RETURN OF NIECES A GO-GO

Greetings, dear reader!

As promised, I am back today with more pictures of my recent excursion to ST. Louis with "darling nieces" Emileigh and Aria. (Trivia tidbit: Emileigh's name was spelled after the famed actress "Vivian Leigh" of Gone With the Wind fame. My sister has always been a "rabid" fan. The name "Aria" means 'beautiful song' in Italian. Isn't that awesome? Since my brother in law is a music composer and songwriter, it seemed very appropriate!)

Back to the photos! Here is our Day 2 Itinerary:

Michael's Craft Store (although we took no pictures, we should have. It was unlike any Michael's I've ever been to)
The St. Louis Art Museum
The Riverfront
The Old Spaghetti Factory

(By the way, all photos are taken by my nieces...they are quite the aspiring photography buffs!)

Here are pictures taken while our navigator, "Tom Tom" was taking us on a wild goose chase. Apparently, when you take Highway 40 out of the possibilities for road travel, there are many places that you "can't get to from here." (EVEN with technological help!) We drove aimlessly for several miles, while Tom Tom navigated us in circles and ALWAYS back to a Highway 40 ramp (which is now non existent by the way due to construction). All was not lost, for shutterbug Aria manned the camera from the back seat and got these fabulous photos. The lamp post was taken in midtown, and the giant shoe made out of shoes was in front of the Brown Shoe Factory.

Approaching the St. Louis Art Museum



The foyer you walk into from the front entrance


A beautiful window in the museum


One thing great about going anywhere with nieces (teenagers) is that you get to experience things through their eyes. Even the most random things take on great importance. For example:

A photoshoot in a random wind tunnel in the hallway



Another photo shoot in the brass elevator



And (of all things) striking a warrior's pose in front of the medieval weaponry armor!





When I told Aria she couldn't pull off the "tough pose" very well, she said, "What can I say? I'm a lover not a fighter." LOL! Cracks me up!

And we HAD to go by Wolfgang Puck's restaurant so I could visit "my" Chihuly chandelier!



And then on to the riverfront to kill time while waiting for my sister and brother in law to get to the Spaghetti Factory:



Urban Grunge: Graffiti on a wall down by the river...



The cobblestone riverfront (remember it was flooded only a few weeks ago...thus all the debris I suppose)

A Lewis and Clark Statue I didn't know was there! (Isn't it a great shot with the riverboat behind it!? GO ARIA! WOOT!)

And of course the Arch (I just love posing in front of giant monuments...it always makes me look small in comparison. :-) )

I don't remember it being so dark that day...but I told the girls I attribute that to the fact that they were so dazzling all day long!

And a final shot on the riverfront...Emileigh looking oh so wonderfully vintage in the black and white version!

And then on to the Old Spaghetti Factory! You've seen this shot before:

But saw it with our posing Travel Companion when my sisters and I went to St. Louis a few months ago!

And the gorgeous window...


And bust of Shakespeare...


And the amazing antique furniture!

But the best part was being with my dear nieces. (Check out the giant aviators! SOooo random!) Nieces are SO MUCH FUN!

Next post I'll show you what I've been up to via craft madness...

More soon!



Paula Clare

NIECES A GO-GO!

Greetings, dear readers!

My nieces have finally made it home and have made the photos of our time in St. Louis accessible to the "old auntie" so I can post them here. First of all, let me introduce you. This is my niece Aria:



And this is Emileigh.


(Aren't they adorable?)

And this is us ready for our big day out:


Our itinerary was as follows:

DAY 1:
The Cheesecake Factory
Red Lead Altered Art Store
The Cupcakery











Our cupcakes of choice: Em: Double chocolate chocolate, Aria: Tuxedo, and me: Orange Crush! After going back to the hotel and crafting for countless hours on end, we finally went to sleep and prepared for the next day's events:

More on THAT tomorrow!

Peace in the hood!


More soon!



Paula Clare

WINNER... SHOPPE GIVEAWAY!

More soon!



Paula Clare

WORDS, WANDS AND WALLABIES

Greetings, dear reader!

First of all, I must 'fess up' that there are no wallabies in this post...well...other than these:

Aren't they adorable? I thought so...but they have absolutely nothing to do with anything except that I LOVE alliteration...so I needed a catchy "W" word, dig? Anyhoo, on to the post!

