Road Trip

For the last three and one half years, I've been commuting from Boston and then Baltimore to Scottsdale, Arizona for my real job.  I rented a two bedroom furnished condo in Scottsdale and split my time evenly between the two locations.  I usually fly from Baltimore to Phoenix on Sunday and then fly home the following Friday.  I spend one week at home and return to Phoenix the next Sunday.  In addition to racking up a bunch of frequent flyer miles, I  was often exhausted from the travel.  I have decided that as of June 30, 2011, I am leaving my job to pursue something closer to home.

In order to do that, I have to fly to Phoenix (which I'm doing the day after tomorrow) and drive my car back to Baltimore.  Hence, the road trip.  This trip is approximately 2500 miles.  In other words, I'm not just running out to the grocery store.  Even if I take 5 days to make the trip, it will still require me to drive 500 miles every day.  Arrrgh!

It isn't all bad, however.  I've asked my oldest sister, Fran, who lives in Dallas if she would make the trip with me.  She said yes so now I have a partner.  At least I'll have someone to talk to while I drive.  She isn't going to be much help with the driving because she isn't comfortable driving my car.  I drive a Lexus SUV and she is tiny.  I don't just mean short.  She is really tiny and just can't see well in my car.  I am, however, grateful for the company.

We have planned our route so that we can stop and visit some folks along the way.  Of course, before we can start that, I have to get to Dallas to pick her up.  From Phoenix to Dallas, is approximately 1200 miles.  I've planned two days for that part of the trip.  I'm leaving Phoenix on Monday morning so I should be arriving in Dallas sometime late Tuesday afternoon.  I'll spend the night at Fran's and we'll head out together on Wednesday morning.

Wednesday, we plan on driving to Little Rock, AR or Memphis, TN, depending on how far we get.  We'll spend the night in one of those cities and drive to Ft. Thomas, KY on Thursday,  This will be one of our best stops because we are stopping to see my son, his lovely wife and all three of my grandkids.  I think we'll be in Ft. Thomas until Monday or Tuesday morning.  I'm not sure yet.  While we're in Ft. Thomas, we are planning to head over to New Albany to visit our dad's brother and sister that neither of us have seen in the last 30 years.  I'm also hoping we can take a grandkid or two to meet them.

Then on either Monday or Tuesday, we will drive from Ft. Thomas to Baltimore which takes about 8 hours.  My sister will stay at my house for a day or two and then fly back to Dallas.

I'm busily looking up bead stores along our route.  I thought it might be really fun to visit a different store wherever we stay.  When I started looking for bead stores, I realized we are only staying in one hotel on the trip from Dallas to Baltimore.  It didn't seem like much fun to just visit a store in Little Rock or Memphis.   Now I'm thinking we need to visit any interesting bead stores that we can find along the way.  This should certainly help break up the drive.

I'll try to post along the way but obviously, my business will be taking a few days off next week while I move home and get settled.

Let me know if you know of any interesting bead stores between Phoenix and Baltimore!

From Parts to Pieces (Jewelry Pieces that is).

I've had a few days to mess with some of the parts that I bought a couple of weeks ago at the Bead Fest show.  I think I also showed you a picture of my purchases the last time I was able to go to Scottsdale Bead Supply.  Some of the parts from both of those trips have now made it into  pieces of jewelry.

When at Bead Fest, I found a charming clay heart pendant with lustrous colors of copper, green and just a bit of blue.  I also found some beautiful square lampwork beads that are crystal clear on the outside but the inside is swirled with copper, green and, of course, blue.  In addition, after I had purchased the pendant and the lampwork beads (still not sure of what I was going to do with them), I continued to wander around the show looking at everything.

When I look at things at a bead show or sale, I don't just look with my eyes.  I also look with my fingers.  I'm forever picking up things and feeling their weight and texture.  There is just something about having these components in my hands that makes me know what to do with them.  I do order components on line sometimes but when I do, I really struggle to know if they'll work for me.  It is almost like if I can't touch them, I can't really see them.

Anyway, during my wandering, I found some lovely fire polished Czech beads in a shade of green that complimented the other beads I had already purchased that day.  Of course, they went into my bag of goodies too.  At this point, I knew I was going to make a necklace that utilized the clay heart pendant, the lampwork beads and the green fire polished beads.  I wasn't yet sure of what it would look like.  Often, when I'm buying beads or stones, I pick out colors that I like and that compliment each other but I don't really know what I will be making out of my purchases.  That usually comes later when I'm sitting in my studio playing with my purchases.

Now I was back at home and ready to begin the creative process.  I got out all of my recent purchases and began to play with them, laying them out on my work table and adding accent pieces that I already owned.  I usually play around until I know what it is that I want to create.  In this case, the first thing I wanted to work with was the lampwork beads described above.

This is what I ended up with:

The next step is to polish it up and get it listed on Etsy and Artfire, which I am hoping to do this evening.

