I am still in the thrall of that AMAZING 2016 World Series Game 7 that I got to watch last night between two of the best-matched and incredibly talented give-it-all-you-got baseball teams: the Chicago Cubs & the Cleveland Indians. WHAT A GAME!!! I’ve never seen anything like it. It had all the elements of an epic movie: action, mega-suspense, dramatic pauses, laughter, tears, heroic perseverance in the face of fatigue, big league Pressure with a capital P—plus—an unforgettable ending … it was all that and more. Beyond WOW.
108 Double Stitches
Posted November 3, 2016 by Paula's ParadiseCategories: cool stuff, Creativity Workshop, inspiration, movies, wonderful ideas, writing
Tags: 2016 World Series, A League of Their Own, artist of life, baseball, Chicago Cubs, creativity, Groundhog Day movie, Kaizen Muse Creativity Coaching
Finding Über Bliss: A Wildly Creative Journey to the Present Moment
Posted June 21, 2016 by Paula's ParadiseCategories: art, Books, collage, cool stuff, Creativity Workshop, favorite things, inspiration, quotes, wonderful ideas, writing
Tags: creativity, Delray Beach, Duncan Conference Center, Jill Badonsky, Kaizen Muse Creativity Coaching, labyrinth, retreat
Excited to announce that this January 19-22, 2017, I’ll be collaborating with one of my most favorite, brilliant, and fun-loving mentors, the inspirational humorist/author/illustrator/yoga teacher and Founder of the Kaizen Muse Creativity Coaching Training program— Jill Badonsky—to offer a warm-winter retreat and joy-centered learning experience in beautiful Delray Beach, Florida: Finding Uber Bliss … A Wildly Creative Journey to the Present Moment. It’s an amazing opportunity to hang out with Jill in person and discover more ways to deepen your own imaginatively-inspired life as an Artist of Being Alive. You’ll be guided through stories of wisdom, creative adventures & writing, smart camera art, drawing, painting, brushes with the absurd & sublime, and enlightened contemplation … all in a gentle, non-pressurized, rooted-in-playfulness environment.
For KMCC coaches, it’s an ideal chance to ground yourself and learn in-person as you become certified to lead your own Finding Uber Bliss groups or classes. And for any creativity-loving attendees (artists, writers, gardeners, non-coaches, musicians, spiritual-seekers, everyone welcome!), it’s a wonderful way to amp up your awareness, more fully embrace your own distinctive creative thinking, deepen peace-of-mind practices, meet more mirth, and enhance the ongoing layers & blending of your own daily collage-of-life.
“Inspiration is an awakening, a quickening of all man’s faculties, and it is manifested in all high artistic achievements.” ~Giacomo Puccini
“Anyone at all who is known for having found a path to consistent, recurring joy — cites staying present as the essential teaching.” ~David Cain, Author of You Are Here
“Living creatively, you don’t constantly manufacture a future, you grow the life that is present.” ~Thomas Moore
“If you want to conquer the anxiety of life, live in the moment, live in the breath.” ― Amit Ray
“You must live in the present, launch yourself on every wave, find your eternity in each MOMENT. Fools stand on their island of opportunities and look toward another land. There is no other land; there is no other life but this.” ― Henry David Thoreau
“The aim of life is to live, and to live means to be aware, joyously, drunkenly, serenely, divinely aware.” ~Henry Miller
“And I urge you to please notice when you are happy, and exclaim or murmur or think at some point, ‘If this isn’t nice, I don’t know what is.” ~Kurt Vonnegut
Why the name “Uber Bliss”?
(A note from Jill Badonsky about Finding Uber Bliss beginnings)
“Über” is a German word meaning “over”, “above” or “across”.
“Uber” crossed over from German into English in 1883 when German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche coined the term “Ubermensch” to describe the higher state to which he felt men might aspire. Mensch means “man” in German.
The name of this program, “Uber Bliss”, was a spinoff of an explanation Dr. Seuss gave when people asked the question, “Where do you get your ideas?” He invented a fictitious account involving a hamlet in Switzerland called Über Gletch where he claimed he went every August to get his cuckoo clock fixed and while waiting, strange people would give him his ideas. It turned out to be an explanation that was as absurd as the question, “Where do you get your ideas?”
“Where do you get your ideas?” is a confounding question to most artists and writers because the genesis of ideas is elusive; there often is no explanation that the conscious mind can grasp. Because he was so imaginative, Theodore Geisel (Dr. Seuss), was frequently asked this question and rather than get annoyed, he invented a description, which showed us his tongue-in-cheek resourcefulness, his ability to rise above predictability, and his comfort with being imaginatively absurd. (All handy elements in the creative process as well as in life.)
The Greeks, who were known for inventing myths to explain the unexplainable, invented Muses to justify where ideas come from. So you see, Muses and Uber Gletch have a common theme—not to mention, the reference to “uber” as aspiring to a higher state.
When the transportation network, Uber, created a new association to the word, I was concerned people would be think Uber Bliss was related to a taxi service and considered changing the name. Instead, my inner Dr. Seuss helped me get resourceful, which was easy since both the Uber transportation network and Finding Uber Bliss, “transport” people to places that will make them happy.
