Privilege to Serve

Don't you love the opportunity to take one person's un-needed goods and help to fill someone else's needs?  Marina mentioned that she had a bunch of baby clothes she wanted to get rid of since she didn't plan on having any more babies and asked if I knew anyone that was having a baby girl.  Of course me being 30 that's not that hard to come by, but I thought of my mission companion, Melissa.

This was the scrapbook page I did for our companionship in my mission journal, forgive the poor execution.

She above all would be a person who would welcome the clothes.  Up until now she wasn't sure if she could have children, and so her pregnancy came as a complete surprise and delight to her and those of us that love her dearly.  So for the last couple of weeks I have gathered, in a few trips to Marina's, the baby clothes and other gently used items she wanted to pass on.

It has been fun to go through the clothes.  I decided to help Marina out in that I would take them, however she could give them to me and launder all the clothes myself, since most of them had been sitting in her garage in bags for the last 6 months.

Oxyclean soak for brightening and stains ☺

I also thought it would be a good opportunity to check for any extra wear and tear, make repairs, and set aside a few items to make Marina and the girls a little surprise.  Can you guess what it might be?

Here's a hint.

I'm so excited to get it done.  I'm still working out the design, but once that is finished I will be able to get started on it. ☺

Anyway, here's to helping to pay it forward and help other people!

~ Fraise

Turned Photographer

 
Do you remember this little girl?  And how I wrote about how she loves to be the center of attention when the camera comes out?  Well either her Aunt Sisi (me) is wearing off on her or she's starting to discover her own creative bug, because her new favorite thing is to be the photographer whenever she sees a camera.  She asks if we can take pictures all the time even when it isn't out too.

The fun thing is that even though she's just pointing the camera at random and clicking, she has a unique and some times quite brilliant eye. I thought I would show you some of her photographic work (click on the images to see a bigger, clearer version):

She may turn out to be quite the little artist as time goes by.

I'm excited to see what times brings with this one!

~Fraise

(This one was also taken by Mirna.)

Showered with Gifts

The other day my boss was talking about cleaning out her dad's home after they had installed him at a care center.  She mentioned that they had found all sorts of things including two hand-crank wheat grinders.  This week she showed up with this in tow and gave it to me as well as a 13 gal trash bag of yarn skeins and balls.

She said that some of them had belonged to her late mother, and that some looked to have been in some sort of kit.  We think they might have been a rug kit as the texture of them is far more coarse that that of the other yarns.

She further explained that the yarns she was giving me were the worsted weight yarns that were in colors she found ugly or could see no use for as well as a select few smaller gauged yarns of the same description.

I tell you it is a marvel at how many lovely colors and varied textured yarns she gave me! ☺

I can think of a few uses for them such as as a variegated wheat colored flower, or as some sort of colorful flower combo.  I'm so excited!

Hope that your Sunday is lovely and filled with color.

~Fraise

Belated Easter Stuff

Seems like I followed the general trend this year and made the Lamb Pillows from the Purl Bee tutorial.

Though truth be told I've been dying to make them ever since they published that pattern last year.  I've had a sort of lamb obsession ever since I got married, since our last name is Lambert.  I know, kinda cheesy, but lambs are too cute!

~Fraise

Helping Mom...

I love how little children are such a good example of how we really see our parents.

This week when I visited Marina, the girls kept arguing about who got t help put the flour in the crepe batter. 

Later they were both helping Marina clean up the grass left over from weed whacking the front yard.  I guess we all love our moms and want to help them, and show them how much they mean to us!

Happy Mother's day to all you moms out there in what ever form you come.

~ Fraise

Awwwwwe, I feel ...better!

Carl Bloch exhibit at BYU

My husband and I went down to the BYU Museum of Art on Saturday to see the Carl Bloch exhibit.  It was so nice to be able to go to a museum again,  I haven't been to one in a long time.

It was a lovely and fairly simple exhibit, as far as BYU stuff goes, but it was awesome to be able to get that close to the real paintings and see how the artist used his paint, and how he used color to indicate a change of light.

I thought it was interesting how many people were willing to pay the extra $3 to rent an iPad.  Aparently it gave insights and additional information about the paintings and etchings that according to my mom you wouldn't normally notice.  We chose to take the tour as it came and save money (since the tickets were already free).  I figured that I had been going to museums long enough without having extra technology like that to help me appreciate the art, that it wasn't really necessary.

I guess it was a good test to see how much I remembered from my Art History, Art Theory, Design and Figure Drawing classes.  I loved his religious pieces.  However my favorites were probably his portraits of his parents in their home and of his wife.

He had some other fun, satirical and though evoking pieces of the street life he observed in Rome while studying.  It was really fun.  I just wish we had gone earlier this year, because it was a little crowded.

We also decided to visit one of the other exhibits going on in the lower level, called, "At War! The Changing Face of American War Illustration."  Mostly highlighting the use and adaptation of illustration for use in ads and posters.  For those of you that know my art tastes well, know that I kinda geek out on poster art, so this was right up my ally.  (I love it especially because it combines illustration and design).  Some of the imagery was a little gruesome, they were war posters after all, but some of them were simply breath taking.

They even had posters done by famous illustrators like Norman Rockwell and the surprising one for me was Dr. Seuss.  My husband's favorite Rockwell was this ammunition ad (appropriate since he served in the US Army and Airforce).

They also had some illustrators that I wasn't as familiar with and I really liked:

J.C. Leyendecker

  

Howard Chandler Christie

It was also very interesting how they used advertising, everything from buying bonds and stamps to saving rubber and not wasting food.  Behold the power of advertising:

Oh to live in a time when advertising was as much an art form as it was a form of persuasion!

~Fraise

(all images were from the BYU exhibits pages)