Inspirational Message

The art department paints signs to hang in the hallways at school.  Some of these signs promote school pride.  Some cheer on the sports teams.  Others are simply inspirational works to foster positive attitudes and to provide motivation.

On the wall directly opposite my classroom door hangs one such sign.

Students swelter in my stuffy classroom where temperatures hover between 85 and 95 degrees (no, we don't have air conditioning) and for an hour struggle with geometry or statistics problems.   Finally, the bell sounds.  BBRRRRIIIINNNNNNG!!!  As students gather their belongings and scramble to beat each other out the door, an uplifting message awaits their exit.

 

 

In all fairness, the sign originally said "NEVER GIVE UP" but the tape on the first part didn't hold and the custodians swept up the fallen paper and tossed it.  Much to my amusement, it took a few days for most people to notice and a couple more for the art department to redo the missing word.  In the meantime, I seized the day, not to mention my camera, and snapped a few photos.  They still make me smile.

piggy

http://www.geico.com/public/ringtones.php?filename=piggy_ringtone.mp3

Free Marriage Counseling

You're welcome!

Lovely Tulip Card

Thanks go out to Sirpa Roos for this lovely tulip she painted for me. 

Doesn't it just shout SPRING IS HERE?  It does to me.

And if that wasn't enough goodness, check out the envelope she sent it in.

It is gorgeous as well.  Notice the numbers in my address.  She used ones cut from the tape I sent.

Good idea. 

Cherry Blossom Time

Today I mailed out six postcrossing cards.  All of them depict scenes from Washington, DC during Cherry Blossom time in early April.  Aren't they gorgeous!  And, for those of you who think I can't count, there was a duplicate of the last card.

It's Getting To Be That Time Again

Time for one of my all-time favorite cartoons.

Do You Know About Peachy Cheap

Here's an item some of you might be interested in.  12 rolls of tape for one low price.  Check it out at Peachy Cheap.  And no, I am not affiliated in any way with that site.  They offer deals good for one day only, except on weekends when the deal runs on both Saturday and Sunday.  I held off ordering this tape all day Saturday and it still hadn't sold out at noon today, so I took that as a sign I was supposed to order.  It still hasn't sold out as of this posting, so maybe that's your sign????  Call me "Enabler."

Book of Days 2012

Besides letter writing and mail art, my next favorite activity is art journaling.  Here is the front cover of my 2012 Book of Days.  I'm following along with our fearless leader, Effy Wild.  Here's a link to her Book of Days site.  The basic program is totally free.  There is also a Facebook group to join if you like.

She provides two or three videos per week where you can watch her create pages in her own art journal.  Very helpful for those like me who have a huge gap between the idea of my page as it exists inside my mind and what I actually translate onto on the paper.

I won't be posting the journal pages here, but if you are interested you can follow me on Pinterest.  It amazes me that I have 60 followers already on Pinterest, but I've never pinned anything to a single board!  Who are these people?

Security Envelope Trees

If you know me at all, you know I love to use security envelopes in my mail art.  See my post Never Buy Another Envelope. Imagine my delight to find this Christmas card in my mailbox.  It comes from Marguerite Keen of Piccadilly Post.  Check out her blog post Trees Galore! to see the much larger piece she made and donated to a museum fundraiser.

So Marguerite, thanks so much for the card and for all the other mail art you've sent during 2011.  All the best to you and all my other blog readers in the new year.