On The mend and Blessed

     It has been awhile since the accident and last post. Healing and gaining strength back has been only part of the process. Since that time I read the actual emergency room report. It is described as "retroperitonial bleeding" and is a rare life threatening problem. It includes bleeding from an organ (my case), tumor, pelvic fractures and aneurisms to mention a few. I was informed at the time that they were considering admitting me to the ICU unit but decided not to after consulting with the surgeon on duty. Whew!
   
    What was not shared is that I knew I was in serious trouble while in transit to the hospital. I felt there was a chance this could be fatal. Yes I felt that bad. I told the Lord "I place myself in Your hands. Whatever will be will be." At that moment a calm peace set in. Since then much has changed in how life is perceived. It is not clear what direction that will take but there is a definite change in direction. Jill and I are much closer than we were before. That is amazing in itself. There is a different attitude from family members, well, most family members.Many friends and neighbors have been most supportive as well. Some of you left comments to the last post that really were a great blessing to me. I have not gotten back to all of you but I will. Your posts have been kept and will be answered.

    Walking for gaining strength is getting better each week. Currently it is up to 3500 to 4500 steps, that does not include 1000 to 1500 steps when making supper, grocery shopping or other routine things during the day. It sounds like a lot but most of the day is spent resting or sitting. DW insists I not exert myself to much yet. LOL. "Yes Mother!"

    Since then windows 7 has been replaced with windows 10. That was not an easy transition. It took about a week until everything was ironed out, settings changed and programs updated, etc. Then there is the matter of creating system images and backups as well as emergency system repair disks. This was done for 3 computers. Angst was not a good things for a day or two. Jill was not happy about that part. It has taken me a bit to feel comfortable using the new system. Here I am and hopefully all goes well with this post.

   I haven't worked much doing artwork because the sitting position causes discomfort. This heat wave is also hard. There is no air conditioning in the room my computer is in. I am beginning to create again and will share what is done when finished. For now it is hoped a few special photos will do as a replacement.

The first two images are of a red tailed hawk. The first one he was  playing hide and seek with me. The second he was just looking to see what he could capture for a meal.

The next image is a broad wing hawk. The are smaller than the Red tail hawks. 

The hawk had just caught and dispatch a squirrel.

Here he is protecting his prize from a red tail hawk that was cruising overhead. He actually crouched down and spread his wings over the squirrel to keep it from being stolen. Amazing!

Hope you enjoyed your visit. As soon as this heat lets up I will be visiting blogs to comment. Thank you so much for visiting and commenting. Remember to always Love The Details. God Bless.   

Just a short note

Sorry I have not been around for awhile. Back on June 17 I had a fall while working in my garden. It took a week to feel the results. That Saturday I spent the day in the emergency room. The results were the loss of two units of blood into my lower abdomen and three cracked ribs. I am told it was a rare condition and I was lucky it happened this way and that I am in such good health. It could have been far worse. No operations or other procedures were needed. I am on the mend but it will take at least three months to get back to near normal. They also did an EKG and a deep scan of my heart for an anomaly the doctor saw. I suspect it will be a heart murmur that I have had all of my life. I am doing well but tire easily and have little get up and go right now. Thank you for your support and I will be back and post as soon as I am able. In the meantime, remember to Love the Details.

Love, Hugs and Blessings to all.

Mercury Transit

Being an Amateur astronomer I could not resist today's transit of Mercury across the face of the sun. I was up at sunrise to see if it would be possible to see it. Good thing I did get up early because by mid morning the clouds were moving in and I would have missed it completely. Anywho, I used the projection method through a 3" refractor (all lenses, no mirror) to see it. I took a sheet of green card stock, cut a hole in the center and slipped it over the end with the eyepiece to act as a shield that would produce a shadow to make the projected image easier to see. I used a second bright white cards stock to act as the projection screen. I held it behind the telescope and focused the image onto it then took a bunch of pictures of the projected sun image. Here is the result.

It turned out pretty good considering there way a Breeze building. It made the scope vibrate and the card stock was hard to keep still. It later became impossible. 

The image is actually horizontally reversed. The Blue oval circles highlight Sunspots that were captured and the Round black circle highlights Mercury on the face of the sun. It will be several years before this happens again. This is the best of five pictures taken. Shortly afterwards the clouds were too thick to get any more images. 

