Basically Bare Is Gettin' Good BUZZ!!! From CHA!!!

Back in May, the design team members on Scraps of Color were asked if we'd be interested in creating some projects using products from a new company called Basically Bare. Well I don't know about anyone else - but I jumped on it.

Fast forward to reports coming out of CHA, and one of my fav Scrapbook Updates sites has chosen Basically Bare as one of the top 10 companies that they liked! You can read about it HERE.

I've been sitting on pins and needles waiting to show what I created ... and since CHA is over, I'm going to show you the project that I mailed off to be displayed in the Basically Bare booth. Here's a couple of pics of the acrylic album I mailed offhttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gif.



The good news is that their products will be available soon on Scrapbook.com - and I'm told that there will be a little video clip of the Basically Bare booth where many designers (including myself) had their samples displayed.... so I'll post again, when it's available.

Being ....

One of my favorite artists, Mystele, recently wrote a post title "Being", and invited others to also post, weekly, about how they honestly feel about this time in their lives, and how they journey to change.

How funny that there are many of us going through this. I don't know if it's a reflection of the times we are living in (all the excess, hate and corruption) ... you wonder if you too have wasted a life you've been blessed to receive.

... or if its just a thing that we all seem to go through - and when we reach out - we discover we aren't alone.

I think the beginning of feeling as Mystele does, actually started years ago ... and for me, when I begin to feel as if I'm drowning - I turn inward ... I withdraw .. and I don't.create.anymore.

THAT is when I know I'm in trouble, when I can't put pen to paper to write, or want to pick up a brush and paint.

It took a lot for me to really look at my life and ADMIT that I was unhappy. It wasn't totally my exes fault .. I took fault too in trying to FIX something that was broken. You can't fix a problem if the other person doesn't want it fixed. I stayed because, I told myself, I wanted better for my son than I had .. I stayed because, I told myself, no one else would want me and 1/4 of a marriage was better than none at all ...

...and then I knew I was staying because I was afraid to admit I was wrong, that I'd made a mistake ... and I was scared to start again, alone.

I won't say it was easy deciding to end things, I won't say life was instantly better .. cause it wasn't and it isn't.

But I can say that my heart doesn't feel as heavy anymore ... I can say that my desire to create has returned full force.

I have lost 49 pounds since last year and I have about 40 more pounds to go ... and for the first time EVER in my life I walked into a gym - alone. I didn't feel as if the whole world was pointing at me, laughing at the fat ass. I didn't feel as if I was the ugliest person on the planet in a room full of beautiful people.


See, I've found that when the one person you thought you would spend your life rejects you ... you think , at least **I** thought ... that the world rejected me too. If he didn't want me, then I had to be ugly ... so the world saw what he saw.

I was wrong.

Shedding the weight, creating art again, starting my life over after 17 years with just myself and my son ... it's hard, but it's also been freeing.

...it's like the Kenyatta that I always wished existed is finally getting to emerge.