A Few More Journal Pages

Hello friends!  Well, we made it to the last day of February!    March arrives tomorrow!  Yay!  We have a light dusting of snow on the lawn...but every time I take the Pup out to do her business, I'm eyeballing the yard.....mentally noting all the things I want to do with it.  We did some landscaping/bulb planting in the front of our house last year....but now it's time to work our way around the sides of the house and into the back yard.  Our house's previous owner, bless his heart, really let the "natural" look take over the lawn, but not in a good way.  Ha!  It will be nice to dig in the dirt again!

Here are some more journal pages, from the same book as before.  Thought you might enjoy a peek!

This is a copy of a poem that Lovin' man sent me on Valentine's Day a few years ago.  I had saved it in my Inbox for a long time, and thought it would be good to bring it out into the world.

I scribbled down some notes for a project on the left side....but hated not having any color...so worked it around my notes!  On the right, a cool article a friend gave us about a man building with Legos.  (we love Legos at our house)

More pages with favorite magazine clippings.....

Doodles and more doodles with markers and water soluble crayons......on the right, a snippet from an old Home Companion magazine....remember that mag?  It was my favorite, and I miss it!!!

Loved this pic of a colorful garden stone.  We will have lots of garden stones to decorate in our studio this spring/summer!  Come and make one!!!

More to come very soon.  Hope you all had a restful weekend!  Ta ta for now!

Whine and Wags March 31st

Hey there!  Elsie says thanks for all the Cafe Press love, y'all!  A few of you are ordering onesies for teeny babies, some of you will be sipping your morning joe from a snazzy new mug....cool!  Love it!

 Elsie was my sidekick all day today, up in the studio.  I finished up this little side table....

and I'm working on a few other large projects for the store and for clients. 

As many of you know, our sweet Elsie is a rescue dog, and we are so grateful for organizations who donate their time, talent and hard work to save the animals out there who are down on their luck.

 I'd like to let you local folks know about an upcoming fund raiser for Cedar Valley Humane Society....we are going to be there!!!  Come and join us!!  You can register HERE.  There will also be a surprise piece of Dreaming Bear art up for silent auction.  They need your financial support to give these animals the food, shelter and medical care.  Even if you can't attend, please consider sending a donation anyway.

Whine and Wags

Cedar Valley Humane Society Wine Tasting and Silent Auction
Thursday, March 31st 5-8pm
Daniel Arthur’s
821 3rd Ave SE, Cedar Rapids
Admission is $25

Reserve your tickets in advance by contacting Jan Clarke at 319-362-6288 or email: jan.clarke@cvhumane.org
Enjoy an evening of fabulous silent auction items, live guitar music, fine wine tasting by 7G Distributing and hors d’oeuvres compliments of Daniel Arthur’s.

Hope you are all having a good week so far!!!!

New Cafe Press Shop!



Hello friends!  I'm tickled to announce that Dreaming Bear products are now available on Cafe Press!  Yahoo!!!!  We have taken some of our most popular designs and put them on T-shirts, tote bags, posters, and more!  It's so cool, and Cafe Press is an easy, safe way to shop online!  I made a "test purchase" before our announcement, and our order arrived very quickly (within the week) and the quality was superb.  Love it!  Can I interest you in an adorable Robot Love tote bag?

Or perhaps a "Keep On Keepin' On" water bottle, featuring one of the pink hair girls?

"Happy Cloud" notecards will make snail mail much more bearable.......

And many of you have asked for prints of our very popular "Determination" collage....here it is, in poster form!!!  (and available in several other "forms" as well!)

Isn't this fun?!  I'm really thrilled with how everything turned out.  I know you will be too!  Click HERE to get to the main storefront, and then you can browse by desired image.  Enjoy!!!

P.S.  Is it warming up where you are?  It was sixty degrees yesterday here!!  Almost all of our snow is gone!  Those temps won't last, of course, but it was a much needed boost to the spirits!!!  In other news, our window is supposed to be replaced today at the shop!  Yahoo!



Happy Valentine's Day!

Wishing you all a Valentine's Day that makes your heart sing!

XOXO

More Journal Pages!

Hello there friends!  Thanks for all the great feedback on my current journaling obsession!  Here are a few more journal pages from the aforementioned book that I'm currently having a BLAST playing around in!  Above, a fast page where I was playing with my water soluble pastels.  It's hard to read, but at the bottom of the page is a quote from Barbara Sher, "Whatever your dreams are, start taking them very, very seriously."  Amen, sister!  And below, more playing with pastels...the flower on the right is a color scan of a collage flower I made a long time ago.....





I recently purchased a couple of tees from Kalidarling, and she sent me this ADORABLE monster sticker!!!  Oh lookie!  She's selling the stickers too!!  Check 'em out!



Then I played with my markers for a while......that dresser is a snippet from a mag that someone gave me for inspiration.  Harlequin is such a great pattern on just about anything, no?

