Happiness is a Choice.

Today is the first day of the rest of your life.

Happiness is a choice - I am going to choose to not allow the outside influences of the world affect my mood. I promise you will live a happier life.

The last two weeks I have been through an emotional roller-coaster of getting kicked down by life and getting back up, to only get kicked down again. I consider myself an extremely positive and upbeat personality. Sometimes life gives us bigger lessons than even those of us upbeat positive people can handle.  

Life happens people! Everyday is a blessing and even in the most frustrating situations, the problems you think you are facing, are there for a reason and a lesson is to be learned. Today I hit a breaking point emotionally and I ended up being a cliche chick and having myself a super solo cry session. I cried in my room, then in the shower and then while brushing my teeth. Dramatic much? I think so.

All I know is I got it all out. Crying helped me let all my frustration out in a healthier way then being angry towards loved ones or in unhealthy eating and etc. You know what I did after I cried myself a river....I GOT OVER IT! I sat down and wrote a list of everything I was overwhelmed with and wanted to work out. 

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Seeing everything written down in a list is so freeing and I feel like I have my problems in a tangible and manageable form. Also, when I looked down at the paper and was out of things to write I couldn't believe how little I actually had that was really problems. It is amazing how writing down everything that is jumbled in your brain down on paper can really center you and bring back the focus on what matters.

Tomorrow is Valentine's Day and I have the most wonderful man in my life I could ever ask for. As I am sitting here typing this mush of gush out, there is a vase full of pink flowers and a note to my left. He has noticed how much I have been struggling recently and he got me flowers and wrote me a note about how he is sorry that I had a bad day and that he loves me. 

With Valentine's Day tomorrow, this honestly meant so much more to me. It reminded me that I have someone who loves me enough to go out of his way to make sure that I know I am appreciated and have support just because I needed it and not because of a holiday. It really is the little things in life that we can take for granted and let all of life's crap cloud our vision. We can't forget what really matters and that's always love.

So as I end the day and start another tomorrow I will wake up with the attitude that today is the first day of the rest of my life. I am loved and have abundant happiness. Everything will work out the way it is meant to so long as I stick to my responsibility and trust that the universe has bigger and better things for me to experience everyday. 

Until Tomorrow - Dream Away

Samantha Menzo

Cloud Nine Studios

Etsy Featured Item of the Day: 

I love you to the moon and back - quote - ORIGINAL OIL and acrylic PAINTING - 14 x 9 x 1 inches on wood

Song of the Day:

Céline Dion - Love Can Move Mountains

Color of the Day:

 Benjamin Moore's Dalila 319

My inner Girly Girl and "Embracing the Pink."

Hello Everyone! I am in such an inspired and motivated mood today. I spent most of the last few days locked inside my studio trying to get as much done as I can and I really am hearing that clock tick with the DIY Art Fair right around the corner. I was able to finish up so many half done pieces and that was so gratifying. I also was able to take a good chunk of the day to prepping more wine bottles. I soaked them and peeled the labels and then took them outside to spray some base colors on them and I can't wait to get back and knock some cute new wine bottles out! 

So yesterday I was on Facebook scrolling along when I came across a video that caught my eye. I clicked on it and was instantly hooked. It is Lil' Fairy Doors and my inner child was squealing with delight! I was so excited over this little pink door that I had to take a step back and look at exactly why I was so giddy!

(My brother and I fishing as little kids :] Happy Birthday Zachary!)

So I began to think about how I was raised with a tom-boy sporty spice kinda attitude. I loved my cut off jean shorts and bandannas. I loved showing up the neighborhood boys in any sport I could and after a certain age I made it by business to HATE pink. I even convinced myself that the thought of pink made me mad. Why? 

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When I started playing disc golf around 2 years ago, I had a disc that was my favorite to use but it was pink. I was the best at throwing that particular disc and slowly I grew fond of the color. I had a connection with it and a positive one. Slowly I started wanting more pink discs. Then I wanted pink shirts, then a pink bag, until I slowly was EMBRACING THE PINK!

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I realized a connection with this transformation after listening to part of Gretchen Rubin's - The Happiness Project. She wrote about how for so long she suppressed her love for children's literature. She wanted to be known for reading intelligent books and not fairy tales. She figured out what she was doing one day and decided to ditch the thought and embrace her love for children's literature and she started a small book club dedicated to it! 

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I was suppressing my inner Girly Girl. I wanted people to think I was tough, and cultured and intelligent and somehow me liking pink went against that notion. So i decided to start my own book club......well not really. I just decided that I loved pink and girly girl things. When I saw the Lil' Fairy Door I wanted one so badly. I made me think about my art pieces that I create in my studio. 

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I have mentioned making "sell-able art" vs "enjoyable art." I have struggling with this thought lately because of trying to prepare for this Art Fair. I have found myself knocking out so much generic sell-able art just to make sure I have inventory and it's not as enjoyable for me. When the fair is over I have decided to dedicate a chunk of my time creating fun and light girly pieces. I still love my rustic pieces on wood and wine bottles but I am missing something and it's all for my inner Girly Girl!

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So I hope you all enjoyed the blog today and remember to embrace any and everything you love in life because we all want the real you! I will be Periscoping in my studio tonight at 7pm Eastern Standard Time if any of you are interested in joining me you can find me @Cloudninestudios. 