By using a projection screen I was able to see the detail on the sun. NEVER view the sun without protection. It is advised that you never view the sun directly through a telescope or binoculars unless you have a proper sun filter attached to the front of your instrument. Never use an eyepiece filter as the heat generated will crack the filter and could result in blindness. Due to Mercury's small size the only way to see Mercury was through a telescope.

Hope you like what I managed to capture. Remember to always Love The Details. God Bless. 

The Sound of Prayer

     The sound of prayer is not what you hear or speak but the voice of the soul submitting itself to the Lord.

     What the mind of the believer struggles to put into words is in many cases a futile attempt to describe the indescribable. If you pay attention to the posture and face of the one praying, it is apparent the soul is speaking far better than the words being used. Eloquent words and long detailed prayer is often an attempt to convince God of the need within the prayer. Simple words from the heart, to the point and uncluttered, are more pleasing and more what our Lord wants from us. He knows better than us the details that fit the need. All of the reasoning in the world will not convince Him that we deserve something. He provides what we need and gives us what we are due as He sees fit. That is not to say a prayer will not be granted. You may have to repeat your prayer often. Matthew 7:7-8 states “Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened."(New American Standard Bible). Hope not coupled with prayer is an exercise in futility in my book. Far too often an unspoken prayer has been answered whereas spoken prayers were not. If a simple prayer is voiced and the soul is in agreement the sound of prayer carries to heaven and is heard. There is no pretense in the soul. No deceit or hiding place. All is open and pure. It is not clouded with the muddy waters of this world but the clear, pure dwelling place of our Lord within us. Prayer, especially the sound of prayer from within, is always heard. Your will be done and not mine, Lord. Amen
    
     The time has come to show the results of the stencil project. This has been my project for several months. First, here is the stencil used to provide the base for this colored image. Simple enough isn't it? NOT!!!! It is not the way of this crafter to do things the easy way. As Jill most often says, " You are a brute for punishment." So what is new? Chuckle!! Where is the fun in boring? LOL.

     Here is the Stencil called "Free Spirit". It is from PRIMA and the artist is Jamie Dougherty. It is roughly 6.75 X 11 inches (180mm X 280mm). That is a width and height measurement. I loved this image from the first time I saw it. It lends itself to the rebel within and the native american. I WILL NOT do this one too often but it is fun to do.       

     Here is the finished stencil. The hair was a major consideration. I settled on black, although that presented challenges in itself. Black is a greater challenge for me than the other hair colors. 
     The colors are slightly off true. I am looking for a way to true up the onscreen color with the real colors. There are utilities to do this but it also requires specific hardware. This reminds me, if anyone has problems reading a post, mine or otherwise, you can hold down the CTRL button and use the scroll wheel on your mouse to enlarge or reduce the size of the window, and thus the font, you are viewing.

I just realized the "r" and "t" in the word Spirit on the image are transposed. OOOPS!!!! Smile.

The top right of the card stock got a bit wet and is a little out of shape. Sorry about that. Smile again. SIGH. The image turned out quite well just the same. The pallet of Copic colors and pens is:

Skin: E41, R0000, R000, R00
Eye:   B000, Boo, Copic Black 0.05 Multi liner
Lips:  R81, R21
Head Band:  #11 Gold atyou Spica pen, Copic Black 0.05 Muti liner
Feathers:  B16, B21, B23, E42, E81, T10, 100
Flowers and Stems: YG63, Y14, Y67, YR24, YR31, G29, E09, E23, C29, R00, R27, R29, R39, R46, Copic Black 0.05 Multi liner
Hair:  C2, C4, C6, C8, Copic Black 0.05 Multi liner

This image was both a challenge and fun to do. It turns out the skin shading was easier than expected as was the hair to some degree. The hair detail was tedious to say the least. That took several days.                                      

Hope you enjoyed your visit today. Thank you so much for dropping by. Remember to always Love The Details and correct the mistakes. LOL. God Bless.

One Step At A Time

For the past week or so I have been walking as much as possible. This past week, however, I turned up the the pace. I wanted to do as much as possible each day and have the best week ever. In a 7 day period I did 143,000 steps (paces).That translates into 66.79 miles. Within that, 217 floors (10 feet in height per floor) were registered. One 30,000 (14.16 miles) and one 35,000 (16.57 miles) and several 15 to 20,000+ step days were recorded. This was triggered by achieving a recorded distance of more than 1600 miles since last May. That is more than 3.5 million paces. Why am I telling you this? My walks are my time with our Lord and, at times, with my dear wife when she wants to walk for awhile.  (I do spend good quality time with Jill other than this. No, she does not do the distance I do. Smile! I have no wish to carry her back to the house.) It is great alone time and meditation time. Just wanted to share this with all of you. Each and every step we as Christians take is one step closer to our goal. Looking back should present a view of how far we have come. In this case there is a spiritual and even a mental tally we should be able to recognize. It should be encouraging to you to recognize where you started and where your journey has brought you. Hindsight will keep you on track and moving in the right direction.

