I was born about 30 years too late. I always wanted to be a 50's housewife like my mom was. I have hundreds of Woman's Day, Good Housekeeping and those kind of magazines from the 1950s and I loved to look at them. And every pink or turquoise appliance in the background of the kitchen. And the recipes, and the ladies cooking in their high heels, (ok, i don't do high heels but still, maybe I would have been skinny had I been born earlier!!) Things seemed so much easier then, nicer, warmer, sweeter, warm and fuzzier!! All that to say Look at my 50's Christmas girls!!

I hope everyone had a Merry Christmas!

And wishing you a Happy Prosperous New Year!!

Happy Thanksgiving!!!!

Had my mom with me all day today and was trying to keep busy and entertain her too. She didn't have a clue what was going on. She is the one who taught me to bake and do fancy cakes. She did so much, taught me so much and was so creative and it breaks my heart that with her dementia its all lost, all gone, just in my heart forever. I love you mom and I miss you.

Having such a good time making these folks!!

My new winter creations!

So its almost over...the leaves are going fast, the pretty colors fading...why isn't Fall as long as winter?? Another question to ask the Lord someday on my list of a zillion things I want to know. I think I am in the Fall of my life and I am very afraid it will go by fast. In taking care of my parents I have realized that it is VERY important to live my life fully while I am healthy...BUT I have no freedom because of my responsibility to them. More questions of WHY? for the Lord...

HaPpY HaLLoWeeN!!!

Good Witch Lulabelle!!! The Halloween children's book I wrote and illustrated!! http://www.lulu.com/product/paperback/lulabelle/4414527

I wrote this back in January and since Halloween is coming up I thought I would repost...

So I am a Christian woman and I sell Halloween things....YIKES!....betcha some don't like that! I love Halloween! Always have. It's fun! I just can't ignore Halloween because somewhere back in time there was a pagan thing called All Hallows Eve or something that was evil. Nope! Halloween is pillowcases full of candy and funny costumes and parties and fun! I don't sacrifice burnt offerings or get in a circle naked. I don't call forth spirits. I make cute little Jack O Lantern figurines out of old stuff. I decorate my house, carve a bunch of pumpkins and converge with the neighborhood! I try to be a good example as a light of Christ and I try not to judge others. By not celebrating I think it alientates my neighbors that I am trying to reach out to.I don't preach, I set an example with my life.Satan is not just around on Halloween, I am pretty sure he's around every other day too, when you aren't looking for him! Ohhhhhh Scarrrryyyy. :)I prayed for a long time about this and asked God to show me if it is wrong to make my little Jack O Lanterns. Nothing! I say follow the convictions of your own heart. I won't judge you and I ask that you don't judge me.If you don't tell the little kids the pagen part then they will never know...its just a fun day that they can carve pumpkins, dress up however they want, be silly and eat candy till they are sick. And Oh! They can still know Jesus if they choose to!

Was honored to be asked to make a wedding cake for friends...and they wanted CHOCOLATE!! Happy Life...Rob and Linda!

So I bought this big ol' thing of Bic markers and I am having a ball!!!

So did I mention I have the best friends in the world. Not only did they give me a surprise birthday party and gifts but the best gift was this: 2 printed out calendar pages with names filled in for days that they would make dinners for my parents and take some of the load off me! God is good! How lucky am I!!! Thanks you guys! (thats me in the black!)

So two really nice things happened to me today. First of all, my dear friend Vicki and her daughter, Meagan (who is my mom's caregiver) left me a Birthday Week Riddle at my mom's so when I got there this morning there was a riddle and I had to solve it and find a gift. It was so fun and the gift was a gift certificate to my hairstylist! And they are doing something everyday until my birthday next week!! SO FUN!!!!!!!!!!!

Then I came home from my mom's and there was a box in the mail. This wonderful blogger artist lady named Marilou (Lulus Lovlies) who I don't know, never met and just commented back and forth once or twice on our blogs sent me 24 old spice tins to make my pumpkin folks out of!!! What a surprise!!! What a NICE PERSON!!!

And let me say that God is Good! I needed these nice people and things as this has been a rough couple days in the mom/dad world....sometimes I lose my mind. And those of you who know me, know that I LOVE MY BIRTHDAY! I LOVE PRESENTS! and am not afraid to say it! I just don't love my age.....

So we live in an 86 yr. old house with radiators, therefore, no central air, no duct work to get some. It has been very hot here and it makes for a crabby crabby artsy person. There is no way to go upstairs in my studio and create. You see along with the charm and coziness of an old house you get the whole 2nd floor on one electric circuit so no window air conditioners either! But that's fine, really, I love my home.