More images from mags, and lots of doodles.  That circular pattern is a plate design by Susan Sargent.  Love her work!!  I hope to own some of her dinnerware someday.

Bits of gift wrap...and on the right, a brochure from the latest exhibit at the CR Art Museum...Pop Up Art!!!  If you are in the Cedar Rapids area, get your booty down there....it's such a fun exhibit, and lasts until May!!!

The kitty cat is a scan of old artwork.....it's fun to look back sometimes......

I don't think this picture does it much justice, but I dig this border, and the fact that my writing on previous pages has pressed through and left a "ghost-like" mark on this page.....

More snippets from my paper collection.  The funny girl is from a Teesha collage sheet......

Cheers!!!!  And Happy Monday!!!!!

Journaling Obsession

Howdy everyone!  A few weeks ago, my friend Gae visited me at the store.  Gae owns Temptations Fine Candies....her store is up around the corner from mine.  We have become good buds over the years, sharing the common interest of having store fronts in downtown Marion.  Little did I know we had so much more in common!  As we share and talk, we find we are alike in many ways!  (don't you just love it when that happens?!)

During her visit, I asked how their new building was coming along.  (they will be moving to a new location not far from the current one)  To illustrate, she pulled out her moleskin notebook, flipped around a little bit, and showed me some pictures of the inside of the building.  It was really cool to see the progress they are making on the new place....but I gotta say, what stuck with me hours later was that NOTEBOOK!!!  Ha! I just couldn't get it out of my head.

 So I sent her an email, telling her I realize that I'm being weird and nosey, but I was so intrigued by her notebook, which was full of notes, doodles, pictures, sketches, bits, pieces and stuff.  I asked if she would share a little bit about her method of journaling....and she did so much more that that!!!  The following week, she dropped off three of her notebooks so that I could browse through them!  Wasn't that nice?  She fills a notebook a month, and has done this for about a year and a half.  Below is a picture of her journals, piled in a basket in her home.  Wouldn't it be so much fun to paw through all of these??!!!  Eeek!

Well, this little exchange with my friend Gae has lit a FIRE in me!!!  She really got me excited about documenting the little moments in this crazy thing called life.  One thing I noted about Gae is that she mostly journals about the good stuff.....sweet things people say, tickets to a concert, quotes she runs across, doodles by her grandson, and more.  I like this.  This suits me too.  I am not one to put the icky stuff in my journal.  I just don't care to record negativity.  I'm not judging folks who do....everyone should make their journal THEIR OWN.  But seeing her method of journaling really resonated with me, and got me movin'.  I'm mean, MOVIN', people!!! 

 I became obsessed for a few days, and for a while, I was really kicking myself for not documenting the many months and years before this!!!  But as they say, better late than never, right??  Would you like to take a little peek?  I would just like to point out quickly, that this is not the same as my altered book or my art journal.  Soooo.....you will see snippets of magazine pages, post cards, pieces of gift wrap that I love, and little bits that I find and love.  Some of the doodles are my own, but some of it is not....just things that inspire me and everyday stuff.  I journaled about the day we brought Elsie home....

Love my Iowa Native stickers that arrived in my Christmas stocking......

I found old newspaper and magazine articles that I had been hanging onto for a long time.....



Random pictures of things that make me happy...like my tokens of affection......

Snippets of funky gift wrap, and doodled pages waiting for my notes.......



Saved concert tickets from a favorite band....

and on the right, a postcard from Tara Ross, an artist I admire......

Doodly doodles....

A funny face that Lovin' Man drew for me to cheer me up....note the nose hair.....cracks me up!!!

Did you notice that I'm adding more color as we go along?  I thought you would.  (Smile.)

More to come soon.  Hope you had a great weekend!!!

A Day in the Life of Elsie.

 "Mama, I'm tired of being cooped up.

I'm soooooo booooorrrrred.  (whine, whimper)."



"Oh, okay!!  A bone!!  Yummy."

"Crunch, munch, slurp."

"Mmmmm.."  (contented sigh)



 "Eeep!  What was that?  Is someone after my bone?"

"Aaaaahhhh....all is well." 

Winter is Making Us Crack.

Sooooo.... this is what the front window of the store looks like this morning!!!  Yippee!!!  (not)

I stopped by the office yesterday to grab some paperwork, and found this, as I walked by the outside of our store.  Apparently someone was parked right outside our store, stuck in a snow drift, and in his attempts to free himself, his wheels spun, and we are guessing that a chunk of ice or a rock flew up and hit the store window.  ARRGGHH.  The guys in my building were kind enough to tape it up for us in my absence, and we are awaiting the replacement.  And so it goes.  We got a foot of snow on Tuesday night.  Our backyard looks like a winter wonderland.....and it would be for us, but the temps are so bitterly cold, we just sit inside and stare out at it all.