Shadows in Santa Fe

The first picture is outside the Bill Worrell gallery.  We've always loved his work and bought a piece when we were there two year ago.  I couldn't help noticing the shadow it was casting.  The sunlight was just right.

The next picture is from Santa Cafe.  We had a wonderful meal there and the piece over the mantel and it's shadow was amazing.

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Back from Santa Fe....

I had a great time in Santa Fe.  I came back a little run down...well maybe a lot run down.  I had a cold but that didn't stop me from going...but I felt the effects when I got home.  I went to work for three days then stayed home on Friday and slept.  And I slept alot today too.  I'm finally getting rid of the cold I've had for 2 weeks. 

Besides having fun with the girls and eating fabulous food.....I bought lots of beads to go with the bronze.

 Lapis

  Etched Agate

Carnelian

 Onyx

  Turquoise

 Bauxite and shell

  Clay beads from Mali

And no bead shopping trip is complete without something from Gary Wilson.  I think Cris was the first one to say...."I wish I could quit you Gary Wilson".  Except for the trilobite...these are all beads or pendants.

 Trilobite

 Petrified Palmwood

 Fossilized Turtle Shell...I love the texture on this.  I'm going to roll out a sheet of polymer clay and impress this into it for a texture sheet. 

 Petrified starfish and fossilized tree fern

 Pima Canyon conglomerate, petrified wood, and more tree fern

Fossilized sea urchin and more tree fern



 A few artifacts... a small brass bead from Ghanna and a double chameleon from Burkina Faso

And a few of my most favorite things.......

Viking beads from Karen Elmquist.  She hide these in my coat pocket and I didn't find them until I got the airport.  What a great surprise!!  These beads go great with the bronze.

Twisted bronze bracelets from Cris Leonard.  I'm into bracelets right now.  I love stacking multiple bracelets.  These are so cool!!  She slipped these on my wirst and I didn't even notice :))  LOL.

And a new messenger bag from Susan Dilger and Taos Edge.  This is so cool.  The dragonflly has a skull head and the latin reads..."The unknow is maginificent".  I was able to put everything in this bag for the flight home. 



Here in Santa Fe

I'm here in Santa Fe having fun with Cris and Karen!!! Talk to you when I get back....if I come back :)

Tuesdsay Ramblings

I feel like I've been in a fog...since...well...for a long time.  I can't seem to get organized and moving.  I get one task done and 5 others crop up.  I get one room cleaned up and the others all go to hell.  HA...and it's not going to get better any time soon.

Next Tuesday I'm heading to Santa Fe for Beadfest.  My favorite town...having fun with my girlfriends...fantastic New Mexican food.  I won't get anything done or get more organized but I will recharge my batteries and laugh non-stop.  I thought about exhibiting but didn't really have enough pieces put together and I guess I didn't want to put myself through the stress of doing an out-of-state show that I can't drive to.

I am going to take two classes and I don't have to bring a single tool.  YAY!!  One is a photography class.  I don't think I can ever take too many photography classes.  Every little tip helps.  The other class is Art Glass Clay with Paula Radke.  I want to use it to make flat disc beads to go with the bronze.

I picked up a book this week.  Folk Designs from India.  The only unfortunate thing is that I had to find it from a used book vendor.  I found someone in Canada that had it.  It's full of line drawings of various folk designs.  Great as a jumping off point to make new texture plates.



I also found a new iPad app that I like....Zinio.  It's an on-line newstand.  You can buy on-line subscriptions or just single issues of various magazines.  They also have free articles from select magazines.  This is another great app to have when you are traveling and don't want to weight yourself down with magazines.  I'm getting the digital version of Art Jewelry this way.  I've also been able to find Marie Claire Idees which is a French craft magazine.  I picked up one a couple years ago when we were in Paris.  Finding it in the US wasn't easy.  Borders used to carry it but the issue would be at least 2 months old.  Now I can get it hot off the press...virtual press. I can't understand a word of it but the pictures are wonderful.  I need to get a really good french-english dictionary and work my way through it.  Maybe I could learn more French that way. 

Goodies from the kiln

Just a few fired pieces...

I like this one.  The texture is so deep that the color remained on the inset areas even after polishing.   I am going to mold the fired piece so I can make smaller versions. 

This is a Tibetan Calendar Pendant.  A calendar on one side and smooth on the other.  I've read that the smooth side is rubbed in a circular motion on a baby's belly when they are fussy to sooth them.

 I haven't polished this one up yet.  The colors are amazing.  It goes from green to purple to red to orange. 

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I've ranted enough about politics...for now.  It's a topic that can turn people against one another so quickly. Time to focus on something that brings people together....art.  

I've spent the last few days cleaning the studio.  Most of it is clean except for the desk...which is where I've piled everything.  Now I have to attack the pile.  I promised a co-worker a pair of little hoop earrings so I stopped the cleaning to work in bronze.  I have a few other interesting pieces going into the kiln besides the hoops. 

I've been playing around with carved wooden stamps from India.  I made a silicone mold of the stamp below so I could make bronze hearts.  When this bronze heart comes out of the kiln I think I will make a mold of that so I can have a smaller version. 

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Tuesday Ramblings....again

Maybe I'll make this a regular feature...Tuesday Ramblings.   A little of this...a little of that. 

Last week I was on a roll....being angry at our politicians and news people.  The first thing that set me off was a House Oversight committee on religious freedom and contraceptives.  The panel that was assembled was all men.  My reaction...quite bluntly was....WTF???  Where are the women??  If we are going to have a discussion of contraceptives....there must be women.  I'm getting the impression that some of our politicians want to take women back more than a few decades.  They behave as if it's their duty to speak for us rather than engaged us in the conversation. I'm old enough to know the frustration that comes with not being listened to or believed because I'm a woman.  I've never reacted well to this type of treatment.  I'm an "in your face" kind of girl and it's gets worse when I see things like this happening. 

