Weekend Update...

I sometimes think that it is good to come to work on Monday, to try to catch my breath and have a bit of relief from the weekend craziness! On Friday, I had my follow-up mammogram to check up on the lymph node on my left armpit that had shown up irregular at the beginning of the year, and everything looks fine so I don't have to come back for another until next year. Mom had her knee surgery, and though they didn't take her to surgery until 3:20pm, everything went well, and Dr. Bohlen (he is awesome and from Hastings Orthapaedics in Hastings, NE) said the bone was actually in better shape than her other leg when they did the first surgery on it. Of course, on that leg she had gone through a great deal of trauma from a very bad break at my niece's basketball game a couple years ago. So after Dad and I had dozed off in the waiting room (thankfully we were the only ones there), we got to go back to recovery and talk to Dr. Bohlen on the phone because he had been running behind, went upstairs to check a patient and then was late for something else, so forgot to stop back by and talk to us. Dad and I got a good chuckle out of that, because we were sleeping and he was late, and none of us even remembered the other until later! (Guess it was funnier at the time)! It was 9:30pm by the time I dropped Dad off and parked the car at home, and drug myself into the house. We had been at the hospital since 12 and we were pooped! Saturday morning took us to Morman Island near Grand Island, NE where we took 3 of our GS for an overnight camp out. We had a GREAT time! Hiking, cooking outside, doing a directional scavenger hunt, the girls went swimming in the lake, smores by the fire, making bracelets, walking sticks, and leaf coasters, and then being driven into the tents by the evening chill and the GIANT mosquitoes! We had a terrific time visiting with the girls from the other troops. Yesterday, we returned home briefly, unloaded the car, repacked Mina's suitcase, and returned to Hastings so that Grandpa and Granny H. could take their granddaughter for the week. Chris will bring her back home after the 4th of July shindig at Keith and Carol's. He is heading to Fairbury Thursday afternoon, and they will come home on Saturday so that Mina can accolyte at church on Sunday. Which leaves me in Lawrence to work on Friday and Saturday. Thankfully that is all that is going on this week, though we are filling beading orders for our special Pixybug customers, and trying to catch up on chores at home!

Medical Tests and Another Crazy Week...

This week is filled with medical tests. Sunday morning started with me doing the prep work for a colonoscopy, which I had done yesterday. YUCK! If you have never had to do this, consider yourself extremely lucky! For the rest of us, we hope we don't have to do that again. Though I am thankful it turned out to be nothing major that was wrong with me. On Friday, my Mom is having her third knee replacement surgery. No, she doesn't have 3 legs, just had to have one leg done twice because her bones are so soft from osteoporosis that the first surgery didn't take. DRINK YOUR MILK LADIES or take a supplement you do not want osteoporosis! I also have to have a mammogram repeated on my left armpit area because I had an irregular one in January and they repeat them in 6 months to check. At the time they diagnosed it as a benign lymph node, so hopefully everything is still the same. I am a big believer in preventative medicine, because when we were growing up, we had no medical insurance and that lead to not going to the dr. when we should have and there were long term problems afterwards. The other crazy thing about this week, is we're doing a backpacking camp with our GS on Saturday to Sunday at Morman Island in Grand Island, NE. The girls will learn about packing your pack and canoeing, and sleeping out while on a backpacking trip. Chris filled a couple special orders last night, and I made a gorgeous stone fringe bracelet that we will get pictures up to show you soon.

New on Etsy

Would you believe I have items listed again on Etsy! Check it out. Not many, but keeping all those balls in the air is a challenge! A note of clarification, our house was not hit by a tornado, the inside just looks like it was! After I posted the other day, I went back a couple days later and reread what I had written and I was definitely in a fog of exhaustion. I appologize for any confusion. Now on to some new pics!

Chris, Mina, and I on the top of the observation tower at Platte River State Park.
The "Girls" hanging out at the top of the observation tower at Platte River State Park. There are SO many stairs to get to the top of that tower!


