MASdesigns

Fall colors and other stuff

The fall colors are peaking around here and each day I'm afraid it's the last one to get some photos. One good windy day and they will be gone. So yesterday I took my camera to the woods along the path to Brad's school and saw this tree on fire with color. 

Another thing I wanted to share...well..two things. The first one is that I went grocery shopping yesterday and bought a bottle of wine along with a weeks worth of food. That's not the big news. The big thing that totally made my day was I was carded. When she asked for my driver's license I was confused at first. Then I got it and said "Wow..thank you!" 42 year old me got carded! All I can think is that the check out lady really needs glasses. 

The other thing I wanted to share is I discovered a new use for an old thing. I would get so frustrated at the gym because my ear phones would always get tangled in my gym bag and it would take forever to un-tangle them, using up precious gym time. So I found this little lipstick holder that was just sitting in my junk drawer and it works perfectly as an ear phone holder. No more tangles! Gotta love that!

Generosity

Today I am sharing another page from my 2009 calendar. I also use this as my iPhone's wallpaper. It's a daily reminder for me to live generously, which I need sometimes since I tend not to be very generous. There is another verse I love that's the opposite of this one. It's Matt 6:22 and in talks about being greedy and living squinty-eyed. That's such a descriptive word....squinty-eyed. Can't you just picture someone all cranky, squinty and petty. I really don't want to be that person. Both of these verses are from The Message which is my favorite version of the Bible. The photo was taken in May 2006 at Mackinaw Island.

Sauerkraut Pizza??

Brian came home from his trip to Minnesota this Friday raving about the pizza he had there and that we just had to make it for dinner this weekend. The thing that made this pizza so awesome was sauerkraut. Sauerkraut??? So last night we put sauerkraut on our pizzas and it actually was pretty good. It also had pineapple and ham so it had a sweet and sour thing going on. 

Miranda liked it but she loves sauerkraut so that was no surprise, 

but Brad....not so much.

Why I used "Heaven in a wild flower" for my banner

This part of a poem by William Blake popped into my head one day. 

"To see a world in a grain of sand,

And a heaven in a wild flower,

Hold infinity in the palm of your hand,

And eternity in an hour."

Not sure why this came to mind since I really haven't thought of this poem since it was required reading in my high school English Lit class. And to be honest, I never really got it back then. I think I get it now...at least the first two verses. It was one of those "A ha" moments. One of those "Where did that come from" moments. It perfectly described what I'm trying to do with my art. Paring my nature photography with bible verses and a creating a deeper meaning for both. To be able to see God through his creation, in other words "Heaven in a wildflower". 

When I created my banner for this site I knew the exact photo I would use. Every spring a bunch of Trilliums pop up in the woods along the path to the kids school. I was intent on capturing the perfect photo of these flowers and I took about a hundred shots of them last year. I had no idea I what I was going to do with all these photos-just felt the need to get the perfect shot...and this one was my favorite.

Wide Open Spaces

A couple months ago I read this verse and I knew right away that I would use it as a calendar page. In fact, it's both highlighted and flagged in my Bible with one of those little post it's things. The phase "Wide open spaces of Gods grace and glory" struck me. The problem was finding the right photo. Nothing really did it justice. Then I remembered the photos I took a couple years ago of the Pictured Rocks in Munising, MI. Perfect....well almost. The colors were not as brilliant as I would have liked-but thanks to some new Photoshop actions I just downloaded I was able to make the colors of the rocks pop and deepen the blue of the sky as well. Gotta love Photoshop! If you can't read the smaller type just click on the photo and a larger version will pop open.

Christmas already?

I know it's only October and I should be focused on Halloween costumes but my mind is on Christmas cards. I was looking through my iphoto library and saw this photo I took last March. It was on one of those clear blue days with fresh snow from the night before covering the trees. I went out in our backyard to get some photos of the snow and saw the sunlight was peaking through the branches of this tree. I'm thinking that this might be our Christmas card this year. Maybe...I don't know. The verse is a favorite of mine, John 1:1. It's so poetic. Maybe it doesn't seem very Christmasy, but it will when I add John 1:14 on the inside of the card "The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us."

How you know your daughter is not REALLY dying

This weekend we went as a family to the cider mill. We had some yummy donuts, cider and apples and all was good until the ride home. Miranda suddenly felt car sick and was moaning in the backseat about how horrible she felt. Her head was rolling back and forth and she kept crying to hurry up and go home NOW but....don't go so fast because "I'm going to throw up". Believe me, as any parent can tell you, when your child says "Mom, I don't feel so good," and you're in a moving car, things get serious fast. So, in the midst of Miranda moaning and me looking in vain for a bag....any bag...to use if she did get sick, Miranda's cell phone gives a little "ding". It's the telltale sign that she just got a text message. So my very sick daughter stops moaning, searches through her backpack for her phone, reads the text and then SENDS A TEXT MESSAGE BACK. That's when you know your daughter is going to make it.

Reflections

For my very first post I wanted to share a card I just made. The photo was taken earlier this month at Bambi Lake conference center. I was there with my good friend Aleda (hi Aleda) for a scrap booking weekend. I didn't make as many scrapbook pages as Aleda did, but I did get some great fall photos. The weather was beautiful and the colors were almost at their peak so I had to take a couple walks around the camp with my camera. I loved the way the trees were reflected in the water. This might just make it in the 2009 calendar.