What Is Your Recipe For A Delicious Life?

Recipe For Two - ATC

The weather we are having today makes me want to cook some real "stick to your ribs" food. The rain is constant and streams down the gutters. The temperatures are relatively mild compared to what we have been experiencing. But still, there is a distinct chill to the air that makes you want something warm and comforting for dinner.

Looking through a cook book, I found inspiration not only for a meal, but for an Artist Trading Card as well.  Attached to a fragment of a recipe was a photo of two women. Irony, Synchronicity, or Muse...the recipe was "for two"...and begs the question: "What Is Guacamole?"

I couldn't help but think...isn't everything more intense, more joyful when shared? Problems don't seem quite as unconquerable. Our happiness blossoms. Creativity soars by exchanging new ideas.

The substrate for the ATC is illustration board. I copied the photo of the two women on to newsprint paper. I stained craft paper with tea. The recipe is from a newspaper printed in 1970. Washi tape, sewing pattern paper, and metallic gold acrylic paint complete the card.

Isn't the recipe for a happy life one that includes a mixture of generosity, compassion, and creativity?  We all have the basic ingredients within us. May you find that person who encourages you to explore a delicious life.

Oh, and in the end I decided on slow cooker lasagna. 

It's Only A Paper Moon...and other stories...

"Why Girls Go Wild" conventional collage

Ah....a day out with friends! You feel like you're over the Moon....

And for many the day was captured with a dreamy, Moon inspired photo postcard.

I wondered what brought the women to the photo studio to have their day on the Moon. Their clothes suggest the early 1900's. Are they friends, family? Many people do walk in and out of our lives...were they friends forever? Did they leave a mark on each others hearts? Did they believe in each other?

The collage is a conventional work on heavy card stock. I used handmade and art paper, found objects, postage stamps, ephemera from magazines and books, and of course the paper moon photo.

I couldn't help singing the popular 1930's song while I worked: "It's only a paper moon...hanging over a cardboard sea...but it wouldn't be make believe if you believed in me."

My Romantic heart wants to believe they did.