The results of "Our Big Girl Scout Adventure"!

Our crazy cat Sabrina, "helping" us pack for the Cottonwood festival.

Here is a new pin that was for sale at Cottonwood, but hasn't sold yet. I really love how this one turned out! Around the goddess bead are tiny 2mm Swarovski rounds.

Our Cottonwood Festival booth set up. This is the main table of jewelry.

Our side table with Chris' beads and a bit more jewelry. The earring display was made by local artist, Sally Buss, who is another of the artists at the Graham Gallery. The earring display now belongs to Pixybug Designs! It worked so well and matched our other displays, we just had to get it!

Finally a moment for a long deep breath...

We made it through the GS trip and Cottonwood Festival. Now we have time to put our home back in order, before the disaster relief people start to show up because of the "tornado" damage to our home! What a mess. We came home Friday afternoon about 4:30pm and we were unpacked and repacked and back in Hastings by 6pm. While we were trying to set up, people were sorting through our piles (that was CRAZY)! We did very well sales wise over the weekend and had a wonderful time meeting and talking with other artists from Graham Gallery. Mina came home with some wonderful art from the children's art tent. Local artists were asked to donate a piece of art and then the kids got to purchase the art for themselves. Adults weren't allowed in the tent! On the GS trip front~EXCITING! We spent Wednesday evening in the storm shelter due to all of the tornadoes in the area. That was the same night as the Boy Scout camp tragedy in Iowa. Thursday brought paddle boating, water parking, and play in a giant playground at Mahoney State Park. Friday we cooked breakfast, and then went horseback riding. I had "Lightning" which of course didn't bode well. He was an "independent" thinker, eating when he wasn't supposed to, trying to bite me for stopping the snacking, thwacking me in the head with a tree branch after another snack of leaves came loose, and dancing in a startled circle after a fish scared him. We were definitely ready to come home on Friday. Exhausted, the girls slept from the time we loaded them in the car in Lincoln after gas fill up and a quick lunch, until we got to Hastings to unload one of the girls with her family. Last night after we got home, I slept in the chair for an hour and went to bed at 9pm. I so didn't want to get up this morning!

Cottonwood Festival Coming Up and So Are The Hives...

We will be participating in the Cottonwood Festival next weekend, June 13, 14, and 15. Chris is taking his torch and will have a work table set up to do demos during the festival of working with the torch and glass to make lampwork beads. Also, a very talented glass blower, Art Ciccotti, will also be at the festival doing demos all weekend. There will also be other artists doing pottery demos, life size people paintings, the local belly dancing group will perform, live music and entertainment Friday evening and all day/evening on Saturday, and special events on Sunday for Father's Day. If you are in the area and would like to attend, you can find out more info here http://cottonwood-festival.org. We have been beading, and making beads like crazy this week, and I have the hives (and the blood shot eyes from late nights) to prove that the stress is starting to get to me! Chris had a phone call yesterday afternoon from the Hastings radio station "The Breeze" asking if they could interview him on the radio to tell about what we do. Pretty cool, huh! So since he is off Wednesday morning, before we leave for our 3 day Girl Scout trip, he will get interviewed about being an artist participating at Cottonwood. Did I mention a trip? Yes, we are insane. We are taking our GS troop Tuesday afternoon to Hebron, NE for an afternoon of Outdoor Education before returning home, and then leaving Wednesday afternoon to spend Wednesday evening, all day Thursday, and most of Friday at Platte River State Park and Mahoney State Park in the eastern part of Nebraska. Upon our return from our GS trip, we will proceed to Hastings to set up for the Cottonwood festival which will be starting about the same time we are getting there to set up! Great planning on our part, but we love our GS and they have worked for two years to earn this trip so it is worth a bit of insanity. We just have to get organized and packed for two events this weekend! If I am absent from my blogging next week~you now know why!

New Beads by Chris

These lovely little googly-eyed fish are some that Chris has been practicing making. I personally love their pretty red lips!
Though hard to photograph, and the picture is slightly blurry, these are our new barnyard crew! I had the idea to make them into a charm bracelet, and my talented hubby, whipped me up a barnyard of animals for it.

