Blaisdell Manor

Hosted by Cecily and MamaGeek

This fountain greets you, after you enter the gate at the Blaisdell Manor (built in 1910) in Minneapolis. We were there for a wedding reception, and there were people milling around everywhere sipping champagne so it was hard for me to get shots of all of its beauty, minus people. But here are a few.

Many of the guests were from France, and this little French boy was just too adorable to resist snapping a photo of.

This is the chandelier in the foyer, entryway.

The cool light above the stairs.

I went upstairs, and no one was making use of this room.

And I looked down on the garden fountain.  Like the photos of The Basilica of St Mary's, these were all handheld and no flash.  We ate dinner in the ballroom and I shared my dinner with you a couple of days ago.  I had pork chops, and some cute little dessert.  Each dish came with an orchid and I had fun playing with mine.  You couldn't tell, could you?

If you’re interested in seeing the ballroom or more of the wedding it’s over on our Newdae Photography Blog.

PS - If you are a blogger and crafty you might be interested in the post below this one. :)

Altered Books and Blogging (swap around?)

I am feeling somewhat better, this “stuff” seems to want to hang on, but hopefully soon, very soon I will be able to breath again without feeling like I’m breathing through spider webs, and cough again without my head exploding, and . . . Well you get the idea.

So, I need to ask you guys a question, or two. How many of you are crafty? Have you heard of altered books? Would you be interested in getting a group together to do a round robin kinda thing with an altered book?

So here are my thoughts. First, if you aren’t sure what an altered book is, here’s a short explanation I snagged from the International Society of Altered Books Artists website.

It is any book, old or new that has been recycled by creative means into a work of art. They can be ... rebound, painted, cut, burned, folded, added to, collaged in, gold-leafed, rubber stamped, drilled or otherwise adorned ... and yes! It is legal!

So, it’s kinda like scrap booking, and kinda not and to be real honest I have only started one so far so I’m by no means an expert. But, to continue my thoughts, I thought it would be really cool to get some crafty bloggers to each start a book, and pass it around, working on the blogging theme.

For instance, I would mail my book to someone and they would do a page spread on the theme of Lisa’s Chaos, or how they see me, maybe they would use birds, or Wisconsin, or whatever and when they were done they would mail the book on to the next person who would create their idea of me or my chaos and eventually the book would get back to me.

So, expenses would be:

• the cost of your book (Check used book stores)


• sturdy shipping box (probably free)


• Postage to ship each book (I plan on keeping the group to 10 people or less and I'm cool with media mail if you all are)


• Supplies you want to use on the books (could vary greatly)

So what do you think? Would you like a book created by your readers all about you? I was thinking we would start sending our books around in January, after the holidays are over. But I’m throwing it out there now, so we can organize, get our books and make up our covers the way we want to in our spare time now.

This could be a lengthy commitment. I know it would take months, even with only 10 people involved.  I figure that a week should be a long enough time limit once we received a book to work on.  Plus time in transit. . . So it’ll take a while to complete, but you probably won’t be working on a book continually.

Let me know your thoughts in comments or via email lisa (at) lisachaos (dot) com

LATE ADDITIONS:

Here are a few more links with info and photos:

• Karen's Whimsy (Thanx Alisha)


• altered-book


• Ingrid (gallery of 12 different books)

There are even a few flickr groups dedicated to altered books:

• Altered Books


• Altered Books RR


• Attractive, Alluring, Altered Books


• The Altered Dive Collage Pool


• Book Art


• Creative Minds

I have to thank you (Margaret, Tracey, Alisha, and Karmyn ) for your puzzlement and asking questions, because of that I think I've found some helpful sites to explore.

And as for Anglophile, I'm sure you could do it girl!  Dallas, of course you're in, I can mail to you so no one else incurs the overseas postage, as long as you're cool with mailing back to the states.

Did you all see what Susan said?

