Becoming - A Free Online Class {...when "it doth not yet appear what we shall be"...}

I never picked up the first paintbrush until my heart broke.  Then...just like that...I became.  I became an artist.

That was about 5 years ago, but it wasn't art that restored me.  It wasn't art that fueled my "becoming"...it was worship.

The Bible says that ..."By faith Jacob...worshiped as he leaned on the top of his staff. "  

Jacob felt it before I ever did.  He felt the pain of his own jacked-up-edness (that is a word in my house), he felt the misery of his own inability...and he glimpsed something of the grace of God when he saw that ladder that connected earth to heaven and heaven to earth.

 And He worshiped, leaning on his staff, favoring that hip put out of joint after his long wrestling in a black night of the soul.  Jacob wrestled for his identity, and I remember wrestling for mine.

See, I never expected to have not one, but two prodigal sons.  

(And yes...they are fine with me telling my story, and their part in it - past, present, and future.  We have good relationships, my boys and me and their dad.  I think the reason why they don't mind me telling you any of this is that - first of all, they still believe.  Not one of them has denied a solid belief in a supernatural God;  both would fight you over the truth of the deity of Jesus Christ...perhaps physically.  Ahem.   

I also think my young men know that their days in the pig pen are numbered.)

So I ended up with prodigal times two.  And it broke my heart, and it broke my identity as "The Homeschooling Preacher's Wife To Whom Such Things Should Never Happen."

I was going to write a book on child training.  Then, I had teenaged boys.  Then, they grew up.  Then, I needed therapy.  (Which I never got...)

Worship has fueled my becoming, from the time I was a little girl who wet the bed every night, through my early-married years when I gave birth to identical honeymoon twins (two beautiful daughters, who are mine and the Preacher's right arms today), and it fueled my becoming when middle age came calling...it fuels me at this moment, as a grandmother.

I am that "older woman", now, to whom the Great Apostle gave the admonition to "teach the younger women".

Teach them to love. That's the gist of what Paul told the older women to teach the younger women....teach them to love.  

With all my own becoming, it still "doth not yet appear what I shall be".  I believe - with all my heart - that my best days are right in front.

Having said all that, I am so thrilled to share with you that I have been invited by Jeanne Oliver to take part in an online course entitled, "Becoming - The Unfolding of You":

This course is FREE.  There is no cost to join Jeanne's creative community, and there is NO COST to join the 8 week course, "Becoming - The Unfolding of You".

Here is the trailer:





Here is the link to join the study directly.

Here is the course description, and instructions about how to join:

Course description:
This January join 20 women for an 8 week study all about finding your true identity in Christ.  Each week you will hear unfolding stories from the women in this study.  We will be sharing truths about who the Lord says we are and our personal journeys to accepting those truths.

We will also have fun creative videos that follow the study where the women will share one of their gifts. Think guitar playing, bread making, painting, entertaining and more.  You know I can't have a course without sharing how the Lord uses our creativity! My hope is that the study will give you fresh eyes for the Lord and yourself.  When we know who we are in Christ it changes everything and opens our paths and gifts in incredible new ways.
Some of us are carrying around "truths" about ourselves that are flat out lies and it time to lay them down

This study will be open and honest, real, Bible based and a bit of creativity too.  We hope you will join us January 6, 2015 for this free online study!

Directions to register:To join this free study you just need to be registered at jeanneoliver.ning.com (registering is free).

Once you are on the site you will find this study, free videos (business and art), my Creativity Takes Courage series and new online courses along the left hand side of the page.

You will find all of our courses/videos under the COURSES heading.

To register for Becoming | The Unfolding of You

1) Go to COURSES along the left hand side of the page

2) Go to the bottom of the course and click “view all” to find Becoming | The Unfolding of You

4) Click on Becoming | The Unfolding of You

3) Click the +join button on the upper right hand side

4) All of the details are on the page and you are all set for the study to begin on January 6, 2015

I cannot WAIT to see you in class.  Please tell your friends...share this blog post...help me spread the love and the good news of the grace of God, in the face of Jesus Christ...

