Lace Parade

I finished my latest bead embroidery project yesterday. It is a 21" Chenille stitch necklace and a bead embroidered pendant that is 2 1/2" wide by 4" long.

It is up for auction here for the next 29 hours, if you're interested :-)

My next project is already in the beginning stages but I can't post pictures as it's a surprise for someone.

Thanks for stopping by :-)

Independence Delay

Been almost two months since I posted so I guess it's time to catch up. The mystery sickness I had for so long has finally been determined to be fatty liver. Most likely hereditary and the explanation for a lot of other problems. Drastic diet changes and more exercise will hopefully take care of it relatively quickly. I had a spot in my right kidney when I went to the emergency room a few months ago, and I went in for an high definition CT scan and it's not cancerous. I still have to have an endoscopy done to make sure that I don't have and am not developing esophageal cancer, but I'm not worried about that.

Today is Independence Day in America and a phone call I had has brought to my attention that you can tell a real  American holiday by whether people wish you to be safe or to have a good day. Everything about Independence Day and New Year's is always bid to be safe- today meaning not to blow your fingers off or burn down your house.

We spent the first two weeks of June visiting family in South Carolina, so I wasn't home to work on any projects. I did, however, learn peyote stitch and made a small bracelet for my mother-in-law.

After getting back home, I decided I was finally going to teach myself to do bead embroidery, so I have two in-progress pieces. The first is a blue pendant with a druzy agate center focal and a faux pearl, and the necklace is my first attempt at twisted herringbone peyote stitch. The second is a piece I started last night. The large focal is a Czech glass button and the two smaller buttons were in an old can my grandmother had.

We found this zombie troll out in our front garden a couple nights ago. We think someone left him here last Halloween. We left him out there because he fits in. 

Husband and I will be celebrating our sixth wedding anniversary in 11 days. He got me a Lego Castle set because I never had Legos as a kid and I've recently taken up and obsession with them. My favorite thing is to put the characters in compromised situations (where they're usually prisoners or dead) and posting photos to facebook. I was very proud of myself for getting most of it put together without looking at the book. So here's a picture of my cat as she was waiting for me to look away so she could chew on the wizard's hat. 

Anyway, that's all that's happened lately. I've been feeling much better and it's nice to be creating again. 

April Showers bring May Flowers. Mayflowers bring smallpox.

Haven't updated much lately because I haven't felt like I've done anything. Mystery sickness is still hanging around a little bit, but I'm working on getting back in the creative saddle. So here are creative happenings from the last couple weeks.

Daughters turned 3 and 5 last week (they share the same birthday, two years apart). These were their cakes - ying and yang, light and dark, half and half, flora and fauna. They were happy and I was satisfied with my first ever attempt at drawing a koi fish. The cakes were marbled Devil's Food and butter cake with raspberry filling and vanilla buttercreme.

Next comes jalapeno peach, and jalapeno strawberry jam. We were out after mailing a bunch out as Pay It Forward and Christmas gifts, and they make an amazing glaze on pork or chicken so I had to make more. 

Third grade at Son's school did a mini-society project where every kid had to make something worth selling, then they earned fake money for a couple weeks and sold their stuff and bought goods from the other third graders. His project was a pillow box with three glass beads in it, tied with a ribbon. Each one was different. 

I've spent the last week or so working on seed bead projects. These are peyote stitch. I've now made three similar sets and have moved on to starting a spiral tubular piece that will be turned into a bracelet if I ever finish it. 

This table and chairs set was found by a friend in North Carolina as she wandered an antique shop. So I plan to take the stain off and re-do the upholstery. It will make a perfect addition to my Painted Lady house. 

So that's that. No updates don't mean no work, though it feels that way to me. Thanks for stopping by :-)

Uh oh! Guess What Day It IS?!

Guess. What. Day. It. Is.

Hump Daaaaay!

There is a nest of tiny birds somewhere right outside my office window and they have quite a story to tell this morning. I am glad they waited until the sun was up before they decided to sing the song of their people so loudly.

Today we are doing laundry and trying to get the house somewhat ready for a large birthday party this coming weekend. The carpets need cleaned anyway since they haven't been cleaned since before the floods last fall and I'm sure the dogs have tracked in obscene amounts of mud over the winter. I also really need to throw out a bunch of stuff that's been sitting around forever so now is as good a time as any.

I made one bead yesterday but it took five tries for me to get the core finished without my bead release breaking for no apparent reason, and I'm so glad I didn't give up on it because it is technically the best bead I've ever made. It even slid off the mandrel like melted butter. It's currently on a 24 hour auction on the facebook page Lampwork Beads for Sale but here picture collage of all sides of it. It did take three tries to get the cubic zirconia to stick but well worth the effort, I'd say

Also, congratulations to my little sister who ran off and eloped over the weekend. We were all starting to wonder if she and he were ever going to get married, so there was that surprise. 

Anyway, that's what I've got for today. Thanks for coming by.

Pretty in pink

Yesterday I wrapped my new rod of goldstone in a striking pink before pulling it into stringer. This is the result.

I'm very fond of this new purple and the pink together, so I may be expanding upon this idea. I also have some French renaissance ideas to combine with some gothic elements that I'd like to experiment with translating into glass. So maybe some new stuff coming soon. 

