Ive completed the artwork for the altered CD’s (Gothic Theme) for a swap I am hosting at illustratedatcs.com. Now that Ive done the artwork its on to adding all the fun ‘bling’!

Here we go!!!!!! Registration is now open for our HUGE MEGA Art get together in Rochester, NY.

Click on the image below to find out all the details you need to attend this fantastic event.

This is a painting I did for one of my secret santa partners (Dina). Its approx 30cm x 20cm and I used many different media. Acrylic, water soluable pastels, watercolour, ink, prismacolor markers and pencils on illustration board. I really enjoyed creating this painting.

Happy New Year!

Once again Ive been missing from my blog for a while, real life is my only excuse. LOL The silly season has come and gone and the new year rolled in. I havent been creating alot of art but I did do some for my secret santa partners this year, which I will upload in a minute.

Im looking forward to this new year and getting down to more artwork. After 11 1/2 years of having my darling kiddies around me 24/7 I finally send the youngest off to school full time! Its the funny things Im looking forward to – going to the toilet without an audience, having a showing without the company, having the house stay tidy for more than a nano second……and the quiet……. Im sure that it will take me a little while to get used to all these things and catch up on sleep, but once I do I plan to create more and perhaps paint on all those canvas that I plan to put up in the house. And get my etsy shop going again. While still going through the battery of tests to find out which auto-immune disease I actually have. ARGHHH…… (going for a muscle biopsy this month YUK!)

But enough of that icky stuff and more about art! This year  at www.arttradermag.com have a heap of new online workshops for those who want to learn something new – mixed media mermaids, altered dominos, goth ladies, journals……heaps and heaps! And if you missed out on the Whimsy Workshops 1 & 2, we will be running those again this year too!

Not to mention the big ART GET TOGETHER in Rochester, New York in June! A heap of members from www.atcsforall.com and www.illustratedatcs.com will be converging on the top end of New York for 4 days of creating, learning, laughing and just having a grand ole time. Im hoping to make it again this year……just got to get hold of a cheap flight from Aus to the US! (Im hoping to venture into Canada to see Niagara Falls!)

Anyways I hope everyone has a fantastic 2010! xxxxx

Ive just made my blog wider! (took another css learning curve) but I managed to get it all looking ok now! YAY……

If you have any probs viewing the new format, please let me know.

Just jumping into the middle of my US trip chronicles to briefly discuss facebook! Why? I hear you ask….well Im trying to decide if I want to follow the masses and join the facebook phenomenon.

For a very long time I have been anti facebook, quite easily resisting the fad, especially since I have my own blog. (even though it is mostly an art blog) But now I seem to be folding to the pressure from family and friends who are practicing facebookers. So do I break my previous pact with myself and join the fray? I just dont know….. maybe I need to think on it some more! LOL

I was sooo excited the night before I barely slept! I had to be at Perth Airport at around 6am (friday) and left for Sydney. Arriving safely in Sydney I had about 1 hour before my flight to L.A boarded. So I grabbed some US dollars, a quick ciggie and proceeded through to my gate. The trip from Sydney to L.A was around 13 hours long and I travelled on one of the new A380 planes. WOW they are huge, just from the outside they look like this ominous massive piece of metal….amazing that it actually gets off of the ground! Honestly, I thought we were never going to take off…..it took sooo long speeding down the runway!

The pic above is from my seat out the window and only a fraction of the wing….note the writing that says not to stand on that section of the wing! LOL  The plane was nice, new and had some groovy new features – namely the inflight entertainment in the seat in front. But I wouldnt say the trip was extremely comfortable….could have been my excitement, I guess! I didnt sleep a wink the whole way over! I arrived into L.A at around 1pm on Friday. (yep, kind of lived Friday twice!)

Made my way through immagration, customs etc, manouvered my way out of LAX (what a massive airport!!!!) and caught a taxi down the road to a hotel. I planned to sleep for a couple of hours before my flight to Indiana at 9.30pm that night. I sort of dozed, not slept. I guess I was too afraid to miss my flight! LOL

Next my time at my friend Adriayna (Dana’s) house in Indiana!