2014 Fall-Winter Launch {...my first online catalog/LookBook...}

The Preacher and I just got back from a too-brief vacation, and it is time to launch my latest art and designs!  I am so excited about these offerings...I truly do believe they bring "tidings of comfort and joy"!

The back-story is this:  I wanted a way to group everything in the new collection together, so you could see it as the body of work it is...the labor of love it is.  So, to do this, I decided to create an online catalog, or "LookBook".

I've embedded this LookBook into the below link.  Enjoy!

Another Peek Into My Fall Launch {...my art, as a smartphone case...}

Just a few short years ago, I couldn't see myself with a smartphone.  I was an analog snob.  I was more than satisfied with my flip phone...the one with real buttons.  Buttons you could push.  I sent texts the old-school way...where you went with the number 1 and chose "a, b, or c", and so on.

Then The Preacher got a free upgrade on his smartphone.  He gave me his old one.

Then I started a creative business.  The kind of business that requires you to quickly master digital photography and open an Etsy shop and think outside the box.

Now I love my smartphone.  As in, "if-I-weren't-already-married-I-might-date-it" kind of love.

And I do think technology can be beautiful.  So long as it doesn't interfere with our making eye contact with our children, or making love with our spouse, or making time for a friend, I think technology is amazing.  In what other era could I run an entire business from the beach, with a few swipes of my finger, in less than a half-hour a day, while on vacation?

{Been there.  Did that.  Last year.  Made money while sitting on the beach for a week.}

So here's to the smartphone.  And yes....selfies and apps and all that smartphones entail.  Were I to coach you in your business, I would tell you in a heartbeat to get over yourself and dive into social media.  Do it yesterday.  Start instagraming and tweeting and Facebooking and blogging and heck yes, take a few tasteful selfies (don't try to be sexy - be professional, be fun), because people don't want automation, they don't want faceless,  they want to at least have an idea of who it is they are doing business with.

It isn't ego, when you run a creative business.  It's good business.

I took a few of my favorite mixed media pieces, and made them into smartphone cases/covers for Samsung Galaxy, and iPhones 4 and 5 (not 5C).

Find them here

Won't Someone Please Love Me For Who I'm Not? {...so I have a few personas...}

I don't need you to love me for who I am.  Well, I do, but I mostly need you to love me for who I am not.

Who I am is essentially understood, once you get to know me:  I am a believer in Christ Jesus.  I am a preacher's wife.  I am an artist and a communicator - a speaker and writer and blogger.  I am a mother to four grown children.  I am a grandmother to four - a three-year-old, a two-year-old, a six-month-old, and one on the way, whose name is Susanna Joy.

I am deeply loyal, deeply spiritual.  I am so intense that I need my closest friends to be not intense at all.  I have enough intensity...so much intensity, I nauseate and overwhelm myself.  I don't need more from anyone else.  I don't need a dose of hyper spirituality, complete with tears for all the world's prodigals (and my own) over lunch at Wild Wings.

I need you to love me for who I am not.  I need you to love me when I take a break from myself, which is a lot.  When, instead of primly saying that "I am a Christian", I flatly state:

"I am a jacked-up Jesus Freak!"

Or when I lovingly call my family, "The Freak Show".

When I am so broken I don't want deep conversation or even companionship.  (Know that "this too shall pass", and give me some room to be who I'm not!)

When I confess to being addicted to Red Band peppermint "crack sticks", or Dr. Pepper.  I'm really not addicted to anything but Jack Daniels - aaaand there I go again.  Just kiddin'.

See, I'm a living, breathing hyperbole.  I hyperbolate to blow off steam...all that intensity about the Gospel, it boils like a fire shut up in my bones, and occasionally I absolutely must act silly and say shocking things and adopt pretend personas to relieve the pressure of being inside my own head.

