-- Posted on April 14, 2009

I have some rings to show to Courtney. I had thought I would send her the jpgs in private email, but when I gave it a little more thought, rather than have her have to open 5 emails, it might be fine to post them here, on my bead blog. After all, don't we all want to see the bead rings?

The first two pictures show the rings on a ring mandrel, so she can see their size. She needed size 9, but the sputnik ring finished up at size 9 1/2. The star ring is spot on size 9.



The next picture is both rings from staight down:

And these last two pictures are showing sideviews:



That was fun!

-- Posted on April 6, 2009

see more Lolcats and funny pictures

-- Posted on March 29, 2009

Leslie is busy uploading pictures of nearly everything that I have left after the Cupid's Gems Jewelry show. Everything should be ready by next weekend, the fourth of April. Take a look and see some of my new stuff. And I've been busy since then. I'm still wildly interested in metals. Here is a picture of some of my latest stuff:

I finally got something going with that huge turquoise bead I bought in Grand Junction last September on vacation.
I used that souvenir, and some more turquoise chips I bought there also, a bunch of my lampwork beads, some pretty pearls, and one of my fine silver toggles. This baby took several days to finish 'cause I kept re-doing it over and over until I had a design I really liked. The turquoise nugget weighs it down nicely so it stays centered when I'm wearing it. I think it looks summery too. I'm going to wear this necklace a lot. Here's a picture:



It turned really cold here and our furnace chose this moment in its life to go Kablooey. We are cold, burning some wood in the fireplace and a space heater for Jon Luc and Louise. Honestly, a couple of weeks left until the warm weather is here to stay and we have to fork out the big bucks for furnace repair. Isn't that just the pits?

Cupid's Gems Jewelry Show -- Posted on February 2, 2009

I've been terribly busy getting ready for this year's Cupid's Gems Show in Lenexa,Kansas. This place is one of those towns surrounding Kansas City. I was fortunate to be included in this marvelous show last year so I'm thrilled to be invited back again. The venue is a restored historical site; The Thompson Barn. You just have to see it to believe it. There will be tons of hand crafted jewelry items, made with every type of media, precious and semi precious.

Here is a picture of the copper bracelets that I have ready to go. They are forged copper with fine silver (one has a bronze) sliders and fine silver rivets.



I'm bringing lots of new stuff; earrings, bracelets and necklaces. Lampwork, silver and some bronze. There is a rumor floating around that Molly Noon Quattlebaum is going to share my booth. Molly is a lampwork artist making beautiful glass beads. Stop by our booth and say, "Hi" this coming Saturday, one day only.

Merry Christmas! -- Posted on December 23, 2008

Merry Christmas, everyone!
I have finally gotten around to taking a picture of a project that I have been DYING to show! I was waiting until after I had shown it to my sister because I wanted her to see it with virgin eyes. This is a pendant that I started way back last summer in a class with Louise Duhamel and Robert Dancik. It took me several tries to finish because I had trouble with finding the right picture for the focal point, and I struggled with getting the resin to set. If that weren't enough, I had to re-etch the faux bone several times until I had a design that I liked. But here it is, how do you like it?

New Work -- Posted on October 24, 2008

I have a couple of new necklaces to show!

The first one has a conch shell focal that I picked up last summer at the Bead & Button Show in Milwaukee. The lampwork beads are made by another artist but I bought them a while back; I don't remember her name! How embarrassing! I've lost her business card. The clasp is one of my handmade fine silver toggles.

This next necklace features a hollow puffy focal and a number of small round lampwork beads. All these beads and the fine silver toggle are made by moi.



I have been really working hard the last couple of months. I've been working with copper for a medium and I can show this first project featuring copper, fine silver and faux bone. These diverse components are cold riveted together into a bangle bracelet. I grew interested in the pretty look of copper when I read an article in Art Jewelry Magazine June 2008 by Vicki Cook. Then I met her at the PMC conference the following month. She is an artist, the real deal.

Anyway, I bungled several bracelets, starting with the one I bought from Vicki. I was trying to add silver accents to the basic bangle and managed to fume the silver rivets all over the copper, ruining the connection. So I trimmed and re-shaped the copper. Then, since the resulting length was much shorter and it couldn't re reconnected to fit even a baby's wrist, I fashioned a tablet accent with faux bone and fine silver, then riveted that onto the copper. Its wearable and I like it. Vicki said in an email that I had made the bracelet "my own". I think I can also call it a good learning project.