These are some crazy face guys Chris has been playing with and getting great reviews from all who see them.

These are a pile of pretty buttons Chris made.

A gorgeous bead set in my favorite colors! It also has a button for the clasp.

More bead sets with a button included in each set for the clasp.

Pretty focal tab beads for sale at Beads and Botanicals!

Our Crazy Life, Part 2...

Just when we thought the weirdness of our life had settled back down, we just chased a BAT out of our house! I can honestly say that's a first! We were sitting in the living room watching the weather reports on the storms hitting the state AGAIN, and our cats started freaking out in the kitchen. Chris said, "must be a June bug in the kitchen", and it made sense since Sabrina has been dealing with our June bug problems very forcefully in the living room window each evening. It was not a June bug. Chris went into the kitchen when the other cat, Sassy, started to freak out, and he came back in ducking his head very startled! So, using the butterfly net that Mina conned her Grandpa into buying her last summer, he captured the bat after it flew into the wall and fell to the floor. I must point out that at no point did we touch the bat, and the bat was not harmed in the making of this blog entry. It was taken outside and freed from the net into the storm! Whatever happened to it after that was nature's doing, not ours!

Our Crazy Life...

Thank heavens this week is half over! We went to the water park on Sunday afternoon after church with some friends from church, and all was well, until about 4:30 when Mina started shivering in the sun (never a good sign!) and by the time we got her home, she had a fever of 102. We gave her the usual, Tylenol, off set with ibuprofen, and it went down a bit, but by 4:30am on Monday, the fever was at 103.6, and later when Chris took her to the dr. we had a positive diagnosis for strep throat. This is at least the 3rd maybe 4th time she has had it in 6 months, so that means most likely the tonsils will be coming out. They told us that after the second time she'd had it in a month that the "cooties" (a technical term!) were living in her tonsils. Okay, so we got the antibiotics, and the powerade and she was feeling better by yesterday. Last night we dropped her off with the same friends from church, so she could spend the night and babysit today, and Mina and the kids were out scootering when a bump ambushed her and she "flew" (her term) off the scooter and landed on her arm. So at 10:15pm we picked her back up from Blue Hill and made a visit to the emergency room at Mary Lanning hospital in Hastings. By the time we left there at 11:45, she had her arm in an ace bandage (we are thankful for her guardian angel), and instructions to keep it iced and take it easy for a few days. We were all quite tired and giggly by this time, and we had an interesting drive home after a quick trip through McDonald's to feed our little "danger" girl. Bed at 12:30, and morning came way too soon for Chris and I this morning! So how crazy is your life?!

Fishing Pictures

Here is Mina with her biggest pike. Larger than the one Dad caught!
Here is Mina in the canoe with Chris taking the picture from the back of the canoe. She caught a fish seconds later.

This is Mina and Chris on the fire tower near Lake Hackberry near Valentine.

Bible School, Fishing update, & Picnics...

Another week has gone flying by, and here we are again! Chris and I have been teaching Bible school all week, which has pretty much taken over our evenings. Chris is the storyteller, which puts his theatrical training in college to good use, and I am teaching crafts (shocking, huh!). The theme for the week is "Surfin' through the Scriptures" which has been fun with the beach music, beach themed crafts, and Flame' the Pink Flamingo puppet keeping everyone in line! We have made sand picture frames (and taken all the kids' pictures with our beach hut background), flip flop wind catchers using real flip flops (I LOVE the Dollar Tree!) and leis for the tails on them, small foam surf boards decorated with stickers, and tonight we will make tissue paper fish. Tomorrow night is our program, and we hope the weather cooperates so we can do the planned potluck picnic afterward. The kids are thrilled by the idea of a picnic~do people not picnic anymore? With fast food so convenient, we picnic often, by hitting the designated eating establishment and then going to the park. What about you? When was your last picnic? It is a great way to get out of the house, not have to cook, and reconnect with nature and your family! Chris and Mina returned late Tuesday afternoon from the fishing trip to Valentine, and Mina had out fished them all! Grandpa even threatened her that she wouldn't get to ride home in HIS pickup if she out fished him, but he gave in and brought her back. Todd (Chris's brother) caught the biggest pike, but it sounds like they all had fun and they took some beautiful pictures so I will get some posted up. Jewelry has been slow this week, and we have been trying to get stuff ready for the Cottonwood Festival which starts two weeks from today. You can find more info here www.cottonwood-festival.org . We are going to be part of the Graham Gallery artist tent. Three days of art, entertainment, and fun, stop by and check it out if you are in the area!