Splitting Hairs

I have a friend who got married back in October. When she met her to-be spouse, she had VERY short boyish hair. She grows it out really long and cuts it all off every few years. She has done so as long as I have known her. She grew her hair out long for their wedding and now that they're back from their honeymoon, she wants to cut all of her hair off again. Her spouse is saying "no" to every style she's chosen. It makes me wonder; if her hair was acceptable when they were dating, why is it unacceptable now?

Anyway, I made some beads yesterday. Nothing too spectacular as I've been away from the torch for months and I'm very out of practice (and I had to force myself to get started in the first place), but I've finally got some goldstone that I actually LIKE, and I've got some ideas for dichroic additions to my beads. I made a small dread slider yesterday, and a bunch of small beads for Beads of Courage, and this cone-y tube thing.

Shaped a little strangely at the top because I'm out of practice but I like it anyway. I had a couple people remark that it reminds them of butterflies or dragonflies and that has given me some interesting ideas that I want to play around with. I may add it to my Release A Bead stash, or save it to send out as a bonus for Etsy sales. I'm undecided. 

Anyway, we celebrated Son's 9th birthday on the 26th and this weekend we're having a big birthday party for him and my aunt and my grandmother. Husband and I went to the Avalanche v Sharks game on Saturday to see the Avalanche clinch a playoff spot. I'm waiting on frit and purple glass and a couple other things to be delivered today. Not a whole lot else happening around here, it's mostly the same thing day in and day out. 

Cold Fish

One of our fish died the other day - not surprising as we can't seem to keep them alive since we moved into this house. On the way to flush it down the toilet, Oldest Daughter asked me why we flush fish down the toilet and not the other animals (she's aware of death since one of our birds died a couple years ago and we hand-raised abandoned kittens, losing two in the process). I didn't really have an answer for her since it's never seemed strange to me, but then I started thinking about it a little more and I'm realizing that we've never been consistent with animal remains aside from disposing of fish.

When I was 8, I begged my grandparents for a cat. Finally, they relented. We got K.C. a few days prior to Halloween. She was a beautiful ragdoll Siamese and I tormented her constantly. She lived to be 19 years old and a few days prior to her death she laid down next to me outside and I noticed she was only skin and bones. She was still eating, she was just ancient so she didn't keep weight on. At that time I had ten cats (because I'd had two when I moved back home, my grandmother had two, my husband moved in with two, and one of mine inadvertently got out and had kittens), so she was missing for a couple days when I realized she was probably dead. We went for a walk and found her in the neighbor's yard. I told my grandmother that I'd found her and she called animal control or roadkill pick up or whoever, and they came and took her. Seems fucked up to just leave her there for the trash, right? Yeah. The other cat, Kiki, disappeared and I didn't even notice for months, though other people had. We assume she was eaten by a fox, though my grandmother insists another family took her in.

Well, I'd had a cat a few years prior named Tilly. She was a three-month-old black and white kitten my ex-boyfriend had gotten me during a terrible bout of depression. My depression was worsened when I discovered I'd killed the cat by rolling a treadmill on top of her. I noticed in the evening that I hadn't seen her since the morning, so I moved the treadmill to see if I'd locked her in a rarely-used closet. She was crushed and had been killed instantly. I totally lost my mind, so then-boyfriend sent me and the kids out of the room while he gathered her body up in a trash bag and threw her in the dumpster. I was furious with him but... I never went to get her out. I like to think it was because I was in such shock at what a horrible person I'd been to kill her and not notice.

One of my husband's cats was hit by a car. He was at work when it happened, so I wrapped the cat up and left it in a box out in a never-used playhouse in our backyard until he got home. The next day we took it to the pound and had him cremated, but we didn't get his ashes back. A little less heartless I suppose, but still not the best send-off.

Buried in the yard of our old house are also two mice and a rat named Locomotivation that died when I was a teenager. Two rats I'd had in Wisconsin died and were thrown in the trash. The fourth, named Mascera de Poncho, had a big tumor and was put to sleep and my mother left her to be cremated or thrown away at the vet's office in Laramie, Wyoming.

We eventually sent all the other cats to new homes because Husband and Son were experiencing allergies. We moved, and eventually I wanted another cat. We got Shadow. Shadow got out one day and never came back. Based on the huge number of foxes, coyotes, and birds of prey around where we live, I assume Shadow was eaten. We'd hand-raised some abandoned kittens just a few months before Shadow went missing, so we had one little kitten named Ghost left. The two kittens that died are buried in my front flower garden. The other kitten that lived is now a behemoth named Spectre (yes, 'r' before 'e') and he lives with my sister. If he dies before she buys a house, she is perfectly welcome to bury him here.

We had a bird that got her wing stuck in the cage bars and died shortly thereafter from trauma. She is buried in another flower garden on the other side of our front yard. There is a rock marking the grave of a previous owner's pet name "Chip" out in our backyard by the trash barrel storage corral. It will be there when we move, too. I've painted rocks for the other animals we've buried.

I don't know why we've had such varied and sometimes heartless reactions to the deaths of animals we've loved like family. Maybe it's shock or stress that surrounds certain situations. To end a rather depressing post on a humorous note, I told Husband about Oldest Daughter's question and he said (jokingly, of course) "Because the other animals are too big to flush down the toilet".

Anyway, thanks for bearing with me while I reflect a little on the mistakes I've made and the animals I've missed over the years :)