Sweet Inspiration

Sweet Inspiration

Layers. We’ve been creating, dreaming and thinking of layers lately. We’re working on a new collection of artwork and developing the background layers that will accompany each piece. So much fun!

We find ourselves noticing the intricate layers that surround us each day in the ordinary things of life. This one caught our eye. A last vestige of summer that was reluctant to leave. Its slippery lazy layers beckoned us to slow down and enjoy the last moments of a sunny day. In the south, these layers are always sweet, dark and draped in condensation on a porch. Encased in glass with ice cubes lazily melting in a sweet nectar of summer, it’s a layer you just can’t pass up… and we didn’t! We captured it in photos and in long slow sips. Mmm… a glass of ice cold southern sweet tea. Just drink in its layers.

We’ve noticed the layers in ourselves lately too. The wonderful intricate ways in which we have all been created, woven together and formed. We are layers of walking wonders and a psalmist expressed best … "Nothing about me is hidden from you! I was secretly woven together as if embroidered with various colors" Psalms 139:15

So celebrate your layers today and enjoy a sip of some southern sweet tea.

The Velvet Lime Girls

A Season of Greater Things

The seven foot tall swamp flowers in our summer garden are bent over now. All the way to the ground. Along with the other flowers in the garden, they gave everything they had in a show of color and fragrance all summer long. Hosted hummingbird visits, bumble bee sleep-overs, caresses & sniffs from granddaughters.

The flowers in the garden have a burned-out kind of beauty. Their show is over. They gave every drop of color, fragrance, and effort they could give. They think the best days in the garden have passed.

Right in the middle of this weary expanse a fresh new flower emerges. It thinks it’s springtime! It wraps and curls itself around everything in sight and it’s little green bud ends burst into hundreds of delicate white flowers. White puffy clouds of blooms envelope the entire garden. Floating over the skeletons of rose bushes, dried up trellises and anything that hints of fading. This autumn clematis blankets the garden every September bringing a fresh burst of life just when things looked faded and finished.

It brings multiple messages. A reminder that there are seasons for everything. Seasons to grow and seasons to rest. We captured this sentiment in an earlier piece pictured above.

A second sentiment has emerged now, with these white clouds of fresh flowers bringing new life to a garden that was spent. The latter state of the garden is far more glorious than the beginning… It’s latter is greater than it’s past.

So if you’ve gone through a weary patch, felt like you’ve given your all and the landscape of your life still looks a bit barren, let our artwork remind you that a new season can come. Good things are still ahead and your latter can be greater than your past. (Job 8:7)

The Velvet Lime Girls

Clematis climbing all over everything is a pass-along plant...originating in Pattie Lee Smith's garden, Laura's great-grandmother, dug up and passed along by Clarence Skinner, Laura's Dad.

ROYAL SEATING

Seating affects everything. Have you ever sat in a large arena or stadium near the top? Although you can be very involved in the event, the activities played out below you are distant and removed. You are far above them. It’s as if you are seated in another realm… and yet you are there. Your perspective from that altitude changes and you become constantly aware that there is a bigger picture beyond what is being played out below. Your vision broadens when you’re seated higher.

Being seated in a higher place is the red carpet thought being rolled out in this artwork. We took that noble thought and draped it in royal colors. Anchored it with aristocratic seating. Sprinkled it with a phrase and stars from a divine scepter. A phrase that lifts us from living below our destiny. “ He seats us in heavenly places.” What a lofty thought for everyday life.

Reigning. Majestic. Elevated. That’s the kind of seating we’ve been given. It broadens your vision and makes you realize there is a bigger picture being played out beyond everyday life. You are seated in another realm… far above.

Take a seat in our chair today. Rest for a moment in the luxury of this divine sentiment. May you begin to reign in life today from the place that has been reserved for you… a heavenly place.

Take your seat please.

The Velvet Lime Girls

Enjoy the Journey

Enjoy the journey. It’s a phrase that has traveled around the world and now has journeyed its way into one of our upcoming pieces of artwork. It’s such a refreshing thought …. to pause, embrace and enjoy the passing moments within each day.

This phrase was the flashing yellow light thought on the highway we traveled today. It eventually slowed us down and eased us off our trip to a site we’ve passed numerous times …Bellingrath Gardens in Alabama. How many times have responsibilities, schedules and commitments kept you from pausing a moment to enjoy something you’ve always wanted to do? Always thinking, “Oh, I’ll do that next time.” Today, on a trip to check on my dear father-in-law, we paused … and for one hour experienced that out of this world feeling that comes from entering a place of beauty in nature and taking a moment to enjoy the journey.

James snapped a few photos in the gardens today and we hope they inspire you to take a moment to pause. To do that something you’ve always wanted to do.

Enjoy your journey.

The Velvet Lime girls

Laura & James pictured in middle photo (wishing for Rebecca & Marybeth)

Sunflower Smiles

Sunflowers make us smile. Every time. Their perky little faces bright with noonday sun just sunbathe you in happiness. When they first uncover their little faces, releasing their solar flare, the whole world lights up. They stand there in the rain, wind, heat and neglect … sunshine spears, unmoved by circumstances. Then, something amazing happens … they sink their roots down deep into their source and grow. They grow tall … I mean really tall. A towering presence in the flower garden, they become lighthouse beacons shooting down every melancholy thought with their shafts of light. They become bigger and bigger everyday … better and better.

We can be like them. An ancient writing of prose says, “our paths will be brighter and brighter” (Proverbs 4: 18). It means better and better. Like sunflowers, we can begin to tower over circumstances and challenges as we let our roots sink down deep into our source, our God. No matter how challenging a day may have been, we can pull from our source and become a shaft of towering sunshine in our own little world.

We hope our sunflowers make you smile today ... and shine. J

The Velvet Lime girls

The Giant Oak Inside of You

Acorns. They’ve been a tiny participant in our design studio for several years. They first arrived a couple years ago following a walk . Acorns with their little “hats” were scattered under all the trees. I picked up one of these tiny little seeds and looked up at the massive tree canopy above, amazed that this would be the destiny of this tiny creation. James & I gathered several of these “message carriers” and he placed them on Marybeth’s desk. They sparked a creative force inside of her that was first seen in our photographic acorn series and now revealed in this fresh graphic artwork.

An acorn still amazes all of us. This tiny seed becomes a giant oak. By faith it “sees” its potential. Its future is always on its mind …looming over it while it is at its smallest point. It just sinks its tender roots down deeper into the soil when times are tough … it knows its destiny. It’s a destiny that is always clearly visible. No matter how small the acorn may begin, it knows it will become a majestic oak.

We hope you are encouraged to have faith to see beyond the things that may be sleeping in your life. Things that have the power and potential to change when fueled by faith. Faith does see the giant oak in the sleeping acorn.

Let the giant oak within you awaken today.

Laura

HOPE

Weave HOPE into your heart today. Hope – an earnest expectation, an anticipation, a belief or a trust. It’s more than a word. It’s a force that undergirds you and carries you forward with a strength that is beyond yourself. Hope is the silent strength that supports your dreams. When it’s woven into your heart it enables you to soar above any obstacle. Let this new artwork send you soaring with new hope today.

"Hope does not disappoint us ..." Romans 5:5

Laura