12/11/11
Merry Christmas from the staff at CGBeads.
This was the buffet line at the Christmas party. A good time was
had by all.
11/26/11
I found some Christmas beads I made a few years ago, so I made them
into two bracelets. When I put one on, it was a bit skimpy, so I
attached them together to make this one big bracelet. Much more
full and definitely more fun to wear. It's full of penguins,
snowmen, Christmas cats, Christmas socks, Christmas bulbs, Christmas
ornaments and Swarovski crystals.
11/19/11
Sometimes I buy stuff just so I can have a surprise in the mail, cause
I inevitably forget I've bought something until it arrives on my
doorstep. This time it was Publisher Clearing House, I figure I
have just as much chance at winning as everyone else, but since I'm
more likely to get struck by lightning, I'm now avoiding rain
storms. I got my cashew crunch, love it, for the price I'd had
better love it. Got my meat loaf baker, the one with the drip
pan, now I'm impressed, but for the price, I had better be.
11/12/11
Went to see Josh Mazet demo the other day. When I saw this marble he
made (1-3/4"), I couldn't resist buying it to set along side my Josh
Simpson planet. (I think I'm on a Josh roll) This one is a vortex
marble, I wish I could photo it in 3D. When you look into a
vortex marble, they look at least 2-3 times deeper than what they
really are. I'm not sure about the optics science, but I'm sure
it's the way the extra glass magnifies the back where the vortex is
formed. Someone asked him if he'd ever made a hedgehog, he said
no but would give it a try, it was spot on. *jaw drop*
11/5/11
My cats bring me all the good critters. The hard part is: figuring out
how to catch a squirrel in the house. Fortunately: it was trapped
behind the fridge so it couldn't see me coming with the blanket that I
grabbed it's tail with. It's a good day when you can capture and
release without hurting the critter, or more importantly, scaring the
shit out of me. My only regret is not being able to take the time
to take a picture. 11/1/11
Tommorrow is "Look For Circles Day".
Yep, it's actually on the calendar. When I flipped my calendar to
November, there it was, on November 2nd. If it's not on yours, then I
guess you need a new calendar, cause this is important. [tongue in
cheek]
Well I couldn't pass up the fun, so I'm having a sale.
Now, a bit about the holiday itself. I can't seem to find out who
started, where it was started, or why.
There, now you know as much about the holiday as I [and google] do.
Circle the wagons Ma, I found some links to fun things with circles: Welcome
to the Crop Circle Connector Circle
Makers Mathematical
Imagery - Fun with Circles
Enjoy your day looking for circles. 10/28/11
Some
people should not be allowed to procreate. Not a
Halloween Costume: Washington Man Cuts Off Are With Guillotine Man
Allegedly Beat Woman with Frozen Armadillo (makes me proud
to be a Texan.....)
s 10/20/11 "Shucking
Corn with Ken - Clean Ears Everytime"
This is pretty slick, I haven't tried it yet, but corn is my favorite
food, so I'm gonna give it a try. 10/15/11
I
saw this on FaceBook, love it!!
"Dear Karma, I have a list of people you missed." 9/24/11
We've
had a record 70 days of 100+ degrees here in the Dallas area, and it
shows. The wild fires have been devastating and the ground is so
dry. These are pictures from the past few years, of my rose bush
in the front yard. Then compare it to the last photo from today,
same rose bush. 9/18/11
My
husband is the best, he takes me to all the good places. We took
a Sunday drive to 'The Dump', then Home Depot, but we did wind up in
Central Market buying some of my favorite oddball foods - ahh,
redemption. It was the first time we have gone to 'The Dump' [for
those of you that don't have one, it's a discount furniture
store]. The commercials brag about the hugely slashed prices, but
we were surprised at just how high the low prices were. What ever
happened to truth in advertising. Home Depot? Next to the
grocery store, that's our favorite place so a good time was had by
all. Central Market grocery stores are a real destination in
themselves. I've heard the one in Austin, Tx is the second
largest tourist destination in the city. The isles aren't just
back and forth, the whole store is set up like a maze, and you travel
into one section/room filled with normal grocery isle rows, then exit
out the other side and into another section/room. Not only is it
entertaining, it's full of exotic foods. The meat department is
to dye for. I found some Sprecher pop, the owner of this beer and
soda brewery is a cousin of my mothers, and the pop is old fashioned
and very flavorful. I ate my first fresh fig, holy cow, why
didn't someone tell me before how good a fresh one is? Helva,
woohoo, I found some Helva. And of course, sour dough bread,
millet bread, and chocolate crescents to round off the perfect day. 8/26/11
This
is Jett and Tina, showing off their new toy, I added the whack-a-mole
port. It only cost $300, but it came with a free Dyson inside for
me. With 4 cats and a bad back [not really, but I don't want to
just say I'm getting lazy], my Kirby is getting a bit cumbersome, so
I've been researching Dyson lately.
If you've not heard about Woot.com
yet, it's [in their own words] the original 'one day, one deal'
website. Every once in a while, they have a Woot-off. Instead of one
item for one day, they sell something with a limited
quantity, when that's gone, they go to the next item. They had a
Woot-off a few weeks ago, and a refurbished Dyson came up [actually, it
was for a new box, with a free refurbished Dyson inside]. It was
an upright and I wanted a canister model, but heck, the cat toy [box]
was the perfect size. I've read that a refurb Dyson is actually
better than a new one anyway, because it has been 'gone over' so every
little thing wrong has been fixed.
Now the cats have a new box/toy, and I can clean out all the
miscellaneous ones scattered around the house, well, maybe not the one
in the hall that came with free bubble wrap inside. 8/21/11
North
Texas State Fair was this weekend, that's the county fair, but it's the
largest fair north of Dallas. Steve has been refurbishing the pit
for the past few months, hours and hours, this was like restoring a
car, but the finished pit is awesome.
They placed as reserve Grand Champion [second place].
8/6/11
I
just did a short youtube video for all the curious seekers out there. I
did it with my camera, so it's short and not great quality, but it
shows doing a tool change. If you look at the graphite, you can see
that we machine 10 tools at a time, that explains the main reason we
don't do custom tools.
Get your popcorn and buckle up, it's going to be a boring ride.... CGBeads -
Haas cnc tool change (on YouTube) CGBeads -
Haas cnc tool change (same vidoe, just on my website and a bit smaller
screen)
7/27/11
Things
have been trudging along slowly, but steadily, with the new
machine. Did you know [and no, you probably didn't, but I'm gonna
tell you anyway], if you drop the spindle on a CNC machine and forget
to slow down the speed rate, you can actually snap a 1/8" drill bit
into 4 pieces when it hits the
bottom? Ya, lesson learned, I won't be doing that again. ** A quick
FYI, the Soda Lime
Times has decided to reduce the cost of their online
magazine to a more affordable $4.95 a month. I know Diane has a
lot of things planned for the magazine, and the website, so this will
help her get off and running a bit quicker. ** I now have a newsletter,
would love to have you sign up, I promise it will be a 'newsletter',
fluff n stuff if for this blog and facebook
[oh, if you'd like to 'like' that, too.]
7/16/11
There's
a new beadmakers magazine on the market. It's an online
publication and you can get check out a free issue. I have read
the first issue, holy cow, this is an awesome publication. Diane
Woodall has been writing her local ISGB chapters newsletter, and is now
she's turned her writing skill to be benefit the entire community. Soda Lime
Times
7/12/11
It's
been a long time between post, but I'm still here. The cnc
machine learning curve is coming along fine. Ok, truth? I'm
really lost... When my husband is there telling me what to do
next, I'm fine, but then, I've only run it a handful of times myself,
so I guess I am doing fine. I did start it up all my myself
today, with no one around to help me, even figured out how to warm up
the spindle on my own, and it only took me 45 minutes to remember
how. *grin* I've also been able to get in some torch time
lately. Made these the other day. Like the beadcaps? You can get them
from Donna
Millard website.
6/28/11
The
contest is over. It was a hard choice to pick the winners, so
hard, I had my son, daughter and a friend do it for me.
Here are the winners. A big thank you to everyone for
making this such a fun event for me.
You can see all the entries on the comments
page.
There
once was a
neophyte from Maine
whose imperfect donuts drove her insane
Her instructor relented
"Rounded- not dented"
use the CGBeadrolller and don't complain
Humbly yours,
a newbie who has never used one... ~Pam~
I think
there is a
limit to what I would do for a free CGBeadroller...
Although I am totally willing to gain 250 lbs and then walk barefoot
across 4 miles of rusty nails through a desert in Hell while wearing a
necklace made of dead fish.
Worth It! ~Juls~
With
sincere
apologies to Elizabeth Barrett Browning.
How do I love thee? Let me count the ways
I love thee to the depth of 18 millimeters
My glass can reach, when glowing from the flame
For the ends of beads and ideal glass
I love thee to the width of 10 millimeters
My bead can spread in evenness and beauty
I love thee as freely as a mandrel spins
I love thee purely for defeating wonkiness
I love thee with the passion of Pandora
And the heat of Hestia, goddess of the hearth.
I love the with a love annealed at 968 degrees
Fahrenheit
I love thee with with my breath, my burns, my smiles,
My tears, of all of my life!--and, in the event of a propane mishap,
I shall but love thee better after death. ~Susan~
pologies
to Joyce Kilmer
I think that I shall never see
Rollers as
lovely as CG's.
Rollers whose finest graphite is prest
against
flowing glass to create the best;
Rollers that aid and assist and
inpire
and spark imagination to dream with fire;
Rollers that
help to sculpt and mold
and tame the glass in contours
bold;
Rollers that coax the glass into rounds
and ovals and
disks in shapes that astound.
Poems are made by fools like me,
The best Rollers are only made by CG.
I have just one
roller and I love it madly! It's not just a great tool but it's
obviously made with love and care and I'd dearly love to have
another. ~Patty~
grew
up in a
neighborhood north of Washington DC that was known for making
exquisite hand made beads. The sand from the coastal beaches of
Maryland and Delaware were of a purity not found anywhere else in the
western hemisphere. Families were known to make different shaped
beads, each family perfecting their particular shapes with the help
of CG Beadrollers, which are known to be the finest beadrollers made.
The skill was passed from generation to generation. All children were
taught this skill from the time they were 5 or 6 years old. All
children, but me.
My family was the one family who did not make
beads. My father worked for the federal government. The skills passed
from generation to generation in our family was filing
alphabetically, placing callers on hold and unjamming the Xerox
machines.
Of course, this made us outcasts. While the other
children bragged about how their fathers could make 35 mm big hole
disk beads or perfect 25mm round beads, I was only able to counter
with "my father is a contract procurement officer for the
department of the army". Which brought peels of laughter. I
couldn't blame them, I had no idea what that meant either. While
Peggy Baker's father was known the world over for his exquisite round
dichroic graduated bead sets and Valerie Goldberg's mother encased
silver glass ribbed bicones, all I could brag about was that we had a
much better health care plan, including dental.
Secretly, I longed
to be a normal family like the rest of my friends. I spent many hours
dreaming I was adopted and that my real parents would show up to
claim me and teach me how to form a perfect egg shaped bead
embellished with raku frit.
I remember going to my friend Andrea
LePine's 10th birthday party and seeing her unwrap and entire set of
CG rollers with their beautiful flame handles. I cried myself to
sleep that night.
Every Christmas I would write to Santa Claus and
beg him to bring me a Quad Squad Pandora style roller. I promised to
clean my room every day and help my mother with the dishes if I could
just have a Ribbed Small Chunky Oval Trio. I would wake up on
Christmas morning with such hope in my little heart only to have it
dashed once again when I unwrapped yet another type writer ribbon, or
pencil sharpener.
My mother could see that civil servitude was not
my dream. One year she took pitty on me and bought me a cheap Chinese
made knockoff with a metal handle. The other children laughed at me.
I didn't have a torch or glass so I used it to make Playdoh beads on
bamboo barbecue skewers.
When I became and adult I followed in my
family's tradition and went to work for the county of Sacramento CA,
but in my heart I still longed to someday have a set of my own
beautifully made CG rollers and make beautiful beads like the other
girls I grew up with do now, but it is difficult to break out of
one's class. The untouchables may become rich, but they will always
be untouchable. And the civil servant can dream of being a bead
artist, but without the proper equipment will never take their place
as a bead maker.
But we dream...we dream. ~Kevan~
Sung
to the tune of "Saturday Night" by [who else] the Bay
City Rollers!
R –O – L – L – L – L –
ING…BEADS
R –O – L – L – L – L – ING…BEADS
R –O
– L – L – L – L – ING…BEADS
R –O – L – L – L –
L – ING…BEADS
Gonna keep on rolling in the pulsing flame
On
Saturday night, Saturday night,
Rolling hot glass in Donna’s
great new thang
On Saturday night, Saturday night,
I – I –
I - I just can’t wait
I – I – I – I got a date
At the
good ole bead rolling new tool show
I gotta go
Saturday
Night
Saturday Night
Gonna flame it up, roll it up
Do it
all, make a ball,
Saturday Night,
Saturday Night
It's just a
Saturday Night
A flaming Saturday Night
Flaming Saturday
Night
Gonna roll my beads till the night is through
On Saturday
Night, Saturday Night
Tell you all the awesome things I'm gonna
do
On Saturday Night, Saturday Night
I - I - I - I love them
so
I - I - I - I'm gonna let her know
Saturday Night,
Saturday
Night
It's just a Saturday Night
A flaming Saturday
Night
Flaming Saturday Night
Congratulations Donna on your
business expansion.
I love seeing how you have taken your dream and
made it into a reality!! ~Wendy~
The CG
Beadroller is the Queen of all of lampwork tools. She rules with a
benevolent, yet firm hand, and does not back down from fiery, difficult
situations. All of the kingdom's glassy subjects live in admiration of
her beauty and power. Long live the Queen! ~Glenda
My testimonial
for the beadroller is quite simple. They are truly the easiest to use.
There's no pressing, there's no base and the tools are light as can be.
I can make several beads on one mandrel with ease. I never have to look
for the bottom part or the top part. Just one piece ready and waiting
for me to use. I love the fact that there are mixed shapes so that I
can use one roller for many different styles and shapes instead of
having to pull out a different one each time.
Donna is great! Speedy shipping and I've never had a problem with any
of mine. I only own one however. The reason is not because I don't like
her rollers but the fact that I never have time to do anything "I" want
to do. After I'm done packing orders and dealing with family things,
I'm simply too tired to play.
BUT, I am happy to say that ..that is about to change. I promised
myself that I would give me some me time every day.
I could make up some fabulous, crazy story but there's no need to.
Donna's rollers are simply the easiest and versatile roller to use. I
recommend her to all my customers and her presses are what I give in my
giveaways. People just love them!
That's my story and I'm sticking to it ;-) ~Irene~
Sung to
the
tune of Silent Night.....
Super Wow!
Holy Cow!
All so cool,
Want it now
Round your pandora
Beads shall be.
CG Beadroller
So easy, you see.
Let me win one, please!
Let me win one please..
Thank you very much for this opportunity to enter your contest. I have
never used one. I really, really want to though....
I am hoping for an
early Christmas present.... lol
Feliz Navidad, ~Steve~
6/16/11
RED
LETTER DAY
WIN A FREE CGBEADROLLER ! ! ! It's
been a long time coming, and we finally have our first batch of tools
from our own CNC machine.
We ran one of the most popular versions, the BR-1401 Donut Spacers
Pandora Style.
Now for the exciting news, I'm running a contest to give 9 of these
BR-1401 away (no substitutions). The
rules are simple, write me a testimonial of why you love the
CGBeadrollers. If you don't have any of the tools, write me why you
should
get one of the first ones off the line for free, no shipping charges,
no hidden fees, no fluff and stuff. Here's an
example of my husbands testimonial: I would drag my body
over 19 miles of barbed wire and broken glass, just to drink dirty
water from the tire track of the car that carried the inventor of
CGBeadrollers away.
Email yours to me HERE.
Contest ends June 24th, midnight central standard time.
(Tools will be engraved with the date and number off the line, and come
with a certificate of authenticity.)
(Once submitted, all testimonials become the property of CGBeads)
Proof in picture, our first tools off the line.
v
6/9/11
There's a new website in town. This is a vertual cork board of
advertisers, modeled after the 'Million Dollar Home Page'. The
concept is simple: you purchase a block of squares on the board, when
moused over, this plot of real estate opens up a popup of your ad and a
link to your website/eBay/etc. Details
here.
6/5/11
I've
actually been back from my Murano trip for a week, but I'm still
editing pictures, so in the mean time... Here's an update on the
latest BBQ cookoff. Steve cooked with his longtime friend and
original cooking partner this weekend. They won 1st place in
brisket and the troply was a pair of spurs, they are awesome. (pictures
of Murano soon)
5/10/11
Getting
close, getting close.
I leave for my class in Murano next week, the 20th to be exact. I
signed up for a five day class with Lucio
Bubacco, his friend Emilio
Santini will be a guest instructor. It's a humbling
experience to be taking a class with these truly amazing master of the
flame. I only hope I come home with as much skill as bragging
rights. Anyway, my catalog will be open for orders, but nothing
will ship until the week of May 31st.
4/28/11
We
were looking at new ridding lawn mowers last fall, when they were on
sale. Of course we put it off and they are more expensive now,
but in hindsight, it was good we did. Steve found a metal post on
the corner of the property, probably leftover from a long gone street
name sign. Problem is he found it with the mower, bent the entire
frame of the rider. How the heck he missed it for 18 years is a
mystery. Somewhere in this picture is the 50 yard line. A
game of touch football anyone?
4/24/11
Happy
Easter.
