Lincoln Bead Show Photos

This was an amazing piece of beadwork! The witch's body was hand stitched and the rest of the necklace was lampwork beads!

A strand of teardrop unakite beads I bought.

My BeadyGirl Bead I bought! LOVE IT!
A strand of special order beads Chris had to make, ordered at the bead show.

Upcoming Update!

Happy Wednesday! Just wanted you to know we are still here, starting to get ready for the Holiday Showcase at Graham Gallery and the Christmas Craft Show at Blue Hill (December 5). We deliver to Angela in about 3 weeks, and it is time to get serious, so I am not stressing at the last minute! I have been fighting with my depression the past 6 weeks or so, and concentration and energy have been an issue. I have started using light therapy to supplement the other treatments I use and I do have a bit better concentration after 4 days of treatment, but I know this is not the "miracle" that will instantly fix me. Definitely willing to try anything that will help! Saturday finds Chris working his part time job in the afternoon, and I GET TO GO TO SEED BEADING!!! I love Seed Bead Saturday! Our group meets the last Saturday of the month and we spend a couple hours cackling like hens in a chicken house, catching up on each others lives, and oh yes, seed beading. This week we have a special guest coming to work with us. Jodie Marshall from Lincoln is traveling in to teach us her "Pagoda Pendant" class. FUN, FUN, FUN! Sunday, Chris and I teach Sunday School, after church we have a Potluck Dinner (YUM) and in the afternoon we are going as a group to package food for Kids Against Hunger in Hastings. A wonderful organization, and the program not only helps feed people around the world, but part of it stays in central Nebraska to help our local food pantries also. Hope everyone has a safe and SPOOKY Happy Halloween!

Halloween Etsy Sale!

Check out our Etsy store~Halloween items are on sale now until November 1st!

More Zoo Pictures

When we visited the zoo last month, I enjoyed watching the Gorillas. They were amazing, you could almost see them thinking and analyzing their surroundings.

This is the new Skyfari lift that takes you from the giraffe area to pachyderm hill and back. It was really fun, and the view was amazing.
It was fun to see the Garden of the Senses from the air. I thought it was really cool to look at the sculptures and see where people rub on them because those parts are really shiny compared to the patina on the rest of the sculpture. This is the sundial and pond in the garden.This is the sculpture out in front of the Butterfly/Insect Pavilion. Gorgeous. Shows the complete life cycle of the butterfly. Starts with the egg on the leaf, then the caterpillar, then the cocoon, the butterfly hatching, and finally the big beautiful stained glass butterfly at the top.
Next up, more zoo pictures!

Crazy Week

I know I promised you more zoo pics, but haven't gotten them uploaded yet. Last Saturday, we sponsored the Jr. high marching band trip to Minden for their first marching competition. It was so much fun! We had a great time and the kids were AMAZING! They got a Superior (the best you can get) AND a trophy! We learned this week that it was the first trophy our school has gotten for band since 1979!!!! Chris and I even got to march along behind the band. Sunday, Mina was sick and we ran her to a weekend Dr., she had sinus infection and got her started on antibiotics. Monday afternoon, my parents were coming back from Hastings and my Dad dozed off, crossed the yellow line and HIT A GRAIN TRUCK. Thankfully, their guardian angels hadn't dozed off, because they were not only uninjured, but their car is still able to be driven and it is repairable! Not everyone can say that they hit a grain truck and they were not hurt and the car wasn't totaled. The grain truck was full of grain too. The driver saw them crossing over, and got over as much as he could. We were fortunate too, that there was a wonderful woman who stopped to help and called me, the sheriff, and stayed around til everything was finished up. Truly a day of miracles. After that the rest of the trivialities of the week seem small. I am trying to get my beads back in some order after all the summer beading for shows, before I have to get stuff going for Christmas shows! We have to deliver to the Gallery by the 15th of November, so I don't have a lot of time, but I have quite a bit done. Chris left this morning for work, and then he is off to Omaha for a class tomorrow at the Hot Shops on bringing out the metals in reactive glass. Mina and I are working the concession stand tonight and she has her first Jr. high dance tomorrow night. Sunday is church and then her confirmation class is doing community service and picking up trash along the roadside. Hope your weekend is a good one, and the zoo pics are still on their way!

