Days 363, 364 and (drum roll) 365!!!!

     It is hard to believe this year is almost over.  Wow.  It has been an eventful year in so many ways.  I hope 2016 brings some changes for me.  It will hopefully if I can work it out financially be the year I get to retire.  I can hardly wait.  I love my class and I love teaching, but it has gotten so regimented and tiring.  At least at my school, hopefully not everywhere.
    Day 363 was an important day to me - I turned 61!  Yahoo!  Unfortunately I coughed my way into a new year.  It is this crazy weather, but I can't seem to shake this hacky cough.  Aargh!
    Finished some challenges - the first one was done for Made by Joey.  I spent the day playing a computer game (yes, perhaps, I should grow up).  Sitting and mindlessly playing a game with Ray allowed me a chance to be still and quiet and I do cough less that way.

     Day 364 and I worked on a Facebook challenge using the tangle trapt.  I love this tangle - it just keeps growing and growing.

     The last day of the year, day 365.  I am so happy that I have not missed one day of this Create a Day challenge.  I won't do it again.  It was too hard to keep my posts caught up.  I will still create something each day - that is just me.  I also won't miss any of my faovrite challenges.  I just won't have to do so many posts.  This tile was for day 365 and Diane Clancy's challenge - autumnal, fengle, fans, and migracurl.

    I hope you have a very safe and wonderful New Year's Eve!  Thanks to everyone who leaves me some sunshine - you make my day!!

Day 362 - Cricut, I love you!

    Seriously, I am in some heavy love!  Way back I had a cricut machine, then got a cricut expression not too long ago.  When Ray suggest the Cricut Explore Air this Christmas, I was okay with it.  Sounded nice, but mine worked so why?  Oh was I wrong!  I love my new Air.  I love Design Space and not a day has gone by that I haven't found something to cut.  This machine is so awesome.   Today I worked on a card (not shown), a Valentine box to see if I wanted to use it for my class at Valentine's Day, and a favorite verse of mine. 

    Have a great day and only 3 more days of this challenge to create each year to go!!  I have not missed one day. 

Day 361 - the last inchie of the year . . .

     I love this challenge!  It is small yet so challenging.  Some weeks the idea just pop into my head.  Other weeks, Ray and I bounce ideas back and forth searching for that "right" one.  I like to be unique and a bit quirky.  I don't always pull that off.  Either way, no matter what, it is one of the most rewarding challenges I have gotten involved with.  And that being said, I can't wait until next year!
     This week's word was "next".  No grand idea here.  We did a lot of brainstorming but this is not one of the best.  All I could think of was what will NEXT year be like?  This has been a very rough and demanding year in a lot of ways.  So I think of next year.  Will my situations see any improvements?  I hope so.  But just as importantly, I hope for the faith to endure any and all challenges. 

    When I first started inchies, I saw someone had made a grid to put their inchies on.  Of course, I had to borrow this neat idea.  These have been posted before (well, not 2015) but I thought I would share this small journey with you.  I really love these pages because of the different types of art work I have gotten to play with.  

    Now I think I need to get one made for 2016!  Thanks for dropping by.   I hope you are having a wonderful day!

Day 360

     I tried the new tangle libri for this one.  Something strange - the little bars of libri remind me of twix bars.  Okay, that is odd.  Maybe I am just craving a twix, who knows?  I wasn't sure what to do with the large white space in the right upper corner, so I left it.  Decided it would be too busy to fill it.

     We actually had a day without rain.  Lots of flooding around us so I know they are all happy to see at least a little sunshine.  More rain in the forecast in the next few days though.  Have a great day and I hope you are warm and dry!

Day 359 - Christmas Day!!

     Storms and high winds for Christmas???  Such strange weather.  We even have our air on.  Of course, I suppose I should be glad it is not super cold with all this wet weather or we would be shoveling out in June!  I think all this back and forth weather has given me a rather nasty cough.  I am a bit yucky. 
     Tried out a new tangle - tabz - for a facebook challenge.  I hadn't done any challenges for the Tangle It Pattern Club even though I do enjoy looking at others.  I just couldn't add another challenge.  However lots of my regular sites are shut down til Jan. 4  (the day I go back to school) so I thought I would have a go at this one.

      Guess I had better go get our Christmas dinner ready.  It is just my brother and I but we do love to celebrate!  Haven't grown up, I suppose.  I hope your Christmas Day is wonderful.  If you celebrate another holiday this time of year, I wish you the very best of days.   Hugs and blessings to you!