Time-Lapse Auroras Over Norway
4/8/11
I
hate to tell you how much this makes me miss my nehru jackets. Drat,
just aged myself, too.
4/4/11
IT"S
HERE!! Only took the riggers about an hour to unload and level
it. Electricity is next.
3/31/11
All
tricked out, and no where to go.
The roll up door is the only think left to complete the 'building',
but I probably won't take another picture when it's on, after all, you
probably know what a rollup door looks like.
3/28/11
This
was last Thursday. We went out of town for the weekend so I
didn't get a picture on Friday.
This one is from today. The skin is all on, I've learned that's
the term for the outside walls, the roof is on (not sure if that has a
pc name or not). Next will be the electric, the roll up door, and
the cnc machine. We'll add a room inside later
3/23/11
Frame
is pretty much up, windows are in, one door is framed in, insulation
was delivered today.
3/22/11
The
fix-it parts got here yesterday afternoon, the building is at a
standstill today, insulation and walk in doors arrived in the morning
so the contractor will resume then. We are off to buy windows
today. <to be
continued>
3/20/11 Wow, four posts in
less than a week, I must be on some sort of a roll. But I had to
post that I bought my air plane tickets today. I'm scheduled to
take a class in Murano
with Lucio
Bubacco and Emilio
Santini in May. It will be a 5 day workshop, and I
have no
idea what the exact content of the class will be, but does it even
matter? I don't think it does. *grin*
3/18/11 Guess we will have
to cut the beam ourselves (which is not a problem) and the factory is
sending some patchwork for us, so we won't have to wait and see who has
gotten a beam that is too short in their building kit. Should be
here Monday, not bad. I'll update with pictures next week then.
3/16/11 <NEWS FLASH
FOLLOW UP>
Done for the day with just one hitch, not bad - except it was a major
goof up.
One of the top beams was a foot and a half too long...
3/16/11 NEWS FLASH ! ! !
This is what my
back yard looked like the end of last year.
Actually, this is what it looked like after we had the old building
half demolished.
Yes, that's a 63 Belaire. 85,000 original miles, good condition,
but needs restoring.
Still has the sticker in the window that they put on when it was used
as a street extra in the Stone film 'JFK'
This is what it looked like in January.
This what it looked like in February.
I had no idea concrete stain dried that fast with just a little bit of
sun....
Our 24x36 ft building was delivered this morning, and will take about a
week to put up. Sometime after that, we can take possession of
the cnc machine that has been in storage for 2 months. I don't
know how long the learning curve will be, but we'll be machining the
graphite for the beadrollers in house soon.
2/25/11 Kara keeps making
work for me. I just uploaded a bunch of new
beadcaps for her.
2/20/11 HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO
THE BEST DARN SON-IN-LAW ON THE PLANET ! ! !
2/6/11 We finished the
jewelry tools sooner than expected. YEY ! !
If you make jewelry, you need to try these out.
They're not your mothers tools, extra steps have been taken to refine
the tools for a finish that won't mar your silver. Come and
gettum.....
2/3/11 Coming soon - -
jewelry tools - -
1/30/11 HAPPY
ANNIVERSARY TO ME
! ! !
Yep, it's been two years, can you believe it?
Thanks to my awesome awesome customers,
my little experiment with cavity marvers exceeded my wildest
expectations. To say thank you, I've listened to your pleas, and will
offer the 'sampler' as the anniversary tool. I've also made a
limited
quantity of a ribbed version, and each will come in a flame bag. The
Anniversary Special will run through Feb. 15th.
Now for the 'other' exciting news - Along with my already indispensable
husband behind the scenes, I've grown big enough to bring both of my
children on board. Arik will be helping me in the shop. He'll also be
starting a line of frit (see the catagory list on the left for the
link), and will work into making custom blends. Kara has always
wanted
to retail jewelry finding (link is on the left), and has also found the
cutest line of jewelry tools. She's working on hand finishing the
surface, and will unveiled them soon.
A big thank you smooch to every one that helped make this possible.
1/23/11
1.
Don't sweat the petty things and don't pet the sweat things.
2. One Tequila, two tequila, three tequila, floor.
3. Atheism is a nonprofit organization.
4. If man evolved from monkeys and apes, why do we still have monkeys
and apes?
5. The main reason that Santa is so jolly is because he knows where all
the bad girls live.
6. I went to a bookstore and asked the saleswoman, "Where's the
self-help section?"
She said if she told me, it would defeat the purpose.
7. What if there were no hypothetical questions?
8. If a deaf child signs swear words, does his mother wash his hands
with soap?
9. If someone with multiple personalities threatens to kill himself, is
it considered a hostage situation?
10. Is there another work for synonym?
11. Where do forest ranger go to "get away from it all?"
12. What do yo do when yo see and endangered animal eating an
endangered plant?
13. If a parsley farmer is sued, can they garnish his wages?
14. Would a fly without wings be called a walk?
15. Why do they lock gas station bathrooms? Are they afraid
someone will clean them?
16. If a turtle doesn't have a shell, is he homeless or naked?
17. Can vegetarians eat animal crackers?
18. If the police arrest a mime, do they tell him he has the right to
remain silent?
19. Why do they put Braille on drive through bank machines?
20. How do they get deer to cross the road only at those yellow road
signs?
21. What was the best thing before slice bread?
22. One nice thing about egotists: they don't talk about other people.
23. Does the little mermaid wear an algebra?
24. Do infants enjoy infancy as much as adults enjoy adultery?
25. How is it possible to have a civil war?
26. If one synchronized swimmer drowns, do the rest drown too?
27. If you ate both pasta and antipasto, would you still be hungry?
28. If you try to fail, and succeed, which have you done?
29. Whose cruel idea was it for the work 'LISP' to have 'S' in it?
30. Why is it called a tourist season if we can't shoot at them?
31. Why is there an expiration date on sour cream?
32. If you spin an oriental person in a circle three times, do they
become disoriented?
33. Can an atheist get insurance against acts of God?
1/21/11 Someone showed me
this youtube of Fragile
Ice at Yosemite Park, amazing stuff.
There are 13 vidoe's in the Yosemite
Nature Notes series. 1/7/11 I guess it's time
to do my first update of the new year/decade, althooough - it only
seems like a day has gone by since yesterday.... It's been three
years since I've seem my dad, so I went home over New Years Eve
weekend. I'm from North Dakota (transplanted to Texas), and you
never forget how subzero air can hurt your lungs, but it's still a bit
of a shock when you take that first deep breath and start to
choke. duh... The weekend was great. Pat and Vanna
were doing "Wheel" from Los Vegas. Polka Party Express, ok,
accordion music isn't that bad, I kind of like it. There was a
100 car pile up near Fargo, other end of the state, thank
goodness. The fold out couch bed has not mysteriously become a
pleasant place to sleep. Crock pot roast at dads, nephla at my
sisters, salmon patties at my brothers. Showed Aunt Rose how to
text, I fear my cousins will never forgive me now. Taco pizza at
Happy Joe's, and peppermint ice cream. Oh Oh, and
Jeopardy!!! I love that show!!! Old family photo albums,
even got to take a few pictures. Funny, I don't remember being
that slim, sigh, and my hair was a much prettier color of red once,
double sigh. I hate it that my 88 year old father can out
exercise me. Got to add numbers to the phone book in the awesome
new house phone my brother bought dad. Speaking of my
brother-slash-great-white-humter, how come I didn't get some deer
jerky? Probably cause I'm too stupid to ask for it? And all
the Pheasants along side the road when we drove down to my sisters,
that was awesome, they were everywhere, it's actually become a whole
new hunting industry there now. And somehow, husbands can always
manage to turn white socks into pink socks when wives aren't around,
but I'd rather wear pink socks than complain... Bought a new pair
of ankle boots, they will help hide the pink socks. Walking OUT
TO the plane is a trip, so is watching the pilot do his pre-flight
check by walking up to the propellor and giving it a spin. After I got home,
it took 2 days to get all the orders shipped.Don't people have anything
better to do over a holiday weekend than buy beadrollers? Wish I
would have made a snow angle, not.. Have you ever driven
when it's snowing? It's like traveling through a time tunnel, the
snow looks like it's flying straight at you, it's hypnotizing, glad I
wasn't the one driving. zzz And the oil boom, holy cow, 2-1/2%
unemployment in NoDak. It was a short trip, but dad & I
packed it full of talk and time together. Ahhh, happy camper I am.
12/27/10 oh My, how our
world has changed.
My Blackberry Is Not Working
12/20/10 Merry Christmas
Jingle Bells
Deck the Halls
12/17/10 Tuna Supper
Clean-up Crew
12/6/10 Last time: Roto
Rooter = $179 on a weekend
This time: Mr. Rooter = $251 on a weekday
My take on it???
"I don't know, sells itself" -Vince the Shamwow Guy -
11/29/10 The worlds first
music video... How would you like this guy standing outside your
window serenading you...
Gus Visser and His Singing Duck
11/13/10 Another update on
the 'bring Lilly home' situation.
A PayPal fund has been set up, if you feel inclined to help this family
bring their daughter home to rest.
Don't forget, extra funds will be donated to the children's hospital in
Peru where she was doing her missionary work at the time of the
accident that tragically ended her life. With the holiday season
coming, give a little charity - please.... Thank you. Lily
Cantu Fund at PayPal
(Sorry I had a bad link, but it works now)
Lilly with one of the children being treated at the Peruvian hospital. n
11/8/10 An update on
Lilly. Bringing home a loved one that has passed
away over seas can be a long and expensive process. The American
Embassy has helped cut through the red tape and she will more than
likely be home this week. Great news for a family in tragedy. However,
it will still be expensive, and a fund is being set up to aid in the
expensive, I'll post the link when it's set up. Any extra funds left
over will be given to the children's hospital in Peru where she was
doing her missionary work.
11/5/10 An update on
Lilly. Again, I don't have all the details, but she fell down
three flights of stairs. There will be an investigation into the
accident. Bringing her home will be a long and expensive process
and the family is working with the American Embassy to make that
happen. There
is a donation fund being set up, the link is in the story link below. Denton
Missionary Killed in Peru
11/5/10 My
sons best friend growing up was a set of twins. If they weren't at my
house, he was at theirs, they were triplets.
They had a sister that graduated high school last year and was a bit
non-directional as to what she wanted to do with her life. She hung out
at one of the twins houses, and this summer decided to go to Peru,
through the church, and work in a convent for 6 months with a group of
young people.
She left about a month ago and they had a nice party to see her
off. Being the other triplet, my son went to see her off, too.
The group was up on one of the roofs eating
under the stars last night, as apparently they often do. I don't know
any details,
but she fell off and passed away. I don't even know what to say, there
are no
clear thoughts in my head. I didn't really
know her, but I so admired her for her service, and am in a bit of
shock. I can only
imagine what the family and my son are going through right now. If you
pray, please say a prayer for the family of this sweet child
that went home to her heavenly father.
If you have a child in the service overseas <any service>, thank
them for me for trying to make the world a better place for others.
Their integrity is beyond compare, and they are the blessed ones.
Please say a prayer for them all.
Be thankful and happy.... for every breath is a gift. 10/22/10 The local nightly
new crew in Dallas did a YouTube
video. This is hilarious.... 10/9/10 I took a class
with Corina last weekend. We made frogs and lizards on Sunday and since
the beads were in the kiln, they had to be mailed to us. I go my
lizard yesterday. Not bad for my first one, I guess. Don't know if I'll
ever make another one, but at least I have one. 10/8/10 Went to the Texas
State Fair a couple of days ago. It's been several years since
we've gone, and like most fairs, it's a lot of the same stuff, but fun
none the less. Two of the most popular 'must see again'
attractions are Big Tex and the butter sculpture. Tex is 52 feet
tall and wears size 70 boots that are 8 feet tall. The butter
sculpture is, yes, made from butter and just a bit larger than life
size. 9/27/10 (first off, new
website coming soon. woohoo)
I took a three day class over the weekend with one our top lampwork
bead artists, Corina. I've been making beads for almost 10 years,
so it was a mix of experiences for me. Some things I knew, some
things I didn't have a clue, some things I've never tried, some things
I've never caught on to how to do. So all in all, it was a
successful class for me. One thing I love love love about taking
classes at the Craft Guild in Dallas is, there are never any drama high
maintenance students. Corina has a style of beads she call Quarks,
they are bright and whimsical. Here's my version of the
quark. More subdued, but I want to take the techniques I learned
and translate them into aquarium beads.
The Teacher....... h
9/4/10 This is hillarous,
one of the funniest sites I've ever seen, and it actually works. Australian
Google
8/18/10 I don't know if
there's anything I can say about this.... North
Dakota Bois (California Gurls Parody)
7/8/10 I haven't post
anything about my bead in the main blog in a looooong time, I've been
leaving that to facebook,
but I wanted to show off the beads you can
make from one of the latest CGBeadrollers - cones. I thought this
would be a nice shape, but after making the example beads, fell in love
with it for a focal bead shape. I smashed the smallest one
flat, me like.
7/6/10 This is 4 days
progress. <big sigh>
Maybe leaving the 5 year old nephew to his parents to watch instead of
bringing him to my house one day
(which frankly, is suppose to be a job site) and the 6 year old
daughter the next day,
would help get the job done on a more timely manner, cause frankly, I'm
tire of taking a shower in the camper. </rant> 7/2/10 This was from a
couple of days ago. It shows the main bathroom now cut off from
the mastbath in the back.
Insulation is going up as we speak. Big storage closet, whorlpool
bathtub, 48" shower, ventilation (finally), duck heaven. 6/23/10 Yesterday this was
my main bathroom and master bathroom. Now where am I suppose to
pee?
<ok, don't answer that. That was a loaded question.> 6/18/10 My last few
pictures of Wayne as his mommy. I took him to my sons today, so
I've magically transformed into grandma.
He's an adorable photo subject, so I'm glad I'll be able to photo him
again.
A
kittens first experience with cat litter....
He thinks it's a toy, cause every time he moves, it trickles downhill
like sand.
Hi thinks he's a pony. This kitten is real confused.
It's pretty fuzzy, but I couldn't believe he sat down like a puppy, not
many cats will sit this way. 6/16/10 A couple of better
picture of the new part-time studio help.
I think my son may take him, so at least he'll be close by for me to
see what he'll look like all grown up.
Left
is a close up so you can see the pretty markings. He has that
cute
little white patch, but the fur on his chest and legs have indivual
white hairs that are a bit longer than the black fur. He's
already a stinky poo machine and with no mama cat, guess who gets to
sub with cleaning up...
He moved on the picture below and it got fuzzy, but it's a good picute
of white hairs. Almost looks like a bears legs.
6/15/10 I stepped outside
last night around sundown, and look what I found hopping through my
yard. He's looks to be around a month or two old and very bony, I
was surprised he lived till this morning. Since he's so young,
he's already filling out, though, but you can still feel his
bones. He's soooo adorable, so I don't understand why our 4 adult
cats don't like him (well, duh on that one, though). Not sure if
I'll keep him though, 4 adult cats will determine that, but I'll get to
enjoy him while I'm fattening him up. 6/6/10 Happy Birthday to
my husband Steve.
May the next decade be as happy as the last.
(that's all I'm sayen about age)
Love you, honey... 5/11/10 This is my first
rose of the season. Last fall when I cut my roses back,
I cut this one back farther than I ever have, and wow, I got a two
handed rose. 5/9/10 The Known
Universe on YouTube
Happy Mothers Day 5/3/10 Tina' Eyes
My Chihuly rosebush, two stages 5/1/10 If you haven't
seen this, you need to, it's hilarious. Some Afghanistan soldiers
blowing off steam. Telephone
Remake 4/29/10 4/18/10 Sad news, it's
been a week since I've seen Mouse. He's my black & white
cat. I've lost treasured cats before, but this is different, I've
had him longer than any other cat. Each pet has their own unique
personality and traits, with Mouse it was that he was a bit
cross-eyed. He loved being scratched under his chin, but you had
to approach him from behind or he would duck as if you were going to
hit him, but I'm sure it was just that he saw two or three hands and it
scarred him.
My Mouse montage:
My favorite pix of him - actually, one of my all time favorite pictures.
"Does my butt look big?" Mouse was a
rather large cat
His favorite way to sleep - like road kill ......
This was the time he lost his battle with the hot tub, we found him on
the roof, mad as can be.
Sure do miss my Mouse.......
4/13/10 These are from a
book calledDisorder in the American Courts,
and are things people actually said in court,
word for word, taken down and now published by court reporters.
ATTORNEY: Now doctor , isn't
it true that when a person dies in his
sleep , he doesn't know about it until the next morning?
WITNESS: Did you actually pass the bar exam?
ATTORNEY: The youngest son , the 20-year-old , how old is he?
WITNESS: He's 20 , much like your IQ.
ATTORNEY: Were you present when your picture was taken?
WITNESS: Are you shitting me?
ATTORNEY: So the date of conception (of the baby) was August 8th?
WITNESS: Yes.
ATTORNEY: And what were you doing at that time?
WITNESS: Getting laid
ATTORNEY: She had three children , right?
WITNESS: Yes.
ATTORNEY: How many were boys?
WITNESS: None.
ATTORNEY: Were there any girls?
WITNESS: Your Honor, I think I need a different attorney. Can I get a
new attorney?
ATTORNEY: How was your first marriage terminated?
WITNESS: By death..
ATTORNEY: And by whose death was it terminated?
WITNESS: Take a guess.
ATTORNEY: Can you describe the individual?
WITNESS: He was about medium height and had a beard
ATTORNEY: Was this a male or a female?
WITNESS: Unless the Circus was in town I'm going with male.
ATTORNEY: Doctor , how many of your autopsies have you performed on
dead people?
WITNESS: All of them.. The live ones put up too much of a fight.
