getting out of the box

I love getting out of my safety zone and trying new stuff--hence a weekend of classes at the Oasis. First, I made my first acrylic album with Maria Grace. If people were the solar system, Maria Grace would be the sun. I took her class just to bask in her warmth and energy. Her project reflected her spirit, reflection, and colorful creativity. My friend Karen and I loved the class and Maria Grace, courtesy of Fontwerks, gave all of us the Ringo Starrs stamp--my new favorite!

The next day was an all day affair with Karen Russell, broken up with a trip to the Costco (am I really going to eat 4 lbs of grapes and 3 cantaloupes before they go bad?), with her Photography and Interactive Scrapbooking classes. Karen is ridiculously generous, honest, and sweet and just shares so much info. Loved her photography class--tried new things already and am itching for more info and new lenses! I had never done an interactive layout before and had to get my head around, per Karen, "not scrapping every picture" (!!!). My friend Veronica and I had a great time!

And last but certainly not least, I had an awesome time with Shimelle's Kill Your Television project. What a lovely, lovely young woman. I had a chance to chat with her and learned a few cool things about her: though she lives in the UK now, she's originally from Kansas City, Missouri, until last year she was an elementary school teacher, and...AND, she spent 5 years training to be an astronaut with NASA when she a young teen!

Isn't that wild and inspiring? She had gone to some space camp for kids and she was scouted by NASA for a special training program. Unfortunately for our space program, she didn't meet the height and sight requirements and was released after 5 years. Isn't there times you want to say, "hey, it's not Rocket Science, and I should know"... Well Shimelle can!

I don't know if it's the angle of the pix, but I look ginormous, like some female version of Andre the Giant or Bentley from the Jeffersons.