More Houses

 Hello Friends - I just thought I'd pop in and share a few more houses with you to download and add to your "Address Book". I have so enjoyed drawing these houses and have started looking at "real" houses to draw now.  Gary is so sweet, he helps me when I can't figure out angles and stuff - he is a wiz at all of that! 

you also, like living stones, are being built into a spiritual house to be a holy priesthood, offering spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. - 1 Peter 2:5

For no one can lay any foundation other than the one already laid, which is Jesus Christ. - 1 Cor 3:11

In my Father's house are many mansions: if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. - John 14:2

In you, LORD, I have taken refuge; let me never be put to shame. - Psalm 71:1

Anyhoo - just right click and hit "save as" to download. 

Enjoy!

I hope theses will be a blessing to you and I would love it if you would let me know you downloaded them in the comment section.

PS - Here is the rest of the "Address Book"

 http://garbonzobeenz.blogspot.com/2015/10/the-address-book.html

One More Doodle Download

Hey friends - I just wanted to share this with you as well. 

This is the chore list I use everyday at my house. It has all of the "regular" chores listed and also has space to write in those "extra-special" chores and errands. 

I keep mine on a little clipboard in the kitchen (I keep saying I am gonna paint that clipboard but never do). Anyhoo, I hope you will enjoy these just right click and "save as" to download. They will print out on reg 8.5 x 11 paper with 2 lists to a page. 

Enjoy your weekend!

The Address Book

WOW! I know it has been over a year since I have posted anything - life has been busy and unpredictable this year. And that my friends is an understatement! Maybe soon I will come back and fill you all in on what has been going on in my life. But tonight I want to offer something up to you all. As you all probably know Adult Coloring Books are all the rage these days. (and I love  them!) 

I have been doing some doodling as part of my prayer and worship time. For some reason I was drawn (no pun intended) to doodle houses. Each house had an address on it that went with the scripture I was meditating on. I also wrote out the basic meaning of the scripture as I doodled. This was not typical for me since I hate my handwriting and I am no good at fancy lettering. I did about three little houses and ran out of my favorite blender pens, and so I just kept doodling without coloring them in. Then a friend suggested I scan in my houses once they were all colored and let her try to publish them as greeting cards. I was certain they were nowhere near good enough for that.

 Then one day as I was doodling I realized that my sketch book had turned into an "address book". I felt as though God was telling me to share these with people uncolored as a coloring book and a way to meditate on His Word. 

And so, here we go. Here is my "Address Book" full of little houses for you to color while you meditate on God's Word. To download them simply right click on the image and hit the "save as" in the drop-down window. They will print out on 8.5"x11" paper or cardstock. 

Here are a few of my doodle houses that are colored in for you to see. There are a total of 10 houses plus the cover page for you to download.

Updated - just added this one today (10/15/15) because I am so filled with thankfulness for how God is using these little houses and how kind everyone's comments have been!

. . .But as for me and my household, we will serve the LORD."

Josh 24:15

(this one has a space over the window to add your family name)

For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.

John 3:16

Jesus answered him, “If anyone loves me, he will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him

John 14:23

For you were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Live as children of light

Ephesians 5:8

Enter his gates with thanksgiving and his courts with praise; give thanks to him and praise his name.

Psalm 100:4

Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in me.

John 15:4

And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.

John 1:14

Love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength.

Deuteronomy 6:5

Everyone then who hears these words of mine and does them will be like a wise man who built his house on the rock.

Matthew 7:24

For where two or three are gathered in my name, there am I among them

Matthew 18:20

I hope theses will be a blessing to you and I would love it if you would let me know you downloaded them in the comment section.

Till we meet again. . . 

Hello - Is anybody out there?????

I just thought I'd pop on for a moment this evening and say HI to anyone that is still watching for me and my crazy posts. I know it has been almost 6 moths since I lost popped  in to say hello. So let me quickly catch you up on what all has been going on. . . .

First of all Lizzy's wedding went off without a hitch! It was beautiful and she is happily married now! We couldn't be happier for her and Richard!!!

But soon after this glorious day (about 4 days) My overwhelming joy and excitement turned to worry and fear. Mom announced that she had breast cancer and had known for awhile but didn't want to spoil Lizzy's big day. So the very next day we started another journey in my family with hospital visits and tests and lots of unknowns.

Once the tests were done and the port was installed she started chemo. Eight rounds of 4 weekly infusions was the plan. Sadly we only made it through one of those weekly treatments before things went south for my poor Mom. She contracted the MSSA bacteria (a sister to MRSA) and ended up in the hospital for 10 days. While she was there she had to have her port taken out as they believed that was the entrance for the MSSA and they replaced it with a PIC line. Once she was home she was on hi powered IV antibiotics for 4 weeks - anyway that was the plan. She ended up having a terrible reaction to the antibiotics in week three and had to stop those and have her PIC line removed. Her oncologist told her she was no longer a candidate for chemo and their only course of action was to take the breast now. She knew from the beginning that she would lose the breast but the plan was to shrink that fast growing, 6cm tumor first. So they scheduled the surgery for last Wed. Of course now we got to play with the ins co. They decided on that Monday that her surgery was not going to be covered! It was 1pm on Tues (the day before the surgery) that she was finally given the okay from the Ins co. This only happened because Mom's surgeon told them that Mom would be dead if they had to wait the 14 days they wanted to investigate the necessity of this surgery.  Mom had her surgery on Wed morning and came through like a trooper! But all is still not well, the cancer has spread and we do not yet know what all this will mean for her.