ATTORNEY: Do you recall the time that you examined the body?
WITNESS: The autopsy started around 8:30 PM
ATTORNEY: And Mr. Denton was dead at the time?
WITNESS: If not , he was by the time I finished.
ATTORNEY: Are you qualified to give a urine sample?
WITNESS: Are you qualified to ask that question?
ATTORNEY: Doctor, before you performed the autopsy, did you check for a
pulse?
WITNESS: No.
ATTORNEY: Did you check for blood pressure?
WITNESS: No.
ATTORNEY: Did you check for breathing?
WITNESS: No..
ATTORNEY: So, then it is possible that the patient was alive when you
began the autopsy?
WITNESS: No.
ATTORNEY: How can you be so sure, Doctor?
WITNESS: Because his brain was sitting on my desk in a jar.
ATTORNEY: I see, but could the patient have still been alive,
nevertheless?
WITNESS: Yes, it is possible that he could have been alive and
practicing law.
3/24/10
We now have infamous cats. My son found a picture from my "How To
Arrange 5 Cats" series on icanhascheezburger.com. Funny thing
though, the person who heisted the pix didn't know the source.
hmm I think I want this person to do my taxes next year. My cats
on cheezgburger.com 3/12/10
Went out for a drive, and look what followed us home?? Can we
keep it??
Well, since it's already in our back yard, I guess we'll have to. Don't
chya just hate it when that happens??
26 footer
3/6/10
I guess it's time for me to do an update. I had surgery Monday,
everything went fine, but I'm still a bit worn out. duh There are 4
glands in your neck (parathyroid) that make a hormone (PTH)
that control the amount of calcium your body transfers from you bones
to your blood stream. From there, calcium runs your electrical
system. Usually it's only one gland that will go bad, but for me,
it was all four, but since you need calcium in your blood, only 3-1/2
were removed. What was fascinating was that, during surgery,
blood tests monitored my PTH levels, and when they hit an acceptable
level, the surgeon knew to stop. I'm tired and sore, and
the anethetia made me sick longer than I think I realized, but I'm sooo
much better. 2/12/10
Fifth snow fall this year?? Wait, let me check my mail. Yep, it says I
live in Texas. Over 8 inches here, and officially
12.5 in Dallas, a new 24 hour record, and the second highest total in a
season. This one was so pretty, I took a night picture, too.
2/6/10
You might be a lampwork artist if:
You
have a flower garden just so you can have models
for your next set of beads...
You notice instead of it being dark outside, it's
Moretti black...
You chase fire trucks...
You pause the evening news so you can see the anchors
necklace...
Your favorite coffee cup sits on your work table with
coffee and pulled glass in it...
The neighbors know from the squeals in the morning
that you pulled your best set ever out of the kiln...
2/4/10
I don't care what Punxsutawney Phil said the
other day, one of my cats brought a bird inside today.
I say spring is just around the corner.
1/9/10
1) Dang, I've been looking for that raccoon skin hat, that's where it
went to..
2) The furniture ate Bruce.
3) Remember that Twilight episode "Little Girl Lost"? where the little
girl fell through
the wall behind her bed and into another dimension, then the dog
followed her?
4) "Bruce has been working hard on his weight lifting career"
1/2/10
How's the beadroller business going, you may ask? Well, I just
spent the afternoon transforming the rest of the spare bedroom into my
warehouse. There's shelves along the other wall, too, and a
photography table on another. For company? there's a hotel up the
street..... and I get to take more of the house square footage as
a deduction, life is good.....
12/29/09
What is up with this global warming??? I know I'm in northern
Texas, almost Oklahoma,
but snow for a third time this season??? Does anyone have Al's
phone number???
December 29, 2009
12/28/09
I was a very good girl this year, Santa brought me not one, but two
lumps of coal.
In the form of matching diamond earrings. Hubby done good - happy
camper I am.....
12/25/09
Merry Christmas from Texas
This is the first time I can remember it snowing twice in one winter
season, here in north Texas.
December
2, 2009
December
25, 2009
12/9/09
Oh man, what did
she do ???
She addedGift Certificates!!!
YEY - Just in time for Christmas !!!
12/4/09
Bruce (the rock star formerly know as Hayden) was seen romping with
Mouse last night. He's starting to fit in nicely.
11/12/09
After my Steve's being after me for 6 month (no kidding, 6 months), I
did two demo beadroller video's a few days ago. I've never heard
myself on tape before, and it was kind of like a puppy hearing its own
bark for the first time, it scared me. I've added a
page to the catalog and will keep adding to the library, and
there's a link on the left of the page.
Had a big scare this morning. Tina was missing when I got up,
took 1-1/2" hours to find her. The closet behind where Steve
sits, the ceiling is unfinished and sometimes the cats go up in the
rafters, but they haven't lately cause there's more stuff on the
shelves and it's tougher to climb.
Somehow
she got up there and
was too terrified to come back down, or even meow. She almost
never goes outside without me, and they are working on the street a
block away, so outside was out of the question. I just knew she
was
somewhere in the house and I'd find her dead of a heart attack or
something, cause I've let her get overweight. Treats are now
on ration. Theeeeennnnn..... I couldn't believe it, she'd
been down for 15 minutes, when I saw her trying to climb up to get in
the rafters again.
10/25/09
Big news for me this week, well, not for me actually. My daughter
and her husband put a bid on a house and it was accepted
yesterday. Their first home, wow. Just in time for their
first wedding anniversary next week. On a silly note - ya know
how pillows stick when you try to put a pillow case on? Well, I
decided to blow into the case when the pillow was half way in, and it
just dropped to the bottom. Pretty neat, hah. Only took me
50 years to figure that one out (slow learner).
10/12/09
In a nut shell:
- friend & wife have cat & dog (german shepherd)
- dog plays rough with cat
- friend afraid dog will kill cat one day
- wife leaves, neglects to take her cat
- friend sells house
- estranged wife finally takes cat - to friends house - who has two dogs
(german shepherd & rottweiler)
- friend & my hubby are at BBQ cookoff
- friend calls me - cat is being terrorized and needs to be rescued -
now
- cat has new home - finally safe
- meet Hayden..... now we have five again....
10/6/09
It's not often I take a class, in fact, in 8-1/2 years, I've only taken
3. Leah
Fairbanks is one of the founders of the lampwork movement in
the United States back in the 1990's, so when I found out she was
teaching a class within driving distance of me, I was excited. As
a group, we had a blast and as a class, we learned a lot. One of
the ladies took a looot of pictures, and I'll post some as soon as I
get the disc of them.
Im'
really happy with my first ever aquarium bead. It's 1" wide by
1-5/8" tall and is a testament to Leah's teaching abilities, for sure.
These
are two of Leah's beads that I bought at the class. The long one
is 1-5/16". The black & white is 1-1/4" with a black spinel
stone that her husband imbeds for her.
9/26/09
We had a lot of rain here a few weeks ago and now the spring floweres
are blooming. To the right are our crockus, and I don't know what
the red ones are, but they are in yards all over town. Oh, and by
the way, Happy Birthday Daryl.
9/22/09
I've been pretty busy the last few days. I just finished
assembling 4 new beadroller tools, that's the most I've done at one
time. Then I decided, since I now have 22 tools in the line, that
was too much for one catalog page, so I've been redoing that. Phew,
time consuming, please check it out.
9/6/09
I have a husband that like old movies, but once in a while I question
his sanity. He got into a 'gag me' 70's mood. Charles
Bronson has got to be on the list of the worst 10 actors in history,
not just one, but we watched a string of his movies this weekend. Then
there's 'Foxy Brown". Finally found out that afro's were
good for hiding guns in, and that intro to
the movie, priceless.
8/28/09
Finally, an update on my trip to Seattle. I won't clutter up my
blog with the pictures, instead, the trip has it's own page and a
permanent link next to my other Seattle trips on the left. But
here is a picture of one of my favorite subject, Kara's cat. Seattle
2009
8/6/09 Holy
Cow, it's on YouTube.
This was the video they played several times at the gathering, before
demo's and meetings.
I can't tell you what an awesome industry I have been blessed to be a
part of.........
8/2/09
That was the best Gathering I've ever been to, I guess considering it
is the only one I've been to,
ya, it was great. Two days of "name" lampwork beadmakers doing
demo's on the big screen, wow, I learned a lot. I bought a
Japanese style torch, am excited about that. Here's a short
youtube demo so you can see what they look like.
Two open torch nights where we could "jam", wow. That's one of my
beading buddies, Ginny, showing how she encases. There were
around 40 torches set up. On the second night, the hotel fire
alarm went off (false alarm), but it was so funny to see all those
people at the torches look around as if to say "what.... fire
alarm? We are playing
with fire here..... and I don't have time to evacuate, I'm in the
middle of a bead".
But I think the best part was the bazaar on Saturday. There
is
probably no where else in the entire world that you could find a bigger
display of individual handmade artisan glass beads? Think about it - -
100 artists displaying thousands of handmade beads - -
wow.
7/21/09
I just picked up the prototype base for the beadrollers. I'm real
excited about the design. I gave my fabricator some specific
requirements, and let him have free reign to design the scrolling. He
came up with (what else) flames. Awesome.. We are still working out
production details and pricing, but they should be available in a
couple of weeks. It will hold the tool at approximately a 30
degree angle, in one of two
directions, allowing you both hands free for holding your mandrel and
glass rod and still be able to use the tool, with easy access to pick
the tool up for refining your work. I'm off my first Gathering
tomorrow, see ya'll in a week with pictures. (Gathering: the annual
lampwork beadmakers convention)
7/14/09
I know, I promised a new cat picture, I took one and it's
horrible. Steve's out of town and it's a bit of a production to
'arrange 4 cats' sometimes. But I have a picture of another
little friend in the house instead. We live in a house built in
1902 and sometimes it seems the wall 'leak' of bugs, so gecko's are
always welcome here. This guy just wanted his picture taken.
7/9/09
Once again, I've been chastised for not updating enough.. sigh,
kids.. she has an iphone, isn't that what texting is for? (I'm just
kidding, Kara. Don't hit me with a barrage of texts,
I'm sure your boss would much prefer you 'work' at work. lol). So I'll
update on the tools, there are 15 in the line now
(click on 'catalog'), two more to be unveiled in a day or two, and a
stand (finally got to that) at the metal shop being prototyped. My
health's is getting better.. Our cats are entertaining, as
always. I've thought of a new 'how to arrange cats' series of
pictures, I feel like a bottom feeding paparazzi, but they don't mind,
they get treats out of it. I'll rally the troops for a picture
soon.
6/24/09
Well, I think I'm finally out of the woods. "What do you mean?",
you may ask. Well, I've been sick this year, and thanks for
asking.. Since February or so, I've had a whole host of pain
problems, on a scale of 1-10, it was an 8 quite often. I know
I've been flaky in the past, but this brain fog I don't wish on anyone,
I would forget conversations and things I did that morning, along with
a host of other problems. Hindsight, it's been building for a
long time, though. After a couple of tangents and a specialist
that blew me off, I got my family dr to allow me to get my vitamin D
level back into normal range before doing a ct scan of my head (dread
to think what he would, or wouldn't, find in there, if you know what I
mean). Normal range for D is 30-60 ng/ml, mine tested at 25 and
both drs thought that wasn't significant. phhh Treatment is one
megadose pill a week for 8 weeks, I saw results in 24 hours. It's
been 10 days now, I'm still run down and have a ways to go, but I think
I'm going to ask for an honorary degree for finding the problem
myself. I'm hoping to get my bead career back on track, now that
the fatigue is going away and my focus is returning again, too. (what
were we just talking about???)
6/7/09
It's been a long time since I've posted a youtube video, and in honor
of Steve's birthday (that's my husband and his birthday was actually
yesterday) I'll post a link to one he sent me. I hate to say it,
but it's a bit apropos. Happy birthday Steve. Ode to
Forgetfulness
6/4/09
Two new rollers, actually they are version #2 of a couple already in
the line. Chunky Oval's now have a slot for big hole mandrels,
and the big hole Garden Variety now has an smaller slot for regular
sized mandrels. Wow, can you believe 12 tools in the line already?
Check the catalog for details.
5/12/09
Number Ten... Tube Trio / Frit Holder
The tutorial is now online for your convenience (link is on the left)
5/2/09
Number Nine, Number Nine.. Ok, I know I've aged myself with
that.. This is the ninth tool and has five smaller cavities with a
smaller mandrel
slot for making small holed beads.
4/30/09
I'm real excited to introduce the new handles for my line of lampwork
beadroller tools. When I first stared developing the line 3 month
ago, I was buying a generic handle and wanted something that had a
'wow' factor to it. I found it. My tool handles now have
flames. Took me over a month to procure them and it was worth
it. The latest in the line is the original on steroids, a chunky
oval trio. Check the "tools" catalog for the complete line.
4/27/09
Ya, it must be spring, I'm taking pictures of flowers. This
is my first rose of the year. I cut them back quit a bit last
fall so they should be plentiful.
My new handle for the tools are on their way, I'm excited.
4/11/09
Spring is popping
up here. We planted tomatoes early this year and had to cover
them 3 times for freezing nights. And on the health front, I'm on
my fourth different high blood pressure med in 9 months, this sucks
trying to
find the right one. Reminds me of my teen years when you had to
go through a lot of crappie boyfriends to find the one didn't make you
sick to your stomach.....
4/7/09
A bird in the hand
is worth two in the bush. I have a literal
exception to that rule - not when the bird in the hand is the one you
just took away from your cat in the living room. It's spring and
that
means young birds that are not cat savvy yet. It's the first of
many
for the season, I'm sure. It sure was happy to fly away, I sure
was
happy I didn't break it's neck pounding on it, Weazel didn't care, he
can find more to bring in...
This picture is of a wild flower
growing in my side lawn. I wish I knew what it was, it comes up
every
year, only one plant so there's only one flower, but it's square...
4/5/09
There are a few websites I enjoy check everyday, one is NASA's
'Astronomy Picture of The Day'. Today's was especially
cool. It's a one hour time laps of the sun. It takes a few
seconds to load, but it's so worth it. Orange
Sun Oozing
(fyi: I now stock 1/4" mandrels for big hole beads & 1/4" brass
tubing to line them with) 3/31/09
We've been busy around here - ordering stuff. Since I've designed
some of the new graphite beadrollers to accommodate a larger mandrel to
make pandora style beads with, I decided to expand and carry
complimentary "stuff". First there was the beadstand for large
hole beads, then came the plethora of requests for a small shaft to
hold regular holed focals. Gotcha covered. Now I've put in brass tubing for coring those
pandora sized beads. The 1/4" tubing for mandrels is on order,
with other sizes to follow later. Steve's been amazing at finding
this stuff for me. Have a look in the catalog.
03/26/09
Been lazy about showing off the newest tool. It's another pandora
style plus, this one shapes round beads. Actually I haven't been
lazy, I've been tired. I went to get a prescription fill a few
weeks ago and the manufacturer stopped making it so the pharmacist
called the dr to get a different script. When I went to pick it
up, they told me that instead of taking one pill a day, I would now be
taking half the amount twice a day. Some how I missed the part
where it was a completely different formula, too. Found that out
when I went back to the dr today. All better now, back to
business as usual.
03/9/09
I've had an interesting weekend. I'll back up to Thursday. Kara (DD)
flew in from Seattle to help me with a bead show. I've done art &
craft shows, but never a 'bead' show. To make a long story short, it
wasn't worth my time and if I do another one, I'll be a bit more
selective. The Bead Market is well advertised so the crowd was good, I
guess that's how she justifies the outrageous price of the booth, but
my sales weren't good enough for the time & effort I put into it.
Live and learn. At least I'll have a week with my daughter. In other
news: I've really been enjoying making the slider beads with my new
mold, for the Pandora/Troll bracelets and promise to get my catalog up
and going again. I've been putting a sterling silver core in them so
they can also be worn on a chain necklace or even a ribbon or leather
neck cord.
Here's a picture of my fourth tool, the letter opener & beadpen
mold.
02/15/09
We're up to three tools now, and expecting our fourth next week, and a
stand to hopefully follow soon after. I feel like an expectant
mother. This one will do barrel shapes. Two with a regular
hole size mandrel slot and two with a slot for a larger mandrel to do
Pandora Style beads with. What are Pandora beads you ask? Pandora
Charm Bracelets
02/07/09
Well, here's my second tool. Three ovals, next sizes up. I
even went and got some nice material for backdrops. The lady at
the fabric store asked me what I was up to and when I told her it was
for photo backdrops, she said her best friend was a photographer so she
helped me get the right stuff. Boy was she right. Got to
go, there's a James Bond marathon on one of the channels and it's been
a long three weeks getting the tools up and going, so I'm out of here.
01/31/09 Introducing
cg-beadrollers - mold on a stick.
All those wonderful ovals I make, bet you thought I hand formed
them. Well, my dirty little secret is out, I had a mold made last
year and now (finally) I've put it into production. If you're a
lampworker and would like to have one, they'll be in my catalog soon,
or just email me for now. It will also come with a tutorial on
how to make a perfect bead with a cavity mold. I already have in
mind to make the next
one, it will have the next two oval sizes up from this mold.
01/30/09
Two atoms are walking down the road and one exclaims,
"Oh my God, I
just lost an electron!"
The other one asks, "Are you sure?"
To which
the first replies, "I'm positive!"
I was exchanging website links with Alex (my sons girlfriend) one day
and she gave me a link to 1saleaday.com
Great, thanks Alex, just what I need, another sight with stuff I can't
live without, that uses 24 hour sale only impulse buying tactics. I'm
already hooked on Woot.com
At least "1saleaday" is different in the fact that it has fun and
useless information, like the joke at the beginning of this post. Ok,
I've wasted enough time today..
