Hold Dear

studio friday.

I am determined to make it to Studio Friday this week since I haven't joined in awhile! It's after midnight here so I'm just squeekin' in! Just lots going on. Silver Bella in LESS than two weeks...Miranda moved to Maui...also occupying my mind is my Mom will be having surgery in December so I get to go to California to help out, hang out, and watch movies with my Momma! She's finally gettin' that new hip she's always been hankering for! :-) Yay Mom!!! Oh and an added bonus...I'll get to visit my sisters Renee and Simone and see my great-nieces for the first time! I've got two of them now because Ryan and Tina had number two about a week ago!

So back to SF...this week's topic is ORANGE as suggested by  Espialdesign.

Since Halloween is fast approaching, and it's fall, let's focus on the color orange.

Oh boy! I love orange! It's one of my favorite colors. Specifically, pumpkin orange!!! It just makes me all squeeky and happy.  I don't have any pumpkin-colored fun to share with you because we haven't got our pumpkins yet. We tried to go this past Sunday but our very favoritest place was closed! We'll try again this weekend.

So let's celebrate orange a different way, shall we?Going outside of the studio here but I recently made a very fantastical discovery...Odwalla Pumpkin Protein Drink. And it's soy!!! Is this new? I haven't seen it before. It's pretty good. It has the consistency of eggnog so I think it'll go good in coffee. Or better yet, maybe warmed with a little rum and cinnamon. :-)

The other orange I want to celebrate is the orange of sweet Satsuma Mandarin oranges!

Okay so even though you can get mandarin oranges other times of the year, aren't they just more fun getting a whole box of them? I think they always taste better in quantity! They're SO good and SO fun! And even though Miranda was not of the generation where all she got in her Christmas stocking was an orange, we still like to always put one in there...just as a reminder to all of us that there was a time when if ALL someone got in their stocking was an orange, they were thankful. :-)

Thanks Stacia and Tine for the fun and hope you all have a great weekend!!

studio friday.

This week's Studio Friday topic once again, is extremely timely. It is ART TRIBUTE and it was suggested by Lauren.

An art tribute to someone that you love, and that encouraged\inspired\supported you as an artist...

Okay so last week, I wasn't feeling great and really needed to spend some time laying around. Well, I don't do "laying around" so hot. I always like/need to be doing something and preferably, doing something artsy.

I've been wanting to put together an official Inspiration Book for a long time and about a month ago, I found a very cool scrapbook at Goodwill that I wanted to use.

I've been collecting pictures and saving magazines for a long time. I even recently went through and threw a lot of stuff away (arrrgggh!) because it never occured to me that this was my Inspiration Book in the making. I just thought I was being a nerdy, obsessive compulsive pack rat. Ha! I was cool and didn't even know it!

Since my body was insisting on resting and I was insisting I didn't want to, we compromised and I worked on my Book in between, well, er, um, let's not go there. :-)

So in looking through my newly born Inspiration Book, I realized that smack dab on page one is a picture of my Mom. In retrospect, I just think that's so cool. Could this be a subconscious declaration that my Mom is a huge source of inspiration to me? Yeah, I think so.

That's my Mom in a lovely red print dress that I now know to be something she made. Isn't she glorious!? I just love this picture of her and I just love this woman. Strong. Sharp. Witty. Sassy. Funny. Articulate. Beautiful. Lovely. Elogant. So many qualities that she most likely isn't aware she possesses. Oh and she's smart like you wouldn't believe. She also has a beautiful singing voice and some of the finest penmanship I've ever seen (maybe that's why I love writing and calligraphy so much!) She's also a fine cook and makes the best fudge you'll ever taste!

My Mom is completely self-made. It wasn't until I was a teenager that she finished school, got her driver's license and acquired a trade. Once she discovered she was capable and deserving of respect, she gave husband #2 a well-deserved boot out the door, and she made herself a life. She pretty much rocked it.

I didn't necessarily intend for this to be a huge tribute to my Mom because, well, that would take a lot more than a couple of paragraphs. Suffice it to say that she is the coolest. She is always there, cheering me on, supporting me and encouraging me at every turn of my life. She's my mother and she's my friend. Thanks Momma. I love you..(sniff, sniff). :-)

Just for fun, here are two other pages in my Inspiration Book, or "IB," as I'm now calling it, that are fit to be shared. I still envision adding fabric, ribbon, lace and what nots as I come across them.

