World Travel: Tour de France

Let me just say that I am sucker for classic architecture. 

For my tour de France I'd like to see the  Chamboard Castle, Château de Marqueyssac, Château de Versailles, the Eiffel Tower, the Louvre, and visit with my relatives in Paris. I have no idea how long this trip should be....waiting to decide that until the funds are raised will be important.

The Chamboard Castle is a feat of excellence. I love the color contrast from the creamy stone walls and the blue slate roof. Plus the grandiose use of symmetry is very pleasing and helps tone down the busyness of the place. The sky line reminds me of a modern city from afar, and it made realize, this is something of an ancient city. The way estates use to be self sufficient from the rest of the world made them like a tiny city unto themselves.  I don't know what the outside looks like but I want to be surprised!

Chateau de Marqueyssac has amazing gardens; yes I want to travel around the world to look at plants. If I would have known as a child this thought would enter my head, my child self would scold my future self and become disgusted. However, I would bribe my child self with promises of GARDEN MAZES! Oh yes, garden mazes fascinate me and I can't wait to get lost in the bushes. 

Part of me thinks Versaille might be a tourist trap but part of me really wants to experience the Hall of Mirrors (Like we don't have that in dressing rooms at Kohls, which I avoid like the plague) and the other room I am excited to see is the Queen's chambers (which is not available at Kohls). Plus in school for design I did a small report on Versaille so it would be cool to experience my paper first hand.

The Louvre is expensive. I might have to enroll in BCC so I can use my student ID to get in for a discounted price, seriously. However, I can't imagine the wonders the doors are hiding. Art, by the room fulls, and no I don't have an interest in seeing the Mona Lisa (I know what it looks like already). As long as we are on the subject of the Louvre...how did they come up with the pronunciation? Was is the same people that came up with the pronunciation of colonel? And bologna? The same deal with Versaille... 

Chamboard Castle, France

Gardens at Chateau de Marqueyssac

Versailles, Paris, France

Louvre

Arc de Triomphe, Paris, France

Jardin du Luxembourg, Paris, France

Eiffel Tower 

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World Travel: Turkey and the Ukraine

What unusual countries to visit. How often does your neighbor/friend/colleague say, "This year I'm visiting Turkey and the Ukraine." Not that many eh?

Well, honestly, out of all my trips this would be the one I'm willing to cut if Eric says my dreams of travel are too extravagant.  However, I wouldn't turn the opportunity.

The two main things I want to see are the pools in Pamukkale, Turkey and Swallow's Nest in the Ukraine. 

Pamukkale, Turkey

Why, yes, those are weird rock outcropping. And yes, you can go swimming in them. No, I'm not sure if that is sand or snow in the background my Florida logic claims it could not be snow because people are sitting in it in what appears to be shorts. It could also just be part of the rocks...hmm....

Swallow's Nest

Now I want to go here purely because I think it will enrich my reading life. Every castle ever described to me a book could be this one. It's amazing and quaint. 

I don't know a whole lot about these places but maybe they could be grouped together on another adventure, but they would be fine on their own. Perhaps my uncle could tag along and interrupt for us. I also would like to travel between Turkey and the Ukraine via the Black Sea.

No rights to the pictures (darn I forgot to disclaim in the other posts! I disclaim them too.)

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World Travel: Texas

Texas in a place I'd never thought I'd want to go but it turns out I'm going to want to make a minimum of two visits to the land of cowboys and cattle.

The first visit will be during Eric's schooling in Oklahoma City sometime at the end of this year, beginning of next year that visit will be to visit family and friends, not to sight see but the second visit I hope to have is a long weekend away with my husband, and maybe the kids (yes, I am thinking that FAR into the future, which is far, far away).

For the second visit I want to go to San Antonio, Texas and hang out at the Hyatt Regency Hill Country for a day or two.

Who would have imagined Texas would have this paradise hidden away?

While there it would be awesome to visit Fiesta Six Flags. Plus that is sure to right up Eric's alley.

Just for fun (and to torture myself later) I'm going to record the daily admission prices as of today, August 30, 2012.

Adult: $58.99

Child under 48": $41.99 

Here's the map! Only 25 minutes from the hotel.



