Sometimes I Wonder....

Sometimes I wonder if I have the soul of a flake or an artist.

I started expressing myself in artistic, crafty ways when I was a small child and my mother taught me how to embroider. I was 6 or I may have been even younger. I dabbled over the years, making necklaces from Goodwill finds and loop loom potholders and pillows made from washcloths and yarn. I even remember making a jewelry box from a book. My mother was horrified over that one. The next thing I remember learning was decoupage. I taught myself by reading about it. Probably around 10 or so. I tried to learn to sew in Home Ec class, but I was truly horrible at making clothing. I don't remember learning any other crafts until I got married and moved from Dallas, TX to Biloxi, MS to be with my Air Force husband at the ripe old age of 18. I explored some and came across cross stitch at that point. I cross stitched for a long time. Then I found quilting. I love quilting. I made traditional quilts for years. Now, I'm branching out into art quilting and my own original designs. I've taken photography classes and done some scrap booking. I also started to make jewelry that doesn't fall apart because I use the proper stringing wire instead of thread (like I did on my Goodwill necklace).

There is still so much more out there that I want to learn to do. I want to learn to paint with both watercolor and acrylic. I want to knit scarves and dish cloths for everyone I know. I want to work with stained glass. I want to learn to make more expressive, nontraditional jewelry. I want to take better photographs.

As it is now, I have so many options, that I am often slowed down by just trying to figure out what I want to do on any given day when it comes to creativity. Still I add more ideas and plans for others types of expression. Does this make me a flake or an artist at heart?

Christmas Eve 2009

We were supposed to go to my sister-in-law Charmaine's house today. When I woke up, I could tell that it had indeed gotten colder, as predicted. I felt a migraine coming on. I feel miserable. I did not feel like visiting with anyone even someone I love and enjoy so very much as Charmaine.

I drug myself out of bed, washed the remaining dishes and had breakfast. Then I told my hubby how I was feeling. Seems he wasn't feeling terribly good either. So he called his sister and told her we wouldn't be making it to her house after all. I feel bad about canceling on them, but with 16 other guests expected, hopefully they won't miss us too much.

I came back upstairs and put on my Holly jewelry that I made last night. I turned on the White Christmas marathon that is showing on AMC. I have it muted so that I can listed to Christmas music on the radio, which I'm listening to through the computer. I have KVIL (a Dallas station) on because they play all Christmas music after Thanksgiving (I think). Since it's on the computer, they usually show the song and artist, so I'm making a list of songs to down load later.

I've got the shades up, watching for the snow we might get. It's snowing at Charmaine's now and at several other friend's homes who all live farther north than us. It's very windy here and ice is melting from our roof, but no rain or snow yet today. We got a lot of rain last night, which I guess is where the ice came from. I've seen a little bird land several times on the deck rail. That's been fun to watch. I have an urge to put bird seed on the rail, but I'll have to wait for hubby to wake up. I can hear him softly snoring in the recliner downstairs.

So, this is our Christmas Eve. Quiet and drippy. Nice, but not quite what we had originally planned. Head achy and hoping for that to end. Maybe I need a nap too.

"Holly" Jewelry set

Hubby and I are going to his sister Charmaine's tomorrow for Christmas Eve dinner. I'm not entirely sure what clothing I'll wear, but I did want to make some jewelry to wear to the gathering. So, tonight I pulled out my new green glass beads and started playing. I knew I wanted it to be Christmasy looking, so I pulled out all of my reds, whites, clears and other greens also.

My garnets are beautiful, but too dark for Christmas and rather brown looking, like most of my other red beads, which I hadn't realized before and I find rather disappointing. The garnet beads are what I had originally planned to use, so on to plan B since they just wouldn't do. I had 30 lovely little green, red and white millefiori beads that I almost incorporated into the necklace. I also tried some Swarovski Crystal AB beads, but I really liked this combination of the glass beads and coral best once I came across them together.

It's the shortest necklace I've made for myself since I've been making jewelry. I couldn't make it any longer. I used all of my coral beads in this. The earrings are the first I've ever made. I call this the Holly set. It looks like abstract holly leaves and berries to me.

Merry Christmas!

Art Today

I'm in a beading mood. I wish I was in a sewing mood, especially since my quilt retreat next week is now in danger, but I'm not. I wanted to do something with the beautiful blue tiger eye beads I had, so today, I grabbed them. All the beads in this Anglican rosary are tiger eye or black glass seed beads. I used three different sizes and two different types of tiger eye, with a gold tone pewter Celtic cross and gold findings. I really like it and I'm tempted to keep it for myself, but that was not the reason for making it. This one is really long and can be worn as a necklace. I need to make more necklace type prayer beads. Maybe even some that are totally unique and don't follow any kind of Anglican or Catholic style.

I may not have gotten any art done yesterday and all I really did the day before was photograph beads I had made the night before that, but I tell you, this art challenge has really got me going! I hadn't beaded in ages and in three days I've made several new things. I'm happy. Be sure to click on the photo to see the beads more closely.