I'm just so happy to have finally organized these bits of my life enough to start putting together a book for myself. Let's just hope it doesn't take another bout of stomach flu to get me to work on it again!

Thanks for the visit! Happy Friday!

studio friday.

Another glorious Friday. And a summer Friday! Aren't those just wonderful?

This week's Studio Friday is perfect timing because the topic is SUMMER AFTERNOON as suggested by Lauren.

What does a "summer afternoon" mean or feel like to you....?
-Lauren

I wasn't sure what I wanted to do with this week's topic but then I remembered I hadn't shared any pictures from when Glen, Miranda, and I went to the County Fair a few weeks ago. I didn't take a whole lot of pictures at the fair. Probably because I was just enjoying hanging out with the family. I was; however, captivated by the garden display with all the sunflowers. I took a few pictures there. In looking through these pictures, I was thinking that they totally epitomize summer!

So if sunflowers epitomize summer, then I think this sign totally epitomizes a good ol' County Fair!

LOL! I just thought this was SO funny! We didn't have one of these but we did partake in some of these...

They sound weird, look weird but oh my, they sure don't taste weird. SOOOOO good! :-)

I thought I'd also throw in a couple of pictures from around my house that could only happen in summer...

Our sunflower. I only planted one seed this year. I meant to plant more but an area I was going to clear to plant sunflowers never got cleared and so that didn't happen. But I tell ya, we're sure getting our share of sunflower entertainment with just the one...

Here's as close to the flower as I could get without standing on a ladder...

If anyone's still concerned about all the buzz (pun intended!) earilier in the year that there weren't any bees, rest assured they're still around. They're all in my garden on my mint plants. Well, there and in our back yard buzzing around the cat food. :-)

The raised beds still seem to be happy too.

Our tomatoes are going bonkers!!! I think we're actually getting to the point where we can share! We've never had that many. Usually the tomatoes never even make it indoors because they get eaten in the garden picked fresh from the plant! But this year, they're plentiful! Maybe because there's so many bees! :-)

And the basil plants too. Oh man, this is an absolute dream of mine! Big full lucious basil plants. Sometimes I'll just go in the garden and ruffle up the leaves of these plants just to smell 'em. Summer!!!

That's all for now. Hope you all are having a wonderful summer! I can't believe it's almost the end of August! Egads! I'd better get out there and enjoy it while I can! Fall will be here before we know it! (Yay!)

Kari's party and studio friday.

Howdy...so wasn't Kari's Artful Blogger party just a hoot!? It was SO much fun and what a great turn out!

I'm still trying to get out everyone's blogs to check out their tutorials! Thank you thank you so much for leaving such sweet, encouraging, and thoughtful comments on my blog. Your words are absolutely magical to me and are so motivating! Thank you again for your generous kindness, sweet friends!

In addition to all the activity and excitement generated from Kari's party, I saw that my blog was also getting some visitors from a site call Scrapscene.com. I made a post (here) from the Studio Friday topic "containers/storage" and it was linked to their site! This totally rocks!!! You can check it out here. To say that I am flattered would be an understatement! I am just over the moon happy to be listed on THIS Website!! Thank you thank you and welcome to all those who are visiting from Scrapscene! :-)

So I'm posting my Studio Friday on Thursday. Not because I was a day late last week and am trying to balance out the Universe (he he he), but because tomorrow morning at 7:00 am this girl is hittin' the road! I am having a "Girl Weekend." :-) I am driving down to Ashland to go to Anahata Katkin's Symbolic Icons class on Saturday and Sunday. Can I get a Whoo-Hoo? I am totally excited about this and I am so excited to meet new people, including Anahata!

So let's get on with this week's Studio Friday, shall we? The topic: ONE PAGE!

Let us have a look at one page from your sketchbook or notebook...just curious. It's up to you which one you would like to reveal. Should you want to you can show us more than just one, too.

For this topic I thought I'd share with you a page from my Things To Do (TTD) notebook.

