Icing on the Cake

All righty then, I finally got a little caught up on all the

busyness of last week. Heather and I spent two days

working with our etching projects, but of course we

couldn't do a couple of stampings we managed to make

a hundred pieces of brass and copper. Talk about over

doing on a first time project! We cut, stamped, etched,

pickled, polished and made some killer stuff.

We have a nice video to that Heather is gonna edit and

put out so you can see.

Then our friend Melanie from Earthenwood Studios

came for a couple of days to visit with Heather and stay

at my house. We spent a day (a very long one), getting

our pieces ready to make some resin pendants.

Heather and Melanie pounding, heating and preparing

stuff to put into our pendants. I was taking some pictures

and making a couscous dish for lunch. I got a little behind,

couldn't find any of my small items to put into my pendants.

So needless to say I still have things to make. Beverly and

I can work on some when she gets here. I paid very close

attention and managed a couple of pieces, so I can finish my

stuff later .

These are the four finished pieces of mine, above.

A couple of Heather's pendants....above.

And these are Melanie's. Three totally different artists,

and three totally different looks. We used Ice Resin that

I purchased from Ornamentea.com. Very easy to mix and

super easy to pour. No smell, but could be messy, so take

your time! Heather will be heading home soon. That's gonna

be a sad day. We have had so much fun these last few weeks.

But she'll be back at Christmas and my sister and brother are

coming in here intwo weeks. Best summer I've had in a long time.

This week Geary and I head for the tennis championships in

Indianapolis. We love to go to those matches.

My Treasures

Okie Dokie...I promised I would show my goodies

I got at the Bead and Button Show. I didn't take many
pictures while I was there...my hands were too busy

touching all the beads on every one's tables. IMO I

didn't think there were many people there. But we

were there on Friday, maybe the weekend was better.

Bev and I hung around Melanie at Earthenwood Studios.

She did demos at Vintaj using a combination of her

beads and their brass. Beautiful things!

I love the "earthy" qualities of her beads. Probably how her

business got its name. Dah! Anyway we had a lot of fun

visiting with her. She is such a nice person.

I found a few great looking strands of pearls. Speaking of

which Art Bead Scene's monthly challenge is called

"Pearls of Wisdom". Check it out and if you have a design or

two to enter, you should do it. They have great give aways

to the winners.

I guess this time around I was pretty cautious about

how I spent money. I think I finally have enough...NOT!

I met a lot of people, especially from Michigan. In fact

one from the South Haven area. A PMC artist from around

Three Rivers. We are gonna get together for some beady

fun this summer. I'm excited...

We also met a woman all the way from Australia.

She flew 14 hours just to L.A., how nuts is that?

She was shopping for her business. There was another

woman from Ontario who lives at the very far end closest to

the North Pole, raises Icelandic sheep.

Another fun thing that happened was Bev and I went to

talk to people about sponsoring the Bead Cruise 2009 and

there happened to be the last three women who signed up

standing there. One was going for her birthday and she

talked her two friends into going with her.

Bev was wearing The Queen of Denial necklace that

she's teaching. It just made it seem more real and

exciting to the women. All in all, I had a very good time.

There was even a tornado in Milwaukee, but no one

knew and just kept shopping. Nothing can stop us

bead shoppers...didn't even hear the sirens going off.

To top the evening off Beverly and I went a spent a

little time with Dona Anderson. She has some great new

beading projects going. Handle It is a really nice bracelet.

She is a special person and I am blessed to know her.

So that's my trip to Milwaukee...more pictures are on my

Flickr page. I'm off to put the inspiration I was bombarded

with to some use. Night!

Ode to Joy Revisited

Finally, I finished my July page! This is another version of a needlefelted sample that I did a couple of years ago. Funny thing is, as I look at her I realized she changed about as much as I had! Hips are fuller, arms a little larger, no waist! But the embellishments inside her are as rich and precious as my life. The focal bead (face) is from Melanie at Earthenwood Studios. I used my favorite seedbead colors, pearls and a couple of crystals. The flowers were from a bead store in Tennessee that I got years ago. I added the purple heart as an after thought. Most of July was spent having tests done on my heart. It was a wake up call for sure. Thank you everyone for your prayers. I got all good news back.

Now I'm looking for a special button that I put somewhere so I wouldn't forget where it was. I'm going to use it on my August page. Notice the key words "wouldn't forget"...(big sigh)....