Its certainly been ages since I wrote last and its been a whirlwind couple of months. My trip to the USA is over (and what fun it was!) More of that in my next post. Im still not well and my art has suffered majorly. Im barely creating anything at all. Actually Im not getting much of anything done lately. My specialist appointment is on the 7th October, so hopefully it will see a resolution to my health issues. Finally get back to a normal life and start creating again.
As soon as I arganise all my pics from my US trip I will post about all the fun I had, so stay tuned!!!!!!
Hugs to you all.

As I mentioned in my previous post, Im madly creating cards for this Pick-A-Theme swap at Illustratedatcs.com. Here are 3 of the cards that Ive created so far on the theme that my group members requested. Tlouey’s was a Moon, Morning Star’s was flowers and Lemurkat’s was a caricature of her and her hubby. Have done 4 and have 4 more to go.

Finally my feet are touching the ground! Ive had another hectic month and things are just starting to get back to a normal pace. Ive been creating my sections of the Whimsy Art Workshop Level 1 & 2, organising passports and stuff for my trip to the USA in just under 4 weeks, helping my mum move house, attending multitude of doc & specialist appointments as well as getting all these tests done and just madly running around with stuff for my kiddies. Phew!!!!!

MY ART ~ well I havent created very much at all. I either havent the time or the energy. Plus I think someone stole my muse or she’s gone on holiday early. Im really behind at the moment, owing things to my fellow traders, and withdrawing from swaps, left right and center. One swap I couldnt withdraw from is a Spring PAT (Pick-A-Theme) at illustratedatcs.com, which is due on the 1st of June. (In Canada!) So Im currently madly creating these cards so I can get them mailed (gonna have to go courier post) on Saturday. But more on those later.

MY HEALTH ~ They still cant figure out what’s going on with my bloods. Ive had lots more blood tests. One of which discovered that I have just about no folate or B12 leading to a extreme deficiency. Which is a complete mystery to my doc. Apparently my types of levels generally take a year to get so low, but mine have dropped alot quicker. The most common reasons are Celiac, B12 Anemia, malabsorption or alcoholism. Im definitely not an alcoholic, I dont drink! Doc tested for Celiac and B12 Anemia, which both came back neg. So sent me of to a gastroenteroligist to have a colonoscopy and gastroscopy. Which Ive had done and oh my goodness, I dont recommend them to anyone! (The procedure was fine, I was out like a light. But the preperation before hand is aweful!) All came back normal, so no reason for malabsorption. Doc thinks that all my other wacky bloods are a result of these deficiencies. So hes given me a B12 injection and I have another just before I leave for the USA. Then when I return he will test my levels again. Meanwhile Im still waiting for my appointment with the Diagnostic Specialist. The B12 injection has given me a little more energy, but not alot. Im still really exhausted all the time. Im hoping that when my B12 levels get back to normal Ill start to feel like a human again.

MY TRIP ~ Its getting soooo close now! Onl 24 days until I fly out of Perth headed for the USA! My passport has arrived and I now have my visa waiver authorisation. Organised travel insurance and a letter from my Doc for my medication….so Im all good to go!!!! Im excited but a little nervous about flying all the way there myself  ( I hope I can sleep on the 13 hour flight!) as well as a little worried about leaving hubby and the kiddies behind. Ill probably miss them more than they miss me! LOL

MailArtWorld ~ It was a sad month with the decision to close the site down. It was such a hard decision to have to make, but I think  Ive done the right thing. There just wasnt enough members active to keep it going. But its all not bad news. Ive joined ownership with illustratedatcs.com and we have together opened a new division of the site for mixed media art! Having the two trading groups together made sense. Both mailartworld and illustratedatcs have relatively small memberships compared to our sister site atcsforall.com, so combining the two would give members of both groups a more active site to participate in. So far its working really well and everyone seems to be happy!

So thats whats being going on in my world! Hope your world is being good to you! HUGS