Air Angel -- Posted on October 19, 2008

We are busy this weekend trying to get some of the get ready for winter chores and repairs done. We took a break to play with Angel and her frisbee. Check this out;

This is the launch. Notice the extreme intense look on her face as she races under the spinning flying frisbee;

Then she's airborne;




Got it!



I'm on call this weekend so I have to stick around close to home. I made a few beads yesterday and I managed to put together a new necklace today. I'll get a picture of it soon to show you. I had thought I would be doing a lot of Halloween type beads this month but I just haven't been in the mood yet. I can't force it, that never works.

How the West was Toured part 1 -- Posted on September 27, 2008

Friends and family are asking, "are you home?" and "did you take pictures?". We are home from our 2 week vacation road trip out West. We toured 6 National Parks and one Indian Park in 12 days. We took day hikes in the Parks and geo-cached in between the parks and slept in motels.

We had two wonderful house-sitters who took care of our pets so that we could enjoy worry free peace of mind while we were away. Thank you Curtis and Sarehna!

So lets get started. We got a big jump start and got all the way deep into Colorado by the second day. Then we started to geo cache on the way to Utah which was to be our first national park stop. I got real lucky and found one that had a Corona bottle koozy! And it sure came in handy, except I drank a Fat Tire beer instead of Corona. Sorry Corona!

The next day we managed to reach Bryce Canyon National Park. We spent the day touring every overlook and we took a few short hikes along the park's trails. This was our first time to visit Bryce.



The canyon had these most remarkable rock formations called "hoodoos". And striking strata colors.



I think this shot is a really interesting one:



We left Bryce late that afternoon and drove South into Arizona where we got the last motel room in town and it was a real stinker of a room. It dawned on me after stopping at the umteeth motel that I was wearing my FSM hat and that might have had something to do with the "sorry, no vacancy" that I was hearing. Or maybe it was the giant tour buses that filled up the motels. I don't know for sure. But that was a pretty miserable night. Yes, I should have arranged for a motel reservation. I really had thought that mid/late September would be far enough out of tourist season that rooms would be available, but I can now testify quite clearly that any town near The Grand Canyon will not have an available room any night of the week without a reservation. Everyone should learn from my experiences!
Its just that our itinerary was not planned precisely and we didn't know really what day we would arrive. Oh well.

We had never seen the North Rim of the Grand Canyon. Charlie and I both were surprised at the difference from the South Rim. The North rim is covered in fir and pine trees. Very forrested. And that differs greatly from the South rim which is all desert, sand and rocks. Travis and Charlie and I hiked easy trails and viewed all the overlooks. The main overlook near the Grand Canyon Lodge was the most congested with tourists but once we finished there and the visitor center, it was nice and not crowded. We were wishing we had a camper trailer again!



We drove out of Grand Canyon and headed back northeast to Page Arizona for the night. We were ahead of schedule and considered driving west to Las Vegas and then down to the South Rim because we wanted to see the new glass enclosed walk out over the canyon, but I couldn't face driving through Vegas this year and after much discussion we decided to tour a southern route next year and see that glass walk-way. And Charlie hasn't seen Sedona AZ, so it will be a great destination for next year.

We drove northeast from Page and along the way we made a visit to Monument Valley Indian Park. It was a scenic stop only and we got some great lattes in a very interesting indian run latte place. Very good latte. I was lucky that I didn't wear my FSM hat in that place though. The Indian proprietor had his bible open on the counter. A super nice fellow; I wouldn't have wanted to upset him and lose my scalp.



We got to Mesa Verde late that afternoon and got up early to see everything there. There is a lot to see in Mesa Verde. Lots of trails and overlooks. Balcony House is closed after Sept. 1st but we took a Ranger Guided Tour of Cliff Palace complete with ladders and rock steps and kivas.
Travis was a ladder-climbing 2 year old last time; he can still scamper up the ladders.



We hiked out to really nice overlooks and had the place to ourselves. A nice view of Cliff Palace from an across the canyon overlook:



And there are some great things to see on the mesa top.



It was a fairly short drive that afternoon back westward into Utah again. Moab UT. Great clean health-conscious town. I love Moab. Moab is situated between two National Parks; Canyonlands and Arches. We toured Canyonlands first and geo cached around the area too.