01/25/09
So, Steve's been telling me about this commercial and I finally got to
see it. I love this guy, and it's on YouTube so I can see it
anytime I
want to - Vince
with Slap Chop. I was always the kid who would watch the
commercials and walk off on the show. Give it to me short and sweet,
get your point across in two minutes or less or I'm out of here. Vince
with Slap Chop is the most entertaining commercial ever produced. Shamwow was ok, but
annoying as h*ll. Slap Chop is great, and that duel screen chopping
scene was hilarious, "you're gonna love my nut"??, and when he throws
the competitors product over
his shoulder and it lands in the sink, classic slapstick at it's best,
"taco's fettucini linguini
martini bikini", and of course, the line "call now, within the next 20
minutes, cause we can't do this all day". Vince is the best.....
01/24/09
Sometime opening the kiln in the morning just makes my day cause
everything turns out better than I imagined it would.
01/17/09
This is my "I'm so lazy" blog entry.
I don't know what it is about blogging, but sometime I just hate to
write. My last post was a couple of days before the anniversary
of moms passing, and the holidays were fine, getting better to handle,
end of story...
So many new things that I've tried the past few weeks. I've
finally started to use my big hole mandrels - 5/8" & 1/4" holes -
and have learned to core the 1/4" with sterling silver tubing to make
slider beads for the Pandora/Troll bracelets. I also took a
mandrel out of moth balls that makes a heart hole. I want to sell
them as toggles and am coordinating with Kara to have her make the
toggle bars out of silver. Then there's the thimble mandrels I
bought, those are too cool. Why the big jump in creativity? I signed up
for a bead show, no more art & craft shows, did several
last year and they just suck toooo much. I hate standing and
explaining to someone what lampwork is only to have them say "nice
bracelet" and walk off with that deer-in-the-headlights look. If
you're in Ft Worth March 7-8 I'll be at The Bead
Market show (don't forget my Etsy
store) and yah, Kara is going to come help me, excited about
that I am.
11/25/08 How
to Arrange 4 Cats -
The sequil - part one
Cats - squared. Maybe this is why one should pay attention in geometry
class, so one can arrange their cats.
11/6/08
She was a beautiful bride in a stunning dress, and he was an
"every-girls-crazy-'bout-a-sharp-dressed-man" groom. I'm proud to
introduce Mr. & Mrs. Whitney, my daughter and new son-in-law. They
were married Monday just north of Vegas in an outdoor ceremony at
The Valley of Fire. Pictures to follow after I finish cropping
and stuff.
10/26/08
One of my duties at Wired Up Beads is to make the jump rings. Fun, but
not a very glamorous job. Then I decided to take some home and make
some chainmail myself. I bought a book of chainmail patterns about a
decade ago but could never decipher the patterns so I gave it another
try. This was so relaxing that I got lost in the process and lost track
of time. I don't see how anyone makes any money at it, but I sure
enjoyed it. The top bracelet is bronze and silver. The
second is copper, bronze, and silver with copper and gold vermeil daisy
spacers. The last one is 14K gold filled with stardust silver
balls and it's my favorite, but then there's nothing like the look and
feel of gold. I think I'll replace the clasp, though, it's a bit
too long.
We're off to Vegas this week. I have a long awaited wedding to go
to, my daughter Kara is getting married.
10/18/08
Fall is here, not in the weather cause it's still in the 70's to 80's,
but I can tell it in the cats. They've started to romp and play
with each other again, we're getting more 'critters' in the house and
all four are snuggled on the bed when we wake up. Two out of
three pleasures ain't bad. I've been working at Wired Up
Beads for 2-3 days a week, but now that my thyroid and blood
pressure are under control (phew, I hate
being sluggish and that 'I can't put my finger on it' icky feeling)
I've started to torch a bit more. Still not up to speed to do
eBay again just yet, but then, it seems eBay is a 'has been' as far as
lampwork goes. Etsy is a joke unless you are part of the 'click'
and since I'm not a 'clicky' type, I may close that soon. I still
have a few bead stores and galleries, but they have been slow
(dah). Here's my first Christmas beads, part 2. These went
to a gallery, but
since them I've made some more 'snowman' penguins and designed some
'snowman' kitties and some regular snowmen. I've enjoyed my small
dabble in Christmas sculptures and have decided to do a 'snowman'
series. This weekend I want to
design some 'snowman' santa's, puppies and angels.
10/1/08
I have a friend who does a lot of sculpture beads and she did the most
adorable Haloween beads. Well, I don't care for doing sculptures,
but it motivated me to gave doing some Christmas beads a try. They're
not bad and I'll have to admit, they were fun. Here's my
first batch, it's a small one but I wanted to see what bugs had to be
worked out. Now I'll make some for an upcoming jewelry making
open house at a gallery I'm represented in, and some for my catalog,
too.
9/28/08
Introducing - - THE DRESS - - Kara got her wedding dress. Wow,
proud isn't the right word, more like so pleased that life is going so
well for her and Dave. Only 5 weeks, man the time is flying.
9/18/08
A man from my husbands forum relayed this story to their board. This is
a true story.
My oldest daughter is about to give birth to my ninth grandchild (a
girl this time). She is also the mother of my 3 year old granddaughter.
The three year old is very observant and quite outspoken for her
age. My daughter is tall and heavyset, not obese, but nonetheless
a big girl. Her weight has gone up only slightly during the
pregnancy, but her belly is swollen.
Last night she was showering and my granddaughter joined her in the
shower. The granddaughter exclaimed "Mommy your getting fat!. Is
the baby in your tummy?" "Yes" mommy explained that the baby in
her tummy makes her look fat. My granddaughter then said "Is there a
baby in your butt too?"
9/15/08
The cookoff is over and there's nothing left but the bragging.... Steve
got 1st in chicken, 2nd in beans and 5th in brisket. There were
around 45 cooking teams, doesn't sound like much, but this is an old
cookoff and these are seasoned veterans so the competition is high....
When "Crosstimbers" was in their hay day doing cookoffs every weekend of the year (sometimes
two in a weekend), this would have been nothing to brag about, but when
you only fire up the smoker a couple of times a year, the "seasonings"
inside the cooker just aren't the same, so this was actually a nice
accomplishment. Steve had a friend compete for his first time in
competition, Ryan took 5th in ribs. He does a bit of catering,
but competition is a whole different ball game, so he gets bragging
right for placing, too. A lot of times, the spices you put on
competition meat will cost more than the meat itself, so chances are
you won't taste something this flavorful in a restaurant. One
thing I really like about the Sanger trophies is they are always
unique. We have an ornamental iron worker in town and he does the
trophies.
9/12/08
I have kind of a different post today. Not much been happening in
my life lately except hum drum stuff so I thought I'd post about an odd
subject to talk about... teeth... After years of drinking mucho
glasses of tea a day, I finally decided to try some of those teeth
whitening strips. I did my research and came up with a couple of
rousing endorsements of 'Celebrity Sexy Teeth'. Kind of pricey
but I bought it anyway. Wow, within the month or so I've been
using it, I've actually gotten a couple of shades whiter. Wello, if
hurricane Ike does what it suppose to, it will only
skirt the Dallas area and Steve & I will cook our first solo BBQ
cook off here in Sanger. Steve and his cooking partner were an
award winning cook off teem in the 80's. Sometime in the mid 90's
life stared getting in the way and they dwindled down to only a couple
of local competitions a year, with the second generation helping
out. I never got involved much when we got married but everyone
had other direction this weekend so instead of not competing, we
decided to do this one, just the two of us. I know - awwwww...
8/22/08
Been tired lately, not sure if it's the hot summer (of which I don't
take the heat well anyway) or if its just this getting old thing. I
think I like the hot summer explanation the best. I have a
friend that is opening a brick and mortar bead store and I've been
helping there one or two days a week. If you make jewelry, you
need to take a look at her website. (Wired Up
Beads) She's the one that has come out with the high
end jewelry tools called Wubbers,
and of course, all kinds of other findings. She's growing almost
faster than what she can keep up with. My good friend Trudy is
also working there full time so it's nice to get out once a week and
spend time there.
8/9/08
This is why I have a 6 ft work table, at least this time they left me a
small work area on the corner. It's been too hot for them to go
outside much, so hanging around crowding mom has been what they love to
do.
8/2/08
More electroform, I've become obsessed. This time I put six flat
ovals into a bracelet with copper accents.
7/27/08
I'm have a great time learning to electroform. Some stuff is in
my catalog
and some is on Etsy.
After ruining a batch of the solution, a lot of technical things just
clicked. The patina part will take the most research, all those
formula's, and what chemical does what. I'm not a science whiz,
but I'm learning. I really like the turquoise, it goes good on
the geo faux rock type beads. It's simply done with ammonia, some
suggest using used cat litter, that was just to icky of a visual for me
to even consider. I made one the other day that had a contaminent
on one of the anodes and it transfered green, indigo and rust colors to
the copper on the bead. 7/13/08 How
to arrange 5 cats -
the final chapter
Missing Man Formation
It was late summer of 2007 when this cute-as-a-button black and white
stray started to hang around the yard. He must have been about
6-8 months old, and you could tell he was born in the wild, not afraid
of humans, but kept his distance. We left him along for a week or
so, just in case he had a mind to go find his mother... but he
didn't. Mouse would hiss at him, then ignore him. Weazel
would bat the crap out of him and Maynerd (as we came to call him)
would just look at him as if to say "are you done now, cause I just
want to play", and off they would go. Tina and Jett made it know
they were the matriarchs and he was to mind his place. Eventually
he learned that if he went through the cat door, he could eat when HE
wanted to, not when we fed him at night. He became my buddy,
always plopping down in front of me when I was standing at my work
table, even learned his name. It's been several week now, since
we've seen Maynerd and the others still seem to look for him. We
all miss our little buddy.
7/5/08
(this
is an abreviated version, for the whole trip click here,
the sandcastle pix are worth the view)
Time
to update you on my trip to Seattle a few weeks ago. First off, Kara's
cat. I love this cat, he's Javanese, an offshoot of Siamese. They
have fur as soft as rabbits, and oh those eyes....
First we went to Cannon Beach on the Oregon coast for a sandcastle
building contest.
And the main reason for the trip. After struggling for 10 years in
junior collages, Kara put
graduation on a fast track. She had enough credits to wound up with a
degree in
geology and anthropology.
6/23/08
Well
I went to my electroforming class this weekend. That's Janelle
Zorko of Pigeon Point Glass to the left, the teacher. The
others are my fellow classmates. I got a nice refresher in
electroforming, filled in a lot
of gaps that I didn't learn the when I first started 2 years ago, and
learned the tricks to making monster bycones. We even made hollow
perfume bottles with cute little feet. My head is swimming but my
overload mode is giving way and I've been making some cool monster
beads and should have them up for sale in my catalog in a few
day. Aaand, I plan on getting to my Seattle vacation pictures
this week
6/19/08
I'm
going to be taking my electroforming class this weekend, so my vacation
update to Seattle will have to wait for a couple of days. I guess
I'll have lots to blog about on Monday. Sandcastles and
graduation and electroforming, oh my......
6/6/08
First
of all I want to say: HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO
MY HUSBAND STEVE
I'm off to visit my daughter in Seattle for 10 days, so the catalog
will be closed. I've been playing with a couple of new shapes for
a couple of weeks so there's be NEW new stuff up in a few weeks.
5/16/08
I
went to the dr again
today, maybe this
prescription will get rid of the throat infection I've been plagued
with for 5 week now. - Ya know that link on my beads
catalog to my electroform beads? Ya, the one with no
electroform beads for sale? Well, I plan on remedying that in a
few months. I signed up for a class in June with Janelle
Zorko, her beads are extraordinary. I stopped
electroforming last summer when I just didn't have the energy, and have
missed it terribly. I have the equipment and it's just sitting
there collecting dust, lots
of dust. This is one of my first electro beads.
5/4/08 How
to arrange 5 cats -
part eight
Bermuda triangle style - - which way is up? which way is down?
5/1/08
My
first Chihuly rose of the year. The side shot looks like the
inside is on fire.
4/29/08
Sorry
I haven't had a new catalog up in what seems like forever, sometimes it
seem like there's a plethora of excuses to choose from, but here's the
one I like the best. I don't feel good. (I know, whaaa) Just one of
those throat things, and I get run down so easily (in my old age), but
I have gotten a
few focal lentils done lately. Ya, you heard me right, focals. I'm
doing lentil focals now, 13x30mm. I've had the mold for over a year
and finally got a bigger torch a few weeks ago, so I can stop
struggling to make big beads. Here's a picture of one. If you're on
my email list, you'll get notified when they are up, if you're not on
my list, well, why aren't you? There's a link at the top of the
page....
4/18/08 How
to arrange 5 cats -
part seven
to match my eBay auction, Midnight in
Albuquerque....
4/11/08 "Mom, would you do something about
Weazel. He's always chasing me. I went to jump up on the
hot tub to get away, and the lid was
off!!!!! I was just up there not 15 minutes ago, sunning
myself. Dad didn't tell me he was going to clean it!!!! I'm
soaked to the bone.
4/2/08 Sorry, I've kind of dropped off the
face of the earth lately. eBay sales
dropped out from under me, so I've been taking a side road and taking a
few months to get myself some local venues going. I already had
my
beads in Kittrell/Riffkind, a very schnazzy glass gallery in Dallas,
and my jewelry in Vetro, a working glass blowing studio with a schnazzy
glass gallery store front. Now I've added two local artzy fartzy
art
gallery/boutiques and a bead store. Even did a couple of
shows last week. Next I'll put together a portfolio to
present to a couple of gallery/boutiques. In June, I'll be off to
Seattle to see my daughter and will take some loose beads and finished
jewelry with to scope
out a few places there, so I'll need to get things made for that.
eBay... well, I'd like to get back to it, but the market just isn't
there right now, maybe later this year, but I will be keeping up with
my website catalog, just need to get those pesky taxes done first.
3/23/08 I finally got around to blowing my
first shard. I had a pretty good bubble blown, then I tried to
heat it a little. Big mistake, I collapsed it. Then I tried
to fix it. Another big mistake, I blew a side out. I should
have trashed it and started new. Reminds me a bit of a
duck. It's a lot of fun, but I think I need a lot of practice.
3/16/08 I went to our local bead society's
monthly meeting last night and saw a demo on making glass shards. Very
cool. So I bought a blowpipe from one of the ladies and now
I'm ready to be a faux glass blower. What is a shard, you might
ask? Well it's as simple as building up a hollow bead on the end
of the blowpipe and blowing it into a bubble, like a balloon. When it's
broken, you use the thin 'shards' as decoration on
beads. Sounds simple, I'm betting it takes a little practice,
though. Since I use a lot
of twisties, I have plenty leftovers laying around and I can see lots
of design possibilities.
3/9/08 How
to arrange 5 cats -
part six rug - not - wide - enough - - -
3/6/08 Snow has been falling for about
three hours now, there's 5-1/2 inches and it's still falling. Oh,
did I mention, I live in Texas??
3/4/08 Maynerd went to the vet yesterday to
get his first shots and to get fixed. Boy was he mad when I went
to pick him up. But now that he has his own vet card, that makes
our latest little stray officially part of the herd. Since he was
a stray, he prefers to go outside instead of using the litter box (ok
fine with me - -). Well it snowed here last night, you should
have seen his reaction, "you have got to be kidding, you traumatize me
at the vet, then expect me to go outside and squat in the snow?? Oh
well, the food is easier to catch."
3/2/08 My daughter Kara, and Dave, have
decided on a location for the wedding. The Valley of Fire is just
outside Las Vegas. Holly visual reality check Batman, time will
go by quickly now and I've got to start getting my butt in gear and
loose some of that weight I gained when my thyroid went amuck on
me. I at least want to look halfway decent in that ugly
mother-of-the-bride dress I've heard so much about... What a
lovely setting for a wedding though, don't you agree?
2/24/08 It's been a long couple of weeks for
me. Bead wise, a few doors have opened, so I am closing one. One
of my customers graciously offered to contact me when her local bead
store admired some of my beads in a necklace she wore into the store...
so now, my first trunk show is forthcoming at Naturally
Jennifer's in San Luis Obispo, Ca. Don't know
when the date is, the beads will ship to them tomorrow and I'm reeeal
excited.... My friend Trudy & I, went hunting
gallery/boutique outlets last week, and we found one that will carry
our jewelry, at another the owner is out of town so we'll make
appointments in a couple of weeks, and I'll start putting loose beads
in the glass gallery that already carries my jewelry, got another
gallery/boutique scoped out to hit next week. Oh ya, almost
forgot about the boutique that wants me to come back for Mothers
Day/Graduation. And the door that will close?? eBay has been
extreeeeeemly
slow for me, but it's been good to me, so I'll not stop completely,
just slow to a trickle. How to arrange 5 cats -
part five When you wish upon a star....
2/10/08 How
to arrange
5 cats -
part four All in a circle, pheweee......
2/6/08
Lordy Lordy, look who's 40 + 40. Art, my favorite uncle, had a
birthday party over the weekend. Happy 80th Birthday, Art ! ! !
2/4/08
Have you seen this email going around? How embarrasing...
"When making a fake ID, attach a picture of yourself only...
no matter how much you love your girl."
2/1/08
Found this prickly pear cactus patch not far from my house. If
you think this is a lot of cactus, you should see how much is behind
it, too, at least double.
1/30/08
According to Bill Nye, The Science Guy, if everyone in the U.S. flushed
their toilets just one less time per day, we would save 1.5 billion
gallons of water per day. That's enough to fill 2000 Olympic
sized swimming pools. Kids, please don't try this trick at
school, and parents, please don't try this trick at work........