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More posting soon, it's lunch time. :)

World Travel: The Spanish Adventure

Travelling is something I'd love to do. Sadly, it is super expensive but I have a plan. It's called a saving up. Whenever the year 2013 is over, January 2014 will start my savings plan to take Eric and I around the world  one adventure section at a time. 

One of the places I'd love to go is Spain, specifically the north eastern part of the country. I'd also like to find out where my grandmother was born and visit the area which was in the northern part of the country as well. A 6 day break would be a good amount of time to explore. We could spend two days in the Bilboa area, a day in Costa Brava, a day in Barcelona or San Sebastian (no pics), and a day in Valencia. These places could be driven to all in the same day (about 12 hours of driving to see them all) but that would hardly be any fun.

The Spanish Adventure:

Costa Brava, Carrer de Josep Anselm Clavé, Blanes, Spain

Costa Brava, Carrer de Josep Anselm Clavé, Blanes, Spain

  

Castillo de Butron, Vizcaya, Spain

Valencia, Spain

My favorite place: Guggenheim Bilbao, Bilbao, Spain

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I'm already in love with Spain and I haven't even been there. It must be my heritage ingrained in my brain to think it's beautiful. Prepare yourself for more posts about my travelling adventures. I spent yesterday afternoon during work down time preparing my photographs and organizing my locations. Look forward to seeing these postings: England, Australia, Africa, South America, Japan, China, Greece, Europe, Florida, Texas, New England, Georgia/North Carolina, Western States/Canada, Louisiana, India, South America,   Ireland, Alaska, Fiji, and others. 

Publix Sales for the week of 8/30

Finally, an excellent opportunity to blog about sales BEFORE I go shopping. Grocery shopping is my favorite kind of shopping because I get to score awesome deals on a weekly basis. :) For reference B1G1 is short for Buy 1, Get 1 FREE!

Here are some things I will be buying at my favorite place to save, Publix:

B1G1, Minute Maid Lemonade/Punch found in the refrigerated section. ($0.99 per unit)

B1G1, Publix Deli Tea (~$1.25 per unit)

B1G1, Publix Fresh Pizza Dough (~$1.30 per unit)

B1G1, Honey Bunches of Oats with a coupon for -$1.00 off of two boxes (~$1.50 per box)

B1G1, Hersey 6 pack chocolate bars with -$1.00 off two packages (~$1.40 per box)

B1G1, Reynolds Wrap foil with -$3.00 worth of coupons (~$1.50 per box)

B1G1, Cool Whip Topping

50% off of Bird's Eye Frozen Veggies

Farm Fresh Snacks with -$2.00 worth of coupons

If I am really lucky, I might get to go to the Publix on Post Road to score the best deals in town!


Of course, there are many more sales available at Publix, just check out your local ad and start looking up coupons at these great sites:

www.coupons.com
http://www.quericavida.com
www.target.com (check if your Publix accepts target coupons, mine does!)
http://smartsource.com
http://www.campbellskitchen.com
http://www.redplum.com
http://www.pgeveryday.com

If you find any great deals combining coupons and sales make sure to post them. <3

Charlotte Russe Sale

More sale blogging, I'm very sorry I'm late on this one but some family issues needed to be taken care of first. I really don't buy other than groceries but this is an odd season of my life. There are so many weddings, I started a new job, and I've gained weight since my wedding that I can't keep off. This has lead to more buying of clothes and such.

So Charlotte Russe Sale on Saturday. The Happy Hour Special was buy three items get the fourth free. Jhoana and I needed cowboy boots for the wedding we are going to be in April. Authentic cowboy boots run over $100.00 and we don't have that kind of money. Charlotte Russe has authentic looking cowboy boots for $40.00, and a sale on boots, buy one get one for $15.50. We agreed to combine the total cost of the boots and split it down the middle so $27.75 per pair. 

Aren't they cute?

So now I have two items; one more and I get something "free!" Well I started this new job and I need jeans that I can wear all day long. Charlotte Russe also had $10.00 off of selected jeans so I got a pair. That made them $25.00 which is the upper limit I would pay for jeans. These are the dark wash skinny jeans. Fear not, they won't high water on me.

I really wanted a blue dress but there wasn't a blue dress on sale that was appropriate. Instead for my free item I pick out  a yellow dress off of clearance (reg. 29.99) for $14.99. This ended up being my free item.