The other thing that set me off was Fox News commentator Liz Trotta.  I don't watch Fox...I like objectivity in my news reporting.  What left me speechless was the phrase "raped too much".  It still has me speechless.  My mind just can't grasp the ignorance of this statement.  But you have to see/hear it yourself to believe it. 

 

There was another journalist I was angry with....Richard Florida.  Back in November I read his on-line article about how people in the Midwest are stuck.  His theory was that the only reason people live in the Midwest is that they don't have the resources to move to either the east or west coast.  So I commented on the article.  Something to the effect that we have good jobs, a good standard of living and are close to family and friends...in other words....we live here because we we choose to live here.  I found out later that my comment was referenced by Julie Irwin Zimmerman, a journalist from Cincinnati, who also disagreed with Florida and wrote an article about it.  Zimmerman's story was published in the Cleveland Plain Dealer on Sunday.  I had no idea it would show up in the local paper. It's a little disconcerting to see a comment made on-line end up in the local newspaper.   It's a good reminder that anythng you put on-line is out there for the world to see.

I'll get back to jewelry in the next few days.  I still need to finish cleaning the studio.  I have a few seedling ideas that I want to grow and some texture plates I want to make.  OHH....and I have some jewelry that is winging it's way to Scotland.  More about that later.

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Studio Cleaning

I was going to work in the studio today....but I couldn't figure out how to even walk into it.  I'm such a pig.....

I set to work on cleaning and straightening things up.  At least I got one area cleaned up. 

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Bliss.....

Could this be anything other than pure bliss???  Either that or it's the start of a sneeze.  I prefer to think it's bliss.   Thanks to Sophia for posting this on Pinterest.

I know I bitched a little about Pinterest...but just like Facebook when I first got on it....I can't quit looking at it or loading images.  It is addictive. 

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Tuesday Ramblings....

How is it we are already in February?  HA...a common theme in this blog is how fast time flies.  And it does.  I had this discussion today with one of my employees.  He's been with us for 10 years.  That surprised him.  I've been in the same job for 15 years.  I guess I like it.  I guess my boss likes me. 

I received an Excellence Award today at work.  It was a surprise...a very nice one....it comes with $250.   My boss took the time to put down on paper all the reasons why he thought I should get the award.  That, to me, means more than the award or the cash.

I had my annual mammogram today.  OUCH...not really.  It's really not that bad.  When you get your first period people like to say you have become a woman.  But there are a number of milestones that mark being a woman.  Having children...one milestone that I've never reached...and never will at this point.  Getting your first mammogram is another one of those milestones. Usually I get called back for more images.  This was the first year that I had a clean exam the first time.  I had the mammogram and 1.5 hours later I had a message on my computer that it was negative.  We have an electronic chart at the hospital so as a patient you can login and see all your test results as soon as your physician releases them.  Not bad...from exam to result in 1.5 hours....not bad at all.

Pinterest....have any of you been looking at it or using it. The images on Pinterest are really amazing.  The great part about it is seeing so many images of things that you like.  Images that you may not have run across if it hadn't been for someone else pinning it to a board you are following.  The bad part is picture overload.  When I hooked up, it loaded in all my Facebook friends who have accounts and I was immediately follwing every board they had.  I want to see what inspires people, what jewelry they like, studio ideas, decorating ideas....but I don't necessarily want to see 20 pictures of green frogs.  You have to actively opt out of seeing friends boards.  I find it's high maintenance to filter out the things I don't want to see.  It's easier to "Unfollow" the pictorially prolific as a whole.  I haven't decided if I want to continue with Pinterest.

There are just too many social networking sites to keep up with.  I just now closed my LinkedIn account.  I never used this so there is no reason to have my information out there on yet another site. 

I'll leave you with a picture of Princess Sophie and her beautiful eyes.

Weekend trip to Cincinnati

We spent the weekend in Cincinnati visiting Jason, Magaly, and Jakob.  We went shopping on  Saturday.  First we went to the outlet store for Ballard Designs, Travel Smith, Grandin Road and  Frontgate...all under one roof.  It was chair heaven.  If you ever need chairs...that is the place to go.  Everywhere you looked there were chairs.

I did find a duvet cover with a print of the streets of Paris.  We actually located the last place we stayed on it.  Of course I bought it.

Then we spent the next two hours in Ikea.  I had my pedometer on.  We walked 5000 steps just in Ikea.  I had never been to one before.  WOW.  It was mind-numbing.  The kitchen cabinets are amazing.  They have storage down to a science.  You open up a drawer or cabinet and there are all these pull out drawers for mega-storage.

Magaly modeling one of the kitchens I liked.

Lou doing his best "Vanna" in the white kitchen...hahaha...Vanna White...get it.

 Jason, Magaly and Jakob in another kitchen I liked. I think Jakob is doing the wave.

I loved the backsplash on this one.

Jakob has got to me the cutest little boy in the world.  At first he wasn't quite sure of us. 

But after a beer and checking his voicemail.... he was just fine.

Just kidding about the beer  :))
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Inspiration

Pinterst is the new time suck in my life.  It's like an on-line bulletin board where you can pin pictures of anything you like.  It's been around for awhile but has recently took off.  I was part of it long ago and have now come back to it.  Pinning pictures on-line made me want bulletin boards for my studio.  I have all these pictures and drawings and they get piled up into a stack or stuck in a file.  It's hard to use something as inspiration if it isn't visible. 

Here are some of my pins....

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