New beginnings and an unexpected trip

So this is how the story goes......
My daughter graduated college in 2017 with a 5 year degree in Architecture. The 5 year plan allows her to take the tests to become a licensed architect right after graduation (as long as she passes the tests). A 4 year degree in architecture only allows a person to become licensed after they go back to school and receive their Masters, unless they spend a long time (years) as an apprentice. I assumed my daughter was going on the path of getting her license as she worked for the firm she is currently employed at. Not so. Never assume anything, it makes oneself an ass for assuming.  My daughter, who had no interest in glass while growing up announced that she wants to get her Masters degree in Glass Blowing!  Wow!!!  What can I say?  Obviously, GO FOR IT!!!

She applied to 3 schools and got in to her 1st choice, Rhode Island School of Design! They only accept an average of 4 graduate students per year for the glass program, and she was one of them. I am very proud of her for following her dreams!

So with this we planned a quick trip to Providence, Rhode Island.  I booked a beautiful 2 bedroom apartment named "Olney the Lonely" through Airbnb, and was not disappointed. The home was built in 1880 and the owner refurbished it in 2017. It was beautiful! I had a favorite spot to sit and drink my coffee in the mornings. It was a nook in the kitchen where I looked out the windows as people passed by walking their dogs, or going to school. People watching isn't common in the subdivision where I currently live in since nobody walks anywhere.

Nook in kitchen

you can't see it from this picture, but there was some left over snow still on the ground in a few spots.

 kitchen

 Dining room

Living room

We arrived late Monday night as our earlier flight got cancelled due to the mandatory grounding of the Max 8 planes. On Tuesday and Wednesday my daughter was shadowing other students in the classes, studios and hot shops so we didn't get to see her during those 2 days.  Meanwhile her boyfriend had come along with us on this trip, so I felt kind of bad that he was stuck with me and my husband for that whole time.  The good thing was that we like him, and he likes us too. 

On Tuesday we pretty much stayed around Providence and absorbed the city.  It was like stepping back in time. The buildings were ornate, the streets were narrow and it was very quaint.  They still had winter hours on most of the shops  11am-5pm.  I did find a used book store that was open, Stages of Freedom and met a very interesting man named Ray Rickman.  He was like a walking encyclopedia of information and was a past Rhode Island State Representative. The bookstore funds swimming lessons for children of color.  I kind of questioned the swimming lessons in my mind because it's sooooo cold in Rhode Island, but when I read his story, I understood why.  You can read it here.  He is a true activist.

On Wednesday, while my daughter was busy we drove to the Newport Car Museum in Portsmouth, RI.  I had a semi private tour, only because I asked the person who was standing watch a bunch of questions.  He happily took me around while my husband and the boyfriend went their separate ways.  I did find out some interesting tidbits about the museum. For one thing, the museum is privately owned by a couple that lives in Newport.  They own 70 cars they showcase. A couple of the 22 ' Cadillac's from the 1950's were involved in their children's weddings. The have a car with pocket doors,1954 Kaiser Darrin that Lucille Ball drove. I won't bore you with a bunch of pictures of expensive cars, but I will share with you my favorite and also the left leg rest chair. For a plastic chair it was very comfortable!

my favorite car

pretty cool chair!

Our next stop was to the town of Newport where all the old HUGE mansions are.  The coast line was beautiful, and 95% of the stores and restaurants were still closed for the season. Season starts April 1st.  I would love to go back in the summer!

On Thursday, when we were supposed to leave to come back home, our flight got cancelled, not once but twice so we decided to extend our vacation and drive to NY and see family. I re-booked the tickets to leave out of NY on Saturday and just prayed they wouldn't cancel. Our extended family lives in Rockaway Beach which is a great place to be in the summer! it was rainy and COLD when we arrived but it cleared up on Friday so we were able to enjoy the day. 

 the new "boardwalk" built after Sandy destroyed the wooden one. 

 the boyfriend, daughter and hubby

my cousin and me

I look forward to the new adventure my daughter will have and hope to visit RI while she is there.