I have a Filofax that I keep my work, house, appointment, etc. schedule in but I never found it comfortable to use that as my TTD list. I think it's because I love writing so much and I like to have lots of room to write and doodle. I like to have fun and this works for me because it's very flexible. Keeping my TTD list in a journal works for me because otherwise, I have tablets, notebooks, or random journals with just a thing or two written here and there. Very untidy and that all over the yard feeling. I love to be organized and I love to feel organzied and so I am a major list maker. I make lists of lists to make. (I seriously kid you not!) I like to keep my lists this way because even with all the mishmoshed pages, I find it aesthetically pleasing. It's like comfort food for my brain.  :-)

Okay, I'll be away for a few days. I'll miss you while I'm gone but when I return, I'm share pictures of Ashland and Anahata's class with you.

Take care, my sweety pies, and have a great weekend!

studio saturday?

Finally! I have been working on this post for about three days!!! Our computer was being completely uncooperative and unreliable and wasn't letting me load pictures and log on, the little bugger! Today it seems to have settled down and is letting visit with you! :-)

I am so excited about this week's Studio Friday and even though I'm late, I still wanted to play! This week's topic is something near and dear to my heart!  STORAGE/CONTAINERS as suggested by Alex. 

How do you store your arts and crafts supplies in your studio? Where do you store them? Do you have enough space for it? Maybe some of them are even unusual??! And how abot that space under the bed...?!

Oh be still my heart! This is the Studio Friday that's has my name written all over it! I am a storage and container lovin' girl! There was even a point about two years ago when I contemplated taking a part-time job (in addition to working full-time and going to school!) at Storables just so I could get the 40% employee discount. I am always dreaming up ways to store or display things and am always bringing new containers home, despite the fact that I have no more desk, shelf, or wall space. For instance, this followed me home from Art House a few weeks ago during their Sidewalk Sale.

It's a cutie! Not sure what I'll put in it since all my bits, beads, bobbles, and what nots already have homes. I'm sure I'll think of something though.

I have realized that as far as storage goes, function is not a priority. Things just have to be visually pleasing and that's it. Function only comes into play when I've run out of room!

There's quite the wide variety of the containers I use to store things. Baskets, cigar boxes, trays, tins, jars - old and new, plastic boxes, pegs, hooks, shelves, and bags.  Whatever looks the prettiest!

I'll share some examples of how things are stored around my crafty room...

This is a shelf unit that Glen built for me when I first moved into my craft room. My vision was that all my rubber stamps and spools of ribbon would live on these shelves...HA! That was before I went on a Making Memories acrylic paints binge! Those paints are just so yummy and HAD to be displayed. Then I discovered the fab Martha Stewart jars at K-Mart, and then came the tins and well, as you can see, rubber stamps now only occupy about 1 and 3/4 of shelves.

Some more fun storage...

Those awesome drawers I found at Monticello Antique Marketplace. Last week or so when I was there, they had more but I resisted buying them out again!

I think I've finally broken myself out of the habit of buying metal drawers when I'm out and about. While I love 'em and they're pretty AND functional, it's always hard finding the right spot for them.

You can see that my storage solutions don't necessarily mean that I keep out things I'm likely going to use any time soon. It's just what's pretty.

And then lastly, these are the shelves right in above my desk. This shelf gets rearranged proably once a month. That little blue tray currently holds my growing collections of cool business cards and MOO cards! It's all about what makes me happy at the moment. :-)

Hope you enjoyed this virtual tour of how my supplies, collections, and obsessions are stored in my little crafty space!

I have some real fun stuff to share with you over the next couple of days. I received some FABULOUS mail art from Stephanie and I also received my Silver Bella Inspiration Swap from Kari! So don't run off too far...come back and see me real soon!

Cheers!

studio friday.

I'm totally diggin' that it's time for another Studio Friday. I'm posting this early since I wouldn't be able to link my SF entry to Tine's blog until tomorrow night and I didn't want to wait!

This week's topic: FAVOURITE RESOURCE(S)!

What is the most favourite resource you use to seek encouragement, understanding, enlightenment, inspiration, strength, to gain further knowledge or fun? Is it a book or a magazine, a quote, a website, a photo, another artist? How often do you turn to your source and at what point on your creative path?

Hokey Schmokes! I gotta pick a favorite? Where I go for inspiration is, to quote my friend Jay, "all over the yard!" I am constantly feeding myself inspiration! I surf blogs, I read craft books, I read magazines, I read fiction, I read non-fiction, I listen to music, I draw, I doodle, I collect things, I take classes, I window shop, I go for a walk, I go for a drive, and sometimes just plain sleeping and dreaming can be inspiring. Oh and whenever I go on a vacation, I always come back full of inspiration!

