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Yesterday (last night especially!) was big for me. Not only was it the start of my 32nd year, it was also my first fine art gallery showing EVER.

Months ago I was "networking" to drum up interest in a visual art ministry endeavor I was trying to "hatch" (see here) and I gave a contact card to a person connected with National Community Church here in DC.  Weeks passed and nothing happened with it. It was slightly frustrating but I also took it as a sign from the good Lord that the time for things to happen with it just wasn't now.

Fast forward a few weeks and I get a seemingly random email from someone at NCC asking me if I was interested in participating in gallery night showing with other DC Christian artists. There was an application to fill out and slides to prepare to be approved and it had to be done within 24 hours because that was the deadline. All of those weeks and months of not hearing anything? Well, the answer was out there but it just wasn't meant to be revealed until then. God's orchestration is truly amazigood and ng.

To make a long story just a little longer, I applied and was accepted to the show and last night it happened at Ebenezer's Coffeehouse in NE DC...

My only grievance is that the lighting was terrible on three of my pieces when they had promised to bring in more to correct the situation. *shrug* Live and learn and I'll make sure it won't happen like that again.

The opportunity to show again in this venue was presented to me at the end of the event but I might pass in favor of pursuing a venue that offers a more classically defined gallery environment showing that is a lot more permanent - what I showed yesterday was put up and taken down in only hours.

My dream since I was a little girl has always been to be a real and working fine artist. Last night was a small step in that direction but all great big changes start even with the smallest steps.  Now that I have this under my belt I'm aiming for something bigger. I'll let you know when it happens. Not IF it happens. ;)

[Crossposted with my fine art blog - Dream. Pray. Create.]

The power of three

I'm kind of terrible with dates. It was only halfway through the morning that I realized that three years ago today, this happened...

Classically it's the ladies who remember things like anniversaries and such things but as it happens, in my equation (with D) I'M the one who commonly remembers after him. However, I believe that the reason why this happens is because I'm very much a forward thinker and rather than focusing on reflecting on whatever happened in the past, I'm always thinking about what lies ahead in the future.

D and I have had quite an amazing journey of the matrimonial-kind. And I'm not gonna lie... it's not always been easy but the joy that has come from all of the tremendous effort it takes sometimes is undoubtedly boundless and easily that of what could only be called marital bliss. At this stage in our marriage I think D and I are definitely beyond the "honeymoon" phase and, after this last year, I would would also say that we are also over some major hurdles that many others before use were never able to struggle through and overcome. Truly, the only way we have been able to make it through is because we keep our faith in the Lord as the core of our marriage and the love that Christ teaches us to have as the thing that helps us to stay bound together. It's these two essential things that have helped us to overcome life's greatest difficulties and challenges and also REALLY celebrate the triumphs and the joys.

I thank my Lord God for blessing me with a marriage to my best friend that could be called nothing other than amazing and completely worth it. This morning I forgot about the milestone of today but that's because I've enjoyed all of my days with D so much that I'm just constantly looking towards the many tomorrows that I pray Christ will continue to bless us both with.

To: D - Happy Anniversary, Lovey! 

Here's to so many more of these 

that we lose count of how many there are!!

Love 'dem Stillers!

We had big plans for this Superbowl Sunday but had to cancel them first thing in the morning when I went in to get Miss A up for the day and discovered that she had made a mess of herself. (She got sick and we had to wash and sanitize her entire bedset AND bed!!) So, we missed out on church in the morning and then just rested up for the remainder of the day waiting for the game to start.

During Miss A's afternoon nap I whipped up a batch of mini-SteelerCakes to try out some new mini cupcake pans I thrifted earlier in the week. They turned out very nicely and I topped them off with the Steelers logo to complement the black and gold interior...

 
When Miss A woke up from her nap she was all kinds of excited to sample one.  I guess the glasses helped her to taste them better?

And even though the Steelers didn't snag a 7th Superbowl victory, we will steal bleed black and gold here in Redskins country.

All the prit-ty lit-tle horses

Right before the turn of the new year, I was studying a set of devotionals that spoke of when the Lord ordains  your "time of favor." It examined the whole idea of asking the Lord to help you understand your calling, accepting what it is, and then working fervently (with him) to answer that calling and carry out His plans. I thought long and hard about that devotional as it said thought He does want you to heed His callings but He also wants you to feel confident in doing that and be ready to do it whole heartedly. I thought long and hard about the suggestions of the devotional because it just happened to be steering me in the exact direction I just happened to already be going. (Imagine that! The Lord was poising me for His plans months before I ever realized what they could be! He's amazing like that, isn't He?)

Because I'm always up for taking on what might seem like the impossible, I prayed for the Lord to bring my own time of favor to me and I prayed for Him to help me realize the things He wanted me to do with my life in ways greater than I could ever imagine for myself.  Little did I know I would experience an abundance of blessings in volumes not unlike the current snowfall that is being recorded in Chicago in a matter of only weeks.

Want to know what God has delivered for me to carry out? Here's just a smattering of things but bear in mind that this list is not even close to exhaustive...

• Steering my school's student art club for the event decoration efforts of the most major fundraising event of the year
• Assisting a local boy scout troop (yes, the WHOLE TROOP!) to earn their visual arts merit badge
• Preparing for my very first ever fine art gallery showing (not solo but it's still a big deal and a whole lot of work)
• Redesigning and launching a new flash website for my photography business
• Booking events and shoots left and right for the upcoming Spring and Summer seasons
• Prepping for my first ever fine art gallery (not a solo show but still) where I will be showing with a local area faith-based organization promoting visual arts ministry
• Preparing bento boxes for both Miss A and D

*sigh*

I don't know how or where I'm getting the time or energy to do anything these days. The only logical explanation I can come up with for the things I've been able to pull off is that God alone has filled me with endless reservoirs of both energy and inspiration.  Sometimes though, I gotta sit down and just take a breather and the other night I was able to do just that. It's amazing the simple joy that comes from hunkering down with Miss A for a little bit to marvel at the little joys of life when they come in the form of the teeniest tiniest and prettiest little ponies you might ever see...

How about a throwback?

Left my AC adapter for my laptop at work so I'm on the desktop tonight catching up on everything that needs to be caught up with.  Still don't have any recent pictures/videos other than that of bento box work but 1) you've seen plenty of those of late and 2) I don't plan on posting those until the end of the week when I can do a full week anyway.

Just for fun I started going through the ol' picture archive of Miss A here o the desktop.  Man oh man!  Did we ever take pictures and keep up with taking pictures!!  Haven't done a throwback on here in probably a year or something since I never get on the desktop so thought I would do one for fun.  This one was somewhere in the neighborhood of right before six months for her I believe?  It was in what I like to call her "chunky monkey" stage...

Two of my best friends are expecting (one of them will be any day now!) and I am just thrilled to bits over their pending arrivals of sweet baby girls.  Miss A has been the greatest joy and blessing of my whole entire life outside of me pledging my faith and love to D when we married and I cannot imagine life without either one of them to complete it. God bless my wonderful husband and my sweet baby girl. God bless them to the fullest.