And I love Meijers! For a mere $69 I got this pool!! (sorry, took photo thru screen window...) Its 12ft dia and not so deep BUT WHO CARES...it refreshes me, cools me off, MAKES ME UN-CRABBY!! I love my little pool! God is good!

My Art Space

I have a small spare bedroom that is my art "studio". It has enough things crammed in there for 4 rooms! I just lose all track of time in there and get glue and paint all over my clothes! I have hardly any clothes with some goop or another on them! I know where every little thing is in all that mess too. Yep its my very own little heaven. Someday.....I will have a REAL studio! Someday. But for now this is it!

Boy! Am I excited! I found a BUNCH of vintage spice tins at an estate sale for a quarter a piece! Bought 'em all! I feel a bunch of spice tin pumpkin folk a brewin'! I LOVE ESTATE SALES! and garage sales...and thrift shops and the Salvation Army.........

So I have just joined another marketplace online to sell my pumpkin folks! This is so much fun! It is WSOAPP which is Whispered Secrets of a Primitive Past. It is www.wsoapp.org. Everyone on these sites are so nice. And the creativity is unbelievable! So many talented people. Well, I better get busy, Halloween will be here before you know it and I got folks to make!

Blessed Girl

I just wanted to say that my faith is the best thing in my life! God is so good! I am very blessed to have found the Lord. I have the best husband, I have my art, I have the best help for my mom and dad and all their issues always get taken care of even through some miracles! I have the best friends and cousins. I have the best church family. I have to much good to mention. I am one blessed girl!

God is good!

Trust in the LORD with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding. Proverbs 3:5

Lunch with the surgeon

So, finally!, my mom's surgery is over and she is home and healing and my life is a bit back to normal. It was a LONG week.

She has the nicest, sweetest, down to earth female surgeon. She is very intriguing to me since I am the polar opposite of her. She is very cute and tiny with gorgeous thick hair, and those of you who know me know that I am NOT tiny, and my hair is not thick. She must have gone to school a long, long time and has a job with tons of responsibility. I avoid responsibility at all costs (not counting my parents), can't stand being locked in anywhere and am a creative spirit/artist. If I paint flowers and ivy on someone's wall and screw it up I can just paint over it. She can't screw up! PRESSURE!!! How does she do it?? I just can't comprehend...that's why she is so interesting to me.

She probably lives comfortably and we pretty much live paycheck to paycheck. She most likely goes on fabulous vacations but not so often and we go on less extravagant getaways and often. I have tons of freedom, and I assume she doesn't because of her job but I don't know for sure. The choices we made and still make are so different and that is sooo interesting to me. I am very happy with my life and I hope she is with hers.

I had a lot of time sitting in that hospital with my mom and I was thinking that if her and I had lunch what would we talk about? Is there a level that two people like us can meet on and talk about our lives? Just because she is a doctor/surgeon does she complain about her husband leaving dishes in the sink like me and my friends do? Or is there a housekeeper to do dishes? Can't help it, I am creative and my mind goes and goes. In surgery, does she put out a gloved hand and say SCALPEL! and someone slaps it in her hand? I just want to know!! What's her house like? Mine is warm and homey and filled with vintage/antique things and I decorated it myself. Did she do her own, do people like her have time? Do they want to? I just wonder... When her phone rings it is Bugs Bunny saying WHAT'S UP DOC...I thought it was so funny, (doc...shes a surgeon, get it??). Up until recently I had Frank Sinatra. What music does a smart, schooled surgeon like? These things are interesting to me, so many questions in this world that aren't answered. So many "coulda beens" and so little time left to do something substantial. I want to leave a legacy. Can artwork be a legacy just as much as taking cancer out of people? I like to think of my life and art as encouraging. To show that not everyone has to be book-learned (some of us just can't do it!). That not everyone has to be locked in an office all day. That you can be happy doing what ever you love. I am sure she loves her job as well, how could she not - she is SAVING lives for pete's sake!! I really admire her and sometimes wish I was different, more like her, but just sometimes. I hope she is happy too. Maybe some day we will have lunch and I'll ask her....

I never worry when I sit down to create something, I know that God gave me this gift of creativity and I just take it for granted that I it happens automatically, just like cooking or driving. I just know how.

I also know how to trust God in other things, like health issues, money problems, elderly parents, etc. When I do, He automatically just takes care of everything. But that just doesn't come as naturally, without thinking and worrying first, without fretting and then remembering OH YEAH! Let me give this to God He can do MUCH better than I can. I have known this stuff for a long time. I have seen miracle after miracle in my life. I KNOW better. When will it be as automatic as cooking or creating!