1/28/08
Since I'm originally from North Dakota, I have some North Dakota trivia
for you. Today, millionaire and former North Dakota governor, Ed
Shafer, was confirmed by the U.S. Senate as Secretary of Agriculture.
How did his father, Harold Shafer, make his fortune.
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he invented Mr Bubble
1/27/08 How
to arrange
5 cats -
part three
All in a row, two black & whites facing north, two blacks and one
torty facing south
1/21/08
Well it's in the low 40"s and raining here tonight in north
Texas. I've been doing some work on the computer, rainy weather
is so soothing to me, serene... Then Weazel jumps up on my desk
to get some attention. That fine - except - Weazel likes the
rainy weather too. No, he literally
like the rainy
weather. He's sopping wet from playing outside, and trying to
brush up against my face. He's my virtual weather forecasting
cat, if I get lost in my work, he lets me know if it's raining...
1/20/08 How to arrange 5 cats -
part two
All in a row, facing one direction, color synchronized.
1/13/08
Riddle me this Batman: How many ways can you arrange 5 cats? Answer:
I'm not sure, but we're going to find out. --- We feed our fab-5 tuna
every now and then. We started the tradition when we were feeding them
'average' food. Tthe oil from the tuna was good for their coats,
and
when it's time to take one to the vet, all we have to do is run the can
opener and they come running. This is the first
installment of "How to Arrange 5 Cats"
1/10/08
I can't think of a better way to start my first post of this year than
with one of the best video's I've ever seen. Thanks for the link,
Cheryl. The
Window Washer
12/19/07 Merry
Christmas
It's been quite a year for me. Seemed like I was coming down with
something and getting sick every 6 week or so. It was a God send when
I found out is was my Thyroid and the solution was as simple as hormone
replacement and time. It's been wonderful to not have to sleep 12
hours and take two naps a day and watch my bead production slow to a
trickle. I adore making beads, so I am so looking forward to a new
year of being back to normal production again.
This year, we added a new member to our herd of cats, or should I say,
he found us. He was a skinny little stray kitten that let Weazel and
Mouse bat the crap out of him. They never hurt him, and that's
probably why he never ran away. It only took a week or two for them to
except him. The girls (Tina & Jett) are still working on letting
him know he is the omega cat, but Maynerd is fitting in nicely. My
cats have been a constant source of entertainment and companionship for
us, and I need to get back to taking pictures again of their antics.
I won't bore anyone any further other than to say, have a Merry
Christmas, a Happy New Year and a peaceful holiday season. Steve found
a cute website and plugged my face into a holiday video. I thought
everyone might enjoy seeing what I look like. Miss
Donna Scrooge (fyi, if you use Netscape, the link won't
work. It opened just fine for me in Internet Explorer, though)
One last picture for this year. Santa came to Sanger tonight, riding
on top of the fire engine, blowing the horn, throwing candy to all the
kids who came out to see and wishing everyone a Merry Christmas. How
cool is that......
12/7/07
My daughter just finished her last class today. She now has a
double degree in geology and anthropology. Well, she still has a
couple of final tests next week, but basically, she's a scholar
now. She pretty much did it the hard way and struggled through
part time for many years, so that makes the degrees even more special
to me. At 33, I'm soooo proud of her.
Congratulations Kara
11/28/07
It's been two full years today, since mom passed. I still
keep telling myself she's just off at a bowling tournament somewhere
near a casino telling her girlfriends about her grandchildren. Her
greatest personal passions, travel, ten pins, nickel slots, friends
and
those grandkids.... and dad, 60 years worth of dad.... She was so
vibrent, running at life full speed. Dad's 85 and his bowling
average this year is (as he puts it) only 120. sigh
I want to be like my mom & dad when I grow up.
11/11/07
I have one smart cat, well, more on the line of just lucky. Tina
loves to come up on my desk while I'm on the net. She sits in
front of the monitor until I crab at her to sit down, or she just takes
it upon herself to flop down on the desk herself, usually aiming for my
keyboard, sigh. Last night I wasn't watching her close enough,
sigh. She usually hits the function keys, but this time I didn't
see what she plopped on, sigh. Did you know that you can change
the color of a highlighted email from black to 6 other colors just by
pressing a number key? Took Tina only seconds to discover that,
but it took me an hour to figure it out. Of course the cursor has
to setting on top of the chosen email, but I'm betting Tina already
knew that, too. Life has not been dull
with Tina around. Oh ya, for the second time this week, I have
the bottom of my stove stuffed with towels so the mouse (or should I
say mice) she brings in and drops in the kitchen don't escape into the
house before I can catch them, sigh.
11/3/07
I can't believe it's been a month since I've written. My thyroid
is squaring away, and it's great to be getting my stamina back, nuff
said on the health front... Our TV started getting flaky this
week so we went out and bought a 47 inch HDTV. Dish came
yesterday and hooked us up to receive HD programing. Holly
mackerel, what a picture.... Even the sound is different. Fall is
definitely here, the yard is full of pecans with more to fall,
and the house has had a rash of mice lately, all brought in by cats, of
course. We're getting good at snaring them with either a towel or
the leaf net for the pool.
10/4/07
"What's that nibbling at my toes in the middle of the night? I'm
not sure, but it's probably the baby mouse that Jett brought in and let
go in the bedroom!!!"
Since we couldn't find it, we figure one of the 5 cats should
eventually catch it, or since it's so tiny, it may find it's way
outside again. At least we found Jett's stash of bugs and birds
under the bed, the ones she sneaks in, in the middle of the
night. Just part of the joys of having their own cat door, I
guess. It's been a while since I've updated and although I feel
better than I did 3 weeks ago when I started taking my thyroid meds, I
still don't feel all that great. But at least my 2 naps a day
have been reduced to just resting a lot with an occasional nap. I've
even started spending more time at my torch. Having good
health really is one of the most important things you will ever own in
life.
9/11/07
Well, I had my appointment with the endocrinologist yesterday to see
how to treat my fluky thyroid. He put me on snythroid, hopefully
that will reduce the goiter and stabilize my thyroid. Not much
more to say than that, it's a waiting game now.
9/7/07 And
Maynerd Makes Five
This is the new addition to our herd of cats. He was a stray and
wouldn't go away when the other cats chased him, so he gets to stay.
He's probably 5-6 months old, and it took us about a month
to tame
him. Tina & Jett still hiss once in a while, but they're getting
better. I love the way his white fur feathers into the black. He has
very long legs, long head and tail, so he probably has a bit of Siamese
in him.
Just a short
announcement
My doctor diagnosed me this week with hypo thyroid, guess that
explains my chronic fatigue
coupled with this annoying insomnia the past few months. I'm not going
to stop making beads but expect I will be slowing down a bit until I
can get my health under control again. So please don't stop looking
for my beads, I haven't left the planet, just taking production a bit
slower.
!
! !
! !
WARNING ! ! ! ! !
! ! ! ! ! Proud
mother announcement ahead ! ! ! ! ! I am proud to
announce the engagement of my daughter, Kara Hillius, to
David Whitney. Kara is a part time pharmacy tech for Walgreen and a
student at The University of Washington in Seattle, Washington. She
will graduate in December 2007, with degrees in geology and
anthropology. David has a degree in business administration and also
photography and is employed at Trident Seafood. A wedding is planned
for late 2008.
The Ring - it's brilliant cut round set in a square setting.
I love this ring, but I'm betting Kara loves it even more.
8/10/07
Well, I went outside to get the mail this morning, and when I came back
in I noticed feathers. It's been a long time since I've had to
clean up feathers. I did a quick surveillance of the cat toys and
didn't find anything that didn't belong... phew. So I got out the
vacuum and cleaned up the feathers under my desk as two of the three culprits cats scurried
from the room, then I went on to the ones by the door. As I was
almost done, it felt like I was being watched so I looked around for
Tina. Nope, it was the bird, I have no idea where he came from
but he was sitting about two feet away calmly watching me vacuum up his
cloths as if to say "When you're done there, can I have my tail back...
and oh ya, where is the exit"? Through experience I've learned
the easiest way to catch a bird is to throw a towel over it, so I went
to get one expecting one of the cats to resume the chase. Guess
the fun was gone once mom interfered, cause he was still sitting there
calmly waiting for me and I caught him without an incident. I
though birds couldn't fly without a tail but it was like a Disney
movie, he took off and didn't look back. duh
7/29/07
When you see a disclaimer, you know it was because someone did
something stupid. Steve found this ATM at the drive through of a
local bank this afternoon and came back home to get me with the
camera. It speaks for itself. Watch out for shooting money.
7/20/07
When I was growing up, one of my favorite things to do was to put
puzzles together. I had one that was a circle and that I knew so
well, I could put it together with the picture facing down, and from
the center working out to the border. I loved that
puzzle... Guess that's why I loved putting stained glass panels
together too. But I didn't expect it would help prepare me for
what happened yesterday. Steve went outside and found the yard
flooded. What the heck? "Oh sh*t, that's why it took
so long for the washer to fill." Now it was only a matter of
finding which pipe had broken. (I'm getting to the puzzle
part) Steve turned the water to the house off and put our sump
pump (doesn't everyone have one?) in the pool of water next to the
house to drain the pool of water running out from under the house. Three
hours later and we hadn't made a dent in the amount of water,
that's cause the leak was at the far end of the house, under the
kitchen... again... So Steve ripped up the floor, repaired the
leak, turned the water back on, let out a sigh of relief and four hours
later was still pumping water out of the yard. While I got to
work with my puzzle skills of piecing the floor boards back into
place. But the funny part was later in the afternoon when we
heard a faint meow... After a 10 minute hunt, we found all four
cats, safe and sound above
the house.
7/16/07
Just a fast update. My catalog is full of the new oval beads from
the mold I had made.
It's a chunky little oval at 13x22mm, but it's a comfortable width for
bracelets.
7/13/07
Once again, I had a
new custom mold made and it was delivered to me
this week. It's a chunky little oval that is 13x21mm and I love
this
shape. The mold is super easy to use, and since I just put
Steve on
an airplane and have the whole weekend to myself, I'm planning an oval
marathon. There will be lots of ovals in the catalog next week so
if
you're not on my notification list, you can just come back and check in
yourself. What else is new in my life? Well... it rained
again today... sigh... monsoon season in north Texas.
7/5/07
Happy 4th of July, well, better late then never. We did ours last
week end. Went to some friends house and had a nice time. Fun, food and
new friends, what more can you say. Here's a
picture of the fireworks we bought (all aerial) with Tina
guarding them, obviously we had quite a show, with people from across
their lake applauding. The other picture is of Steve and his BBQ pit
hooked up to our friends tractor, and Woody in attendance.
6/27/07
Need a little fun quiz for once? Which
Fantasy/SciFi Character Are You? I get to be "Yoda: A
venerated sage with vast
power and knowledge, you gently guide forces around you while serving
as a champion of the light." Maybe that explains why I feel a
need to have all the lights on when I'm home alone at
night. Not cause I'm scared, but because I'm championing
them. (but I'm only green when riding a roller coaster.) 6/18/07
You know it's been too long since you've made beads when... you find a
spider has built a web between two dipped mandrels.... (forgot to take
a picture before I scooted him off). Sooo... I go to light the
torch, and I think I forgot my didymium glasses at the
meeting Saturday night... drat, I have boro glasses though, but,
drat. Then I get a glass sliver in my foot, dang, those hurt worse than
a
wooden sliver, I'll finish my stringer
first. Now the cat wants to rub on the bottom of my foot. What the
heck? he's never done that before, dang that hurt, I'll finish my
stringer first. But I could be wearing high heals, working in a
stuffy office somewhere. Live ain't too bad after all. Ok,
then I break a few of stringers cause I forgot not to touch them with a
cool tool,
that breaks the glass, drat. Here's my saving grace --- I found a
rose
on my giant rose bush and measured the stem at 4'11". Yep, almost
a 5
foot stem. I'll cut it in a few days when the bud opens and take
a
picture.
Bare feet, cats and 5 foot roses, ya, I guess life is pretty good after
all.
6/9/07
DISCLAIMER: If you are squeamish about what cats do to birds,
don't read this post.
Sometimes my cats make me feel like I'm in a bad movie satire. This one
I call: "Godfeather,
Part 1"
rated I for icky
(the condensed version)
It was a restful nights sleep. Her husband was out of town, and
in spite of four cats to contort around, Donna had the king sized bed
to sprawl out in. It was Saturday, and there was no alarm clock
to wake her, only the post man delivering the mail to the box at the
curb. Three of the cats had already dispersed to their favorite
sunny windows, only Tina was left, meowing softly, wanting her
customary morning treats from the jar on the night stand. Donna
flipped the covers off, sat up, reached for her glasses and the
treats. Then she discovered it.... laying next to her on the
bedspread.... It was the liver of a bird.... "WHAT THE
F***..." Fully expecting the house to be riddled with feathers,
she grabbed her robe and cautiously peaked out into the hall. Nope, all
clear. On to the living room, her luck ran out. Next to the dinning
table was a wing. She cautiously did a visual
check of the 30 million cat toys sprawled out over the office
floor. "Oh no, more feathers?? Oh wait, those are cat toys"
as she giggled at the silly mistake, then came to her senses and
finished the search. Only the other wing was discovered at the
cat door in the studio. With the house cleared of all the muck,
Donna threw the spread into the washing machine and dragged out the
carpet cleaner. At $199, it had become her best friend. 6/7/07
That learning curve I was referring to in my last post has gotten a
little bumpy lately. I've only had one bead electroform in the
past
week. The paint on the other beads has just washed off instead of
plated, and it's so time consuming to trouble shoot. Not to
mention the stomach crud stuff that's going around landed at our house
again and it's my turn to be whiny this week. Bizarre stuff this time,
you feel sick and at the same time you don't. 5/28/07
Well I finally did something I've been wanting to do for a long time
now, I revamped the top of my website. I took out the old tired
Black Velvet logo beads, and redid some html so I can switch photo's in
and out. I really don't know html and had to played with it
and just experiment, so it was a little nerve wracking, trying to not
screw it up. The new beads are three of my electroforming success
stories. Man, I have fallen in love with this new toy, so as soon
as I can get some non-experimental prototypes done, they'll be in the
catalog. I Still have a bit of a learning curve to go through.
5/17/07
I finally realized
how long it's been since I wrote something and since I don't have much
to say, I thought I would show a picture of my second successful
electroform bead. I haven't taken the time to play with the
electroforming much in the past couple of weeks, but I think I have
weeded out all the things I've been doing wrong. Next week I'll
be making some focals to form and sell online. Our little local bead
society just became an official chapter of the ISGB
and we are having a booth at the The Bead
Renaissance Show in Grapevine (TX) this weekend, I think
I'll wear the bead and show it off a little.
5/4/07
I found this flower in
the yard, on a weed, no less. Looked almost like a dandelion
plant. I don't think I've ever seen a
square flower. Guess I'll have to do some research now to find
out what it is.
5/2/07
Well here it is, my
first electroformed bead. It only took me 6
attempts to figure out that they call it an electrical "current' for a
reason. I had it just high enough that it was just "washing" the
conductive
paint right off the bead. You can still see one spot inside the
beads that has a hole in the platting, but I think that may just be due
to the way I had it hanging on the wire. All in all, I'm happy
and am looking forward to many more beads, got two hearts plating as we
speak.
4/29/07
I've had a busy couple of days and I'm just going to hit the highlights
in a nutshell. Steve has been out of town at some friends
house. Our guys are in the same line of work and they are doing a
project together, so I drove up for a couple of days. Lynne took
me into Oklahoma City Saturday. First we went to the memorial at
the bombing site. Wow, surreal... I had forgotten my camera at
home so I missed a shot that would have probably become one of my
favorite photo's. We were standing and looking at the memorial
chairs of the victims, when a duck and about 8-10 ducklings waddled through. Now that was surreal,
life goes on. If you're ever close to OK City, it is worth the
side trip to see. Next was the Festival of Arts and we wondered
through the art & craft booths, mostly painters though, not much
glass. Now for the best, we walked over to the Art Museum to see the
Chihuly display, now that's a whole lot of glass. I told the
guard that one of the pieces was broken and I would be glad to remove
it for them, I don't think she believed me... Thank you Lynne, I
had a great time, don't forget to send my cook home soon, I'm starving
(footnote: Steve does all the cooking cause he's good at it and I suck
at it).
I drove back home this morning to go to an open house at Kittrell/Rifkind
Art Glass Studio in Dallas, they have given me the honor of
carrying my beads for sale. I got to see my friend Ginny
Hampton Schmidt demo beads for a couple of hours, saw Donna
Merrill again (she teaches there and it's been several years since I've
seen her), finally got to meet Marsha face to face, a customer who has
gone from being an email friend to just plain old friend, and of
course, owners David & Barbara Kittrell, wonderful fun people to
know.
Here's an update picture of my rosebush from 10 days ago. Over
half the buds are yet to open. The rose in my hand is from a bush in
the front yard, each year the flowers get bigger.
4/24/07
However many lives we think we have, this is the one one we need to
make the most of.
(from: What Cats Teach Us... Life's Lessons
Learned From Our Feline Friends by Glenn Dromgoole)
This is Mooch. He was born from a stray cat in
our barn. After his mother and siblings moved on, he stayed and
would come in to eat (thus the name mooch) but we were never able to
fully tame him. Thank you Cheryl, for the book.
4/19/07
This year one of my rose bushes brings a whole new meaning to the term
bush. I trimmed it back last fall and all of the purple leaves
are new to this year. This thing was an ugly monster out of
control 10 years ago. Now it's a beautiful monster under
control. We guestimated there are over 200 buds right now.
