.

Max Lucado
Inspiration Peak

Angels be with you dear friends,
Wendy

Home is in your heart:
This is the mantra I'm trying to hold in my head at the moment. We're trying to get the bids in for just the painting as we can't really move back into our house until it's done. We got frustrated when we learned on Friday that the insurance adjuster had taken the day off and we'd have to wait until today, Tuesday, to get approval to get just the bids for the painting in AND we know the adjuster won't be in again tomorrow because of a funeral. Big sigh.
We also know it will be quite some time until the kitchen cupboards will be built and the new flooring for back entrance, stairs and basement installed.
Patience Wendy (:

On the really positive side is the fact that the cleaning crew is pretty much finished in the house AND my studio does not need painting or other work. So I can be back over there and get back to creating. I actually did some contact paper transfers on the weekend. One turned out quite beautifully. I also found some wood at the farm I will be able to use for painting on and an old box, bottomless, which I love. Greg will be so kind as to put a bottom on for me (:

At the top is one of Jessie Marion King's images with a whole lot of paint chips on it. I'll try to show you the colours we chose in next couple of days.

I must be away. I'll try to have more for you on Thursday, back to Saskatoon tomorrow.

angels be with you

carry on:
while feeling kind of low at the moment i am trying to find some calm midst choosing paint colours and flooring for the house. i've picked up some magazines and books from the library as well as lots of brochures on flooring and paint colours.

guess i should mention that if you don't know what i'm talking about you need to read my last post.

Elena has brought my attention to Jessie Marion King's art. i have fallen in love with it. i am hoping to get inspiration from her colours One of my faves so far is the lambs play away



going to farm for a few days so probably won't be doing another post till next week sometime.
angels be with you,
Wendy

Life is truly good: The past week met us with some new challenges but we are all safe and fine. That is the important thing. Last Thursday morning at 4 a.m. we woke to the sound of our smoke detector. I ran out to find the dishwasher all in flames. We were able to go out the front door. Greg put the fire out with a blanket and I phoned 911 on the cordless phone which Greg brought to me from the coffee table close by. Greg was a bit perturbed with himself for not switching off the furnace fan as the furnace managed to spread the smoke throughout the entire house. It’s OK. The smoke detector worked. We are all safe including the pets and we had insurance. There is a cleaning crew that has been washing, scrubbing walls, packing boxes, using ozone machine and ripping out cupboards and flooring that need to be removed. We will get new flooring put in our back entrance, down the stairs and into the main room in the basement. All the replacement work and painting will be done by a carpenter. We’re getting bids for these jobs and then insurance company will choose.

Sorry to tell this almost by rote but the whole thing seems just another adventure in my survivor life series. I am trying as much as possible to laugh, to think of the good things that can come of this, Relationships of family and friends are being strengthened. I learn of kindness from people like Constanza, near strangers, who are offering help. I learn of people that don’t really care. I learn of how very, very strong I have become when a friend comments on how so many people would be very “pissy” (her word, not mine) about the whole thing. As I skip down the hallway of my mother-in-law’s basement where we are residing, I realize that life is truly good. As I shed a few tears of sadness, exhaustion, I realize that life is truly good,

The fabric photo shows a piece I had dyed brown, used a bleach resist on and then painted with white fabric paint. The photos are from before the fire.



The greens and flowers started as a small gift to myself late on Mothers Day. They were embellished by a dear kind soul at the nursery, florist shop. They smell so wonderful at this time where it often felt like smoke was curling about near my nose, inside my nose, in everything that I breathed in. Now I am reminded that my cell phone, which I have with me near constantly, was in the kitchen right in area of greatest smoke concentration. Oh well. I need it with me.
The pears and lamp with ribbon (I'll catch you up with these tomorrow) only show how I am trying to make our temporary abode into somewhat of a home.



Thanks to all who have offered support of any kind, especially of thoughts and prayers

Angels be with you,
Wendy

Creative every day: sometimes I lose track of what I've done, shared and completed. These are some sketches, some from quite a while ago. They were mostly done while I was waiting for appointments of one kind or another, as with the journal page with lots of rub on letters. I ran out of my fave black letters. I guess I should have known better. That's OK. The message is still the same. I finished the two journal pages yesterday. Actually has been quite awhile since I've felt like doing any.


I also did some preliminary painting on some canvases yesterday.I've got a caulking transfer happening on one of those. I have to wait till later tonight (24 hours) to see results of that.

On a May day: These photos were all taken on last Thursday evening. I was at St. Pete's with a friend. There are no classes at this time. The beautiful wooden floors, the tall old windows, the light at just the right height shining in - a fabulous set up for photos. Ummm - I feel so pleased to know, to recognize, these opportunities and take advantage. I hope you like them too. I've some more. I'll share them another day.





Another new video - this one is totally different. It is only my landscape photographs together with a song of St. Peter's Chorus. St. Peter's Chorus celebrated it's 40th anniversary last year. I have been with the chorus for the past 29 years, only having missed a few years in between. I love to sing. This particular song is one of those we did for Saskatchewan's centennial year in 2005. It is a song written especially for Saskatchewan's centennial by Stan Garchinski. For those that may not be aware you can get a full screen view by clicking someplace on the video which will take you to its homepage. Then just below the video on the right side is a little square which you can click on for full view size. I believe there is also a place to click where it says "watch in high quality". There are at least four of the photos where you can see the moon. I believe they are all on the left side just a bit above horizon.

Please enjoy my video. See more of them at my channel.

Just wanted to say:
HAPPY MAY DAY







I also wanted to share with you another fabulous blog which I had found a few weeks ago and then forgotten about. The blog is that of "the colour guru" from Australia. I especially love the most recent slideshow Keron recently completed. AND I am totally green with envy because she mentions something of an art retreat with Misty Mawn. Sigh.

I was hoping to introduce another video and more items to my etsy but... Well, I'll say I was trying to fly. You can interpret it any way you want (:

I think I just figured out that I have swacks too much vintage material to be working with right now. YES! I shall not be bored for another few centuries, as if.

Must toodle ooh. I'll leave you with this image of a project I'm not certain about - if I'm finished or not. What do you think of it? It says something of which I must reassure myself frequently.