Having said all of this, I actually do have a quote that is very powerful for me and I go to it often when I need a boost of inspiration. I feel like I post this thing every few months or so. Not surprised, since I always come back to this...

"Nature never repeats herself, and the possibilities of one human soul will never be found in another."

Elizabeth Cady Stanton

This quote feels like my foundation. It feeds me. It keeps me going. It keeps me honest and it keeps me from ever being hard on myself.

One thing I know about myself, I am a visual learner. In order for me to learn, I need to see pictures. I think that's way I still love to buy Japanese craft books or Marie Claire Idees even though I can't read them! I don't buy books for "how to" lessons. I buy craft books and magazine to fill my conscious and subconscious minds with color, contrast, combinations, textures, and sugarplums! You can always tell when I'm about to start working on a project because there will be a pile of books on my nightstand...and the floor under my nightstand and bed, if you must know! (Gee, Mom, I wonder where I get that?!) I love to just peruse a book or magazine right before I go to sleep and let the images just settle into all the nooks and crannies of my brain.

I also love to blog surf. So many yummy, amazing, incredible artists! I do have to confess, though, and it may be because I'm old school (okay, old!), I still love "holding" pictures. The computer screen is great and I am a blog junkie but none the less, I feel like my mind's eye is filled differently when looking through a book or magazine than pictures on a blog. Does that make sense? This is one of the many reasons I completely adore the new mag, Artful Blogging. I get to POUR over pictures from lots of the delicious blogs visit on a daily basis in natural light, far from the anything electronic.

Okay so since I like to include pictures with my posts, here's a few from my archives of inspiration..

Um, yeah, I have a few books. These are just craft and design books. Tucked away in here are also my beloved issues of Teesha Moore's Play and Art and Life. I won't show you my pile of magazines. It would just be too embarassing since there's a lot and they're not neat and tidy like this!

Something I starting picking up a few years ago, but don't use near enough...

Gotta love Craphound. It's a local publication out of an amazing shop in downtown Portland called Reading Frenzy. Independently-owned, political books, lots of zines and self-published books. It's a great place to give your money to. Craphound is jammed full of images and most are copyrighted by "lawsuit-friendly entities" so you can pretty much use them to your heart's content.

Here's a couple of pages...

One last pic...my bits and bobs box that I put together for last year's Art and Soul. I usually keep this sweetie close by. It's kind of a palette of my current favs and obsessions so things get changed in and out of it on a regular basis. I just like looking at it.

Okay, my dears, hope you have a serioulsy FABULOUS Friday!

studio friday.

Whoo-hoo! Some big fun this week over at Tine's Studio Friday! I say that because I suggested a topic and she's using it this week! Thanks Tine! :-)

The topic is "what does the color yellow mean to you??"

Even though I love shabby pastelly hues of pinks and robin's egg blues, I am still drawn to yellow. For me, yellow is epitome of summer and happy faces. Yellow is hot summer sun and mustard! Yellow just makes me happy and I wonder how other artists interpret this color.

When I think of the word yellow, it just makes me happy. It's bright, cheerful, sunny, and happy. Of course there's some negativity associated with the color yellow, i.e., the whole "don't eat yellow snow" thing, but we just won't go there today. :-)

This is but a short list of reasons why yellow is a good, happy color for me. There could be more and probably are.

Yellow is the color of sunshine (this is pretty much worth 1,000,000 points right here!)

Yellow is the color of mustard on a hot dog (or veggie dog!) at a baseball game.

Yellow is the color of corn on the cob.

Yellow is the color of ice cold lemonade.

Yellow is the color of Slip 'N Slides.

Yellow is the color of daffodils.

Yellow is the color of a Cheerios box.

Yellow is the color of leaves in the Fall. Sigh...I love this time of year.

Yellow is the color of mellow, i.e., "they call me Mellow Yellow..."

Yellow is the color of Lemon Cooler cookies. Yum!

Yellow is the color of buttered popcorn at the movies. (BTW - We went to see Ratatouille last night...SOOO cute!)

Yellow is the color of The Simpsons.

Yellow is the color of hat of the man that takes care of Curious George.

Yellow is the color of fire hydrants. (They always make me feel safe.)

Yellow is the color of bananas!

Yellow is the color of happy faces...

