Soartful Challenge and Arizona sunshine

 

I feel like I haven't blogged or done a challenge FOREVER!....so I played with this one and it really doesn't make too much sense, but then why should it if it is "out of this world!"

The image below is what we started with to do this

SOARTFUL CHALLENGE with.

On to other things....the weather has turned absolutely gorgeous! We are supposed to be in the 70's all week! Garage saleing this last Saturday was so much more fun with the beautiful day we had!

And I spend a couple of hours by the pool in the afternoon too!

 

This afternoon, my BFF Millie and I grabbed a coffee to go and went a quarter mile up the road and parked at Prospector Park where we have a bit of a different view to soak up while we enjoy our coffee.

I didn't even realize there was a little birdie perched up on this big saguaro cactus until I uploaded the pictures to my computer! CLICK ON THE PICS TO ENLARGE

I'm sure I have a zillion pictures of the mountain. I just never tire of looking at it and taking pictures of it from different spots and angles.

Theres Millie, watching me taking pictures and soaking up the sun. She's sitting on her "baby". Her 1990 Nissan Maxima lives here year round in Arizona (Millie and husband Tate return to Oklahoma City in May). We put alot of miles on "baby" between garage sales, shopping, riding around taking pictures. She runs like a clock! ......even at 20 years old!

A beautiful Ocotillo cactus infringing on a saguaro. Did you know that it takes approximately 75 years for a saguaro cactus to sprout 1 arm?....so we know that although the cactus in the picture doesn't look too large, it is around 75 years old.......it does have the beginnings of an "arm".

They get really quite huge and live to be around 200 years old.

....did you know that?

Three Muses Birds of a Feather

For THE THREE MUSES Challenge this week......Quite simple.....that gorgeous background is part of a digital collage set I won over at DEZINAWORLD  (thankyou so much June!)...I just had to add a few things. The lovely white doves were just googled.

Soartful Background Challenge

I'm sure we've all seen a sunrise or sunset with these vibrant colors! Depends where you live, I've seen these colors in Canada on the prairies. Here in Arizona there is more pink involved. Anyway....here is my entry for the challenge this week. As usual, it's not at all as I planned, but just kind of evolved!! Look at my last post to see a few pictures of last night's beautiful sunset here in Arizona, plus a gorgeous moon!
Below is the background that Jeanette at SOARTFUL gave us to work with.

Moon on the mountain

Looking to the east last night at just about sunset. A most fabulous view of a big yellow moon hovering at the edge of the Superstitions. I ran out to the road to get a shot before it disappeared or got too dark.

My pics didn't turn out too great in the dim light, in reality it looked so, so beautiful

Zooming in a bit, not a sharp picture but gives you an idea of the spectacular view I had!

I turned to walk west back to the condo and I can see there must be a great sunset happening!

Yep! My BFF Millie is at the door and we quickly drive out to the road and down a bit to a spot where we had a view. Not our best view but no time to waste!

..what can I say? ...I wish you could have been here!

Crazy Amigo Challenge RED

My first time doing a challenge for  Crazy Amigo The theme is the color RED. The Aix-les-Bains poster is an image of an old advertising travel poster. Aix-les-Bains is a tourist destination in France.
I just can't leave the photoshop alone!

....I do have a zillion other things to do! Next week I will start going to the rec center just down the road for some fitness classes....I need to "tone and trim" and seem to only get around to doing so while we are here in Arizona for a few months.

It has also been kind of dull and cool around here, so no swimming pool.....it's heated but I like to feel warm when I get out of the water!

I did go to a huge church sale this a.m............a few vintage linens for ebay, nothing spectacular but the price was right. This particular sale is a yearly event and only 5 minutes away and it is HUGE!! The crowds are HUGE as well! You can't MOVE once you get inside. I'll go back later and check tomorrow and Saturday as well. Some good sales coming in the next couple of weeks, hoping I can SCORE!!!!
Bye for now, but I'll be back!! The challenges are calling me!

Yes another collage!

I am determined to practice and learn more in photoshop! The weather is a little cool here in Arizona (but a beautiful blue sky and sunny day) and I had washing, grocery shopping, etc to do today so in between I've been sitting and playing!

I made this for the Dezinaworld Spot Challenge, and used some of the elements from the collage sheet set that I just purchased there. The set was featuring Gold, but I ended up getting all involved with the photoshop effects and I liked the way it turned out.......silver or pewter!