More for the Shop

I've been beading (last night), photo-

graphing (today) and listing things on etsy. It's about time I got my shop in order and my rear in gear. Hope you like what you see.

My only art for today, may well be my photography. That was not my plan, but things have taken me longer today than I had originally thought they would, plus I'm adding more to my shop than I thought I would too. It's all good. If you want to see almost all of the photography, check out the shop photos. I love the ones I took on the bird bath pedestal!

Will soon be in my Shop

I'm going to be working on beading and adding items to my etsy shop this coming week. Thought I'd show you what I have as I start to add them. Hopefully these two will go in tomorrow. I'm almost finished photographing them.

My First etsy Sell!

This is the first item to sell out of my etsy shop! My Chalcedony Anglican Rosary sold while I was at my sister's for the Houston Quilt Festival. Talk about excited. I did a happy dance, to the best of my ability after two days of walking the show. I looked more like Fred Sanford from "Sanford and Son" doing some kind of jig than any kind of happy dance. My niece B got a big kick out of me.

I shipped the rosary out on Monday. Hopefully it is now in the hands of it's new owner. Now, I need to get busy uploading photos of new items for the shop.

The Ramblings of a Grieving Crazy Woman

Marianne's funeral was today in Michigan. I live in TX and money is tight right now, I mean I haven't even seen my grand kids in over a year, so I couldn't go to the funeral. That made me very sad today. Of course it's a wonderful, clear, cool, beautiful fall day here. Just didn't feel right that it should be so nice, but I was glad it was when I finally hauled myself to the grocery store. You know you're down when going to the grocery store cheers you up!




I had an appointment with my allergy doctor on Thursday. Found out that I have a sinus infection. Can you believe that? This is the second year in a row that he has done sinus x-rays on me and we've discovered a sinus infection. I've had headaches, literally all of my life. Even as a small child I remember having them daily. I'm so used to being in head pain that I don't even notice it any more! The pain from this is so mild in comparison to a migraine, I haven't even been taking anything for it. It's like nothing to me. I did think I was getting a sinus infection several weeks ago. I even went to my family doctor. I didn't have a fever and was showing no signs of pain when he pressed on my face, so he said I didn't have one. I think I had one then and I've had one ever since! The allergist said that I seem to get sinus infections when I am stressed and overly tired. Great! One more thing to add to the list. I wonder if this is related to living with smokers too? I tend to get bronchitis if I get a cold because of living all of my life with smokers. Now, the doctors are concerned that I'll start getting pneumonia. I got a shot for it last year and I keep my fingers crossed.



I broke my glasses last month. The ear piece fell off as I folded them to go to sleep one night. Talk about an irritant. I can't see without my glasses! I can't even hear to talk on the phone without them. I know that's weird, but it's me. So, I go get my eyes checked and picked out new ones, which is no easy feat when you have to look at yourself with your nose pressed to the mirror. Then as we were writing up the order, the manager of the optical department realized that I had purchased that little warranty thing that I usually never purchase and I still had several months left on it! Woo hoo! I was going to get my glasses replaced for free! And I was told they had the same frames in stock. I picked them up on Thursday. Seems like there's an old saying that goes something like anything for free isn't worth what it cost or something like that. Well, the first thing I noticed is that even though I was told they would be the same frames, they aren't. I think they have a slight cat eye 60's look to them. I've done that and didn't really think it was a great look for me in the 60's, but I was a kid so it didn't matter. I've already planned to buy new frames and use these glasses for back up. Then today, I went to clean them and the right lens fell out! It also did this the day I got them while I was still getting them adjusted. That should have been a warning. So, I drag out the really ugly glasses that I use for back ups right now and try to put the new ones in the case to safely carry them back to the store on Monday. They won't fit! The ear pieces are so long that they had to bend them about half way down the length to get them to fit me which makes them hang outside the case! That's one more thing that proves they are different glasses. I would have never bought glasses that didn't fit to begin with! But they sure didn't care if they fit when they replaced them. I'm not a happy customer.




OK, I'm taking a deep cleansing breath. I've just reread this and it sounds much more like bitching than rambling. Well, enough is enough. I've posted a couple of pictures of some of the prayer beads that I've made. I've made myself one set. It's the one with the frog on the bottom. I wanted to continue the earthy feel I had from the beads and I loved the frog. I just use it as my cross when I'm praying. The one with the dog charm is for a friend's hubby. He was in a serious motorcycle accident just over a year ago and he's a peace officer. That one has healing beads and protective beads and the dog charm is to represent protection too. There are others that are gifts and I plan to put some on etsy. Making them has been a joy for me. I love working with the stone beads and seeing all the wonders the Lord made for us in them. I love the feel of the stones as I pray. They are somewhat cool to the touch at first and then they warm up. The practice of using prayer beads has centered me and helped focus my prayers. I've really enjoyed them.