Until Tomorrow - Dream Away

Samantha Menzo

Cloud Nine Studios

Etsy Featured Item of the Day:

Pink donut watercolor PAINTING rainbow sprinkles (fine art print realistic food doughnut girly pastel art nursery dessert kitchen decor) by - ASheaDesignLab

Song of the Day:

Beyonce - Run the World (Girls)

Color of the Day:

Coral

DIY - PAINT BRUSH CLEANER (Made with hot glue gun)

It has been a weird couple of days but also an AMAZING couple of days. My love took me away for a night to the west side of Michigan with another couple. We stayed in an amazing castle and saw my favorite band Lake Street Dive. It was a magical two days and I felt very inspired and in love.

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Since I have been away all weekend I wanted to use my last day off to really get things done in my studio. I entered the room this morning and felt SO OVERWHELMED. There were things everywhere. I have started so many pieces and each are different mediums. I just couldn't get my thoughts together so I decided it was time to clean and reorganize everything.

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I started by getting all the random trash out and creating more space. I felt cramped and anxious and now I feel free! I had also been putting off cleaning a ton of my brushes that were just sitting in old mineral spirits. I was actually convinced I had ruined all of them because they had been sitting there for so long. I remembered this great idea I saw and decided to make one of my own!

I understand that this video was made for make-up brushes but it works the same for paintbrushes. I made one on a metal tray that I had left lying around. It works so well I wish I had more brushes to clean. I not only saved every single brush I don't think they have ever been this clean. It took maybe ten minutes to make and if you are an artist with deals with paintbrushes of any kind I DEFINITELY recommend making one of these.

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ANYWAY! Now that everything is clean and has a place I am going to organize my inventory on paper which is something I have never done before. I want to do this because like I already mentioned I keep starting all these little pieces for the DIY Art Fair but not finishing them and I feel all over the place. I want to know exactly what I have and how many of each so I can focus on what I want to have for the fair. I know as of now that I probably need to at least DOUBLE my inventory which is terrifying but I know if I can just get my thoughts straight I will make it happen.

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Before I left for the weekend adventure I did however finish my lovely little Alice in Wonderland inspired Watercolor piece! Sometimes I make pieces and I think "oh, that's cute.....moving on" but every now and again I make something I love and it might be vain but I CAN NOT stop looking at it. I really want to make more pieces like this and get prints to sell but I feel like I need to stick with what I can do for the fair for now and after this month dive a little deeper into my watercolor ideas.

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So that's all I have for today. I really want to get to work in here now that it's cleaned up but I wanted to make sure I blogged since I couldn't while I was away. I hope you all have a wonderland day!

Until Tomorrow - Dream Away

Samantha Menzo

Cloud Nine Studios

Etsy Featured Item of the Day:

USB flash drive 8 GB, kawaii blue cat, cat with constellation big dipper, back to school , cobalt cat usb flash by - CloverPower

Song of the Day:

Garden Sessions: Lake Street Dive - "Look At What Mistake" - Radio Woodstock

Color of the Day:

 BENJAMIN MOORE CORLSBUD CANYON 076

Inside Cloud Nine Studios - Making Greeting Cards

The last two days have been SUPER productive! I spend the majority of the last two days off from my gallery job in my own studio kicking out work that I plan to display at the DIY ART FAIR next month. I thought today I would bring you inside my studio and show you how I made this fun Michigan watercolor greeting cards.

Supplies you'll need:

                   Watercolor paper

   Ruler

Painter's Tape

 Acrylic Paint Markers (Fine Tip suggested)

 Spray Adhesive

 Watercolor Paints

 Blank Greeting Cards 

Let's Get Started:

I started by measuring my blank greeting card 1/2 inch smaller on each side to come up with the dimensions for my watercolor piece. Mine ended up being 3 x 5 (my greeting card was 4 x 6 in).

I then cut out 20 or so watercolor pieces at these dimensions. I now had my template.

Next I used my painter's tape and taped the edges down on a flat surface. This is because watercolor causes the edges to curl up and this ensures that your paper stays as flat as possible. I applied some watercolor to the paper how ever I felt looked nice for each piece. GET CREATIVE!  I decided I liked the look of flicking white over the top of the watercolor for another layer. Feel free to do whatever you like!
Next I traced the Michigan mitten on the lower right hand corner with a fine tip pen. I painted it in with different acrylic paint markers depending on the colors I used for that particular card!

After I had made a good number if card covers I took my watercolor pieces and my blank greeting cards outside. I sprayed the adhesive to the back of the watercolor cover and placed it in the center of the blank cards.

I had such a good time making these cards! You really can do so many things and they are a great little item that should sell fairly easily. I will be so pleased to show off these little items at the DIY Art Fair next month and I just know that having smaller and lower priced items along with the rest of my inventory will really be key in having a successful booth.

One of my biggest tips with this project is really make sure that your watercolor piece is completely dry before tracing your Michigan stencil. If you want to speed up the process, using a hair dryer on a warm low setting helps a ton!

I hope you enjoyed a look inside my studio today and hope I have inspired you to make some of these great watercolor greeting cards! What would you put on your cards?

Let me know what you think be commenting below and have a wonderful day!


Until Tomorrow - Dream Away

Samantha Menzo

Cloud Nine Studios

Etsy Featured Item of the Day:

Watercolor pillow, home decor, watercolor accents, watercolor painting, abstract watercolor, throw pillow cover, modern home decor, colorful by- RoveStudio

Song of the Day:
Agnes Obel - Riverside

Color of the Day:

Henrietta