A Spring of Rainbows...

Good Wednesday to you! This morning in Nebraska the sky is beautiful. We have mostly cloudy skies, but it is changing quickly. When I got out of the car at work, the sky had the puff ball clouds that look like hail clouds, and off to the south and west the sky was very dark from rain coming in. To the north and east the sky had puffy white clouds highlighted by sunshine and bright light blue sky. By the time I left the station to come over to the office (where I spend too much of my life!), there was a beautiful half rainbow in the sky lit up against the dark blue of the storm clouds. Very pretty, and very much Nebraska, where if you don't like the weather wait five minutes for something else! Right now, there is a heavy shower going on, and by the time I have typed that it is over! I really love this time of year because, everything is green, blooming, and fresh and new. I am even starting to enjoy being outside as my allergy treatments are working, and after years of being kept in the house, I am getting back outside. Chris, Mina, and I celebrated the last day of school last Friday with a lunch picnic in the park with our carpooling group. Very beautiful, and Mina and I got sunburned. Saturday, another beautiful day, we went to Pier Park in Grand Island, where Chris and Mina puttered with fishing and I beaded in the shade after a lunchtime picnic. Last night we enjoyed supper on our deck, the first time since Mina was a toddler! The yard is so beautiful with fruit trees blooming, flowers and trees greened up and Mina and Chris thrilled to have me outside. So I hope wherever you are, you are enjoying the small things that the seasons bring. On the beading front, Chris has been making beautiful tab shaped bead sets, and I am making a spiral rope that is taking me forever to finish! It goes with the sea charm fringe bracelet that ended up too big, and is now being converted to a sea charm fringed necklace. It doesn't help that I have Bible school at church next week that I am craft leader for, so that was how I spent last night. Oh well, once I get the projects put together for samples, name tags made, I should be able to be back at the beading. I was beading Monday night, and our cat Sabrina, who has "issues" too numerous to mention, crawled into my bead project box and laid right on top of the beads I was working with. That pretty much ended the beading for the evening! I would call that a "subtle" hint that petting was in order!

New Pictures

While I had the camera outside, I took a picture of the corner garden by our house. I didn't do the golden mass of flower justice. Unfortunately, the dry sticks were our lavender plant that winter killed.
This is our creeping phlox that is blooming in front of our house.

We just had a quick burst of rain, and look what it left behind! This faces to the south east from our front yard across our neighbor's yards. Very pretty! Talk about up to date pictures! It doesn't get faster than that!

Mina's first butterflies of the season hatched last week when it was so cold, so we kept them in the house and gave them sugar water until it warmed up. Here Mina is releasing a swallowtail on Mother's day before church.

These are the dragonfly earrings I mentioned. Their wings are actually silver, but I guess the natural sunlight made them look more golden. They all are made with Swarovski crystals.

This is the necklace I made for my friend Leslie. I really love the copper chain, and then I made wrapped links with magnesite and copper beads. She had purchase the teardrop pendant when we spent her birthday together, and I wire wrapped it and added the zigzag of wire down the front and up the back of it.

This is the copper bracelet I made with some of the left over chain from Leslie's necklace. I wire wrapped teal cathedral beads into the links (not fun!) and there are some Swarovski crystals in matching tones in the center link.

Workin for the weekend...

