Monday, December 29, 2008

Goodbye Holidays

I'm really ready for the holidays to be over, in fact I'm ready for this entire year to be over. First half of my christmas vacation was me running fever and feeling like death warmed over. I still feel really crappy because i'm still sick and I got news I never wanted to hear but that's not something I want to talk about or think about, for that matter. My mom ended up in the hospital for a couple of days because of pnuemonia, she's home now and doing better. I got to see my cousin that I haven't seen in like 8-10yrs. We had a nice christmas, most of our gifts were for my 4yr old niece. One of my uncles gave my daughter a Yamaha keyboard and she was THRILLED to pieces. She didn't care that it was used. 1st thing she said was " I can hit more than one key now". I'm surprised she hasn't run the batteries down in it yet. I have to go and get an AC adapter for it. The nicest gift I got was from the hubby, a professional airbrush kit, I just have to wait on the compressor portion of it now. I'm so tired, I need more sleep. LOL! It's really quiet at work and has been all day. Most people are still on vacation. We've only had one person come in and that was to drop something off for service work.

I'm really hoping that after all the holidays are said and done that I can finally get to sit down and breathe and maybe create some new stuff. Right now, no ideas cause i'm full of brain fog (sinuses). BLEH!

Thursday, December 18, 2008

Poor Workmanship

Hello!

I got pictures. I posted about these items yesterday and how shoddy the workmanship is. I was taking the pictures last night and my camera just didn't want to look at them. I could see the flaws, the lack of effort and the evident lack of pride and care for the work. It was making me mad all over again. I know the pictures aren't the greatest but I was working on limited time. The batteries in the camera were about to die and it was really late and I just didn't have time to set up a lighting.















Wednesday, December 17, 2008

Just around the Corner

HI! Just another week and Christmas will be here, YEAH! I've gotten almost all of my Christmas shopping done and went way over my budget, oops! I still have a few things to make, just need the motivation. I got some of the supplies I have been waiting on and now just need to find a bit of time to finish up the earrings to go with a necklace. I also need to finish the scarf i'm working on for my grandmother. I can't wait till next week because i'm OFF, OFF, OFF! 9 day vacation, WOOHOO! I'm excited but I'm not, cause probably half of that is going to be sent traveling from one place to another. Honestly, I'd rather just stay home but I can't cause I miss my family too and it's hard to go and see them and this time of year is when I get my vacation so I gotta go.

Creatively speaking, I have earrings to finish and I need to finish up on a prototype ring design. I haven't come across a ring like this yet but doesn't mean that someone hasn't already done it or something very similar. So after the holidays look for my new design (to me anyways).

I have a beef with an artist even though I don't know where this lady is from, just somewhere near El Campo TX., I think. My great Aunt T ordered a couple of floral paperweights for my grandmother. My grandmother wanted red roses and the date of birth and death of my grandfather. When my grandmother recieved the items she told me that she almost started crying and was just going to throw them in the trash. First, they weren't even red roses, they were a reddish carnation and a yellow carnation. Second, they weren't even the same sizes. The reddish carnation is probably the better of the two but not by to much. The yellow carnation one, it's like the lady just decided to hurry up and since she didn't seem to have enough resin to make it the same size the carnation looks squished.The yellow one, it's just horrible, I was upset that this artist actually let that one leave to a customer. They both have knicks like they were cut by something. The bottoms were painted with a crappy green paint that didn't even get into all the cracks and crevices. The bottom was covered with green felt and it was a sloppy job on cutting it to fit the bottoms. The yellow one actually had scraps of green felt stuck to the bottom. As an artist, selling a product, I would never have let those leave my home much less expect the customer to pay for them. It's things like this that give crafter/artists a bad name and make consumers continue to see our creations as "garage sale" type products. Grrr, just thinking about it makes me mad and I have those horrible pieces at my house right now. About the only decent thing I can say about them, the person did a decent job on keeping the air bubbles out. I'm going to have to get pictures so that everyone can see. I just haven't had time yet.

Wednesday, December 10, 2008

It's cold, It's cold, It's COLD!

BRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR! It's cold outside. I can't believe it, just yesterday before the cold front moved in, it was in the mid 70's and dropped down to the 30's by midnight and it snowed. It was really windy and it was mentioned we might see some snow flurries. WOW! it was coming down fast and big huge snowflakes at that, more like ice than that soft stuff most people think of. Yet it was still light enough to float around. I was so excited that I forgot that my camera takes video footage too. I think the video would have captured the intensity of the snow coming down. I did get some pictures though and almost froze my fingers off. My poor digits were so freaking cold that I couldn't even feel the button on the camera or if I was even pressing hard enough to take the picture, the flash was the only thing that said yes I was. LOL! It was really cool cause in Texas, especially Austin, we don't get much of anything like this, mostly sleet and ice when it does happen. I've only seen it snow a few times in my life, that it actually stayed on the ground for more than a couple of hours. We had the sliding glass door open to let in some fresh cool air and my kitten Lira was going crazy. Some of the large snowflakes were floating onto the porch and she wanted at them. She kept running back and forth like a kitty on crack, her tail like a bottle cleaner. LOL! She kept standing up on the screen door and meowing like she wanted at those snowflakes. So silly and to bad I didn't get any pictures of her acting like a freak.

