No Photos of Us

The other day I sat down and began work on the yearly holiday card designs.  It was difficult due to the fact that while we have pictures of cats:

Mina and the Girls: Sabrina, Suki, and Luna

Luna

pictures of beads:

Dazzled Dragon w/wire flame and Swarovski crystals

and pictures of jewelry:

Lord of Shields and Rings

We had about three very poor pictures of the three people in this house!  How is that possible?!  Thankfully, we had plenty of family to help us with the problem during our Thanksgiving get together.  Here are the results:

Much better!  Thanks to Walgreens, we have our cards all printed and purchased.  I also have almost all of our Pixybug business cards addressed and ready to go.  We always send Pixybug cards to customers who have purchased from us during the year and to our business contacts.  We use a photo or photos of designs or shows throughout the year.  This year we used a photo of Chris's penguin pairs that had been made into a necklace for a little girl in North Carolina at Flatwater Festival this summer. So I have almost checked the cards off the Holiday To Do list, and remarkably I have most of our shopping done except for some gift cards to pick up.  Shocking, really!

Happy Thanksgiving and a Sneak Peak...

Happy Thanksgiving dear readers!  I couldn't find any witty cartoon turkeys to share, so I went with this cutie!  How adorable!

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What I am Thankful For:

1. Freedom.  To live, think, and speak the way I choose.
2. Love.  The love of my fabulous husband and best friend, Chris, who I am grateful for every single day.  And for my beautiful, talented, funny, sarcastic, and sometimes surly, daughter Mina.  She is an angel sent to make our family complete.
3. Home.  Whether it is my humble, yet completely cluttered home, or the warm feeling I get every day when I return to it.  I am thankful for the shelter and comfort it provides.
4. Furry "children".  Our kitties provide light and laughter to our home, even when they are very naughty and tear up my new shirt hanging on the drying tree in the kitchen. (grrr...grumble...)
5. Work.  Thankful, even when it makes me grumpy and crazy, to have not one job but 2 that I enjoy and don't mind going to.  
6. Creativity.  I am so grateful for that "one bead" and all that it has brought to my life.  I have an outlet to express myself, a passion to spread to others, and fabulous people who want my jewelry.  
7. Expression.  I am thankful beyond words to have this outlet in my life.  I am tickled by the people who comment and continue to stop by and read the blog.  It takes my breath away to know that anyone is interested enough to hear what I say and come back for more!  On that front, sometime in the past couple weeks when I wasn't looking, I crossed the 30,000+ hit mark on the blog stats!  Thank you all!

Now I promised you all a sneak peak, and here it comes.  In a couple weeks, my Day of the Dead Challenge project is due for submission to The Hole Bead Shop for judging.  I finished it at the end of last week, so that I could get it to a professional photographer to do it justice in a single photo.  Amy Sandeen helped us out and did a terrific job.  I would love to show you how great the photos are, but that would give away the design before it is time!  So here is a morsel to tide you over!

Yes, it is cruel but I spent 20+ hours working on it, and I don't want the surprise spoiled!

I hope you are surrounded by all that you are thankful for this Thanksgiving!  See you here next week!

Continuing The Theme of the Week...

The other day one of my Facebook friends had this on their page.  I though it was hilarious and follows along with the past couple days posts.  I wanted to share it with you!  I have long been a Muppet fan and am glad to see them in the media and movies again.  Now if they would only release the Muppets Tonight show on dvd!  I loved that series of the Muppets, my favorite being BoBo the Bear.  So funny!

Here is the link to the episode which I found on YouTube!

Happy Thursday!  Enjoy the things you love today!

Are You Ready?

Yep!  I have my Twilight themed Charm bracelet ready to go, and Mina, her bff Lexi, and I will likely hit the theater on Friday night to watch the much anticipated Breaking Dawn Part 1.

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We are excited, but having read the book, I don't know how they will pull off parts of the story in conversion to a movie screen.  We will see, and any excuse to eat movie popcorn!

Maria's Giveaway

My "blog" friend Maria is hosting a Twilight inspired giveaway this week.  Here is the link to enter:
Maria's Garden Path Beads

Stop by and enter!

Weekend Class

Good Monday to you!  I had the pleasure of beading the weekend away with NanC Meinhardt this weekend in Lincoln.  The class was an intensive on Right Angle Weave.  Not familiar with NanC's work?  Here is her website:
NanC Meinhardt Studio

This was one of my very favorite pieces that NanC brought along to show us.

Izzy & Lucy bracelets

The design is copyright by NanC Meinhardt and I borrowed the photo from her website.

Pretty Idea

This was so pretty I had to share it!  Here is the link.

New Necklace Designs

 Here are a couple of new necklace designs for my holiday shows!

 Like Bees to Honey combines a huge crazy lace agate pendant with citrine, yellow adventurine, crystals in pale gold and gray opal, and a brass honey bee charm.

Geared Jewels combines antique brass chain, a porcelain pendant from Hip Chick Beads, various stones, pearls, crystals and C-Koop enameled gears and gears from B-Sue Boutique in their Rusty Black Patina.

More to come!  Stay tuned!

I Feel A Bit Twitchy...

Sorry I have been silent, I have deadlines this week to get jewelry to two art galleries for their Christmas showcases.  So on that note, the stress is getting to me.  Here is something that made me giggle. 

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Now this could be taken as him defending his nut stash for winter, or the reference to male anatomy or as the thought struck me- Am I ready for a squirrel knight brigade to defend me since I am feeling pretty NUTS right now?  Which ever it is, hope you are having a great week!