If that wasn't good enough, which it wasn't, I qualified for free shipping. Still not good enough? I didn't think so either so I found a coupon code for an additional 10% off the entire order. So what did I spend? $50.30 including tax. (Note, this does not include the cost of my friend's boots)

Here is a break down for the final pricing before tax:

Boots for wedding: $25.05 (original $40.00)
Jeans for work: $22.50 (original $34.99)
Dress for fun: FREE (original $28.99) 
Shipping: FREE (original $8 something)

Total savings: $61.68

Even though I hate to spend money on clothes, I am grateful to spend $50.00 on jeans, a dress, and boots rather than $139.95 sale (originally $169.95) on this similar pair for "real" boots that fit the image the bride is looking for.

What do you think? Do you think I fell victim to the sale? 

Spending $22.50 on a pair of jeans is steep for me, so is $25 on a pair of shoes but pair it with a free dress that I might have spent $12.00.... I guess it wasn't that bad but there is still room for improvement!



  

What if the Hunger Games movie was good?...Like really good?

Spoiler Alert. 

Things I loved:

+Rue: was she not perfect? 

+Seneca Crane's beard 

+Cinna

+Wild dogs

+President Snow with his roses: though the dialouge with Crane was a bit off in my opinion.

+Peeta's interview and camoflauge skills (though his face in the arena wasn't believable, he didn't have a mirror!)

+Thresh saving Katniss

+Tracker Jackers explination 

+Jennifer Lawerance as Katniss

+The actors in general

+Cornucopia: I had a hard time imagining this in the book but the way it turned out was super cool.

+Haymitch's messages in the parachuets 

+The Valley Song

+Caesar Flickerman was great!! I'm kinda gald he didn't have blue lips.

+Katniss with Buttercup

Best way to improve:

+Katniss voice over narration. There are plenty of times where the viewer must sit in silence wondering what is happening. We don't get Katniss' thoughts which explain so much in the book. Instead we are viewing the movie, often when nothing going on. VOICE OVER SOME THOUGHTS!!!!

Other things:

+They exaggerated Peeta's manliness. No one gets biceps like that working in a bakery. Carbs, not protiens people....

+Cato mercy kill....really?

+ Gale. Oh the tragdy.....like he would scare a deer away?? Please, these people are STARVING. He would let her shoot it and GALDLY carry it for her where ever she wanted. If he wanted to be funny he would stick an arrow in a loaf of bread or something.....

+And no Gale flashbacks to the nice times they had during the games. Very sad...we all thought he was going to be given his due because of the trailers. They tricked us, those dirty dogs.

+No family and friend interviews!!!! WE WERE ALL WAITING FOR THIS!!!!!!! Right? This would have emotionally invested us more in the characters.

+Katniss' interview....awkward and confusing. In a bad way.

+Too many annoying cut outs to the game makers control room. Some would be great but it was over kill. Let's have some Katniss flashbacks to her and Prim or the hob or her father dying/getting his metal or Gale or....anything that was in the book that was left out

+I know it's a movie....however, there wasn't enough personal investment in the characters. Everything was jumping around here, there, everywhere. Though the scene with Katniss and Prim hugging in the beginning was priceless.

+The scene with Peeta and Katniss and the bread....*coughvoiceovernarrationcough* So what was that about?

+Haymitch didn't fall of the stage

+No sleeping medicine for Peeta. The whole explotation of romance for survival was downplayed emmensly. Instead we have awkward shots of Gale making ambigous facial expressions?

+No awkward moment where Katniss reveals that she just not that into Peeta.

+Taylor Swift's song wasn't played until the credits (okay, that is pure personal preference)

+Why were some of the careers snuggled up together?

+Also, when Katniss was climbing the tree, there was something obvious in the shot that should not have been.

+Katniss in kneehigh laced up boots in the beginning. Really? That is not probable. Can you imagine the trade for laces for those things???(There was even a comment about that in the book.) Her whole get up in the woods was weird, short, fitted jacket that was suppose to her dad's? Has anyone ever seen a hunting jacket?? 

+The mocking jay pin.....beautiful but handled poorly.

+There were soooo many good lines for the book that could have been used easily that weren't. Ex: "You'll be up in some tree eating raw squirrels  and picking people off with arrows."

+Either have the hob or don't. Don't just put it in like it belongs without some back story. It doesn't belong, which is the point.

