Awesome Day!

I follow a couple of art challenges on Facebook, one I've been following for over 3 years and a couple of others for just over 2 years. The one I've been following the longest is Colour Me Positive, run out of Queenland in Australia. (https://www.facebook.com/groups/1712426162335330/?fref=nf)

This week's quote is "Have an awesome day! And if that doesn't work, try again tomorrow", and as I have done for a couple of other challenges this year, I am responding by doing a blog entry. My blog was dormant for a long time until this year, when I have done several posts in response to various art challenges, lessons and experiences.

Today's experience definitely comes under awesome. It started out as a visit to Dandenong Market with my sister-in-law (Cheryl) so that she could buy some small Australian souvenirs to take with her in June when she embarks on a European tour. Cheryl is so excited about this trip - her first overseas trip, if you dismiss the cruise to New Caledonia a couple of years ago.

This is a long held dream for Cheryl and she is very brave to go off on her own (leaving hubby at home) to join an organised tour hitting all the hotshots. After that, her younger son is joining her to tour around France where he has numerous friends, having played his guitar at music festivals every European summer for a number of years.

Anyway, that's why she wanted some small souvenirs to give as gifts to friends, family & anyone else who helps them out.

Souvenirs purchased, we stopped at a Turkish Cafe she knows for coffee and a snack. As Cheryl paid, the Cafe lady asked her to help another customer which Cheryl did quite willingly. When this other lady went to sit down with her food, Cheryl invited her to join us.

Nina, is from Taiwan and has been in Australia for three years. We found out lots of things about her because my sister-in-law asked and was interested in the answers. Nina is learning to drive, her son lives near us, her husband passed away, her son sponsored her to come to Australia, and she is learning to like all the different cultures and loves all the shops.

Nina told us that she also met someone the last time she bought coffee at this Cafe. So the awesome part of our day was making a new friend, even though we may never see her again. I hope Nina enjoyed meeting us.

Nina commented that Cheryl really listened to her and tried hard to understand what she was saying. That's pretty awesome too - it's not a skill many of us have - too busy on our phones or just not prepared to give people the time of day. This skill is one Cheryl has always had, but it has been honed over the years with her work in aged care, particularly with dementia patients.

Cheryl is now retired, but the skill is being put to AWESOME use making friends with all sort of people in all sorts of places - and won't she have an awesome time on her travels talking to all and sundry!!

A-Z Collages finished

Well it's taken me a while, but I've finally finished the A-Z collage challenge that I set myself. I was a bit worried about Z, as my favoured word "zany" was a bit too close to the Y words "young at heart".
Looking through my favourite blogs one day, I got a lightbulb moment and decided to use "zentangle". So here are my last two collages in this challenge...

Collages - Y & Z

My favourite image on this page is Dr. Karl being hugged by a tree!

Most of the zentangles are mine, with the exception of the round one in the centre, done by Dudz for one of the Diva's challenges, and the icosahedron in the bottom left corner. If you are interested in Zentangles I recommend Linda Farmer's site Tangle Patterns which has links to lots of patterns, strings and the founder's website. http://tanglepatterns.com/about

Colour Me Positive Week 29 - JOURNEY

I've been feeling a bit flat lately for various reasons - impending surgery, cold weather, death of a friend - so trying to come up with a travel page was a bit beyond me. Eventually, I did this page just to get the challenge over and done with.

Mission Inspiration - July again

I decided to have another go at the July Mission Inspiration challenge, but without song lyrics this time. I had cut this image out of a magazine and knew that I wanted to say "CLEAN UP YOUR ACT!" as a nudge to me to get my house cleaned and tidied. And I wanted to have another go at a Mission to see how I would go with planning it all out.

Judge for yourself - here is my page...

Mission Inspiration - April

I am slowly working my way backwards through some of the Mission Inspiration challenges, so here is my page for April's Mission together with the mission details. I found the old boarding pass while clearing up and already had the image of the Sydney skyline stamped on tracing paper - so that was my focal point.

Journal 52 Week 31 - Letting Go / Holding On

As you can see, I have nothing to offer for weeks 27 through to 30 for Journal 52, and even for week 31 I am recycling a page I did for Mission Inspiration's May challenge. Partly this is because I have not been feeling up to it and partly because the challenge prompts are not offering any inspiration at the moment.

As I've said previously, I may use the prompts later if anything comes to me, but for now, here is another upload of my "Letting Go" page.

Getting it all out

This page was done in response to feeling very frustrated with nearly everything in my life. You know - all the usual stuff - too fat, too lazy, too tired, house too messy, not eating right, scared about surgery, sudden death of a friend, etc, etc, etc.

I just wrote it all down as I thought of it - scribbled, moaned, whinged - and then I covered it up with the happy picture from a magazine. I highlighted some key words, then painted over the other words in bright colours in an attempt to lighten my mood.

It certainly helps to have something to keep my mind occupied and not dwelling on what is coming. 

There is way too much introspection in my life and as a result I have contacted an old friend via FB and hope to catch up with her soon. We have not seen one another for twenty years, but I see no reason why we shouldn't just resume where we left off!

This was prompted by the death of my other friend - one I had not seen in forty years - but who I was close to at one time and who I had been thinking of lately. I was going to try contacting her and see if she would come to the next class reunion lunch in October. Too late - she died suddenly in early July and I have missed my chance to re-connect.

I am going to make a concerted effort to get out and see people (relatives/friends/former work colleagues) because while FB gives the illusion of friendship, there is nothing like actually sitting down with people face to face.

Keep well and happy. Cheers!