I have been reading through the book of wisdom for the past several months. There is much to ponder in this book. It is not the first time through but each time I try to read it from a different version of scripture. In 2 Chronicles 1:10 - 12 Solomon asks for wisdom and knowledge in that order. God grants his wish in that order. Knowledge is of no use without wisdom. Knowledge in and of itself is useless without the wisdom to know how or when to use it. 

I have Two cards to share with you as well. I am not going to elaborate much on them. They are made from materials purchased at the Allentown, Pennsylvania  Craft Fair. The first card was a bit of a challenge but Came out fairly well.       

This card was meant to be a note card as is the second card I will present to you. The heart die cut is Impression Obsession  "Die126-U". The Key is Our Daily Bread "Keys". The border is from Stamp On It. The paper and pearls are from my stash. Everything was glued on with TomBow Mono Liquid Glue using a tooth pick as the applicator

The next note card is a Impression Obsession die cut as well. It is "Die044-Y". 

There are about 40 or 50 flowers in that flower head. Each one was glued on with TomBow Mono Liquid Glue using a tooth pick as the applicator. The white centers to the flowers was done with a white Gel pen. All Papers are from my stash.

The image that was shared last time is still in progress. Very tedious. 

That will be it for now. Remember to always Love The Details. Hugs and  Blessings.        

The Challenge

Life waits for no-one. Cherish it!

This has been a trying few weeks since the last post. Life is full of surprises. Not everything is pleasant or controllable. Several weeks ago my sister-in-law lost her son to a massive heart attack. His 16 year old daughter found him a day or so after he passed. They were very close. She took it very hard. Jill and I were not informed of his passing for several days after. It was a family friend that told us what happened. We both liked Mike. He was friendly and never failed to say "hi" or to stop and talk to us.

About a week and a half ago a long time friend passed away from lung cancer. She was a heavy smoker and had been going through heavy Chemo and radiation treatments. She lived with a friend so they could share the costs of living expenses. She was a gentle and caring soul who worked at a county nursing home until it was sold to a private provider. At that point she retired. 

A week ago my circulator for the upstairs zone on my heater began to fail. I decided to take things into my own hands and repair it rather than put one of the new throw away circulators in. This requires the complete heating system to be drained. I waited until the night time temps were suitable and drained the system. To prevent having to drain the system every time, I put shut-off valves before and after each circulator. I repaired the circulator, reinstalled it, filled up and tested the system. Works fine now.

I have been working to set up my new computer to to handle the peripherals my old computer had attached to it. Needless to say there are more wires to clutter up things but it is working faster than the old setup. 

Yesterday I had to purchase, replace and set up a new printer for Jill since her old one died. Fun?!?!?!?!?!

What does all of this have to do with the title of this post? No matter how many things happen in the course of living your life the challenge is to accept all of it. What seems insignificant is in fact not something that you can cancel out and ignore. From the smallest to the largest, from the most devastating to the joyous, all things are important. We pass through life but once. All things matter in our lives. If you ignore something trivial does that mean it never happened? Just because you were not in the woods to hear the noise a falling tree makes does that mean it didn't happen? If we do not hear the babbling sound a brook makes does that mean the water stopped flowing. All things are important and affect who we are and who we become, noticed or not. Our Lord is aware of everything. Are we not called to be like Him in every way? Life is what molds all of us. Christ, God and the Holy Spirit guide us and teach us as we continue our journey. 


Introduction The Inheritance of Christians
Blessed be God the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who in his great mercy has given us a new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead and into a heritage that can never be spoilt or soiled and never fade away. It is reserved in heaven for you who are being kept safe by God’s power through faith until the salvation which has been prepared is revealed at the final point of time. 


The New Jerusalem Bible. (1985). (1 Pe 1:3–5). New York: Doubleday.

I am going to share a portion of a 8.5 X 11 image I started some weeks ago and have been interrupted in its completion more times than I care to count. I did a card that was downsized from this stencil some weeks ago. This is the full stencil. I will show the completed image when it is done. For now here is a portion of the image that is complete. 