Day 358 - sort of

    My numbering of the days of the year was clearly off.  I thought day 358 was Wednesday.  Not so.  It is Thursday, Christmas Eve.  Not a big deal.  Unless you are a perfectionist like me.  Little things like that drive me nuts.  So this is day 358, part B, I guess.
    I worked on Diane Clancy's challenge #38.  Since I was still in a coloring mood, I added color.  I used the tangles - lamar, paris, and nacho. 

    I wish you a very Merry Christmas and a blessed holiday season!  

Day 358 - Coloring . . .

One of my Christmas presents (opened early), was a couple of coloring books by Creative Haven, Entangled and Dream Doodles.  Both are filled with really intricate and pretty designs.  As a child I loved to color and it still is one of my favorite activities.  I often will sit at my student tables and color along with them.  We chat and visit.  This is a very informal way of finding out about my class and what they are thinking.  They also enjoy that I share with them bits about me.  So needless to say, I am delighted with the adult coloring book craze. 
     One day I am going to get some really good color pencils, but for now if I want to use color pencils, I use a large set of Crayolas I have.  Actually I like them.  I just wouldn't argue with some prismacolors. 

Thanks for dropping by and I hope your day is going great!!

Day 357 - A Christmas Present

     Made by Joey has given us some beautiful strings to play on the last few weeks, but this may be my favorite.  It was a simple package and we could choose any tangles we wanted.  I decided to put mine under the tree!

     I hope your tree has all the wonderful things you wish for underneath it and your house is filled with family memories!  Blessings to you all!

Days 353 - 356

    We had an awesome day at school today!  It was the day after our class party and we played reindeer games!  Actually I enjoy this day better than party day which just centers around food - tons of it!  We threw marshmallows (snowballs) over our shoulders into a bucket.  Not easy, but I had some kids who were good at it.  One little girl showed up my boys big time.  We had a silent snowball fight - wadded up old worksheets and if they made a sound they had to sit a few minutes.  Loads of fun!  We tossed mini snowballs (again, marshmallows) into cups that the rest of the team held.  And we stacked paper cups into towers - how may can you do in 30 seconds?  Like I said, so much fun.
    I have some things to share, but hadn't had time to sit down and do this.  Oh well.  My brother and I open Christmas gifts way early so I have as much time as possible to enjoy them before returning to school.  Then on Christmas Eve, we have a more solemn and spiritual celebration.  It words for us. 
   I got a totally wonderful Cricut Explore Air - yahoo!  It is going to be so much fun to create with.  That is once I figure it all out.
   Okay on to some challenges -

Adele Bruno's string challenge, day 353
 

Square One challenge, ixorus, day 354

Diane Clancy challenge #37, Tripoli, oflaarla, and quandary, day 355

    


Every Inchie Monday, evolution, day 356
 

    And one final inchie that I did not get posted for last week - I know it is sort of lame, but it was my first thought.  Grab your QR reader and enjoy Jethro Tull's Locomotive Breath.

Every Inchie Monday, locomotive

     Thanks for dropping by and I hope you are having a wonderful day.  Now, it is time to "play" with my new cricut. 


Days 350 - 352

     I honestly meant to get all my Christmas gifts for friends at school done over Thanksgiving break.  But that didn't happen.  Not even close.  So this week I have been rushing around like a mad woman to get things done.  And last night at 12:45, I had to quit.  I was finished but barely.  But today is the last day before break and so there was no chance to not finish.  They had to be done.  So here are the pictures from days 350 - 352.  I can't sort them into each day - they just all were finished over a mad dash of 3 days.  I have several others but I am only posting my best pictures!
     Thanks to Diva for an idea for ornaments for 3 special people - I hurried off to Michael's to buy them.  I just wish I had purchased more.  They are so pretty.
    

     Thanks for dropping by!  Have a great day!

Day 349

     A little something different over at Made By Joey's site this month.  We are given some really pretty strings to fill - Christmasy strings.  I love this one with the 3 trees! 

   Chorus performance tonight at school and Open House.  Yikes!  A long evening and I have to get some Christmas presents finished.  Have a wonderful evening and thanks for dropping by!

Day 345 - 348

     Today I worked on Diane Clancy's challenge.  We had to use tangles that began with the letters XPI.   I chose to use xenso, puf, and indy-rella.  I kept debating on whether to add color, but decided against it.

Day 345

     Square One's tangle for this week was "wud".  I used it in a hollibaugh fashion.  This reminds me of a stack of boards - like the kind I might find behind my papa's garage.  We used to climb on them. Or "borrow" them to build something, perhaps a clubhouse or fort.