Happy Midweek to you! I am thankful that today is Wednesday, why is that important loyal reader? Because I am taking the rest of the week off! Thursday is my normal day "off" (spelled running around like a chicken with my errands, shots, etc.) and Mina ends another school year on Friday. It has become a tradition for me to take that day off, go to her grade promotion at school, and then we celebrate with lunch out. The last couple of years we have joined up with our good friends and made a big celebration with our two families. I always enjoy the summers, with the different schedule, more time with Mina, and then at the end of it looking forward to going back to my Thursday's alone to run around crazy again. Last Thursday, I had sinus infection (I found out on Tuesday) so they wouldn't give my allergy shots to me so I got to stay home on Thursday which hadn't happened since February or December! It was pretty wonderful puttering around all day in my jammies! On Saturday, Stuhr Museum in Grand Island has "visit for free" day, which we have made an annual event. The first year we went because Girl Scouts were retiring flags and we had never seen that done before. We ended up being included in the ceremony, and the Civil War reenactment group were there to help as they were putting on a presentation also. They were really awesome. The bugler was amazing and the cannon was also very moving. So we will likely visit the museum on Saturday. Mina loves the Railroad town, which has buildings which are open to the public with people in period dress, doing the jobs they would have done in the "old days". So needless, to say I am very happy that I have a few days off from work. On the beading front, Chris has been "flaming" his fingers to the bone each evening making buttons, bead sets, and even a blown glass bottle last night. I fell at Mina's music concert on Monday, displaying my inherent gracefulness for all to see! I tripped over the conductor platform for the band director! In my defense, it was the same color as the floor, and I was very surrounded by others leaving after the concert ended. Consequently, my wrists, shoulders, back, and knees were killing me yesterday. That didn't help me to bead! But I finished up a beautiful copper and magnesite necklace for my friend Leslie, used some of the copper chain left from her necklace, added some pretty teal cathedral beads from beads and botanicals, and came up with a beautiful bracelet. Sunday afternoon, I made three pair of very pretty dragonfly earrings, and I made a cute ring from a pile of seed beads I didn't want to put away! That worked quite well. I have a necklace in the works from a fringed bracelet that was too big to be a bracelet when I finished it. So adding a seed beaded rope and some of the lovely flowers from The Hole Bead Shoppe I am converting it into a necklace. Obviously, that was what it wanted to be all along! It is really pretty in many shades of blue and silvers and has sterling silver sea life charms tucked into the fringe. I will get pics up soon of the ring, earrings, and the copper projects I finished.

Wonderful Surprises in the Mail...

I picked up my mail this morning, and there was a wonderful package in it! I just love getting packages in the mail, and after consulting the address label, found that this wonderful package came from one of my favorite bead supply stores. I have mentioned the Hole Bead Shoppe before, the gals there have fabulous Lucite flowers and leaves which work so well for my fringing fascination! The last order I placed, I picked up some beautiful leaves in burgundy and lilac thinking of a necklace or bracelet for fall, and fabulous little yellow maple leaves that my nephews (all my "kids" (except Mina ironically enough) love to go through my bead boxes) really loved. They are even curved like they have just fallen off a tree! So anyway, back to the package, I opened it thinking there was something missing from my last order that had been back ordered and I just didn't pay attention due the fact I was busy oohing over my new beads. But no, they were treating me to a Large bag of mixed Lucite, flowers, leaves, and butterflies! They mentioned in their very nice letter, that they saw on my blog all the nice things I had said about their shop, and wanted to thank me for telling all of you about them. Wow! Today is Friday, the sun is out, and I have just received one of the nicest compliments I have had in awhile! So this blog is for you Michael, Kelli (love your emails by the way), and Tarlee (check out your Lucite flowers in the rings I have been making posted earlier on the blog)! Thank you so much and I will definitely show you what I have made with the beautiful bag of beads! Check out their website at www.theholebeadshop.com! They have had some beautiful work in recent magazines which is also shown on their site. So go check them out, and Thanks So Much again guys!