Simply Beautiful ~ EBRU

Beauty is simplicity to me. 

I love the simple things in life. 

I especially love color in all it's ranges. 

This post is celebrating the beauty of Turkish Creativity. 

Enjoy the color.. and enjoy Turkey for a moment too.

This last weekend we as a family went to a Muesum here in our city and there is a husband and his wife who do traditional Turkish art called paper marbling or in Turkish EBRU.  I have included pictures to record how fasinating and beautfiul it is.  Everything they use is natural and each piece is unique, no two pictures are the same. 

EBRU (marbling paper): is the art of transferring the patterns prepared on the surface of the water to a sheet of paper.

The girls are so interested and I love that they were able to sit so close and watch everything.

Here he is flicking differnt colors of paint unto the surface of the prepared water.

He uses differnt tolls, like a scredriver to move the colors around.

Tulips originated from Turkey. Tulips are literally everywhere in the spring here.
Usually the paintings are of differnt colors of tulips.

This is just a normal piece of paper where the image will be transferred onto.

Simply Beautiful!

Autty gave this gentlemen a flower (weed) she had picked so he gave her his demenstration picture.

What a great gift for her. It is very fitting since she herself is a rainbow of colors and creativity.

If you can see there are lots of paintings in the background done by him, his wife and daughter.
The pictures range from 10 lira to 60 lira.  They are amazing.

These are both demenstration pictures, they end up selling the demenstration ones for just 10 liras.

(About 7 U.S. dollars)

The more expensive ones are flawless and have an amazing range of color and detail. I would like to go back and buy one but these two are for the girls for now. The experience was an absolute joy.

When we got home I kept thinking about how we too could try marabling,  we ended up with some fun prints of our own...but that is for next time. :)

Update:  

Paper marbling with shaving cream. Check out our experiment at home with paper marbling. 

It was a lot of fun.

Click  here to visit our marabling with shaving cream post.

 I have been considering doing a GIVE AWAY based on 'Celebrating Turkish Creativity'.  I thought these paintings might be a good option.

Tell me what you think? 

 I would love to know if others would want an origanl Paper Marbaling piece of their own from Turkey?

Pointallism painting with q-tips

Today I am featuring my sweet daughter. 

We are learning about different forms of art and so I wanted Autty to share her project about pointallism or dot painting with you. I think she a fabulous job and did great with detail.

  Enjoy. :)

(fun thing about Turkey is all the fairy boat rides) 

Hi again it is me Autumn. 

I like to do pointallism painting, so here is a picture that I did.  

You can try it too it is very fun and super easy. 

This is what you use for this project.  It is called pointallism painting.  
Pointallism is dot painting.

I used this paint for my picture.

Every part needs to be dot dot dot.

This is me doing my picture with the q-tips.

This is the picture I made.    


Thanks for looking. ~ Autumn

Thanks again Mom for letting me use your blog. (he he he he)

You can also check out Autty's other project here.


Also George Seurat is a famous pointillism painter, who developed the technique. His famous painting Sunday Afternoon On the Island of La Grands Jatte took him 2 years to paint and is comprised of millions of dots to form the picute. It is spectacular.

Hey fun idea: leave a comment for Autumn and tell her what you think her picture is of.

We recently were able to go and see marbaling paper done. (Ebru in Turkish)

It was fascinating and we will post on that this week too and how the kids did their own. Here is the post on Ebru: simply beautiful Ebru - marble painting

Here is an updated post I did on Pointillism painting at the local Turkish School that my girls attend. Hope you enjoy the pics and cultural twists. :) Investing in the Neighborhood School #2 

In our west corner.
Becky

fabric & jars endless possibilities!!

I love color and fabric has a way of helping me enjoy color. 

 I also have this thing "USE WHAT YOU HAVE' and I 'have' lots of glass jars and I am always trying to find a fun way to use them for storage.

 I am so happy about my new found colorful storage option.

 I saw my dear dear friend (who is fabric lover herself) do this but I think she sewed them and well I just wanted an easy peasey way of covering them.

This project is simple and totally me.

A tad boring..
however I do think that no button jar can be boring with all those colors.

I used double sided tape for this project.

1,2,3,4!  I love simplicity.

These make me smile and I can take the lids on and off with ease.
I would add though that if I didn't get just the right size of tape then it was sticky (my green lid is that way).

I have thought about sewing a bunch of lid covers with elastic
but this is so simple I have a feeling that will not be happening any time soon.

I have a few fabric/sewing projects I am really wanting to do but time is not on my side and I figure if investing in others is what is keeping me from doing the fun things I like to do then I choose to wait.

Lord give me your heart to choose others over myself and provide windows of opportunity for me release all this crazy pent up artistic creativity.

feeling rather chatty this evening...;)
~becky

diy Patchwork bookmarks ~by my girlies

Happy Spring... I am happy that the day on the calendar has arrived but really when the weather finally turns then I will really be able to say Happy Spring to all. 

 However in light of the seasons changing which I absolutely love

 we have been doing a few fun projects ..especially with fabric scraps.  

We worked on these 'patchwork' bookmarks the other day for a B-day present for the kid's Grandpa.  

The thing I like about this idea is it gave my girls the opportunity to touch the fabric and put colors together.

  It was a lot of fun and easy to do. 

 I used up some scrap fabric but I think if you had some really chick new stuff these could be a real hit!!

Patchwork bookmarks made by my girls.  
I think a new or used book and a book mark is one of the best gifts! 