Trust in the LORD with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding;
in all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make your paths straight.
Proverbs 3:5-6

Irritability and Ice

I thought it was menopause starting, this terrible impatient, crabby feeling I have all the time. Kept praying that I would be more NICE and it just wasn't happening. Had my yearly physical and found out I am anemic, me, who is always as healthy as a horse. So I google it and one of the symptoms is IRRITABILITY! So that's what I am! And I get to have an excuse for it! I also get to get a colonoscopy...oh joy! One of the other things that goes with it is a carving for ice, dirt or starch. Well I have been chewing ice like crazy for a while here and my husband yells at me constantly because he can't stand the sound of the crunching. Now I have an excuse for that too! I AM SICK HONEY! See, there is always good with the bad.

I never really feel my age, at least not until today when I was applying for new health insurance. I didn't realize that it was gonna be such a big rig-a-marole! Geez, now why did I take that Xantac 9 years ago??? And why is my left eyelash crooked?? My husband and I hardly have any medical issues but the interrogation was immense! And it seems like we are falling apart after filling out that form! BC/BS is raising our rate to $1800 a month for just the 2 of us and that's with bunches of co-pays so we gotta look around. That's more than a house payment!!
I still feel young, act young, and try to look young but this sure was a reality slap in the face!!
Oh well, if you didn't know how old you are, how old would you think you are? I think I am 32 and I am stickin' to it!

Today was a good day. I took my mom to the oncologist to get results of her cat scan and was told that the cancer has not spread anywhere else and hopefully they can remove the tumor in her colon with laproscopic surgery. Relief! Another blessing.
So since I was so relieved I felt like going to one of my most favorite stores...Silver Quill Antiques...near my house. I go often and the owner Linda has been a big supporter and encourager of my creativity for a long time. She always has new things, not only antiques but artsy jewelry and art glass. It's always rearranged in new ways, and believe me there is A LOT of stuff in there. She has a doorway that is always decorated for the season with a desk next to it that has the neatest seasonal things displayed artfully on it. I told her today that she is a display artist! One time she had the most beautiful sheer curtains with little embroidered rosebuds tastefully arranged to hang around this doorway. I commented on them and she told me they were called VINTAGE and where she bought them. I went out and bought them for my living room! Art can be done in more ways than with a paintbrush or pen or paper. This lady has been rearranging her shop faithfully on a regular basis for 30+ years and it is a work of art every time. Not to mention her eye for unusual art pieces that she mixes up with the antiques. Yep! She is an artist too.
http://www.silverquillantiques.com/home

*~*CaKe SpRiNkLeS*~*

I had a bulletin board in my room when I was a little girl and I re-decorated it every month. Of course, Halloween was my specialty. I made borders out of construction paper, put notes from girlfriends (note writing was the texting of the 60's in elementary school), photographs and all sorts of things. It was so fun to me! I really wish I had a photo of that bulletin board today to remember it by.
I was also teachers pet in 5th grade and this lady made homemade cards while the students were doing work. She always let me help her instead of working. The other kids hated me for it but I loved it! She used construction paper and cut out pictures from magazines and then covered the whole card tightly in plastic wrap. I would go home and make more just like she taught me and hang them on my bulletin board. I still do have some that I made for my parents.
So yesterday I was looking at my most favorite thing in my house, my old cake sprinkles collection. I bought my first little bottle around 1980 and very slowly gathered a collection. Then Ebay came! OMG! Now I have a lovely collection that I am in love with! So dear readers, here are my photos that I will have when I am an old lady stuck in a little condo that all my precious stuff won't fit in and I can remember the things I loved so much.

I know this will seem piddle to some but to me it was great!

You have heard me mention the magazine Where Women Create that I love and inspires me beyond belief and I always eagerly wait for the next issue. So last night I was bored and realized that the new issue was out so I bribed Kirk (by saying I would go to a sporting goods store too) to go with me to Michaels to get it.

I got all comfy in bed with the Oympics on tv and my new magazine while Kirk watched some shoot-'em-up, squeeling tires movie real loud downstairs. I like to savor this magazine so its an event with me.

Started looking at it, about the 3rd page or so was letters to the editor and I thought, I'll just skip this and get to the good stuff. Then I thought, no let me just read them real quick. I get to the 3rd letter down and IT WAS FROM ME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Yes, I realize this is not a big deal to those of you reading this. But I was so excited!

Hey! There's not a whole bunch of thrills in my life. And as I said before I think God is preparing me for a new chapter in my life so here was just another little nudge.

So there you have it, the highlight of my week!