     

  The photo is not the best but it gives an idea of the detail that has been done to this point. The flowers are not yet finished and a lot of detail in the hair must be added as well as finishing the hair. Hope you like what is done so far. Don't know when it will be finished. It is a work in progress.

That is it for this time around. I hope all of you are in good health and prospering. Remember to Love The Details.

Winter BRRRR

I don't know about you but it seems the older I get the faster time seems to slip away. Hindsight almost seems to come before the event. LOL. Hibernation might be in order with all of this white stuff that is accumulating outside. It is quite a change from when we were young. The snow glistening while building snow forts and even working in it was a fun time. Now it is more comforting to sit inside and look at it and reminisce on what it was like back then. Those memories were happy ones for the most part but the past is gone. Today is here to be lived and, no matter what may be happening, there are memories being made. Retrospect is a good thing if we learn from the life that went before. It has often been stated that " If only we could be born with the knowledge we now have." The problem with that is the knowledge would not be connected to a life lived or a memory lived within that life. In other words no wisdom would be available to make that knowledge come to life. The whole of the book of wisdom in the bible is directed to living life and seeking wisdom. Knowledge is the beginning and wisdom is, hopefully, the end result. There are no shortcuts or magic potions to make that happen. Learning from living is the most complete teacher of knowledge. Living is the wisdom part of living and learning. Without both, neither are of any use. 

Sounds easy doesn't it? It isn't! If only we could bottle everything we experience just before we are called home and give it to someone to drink to preserve the life within it! That would not work either. The process of gaining knowledge, absorbing wisdom from it that can be passed on is an ever present, ongoing process. It is never really finished. The nice part is that it is already written down for us. It is called the Bible. There is a life guide and wisdom for living already there for us and it was all hard won and preserved. This does not release us from living life. It only works if the life you have right now is experienced in the here and now. Life is ever changing as are the things we experience in the here and now and going forward. The Word of God in the Bible is our guide.

I have a card to share that was sent out in December. It is a rather special card since it is not what you might call traditional. The image was designed by the craft shop owner that Jill and I love to frequent when we are able to make the trip to Ephrata, Pa in Amish country. The image was given to me and was perfect for making the card. Sorry folks she is Mennonite and has no computer. I don't know if she does mail order.

 I cannot find the menu of colors used. The crown is made from die cut glitter paper pieces from my stash, the die is Spellbinders Antiquities, and the blue gems are are from Coastal Stickers. The red gems are taken from  two heart embellishments that Maria F. sent in a gift package. The burlap and black card stock is from my stash. The sentiment was created  with Microsoft Word, (NOT and easy task), fussy cut and everything was attached with Sookwang tape. Here is the inside.

This is a Cottage Cutz Christmas die. It is delicate to say the least. It took three tries before it could be die cut without tearing it. Fun! Jill has a gizmo that I ran the die through to put the sticky shtuff on the Sentiment. Worked pretty good but I still had to clean the excess off to attach it to the inside of the card. More Fun.

That is it for now. I hope to have an image finished by the time of the next post. It is a full 8.5 X 11 card stock image. Until then, God Bless and remember to Love The Details.

                                  

Have You Ever Wonered

The Amazing Thing about Scripture is that it Is Timeless. It is accurate and relevant more than 2000 years after it was written.

There are times when reading the scriptures and the gospels that I stop and ask why is that happening this way. Has This ever happened to you. There are some things that the scholars are trying to explain but find it difficult if not impossible to explain and prove. Others are relatively simple to explain. Much of the new testament is fairly cut and dried, or is it? The star of Bethlehem is a mystery and probably will always be so. There are many theories and suppositions as to what it could have been, none of which are proven or universally accepted.

For me there are many questions. Two of them are:

1. Why did Herod send troops to kill children from 2 years of age and younger if Jesus was in swaddling clothes?

2. Why is there no record of the deed in historical records?

Interesting enough the answer can be had by knowing the conditions and times that Jesus lived in. First of all is the slowness of transportation at the time, mostly by foot or camel.Until the wise men traveled to Israel, stopped and queried Herod of the birth of Jesus, found Jesus and left Israel without returning to tell Herod what they found and the time it took Herod to realized they would not return, it is most likely that the better part of two years had passed. Jesus could have been more than a year old when the slaughter of the children took place. As to why the deed is not in any records, Bethlehem was only a small village at the time comprising only a thousand or so inhabitants. unlike today, this was not an uncommon occurrence in ancient mid eastern civilization. The deed would not necessarily have been taken note of for a small settlement such as Bethlehem in historical records. 

