Sunday, May 9, 2010

Mothers Day-Ziplining!


My Mothers Day gift from my daughter Kristen was to go Ziplining. It turned out to be a beautiful day. We had such a great time. What a fantastic Mothers Day gift!
I hope your Mothers Day was equally as fun as mine!

Tuesday, May 4, 2010

Art Bead Scene May Monthly Challenge

The Juggler (Le jongleur) 1943
Oil on canvas. 110.5 x 78.7 cm. The Art Institute of Chicago.

 About the Artist
Marc Chagall (1887-1985) was a Russian-Jewish painter of the 20th Century and one of the best known representatives of the Russian Avant-Garde in the West. Chagall painted in a style all his own, combining elements of Expressionism, Symbolism, Cubism and, to a lesser degree, other Modernist art movements. A prolific and multi-faceted artist, Chagall left behind him thousands of works in many different techniques and media that have established him as one of the foremost artists of the 20th Century. 

About the Painting
"The Juggler is a major picture of American war years. A very serious and mystical painting in the full sense of the word, it is filled with a personal mythology which avoids any literary symbolism. The signs are esoteric and ambiguous; they seem to suggest something real and then shift to the unreal, yet they are readable as an allegory of a personal confession."

The Prizes:
Winners will be randomly chosen from all the qualifying entries on June 1st.
Our sponsors this month are sponsors: ExpeditionD, Heather Wynn and Off Center Productions, please visit Art Bead Scene tomorrow to see the prizes!


Featured Designer of the Week:
From all the entries during the month, an editor is going to pick their favorite design to be featured every Monday here on the ABS. We want to give our participants more time in the spotlight! Our Featured Designer will be this Monday, so get those entries in soon.

How to enter the Monthly Challenge:
1. Create something using an art bead that fits within our monthly theme. This challenge is open to jewelry-makers, fiber artists, collage artist, etc. The art bead can be created by you or someone else. The challenge is to inspire those who use art beads and to see all the different ways art beads can be incorporated into your handiwork.

***Beads by themselves and beads simply strung on a chain or cord will not be accepted.***


2. Upload your photo to our flickr group. Detailed instructions can be found here and click here for a tutorial for sending your picture to the group.


Please add the tag or title MAYABS to your photos. Include a short description, who created the art beads and a link to your blog, if you have one.


Deadline is May 31st. Photos are approved by our moderators, if a photo hasn't followed the guidelines it will not be approved. You may upload 2 photos a day.


What is an Art Bead?
An art bead is a bead, charm, button or finding made by an independent artist. Art beads are the vision and handiwork of an individual artist. You can read more about art beads here.


***A bead that is handmade is not necessarily an art bead. Hill Tribe Silver, Kazuri ceramic beads or lampwork beads made in factories are examples of handmade beads that are not considered art beads.***


p.s. If you have a blog, post your entry and a link to the ABS challenge to spread the beady goodness.

Saturday, May 1, 2010

This Week

It's been quite a week. My son tripped at our soccer game last Thursday and injured his wrist. We spent several hours at Children's Hospital waiting for the Radiologist to read the X-rays.
Thursday we went back to see the Orthopedist at Children's. A long wait just to get in a room, let alone get another X-ray. Several hours later we left to get an MRI.
The X-ray showed a fracture but he wasn't experiencing pain on the bone that had the supposed fracture. Pain was on the opposite side of the wrist. Getting an MRI would settle the debate as to whether he had a fracture. Hours later the result was there was no fracture. But where he was having pain on the opposite side there was a bone bruise. That shows up really well on an MRI. The tech let us look. My technical son had to see what the result of laying in an awkward position for very long time in a VERY loud MRI machine. Amazing what it shows. This was my entire day.

The beginning of my week consisted of carving 4 new prototypes of 4 new button designs for a wholesale client. Now I need to make a mold and samples. 
Soccer practice this week also for this coach, who is happy that her main defensive player can play in the game today! Yeah for MRI's!