If your interested here is how we went about it. :)

I tend to do almost everything "with" my kiddos and so while
the little guy was playing cars we were cutting up fabric.
 However in this pic I guess he was more interested in his 'bear bear' and the fabric. 
It's amazing we caught him holding still. ;) 

I absolutely love this picture of my girls hands
reaching for the colorful fabric.

We just used pieces of scrapbook paper I had
and a glue sick  to put the fabric on.

My little Lydia took this pic.  ;)

We wanted to monogram the bookmarks to make them more personal.
Plus I just love monogramming..;)

I think stitching on paper is fun so I decided to give Autty a go at it.
She was a natural on the sewing machine and tonight we practiced again.
It is fun to work with her on something she really desires to do, funny thing is she will probably pass me up if she keeps learning at this rate. ;)

Here is the back of them. 
 I didn't want to cover up the back because I wanted to leave room for a written note.
As you can see one is for one of the Grandmas. :)

They are done except for being laminated and some ribbon.
I did leave a few with no stitching just for variety.

Here we are at the Kirtasiye (office supply store) getting them laminated.

For all you Turkey dwellers several Kirtasiyes have lamination machines and it is inexpensive.

 Yep that's the lamination machine. I don't know why I took the pic authenticity, I guess. ?? ;)
 It cost about 2 liras for one page. (just over a dollar)

Here they are laminated.
 I cut them up and then rounded the corners so they weren't so poky. 

I put a slit in the center top and found a pretty ribbon for each

 and then hand sewed the ribbon together.

This little picture is a token for my girlie's. 

I have a few more 'no sew fabric projects' I want to post.  Fabric is one of my favorite things and this last weekend our family went to Istanbul for an education conference and I was able to buy a few cotton pieces of fabric.(cotton is really hard to find and pretty expensive) I am thrilled and completely inspired ~ inspiration is not usually my issue for not getting more done, it is time. I figure God allots 24 hours for a reason so I guess I will submit to it and go to bed. :) 

Good night from the west corner.

~becky

Fretzel the pretzel

Introducing a 

Happy Friday with

Fretzel the pretzel
 To make your own Fretzel
you will need:
Coconut flakes, peanut butter, pretzels, raisins and little c. chip pieces


Really who couldn't be happy on Friday with that coconut fro! ;)

Enjoy your Friday.

Play with some food - it makes you smile 

and a happy heart is good for you health. ;)

FYI - I have a few really fun  projects I am looking forward to posting this next week.  Spring is on the way and I am getting inspired by the sun and bits of color I am beginning to see.

~becky

Turkey what I like and don't like about you :)

Hope  is my friend

These flowers come at the beginning of spring here. This pic is from last spring.
 I love the way they pepper the ground with specks of red and give hope
that spring is here and a new season is beginning.

Turkey

10 likes 

~My friends

~the food

~the bazar

~the way people take time for others

~the tea and how long it takes to brew

~that Turks like foreigners

~that Turkey has helped me see culture and the complexities of it

~the flower sellers

~ Turkish sayings and proverbs

~Istanbul and its diversity, intrigue and history

~that we live so close to Greece

~fresh warm bread any and every day

and many more..

10 dislikes

~High rise apartments

~the lack of green grass and trees (in the cities)

~the garbage everywhere

~that lying is an acceptable form of parenting

~the lack of creative expression

~the way women are treated

~no libraries

~that there  homes are so clean you could eat off the floor all the time

~that I am automatiticly rich when it is discovered that I am an American

 For me today that nagging 'dislike' is apartment living...I am struggling with contentment and am trusting the Lord to give me what I don't have - "a good attitude about it". Plus our apartment (daire) is being sold so it is unclear how long we will be here and that too is another issue of contentment for me. I have embraced hope as my friend today because I believe and know that you Lord Jesus are more than enough to change my attitude and bring contentment to me like you have so many times.  I trust in your faithfulness and the way you work on a human heart and soften it.

the beauty of hope in a red flower.

yes I am having some pretty reflective moments today :) ~becky

hey click 'helpful' in the reactions if you can relate. ;)
 or even better leave a comment about a 'dislike' you have found contentment in.

Edible foam..well sort of. ;)

Fun with Foam

Foam seems to be something lots of people are blogging about and truth is I may be behind the times but we are foam-less here. (lol) Yep no foam here so this post is dedicated to
 my friend Tracy G. aka Tiny.
Thank you for sending us this fun foam.

I figure I am bound to come up with something ingenious and original if I continue to stare at these fun colors and cute kid...

However until then this is what we have done so far with our thoughtful gift...
some ideas are from friends on the web and some are our own.

     We saw this idea over at frugal family fun

 and thought we would give it a go.  

We used washable markers and warm soapy water and this idea was a hit and almost edible!!

Check out this fun foam on the go idea ..some foam cut into garden shapes, a cool container, and some wet wipes.  I think the container could look even better but I just used what I had and it was a fun little gift for some friends.

The nice thing about foam sheets is that you can cut and create whatever is the item for the moment and my little guy is a car lover. :) 

Just takes a little water 

 and tada fun all over and a window that needs to be cleaned. :)

Hey wait the cars seemed to have traveled. :)

Thank you again Tracy for our fun foam ...

None of these are ingenious but if my kids play with them for an hour at a time then they are kid approved!!

If anyone has some fun ideas for foam leave a comment or your blog or link I would love to have a few more.

~becky

Hey and a big hello to all you who have newly subscribed or are now following.  Really fun to have you!!!