Consider that you are about to get a lift to a new way of existing in your world. – Jill Badonsky
Includes all the above except no license, Hard-Copy, or network.

Duncan Conference Center Room


Ocean and Sunset Artist Trading Cards
Posted April 12, 2016 by Paula's ParadiseCategories: art, by the sea, collage, design, favorite things, Grand Bahama Island, inspiration, intriguing images, love, The Bahamas
Tags: art, ARTchix Studio, artist trading cards, collage, gelli printing, Lenna Young Andrews, mixed media, ocean, oceans, stamps, sunset, sunsets, The Bahamas, vintage
Creating Artist Trading Cards (ATCs) with the fabulous Helga Strauss Stevens of ARTchix Studio was a big part of how I discovered my love of making collage and mixed media art. It’s also how I made the e-acquaintance of the delightful artist, Lenna Young Andrews, who is hosting an Ocean & Sunset themed swap of these small, almost-business-card-sized works of heart—all made just for the love of art and sharing the joy with other artists and crafters!
I couldn’t resist this theme, especially with such glorious sunsets by the sea and crystal-clear aqua waters around here.
So, I set out to have some fun with warm tones and cool blues, making 3 of each theme (and a couple extras for personal swapping). I started with watercolor paper and acrylic paints for the Sunset cards … yellows and oranges and a touch of red mixed in with some gold highlights:
For the Ocean cards, I let my love of gelli-printing on tissue paper lead the way and started layering that in with various bits of collected paper (and vintage ARTchix sheets):
With all the backgrounds ready …
… I started browsing through my stash of image sheets from ARTchix, and paired pictures with some other wisps of paper, stamping, some typed “by the sea” words (on yellow tissue to blend with the paint), and little embellishments to bring the ATCs together … I kept the colors separate in the Sunset & Ocean themes (warm and cool), but loved playing and mixing the themes together in the content, with bathing beauties and sea creatures cavorting on the Sunset cards too! The little veined marks in the backgrounds of some of the Sunset cards (almost reef-like) was made by letting a little water into the paint mix and pressing the cards together … it added to the blending of the colors and I’m totally in love with how water creates these little rivulets—patterns that show up in paint, in tree roots and branches, in underwater coral fans, in our veins, in trickling raindrops … it’s an organic flow that shows up everywhere water makes its mark!
A quick picture of the fine line needle tip applicator that I used for putting little gold highlights on the cards—shown in front of my beloved trusty 1955 Royal Quiet Deluxe typewriter—I love pecking collage words out on this machine as much as I love hearing the carriage return bell DING!
I finished off the backs of the Sunset cards with snippets of polka dotted papers gleaned mostly from odd bits of wrapping paper and smudges of paint in the same warm tones … just because I love dots dots dots … and paint!
Totally enjoyed finding more bathing beauties and images and sea-inspired touches for the Ocean themed cards … snip, snip, glue, stamp … there’s even a thin layer of clear pouring medium over the blues to give them more of a water feel …
Finishing them off on the back with more polka dots, along with Starfish postage stamps from The Bahamas (they have especially pretty postage stamps in The Bahamas that I seem to use more in collage than in mailing letters! 🙂 )
Thank you, Lenna, for hosting such a wonderful swap—I really enjoyed the process of making these—and what fun it will be to find ATCs from other artists waiting for me in my mailbox in a few weeks!! Swaps swirl with shared joy and the glow of art enthusiasm … just like sunsets and the oceans of creativity sparkling out there … enjoy!!
Picture Postcard Kind of Day
Posted January 25, 2015 by Paula's ParadiseCategories: by the sea, favorite things, Grand Bahama Island, inspiration, intriguing images, photography, Sunday Inspiration, The Bahamas
Tags: avocados, Banana Bay Restaurant, Grand Bahama Island, gratitude, picture postcard
Enjoying the afternoon at Banana Bay … a true Grand Bahama paradise kind of day … straight out of a picture postcard. The combination of brilliant and soft-blended blues, an intensely-gentle warming sun, a just-enough breeze, and low humidity all came together today in one stellar “Ahhhhh ….” that begs both simple enjoyment and a cyber-singing of its praises.