I counted 19 buds on this branch, that beats last years record of 13 on
one branch.
4/14/07
Spring has sprung
The grass has ris'
The taxes are done
I'm not a good poet
But I'm a happy one
We did some spring things in the yard a few days ago, one was to spread
some new mulch. I put some in front of the hole leading under my
studio and it hasn't been disturbed so I guess our little possums are
gone. phew Now on to the next 'friend' in the house. Except this one we
won't mind. Seems one of the stray cats has
found that where there are other cats, there is probably food. 'It' was
in the house twice today. Our fab four seem to be
indifferent about it. They will hiss and scare it, but don't seem
to be very bothered too much by it's presence, so we'll see. Mouse does
chase it around the yard, but they don't fight, so maybe
it's probably just a territorial thing. And the highlight of the
week... I had a local toolmaker make me a new mold. One of the
shapes is an inch long oval and I'm real excited about. Even
though the round bead will always be my main shape, it's nice to expand
my line. The others are a couple of barrels and a veeery long
thin barrel.
4/6/07
I guess the season for bringing friends into the house has
started. A couple of nights ago, we were sitting at our
computers (yes, we
have three, plus two laptops.. doesn't everyone? Well now a days,
if you're both self employed it's a must), anyway, gecko's are a
favorite around here, and sitting in the middle of the floor was the
biggest one I've seen yet. Gecko's and twigs are Jett's favorite
things to bring in, so I'm putting my money on it beeing her. Then
there was that noise at 4 AM. I
went out to see which two cats were having a spat and saw this huge rat run into a corner,
except rats don't have bunny ears.... A neighbor across the
street runs a salvage operation (that's PC for junk yard) in his back
yard. It's mostly behind a fence, goats keep it clean and the
cats & dogs keep unwanted critters and vermin's under
control. It's a small rural town and it's been there for over 50
years so he's just the lovable
old guy down the street. How's that for getting sidetracked....
This year he also has rabbits and how that bunny got in my house will
remain a mystery. (darn cat, now I want a bunny) Have a
peaceful Easter weekend.
4/1/07
If you haven't read yesterdays post, please read it first.
Just an update on our possum. The neighbors told us yesterday it
has been around for a while. Their dogs have had it tree'd a
couple of times. Dogs?? If you call something that is smaller
than our cats a dog, but I digress. Well, that darn critter was
in the house again when Steve got up, just having a lovely breakfast of
cat food. He managed to trap him in a corner so we stuck a cat
carrier in his only escape and just waited. Didn't take him long
to come out. We have a lake nearby that will make a lovely new
home for him. I'll be removing the 'beware of attack cats' sign
from the window.
3/31/07
If excitement also comes in three's, than we've had an exciting 24
hours here. I didn't quite tar the roof of my studio good enough
last summer, as I found out when the storm system went through last
night. I always thought it would be fun to have one of those
waterfall walls, and I got to have a temporary one for about half an
hour. 'Storms are gone, now I can settle in and have a peaceful
night of making beads." Yep, stayed up until 2:30 AM, got to
listen to Coast to Coast again, surreal. Went into the kitchen
before heading to bed, 'aw crap, what is that noise, sounds like water
running.' Nope, it wasn't rain leaking into the house again, this
was coming from under the floor. Steve mentioned to me a few
weeks ago that one of the toilets needed to have the tank stopper
replace cause he could hear water running. Nope, that wasn't the
toilet, it was a slow leaking pipe under the kitchen floor and you
could just hear it in the bathroom piping. I checked the utility
bills and realized it was slowly leaking for at least a couple of
months, but last night the house was just quiet enough to finally
notice it in the kitchen. I left a note for Steve and went to
bed. 5:30 AM he wakes me up. Nope, it wasn't to help fix
the pipe, it was to help corral a possum out of the house. Steve
was sitting at the computer when it came in the cat door, three cats
right behind it, as if to say, "Hay, come on in here, it's dry and
we've got good food. Can you stay a while and play?" Good
thing possums are nearly blind and slow moving, much easier to get out
than a mouse or bird. When I finally got up at 10:30, I found out
that he had come in for a second visit but decided he didn't like his
butt whipped with a broom, and he gladly left on his own. Now on
to the pipe fixing, those are never quick projects. The kitchen
has a hole in the floor and there's a thin layer of sawdust everywhere,
but the leak is fixed and I'll clean up tomorrow after we are sure it
will stay fixed. Finally it was 4 PM and we went to pick up a
ridding lawn mower Steve had located on craigslist.
So I tried it out, pretty neat, and did you know you can knock a wheel
off just by running over a decorative railroad tie? I think I've
had enough excitement for 24 hours.
3/29/07
It's gone, I miss it, but I sure don't regret that it went away. Had a
tooth pulled this week. Second from the back, upper left so
there is a lone tooth back there for now. Funniest darn
feeling. It's like having a wad of gum in your mouth that is
irritating the crap out of you cause there's nowhere to throw it away,
so you have to keep it tucked away in your cheek. Hay, maybe I
could fill in the gap with a wad of gum for now, hmmm, maybe not....
3/22/07
Ever wonder what's
on people's walls? Well, this is what I stare at every time I sit
at my computer. We went to New Orleans a few years ago and I
splurged on this ceramic & feather mask. It's as if those
eyes are looking straight into your soul. And of course, from my
stained glass days, copper is my favorite color.
3/18/07 Where do pets come from?
A newly discovered chapter in the Book of Genesis has provided the
answer to "Where do pets come from"? Adam and Eve said,
"Lord, when we were in the garden, you walked with us every day. Now we
do not see you any more. We are lonesome here, and it is difficult for
us to remember how much you love us."
And God said, I will create a companion for you that will be with you
and who will be a reflection of my love for you, so that you will love
me even when you cannot see me. Regardless of how selfish or childish
or unlovable you may be, this new companion will accept you as you are
and will love you as I do, in spite of yourselves."
And God created a new animal to be a companion for Adam and Eve. And it
was a good animal. And God was pleased.
And the new animal was pleased to be with Adam and Eve and he wagged
his tail.
And Adam said, "Lord, I have already named all the animals in the
Kingdom and I cannot think of a name for this new animal."
And God said, " I have created this new animal to be a reflection of my
love for you, his name will be a reflection of my own name, and you
will call him DOG."
And Dog lived with Adam and Eve and was a companion to them and loved
them. And they were comforted. And God was pleased. And Dog was content
and wagged his tail.
After a while, it came to pass that an angel came to the Lord and said,
"Lord, Adam and Eve have become filled with pride. They strut and preen
like peacocks and they believe they are worthy of adoration. Dog has
indeed taught them that they are loved, but perhaps too well."
And God said, I will create for them a companion who will be with them
and who will see them as they are. The companion will remind them of
their limitations, so they will know that they a> not always worthy
of adoration."
And God created CAT to be a companion to Adam and Eve.
And Cat would not obey them. And when Adam and Eve gazed into Cat's
eyes, they were reminded that they were not the supreme beings.
And Adam and Eve learned humility. And they were greatly improved.
And God was pleased. And Dog was happy. And Cat didn't give a shit one
way or the other.
3/14/07
I got bawled out again last night about not posting enough, so I guess
I'll try to stop in on my own blog more often. Darn daughter,
she's just too lazy to call to catch up on my news. Actually,
she's pretty busy. She works 25 hours a week as a pharmacy tech
and has a full load of classes, at opposite ends of the universe of
course. She'll graduate next winter with double degree's in
anthropology and geology. She'll be taking a geology field
trip to Montana for 6 weeks this summer, so hopefully I can talk her
into some pictures to post later in the year. (There Kara, bet
you're popping in to see what's new and all there is to read about is
yourself. haha) There has actually been a (lame) reason for me
not posting much lately. We have had three rounds of full blown
two week cold/flu episodes since Christmas. So my 'good' time has
been mostly spent on catching up with eBay, bookkeeping, cloths
washing, etc, and generally getting some energy back. And not a
minute too soon, spring is here and the yard is full of weeds. We
had them all weeded out last year (pun intended) but we sit on a
downhill corner lot and all the rainwater washes everyone's weed seeds
into our yard. With a bit of consistent 'WeedStop' spraying,
they'll all be gone soon. Then we're going to revamp the rock
garden again, tried to make a stream in it last year. We won't be
making that mistake again this year, just a simple waterfall without a stream will do
just fine, we like the noise of the waterfall.
3/9/07
I have two websites for you to take a look at and enjoy. The first was
sent to me by a friend and I have never been so awe stricken and felt
so insignificant. Akiane
is a child prodigy painter & poet and the only way to describe her
work is,
calming and profound. The second is an 'I need a good laugh' site my
daughter, Kara, found. Engrish
What is Engrish? The site defines it as: "the humorous English
mistakes that appear in Japanese advertising and product design".
2/25/07
Well I guess it's time to do an update again. The week has been a bit
daunting. I've been smelling a very faint gas leak for a while
(natural gas, not propane), so Steve went looking for it last week. We
live in a house built in 1902 so no project is just cut-and-dried. We
spent two days digging new trenches, tearing up part of the floors in
two bathrooms and rerouting & replacing pipes. Then two more days
replacing
floors, resheetrocking the wall behind the washer/dryer and painting.
But the good news is that I have a new washer & dryer and a marble
will not roll to the wall on at least 1/5 of the floor in the main
bathroom. The rest of the floor will wait until I save up some money
for some exotic type of tub. aaah We found three layers of floor in
the main bath too, the third was put right on top of the linoleum of
the second floor. Two layers of sheetrock on the wall with 3 different
wall papers. All in all though, I love our little old house, my only
regret is that when it was remolded in the 50's-60's, the originality
of it was destroyed. sigh
2/17/07
I love my cats, but sometimes they go too far. They usually
scatter around the room at night, but on cold nights, they like to pile
up at the foot of the bed. Sleeping in a fetal position can lead to back
aches.... Ya know those boxes that a magicians assistant lays in
while he stick swords into it? Well if you've ever seen the
inside of one, you know that the person is just contorted and twisted
like a pretzel around where the sword goes through the box. That's kind
of what our cats think they are training us for.
Now for some good stuff. I was up late last night so I turned on
Coast to Coast. I love that program and boy did George have a
good show. I've heard him talk about this topic before, but now
someone has actually put together a scientific team to explore the
"Hollow Earth Theory". I was making beads so I didn't listen all
that closely, just thought I would go to the website later, but it
doesn't say all that much about the expedition. sigh Here's the
gist: there's been a theory around for thousands of years that the
earth is hollow. A bunch of scientists have a Russian ice breaker
and three documentary film crews lined up to leave for the North Pole
on July 4, 2007, and yes, seats are available to the public. The
site doesn't talk much about the theory but they have a neat
picture of what the hole might look like. They (and
who are these "they" anyway) theorize the hole may be anywhere from 80
to 500 miles in diameter and that's why Admiral Bird didn't know he was
flying into it when he supposedly
did. It's too big to see from the ground. Dr. Agnew said
(on Coast to Coast) that the theory has the earth at round 700 miles
thick and being hollow, with the inside possibly having it's own
ecosystem, complete with intelligent life, and the sea linking the two
worlds. I'm confused on the gravity thing then. If gravity
keeps us on the ground by pulling us to the center of the planet, how
do they stay on the ground on the inside of the planet? Sure
hope one of the 'big boy' networks has one of the documentaries on
this fall.
2/1/07
Grab the other people in the house, sit down and be prepared 6 minutes
of laughing. Evolution
of Dance - YouTube video
1/28/07
I'm finally feeling better. Cold is gone, strep throat is gone,
sinus infection is gone, two rounds of anti biotics done with. All
that's left is to get my stamina back, but then, I've always liked
to sleep late and stay up late.
Our house was built in 1902 so it's a never ending fix-it-up
project. We have a couple of kitchen counter top tiles that
needed replacing so we decided to tackle that this weekend. Funny
how these things around here grow beyond the original project. The
caulk between the counter and the wall was discoloring, so we might
as well replace it too. Yeck, mold!! Not much, pretty
localized, and pretty old so it was dead, but still, it expanded the
project. We replaced a 1"x6" section of sheet rock behind the
sink and hoped we still had paint to match. Yep, phew. I
could just see replacing a few tiles growing into painting the whole
kitchen. The grout wasn't sealed yet, so it was pretty
interesting having cling wrap on the counter top so you can cook. Nope,
no take out in this house, not with Steve, an award winning BBQ
cook, doing all the cooking. He'd rather east sawdust
first. Come to think of it, we've done that before too.
1/18/07
I normally add a picture & caption to my
auctions, usually one of the cats. This time I thought
I would also post the picture here. Here is how I described it: we went out driving the other night after
the freezing rain. The lights in the park lit up the ice
accumulation on the branches of this tree. Looks like a great
character for a sci-fi movie. This has become one of my favorite
pictures. We didn't get a lot of ice on the roads here (north of
Dallas) but it's been a longer low 30's cold snap that we usually get.
1/3/07
I hope you all are having a good new year so far. Just a brief
summery of my holiday. Christmas was the Saturday before at our
house. Great, it came and it went, and so did the
relatives. Then Christmas day came and went, quietly, and so did
the hubby. He left the 26th for California to work until the
2nd. What a holiday, alone, with lots of time and peace and quiet
to myself to make lots of beads. Then it hit, the cold from h*ll,
and oh ya, strep throat, and with it an allergic reaction to
amoxicillin. My lovely time along turned into a History and
Science channel marathon. Not a total wash though, I learned all
kind of archeological things have happened in the past 30 years. I even
understand E=MC2 now, and the new theory of parallel
universes. Did you know King Hared made his 17 yr old
brother-in-law high priest of the Jews, then drowned him? On that
lovely note - I'm off to make my first bead in over 3 weeks. (did
I mention, I finished the last half of an afghan?)
12/23/06 this
years Lindsey lights video
We got back from Vegas a few days ago and blogging about it has
just not been on my list. If you've ever seen one of those shows
on TV about Vegas, well then, you've seen better pictures than I took,
so that saves me from uploading them.... It was wonderful though,
to see Kara & Dave again, and it was fun to watch Kara play the
penny slots, o-n-e p-e-n-n-y
a-t a t-i-m-e. And this was the first time I saw the
dealertainers at the Imperial
Palace. They have an area where the dealers are celebrities
impersonators and every hour or so, they get up on a stage and lip sink
a song, fun stuff, except Louis Armstrong sang live, wow, he was good.
Well, my Christmas is officially over. Yeehaa. We had the
gang in today, done, finished. Christmas just isn't the same for
me after loosing mom last year. It's getting easier though, and
maybe when I have grandchildren the season will be alive for me again. Merry Christmas
to all of you.
12/13/06
It's vacation time so the catalog will be down until Dec.19th. We
will be flying to Vegas and meet my daughter and her boyfriend
there. Then after someone wins their first big jackpot, we'll get
tickets to
The Beatles Cirque Du Soleil. The cheep seats are $130, times
four equals 'a big jackpot first'. Kara hasn't decided which
cheesy Christmas show to see, but we'll probably figure that out when
we get there. We've planned a rental car side trip into the
mountains so I'll have pictures next week.
11/30/06
Do you think this is a little bit toooo compulsive? We had been
babying these tomato
plants
since early spring. They finally
started to
produce fruit this fall so it was just a matter of "we will not give
up" when the arctic cold front hit last night (we're just north of
Dallas, Tx. don't ya just hate global warming). It went from 77
degrees yesterday to 26 last night. The cold snap will be too long to
just cover them up so we pulled up plants and all and drug them in the
house.
11/29/06
One last picture of my rose in full bloom.
11/27/06
Here is an updated
picture on my ruffled rose. It's in full bloom now, and the color
is actually a deep
burgundy rose, darker than the picture. There's still one more
bud but I don't expect it to survive the hard 20 degree freeze
that is suppose to hit in a couple of days. Couple of years ago,
one rose had a 3 foot long stem all to itself.
11/25/06
I pruned my rose bushes about a month ago and one had a few buds that I
decided to leave along. I went out to look at them today and got the
most lovely surprise. One is in full bloom, and it has ruffled petals.
It's not suppose to have ruffles. The second picture is from last year
from the same bush. Guess it has evolved or something. We
had a peaceful Thanksgiving this year, no one came over..... I
lost my mother at this time last year so it was fine with me to sit all
day with my sweetheart and watch TV..... and just be still.
11/18/06
This is the first
flower on my African
Violet that we bought a few months ago. This just amazes me, cause if
you want a plant to die, just give it to
me. But I have no problem with these plants.
I
stumbled across some of my first beads today. They're from the
summer of 2001, top set
in my hand. They didn't sell at the time and I'm glad now that I
still
have them. It's been quit an evolution. The bottom set on
eBay right now, so you can see the size difference. The old set
averages 5x10mm,
as compared to the 18mm that is my standard bead now.
11/10/06
At the risk of sounding like an advertisement page, I'm once again
going to push a product for ya'll to try. Zicam, you know, that stuff
they advertise that will "reduce the duration and severity of a cold"?
Wow, does it ever!! I've never had a 3 day cold before.
11/5/06
Do you like to try new flavors? Something you maybe wouldn't
stumble across on your own? I'm originally from North Dakota and
there are a few wild berries that we make into jelly. My favorite
is the chokecherry. Others
include buffaloberry, juneberry, sandberry and wild plum. These jellies
are hard to find, if non existent, in the south. I've lived in Texas
for 23 years now, and believe me, you just can't
find them here. Except for now, they finally made it to the
web. I am now in chokecherry heaven. The flavor is
undescribable, laterally, it's not like any other flavor you'll ever
taste. Here is a link to Dakota
Seasonings and Berry Dakota,
each has flavors the other doesn't have so look at them both. The
prices are reasonable and they would make a great unusual Christmas
gift.