+The hallucination scene would have been GREAT for some forshadowing...

+Shouldn't she have been....hairier in the first bath scene??? Just sayin...

+Erm, the Avox girl...I am really confused about this one...she was in the cast list but did we see in her in the movie? Or know what she was/importance if we did....

+The scene with the injection of the tracker...nessicary? The scene where Katniss confronts Peeta about his feelings and the lacking of hers....optional?

Well I am going to stop there. I wish I was a movie producer.....no offense to anyone that made movie. It is just weird that some many little things could have helped and not hurt it. Props for giving it the over right feel of darkness. Also for not doing anything super weird from the book, like letting Rue live, or killing Peeta, or letting Katniss' dad be alive. It was appreciated for staying to true to the story.

Copied and pasted from my facebook notes. I rewatched the movie this weekend and thought about the same things over again so I posted a copy to my blog. No rights to the pictures. 

Doing Christmas for $250. Part One

Part One-The homemade gifts

This year is going to be tight. Very tight for Christmas so here are the homemade gifts I will be making this year. I hate leaving people out so I made a plan!

For my lady loves in two different colors. Estimated costs for 20 bracelets: $15.00

For the grandparents and extended family:
Homemade Strawberry or Grape jelly! This is my personal favorite because I can do it with my Mommom and it is better than anything store bought.
12 jars with fancy ribbon (estimated costs $10.00 recycling jars I already have)

For the men friends:

Peppermint Rice Crispies estimated costs for 20 treats less than $10.00

Next week I'm going to start the bracelets! I'll post pictures for how they turn out.  

People with gifts: 27

Total estimated costs so far: $45.00

Book Club!

Right now, a book club is being birthed. After researching here's what I have come up with:

General Guidelines
1. The meetings will be slated for the first Friday evening once a month. Or maybe the first Tuesday. 

2. We will read primarily fiction books but not 50 Shades of Gray. 

3. Leadership will be equal parts host and general organizer.

3. Speaking of books we will not read, there will be a list of banned books. Call me judgmental...and you'd be right.

4. Location and time will be worked out prior to all meetings and left to the discretion the leadership. 

5. All official communications will happen via a facebook group. 

6. All members will be responsible for getting their own copies of the material.

7. Females only.


First Meeting!

Book recommendations will be prepared by leadership. 
All members will agree to a code of honor.
Meeting layout will be reviewed. 


How will the meetings work?

There has to be food/snackage, Pinterest demands it with all the exciting treats there is to try. Food/snackage will be rotated among volunteer members.


Then I stole this from another website. I'm feeling risky today so no citing. Plus I changed it.

Step	Description
1	If there are new members; then in a round table fashion, we each take 1-3 minutes to describe our educational, job and personal background.
2	In a round table fashion, we each get 3 seconds to give the current book a ranking from 0 to 5, where 0 is the worst book you have ever read and 5 is the best book.
3	In the same round table fashion, we each take 1-3 minutes to justify our ranking.
4	We then have an open discussion of the book for 10-30 minutes
5	We then nominate candidate books for our next selected book.  Anyone nominating a book must bring at least 5 copies of a one-page book synopsis.
6	We vote on the book by each selecting our two recommended picks, where our first pick receives 5 points and our second pick receives 3 points.  The book with the most points becomes our new selected book
7	Book Club members who aren’t attending can vote for a book by sending an email to me. Absentee votes are 4 points for the first pick and 2 point for the second pick.
8	For those who wish to stay, we discuss topics of interest.
9	If you wish to nominate a book, you need to send to the book coordinator a synopsis of the book, with info on the author, number of pages, and cost (under $30), at least 10 days prior to next meeting.

Diet, what a four letter word.

I did this diet. Yes, I cheated one dinner with husband and I hate yogurt and milk so I cut one of the days. The last day I only ate fruits and veggies... Okay so I didn't do a very good job at following but this is was much more successful than previous attempts. I also did not drink the recommended amount of water. I lost 5 pounds in six days and I wasn't hungry. In fact it curbed my appetite a lot. This makes me happy because with over a month in a half of serious exercise I only gained weight. Later this week I plan to repeat the diet to shed a few more pounds and tie it in with some swimming. :) I also want to do a better job at following it.

The point is, I like it.