When I got home yesterday, the hubby had decorated the porch with lights and decorated the tree. He's so sweet when he's not being Mr. Grumpy.

So here are the pics, starting with our wee little tree, hehe!


The wreath I made a few years ago. It's changeable cause the only things somewhat attached are the bows and they are just twist ties on the back.


Here are the snow pics










Monday, December 8, 2008

Just a jolt

Well it seems that I've recieved a bigger jolt of creativity than I had thought. YIPPEEEE FOR ME! Some of my readers know that i've been dealing with a major slump the past few years. This has been the longest and hardest slump I've gone through in a really long time. There are many factors that haven't helped in getting me out of this but I have hope and look forward to another year. Around the end of the year, christmas holiday, I get a little more inspiration to create, mostly gifts though. So here is a few things I'm working on at the moment.

Necklace- Sterling silver, fresh water pearls and black czech faceted briolettes.



Close-up


Cute little angel earrings- sterling silver and faceted czech glass rounds



Here are my girls, Kitty (aka Fat cat) and Lira (aka Brat cat). This is one of their more quieter moments. Kitty had been cleaning Lira.


Tuesday, December 2, 2008

The Muse came and visted

Hi everyone!

Hope ya'll had a lovely Thanksgiving Holiday. We had a small family get together, the hubby cooked a most excellent ham. I made candied yams, green been casserole, 7-up cake, cherry pie and a pumpkin pie. The next day we used the ham bone and made stock for a ham soup, it was sooooooooooo good..Mmm,Mmm Yummy!

I didn't get half the things done that I had planned to do over my little vacation. I had a 6 day weekend. Tuesday I had already scheduled off over a month ago not even realizing at the time it was the week of Thanksgiving. My appointment went well, I now have some medical coverage and assistance through my county for atleast a year. I only have to pay 25% of my bill, unless it's a private doctor thing through the ER then I have to pay the whole bill. My prescriptions won't cost me but about $10-$20 which is good. I also qualified for women's health services, which is why I needed the medical help to begin with.

Later that afternoon however, my good day went to pot. I was on my way to pick up my daughter from school. I didn't even get around the corner from my apartment before I got backed into. I was coming to a speed bump and slowing down because I have bad struts on my car. I caught the vehicle lights come on out the corner of my eye and no hesitation, the lady just started backing up. I tried to swerve and honk at the same time, but I just wasn't fast enough. She got a scratch on the pretty chrome of her bumper and I now have a dent in the rear fender well to match the dent on the same side on the front fender well. I got backed into back in February in a parking lot. It's almost identical except different parking lots. Both vehicles that hit me were trucks and both drivers said they didn't see me, even though my car was past theirs and if they'd bothered to look out the side mirrors they wouldn't have had any problem seeing me. Grrrrrr! So either I'm going to have a great christmas from the money I get or a newer car. Personally, I'm leaning to a newer car, maybe even a bigger car so that noone has a problem seeing me. (rolls eyes) Unfortunately, my car being old and way past it's prime, the replacement parts have all been discountinued and the probability of finding them is like 50/50 shot. Noone was hurt, I was a little shook up from it though.

The rest of my little vacation, went just fine. I have some pics of new stuff.

This is a pair of earrings I'm sill working on. I have some chain coming in so that I can finish them. I glued swarovski flat back crystals into their spots. I have realized that some how I've ended up with A LOT of the green flat backs in several sizes.



This is a necklace I finished. I'm really liking the new Global Nomad line of products by Blue Moon Beads (creativity inc.) that you can find at Michaels. I still have another centerpiece to work on, waiting on chain for that too.


A close up of the center piece.



Another gorgeous pair of earrings. I got the moon like shapes from a seller on Etsy (GreatMusings). I glued on tiny flat back AB crystals and a citrine crystal to give them just a little sparkle. I really like these earrings.



My grandmothers bracelet. She wanted a dice bracelet and charms to indicate gambling. She likes to get down to Louisanna now and then or the bingo hall. hehehe




I also finally took some decent pictures of some stuff I've been meaning to list on my Etsy shop. More handmade jewelry and some more supply stuff, like pre-printed fabric patterns for stuffed dolls. Like this cute little guy.