Day 346

     I have one week of school left before Christmas break (insert really loud yahoo!).  I have to finish up my shrink plastic ornaments and get those ready.  Today I worked on Christmas cards to give to some special people at school.  Well into the project I realized I had almost no red paper.  How do you do Christmas with no red paper??  I managed, but I must get to Michael's this week for some glue and red paper.  I am getting a new Cricut Explore Air for Christmas which I can't wait to play with.  The beauty of that over my current machine is that I will be able to send things to be cut wirelessly from my laptop.  That should be fun.  I can't wait to play with it.

Day 347

      I had big plans for getting my tree up.  It is a bit of a hassle to get it up because it is stored in our attic and not easy to get to.  Since Ray's shoulder has been hurting the last week or so he couldn't get it .  So we were a lot later this year than I like.  It is an old tree but it is very pretty.  Today - no school work - was the day.  We got everything from the attic and began to put it up.  Oops.  Our prelit tree has no lights in the middle.  So we are faced with either getting a new tree (too expensive) or buying a strand of lights for just the middle or having no lights.  We just stopped.  Ray says no lights would be fine.  I love the lights.  We have to reach a decision.  So here is my "creativity" for day 348.  Not much, huh?

Day 348

     Thank you for dropping by.  I hope you are having a blessed day!

Day 344

    Made by Joey's challenge this week was to use any tangle we wanted to fill her Christmas ornament.  I couldn't print her string, but drew it the best I could.  Then after adding a gem - voila!  We are ready for the tree.  I thought about adding some verdigogh to the background.  I may do that yet.

     Hope you are having a blessed day!

Day 343

     Here is my small bit of creativity for day 343.  I could count putting up a classroom Christmas tree or several other class projects, but this was my relaxing moment.

    See you later!  Have a great day!

Days 338 - 342

   One of my facebook groups (Square One) is doing the 25 days of Christmas and having different tangle artist feature new tangles each day.  This is loads of fun.  So for days 338 and 339 I worked in my calendar journal and put in the new tangles.  I love this journal and have been dropping hints for a solid month to my brother about a new one for this Christmas.  Should I send him this link so he can get even another hint?

     Day 340 and I worked on my inchie for Every Inchie Monday.  The word was angel.  I make these quilled angels and put them on pins to give as gifts.

     Day 341 - I love Diane Clancy's alphabet challenge.  The letters were KUC.  I used several fun tangles- koaxil, up and down, crescent moon and chard.

     We had the last art club on Monday, day 342.  This has been such a great group.  We worked with shrink plastic and made ornaments.  Lots of fun!  I also did this with my class of second graders today.  So funny to watch their faces when it started to curl up.  I had one little boy who could not quite understand it was the plastic that did the shrinking not the heat tool I was using- he kept asking if he could try to put other things under it so they could shrink!  Too funny!

     Guess I will try to get these posted and caught up.  Thanks for dropping by and I hope you have a blessed day!

Day 337 An Aqua-flourish Tree!

     When I first saw the challenge by Adele Bruno this week, I thought this is not going to be possible.  Aquafleur as a monotangle?  On a Christmas tree string?  Nope, not going to happen.  Well, I was wrong.  I love using aquafleur as a filler!  This is so much fun.  I can't wait to try it as a filler in some more tiles!

     Thank you for dropping by and saying hello!  Have a great day!

Days 334 - 336 Please send sunshine!

    I wish it would stop raining.  I need you to send sunshine quickly - and lots of it.   I don't mind showers, even an occaisional downpour.  But days??  Really??
     I worked on my inchie for Every Inchie Monday when I finished school work on day 334.  The word was tea, so made a tiny teacup.

     I am doing a swap for one of my Facebook groups and so on day 335, I finished up my ATCs for the swap so they could go into the mail.

     Made by Joey's challenge this week was to use the tangle, zingers.  Diva's guest challenger asked us to do a tree using a monotangle.  Sounded like they could be combined!   So I did a . . . zinger tree!  Here is day 336.

     Okay.  Back to doing some more drawing.  You know it is going to keep up this rain and we are going to have school delay.  Two hours and the chance to sleep a bit longer . . .  uh, wait a minute. Please cancel the request for sunshine.  At least until tomorrow afternoon.  Thanks for dropping by and saying hello!

Days 330 - 333

     Day 330 and the day before Thanksgiving.  It is just my brother and I but we still enjoy a rather nice "feast".  I like to cook a bit more than usual so I can do left overs as much as possible.   When we were younger and lived in North Carolina, we had lots of family.  My grandmother, aunt and mom cooked for hours (probably days).  Nannie's pecan pie.  Mama's special potato salad.  Oh my.  Such a bounty of good food and the warm feeling of being surrounded by people who loved you.  I was very fortunate to have grown up when and where I did.  Adele Bruno's string challenge was to keep it simple and use two tangles, gourdeous and lichen.  Then to use the tile to reflect on someone or something that you were thankful for.  I am most thankful for my brother.  He is my best friend and favorite person to be with.  I have been blessed with him.