10/29/06
What a wonderful way to spend a Sunday afternoon, I took a 4 hour
nap and then updated my bead catalog. Had to build up some mental
energy...
I've come to realize that my eBay customer base is quite different than
my web site in terms of # desired in a set of beads. So, I will
start to concentrate on making small sets specifically for the site
instead of someplace to stick my odds 'n' ends. I've also started
an email list to notify when I update with new 'stuff'. There's a
link on the 'Bead' page to email me if you want to be added. Phew, that
wore me out, think I'll go take another nap.
10/21/06
I took a picture of the full moon a few weeks ago. It came out
kind of blurred so I wasn't happy with it, but you know what? It
has grown on me since then, it has a bit of an eeriness to it. How many
faces can you see in the moon? So far, I've found five.
10/16/06
I didn't realize it had been that long since I posted last until my
daughter phoned me last nite to complain. Sorry Kara, I'll try to post
more often but when you lead a boring life... But, we did go to
the State Fair of Texas yesterday. It was drizzly all day, mostly
light, so the crowd was about 1/4 of what a
family-Sunday-at-the-fair-day should have been. Nice. I get
headaches from too much sun and heat and I love the rain anyway so this
was the most enjoyable fair visit I've ever had. Nope, I don't do
rides either. I'm one of those old fogies that goes for the food
and exhibits. They had a new thing this year, fried
cheesecake. Can you say 'seventh heaven'?? It's nothing
more than a frozen cheesecake log with fillo dough, deep fried with
powdered sugar sprinkled on top. But the freezing keeps the
cheesecake cold. The fair grounds has one of the largest ferris
wheel in the world and I took a picture that gives a pretty good sense
of how big it is, and you can see how crowded it was at three in the
afternoon at the state fair...on a Sunday.
10/6/06
I thought I would write something about beads this time. I've
started into another of what I call my "if you think you're done, add
something" style, some other bead makers are calling it "the kitchen
sink" style. Here is my latest set up on eBay
right now, ending 10/11. I though I would show you
what it took to make this set. 9 different colors of glass rods,
9 different stringers and 11 twisties. It took 1-1/2 hours to
pick the right contrasting colors and pull stringers &
twisties. Then it took another 2-1/2 hours to make the beads,
then overnight to anneal.
9/26/06 HAPPY BIRTHDAY DARYL Today is my brothers birthday and
tomorrow is mine. Just what every little six year old boy wants
for his birthday, a baby sister. Well, he probably got something
else too, but I'll bet he's toooo old to remember what it was....
9/23/06
As most of you know, my mother passed away in Nov this past year. My
children have had a second tragedy, their fathers mother (my ex) passes
away a couple of days ago, it was terminal cancer also. It was
her birthday today, she would have been 74. Fortunately, the
kids (I have two) traveled home earlier this week to visit her so they
will also be able to attend the funeral. My condolences to
my children, their father, grandfather and the family. That's
both grandmother in less than 10 months. You know the commercial
for the credit card with the punch line "life comes at you pretty
fast"? sigh
9/20/06
It's a bit of a surprise when you are taking a shower and you look down
and see a cat. Weazel loves to go outside and play in the rain so it
was only a matter of time before he decided to check out the shower
too.
Saturday
8/26/06
We got a new baby this week. Since Steve drives a lot of miles a year, we
wanted to go to a diesel engine vehicle. He drove in a Jetta
diesel but like baby bears bed, it was too small. He settled on a
Dodge Ram 2500 4-door pickup. Wow, am I impressed. More
pick up & go than any vehicle I've ever been in, extreeemely quiet
ride, just tall enough for me to fall out of when getting out, huge inside, room for 6
people and best of all, an engine that will last him for the next 10
years of driving 40,000 to 45,000 miles a year. He's
already enjoying being a bully on the road. You know the saying:
"I love my truck".
Thursday
8/24/06
When we constructed my new studio earlier this year I said, if nothing
else, the whole project was worth have the cat door. With 4 cats,
I was getting up 3-4 times a night letting someone in or out. Every
once in a while, they make me eat those words. Like the
other night when I was torching. I heard Weazel bolt in, there
was a commotion with Tina & Jett, jumping around, then
calmness. I knew it would be some sort of bug. It was a
gecko. I gather him up, along with his detached tail, and threw
him out but knew that wouldn't be the end of the hunt. Sure
enough, in the morning I found two more tails and will probably find
dead gecko's behind furniture next time I clean (which could be
months). Last week, Jett brought something
in to play with on the
bed in the middle of the night. I turned on the light but
couldn't find it. Next morning I found I had been hugging a
grasshopper all night. Last night around midnight the terrible
trio came zipping into the bedroom, bouncing around. I got up,
went to the kitchen to get a fly swatter, thinking it would be another
hoppy thing like a cricket or a grass hopper again. When I turned
on the bedroom light I discovered the hoppy
thing had wings. Luckily, the dove was unharmed, just
minus a few feather and his sanity. Glad I decided not to wait
till morning.
Friday
8/18/06 Ever feel like you are living in a
movie? That's how I felt this morning. I was sitting in my
studio making beads and a pecan hit the skylight. Then a couple
of more... Then a couple of more... "What the heck, it's
not windy". I'm very nearsighted and work without my glasses, so
I put them on and looked up. There were a couple of doves pecking
on the skylight, "oh, how cute". Then a couple of more peeked in,
"oh, how cute". I ran for the camera hoping they
would stick around for a picture. Then
they started growing in numbers instead of going away, "oh, getting
eerie". Twenty minutes later they were still there, "oh, now it's
scary". Must have been a dozen or more. What was the
ladies name in 'The Birds"? (had to go google it, it was
Melanie) Most of the pictures didn't turn out very well, but you can
see the shadows of more birds in this one. Pretty cool.
Tuesday
8/1/06 I
thought I was fairly adept at arranging flowers but arranging 3 dozen
roses was a bit of a challenge. Tough job but someone has to do it.
Thank you sweetheart.
(if you missed yesterdays post, it's our 10th anniversary)
Monday
7/31/06 HAPPY ANNIVERSARY STEVE That's one decade down, only 5 or
6 to go. All my love ! ! !
Saturday
7/29/06 Just
a short update to the last post. Steve has been out of town for
longer than usuall this time and I've had Murphy's law all week, no
catastrophes since I pulled the outside water faucet out of the house,
but just constant little stuff. Couple of days ago when I was
photographing some beads, my camera started to fall over on it's tripod
and when I went to catch it I knocked the snot out of my glasses. Got
them straightened out without breaking the frames though. Now
today, you know that yummy crispy chicken crust that always sticks to
the spatula? I had to have it, but fortunately the spatula wasn't
hot enough to blister my tongue, but it's not a pleasant tingle.
Wednesday
7/26/06 Wouldn't
you know it, whenever my husband goes out of town, I have some guy move
in. His name is Murphy and he follows me around and breaks
things. This time hasn't been too bad though (haha). When I
was watering a tree in the yard a few nights ago, he managed to pull
the faucet out of the house. So while I'm running around in a
panic trying to find the water shut off to that part of the house,
Murphy is standing there admiring the new waterfall coming out of the
side of the house. Well, at least I still have 2 other bathroom
that didn't get caught in the shut down, but dang, it's a chore to walk
all the way across the house just to go to the bathroom. waa Today he
broke the extension phone in my studio, now that
pissed me off. Brand new phone system, only a
couple of months old. Made me feel like a fool
the third time a customer
called and I picked up a different phone and heard "oh, can you hear me
this time?" "Sure, I was just distracted by my house guest Murphy
the first two times you called" sigh Can't wait to see what
tomorrow brings. Three more days till Steve comes home and Murphy
gets kicked out.
P.S. Just heard from my daughter and she was wondering who Murphy was,
sooo for all of you who are not familiar with him, it's a reference to
Murphy's law, if something can go wrong, it will. Kara - Murphy
is not a new cat.
Thursday
7/20/06 Well,
this morning our parsley was in danger of succumbing to the heat wave
but by evening it didn't matter. The leaves are half gone and I
counted at least 11 of these Black Swallowtail Butterflies. Seems
they lay their eggs on parsley. They were so camouflaged that I
didn't see them until I got up real close.
Tuesday
7/15/06 OMG, you have to see what my
daughter Kara sent me. I can't figure out if this is funny or
funky but I'm still giggling..this is just too cool.. I think I'm in
love. David
Hasselhoff's "Jump In My Car"
I took the opportunity this week
to travel out of town for a few days with Steve. He repairs injection
molding machines so he (obviously) has to travel all over to
manufacturing plants. We left Sunday and visited the bath houses at
Hot Springs Ark. Back in the 50's Steve's Aunt & Grandmother would
drag him along when they would go to the spa's. He was
just knee-high to a grasshopper so he doesn't remember much, but then
it probably wouldn't be all that exciting to any little kid, then or
now. None the less, it was a nice
little nostalgic trip for him and a glimpse into his past for me. Only
one house has been restored as a museum, wow, I was really
surprised at how accessible they left it. The only things behind glass
were rooms with things that could easily be stolen. ie: the beauty
salon, gym. I've only uploaded a few pictures. Take a
look at this shower.. we think a dozen shower heads is new? And I just
can't imagine sitting in one of those steam things, makes me
uncomfortable just looking at them. Having my roots in stained glass,
the Neptune ceiling just blew me away.. and don't you just love the
rates. Obviously the Fordyce
Bathhouse Tour on the National Park Service web site has
much better pictures, check it out, they're all on one page.
Wednesday
6/21/06
(for the entire blog history of
the studio, visit my bio
page)
Introducing my new studio. Yeehaa.
I've ammassed so many hobbies so this is a dream I've had since
high school. No more sharing space with our home office, no more
dragging something out to use it because there is no space to leave it
setting out. I have stations for taking pictures and cleaning
beads. The cabinet in the first photo houses my last remnants of
stained glass and the photo tent is sitting on my old light box. I have
also tooled leather, crocheted, quilted and made stained glass
kaleidoscopes. The cabinet in the second
photo houses my latest passion, making jewelry with my own beads. And
with 4 cats, I especially love the cat door in the wall next to the
oxygen tank.
And here's the good stuff, my
greatest passion (and income generator). My torch table, glass next to
me, the kiln within reaching distance and a smaller second kiln waiting
for me to learn to fuse.
I love this wall, it use to be the
outside of the house and we just left the siding on and painted
it. Someday soon it will be host to 10 feet of storage units
instead of cat toys. Speaking of cat toys, we plan on putting a
jungle gym of ramps on the this wall around the storage
units. Can you spell s-p-o-i-l-e-d ?
Weazel and Tina already had
their first fight over sleeping space at the window.
Sunday
5/7/06 Found some rather interesting
things in
the grass this week.
This is Jett and I love this shot.
You can see by the full size of the tree how small the bee is.
Sunday
4/16/06 I caught this
picture of the
Easter Bunny
putting eggs in our yard this morning. Sure glad the Easter
Hunters visited and found all those pesky eggs filled with candy and
money so we would have to go look for them ourselves.
Saturday
4/1/06
Well now I'm really excited. I've
been wanted for a long time to have a separate studio, one that didn't
include our home office. My own little recluse place to go to
concentrate on my glass work, might even make a few kaleidoscopes
again. We decided to close in the back patio area. Yesterday we tore
down the patio roof, hauled off the old cement and
laid down a sub-floor today. Since we'll be using two exterior
walls we'll only have to put up two walls and
roof it in. This is a week-end warier project that we will be
doing ourselves but I hope it won't take too long. Hot days come
very quickly here in Texas. Too much of a mess, maybe I'll take
pictures of construction later, but definitely when it's done.
Tuesday
3/28/06
Do any of you ever listen to Coast to
Coast AM on late night radio? It starts here at midnight. I
like to hear about some of the stuff that people actually believe
in. Last night was about shadow people again. I have to admit, this
subject creeps me out and I usually wind up turning it off. Here are
some quotes from last nights guest and will tell you why it's
freaky... Shadow people
have been around since the beginning of time and are a dark influence
upon society. They also relate to negative alien entities such as the
Reptilians and
Greys, and may in fact be part of the same overall phenomena.
Typically, shadow beings don't like to be spotted but they are
sometimes discovered by a person who wakes up to find them trying to
choke or suffocate them. I have 4 cats so of course if I'm working
on my torch while listening about shadow people any little noise behind
me, well, lets just say that I have a few flame scars. hehe Just so
you don't think that Coast to Coast is always off beat, they talk about
a wide verity of things like the climate changes, building a base on
the moon, the influence of prayer on healing, even the bird flu.
Saturday
3/18/06 New fish
beads in the catalog and a couple of new links to the
left. I've gotten a little lazy with pictures of new techniques
that I've been playing with. I'm having a great time with the
raku though. Most of my auctions lately have raku beads. Here is my
favorite set. The auction is closed but you can have a
look at the beads. It's tax time for me (slow at that too)
so by this time next week I expect I'll be half bald. I'm off to
visit my dad for a couple of days next week, I think I'll need the rest
by then.
Thursday
3/9/06 Here is a preview of
the beads with gold
leaf that will be up on eBay from 3/9 till 3/16. Big patches of
gold leaf, raku swirls, urchin twisties and all that sparkle is silver,
topped with metallic dots. This was a compilation of several some
of my old standard favorite things to do and a few new things, like the
gold and raku. I'm doing a bunch of raku fish today so look for
them Saturday night (3/11) in my catalog. Tomorrow is play
day. A friend & I are going to the gem & mineral show in
Dallas. I think I hear a sucking noise pulling money out of my
purse. Yep, I'm sure of it, it's building into a roar.
Monday
3/6/06 Oh boy am I in hog (or
rather, glass)
heaven today. I got some of the new blue silver leaf today and my
first gold leaf, and last week a freind gave me my first raku. I'm only
behind on the raku craze by a 1-1/2 years and of course, gold
has been around as long as glass beads. I'll try to get up some
pictures in a couple of days.
I also have some new fish
up for sale in my catalog.
Thursday
3/2/06 Well the books are on
their way, Bead
Review 2005 should have been shipped out to all the people selected to
be publish in the book. Can't wait to see which one of my beads
made it in. I haven't heard when it will be available for the
public to buy but as a participant, we were offered a discount for
additional books. I got 5 extras, two for my kids and one for
each of my bathrooms. hehe I've made it into two other
publications but only by osmosis, once in
someone else's jewelry and
once in a Corina Spotlight. This is my first real bona fide
print. Can you tell I'm excited? There is a new silver on
the market, it has been "treated to add a blue coloring". Not
sure what that means but I ordered mine last night along with my first
gold leaf. Can't wait to experiment with my new metals next week,
like a kid in a candy store. I'll post pictures.
Thursday
2/16/06 It's been a while
since I have
talked
glass beads. It's taking a while for me to get back into the
swing but I've made several sets in the past couple of weeks. Round,
round and more round. I bought a mold to make 'round'
beads and I just love working with my new mold, much more fun
than a press. I can now see myself someday
advancing into glass blowing, my kids have been hounding me to that for
a long time now. I've even made a few fish lately. They're up for
sale on the fish page. I've had a bit of a problem
trying to get them to sell on eBay so they will be then exclusively on
the site from now on. I am hoping that the book 'Bead Review
2005' by Deanna Griffin Dove & Brad Pearson will be in my mailbox
soon. It was my first juried event to enter and I made it
in. I'm still ecstatic to have been selected.
Thursday
2/9/06 Someone showed me this
story and
remarked
that there are twenty books of the bible hidden here. He
challenged me
to find them. Sure enough they're all there. Still this thing's a
lulu, kept me looking so hard for the longest time. Some of you
will
get bogged down with facts, other are hit by them like they were some
kind of revelation or something. You may get in a jam, especially
since the names are not capitalized and often leap the spaces between
the words. This makes it a real job to find them but it'll
provide a
most fascinating few minutes for you. Yes, there are some really
easy
ones to spot, but don't get the big head cause truthfully you'll soon
figure that it would take most federal judges and preachers numbers of
hours to find them all. I will admit that it usually takes a
minister
to find one of them and that is not uncommon for there are to be loud
lamentations when it is pointed out. One lady says that when she
is
confronted with puzzles like this she brews a cup of tea to help her
concentrate better, but then this gals a real pro! Verbs, nouns,
and
all that stuff are her thing. See how well you can compete. Relax!
There really are twenty names of the bible books in this story. If you
fail to find them there's a penalty. You'll have to go fly a
kite, sit
on a banana, hum the battle hymn of the republic, or hose a dog (a mean
one). Get to it!
Saturday
1/28/06 It's been a whirlwind
few months.
My
daughter was going to come to south Texas to visit her grandparents
(my parents) last December 14th. Mom had been fighting cancer for
2 years. But on November 15th she was diagnosed as
terminal. On the 16th I (and my son Arik) went to be with my
parents (I'm 350 miles away)and mom passed away the 28th (see my tribute
to my mom). I went home a week later. Kara was
heartbroken, she still had her airplane tickets so I went back for a
short vacation with her since dad had taken mom's remains back to North
Dakota to be buried. I went home for a couple of days then back
to dads again for Christmas. Back home for one day then on to
Hawaii for 12 days. Back home for a couple of days then back to
dads (again). He had been putting off knee surgery while mom was
ill and decided to have it done while we were gone to Hawaii. My
sister had taken time off to be with dad after the first funeral and
was still there but flying out the day after he would get out of the
hospital and I would take over helping with his home recovery. He
had his right knee done and couldn't drive for a while. Mom's
brother and wife will help him for a few days then he'll be in the
clear and on his own. We worry about him though, mom & dad were
married for almost 60 years. Yep, it's been a whirlwind few
months for me, but nothing compared to what my parents went
through. Mom's final 6+ months were painful for her to endure and
arduous for dad to watch. Thank God, Time heals the
heart and rearranges the memories.
