Celebrating 1,000 Blog Posts with a Painting Giveaway!

“A purposeful act or extension of kindness

to another is never wasted,

for it always resides in the hearts of all

involved in a chain of love.”
~ Molly Friedenfeld

I wanted to do something special to commemorate my 1,000th blog post here. Since I started blogging over eight years ago, the online landscape has really changed. My SandySandyArt.com art blog has grown and evolved along the way. To celebrate, I would like to "pay it forward" and offer a giveaway of an original painting. Pictured below is a selection of some recent black, ceramic tiles, hand painted with alcohol inks by yours truly. Some are done with stencils, some using canned air and some are a combination of both. They come ready to exhibit, with hooks on the back for hanging and an acrylic easel for table top display.

Alcohol Inks on Black Ceramic Tiles by Sandy Sandy

Today's winner is a caring, positive, generous lady who has paid it forward, many times over, to others in the community. The first person I would like to nominate is Molly Gummerson.  She's a busy mom and artist who always finds time to help out at the local art center in Medford, NJ, MAC. Molly is unselfish with her time and her talents. Thank you Molly for your kindness, recent referral and your altruistic spirit. Congratulations! Please be the first to pick out the tile you would like to own, then email me at: sandy@sandysandy.com with the tile letter and description along with your mailing address or to make pick up arrangements.

Here is a photo of our inking group that was here over the weekend for the St. Paddy's Day Workshop. You can see that we were all having a grand ole time!

Sandy Sandy's 2016 St Paddy's Day Alcohol Ink Workshop

Below is the work produced by students here on Sunday. I am impressed with such a high caliber of results even though three of the participants were complete newbies! Everyone was helpful and encouraging to each other and so much fun and progress was experienced by all.

Alcohol Ink on Black Tiles - Student Creations - 3-13-16

 Thanks for stopping by and for commenting if you did.

If you'd like to nominate someone deserving of my 1K blog post "pay it forward" award,

please leave a comment with a link to where we can see more about their good deeds.

Thanks again, please pay it forward and Happy Creating!!

X ♥  O

 

What is in a Name?

"Manipulative people do not understand
the concept of boundaries.
They are relentless in their pursuit of what they want
and they have no regard for who gets hurt along the way."
~ Lifehack

A couple of days ago, I got a message from Facebook that I had to confirm my name.

They required that I upload various documents to confirm my ID. Although they say; "The name you use on Facebook doesn't have to be the name on your government-issued IDs.", they seem to have an issue (after eight years) with my name, Sandy Sandy. They also state; "We understand that the name you use in everyday life might be different from your legal name. We want you to be able to use the name you most identify with on your Facebook profile." So far I have sent them a copy of my driver's license with my legal name, Sandra Sandy, and 6 other scans of documents with my "everyday" name SANDY SANDY. They are supposedly reviewing my documents and all my facebook accounts are still locked - my art page, my studio page and groups I administer. I am unable to get onto facebook at all and I really feel like I am being harassed. 

The information I found on the web states that "As it stands, the authentic name policy too often is used as a tool of harassment, and Facebook continues allowing that to happen.
The fake name reporting process is opaque and imperfect. Facebook has said it does not use algorithms to crawl through usernames and instead relies on snitches. When an account is flagged, the company says a real person with two thumbs looks into the report and decides whether to lock the account and request documents. Unfortunately, this means a lot of legitimate, legal names often end up flagged. What Facebook has done is create a system that forces compliance or isolation. And worst of all, it places the power with harassers—as if the Internet needed more of that." ~ Nadia Drake

I can only hope the issue will be resolved soon. It is a shock to be the victim of such a malicious act where over eight years of building online friendships and relationships can be destroyed overnight. I don't know if this was just a random act of cruelty or some kind of "throw a major roadblock up to my art career" kind of jealousy. I'm hoping it was random.

So beware, because just about anybody is at risk! Any enemies known or otherwise could change your Facebook presence overnight. Although Facebook is "free" I may now be paying for using it, big time.

A Rainbow of Love • Sold

Thanks so much for your friendship and please wish me luck.

X ♥  O