     Thanksgiving and day 331!  The casserole is in the oven.   The smells are so good.  And I have a bit to tangle!  I was so happy to see the two challenges by Susy Mosh were up.  I love her challenges.  For That's New To Me #46 we had to use the tangle "points and curves" and a new (to us) tangle that begins with the letter x.  I used a new tangle called "x".  Then I also added some xplode and xplo-zen.  It was sort of empty so I added some color.

    The second challenge is the Tangle Me 3.  We had to use points and curves again for a monotangle.  I almost didn't do this one because I wasn't sure I wanted to play around with that tangle again.  Glad I did though because I liked it much better this time.

     Square One's facebook challenge was to use the tangle steps.  I went and watch Helen Williams's show how to do this in her video.  That helped.  Here is day 332.

     Diane Clancy and working on this blog for day 333.  I chose to use hi-c's, waterslide and nzeppel for her HWN challenge. 

     I think I will take a few minutes and play around with drawing the "gems" that are so popular on a facebook site I go to.  They are so beautiful.  I suppose tomorrow I will spend the day doing some school work.  Then it is back to work on Monday.  I am excited about seeing my kids and hearing about their break.  I hope all goes well with everything else.  I have had a battle with the anxiety I felt, but feel a bit stronger now than I did.  Take care and thanks for dropping by.  Hope your day is filled with blessings!!

Days 327 - 329 Time off!

     I am so loving this week and time off from work!  I needed this break.  I have been able to get some crafting done, a few things around the house, and spend time enjoying a new computer game that Ray and I are loving.  Yep, good break.  Not to mention sleeping in. 
     For Every Inchie Monday the word was crochet.  I had a great grandmother who crocheted all the time.  She did such beautiful work.  There would always be a special crocheted Christmas item for all her family.  A while back I tried my hand at tatting (crocheting lace like items).  I made some snowflakes for our tree, some doilies, and a few other small items.  It was fun but not what I would say relaxing.  Now I am not sure my eyesight would be able to do this.  Probably not.  But for my inchie I went to my old thread basket and found a scrap I had practiced on.  I cut it so it would fit my inchie and there you have it!

     It seems like the tangle hollibaugh has been a focus of a lot of challenges lately.  Diva wanted it to be the focus of her "back to basics" challenge this week. 

     Made by Joey's challenge #88 was to do a monotangle with the tangle Yuma.  I never used this one so much.  I watch one of Ellen Wolters's videos on drawing Yuma and actually found myself liking this tangle.

    Now I think I will head off and work on some shrink plastic ornaments for some Christmas presents.  I will show them to you later.  Take care and have a blessed day. 

Day 322 - 326 Finally

    This has been one of the most difficult weeks I have gone through.  And it is finally over.  I just haven't had the energy to post - I have drawn my tiles, but I really could not work up the frame of mind to write. 
     For the That's New to Me challenge #45, I used the tangle icthus and Sue Clark's falz and echo.  I took the easy way out and made a tile composed of some little tiles. 

     Then the next day I worked on Tangle Me 3 # 21 challenge.  We had to use the tangle ansu. I had this one in my notebook, but had never used it.  At first I really didn't like the tile, but once I added the color I became happier.

      Friday evening I sat down and finally worked on Diva's challenge "Tripoli triptastic".  I like this tangle a lot.  It always makes me think of orange slices.  Yum.

     A little more time on Saturday afternoon to draw.  I did the facebook challenge to use peanuckle (I love this tangle).   Then I worked on Diane Clancy's 33rd challenge.  Tangles had to begin with the letters BEX.  I used bunco, balo, emingle, and XYP.  Added a bit of color to help it be more cheerful.

     There.  Now I am all caught up.  I am also out of school for 9 whole WONDERFUL days!  I love my class so much.  I love the teachers and staff I work with.  I wish I could say that for the "leadership".   My life is being made miserable by one person.  I barely got through this week.  I have spent 39 years in that building.  My passion is education and working with children.  I have spent every evening this week trying to figure out how I can manage to either find another job or financially retire.  Neither seem possible and I don't know how I will find the strength to go back.  I have prayed and hope to be blessed with that strength.  For now I am trying to focus on Thanksgiving and being away from the school.  Normally I would be searching the internet for ideas and things - I am not allowing myself to do that.  For 9 days, I am not a teacher.  I am . . . well, I guess I am an artist.  Or whatever.
      Have a wonderful day and I hope you are feeling blessed.  Hugs to all!!