I can see my errors now that I've posted it.....I should have layered the flowers over the oval locket frame....I'll go back at it later and see if that works or not, LOL...I've already gone back and re-centered the oval locket as I was posting and when I previewed I noticed that!  Well, that's all part of the learning process I guess! Happy week to you all!

Soartful Challenge Little Black Dress

Audrey Hepburn immediately came to mind for the latest challenge at Soartful called The Little Black Dress. I'm actually early doing it this time!!

The sun is shining, although a little chilly here. I wonder if there are any garage sales today?

Dezinaworld Girly Challenge

Little Girly Daydreams
I'm trying to get back into my Photoshop collage fun! I'm rusty after a few weeks of not using what I've learned. I did this piece for the Girly theme over at Dezinaworld

I used the sweet and dreamy little girl image that was a freebie from June on her other site Art Freebies, and other images from Lisa's Altered Art, the pink background image was from Carol Anne's and also a couple of images from my own collection.

Stormy Arizona

Here's my view this morning, ...we had tornado warnings last night! Very unusual, plus we did get alot of rain. Some areas in different parts of Arizona are having lots of problems, so we are lucky where we are.

The locals call the mountain "old spooky"..........I agree

Soartful Challenge POGONIP (FROST)

frosty sisters.....

LOL! I thought I'd better get this submitted as it is already Friday! I have not used my photoshop for the last few weeks, being busy getting ready to escape here to Arizona and the travelling, etc.

I had already made one collage using the image provided and I have NO IDEA where it disappeared to!! I'm sure I saved it to my Soartful folder!........gone!!
Being new at it I have forgotten some of what I've learned......it will come back and I'm always learning something else as I fool around trying to create. Backgrounds of pogonip are what my daughter back in Canada took pictures of a couple of days ago. Ladies and pets are from iTkUpiLLi and Elegia's freebie sheets. They are both so generous....go look at link in sidebar.

Please read more about Pogonip here.
Soartful Challenge

...the one below I like as well but while fooling around I put that funny frame thing around it and couldn't get rid of it!

I'm in Arizona now!

I took this picture as the sun was setting on some flat land northeast of Payson AZ. We made the last of our journey in the dark, a little nerve wracking as it gets very mountainous and curvy closer to Payson and just beyond, although it does not seem to affect anyone as far as speed limit goes!

I took tons of pictures on the way, but I wouldn't want to bore you so will just post the one.

We had good weather all the way down from Canada although we could see where in some places in Nebraska they had waaaay more snow than what we left behind! Fortunately it had come before we had hit the road for our trip!

We did have a few delays........like all ready to hop in the car and go and couldn't set the burglar alarm.....got pulled over at the border coming into the USA (they seemed to be doing it to everyone that morning!)....they took away our homegrown potatoes and garlic!!! Potatoes have to be commercially grown and bagged with labelling, garlic must be processed!!........Then as we approached Denver, CO, we missed a turnoff, got on and off a toll highway several times which we will probably receive a huge bill for, but  finally got on the right track when hubby finally stopped and asked directions ...y'all know what men are like about asking directions! So we did see a little more of the outskirts of Denver than we really had intended on!

We will make sure we have a better map if we do that route again!

Just settling in now, it takes a bit of getting used to. It's going to be a dreary and rainy week, but that's ok!

There is plenty of sunshine to come....and you don't have to shovel rain!!

I can't leave without showing you a couple of pictures I received in the email this morning from daughter Sherri. My grandaughter KIERA plays ringette and they were in a tournament this last week and weekend and THEY WON!!.........She was sooo excited! She is the sweetie on the left in the picture below.

Congratulations to the whole team!

Arizona Here I Come!

ONLY 2 MORE SLEEPS!

I'm just waiting for Kiera to come for a last visit before we leave for Arizona, early Tuesday morning! I'm anxious to get on the road and I always get so excited when I see the first Saguaro cactus, it means we're not far from our destination, Apache Junction, AZ!

We're on the eastern edge of AJ and right near the Superstition Mountains, they are beautiful! I never get tired of looking at them and taking more and more pictures!

I get to visit with my BFF Millie, who lives in Oklahoma City but winters in our complex. We take alot of jaunts around the foothills to take pictures (when we're not garage saleing or shopping for bargains at the mall!)

Won't be long, we figure we'll be at this destination spot by Friday! Back to blogging soon, from a different location and alot of different scenery! Bye for now!!