I painted this little happy face about 25 years ago. Remember when statuary first came out? Yep, I was on that band wagon. I'm sure I even painted one of those tennis shoe planters and a little tray for my bubble gum.

So as I was looking around in my studio, I realized, save for the happy smiley face, there isn't any yellow in there! Oh I did find this art journal page I made when I was on the justjohanna Design Team.

I just now realized, I hardly ever use yellow in my art unless I'm painting with pastels! So...let's go there, shall we?

Oh yeah, this is my happy yellow. Warm, rich, wheat. I painted this from a picture I took during a visit to Paso Robles, September 2005. Glen, Miranda, and I went down for what turned out to be a family reunion and pretty much one of the best weeks of my entire life. My mom, all my sisters and brothers and all the nieces and nephews all gathered in one place. Color me happy. I love this picture SO much because every time I look at it, I am reminded of how HAPPY my family makes me.

This is a picture I painted a few years ago from a black and white photo. (Who says the sky has to be blue?)

Okay....this is an interesting exercise for me. I don't use yellow in my abstract art but yet, it is a dominant color when I paint landscapes. Yellow is a foundational color for me. When I see it, it has a centering effect on me. It just makes me smile.

Hope you have a great, happy Friday filled with all the good kinds of yellows! See ya!

studio friday.

Happy Friday the 13th!!!

I'm joining in the fun over at Studio Friday this week! Today's topic is LOOK BACK!

Here's what Tine has for us:

They say don't ever look back nor dwell on things for too long, one is supposed to instead, just move on, eyes straight ahead focused on one's goal.

BUT...here's the but... while it is certainly true to not look back and dwell on the negative events it is one of the best things one can do, to look back... but on the positive things and see how far you have come!!! On one of my Internet surfs I came across this simple truth on the Salad website written by Jamie Smart:

"The people who are happy and fulfilled measure their progress by comparing where they are against where they’ve come from. The people who are stressed and dissatisfied measure progress by comparing where they are against their ideals.
Just think about that for a moment.
The happy, fulfilled people look at how far they’ve come.
The unhappy, dissatisfied people look at how far they have to go to reach an ideal. "

Read the whole article here   if you like for inspiration (you'll have to scroll down to it).

So how cool is this concept!? It really made me pause...and the most brilliant thing is...I think I fall into the camp of that I compare myself to where I've come from!

I often think about the journey I've taken to where I am today. I've taken a pretty secuitous route but holy moly, what fun I've had! I rediscovered the hobby of scrapbooking when I went to a Creative Memories party about six years ago. That led to stamping, which led to card making, which led to book making, which led to paper making, which led to calligraphy, which led to jewelry making, etc. etc. etc. You get the idea!

It took me so long to have any confidence in myself. I still have trouble calling myself an artist. I think I'm more comfortable calling myself a hobbyist.

The only reason I would even remotely consider calling myself an artist is because, well, even I can admit that I make art. And my art comes from me. And there is no other "me." No one has the same combination of interests, skills and experiences that I have had. No one else grew up in my skin and in my family and bought Go-Go boots and wore them out of the store when she was 8. No one had my car and went "steady" with a boy named Ronnie in 5th grade and went to my high school and worked at McDonald's. No one works where I work now and has my husband and received MOO cards that say "Hold Deaf" and fell down last Saturday and had a Pap Smear yesterday. Okay, TMI, but you get the idea. :-)

All of these experiences are uniquely mine and make me, me. By looking back at all of these things, it gives me confidence that I am unique which makes anything I create from my heart inherently unique. I trust that. I trust me. And that is progress.

Thanks for listening! :-)

studio friday.

Hi there...

The topic over at Studio Friday right now is "Wabi Sabi." Seriously cool topic. Tine chose to post this topic for two weeks so I decided to take some time to thing about it. Oh and speaking of Tine, that lady has some VERY exciting stuff coming up! If you want a hint, click here!! :-)

Let me take the definition from Wikipedia:

Wabi-sabi (in Kanji: 侘寂) represents a comprehensive Japanese world view or aesthetic centred on the acceptance of transience. The phrase comes from the two words wabi and sabi. The aesthetic is sometimes described as one of beauty that is "imperfect, impermanent, and incomplete" (according to Leonard Koren in his book Wabi-Sabi: for Artists, Designers, Poets and Philosophers.

What imperfection are you struggling with in either your art or studio space? Is your ideal set too high? Do you put too much pressure on yourself? Try to see the beauty in its imperfection and celebrate it!!