What is my point? Knowing some of the history and living conditions at the time of Jesus brings the reality of the life of Christ into vivid focus and brings better understanding of some of the things Jesus and the others mentioned in the bible said and did. It is not a lessening of the reality of Christ but an enrichment of it. It creates a feeling of being there. It gives an understanding of the conditions and what the purpose of the actions and words were at the time. For me it is astounding that to this day the words of Christ and God are still very much alive. By understanding the reality of the living conditions then it becomes even more wondrous.

After the holidays I need to find out who is still blogging and who is no longer following. At that time I will once again start giving shout outs. Tank you for your patience.

I have two Christmas cards to share with you today. I do not remember whom they were sent to but I know they have been received. They are both created from Stamps Happen stamp company. Sorry I could not find these stamps for sale anywhere so no link is provided. The Company owning the rights is Custom Rubber Stamp Company. Many of the stamps are discontinued.

The Copics used: C2,Y11, Y28, BG18, Y02, E000, E43

The image was fussy cut fastened with Sookwang tape. The halo was tricky. I left a small strip of card stock to connect the images and used a razor knife to cut it off after it was fastened to the card face and silver halo. The silver and the gold for the halo and star were scraps from my stash. The Noel was created in Word, cut out and attached with Sookwang tape. The card face was also scrap from my stash.

The next card does not have a Copic list with it. It was about the time I first started to note the colors used ( Several years ago ). This image is called Angel of Light. Again there is no Image for sale to refer to and is more than likely discontinued.

This was one of the harder images to color because of the fine detail. It was fussy cut and fastened to the card stock with, what else, Sookwang tape. Smile. The Stars and snowflake are Starform glitter stickers. I didn't have a star to use as the star of Bethlehem so a snowflake stick was use to represent it. 

A delicate gold "Stamponit" sticker was used at  the fold inside the card for a little extra interest. Not very fancy but effective.

That is it for today. I appreciate your stopping by to visit. Have a SAFE Happy New Year. Remember to always Love the Details. See you in 2016. (BOY THAT FEELS STRANGE)
    

In Time For Christmas

Hope comes in many ways but all give joy to the Spirit and a belief in the possibilities of the future. 

These past two months have been a trial by fire in many ways. The loss of my computer. The aggravation of restoring everything that was lost (Yes I religiously back everything up every day), Reloading all of the programs that were on it and dealing with the companies involved and the registrations. That followed with a loss of telephone service and the DSL that was carried over that same line and dealing with a telephone company that for the most part has become insensitive to customer service is disheartening and frustrating. I was beginning to think I was supposed to just give it all up and get off the net. Through the anger, frustration and hopelessness there is the knowledge that Christ has come and defeated our advisary. In this season of remembrance and joy of His birth and the grace he brings to us with forgiveness, He has triumphed and we are the recipients of that gift. I hear of the struggles and trials all around me. There is great strength in humility and steadfast belief in Christ for all who believe in His word and His example. It all began on the day of His birth and carried on for 2000 years. 

I have been given a ministry of prayer. There are several hundred in the "One Day At A Time" prayer book and they are prayed for every day. I have also been given a blog to witness and encourage others with. Both are part and parcel of His work. That includes the art and cards that you stop by to see. It has been expressed that the blog is different in many ways. All I can say is Thank You Lord. It is His work, not mine. It is an honor to be back and share as well as encourage those who visit this humble endeavor. 

Today I would like to share two cards received. One is an old birthday card from my sister and brother-in-law. It is one of those cards that sing when you open it. 

I considered including the sound file from the inside of the card but it is annoying if it plays too long so it is not included.

The sound byte is a LOOOOONNGG single high note. ANNOYING) I thought it was worth a chuckle or two to show the inside and comment. 

The next card was just received from Em Fairly from Creative EM. 

Thank you Em. You did a beautiful job with the card. My photo is a bit on the yellow side but, in person it is perfect.

That will be it until the cards I created and sent out get to their recipients. Thank you for being patient with me and thank you for your visits. I will be trying to visit as many of you as possible in the next day or two. If I do not get to you, have an exceptionally Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year and remember to always Love The Details.




   

Down Again

Just got back online again. Our telephone service has been out since Monday and our internet is intermittent. The internet was out part of today. When I realized it was back I jumped on to let everyone know I will be back to comment and post when it is restored permanently. Thank you for your patience.

Love, Hugs and Blessings to all of you.
Jim