30/30 Challenge

It's Sunday evening and we just had Doug's barbecue chicken. Yummy. We've spent the weekend trying to get caught up on the house after being gone. It's amazing how many dust bunnies moved in during that time.

I finished two challenges this weekend. First was the 30/30 Challenge from the Yahoo Sketchbook Project group. We challenged each other to do 30 pieces of art in 30 days. I chose to do a visual journal. Here are three of my favorite pages.

The "Magic" page I did in the car coming home. It has book text, gel pen, magazine cutouts, stamp pad ink, charcoal and watersoluable crayons.

"Tweet" was a page I did before we left for Colorado. It has acrylic paint, magazine cutouts, graphite pencil, charcoal pencil, stamp pads, and stamps. I did the dots by rubbing Distress Ink Pad ink over a sheet of punchinella (the waste from making sequins.)

"Be Yourself" came from the magazine cutout of  identical chickens. Society or at least fashion society tries to get us to all be alike. We aren't pretty enough, or cool enough, or whatever enough if we aren't like the famous people we see on television every day. I used acrylic paint, stamp pads, book text, stamps, distress ink, markers and gel pen, and a fabric flower and brad.

 This whole challenge has been a lot of fun. We don't have a final count on how many finished but there are quite a few. At the very least we all practiced new things, shared and commented on each others art. We also grew as friends and as artists. What more could you ask for?

The other challenge came when I read about another blogger on Earth Day. She said she was going to plant a tree for each of her children. I decided then and there to plant a tree for each of my grandchildren, plus our great great grandnephew (who seems more like a grandson.) I bought five trees and today we finally we planted them. Not the best idea for Phoenix in June but that's the way it goes around here. The big tree in the background was a live Christmas tree we had when our daughter was small. So that seems appropriate. Now if I can just keep these five Italian cypress alive through the summer.

Meeting these challenges is a great feeling. I think this blog helped. I feel more accountable to myself and my readers. Set yourself a challenge this week and let me know what it is and how you finished it. Really!