Interlude: Atlas Shrugged

Ayn Rand is a brillant writer. Her analysis of the human condition is jaw dropping. Her writing of the battle between group think and capitalism is second to none. One of the most interesting passages of text (so far) is this between a the wife of a steel manufacturer and her husband, one of the main characters. He has recently committed adultery and been feeling guilty about it though his wife is in the dark.

---
""Now you see, that's the cruelty of conscientious people. You wouldn't understand it--would you?--if I answered that real devotion consists of being willing to lie, cheat, and fake in order to make another person happy--to create for him the reality he wants, if doesn't like the one that exists."

"No," he said slowly, "I wouldn't understand it."

"It's really very simple. If you tell a beautiful woman that she is beautiful, what have you given her? It's no more than a fact and it has cost you nothing. But if you tell an ugly woman that she is beautiful, you offer the great homage of corrupting the concept of beauty. To love a woman for her virtues is meaningless. She's earned it, it's a payment, not a gift, unearned and undeserved. To love her for her vices is to defile all virtue for her sake-- and that is a real tribute of love, because to you sacrifice your conscience, your reason, you integrity, and your invaluable self-esteem."

He looked at her blankly. "---Atlas Shrugged, pg 305

Even though it's a twisted description of love, I understand it and side with her. It reminds me of the love God has for us. It's unearned and undeserved. Jesus sacrificed much more than self esteem for us, he sacrificed holiness, to be God and separate from the father. I know people are looking at this so tell me if you agree with Lillian or if you don't. 

Triple Layer Threat

Chocolate chip cookie dough devil's food cake cheesecake cake. With homemade icing.

The week before last Amy and I made this monster and fed it to our men as sign of love. It took two days to make. The whole cake was prepared from scratch. The recipe was four printed pages long without pictures.

It had 7 sticks of butter in the whole cake.

Yes. That's a lot of butter, it also has two full packages of cream cheese.

Amy did all the decorating.

It was tasty but you could only eat a tiny bit in fear of instant death from butter over dose.

The icing was hinted chocolate and molasses pretty tasty.

This cake was a whole new level of complex for me and I am super excited the opportunity to have undertaken it with a friend.

Here is the recipe if you are interested: 
http://www.sprinklebakes.com/2012/03/chocolate-chip-cookie-dough-devils-food.html

Jennifer's Bridal Shower Part I

Part one. Jennifer's bridal shower.

I've been doing some creating for Jennifer's bridal which is on Friday. It's coming up too fast but I'm excited. I love thinking up parties and watching them come to life.

The first thing I did was start with an inspiration/idea board. No, not a pinterest board. This:


I created a mock up of a shadow box, designed an invite, brainstormed food ideas and tied everything together with a concept and color palette. This is the design that we decided to create.

It's kind of hard to see because of the flash (sorry). But there is a basket cake in the upper left corner, duck cupcakes, the palette, the favor idea, some notes....ect. The large piece in the lower right corner is the sample invite. In the lower left corner there is a 3D shadow box as an idea for a guestbook. That sadly did not work out.


Let's talk decorations:

Here are a couple of the pieces I made.

The board on the top is tissue paper flowers (think flower bed) that is simply a white foam board modgepodged over with green tissue paper. I hot glued the 35 paper flowers on in rows with a pattern on the diagonal. I made two of these boards as back drops. The total cost of this project (two boards) is about $8.00. Without the modpodge because I already had that. One of the great things about this is I didn't use all the colors of the tissue paper in the pack so I will still have the red and green for Christmas presents and the blue for whatever else I need.

The image on the bottom is a paper lantern with a burst of butterflies. The butterflies are hot glued to fishing line. I re-purposed an over the door decoration from the Oriental Trading Co. I made four of these pieces for a total of $12.00.

Here's a close up of the texture the paper flowers bring.

I find the tissue paper flowers very pretty.

For favors we made are taken off of this design from the Oriental Trading Co but I stripped it down and recrafted the assembly.

                         

http://www.orientaltrading.com/luau-treat-boxes-a2-PT1790.fltr 

Things to look forward to in "Jennifer's shower Part 2" are the floating photo collage, a picture of the handmade invite, the food table, fishy centerpieces, duck cupcakes swimming in a sea of blue m&ms, crazy, creative food, and lot's of bridal fun.