Tuesday
1/12/06 two versions of our
trip to
Waikiki,
Oahu, Hawaii the short
version - 32 of the best pictures the long
version - 337 pix and lots of sunsets
Tuesday
1/10/06 Aloha. Hope your
holidays were
memorable. I'm back from vacation in Hawaii and I have some great
pictures. We were gone 12 days and landed at 5:45am after an
almost 8 hour flight so I am tired and have a lot to catch up on and
will update with some fantastic sunsets later. I have so much
cloths to wash that for the first time in my life I could separate the
colored wash into colors, one load of red, one load of blue, etc.
That's a funny feeling. My father had knee surgery while we were
gone and since mom passed away my sister and I are helping with his
recovery process (it is recommended not to drive for 30 days). This
week-end I'll go and take over for a week to two weeks, so I'm not
opening my catalog up until I get back.
Monday
12/22/05 A blonde goes to the post office to
buy
stampls for her Christmas cards.
She says to the clerck, "May I have 50
Christmas stamps?"
The clerk says, "What denomination?"
The blond says, "God help us. Has
it come to this? Give me 6 Catholic,
12 Prosbyterian, 10 Lutheran
and 22 Baptist." A Texas Christmas at the Alamo, went
their
last week with my daughter Kara.
Monday
12/13/05
There's
a new series
of books being published entitled Bead Review 200? with the 2005 being
the first in the series. I was informed by Deanne Dove
(co-author with Brad Pearson) that one of my beads has been chosen to
be 1 of only 50 in the book. Can you tell how ecstatic I am? Mom
would
have been so proud, but then I'm sure she was watching as they put the
'congratulations' letter in the mail to me. This one's for you mom.
Monday
12/5/05
My
biggest bead fan is gone. Tribute
to my mom.
Tuesday 11/15/2005
My
catalog will be temporarily down. My mother had surgery this
morning and she is gravely ill. She has been battling cancer for
2 years now and I am going to help out. Please pray for my
mother, and my father, and her caretakers. Thank you.
Sunday 11/6/2005
I
have some new eye candy in the gallery
if you would like to have a look. I've also revamped the focals
and sets pages of the bead catalog. Been having a lot of fun
working on refining my fish and there has been a favorable response on
eBay. Yeehaa Have gotten a few tips from people and the
fins are really starting to take on a better shape.
Tuesday 11/1/2005
Last
week I got together with a few bead buddies and we had a 'bead day', it
was a blast. We didn't do a whole lot of torching cause we were
so busy exchanging info and ideas but Jennifer (our host) did make us
one of her famous fish. Some of her fish are the size of your
fist. Just awesome. Well this week I got adventuresome and
started making fish. Here are my first two, they will stay in my
collection but start looking for them on my auctions.
Wednesday 10/21/2005
My
tribute to Maggie, that's her on the right.
This has been a very sad week for me. I lost my treasured cat
Maggie. We found her in the corner of the yard so she was
probably hit by a passing car. We have 5 cats and several of them
are lap cats but Maggie was my snuggle bum. Sometimes when I was
typing on the computer she would come and stand between me and the
keyboard until I would giver her a good long hug, then she would settle
into my arms and sleep while I worked. She was big and fluffy,
slept on my pillow and was always near by. Maggie was the 'top dog' so
it has been interesting to watch the other 4 since their whole social
structure was based around her. Tina was her litter mate sister and
they were as attached as any human twins would have been, she is
obviously lost. Maggie was a tortie, very territorial, she immediately
took over the rule of the house from Mouse who had been hear for 5
years prier to her. Mouse is a little crosseyed so it was easy to
terrorized him until she had established her 'queenhood', I don't think
he misses her but he notices her absence. Weazel and Jett were the
bottom of the ladder and although they seem to look for her from time
to time, the only thing that seems to have changed for them is that
there is no play time at night like there use to be. Everything
centered around Maggie so they seem to be a little lost, but not nearly
as bad as I am.
Wednesday 10/10/2005
We
had a special guest at our bead meeting this week-end. Her name
is
Baylie, she's 6 years old and she has Chiari Malformation &
Psuedotumor Cerebri. That's OK, it was all Greek to us too but in a nut
shell it is a condition that causes the base of the brain to protrude
below the skull and crowd into the spinal canal. I spoke to her
mother and found out she has had 2 brain surgeries so far and an almost
constant headache. At the time Baylie was diagnosed their was very
little research, almost none, it is rare in adults and almost unheard
of in children. Baylie had seen a Lance Armstrong bracelet and when her
mother explained that the proceeds went toward research, Baylie said "I
can do that". Remember she was 3 at the time. This gal is astounding.
She has been selling bracelets for the past 3 years and her mother said
she has raised $25,000 dollars just since May of this year, one
bracelet at a time. She is selling them on her website Baylie
for Braines.com for a $5 donation. I do hope you will check
it out.
Wednesday 9/242005 (check out
the bead catalog, I have some fall colored beads up)
Howdy
ya'll. I've been absent for a while. Just seems to take a
while to get back into the swing after vacation but this is
ridiculous. eBay sales have been horrible this summer so I
figured it was time to jump off into another phase of beadmaking. I've
been making focal tubes lately and a couple of weeks ago decided
to try long barrel focals. They have to be formed by hand and I
am having the best time making these things. My longest to date
is 2-7/8 inches long but one of the ends broke (that learning curve
thing) so I get to keep it. Funny, my hand really isn't that stubby,
it's just the angle it's laying at. Just had to stick that
disclaimer in their.
And here is a preview of a set that I'm working on. When it's finished
it will be on eBay. I love the color combo so I'm adding some
rounds to it.
Thank God for all the preparations for hurricane Rita. It's
Saturday afternoon so she is well inland as I write this with no deaths
as of yet. How amazing is that??? (keeping
my fingers crossed and praying a lot) We live
just north of Dallas and were predicted to get 50-60 mile an hour or so
winds. Since she took her northern turn before landing we only
got a couple of small wind gusts. We sure could have used the
rain but I'm glad she decided to downgrade and come ashore in less
populated areas instead. I can always put the sprinkler
out. Don't forget, give money, not cloths and here's why.
Here's a picture of our little corner of the hurricane. I'm a
cloud lover.
Wednesday 9/14/2005 I'm back
and I had the time of my life with Kara & Dave in Seattle. We went
to the glass museum in Portland, drove around Puget Sound
in the rain, saw the Fremont Troll, ate at Crabpot where
they dump your seafood on the table and eat with your hands, saw a
silent movie starring Harold Lloyd (can't remember the name but it's
the one where he climbs the outside of the building, I held my
breath). Then came the best part, Dave went to work and Kara
& I went shopping. I am now the proud owner of a pair of
shoes from Macy's (well, it better than Walmart shoes). Got to
ride the bus half a dozen time (little things thrill me), got to be an
ave-rat (those are the people who hang out in the University of
Washington shopping/entertainment district better known as the U
district), had plenty of Starbucks but will have to admit that
Seattleittes are right that Tully's is better, went to a book signing,
watched 5 hours of old Star Treks in one sitting, got up late and
stayed up late (how do mothers and daughters find so much to talk
about), spoiled her cat rotten (she has a
Balinese), met the Russian tortoise and water dragon.
Then came the crowning jewel, I got to meet Peg Medill. If
you're not familiar with Peg's challenge here is a short thread on WC. I'll
put some pictures up after I dig out my camera. Not counting
family, I have met two ladies in my life that have touched my soul, in
my brief encounter with her Peg became the third. Landed at DFW
at 9:30 Sunday night, Steve had to be in Louisiana on Monday so we
headed for Houston to at least get half way their. Steve fixes
injection molding machines so he travels a lot and it's been a long
time since I've gone out with him. Guess he
forgot I hadn't seen our 5 cats in over a week cause he didn't bring
them with. Landed back home late Tuesday night so today I'm
washing cloths and playing with cats. I'll write
more
later when I put up pix.
Thursday 9/1/2005
Well I'm
goin fishin. Packing my bag and going to Seattle. Why do we get
stupid? I haven't seen Kara in a little over three years, you'd think
it was on the other side of the globe. Found a nonstop flight from
Dallas to Seattle, I figured it was worth the $40 extra to not sit in
the Salt Lake airport for 2 hours. I love Seattle and this time I plan
on taking a few more pictures just for those of you who are getting
tired of only seeing my cats on the auctions. Got to get one of the
troll under the bridge.
I've taken the catalog down and will put it back up on the 12th and I
have one auction on for a 10 day stint so don't forget me. The
focals page will begin to look a bit different, I've started to make
long barrel focals and am really enjoying it.
Sunday 8/14/2005
Well it
only took me 6 months to get my act together and put some of my
husbands copper
countertop wine glass racks up for sale. We gave a
bunch of these away for Christmas present's and they were a big
hit. I had wanted him to make a wooden rack, something like the
ones mounted under a cabinet or overhead in a bar, but for a countertop
area. He came up with a copper one instead and I love the metal
idea for a bar area and copper is my favorite metal. It also
serves to drip dry the glasses on, just put a towel over the base to
soak up the dripping water. Oh, he's so clever, we will include
glasses and wine glass charms made with some of my beads.
Friday 8/5/2005
This is too
bazaar and I had to share it with you. Last night my husband and I got
to talking about a friend who is in Ohio on business. Well the friend
has gone fishing a couple of times already and we wondered if he took a
fishing pole, can you just see someone walking down a terminal with an
8 ft fishing pole (maybe he borrowed one from a friend)? Do you
remember the Ronco Pocket Fisherman? Well I had to see if it was still
around, yep, Ron's still selling them. But here's the best part, you
can buy artwork on his site. You can get Van Gogh's Starry Night for
$425, Ronco
and Van Gogh teaming up, go figure.
Tuesday 8/2/2005
Well I
finally figured out the pesky little glitch in my shopping cart. Took
me all night to get it straightened out so if you've been one of
the lucky ones who got an error when checking out, you can come back
now. I've also added some options for shipping, something I
should have done long ago. Is it hot enough for you where you
are? We put up one of those above ground swimming pools this
year. Not big enough to swim in but big enough to get ya out of
the heat and fun enough to get kids out of the house. That's the
best part.
Sunday 7/31/2005
My
husband in on an internet forum that is mostly made up of locals within
a couple of hundred miles of the Dallas metroplex and every once in a
while they get together. Just
when I was getting
use to being a stay-at-home fuddy duddy they decide to have a party
theme Saturday night I can't resist, Texas holdup poker. I love to
watch the game but don't really like to play so I volunteered to be the
dealer all night. It only took me 7-1/2 hrs to deal a straight flush
but if you think of the odds it's lucky one got dealt at all. The fun
part was all these guys throwing money at me and I didn't have to do
anything in return for it. It's a fun game if you've ever wanted to
play I recommend PokerRoom.com,
there is no software to download on this site.
Sunday 7/24/2005
Not
much to write about, just the dog days of summer, eBay is ok, sales
here on the site are slow. Guess you guys are all out selling
bookoos at the art shows, go get um. My sale in the focals will
last until August 1, then I will put up a whole new bunch of
focals. The extras and sets will be combined into one page and
will be completely replenished every Monday night too. So if
there's something you want in these two pages, get them this week cause
they'll be gone Monday night 8/1. Later, dudes.
Sunday 7/10/2005
It
was about time to feature Mouse again and he gave us one of his
'dead-dog' posses this week. Mouse is laid back but cross-eyed
and completely freaks when you try to pet him. *** My heart goes out to
the residents in the way of hurricane Dennis. I was working for
FEMA when Andrew hit. The financial devastation a super hurricane
can leave is hard to imagine, you will hear estimated total figures,
how much is a billion anyway?, but processing individual claims is a
sobering reality of devastated lives. And then there is London,
what a bunch of troopers our parent country has. *** Stop over and take
a look at my new line called Southwest,
it's replacing my Black Velvets.
Monday 7/4/2005
Well,
Happy Independence Day to the
greatest country that ever existed. We wound up at to the Lone
Star Park yesterday. The races were great, I staked out a
10 inch ledge inside an air conditioned crowded beyond belief building
while my husband braved the near 100 degrees outdoors with friends. He
saw them live while I watched 3 inch horses gallop across a TV monitor,
not sure who was the wise one in this situation. But we have been told
Lone Star has some of the most spectacular fireworks in the Dallas
metroplex. When we went into the park they handed us those funky
little 3D glasses and got a few pretty cool fireworks pix through
them. I got a new camera earlier this year and it has a setting
specifically for firework, go figure, guess I'll have to move next to a
Disney park so I can use it more than twice a year. Anyway, here's my fireworks
pixs.
Sunday
6/26/2005 For
some time now I've been wanting to start doing something different
again. Lentils are fun to make and wear and they sell great for
me but... I've made hearts before but have struggled to sell them so
this week I delved into long focals. Had a great time too and
realized my skills are more advanced than I have been giving myself
credit for. Now I have a whole new pallet for my style. This focal was
the first one I made so I kept it. A while back,
Heather of Red Ocean
made this watch for me with some of the first beads I made
and
I love the watch so much that I
replaced the so-so beads with my new focal and it looks so much better
and wears beautifully. I have a watch fetish and this is my
all-time favorite one. I go back to still having my a wind-up
watch I had as a kid. Oh ya, there's my Mickey Mouse watch from
the seventies with the neon green band, a pendent watch bought with
green stamps and a Jetsons movie watch. FYI: look for the focals
on eBay.
Sunday
6/19/2005
Just a little bit of the tropics in my own
front yard here in Texas. When I first moved into this house I didn't
know what this tree was so I kept trimming it from the bottom like the
previous owners. Then it bloomed & I realized it was a hibiscus and
not a tree. There is a white one on the side of the house & when
that one blooms I'll post pictures of it too. I'm off to get a pina
colada smoothie and sit by the above ground pool we put up this year.
Well, it will have to do for now.
Satruday 6/11/2005
I have a new love. This is one of the new 'odd'
lot colors that has come our recently. It's called green ocean
and it is a spectacular color. These are up on eBay this week and
will run from Saturday nite (6/11) till Thursday nite (6/16). There is
also a separate auction of a focal to match. The glass
runs from opaque to semi-translucent and comes out with striations so
it has movement to it. I know as soon as they sell I will be
p*ssed cause I like them so much. Oh ya, I'll make myself some
more just like them, sure-sure. I did manage go pull one out of
the set to keep so maybe in the future (near future) I'll sit and make
some more, hmmmmm, what should I change about them? Well, I'm off
to play with fire and see what happens.
Thursday
5/12/2005
Last
year I was diagnosed with a condition that puts me at 4 times greater
risk for breast cancer, a few months ago the condition still existed so
last week I started to take tomaxifen cause it's approved for breast
cancer prevention. What a joy ride I've been on, if there's a
side effect to a drug you can bet I'll get it. I'm off of it
already and found this article entitled Tamoxifen
- A Major Medical Mistake? That stuff has
some
nasty long term side
effects. California's Carcinogen Identification Committee
even added it to their list of all known carcinogens. It's been a
roller coaster for cancer lately. A year and a
half
ago my mother had a double mastectomy for breast
cancer, done - gone - take care of. Then a year ago they
discovered cancer in her colon, 11 inches were removed. Chemo and
radiation followed. The radiation was too hard on her and she landed in
the hospital on an
I.V.
for 9 days so they stopped the treatment early...too early. A
few months ago she lost another foot of colon to cancer and it had also
spread to both ovaries and some nodes. She is taking chemo and
radiation separately this time and the after surgery problems have all
been cleared up so she is doing pretty well now. And
it's a good thing too, she's 79 and one of the hardest things she's
ever had to do was cancel going to the national bowing tournament in
Tulsa OK. But they'll make it to dads family reunion come hell or
high water. Grandpa was a homesteader in the Dakota Territory and
my father is one of 17 kids. Dad was 8 when grandma died giving
birth to their 12th. Grandpa married a widow with 4 kids and then
came baby Carol to tie them all together. We have a reunion every
5 years and with some of us cousins being great-grandparents ourselves,
I counted over 500 in the last family cook-book and that was 5 years
ago. You think you come from a small town? Check out New
Leipzig North Dakota, I think the
population is around 275
now.
Saturday
4/23/2005
I bought a new
kind of
rose bush this year
from Heirloom Roses. It's called a
Chihuly rose and if you are familiar
with Chihuly
glass
you will
know why it is named after the glass artist. The bush
is just a sprig so the roses are the size of a miniature
rose and are delicate and beautiful.
Saturday
4/16/2005
(Just
put up an new batch of "Heathers Monets" in the 'beads' section, please
have a look.)
I have a new
favorite comedian, his name
is Steve
Bridges. We saw him for
the first time on Comedy
Centrals roast of Jeff Foxworthy. When in makeup and in
character, you almost can't tell him apart from President Bush. The
reason I like him is because he doesn't take cheep
shots. I have heard that even the president likes to listen to
him so that should tell you how funny his material is. I like our
current president but don't always agree with him, but ya got ta
respect a man that can laugh at himself.
Thursday
4/7/2005
In
case you've been
wondering what that
photography page is
all about, Silver Paw Studio is my daughter Kara and her boyfriend
David. David works full time but has a degree in photography and
is
getting into freelance. Kara makes jewelry, works in a pharmacy
and is
attempting to finish out her degree in
biochemistry-something-or-other. So with all that stuff going on,
their
portion of the site is mostly under construcion. Here are a few
of the
links they have going, of course they are the pictures of the pets and
since they live in Seattle, you get coastal pixs. kitty
ratamadeus
& elvisoregon
coast
n
h
