Featured Artisan: tribute to a daughter

This girl is artsy! No doubt about it.

There are so many things I could say about my dear 17 year old daughter. From birth she has inspired beauty and art in our world and she keeps on astounding us with her gifts every single day.Bethany is one of those lovely, bright blue-eyed, rosy cheeked, full of expression, verbally robust, laugh out-loud, girly-classic-vintage styled teen age girls that could really have been born in any era.

She is timeless.

She is one of the most talented actors I have had the privileged of knowing my entire life and I have known and worked with many.Bethany has been part of over 30 shows and is a joy to watch on stage, truly in any roll. But theater being among her first loves, she more than just graces the stage, she costumes, crews, stage manages, and directs. All with the skill, gifts, and responsibility to match most adults.
If that were not enough to boast of, and that is plenty believe me, she is also one of the finest hand stitching crafters I have ever seen. She has a knack for intricate details and fine hand sewn work. She loves to make scarves, hats, embellished hair accessories, purses, bags, etc. She started crocheting at the age of seven and she can make pretty much anything. She started sewing when she was 13 and she is learning to become a fine seamstress.

She has written some of the best papers her teachers have read and she wrote me a song and sang it to me while playing guitar. She taught herself for my last Birthday, which is one of my favorite Bethany moments.

She taught herself guitar! Yes she is very self motivated and when any one comes around that plays guitar she grabs hers and has them teach her a thing or two. She loves to sing loudly. She is growing musically as it has not come as easily to her as acting, she works even harder at it.

She loves Jesus! This is for sure one of the things that has motivated and propelled her in life. She has served and ministered with college age students since she was seven. Using all of her gifts for the Lord has given her the blessing of being so gifted and accomplished at such a young age.
We are SO proud of the young woman she is becoming and excited to see all that God has for her. I recently shared with someone, she is like a force that none can reckon with, except for the Lord of course and in my heart He keeps telling me, just get out of the way Kristen, I am doing all this in Bethany, do not hold her back!

Art in business!

I love work, really I do.

And I get to do some awesome, amazing things in my job. I work with my husband, we have a Real Estate business, he is the REAL-TOR. Yes that was on purpose it's not REAL-IT-TOR. People get that confused. And I am the Marketer/designer/book keeper, etc.

But what I love is the design elements. Laying out our marketing pieces, creating an interesting website or virtual tour or playing with the photos.

We are just re-listing this amazing house and I was playing in photoshop with a new effect I learned called TRIPTYCH which I thought would be perfect for the postcard we will send out to the neighbors. And BTW, here is a great teacher online for easy photoshop tutorials.


Isn't that fun, one picture, three panel artwork! This gives me great ideas for some artwork in my home too.

I love that my work compliments my craving for art, design, and creativity. I love that every day I get to do things that inspire me. I get really excited when our clients and Lionel like what I have created. It is wonderful to get to use my gifts in our business, it is a gift to ME to find that I can have a job and LOVE it too.

I hope my dear readers, you love what you do too!

AH...DRAMA!

I should be doing a drama right now!

Shouldn’t I be?

For the past several years January through May has been an incredibly full, busy, exciting, inspiring and artistic time for my family and me.

I like the pouring over a script, holding auditions, seeking the Lord for vision, stopping in the grocery store to take note of an every day life happen stance that God has stirred me to ad to a scene, I even like lining up the details all nice and neat in my project time-line and assigning tasks to the leadership team, sick I know.

I love the hustle and bustle of our extreme schedule, rushing out the door with notebooks and props in hand, sitting for hours picking out music, set elements, sketching ideas, dreaming up art. Love it.

Last year we took a much-needed break from this routine. I was relieved because I was tired and frankly not inspired whatsoever. And I was content with the decision.

So when fall rolled around, I really began to think about the possibility of the next drama season. It seemed the right time; usually we know in the fall what the drama we will be starting in January will look like.

So my mind began dreaming, only there was just one drama really in my heart to do and that was a repeat of a beloved story form the book of Ruth, which I will share about in a separate post. But I have been writing this story into a novel and it lives inside me. The people, the colors, the very melody of the story breathed on each page sang to me in my dreams. So I was naturally drawn to do this drama again.

However, not sure that we were supposed to be doing a drama at all. But it was the right time to be thinking about it, my heart was stirred towards something, the leaders were all on board to do it, the Pastors gave the huge green light to go forward, my children were asking me please lets do another drama, I could see in full living color the new fresh look and scenes played out like a movie in my mind.

So what’s the deal Kristen?

The deal is I haven’t really heard from you Lord.

And do you want to hear from me, or are you going to go ahead with this on your own?

No. No way, stopped in my tracks by Pastor Rob’s words, “unless the Lord has not told you to do it, then you should not.” Did you Lord? Did you tell me to do it?

You could do this drama Kristen, but I have not asked you to.

Ok.

I had been so set on the...I should be doing a drama right now, it’s the right time, it’s what we do, we sat out a season that was good, we heard from the Lord on that, but I wasn’t stopping to say are you telling me to do this Lord. So when I did ask Him, He answered.

No. Ok Lord, I hear that. No. And with all the rush of a raging river peace flooded my soul. I had not realized until the moment that I surrendered it to Him; I really didn’t want to do one right now either.

I know there is still more dramas to come, but I am content too if I never get to stand before a stage shouting out directions or encouraging a cast. For now it is not what God has me doing and for now, I am so glad.