  

From rain to a warm sunny day!

This morning started off with rain and a cool wind.  Now as I look out my office window, the sun is out and it's in the 70's. Too nice to be inside....

This Sunday I'll be turning 50 and of all the birthday's in the past, this one is scaring me a bit. Not the number itself, but my future.  A future of "what do I want to do with my life".  I never thought I would be asking myself that at this age.....  I thought that I would have figured it out by now.   Okay enough of  my self pity party.

I completed the set of 10 4"x4" glass coasters and dropped them off as gifts to all the baristas that work at my favorite coffee shop that I frequent. They have resident cats so I made all of them cat themed. I thought they turned out pretty cute.

Now I am working on my other small project consisting of nine small pieces and each piece will have a specif artwork of its own added to it for the final firing.  This picture shows the arrangement I would like it be but the final firing of these pieces will determine how they are actually put together on the wood.  I ordered a diamond hollow bit to drill a hole into the circles so I can somehow mount them to be able to spin.  not sure if that will work.  In the meantime I am working on the actual designs I want to create on them.

  

    On another note, since I caught up on my work at the office, I went to the San Antonio Public Library website for the list of authors that will be attending the 7th annual book festival on April 6th.

I went through each individual author and looked at their book, and have come up with a list of 19 I would like to see and hear talk about their new books.  5 of the 19 are children's book authors. Even though my kids are grown, there is nothing like a beautifully illustrated and well written children's book! 

Now all I have to do is wait for the calendar to come out and mark the authors accordingly and hope that not many of them cross over times.  There are over 100 authors that will be there!  I look forward to this festival every year!!!

new things on the horizon

I have been a recluse when it comes to my real estate.  I still have 100 small magnet calendars for 2019 that I have not done anything with. I hope to give them out before the 6th month mark of the year goes by!  If you have a PO Box and want one I will be happy to mail one out! I will be doing my 2nd open house this year and hope since it is spring that I get some interested people that I can help.

Meanwhile I have been busy being a recluse in my art studio/library.  I have been enjoying it.  I have also created some little 4"x 4" glass coasters that aren't quite finished yet, some of them need final touch ups, and then they just need one more firing in the kiln. I've created 10 of them for gifts to the baristas at my favorite coffee house.  I go there to escape at least 3 times a week on my lunch break, and it's so comfy and cozy in there that I don't want to leave and go back to work. They have a cat that wanders through named Midnight, and at times she has sat with me as I read my book and sipped on my coffee. So I decided to make the glass coaster's cat themed. 

I am also working on my art project for Say Si, which the invitation came late, and I thought that they did not invite me this year. They had good reason as to why it was late, they are celebrating their 25th year anniversary and moved the auction towards the end of the year to celebrate!  I am making something extra special for this event, and I would like to price this piece of art (for donation) upwards of $300.  I hope it comes out as good , if not better than I envision it in my head! 

                                                                    my cozy library

                                          work in progress-cat coasters

I'm getting there!

My studio/library is almost finished!!!!!

My brother finally finished designing and cutting the wood for my bookshelves!  It took all day Sunday and half of Monday for my brother, husband and youngest son to put them together, and sand them. Monday afternoon I painted all three of them and by Monday evening they were dry and brought upstairs and put in their places.

 I spent this evening putting books on the shelves. In addition to the books I had in other rooms,  I had two bins of children's books that I kept in storage from when my kids were young. Tonight I was able to put them on the shelves as well.  Looking at all the books as I put each one on the shelf brought so many fond memories of reading to my kids when they were little, and as they got older each one had there favorites stories that they loved to read.

 I still need to add my reading chair and a small table to rest my book and coffee on.  I am so excited as to how it's turning out.  I'm going to make changes as I go along.  Right now I think I'm going to get new white sheer curtains and remove the blue curtain in the window between the two bookshelves.  I think that will brighten up the room even more.  This is the progress so far and I couldn't be more pleased with it.

I have a feeling that it's not going to take me very long to fill the bookshelves up completely.... 

I love books!

Happy New Year! the project continues....

