I just had to share the pictures from my son & his date's prom night. It is hard as a mother to accept the fact that my baby is growing up. But at the same time I am so proud of him & the young man he is growing up to be.
We decided to step away from the traditional this year & opted for a chocolate brown tux to compliment the striking shade of green of her dress. He looked so handsome & just as mom had predicted, he was the only guy at the prom with the brown tux. Score one for mom!!

As his personal florist, for her wristlet & his boutioneere, I chose to use a bright, tropical shade of orange sweetheart roses accented with shades of green & orange ribbons & green rhinestones. I added green pearl head pins to the center of the roses for an added touch. A design that is both youthful & fun. This is not your Grandmother's old fashioned corsage!

They had a wonderful evening full of fun memories & returned home safely, although both bit tired.

Clay Bead Artist, Heather Powers of Humble Beads

If you love the hunt for the next great bead to use in your beading projects, well I have the perfect place for you. Check out Heather Powers at Humble Beads she has awesome clay bead designs! I recently found Heather's blog which is full of wonderful beads & beading ideas. You can find her at humblebeads.blogspot.com


I recently posted a comment on a blog that she happened to be running a contest on & won the beautiful beads pictured here. I cannot wait to use them in a special design. After receiving them I decided that I loved them so much that I went to her website, Humblebeads.com & purchased more of the little beauties & I am anxiously awaiting their arrival!
I will be posting again when I have finished my designs using Heather's wonderful beads
.
Hurry, go check out her blog, you will learn something! Better yet enter one of her contests & you just might win some beads!

Learning to Draw the Human Form

All my life I have been creating something in one form or another.When I was a young girl I would be the one who would get art supplies & beading kits for Christmas.I could sit for hours filling the pages of my coloring books with colorful embellishments beyond the preprinted lines. Adding window boxes to my houses & beautiful jewelry to my imaginary ladies.

During my early education years I loved all art classes & continued them into my Sophomore year of High School. Sadly it was after that year my art education stopped. A new art teacher was hired & literally took the joy out of art for me. I did not take another art class again until my adulthood.(that is a whole other long story)

As you may know, I make my living as a floral designer, which I consider another form of art. It seems art, in many forms, are vital to my being. I have a desire to learn about & try as many types of arts mediums as I can. In the past few years my adult art classes have included: folk painting, introduction to still life drawing, beading classes, ceramic bead making, wire wrapping classes & lamp work bead making. I love to try new things when it comes to being creative & I am planning to take a class using fused glass this summer. My ultimate goal is to one day be able to paint with watercolors.

So being offered a class online on drawing the human form, I thought...why... & then why not. This area of art has not been my one of my favorites, nor was I ever very good at it. Encouraging my self I said I'd try it, enticing me was the fact some Photoshop would be involved. A software that I needed to learn, in order to clean up photos of my jewelry designs for my website.

I have decided to document my progress here, on my blog, for all of you to see. Please be kind with your comments!

Here are a couple of the drawings that I finished for Lesson 1.

Is Your Front Door Wearing Spring Colors?

This past week, many of my customers seemed to be as anxious for spring as I am. One after another they were bringing in old silk arrangements & wreaths to be revamped.
I can always tell spring is around the corner when I see all the old wreaths come into the shop with requests for a spring color makeover.

Just like with our wardrobe & our makeup, our homes need spring makeovers too. I encourage you to either take last year's wreath or swag in to your local florist for a make over or if it is beyond repair, just purchase a new one. I would also suggest that if you have more than one door, you dress them both. They do not have to match, just carry a color theme from one to another. Like yellow in both, but one with citrus green & the other with orange. Have fun with it, do something a little wild this year. Get your neighbors talking. They will be envious of your beautiful doors & will want one of their own. Think how inviting your neighborhood will be if you all give your doors a spring makeover.

Go for something eye catching this year, be bold in your color choice. Keep in mind that most people will be viewing you new door charm from either the street or the sidewalk, so choose something that will pop from a distance. Pastels are pretty, but bold & bright says spring is welcome & so are you guests!

Last year I chose citrus green, purple & hot pink for my front door. I live on a state highway & people see it at 55 mph, so it needed to be bright.

With that in mind I encourage you to get your door dressed for spring!!

This is a customer's wreath that she bought last spring, that I made over last week.

Floral Designs At Inspired Fire's Spring Open House

This past Friday Inspired Fire had it's Spring Gallery Open House. Sharon Owens is the resident glass blower, lampwork bead maker& proprietor of this wonderful little glass gallery, located in Lafayette IN.During the open house, which she has about four times a year, she will have guest glass artists, some who are local & some from all over country, come to the gallery. These artists will give glass blowing demonstrations throughout the evening to the mesmerized guests. Many of the artists will spend the weekend at the studio, teaching students new & exciting methods in which to use the glass & the torch.

For about a year, I have had the honor of designing flower arrangements for Inspired Fire's special events, where Sharon gives me complete creative freedom.

I met Sharon when I took her Introduction to Lampwork Beads class. I happened to mention that I was a floral designer & had a shop in a local town, near Lafayette. When I learned of her open house, I offered to provide her with fresh flower arrangements in exchange for advertisement & an occasional glass bead here & there. A good trade, I thought!

If you ever get the chance to visit a glass gallery that has an open glass studio where you are permitted to watch, I encourage you to sit awhile & prepare to be amazed. Better yet, sign up for a class & melt your own glass. Too fun!

I thought that I would share a few of the arrangements that I designed for Inspired Fire's Spring Open House 2008.