I am so unorganized...are other creative people unorganized? I found the neatest thing at a craft/antique shop yesterday. It is an old wood framed window screen and it has different sized burlap pockets sewn onto it. Kinda big but its perfect for my bills, mail and important papers instead of the pile always on the kitchen table! I added tea stained hang tags to it and wha la! I have one little organized thing in my world!

I am having so much fun going from artist page to artist page and blog to blog, it never ends!!! Too bad I can't make a living doing it :)
People are so creative, it's amazing! Someday I am gonna buy some really expensive art piece just because I like it!!! Some day....

Today I sold my first creation on the PFATT marketplace! I am so excited. I would love to contribute to the family finances by making and selling my art regularly.
On the other hand, I think God is leading me toward this new direction because, as most of you know, I take care of my parents, especially my mom who has been sick for a long time. They have just found a cancerous tumor in her colon and the doctors say she really couldn't withstand the treatment it would require. So our good and faithful Lord is slowly nudging me over to something else so it won't just be emptiness when she is gone.
It's not that I haven't been creating all along, it's just that it is here and there, this and that. I want to be an established artist with a following! I want groupies for petes sake!!! :)
So all you pray-ers please keep her in your prayers. I really hope she doesn't suffer, she SO doesn't deserve that. And in the meantime I will plug along, give her lots of kisses and hugs and make my little Jack O Lantern people when I can.

My dream is to have a studio. A big huge room that is all mine for all my stuff to create with. And believe me, I got stuff! I absolutely adore the magazine WHERE WOMEN CREATE. It not only inspires me but I feel a kind of fellowship with the other artists even tho they are strangers. I anxiously await the next issue.

I cannot express enough how happy I am that I am a creative person. I LOVE to create, it is like playing to me. So my dream is to have a studio and time to be in it. Here's the rub: that would mean other things would have to be given up. I am responsible for my two 85 year old parents. The only way to move to a place with a studio and have time to use it is if they were gone. And while my mom is very sick I don't want to lose her or my dad. So I will just sit late at night in my crowded messy little extra bedroom/craft room and create when I can. I will enjoy my parents while they are still here, pray for more patience and know that when they are gone that I did everything possible for them and sacrificed for them. Then it will be my turn.

So today I have firmly decided I am a picky fuss budget! I am trying to take photos of my little Jack O Lantern guys to send to PFATT and I have found something wrong with each and every photo I take. You can't see the ruffle on this one, you can't tell there is a really neat clock gear on that one. My gosh, get over myself! It is taking me longer to photograph them than it does to make them!

Then again, if you looked at condition my craft room or my ebay room you might not tend to agree that I am fussy!

Halloween

So I am a Christian woman and I sell Halloween things....YIKES!....betcha some don't like that!
I love Halloween! Always have. It's fun! I just can't ignore Halloween because somewhere back in time there was a pagan thing called All Hallows Eve or something that was evil. Nope! Halloween is pillowcases full of candy and funny costumes and parties and fun!

I don't sacrifice burnt offerings or get in a circle naked. I don't call forth spirits. I make cute little Jack O Lantern figurines out of old stuff. I decorate my house, carve a bunch of pumpkins and converge with the neighborhood! I try to be a good example as a light of Christ and I try not to judge others. By not celebrating I think it alientates my neighbors that I am trying to reach out to.
I don't preach, I set an example with my life.

Satan is not just around on Halloween, I am pretty sure he's around every other day too, when you aren't looking for him! Ohhhhhh Scarrrryyyy. :)

I prayed for a long time about this and asked God to show me if it is wrong to make my little Jack O Lanterns. Nothing! I say follow the convictions of your own heart. I won't judge you and I ask that you don't judge me.

If you don't tell the little kids the pagen part then they will never know...its just a fun day that they can carve pumpkins, dress up however they want, be silly and eat candy till they are sick. And Oh! They can still know Jesus if they choose to!

The Stars in Barb's Eyes

So I am sure you all are wondering "why the heck is she calling this blog "The Stars in Barb's Eyes"? And I say to you that its because my whole life I have had LOTS of stars in my eyes. They are creative stars! Stars of millions of creative ideas, and thoughts, and dreams.



I am going to be selling my little Jack-O-Lantern people on a really neat website: http://www.pfattmarketplace.com/index.html starting in February and I noticed lots of the artists have blogs where they write thoughts and ideas and post pictures of new creations so I decided to do it too. And this is my first post!

I once heard a little girl say she was "ARTASTIC". I am artastic! I am never happier than sitting in my little cramped, crowded, messy little craft room and making things. I am truly grateful to God that He gave me creativity. I am so blessed!

Thanks for reading this today. Hopefully I will have good stuff to say and post all the time. And thanks to all you guys, (and you know who you are) for ALWAYS supporting me and the stars in my eyes. I love you all.