As you can see in my sidebar, I am participating in Artsy Mama's Sweet and Sinister Swap as well as her online class. Here are projects made from yesterday's tutorial from Jennifer Lee of Artrageous Afternoon Behold, the "Scaredy Cat Wands!"

These are, par my usual, not just like her tutorial...I used hollow paper mache forms, poked a hole in the bottom and put beans in them so they are Halloween rattles (I seem to have some memory of my gramma telling me that their Halloween toys during the Great Depression were rattles made with decorated cardboard boxes and beans...I guess these are those...several generations removed!) Instead of glitter around the edges, I used silver chenille pipe cleaners (I like the vintage-y look of them) and instead of paper banners I used faux typewriter keys to spell out Halloween-esque words. I added LOTS more ribbon than was called for, a jack o lantern jingle bell, and a stylish witches hat and crown (fashion first as they say!) Anyway, here are my versions...:

And then, just because I was having so much fun, I made this little wall hanging. It's from one of my favorite authors...Edgar Allen Poe! And one of my FAVE poems; quite "spooky" (if you ask me) is "The Raven." I painted the disc black, sanded and "ratted up" the edges, created the images with Photoshop Elements, printed them out on parchment paper, and then decoupaged them onto the paper mache disc. (It's about 6: in diameter). Of course I had to "grunge" things up a bit...I finished by using vintage seam binding for a hanger. And voila! A literary piece of Halloween decor!

And finally, since I did a lot of things on the "sinister" side, I of course had to create something "sweet", so here it is: A Vintage Halloween Rattle!








Thanks for stopping by! And, OH! I haven't forgotten about the drawing for the sample shoppe item...I will be doing the drawing on video and posting tomorrow! Stay tuned!

More soon!



Paula Clare

THEY LIKE ME...THEY REEEEALLY LIKE ME!

Greetings, dear readers! Happy Monday to ye all!

Just a quick note amidst the madness to let you know my little shop (Art In Season) will be included in the Lollishops Mall! WOOT!

One thing I am NOT going to do is turn THIS blog into a perpetual advertisement for my shop. I just hate it when people do that...so after this post, I will put the happy button in my sidebar and speak not of it again...UNTIL IT OPENS mid September. Deal? Alrighty then...onto other news...

My darling nieces and I had OH SO MUCH FUN in St. Louis...here's a video snippet from the "Auntie Cam" of one of the many stops along our "TOUR DE PAULA"

More photos, stories and bloggy goodness to come! (The girls are holding the photos hostage until such time as they can get home and include them on their Facebook pages. Meanwhile, Auntie Paula has to WAIT! BOO!)

More soon!




Paula Clare

BIG ANNOUNCEMENT...AND RAKs FOR EVERYONE!

Thanks for your patience! This has taken FAR longer than I anticipated...although technical difficulties abound, without further adieu, here is the announcement!

Here are the RAKs as promised! Enjoy!






Oh! I almost forgot! I will also pick a name from comments left here and send a sample of the goodies that will be in my shoppe!

BIG ANNOUNCEMENT EVE...

Greetings, dear reader!

I have been working feverishly to get it all together, and will hopefully make the announcement sometime tomorrow. In celebration of said announcement, I will be giving away random RAKs throughout the day/evening. SO at least show up back here tomorrow to see what all the hub bub is about!

See you tomorrow!

SUNSHINE, LOLLIPOPS AND...

SUNFLOWERS!

Hubby Dear came home from work and said his company had received an email from a local farmer inviting folks to come and photograph their sunflower field...so we went! It was a perfect day for photography...the sky was bright blue, the sun was shining...and the flowers had their little faces toward the road...as if they were waiting to see us!

I am 5'7", so I'm guessing the flowers are all about 6 feet tall. Just look at this sea of yellow! Isn't it amazing?!?!

You know how I'm always saying sunflowers are "happy flowers"? Well, as we were walking down the road looking at the field before us, the strangest thing occurred: the leaves of the flowers were waving up and down...like they were applauding! Oddly, there was no other discernible breeze...the trees weren't moving, the grass wasn't blowing...only the leaves of the sunflowers. I told my hubby they were applauding their Creator for such a magnificent day!

As we walked back to the car, I could have sworn I heard giggles and laughter! They ARE happy flowers after all!

Sometimes, even "Podunk, USA" has its beauty and surprises!

More soon!




Paula Clare

PS: