Tuesday, September 28, 2010

Thought of the Day...

The Big Box of Crayons!

Thought for today: Just because people can be jerks, doesn't mean you have to lower yourself to their level! Refer back to Kindergarten~Be nice, share, and use your brand new crayons to make something beautiful today! :0)
(Sharing a big secret!  I love the smell of brand new crayons and Scotch tape! I think that is part of why I got a teaching degree~School Supplies!)

Monday, September 27, 2010

Remembrance

Remembrance, My Art Bead Scene Blog Carnival Topic.
As glass and jewelry artists, we are often asked to make special requests.  We almost always accept the assignments, as they add to our customer base.  We have made special items for:
  • collections, a white rhino, a bunch of fish, 
  • German style mushrooms for Christmas momentos
  • blue whales for a bicycle team
  • sculpture pieces made off mandrel so there are no holes showing
  • a necklace for a granddaughter from her grandmother celebrating her years in 4H
  • a doggy keychain for a sister that had lost her pet
  • dachshund beads for a gal who wanted to make a special gift for a friend
  • jewelry to thank some really nice beauticians for accepting packages of medicine for a guy with cancer while he is at work
  • tomato earrings for a birthday gift to surprise a wife
  • broccoli ceiling fan pull and broccoli earrings for gifts for a college roommate

Regardless of the request, we are honored to be asked to undertake our special requests.  It is not always an easy thing to make what is requested and it is not always what we want to make.  Sometimes doing special requests is difficult and a bit stifling to creativity.  Making what a customer sees in their mind is not the same as creating pieces from our own ideas.  But it is part of our business and we are honored and humbled to be asked to put the love and caring into the gift items for the special people in the lives of our customers.

Sunday, September 26, 2010

Frightfully Fun Halloween Designs









These are our newest designs!  Chris has been working his fingers to the bone (hehe) to get these made for Halloween!  Frighteningly realistic LadyFingers and Ghoulishly Green Frankenstein Monster Fingers.  We have sold some already and have special orders for some too!  What do you think?

Friday, September 24, 2010

Thought of the Day...

Mr. Vampire

Suck it up, Buttercup. Don't take everything said to heart. Today is a new day, let it go, and go with the flow.



Snoopy Clip Art

Halloween is coming!  Autumn is in the air!  Enjoy your weekend!

Tuesday, September 21, 2010

Monday, Monday

Yes, this describes my Monday to a T!  I received this through Lori Anderson's blog Pretty Things, which I follow.  I had to share, it was too perfect not to.  I don't know how many of you follow blogs, or even if you follow mine, but I love getting the day's blog posts through my email!  Makes it so much simpler to follow, when I just open my email, and don't have to remember to go track down the blog site when I am on the computer.

Currently in the works? 
  • I am making class sample for Julie's for October and November (a cool, simple cube bracelet using square stitch, and a spiral sample using peanut shaped seed beads as the center of each loop on the spiral. 
  • I received my first package of beads from Artbeads Blog Partners Program!  Can't wait to play with them, and I will definitely post it when I finish!
  • Chris is catching up on his special orders from the summer at the Farmer's Market and getting ready for the Lincoln Bead Show October 9th at the Cornhusker Hotel. 
  • Check out our updated show list for Fall and the Christmas season!

Tuesday, September 14, 2010

Seasonal Love and Beads...

I love living in Nebraska (though I could do without the croupy bronchitis I am currently fighting) in part because of the beautiful seasons.  Oh sure, last winter was a trial, as a sufferer of SAD (seasonal affective disorder), I began to think I could not take one more cold, gray, gloomy day.  But just as I was desperately in need of sunshine and spring flowers, spring snuck in and we all breathed a sigh of happy relief.  Then summer came with lots of rain this year so we had lovely green grass (and super tall weeds that I am allergic too!)all summer that required more mowing than we are used to (even could be said it was close to baling a couple times!).  Now fall is softly sweeping in, with its cool nights, warm days, and lovely color changes.  One of my favorite things about autumn, is ... acorns.  Weird, yes.  Sentimental, definitely.  It all started in the autumn of 1988, Chris and my first autumn dating.  We were in college at Peru, NE, (Campus of a Thousand Oaks), and we would go out walking and pick them up as we strolled along.  When we moved into our house in Lawrence, there was an oak tree in our front yard (that has grown to a lovely, large shade tree, which Mina swings in everyday).  The acorn tradition now involves crazy stories about a nutty squirrel that delivers acorns to our pillowcases, shoes, purses, lunchboxes, and yes, occasionally my cleavage.  Okay, that was probably too much information.  It is just a fun, silly family thing we started when Mina was little, and it has just continued.   Mina even drew Chris a classic picture when she was about 4 or 5 with a cute squirrel looking up into a tree, with a VERY large acorn.  (My favorite part is the writing that says "I love you Dab", Mina suffers with a bit of her father's dyslexia!)  I love that picture so much, that it still hangs on my wall at work (Mina turned 13 this summer). 

Anyway, with my love of acorns, I was pleased to see bead acorns in my Beadwork magazine that came yesterday.  These lovely beads are lampwork and electroformed copper, and GORGEOUS!  I think I am going to ask Santa to ask that nutty squirrel to put one of these beauties in my stocking this year!

Want more info or to see more of Julie's gorgeous beads and creations? 
Check out her Etsy shop at Credit River Art Glass

Friday, September 10, 2010

Vampires, Zombies, and Hello Kitty?