And honestly everyone, if you are just worried about it being too difficult, I was an art docent for 6th graders and they all created beautiful altered books. (Once they got over the idea of "ruining" a book)

Thanx for the encouragement Susan!

Elegant Water Orchid

Dinner

Right-side up?

Or upside-down?

Dessert

Just Vote Informed

You may have noticed that I have stayed out of the campaigning for the next president.  And while I will say that I am not 100% behind either candidate I did make my choice, and no I'm not going to share it here.

Today's the day and I hope everyone is making an informed decision.  Yesterday, my 18 year old son asked me, "Can't I just get information about them both where I'm voting?"  It may sound like he's a little late in the game but it makes me wonder how many other people are this late.  He has said for weeks who is going to vote for and when I ask him why, it's because so-and-so is, well why are they, he doesn't know.  So I asked him to spend yesterday evening doing a little research and voting on the issues not just going with his peers.  He may still choose the same candidate, but at least it will be for the right reason.

For me personally, if I have not been paying attention - cuz to be honest politics don't interest me - I won't vote.  If I have not heard or read the issues that the candidates are standing on, proposing, I won't go to the booth.  I don't think it's fair to anyone if I did.  I only vote if I can make an informed choice and I'm hoping that's how the majority is. But is it?  Are you just voting for someone because your spouse is, your mom is, your co-workers are?

The biggest thing I'm guilty of is thinking that my one vote won't matter.  I'm afraid a huge number of us are this way, but think about it.  In the whole scheme of things it is nothing but one vote, plus one vote, plus one vote and if we stay home thinking our one vote won't matter it could change everything.

Forest Art Wisconsin

Forest Art Wisconsin Native/Invasive (FAW) is a place we have been wanting to get to for quite some time. Well, we finally made there last month and we walked the 1.5 mile Raven Trail to see what displays were left. If you’re interested in where in the Northwoods it’s located, here’s a map. The artists are from USA, Germany, Scotland, and Finland, if you would like to know the thoughts behind their creations you can find all that on the artists’ page.

Since there are no signs pointing to the correct place for the art we looked at a couple of different parking lots and a couple of different trail maps before we decided on a place to park. Yes, we had looked at the map I linked to above, but we didn’t print it to take with.

Luckily, we did remember the name of the trail was Raven, but the lack of signage really had us wondering if it would be a wasted walk. Well, no time in the woods is wasted but we wanted to see art. We had barely started on the path when we were greeted by these logs full of carvings and we knew we were on the right path.

Yes I know the lighting was the best that day. But guess what, it took us well over a year to even make it up there so I took photos anyways. Shortly after we left the woods, it rained and hailed like crazy!

This little noisy red squirrel made a spectacle of himself and although I had a wide lens on, instead of the huge honkin one, I snapped his photo anyway.

I think he wanted to be a piece of art.

I wonder how long it took to build this nest. Let’s get a little closer.

It is huge! I did climb inside and there was still plenty of room for at least 7 more adults to sit comfortably with me.

Inside the nest. I’m guessing the rocks are supposed to represent eggs?

Dennis tried to create some art of his own while we were there. We call this ‘Shaded Shades’.

There was a little bog with some Pitcher Plants.

But of course the blooms are past their prime.

A monstrous web. I don’t want to see the spider that made it!

More to come.

Spikes and Stingers (Macro Monday)

Macro Monday is easy to play, snap a macro (or close-up) photo, post it on your blog and come back here and leave a comment let's try Mister Linky.  Don't forget to check out each others' macros.

Participants:

The Basilica of Saint Mary (part 2)

Continuation of my exploration of The Basilica of Saint Mary. If you missed Part 1, it's over here.

Many angels, candles, and stained glass. . .many confessionals.

A couple preparing to marry. See how huge the place is?

All of these (like the ones in part 1) were taken with the Canon 40D, 50mm 1.8 lens, handheld, with no flash, ISO 640 and shutter speeds of 8-15.