I hate to be "Debbie Downer" tonight but I wanted to share why I have been gone so long and recruit as many prayer warriors as possible to help us as we fight this battle. So for now I will be away a little longer as I spend time with my Mom and help her walk this journey.

Until we meet again. . . .

More Burlap, Lace and Pearls. . .

Well, seems like I will not be soon getting the burlap dust out of my house! Although these were not bad at all. These burlap covered canvas boards were a life saver. No trying to stretch and stabilize the burlap to make the covers of Lizzy's guest book or the table numbers. 

I do not have the best handwriting so I was surprised my numbers turned out so well. I hand wrote them on the boards and then with glossy accents and a toothpick glued each little pearl on. 

This is the cover of the guest book. It is not bound as of yet - I will be picking up the "special" paper for the pages on Saturday at The Occasional Artist  and then I can start putting photos in it and bind it. We are putting Lizzy & Richards engagement photos in it and people will write around the photos. 

The flower is one of the handmade flowers I made for the wedding bouquets - hopefully it wont be a bother when people are trying to write in the book?

I started working on it last night and was going to surprise Liz. But she popped over unexpectedly so she saw it all out. I cannot tell you how happy I was that she "caught" me - I had put the wrong date on the end paper! That could have been a real disaster!

It is hard to tell in the photo, but the end papers are a beautiful shimmery ivory paper. It really looks lovely!

We are less than 3 months away now and we are doing pretty good at marking things off the list. We are also doing pretty good at adding things to the list too!

Have a great week!

till we meet again. . . .

His Word. . .

So, yesterday I told you I was working on a really BIG canvas - well, it is FINISHED!!!

I have never done anything this big or this linear before but I am super happy with how it turned out and I am ready to do another one!

This piece is called "His Word" and came from a Scripture I have been studying in Psalms. It is Psalms 107:20. The full verse is actually "He sent out His Word and healed them and saved them from the grave".

The entire canvas is covered with vintage Bible pages - I used the whole book of Psalms to cover this canvas. In the corner here you can see that I hand wrote the scripture, but as luck would have it (or maybe God planned it this way) the Bible page net to it is actually Psalms 107!

I thought I would show you the steps involved in case you would like to give it a try!

 My supplies included: 

16x40 deep profile gallery wrapped canvas

An old Bible

Lots of painters tape

Matte Medium

Black & Asphaltum acrylic paint 

Vinyl sign letters

Paint brushes

Spray Matte Sealer

Clear Varnish

I created my design on just a piece of paper drawing it to 1/4 scale to fit on the paper (easy math on this canvas each inch equaled 1/4"). You will keep the border covered with the tape until the very end. This is hard because I kept wanting to pull it off to see how straight my lines were. You will also want to paint the sides of your canvas at this point. 

TIP: let your canvas dry for at least 2 hours before you start adding your tape so you don't pull off any of your pages. 

 Just keep masking off each layer of your design and painting it. I wanted to add my scripture in the very center and I am no good at lettering so I used vinyl sign letters to make my words. I masked off the area and then painted it with a glaze (Asphaltum brown paint and water) so the print from the Bible pages would show through the words. Once the brown was dry I attached the vinyl letters and painted black paint over top. When it's all dry you can pull the vinyl letter right up and you will have your beautiful brown glazed letters showing!

 Keep on going! I set a timer and let my paint dry for 30 minutes for each layer

It might be hard to see in this small photo but the addition of the charcoal pencil makes a HUGE difference. This step is well worth the time and the dirty fingers! The first picture shows the pencil added on the just the bottom half of the canvas. 

I would love to see what you come up with if you give this a try!

My canvas is already hanging in my studio as a constant reminder that God loves me and that His Word does heal!

Okay one last picture. . . .

Just because it wouldn't be me if I didn't share my first calla lily bloom of the season!

Isn't she pretty?

Have a great weekend friends

till we meet again. . . .

Art just for ME!!!

I decided to take a little break from wedding prep this week (well after a tasting on Monday and a meeting at the venue on Tuesday that is) and make some art just for me. It has been awhile and I have missed getting my hands dirty (which they are now). So here is what I worked on yesterday - it is called red letter prayers. I have been studying prayer and healing in my personal Bible study time and wanted to honor the things that God is revealing to me. I also wanted a tangible reminder of these valuable lessons, so what does Marta do? She creates ART!

 This canvas is 12x16 and there is lots of texture in this piece and as you can see LOTS of red! There is also quite a bit of gold (maybe too much? I am not sure yet)

 I used actual Bible pages with some of the scriptures that I have been focusing on

  The Hebrew letters at the bottom spell Yaweh (Jehovah to us Gentiles) It was supposed to say Yaweh Rapha (the Lord that Heals) but I was short one letter to spell Rapha. 

 The main scripture goes all the way around the canvas edge in red (they are the words Jesus spoke). 

 I have another BIG canvas in the works drying on the patio right now

 It is a BIG one - 16x40! This is the biggest canvas I have ever worked on. And I am using a really old Bible for this one. I have been saving this Bible for just the "right project". I am also trying some new ideas so wish me luck that I haven't wasted all of my Bible pages and this big canvas!

Here it is in progress - although right now it is completely covered with the Bible pages and is drying 

I hope you will take some time to do something just for YOU!

till we meet again. . .