Hmm...this is actually a very heavy topic. After some thought, I've decided that I feel like I am just at the point in my artsy endeavors where I am starting to embrace "Wabi Sabi." Prior to it being the topic of Studio Friday, I wouldn't have thought to call it Wabi Sabi though. I would have just called it "Goin' with the Flow!"

I feel like I have learned to embrace imperfection. I am, at my core, a perfectionist, but over the last few months, something happened. I now seek out imperfection! I'm not sure how, when, or why this happened, but I'm lovin' it! Maybe it was after taking that Basic Design class (I still have two more of those classes to do...UGH!). It was during this class that the teacher held us to an almost unattainable level of minute infinitesimal degree of exactness in our projects. When we did any measuring or mounting of bristol board, it had to be perfect. "Close" was not acceptable. Like if something was off by 1/64" of an inch, sorry, unacceptable!

I know that was what we were there to learn but since I'm not often (or ever!) going to strive to be that precise in my own art. I fully embrace my art going in the other direction! I also learned in that class another principle of design which is if things are going to be different, make them very different. So in my art journey, right now I am on a path where if things aren't going to be very neat, then they are going to be very messy. And that, my friends, is the culture in which Wabi Sabi thrives. Anything truly beautiful is imperfect. I first learned this from my stepmother, Melissa's mother, Irma. She taught me how to draw flowers. I would first draw big loopy, perfect petals and then she would show me that to make them look like a real flower, I needed to make the tips ragged. It was like magic. My flowers just "popped" to life. She said nothing that occurs in nature is perfect, but that's why it's beautiful.

Hmmm...that thought just made me smile. :-)

Happy Friday!!!

studio friday.

Oh boy...another Friday and this one's a good one...it's sunny here in Portland and we have a three day weekend! Whoo hoo!

This week over at Studio Friday, the topic is Studio Treat!

Treat yourself to something your heart desires, maybe some chocolate or flowers or new art supplies... a nice little something (no spending of a fortune involved). Celebrate yourself !!

This one's easy. I'm REALLY good at treating myself. Hey, I work very hard and so I like to have things around me that make me happy. The good news is I am very frugal and my favorite treats are someone else's junk.

So even though we just had our garage sale last weekend (we made $38!), I still made my usual twice weekly stops at our local Goodwill and Salvation Army. This week as I wandered around, I kept thinking "what special treats shall I buy?"

Here's the sweetest of my sweet treats from this week...

A fun sewing case. I don't know if it's old but it sure has that funky look that I like...and that's points in my book!

My cute little pardner boy was wondering what was inside so I thought I'd show you too! :-)

At Salvation Army, I went BONKERS because the store was having a 50% off everything sale! No ephemera was safe from my little fingers eyes!

For those of you who spied with their little eye that jar of buttons up at the top left corner, good job! I found two jars full of 'em! And in case you're wondering, yes, I gasped when I saw them. This batch of buttons isn't old, which is what I prefer, but they'll be good for crafts and scrapbooking so they came home with me.

Also, I found this...

Do you remember when it was popular to "paint embroidery?" I picked this up because it caught my eye since it had that old look to it. But then as I held it, I remembered those funky tubes of fabric paint!  That had to have been in the late '60's or early '70's maybe? Does anyone remember? I could google it, buy, hey, I'm in the middle of a post here! :-) Regardless, this little gal was only $1.99 at Goodwill so I couldn't resist treating myself!

Oh and one last little blast of fun...I've already got a mountain of playing cards but I just couldn't resist adding these groovey kitty cats to my collection. The package said 1984. Yep, they look like '80's cats.

Glen and I are going camping this weekend. I'm REALLY looking forward to it. I'm taking some books, my journal, and some watercolor pencils. I'm trying to finish "Reading Lolita in Tehran" so I can start "Eat Pray Love." I'm hoping to fill my days with lots of "me" time and then enjoy evenings filled with s'mores, bonfires and sing-a-longs. I'm taking my ukulele. :-) Miranda's going to come over and house sit for us and put some love on our sweety kitty cat boy Atticus. I'm sure she'll also be enjoying some nice quiet, clean house no roommates, no noise time not to mention all the cable and computer time she wants! Aaahh...the necessities!

Hope you have wonderful weekend plans and I'll *see* you all next week! Take care!!!