(UPDATE:  This kit is now available for $5.98 at the Daisie Store, click on the first image to take you there.)  Here’s the kit previews and a preview of my new Audrey Jeanne’s Whimsical Font that will be coming soon (yeah I know…. FINALLY!)  Fonts are unbelievably time-consuming, I love when they’re done, but process of giving birth to them is painful :-)!

The artwork that is featured in this kit and several add on kits that will be coming later has a very fun story that goes with it.  In 2003, I was asked by Christian Art Publishers to create a line of 6 gift books that would contain both my art and my text.  It sounded like a really fun project until they finished the rest of the proposal with "We’ll need to have it all done in two months!"

At that point I proposed the only way we could accomplish that deadline was for me to come to them in South Africa and work non-stop for a couple of weeks.  They agreed and I took a 26 hour plane ride to the other side of the world.  I wrote 3 1/2 of the books before I came and finished the rest working with their editorial staff each morning and retiring to my beautiful garden "apartment" in a 100+ year old refurbished Victorian guest home that they provided for me to stay in. 

I worked with their very talented graphic arts department to lay out the art for the books and we came to a really difficult problem.  One of the titles was "A Hug for You Today," and we just couldn’t find any of my existing art that could in effect illustrate a hug.  So, I retreated to my quarters, sat in front of the giant window looking at a magnificent garden fountain and a freshly budding spring garden and started to play.  I had decided that the art had to have a playful feel, be oriented to women and be something a woman would be comfortable giving to another woman, other than that I had no idea where the journey would take me! 

Two days later I had more art than we could use!!!  Once I started playing around, idea after idea came to me.  The book was easily finished and sold very well, but because the art was so different from my usual work it was filed away for me to work with "in the future."  This week as I searched my hard drive for heart-inspired artwork I rediscovered it and I’m so glad I did!  There are such wonderful memories associated with it that It’s a true joy for me to work with it.

I hope you will enjoy it and some of the fun, cheerfulness and warm emotional connections that I experienced on that trip will make its way into your crafting and scrapbooking!

SCRIPTURE OF THE DAY: Hos 2:15 I will return her vineyards to her and transform the Valley of Trouble into a gateway of hope. She will give herself to me there, as she did long ago when she was young, when I freed her from her captivity in Egypt.
NLT

PRAYER:  Lord, the woman spoken about in this passage had ventured far from you and had done much that was wrong and yet your heart was compassionate towards her and always ready to forgive, restore and bless her.  Help me to remember that your desire for me is ALWAYS to restore me, no matter how often I forget to seek you out or how far from your ways I roam.

Help me to draw near to you and let you show me the areas in my life that you want to change so that you can bless me.  Help me to learn to trust you more and give myself to you more fully day by day.  Amen