It is after all High Gratitude season here. When I first moved here, people told me this idyllic time of year was sometimes referred to as “gloating season”—that is not my intent here. And we year-round island residents have waded through our share of summer heat and high humidity to get to these glorious days of dewy-free revelry. These slice-of-heaven days may already be well-enough celebrated in the tourism brochures, but those images don’t capture all the little moments of day-to-day warm winter bliss … the long rays of dawn glinting off the cat’s fur …
… the delight of finding that the avocado tree in the back garden is offering up yet one more late-ripening gift of green goodness …
the silhouette of a shorebird wading in late afternoon liquid gold glimmers …
Ahhhh indeed. Perhaps today is received with extra gratitude and thanks because it was blustery and somewhat gray yesterday—a grand day in its own way with the palm fronds applauding madly in gusts, as if cheering wildly for the cool front to get here—sweeping a path clear for silky sun and cyan sky kisses that take your breath away. And give you pause to take an extra-deep breath and offer up a quiet hallelujah for natural wonders—and absolutely exquisite island days. Here’s to the sunshine of the heart, wherever your paradise …
A New Dance of Color & Light
Posted December 14, 2014 by Paula's ParadiseCategories: art, inspiration, intriguing images
Tags: acrylic abstract art, art, Bloom True, Flora Bowley, Susan Moir Mackay, wholehearted
Intuitive Acrylic Painting. I am enjoying it so much; making marks and layers … allowing images to emerge … loving the dance of color and fluidity, ideas and movement to flow onto the canvas and learning to trust the process, the choices, the Now. Here are a few abstract pieces I’ve finished, and a close-up detail of a work-in-progress that’s still on the easel:
With thanks to my dear friend and amazingly talented artist, Susan Moir Mackay, for encouraging me in all creative endeavors (including Life!), and to Flora Bowley for sharing her process and brave intuitive work via her fabulous Bloom True course. So grateful for all the beauty and inspiration and grace and textures and forms and wonder in this wide world of ours—all just waiting to be embraced on canvas! So happy to be a-twirl in line and shape and shades of creative bliss when I’m painting. And even when I’m not. The process seems to spill over and start painting new perspectives on loving what is in all the layers of day-to-day. May the joy of whatever you like to do and make and just be with bring you an ongoing source of satisfaction and serendipity, especially in this season of loving generosity and holy (wholly) grace-full and heartfelt spirit.
Art in the Mail: International Postcard Swap
Posted May 17, 2014 by Paula's ParadiseCategories: art, by the sea, collage, design, favorite things, Grand Bahama Island, inspiration, little luxuries, The Bahamas
Tags: iHanna DIY international postcard swap, postcards
Enjoyed creating these mixed media collage postcards for iHanna International Postcard Swap. These cards are crafted out of recycled pieces of cardboard, along with some vintage ARTchix Studio images, scraps of old sewing patterns, bits of imprinted paper napkins, acrylic paint, gelli prints, and odd wisps of wrapping paper—a blend of textures and colors and fun celebrating the abundant sea and aqua blue waters that make this archipelago nation of 700 Bahama cays and isles extra delightful—along with a vibrant international community that calls these island home! These 10 cards are winging their way to various parts of the world, and I’ll soon photograph and post those that land here too! Handmade art. Snail mail. Adventuring art hearts! Thanks, iHanna.nu for coordinating this lovely exchange!
Smitten
Posted February 14, 2014 by Paula's ParadiseCategories: art, collage, design, favorite things, inspiration, intriguing images, little luxuries, love
Tags: ARTchix Studio, artist trading cards, heart, love, mixed media collage, Valentine collages
Yes, I’m smitten with mixed media collage—these were created for the ARTchix Studio artist trading card swap and are winging their way to other collage enthusiasts. Here’s to finding even a tiny bit more time for doing whatever makes your heart feel light—Happy Valentine’s Day!!!
The Greening of Grand Bahama
Posted December 28, 2013 by Paula's ParadiseCategories: cool stuff, favorite things, Garden, Grand Bahama Island, little luxuries, making a difference, The Bahamas
Tags: Bahamas National Trust Rand Nature Centre, dragon fruit, Farmer's Market, Grand Bahama arts and crafts, organic produce
It’s the last Saturday of the month—and that means it’s time for Grand Bahama’s Farmer’s Market, known as “Da Market” at the Bahamas National Trust Rand Nature Centre from 9 am to 1 pm each month (and possibly more often during the warm winter season!). You’ll find a small assortment of organically grown produce, fresh herbs, seedlings, fresh-from-the-henhouse-eggs, plus homemade jams, jellies and sweets.
Even exotic fruits can be found, such as these locally-grown Dragon Fruit, which have a marvelous fuchsia color and taste mildly sweet, like a kiwi fruit:
The market also has a small selection of ever-changing locally made arts and crafts …
The Farmer’s Market is just one of the signs that Grand Bahama is becoming greener. I’ll tell you more about local entrepreneurs who are providing fresh green menus, vegan foods, and even a local organic farm in another post …. right now I’m ten minutes late for the opening of “Da Market” … see you there!
P.S. SCHEDULING NOTE OOPS: If you’re reading this on December 28th before 1 pm and thinking of heading out in your car, hold off until next month! Da Farmer’s Market was moved up a week because of the holidays … still happy to spread the word and hope you’ll check Facebook under “Da Farmer’s Market” for updates and reminders of upcoming markets–and hooray for all the luscious green goodness that swirls through Grand Bahama all through our warm winter!
Stars & Angels
Posted December 24, 2013 by Paula's ParadiseCategories: art, collage, favorite things, inspiration, love, quotes
Tags: angel, art, christina rossetti, Christmas, collage, merry christmas
Merry & Bright
Posted December 24, 2013 by Paula's ParadiseCategories: art, collage
Tags: collage, collage art, Happy Holidays, mixed media collage, paper doll