Happy and Healthy New Year my fellow bloggers!!

Although my art studio/library didn't get finished by Christmas, I have made progress!

Just a bit of back story from my previous blog last month: my brother is building custom bookshelves for me as a Christmas present for my art studio/library. 

I have one bookcase that I am keeping (my brother built it a few years back)  I painted it "treasure map blue" and the walls of the room were painted "bakery box white" which has a blue undertone so the two colors compliment each other.   I was able to finish all that before Christmas.  So now as my brother settles into his new home and organizes his workshop, I am just waiting to have all the other bookshelves pretty soon!

Well, as an artist I LOVE color and I can't just have a blue and white room, so I am excited to share that yesterday I spent 5 hours to complete my 36"octagon stained glass for my window. This will bring additional color to my studio space, especially when the sun shines through in the afternoon.

My art studio/library space is a really nice ongoing project that I am enjoying every step of the way, and I am not sure what I am going to do next when it is finally complete!

So for 2019 I have made a couple of promises/goals for myself as I will be turning 50 this year. 

1. Put in a bit more conversation time with God.
2. Cut sugar out and cut my meals portions in half.  So far it is day 6 and its going good!
3. Work on a business plan for my real estate career.  I am a good, knowledgeable agent, just not a          pushy sales person so I need to be a bit more outgoing to meet people. Day 6 and it's not going so        well as I stayed in all weekend working on art!

4. Pay off some debt. Trying to figure out how is my plan at this moment.

Other than that I am taking each day as it comes, just like I did last year and every year before that.

This afternoon I am enjoying a cup of Greek coffee in the "new office space" as I write to you (it was my son's old room as he has taken his sisters old room!)

   Greek coffee time!

in my garage, with the garage door open, it was a spring like day at 74 degrees!!!

New project

Last month I decided to recreate my studio space in the spare bedroom.  I wanted a library nook with floor to ceiling book shelves along two of the walls. I also wanted the walls to be freshened up.

So my journey began by picking out the colors. I decided to go with Bakery Box white for the walls (Behr paints) which has a blue undertone and Treasure Map blue for the bookshelves.  My brother is a handy dandy carpenter, so when he asked me what I wanted for Christmas, I told him custom bookshelves! I'll pay for the material and he is gifting me his time and talent!

The room is shaped like an L so last weekend I painted three out of the 6 walls. This morning I added a light third coat, which dried pretty quick.so I was able to put the art back up this afternoon  I did learn a hack from you tube in regards to nails. If you have a fluffy enough roller no need to take the nails out, just paint over them. That worked so it saved me time.

I just finished taking the books off of the bookshelves that I currently have so I can move them and paint the rest of the walls. I'm not sure if I'm wasting my time painting these walls since the bookshelves are going to be cover most of the wall space, but I guess I might as well paint just incase small areas may show.

I also got a bit creative by painting the light switch cover and the plug covers. Something different.

,,  

Hopefully I will be done with the room before the new year!!!

Uptown art stroll

Sometimes I wonder why I do the things I do and have to step back and think about everything. Then I pray, and give it to God.

This weekend is Uptown art Stroll and my first show in a few years. Overall I had a successful day, except that as soon as I finished setting up I spilled all my coffee on myself. I looked as if I peed my pants! Thankfully the sun was out to dry me out. My jeans stained to an ugly tint of brown but, I was glad that I don't drink sugar in my coffee or else the ants may have been after me, and I don't think I could have tolorated being sticky all day.

Today the show is going on from noon till 5, but since I was in the coop I opted not to participate today. There will be two other artisits participating today in the coop booth that weren't there yesterday so I don't feel bad about it.

I have a lot going on in my life right now, none of it which is bad, just overwhelming my mind.  I created this plaque which I thought was appropirate and since this particular one did not sell yesterday I will be keeping it for myself, on my desk.

It will remind me of the impotant things to do and not dwell or sweat the small stuff. 

Here are a few pictures of my setup yesterday at the art show. The wind kept blowing over my small plaques so I had to lay them down on the table. At least none of them broke when the toppled over (several times).