You should've been there when I played milk-pong at a church party, and pretended to get smashed on tiny Dixie cup after Dixie cup of milk.  I did make myself a little sick...but I had friends laughing until the tears ran down.

Laughter is carbonated holiness.  If that makes me holier-than-thou, I will let you figure out how to deal with it.

Yes, I hyperbolate occasionally.  It is my own signature coping mechanism, and I shan't give it up.

It's why I listen to the occasional country song.  ("Red solo cup!  I fill you up!  Let's have a party...let's have a partaaaaaay!")

It's why I sometimes use replacement vocabulary.  Dingdangdadgummit.  Shut.  The.  Front.  Door. 

It's why I can blog about boots and scarves and nail polish one day, and the Ecclesia the next. 

It's why I can think deep thoughts about pneumatology, but there was that time I almost lit my big toe on fire, and that other time when I couldn't properly signal a right turn while driving....instead, I honked my horn.  (??!  I have yet to figure that one out.  Don't you try to figure it out, either.  You'll never do it in a million years.)

The deep thinker is the real me.  The idiot-me is comic relief.  The hyperbolic mess is just for fun.

Love me...accept me...for who I am not.  Who I am won't scare you.  That other girl might.

Countdown to the Fall Launch Begins...{so much love will be in the shop for your holidays}

This design is the culmination of about a year's worth of tweaking.  I happen to love aged metal filigree - but on its own, it isn't very wearable, particularly with a heavy feature piece added to it.  I love to add something beautiful to the filigree - either my soldered designs, or any vintage or unusual new piece I happen to come across.  But they almost always end up too heavy, making the filigree cuff, on its own, difficult to keep arranged properly on the wrist.

I also love leather.  I can't get away from it, and I have tried to.  It finds its way back into almost all my designs.  But on its own, it can get ho-hum.

And so, voila.

So much of art is process.  You find out what doesn't work, far more often than you discover what does work.  I have pretty much discovered two hundred ways you cannot add a statement piece to filigree.

And one way that...oh yes, you can.

So...just as an aside...try not to balk at the price of an online course, or a piece of artisan jewelry.  I know what it is like to be on the tightest of budgets.  But trust me - you could not teach yourself or make it for that price, because you would have to buy the tools, and that is just the beginning.  You would then have to spend even more money and days and hours of your time in a trial-and-error process.

I am proud to be a maker...for you...

This beauty will be in the shop soon.  And she may be a "one-off" since I am loathe to repeat designs.

My artistic ADD gets the better of me.

FALL LAUNCH ~ My Art, As a Toss Pillow {..."comfort art"...}

I will be doing my second annual "fall launch" very soon...and I couldn't be more proud of this year's new things:

This piece started its life as a mixed media original, that sold rather quickly.  This winged-girl simply says, "In her life, youth and old age met in the middle and gave her wings to fly..."

She is only $25 for the cover (no insert), or $35 for the pillow cover with insert.

"Wings to Fly" has been one of my most beloved pieces - you've loved it as cards and prints, and now an 18"x18" pillow.  You'll want to get your order in soon...she WILL "fly" out of here.  {I have only 6 for a first run...I can make more, but the wait will be ten days to two weeks.}

This sweet little redhead says, "She chose to believe everything God says about her..."

Who doesn't need to be reminded to choose THAT?

DO you know?  I mean, do you really know?

Knowing this is a life-long quest, and full of delight.

These will be up in the shop soon!

New Cards In The Shop {...the handwritten note is making a BIG comeback...}

Did you know?  The handwritten note is making a BIG comeback.  It's all over the design blogs, all over Pinterest, all over...everywhere.

I want to help you bless others with your words, so the inside of each of my cards is blank.  I am offering a large assortment of my art pieces, as sets of 4 cards, with envelopes - and even as single cards, with its own envelope.  All my cards are printed on luscious paper.  Enjoy...

..and check them out here...

{And thank you so very much for all your care and support.  It means the world!}