Our Trip to the Zoo...

Last month we went to the Omaha Henry Doorly Zoo. Here are pics from our visit.

Chris and Mina monkey around in the viewing bubble in the Gorilla Complex.

Here they are in the Kingdom of the Night exhibit near the bats. Chris forgot he had his sunglasses on and it is fairly dark in the display, so he was wondering around nearly blind! Lucky he didn't fall in the swamp with the alligators!

Mina and I squinting at Chris near the fountain by the Gorilla Complex.

And the fountain we were sitting by.
Mina riding on the Skyfari sky lift across the park. That was really fun!

Mina with the sculpture outside the butterfly/insect pavilion. I really loved it, more pics in the next post.

Chris and I! Mina didn't cut our heads off! We don't get our pics taken together very often.
We really love going to the zoo, try to go every year. More pics in the next post.

Have You Heard Of Twilight?

I assume that you have, (unless you are living a sheltered life, and don't have a "teenage" daughter). The "Twilight Saga~New Moon" soundtrack is being released today due to high demand! So I thought I would show you what I have been up to in my jewelry world inspired by the Twilight obsession!

This was the display at the end of my table at the Fall Festival. I used the fan magazine to catch the eye of females walking by. Most of the time they didn't notice the jewelry that went with the theme! Gee, I wonder why? : )


These are the latest in my Twilight inspired jewelry. Team Jacob or Team Edward earrings. Who do you choose? Either way, we all win! Thanks to Stephenie Meyer for providing a connection between moms and their daughters and friends! Can't wait for the movie. Opens November 20th, just in time to celebrate my birthday with my Gals!

Harvest Festival Pictures

Sabrina "helping" us pack for the Harvest Festival at Prairie Loft in Hastings on October 4. She always has to inspect the baggage.


My favorite lampwork bead maker, setting up his torch to do demos.


Bracelets for sale.

A shot of one end of our table display. Mina knitted the scarves.The other end of our table display. Please ignore the junk in the background, I really need to work on my photography skills! I do know how to set a pretty table!

Lincoln Bead Show = Success!

We returned home late Saturday night after a successful day at the Lincoln Bead Show. We had really great sales and we both found some fun and beautiful new beads to work with! I picked up some really pretty strands of kiwi stone, chrysacola, conglomerate jasper, mystic jasper (love the name!), and unakite. Also, two large crystal pendants, a gorgeous strand of green and purple furnace glass, some fun and funky Beady Girl Beads (mine has a large lime green peace sign and multi colored flowers all around it, Chris got 2!), and I fed my seed bead addiction from the folks at 5z's. Pictures soon! When we got out of bed yesterday and checked email, we had a gal from Indiana interested in one of Chris's Frankenstein beads, and through the magic of email, we had it sold by the end of the day! Love it when things work out! In other Nebraska news, snow fell Saturday, Sunday, and is falling right now! Weird the calendar says it is October and still fall! North Platte had 15", that is just crazy! Way too early for winter to start! This week finds us filling special orders from the shows the past two weekends, sponsoring Mina's 1st Jr High marching band competition in Minden Saturday, going to Grand Island Sunday for Mina's Girl Scout Advisory Group meeting, and getting her ready to start basketball practice Friday. With those things and putting the house back together after 2 weekends of shows, we will have the week filled! Hope you have a great week and that it is not snowing where you are!

Chris will be featured...

Tomorrow, October 7, Chris will have his beads featured in the Glass showcase on etsy. If you forget to check that out, we will be in Lincoln at the Annual Bead Show at the State Fairgrounds from 10 am to 5 pm! Stop by and see his gorgeous new beads!