Canyonlands National Park:



The next day: Arches National Park. This is another of my favorite places. We stopped at the visitors center of course and then up the hill we went. This is about the first overlook and short hike. Its called Balance Rock, but this is a picture of the huge Other Rock of Whatever Name You Want To Call It:



Another interesting feature of this rock formation is that there are 3 people ON TOP! I figure this is probably that French Climbing Guy who is always climbing up something he isn't supposed to like sky scrapers in Japan. You hear about him all the time. I think he has his girl friend with him on this trip. She was doing YOGA up there on the edge for cripes sakes! I could see her doing it with my binoculars! Imagine!



We hiked to this double arch. Really neat. See Charlie and Travis down near the bottom of the picture?



We stopped to rest in the shade for a little while.



The walk out to this arch was a lot longer and hotter and drier. Did I mention how much I love the National Park Trail System? We each carried plenty of water on our hikes so it wasn't a problem.
This arch had had a rock-fall in 2006. A thin slice had fallen off the right side. People heard what sounded like thunder overhead but no storm. Luckily no-one was standing under it at the time. They have it blocked off now so you can't go all the way beneath it. Look how thin and graceful this arch is. It is huge too. Its called Landscape Arch.



After Arches we left Moab (another couple of yummy lattes) and drove two days to Rocky Mountain National Park. It is a little bit Northwest of Denver. As usual we were underdressed for the cold elevation there. So no hiking. Plus the altitude was intimidating. We saw some poor tourist lady at one of the Visitor Centers who had fainted and the Rangers were giving her oxygen etc. I lurked nearby listening to the what the Rangers were reading off of the pulse oxymeter. The lady was coming around fine and I knew the Rangers didn't want me to butt in. So as soon as I was sure the lady was looking to be OK we sauntered away. But Charlie and I agreed that it was too cold and the oxygen was too thin for us to hike to the tippy top of the trail.
The scenery was enough for us and we took a lot of pictures at the overlooks.



We high-tailed it home from there. Angel had a sore leg. I got pretty worried about her and we all were glad to get home after a long hard final 2 day push. Angel's foot is getting better, she has a swollen toe. No walks or runs for a while until she heals up. I think she probably twisted her foot on one of the damned walnuts fallen in the back yard. A bunch of them fell when Ike blew through during our first week on vacation.

What a great road trip we had! Lots of pictures; I had to choose just a few to show here. We must have found 30 geocaches and I have photos of most of them too.

I found it interesting in the 5 parks we visited that were in Utah, Arizona, and Colorado. They are all geographically sort of close by each other. Yet each one is uniquely different. The canyons and rock formations are not alike at all. You would think that if you'd seen and marveled at one canyon you would then be sort of bored by the next one. Seen one canyon, you've seen them all. But NO! That is not the case at all! The wind and the water and the strata and I don't know what all cause amazingly different effects in the landscape. I love it.

Adventures in BronzClay! -- Posted on August 17, 2008

Hi Everyone!
I'm so excited, I fired my first load of the new BronzClay this week. Here is a picture of the finished "stuff".

The big tubular thing is a whistle a la Donna Penoyer. It doesn't have a mouthpiece but it toots pretty well anyway. And it is so pretty! The other pieces are for some other projects underway,and the two little tabs that don't quite match in size are going to be earrings. I'm going to be doing some more bronze in the near future.

I also have a pretty picture of some beads that are a revisit of a design I was doing last summer. These are in fairly light summery colors.




I have several pairs of silver lentil earrings to be made available. And those pendants made with the big hole beads (see below) came out really nice. I'm going to get some pictures today and we'll have them available next weekend sometime.

-- Posted on July 27, 2008

I've been home from the PMC conference a whole week already.
(Hi, Brenda!) It may look like I haven't been doing anything lately, but I have. I haven't been taking pictures in a long time. So I shot a bunch this morning and prove that yes, I do have some new beads.


First, a little tube bead. Its not big, only 34mm long, but I like the black and white murrinis and I love the bluegreen frit along the bottom.

Now here are a couple of Big Hole beads. They are flat, feature a lot of twisties, and have a big hole. I'm planning to put some fine silver rings through the holes so they will hang on a chain or cord and face front.



and this blue one:




And I am also making these. Some of them are pairs for earrings. Some are still waiting for their match.

Wait! Wait! I almost forgot to show my newest curved bead!




Whew! That's a lot of pictures to put up in one day! Now I'm going to get back to some silver I'm working on. I want to get a kiln full of silver fired so that I can clean up my tools and open a package of BRONZclay! Yes, you heard me right!

I'm also going to update the beads for sale pages soon.

I love Summer! I hope all my friends and family are having as nice a Summer as I am.

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