I AM A WINNER!

No, I am not practicing positive affirmation, though at this time of year with the decrease in daylight kicking in my S.A.D. (seasonal affective disorder) I probably should be.  I am actually the lucky winner of a prize package from Beaducation!  Jean Yates was hosting a giveaway from Beaducation on her blog using the new snap rivets and setter that Beaducation has just added to their product line.  I won the setter, rivets, and a fabulous Power Punch Plier!  I am so excited!  I actually loved the design of the rivets so much, and figuring I wouldn't win, ordered the rivets and setter on Sunday.  Maybe that is why I won?!  Here is the video demonstration of the rivets and Power Punch pliers in action!
Power Punch Plier video
Snap Rivet video

Red Crystal Snap Rivets

Power Punch Plier

Thank you to Beaducation and to Jean Yates for sponsoring and hosting the giveaway!

Boo! Happy Halloween!!!!

I LOVE LOVE LOVE Halloween!  So fun, so carefree!  Here are some fun things I found on Pinterest today!

Mina Love the movie Nightmare Before Christmas, I thought this was a cool idea!

This phrase always gives me a little shiver up my spine when I hear it or read it.

Combines two of my Favorites!  Beauty and the Beast & Twilight!

Wish I had this kind of time!  Very cool and ghoulish!

Cute!

Fun!  Reminds me of Annette Blair books, which I love!

cool decorations!

Nice make up job, reminds me of my Day of the Dead bead challenge.

Love the vintage Halloween cards/postcard designs!

Clever!  Love pumpkins carved in different ways!

See above caption!

Hope your Halloween is filled with more treats than tricks!

Day of the Dead Bead Challenge update:
After adding an additional 6 hours of time to my project Monday and Tuesday evening last week, I had a thread break on the herringbone spiral I was stitching, and it ALL FELL APART!!  I must say, that put me off the project for a few days, and I believe I muttered a few "bad" words.  Consequently, on Friday night I spent time with those beads doing wire crochet instead.  I think I have that portion done now except for attaching it together.  Stay tuned!

Day of the Dead Challenge Update...

Last week I told you about my newest Challenge project.  As I am sure you have noticed, posts have been a bit thin the past couple weeks.  All of my time is being spent at work at my two jobs or at work at my beading table.  To date I have worked about 13 hours on my project piece.  I have done a right angle weave using Tila beads, fringed with Lucite, pearls, crystal, and LOTS of seed beads, and now I am working a spiral herringbone tube that will at this point wrap around the fringe section.  Next (once the tube is done) I plan to finish the rope hanging the piece using some 8mm Chinese crystal rondelles accented with a netting stitch.  I am amazing myself!  I haven't seeded beaded this much all year, but it is looking amazing!  Stay tuned for further updates!

New Challenges...

Sorry for the silence, beading has been consuming all of my time!  Friday and Saturday we were in Lincoln for the Lincoln Bead Show which took place on Saturday.  Here are some highlights:

• The meeting room where the show was held was large and fairly well lit (anyway our area was, people in the back section struggled though)
• The room we spent the night in at same hotel, not so great.  Think 70's disco movie, with the pool area rented out for birthday parties and there were 4 going on Friday night until Midnight.
• The "non" smoking room, may have been now, but wasn't for about the previous twenty years.  Yuck, old stale cigarette smell.
• Bathroom, postage stamp size, but had good water pressure and hot water.  Wasn't too scary if you kept the lights off or your eyes shut.
• The arm rails on the chairs looked like werewolves had previously stayed there.  
• The bed was comfortable and clean, though my side sloped to the floor.
• Mina hung out in the room after we headed down to work in the bead show, until it was check out time.  Check out time came sooner than she thought when she saw the mouse running around in the room.

On the plus side, we had a terrific show and spent time visiting with our other bead vendor friends and had fun visiting with new and returning customers.  The dragons were a huge hit!

On the new front, I am one of ten participants taking part in The Hole Bead Shoppe's Day of the Dead Bead kit challenge.  Here is a picture of my kit supplies:

My kit fee was $50 and I got a $120+ value!  Crazy the amount of items that were in the kit, and WOW do I feel the pressure to create an over the top, fabulous piece!  The kit has a wide variety of Lucite flowers and leaves, Vintaj keys and blanks, fresh water pearls, Czech daggers and fire polish, Swarovski crystals, a variety of seed beads and Tila beads, gunmetal plate spacers, Tierracast beads and spacers, and a Palmtree Queen Day of the Dead lampwork focal.  Here is a picture of the skull beads the Hole Bead Shoppe added to our kits:

Mine is in the second row, second from the left!  They are AWESOME!

I received my kit on Monday, and I have worked on my piece about 5 hours so far.  I have a long ways to go, I will keep you in the loop!

Here There Be Dragons....

Earlier this week, I mentioned that Chris had made dragons and here they are!  Aren't they cool?!  We had a special order for one, and this is what became a new line!  My favorite is the yellow and orange.  I need to name them, but that hasn't happened yet.  This is the "premier" of them and we have already sold two!  They will be with us at the Lincoln Bead Show if you would like to see them in person!  Chris made more last night, but those haven't had their pictures taken yet.  Like the collage?  I am playing around with Picnik for editing our photos.  Not sure I like it, seems to bog our computer down and I haven't learned my way around things yet.  I am trying the "premium" feature for a month and we'll see if it is worth continuing.  I like how the collage turned out though!