My nephew is a member of a band in Switzerland named "Bye Shelley". They are considered hard rock over there which I think is funny compared to what us Americans call hard rock. Check them out...http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewProfile&friendID=197552480/ My nephew is the cute one with the dark curly hair... he goes by the name Chew but we call him Julian.

Here Comes Da Sun!!!

Today is the first day in 2 weeks that we can actually see the sun...not quite blue skies yet...but the air is much better! It won't be long before we are back to our normal sizzling summer weather. The fire fighters are still here and probably will remain for a bit. The fires are not completely out.

I want to tell you about another terrific artist I met via the flickr site. Her name is Sam and she lives in Arizona with her dogs. She is a mixed media and mosaic artist using recycled items and

" just plain trash" for her artwork. Her style is mostly whimsical folk and is sure to make you smile. She is well known for her rock art and flag pieces. Sam has taken some art history classes but she is mainly self taught, getting her inspiration from the "good and bad parts of life". Some of her aristic ideas come to her in the middle of the night...I can certainly relate to that! Sam has the same problem most of us artists have these days...so many ideas and so little time! She also has a love for old vehicles and has lots of pictures of them on her flickr page.

Sam 's flickr page is...http://www.flickr.com/photos/bysam/. She also has a website where you can purchase her art...http://www.arizrocks.com/. If you are looking for something fun to add to your art collection, I highly recommend you check out arizrocks.com!