I've also been experimenting for what I want to do with the my nails for the shower. I've decided on this simple design. (Again, not a very good picture) But it's a coat of lilac with silver sparkle edging. Think reverse french tips.

Woo!  Just got word that Taylor Swift's new album will be out in October. It's called Red. I listened to the single. I'm disappointed that it's not country at all but I like it. It's super cute. Really. According to Eric "Not a bad song but I would have liked it countrified better."

Now that's saying something. 

So tell me what you think about the ideas. for the party.

Arts VS. Crafts

As long as I am on a role,

I have noticed that there is a general lack of knowledge about the difference between art and crafts. Art is a creative process that can take many forms: paint, music, sculptor, film, architecture, photography, ect. They exists simply for the sake of existing and commenting on environment or the human condition. Most would say to bring beauty to the world but the real purpose is to express a sentiment of any variety. Some do have a function such as visual stimulus in graphic design, or the creation of a stable environment in architecture but that adds to the art. Art is the act of discovery.  

Crafts fulfill a different purpose and process. Crafts are generally not original nor do the exist for the sake of existing, we would call that clutter. Crafts do exists to be ornamental but that still having a purpose. Crafting is a skill that can be honed and perfected. Crafts include: pinterest ideas, scrapbooking, diy, quilting, decopodging, ect. 

The distinction in crafting and artistry is important. Artist have a harder job in the originality department. Crafting can involve more complexity in materials than the arts. Generally, crafters do not have to make their materials. They go to the store and buy paper and glue and ribbons or whatever and ASSEMBLE something. Artist may go to the store and but paint but no one told them where to put each stroke or which color to use.   Good art is hard to come by and good crafts are a dime a dozen. 

However, there is a sometimes hazy line between art and a craft. If I gather materials and assemble them based on how I think they should be combined is that a craft or a sculpture? Well it would depend. If the materials were paper lanterns, cardstock printed butterflies, and fishing line that I hot glued together to form a fluttering explosion of wings then it's a craft. I didn't change any medium to form something new. I simply arranged it in a pleasing fashion. If I gathered rice paper, wire, tissue paper, fishing line, and glue then asked myself "What should I make with this materials? And what should it mean?" then fashioned butterflies from long squares of tissue paper, each unique, and wound the wire into circles and covered them with rice paper then strung it all together to result in a burst of flying insects that were racing toward the light that would be a sculpture. 


Here are some examples.

art:

 Guggenheim, Bilbao, Spain

http://whyevolutionistrue.files.wordpress.com/2012/02/02-guggenheim-museum-bilbao-spain-1.jpg?w=1024



 
Leandro ERLICH, "the Swimming Pool"
The artist created this pool with glass and paint and only ten cm of water above. It can be viewed from above and below.
http://www.kanazawa21.jp/file.php?g=30&d=7&n=mainimage&gp=&lng=e&p=1



by the artists CLAMP
http://gallery.funonthenet.in/42657-3/SERIES+Card+Captor+Sakura+-Artist+CLAMP.jpg


Yayoi Kusama: Dots on a canvas
http://www.roslynoxley9.com.au/artists/49/Yayoi_Kusama/432/44167/

crafts:


http://www.apartmenttherapy.com/how-to-make-a-chrysanthemum-mirror-from-spoons-addicted-2-decorating--170879
Mirror frame made of spoons, spray painted.


Scrapbook collage
http://0.tqn.com/d/scrapbooking/1/4/j/r/cruisekitlayout3.jpg



Button Monogram created but gluing fabic to canvas and buttons on top.
http://d30opm7hsgivgh.cloudfront.net/upload/121245414937641964_rH7WlCSM_c.jpg


In the Gray:


Sand bowl made with sand and glue. I couldn't tell you if that was art or a craft. What do you think?
http://www.designboom.com/weblog/cat/8/view/18306/sand-bowls-by-leetal-rivlin.html



Crayon Painting
Is this crafting or artistry?
http://cdn.instructables.com/FLB/VGYL/GS3BCQ65/FLBVGYLGS3BCQ65.LARGE.jpg


I'm pretty sure this is a craft but I could see it passing for art. What says you?
http://www.dillydaliart.com/2012/04/rainbow-pour-painting-on-terra-cotta.html



Tell me what you think!