Several years ago, I read the book Tall, Dark, and Dead by Tate Hallaway.  I LOVE Paranormal Romance/Science Fiction books.  The main character, a gal named Garnet Lacey, had a t-shirt of Hello Kitty with vampire fangs!  I contacted the author to find out if she had actually seen such a shirt or if it was a figment of her author imagination.  Sadly, Tate told me that it was the latter.  Consequently, I have searched since for such a shirt.  I knew that if I could just bide my time, I would find a fanged Kitty shirt, especially with the resurgence of the popularity of all things ghoulish (vampires, zombies, etc.).  A week ago, I hit the jackpot!  I found these fun domino necklaces on Etsy!

Mina and I will be getting the Vampire Hello Kittys in a few days.  Interested in getting you own?  Check out Jodi's shop tubbytabby on Etsy (she also makes non-monster items! :0) )

Thursday, September 9, 2010

Currently Beading...

(B)Ring "B" Kit from The Hole Bead Shoppe






(B)Ring Kit from The Hole Bead Shoppe
I have never been to Bartlesville, OK.  I have been to Oklahoma, but just to visit an aunt that lived there when I was a kid.  Bartlesville is the home of one of my favorite bead store/companies.  The Hole Bead Shoppe is one of my favorite shops to buy from because the sell GORGEOUS Lucite leaves, flowers, and butterflies.  Kelli Burns and her family run the shop and I only know them through the 'net, but I feel like I have known them a long time!  The gals come up with fab designs to use the Lucite in wonderful new ways, and I love it!  These are the newest of their kits and they are in the newest issue of Bead & Button (it is very exciting for them too, as it is their first design featured in B&B)!  Aren't they gorgeous?  The metallic finish on the leaves are really deep and rich, but it is still Lucite so it is very lightweight.  I have one of my rivolis bezel made and now I am embellishing it.  Of course I started on the metallic kit first!  The one I chose is the Antique Copper one on the bottom left in this picture, and it has a sapphire blue rivoli. 

Wednesday, September 8, 2010

Lost and Found...

If you can't make it better, you can laugh at it.
Erma Bombeck
Never go to a doctor whose office plants have died.
Erma Bombeck
 
This week has been as the title suggests.
 
Lost:
My iPod Touch (panic!)
Mina's Girl Scout registration (with the envelope and the check attached)
My ability to have air flowing easily through my nose and lungs (allergies and bronchitis)
My Mind (I left it out for fresh air and it wandered away)
 
Found:
My iPod Touch (left it at the dr exam room when I went for antibiotics for the bronchitis)
Mina's Girl Scout registration (Chris found it filed with the unpaid bills after I searched 15 minutes and gave up)
 
The last to Lost items still at large! I would offer a reward, but I can't remember where I put it! :0)
Happy Wednesday!

Friday, September 3, 2010

OOOH LA LA!

New Autumn/Winter Colors of Swarovski Crystals

While surfing the beady web tonight, I came across these new lovelies!  They aren't out yet, but soon, very soon, they will come to a crystal box near me!
Sunflower (photo courtesy of Merchants Overseas)

Crystal Silver Night (photo courtesy of Merchants Overseas) 

 
Butterfly Flat Back No Hotfix & Wild Heart Pendant 

My favorite new shapes for the season!  Gorgeous!  To find out more click the link at the top of the post to read the Merchants Overseas blog info page.

Thursday, September 2, 2010

Meet Suki Su

"Cats are intended to teach us that not everything in nature has a purpose." - Garrison Keillor
;The trouble with cats is that they've got no tact." - P. G. Wodehouse
"One cat just leads to another" Ernest Hemingway 

  Three weeks ago today, I was at work at my full-time book keeping job.  I do books (and reports and maintenance, and c-store managing, etc) for a group of locally owned gas stations.  The station I work at sits right beside a state highway.  That Wednesday, I came into our c-store (I work in the building across the street that houses our office), and one of the gals I work with asked if I needed a kitten.  I said "no, Chris won't allow us to have anymore cats".  She said they got this one off the highway that morning, and didn't know how it hadn't been hit since traffic was going on both sides of the highway.  So being a sympathetic animal rescuer from way back, I stepped around the building to check out the situation.  OH MY GOODNESS!  She was just a tiny baby, and a Siamese!  This plays heavily into the story, as my husband totally loves Siamese cats.  When we were in college, he had two on separate occasions and they were stolen!  Sounds like something from a villainous Disney movie!  So when I called him about the kitten, he said no.  I said, but she is just a tiny baby and she happens to be a Siamese!  Guess what?  Kitten got a new home. 
  We are calling her Suki.  Chris tends to call her Suki Su though.  All of our cats end up with a name and a nickname.  It is just the way things roll here. 
  Now, we have two other adult cats that are well into their adulthood.  They are not thinking too highly of this new living arrangement.  Suki is currently our "studio" cat, residing alone on the front porch, while the other gals reside on the back porch.  While, Sabrina and Sassy are not crazy about our new addition, we have not seen either of them play as much in years.  This morning, Sabrina was fetching the furry mice like she did as a kitten!  That was fun to see.  She and Suki are almost to an impasse that  they will play together, but then Suki gets too excited, and we end up with yowling and hissing.  When Suki first pounced on Sabrina's flicking fluffy black tail, the squawking was very impressive!  It brought Mina and Sassy to find the source of the trouble. 
Sabrina=NOT AMUSED.

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