As you can see from the pictures of my stuff, I have a lot of other beads and findings that I've purchased recently.  I tend to end up making about 90 - 95% of what I buy into jewelry right away.  There are always a few things that I love but don't quite know what to do with.  These just go into my stash (which is unbelievably large, some say large enough to open my own bead store) and get pulled out each time I come home with new beads or stones.  I've made several other items from this collection of stuff which I'll get up on the blog as soon as I can.

How do you shop for beads, stones and components?  Do you know what you are going to make before you choose your supplies?

Mother's Day

Well, another Mother's Day is coming up soon.  It used to be a holiday to which I paid very little attention.  For years, I would pick up the phone and tell my mom "Happy Mother's Day" on the big day.  Some years, I would actually buy her a present or send her a card.  We were not big on celebrating these little holidays.  I think I always spoke to her on Mother's Day but we usually lived far apart and there was no stopping by to bring her a small gift or a smile on that day.  I guess I wasn't always such a good daughter.  My life was busy, I had kids and a job of my own, and it was just another day, right?  At least I thought so.  Of course, I always thought that my mom would be around forever.  And, if not forever, at least for a very long time.  But I was wrong.

Now, Mother's Day has a different effect on me.  I don't have anyone that I can say "Happy Mother's Day" to.  I can't give her a call and chat about what is going on in our lives.  I can't send her a small gift to let her know how much she means to me.  I can't even send her a card.  She has been gone for a long time, 20 years.  How can it be possible that I've lived for 20 years without hearing her voice or seeing her smile?

Now, Mother's Day is a day like any other for me.   I always get a call from my kids and their families,  and it's great to hear from them.  But mostly  I spend the day missing my mother, who by the way, was the most irritating person I've ever known.  She was also the smartest, silliest and most loving person I've known.  She was as far from the perfect mother as I was from the perfect daughter.  However, we managed to muddle through.

I don't just miss my mom on Mother's Day.  I miss her every day and still, even after 20 years, when something good or bad happens to me, I always think I'll pick up the phone and speak to her.  She always knew exactly what to say to me.  But I always miss her more on Mother's Day, a day we all set aside to show our mother's how much we appreciate everything they cheerfully do for us.

So, if you're able to this Mother's Day, share the day with your mother.  Tell her what she means to you and make some memories to sustain you through the long years you'll be apart.

Rhyolite

Rhyolite is one of my favorite stones.  It is sometimes referred to as Rainforest Jasper.  Rhyolite's most important trait is its beauty!  It has a composition similar to granite but has much smaller grain size.  In fact, magma that never reaches the surface of the earth is called granite.  If the same magma reaches the surface of the earth, it is called rhyolite.  Rhyolite is much less common than granite.   Even so, there are large lava flows and deposits of rhyolite in Yellowstone Park, Wyoming.

Rhyolite was named "streaming rock" because of its beautiful bands, bubbles and crystal-rich layers that form as lava flows onto the surface of stone and moves forward.  Rhyolite can look very different depending on how it erupts.  Because of its varied formational traits, rhyolite represents change, variety and progress.  It sparks creativity in individuals who are ready to move forward and make things happen in their life.  Some say rhyolite allows us to reach out and beyond our capabilities of what we think we can achieve by helping us to break through the mental barriers and to reach a profound and joyous state of knowing.

Here are a few examples of how beautiful rhyolite can be:

Your rhyolite jewelry should be washed in warm soapy water and dried carefully to maintain its beauty.  Never use bleach or other chemicals to clean rhyolite.

My Guild, JCUIN, has some very talented artists

I like to try to feature other artisans from my guild at least once each month.  Here are the artisans I'm featuring this month.  You really should visit their shops and see what other wonderful items they have made.

First, check out these great earrings from Fine and Dandy.

Next, I visited Jewery Arte by Stella Wisner and found these wonderful green enameled earrings.  Check these out:

Now, on to another shop, Baubles Handcrafted Jewelry.  Here I made another discovery which I have to share with you.  I really think these are lovely:

Then I visited Andrea Nicole Zagaris' studio and found some amazing stuff.  Here is one of her earring creations.  I absolutely love this one.

Although I stopped in Artistic Pendants looking for earrings to share on this blog, I was quickly sidetracked by her lovely pendants.  Here is an example of her work:

The last studio I stopped in was Epicetera where I found these  lovely earrings.  I bet they put you in the mood for snow.  I know they did me.

Finally, I'll end with a pair of earrings from my studio.

I hope you've enjoyed visiting some of our guild member's shops and seeing some of their fabulous creations.

Update on Heartsy and Other Ramblings

Thanks to all who voted for me on Heartsy the last few days.  I received 67 votes and have made it to the next level.  Now my pieces will be looked at and evaluated by an actual person.  In another week or two I'll know if I'm going to be lucky enough to get a feature or not.  I hope so.  March was an impossibly slow month for my shop and I need to jumpstart some sales.

I'm still thinking about starting another Etsy store for a less expensive line of jewelry and perhaps some other crafts.  My sister, Fran, is a gifted seamstress (my sister Susie is too).  I've been trying to convince Fran to make some things for a new store.  She made the most perfect aprons for some friends and for my granddaughter.  I'm sure they would be a big seller.  Fran also makes custom window treatments.  If you have a need for window treatments, leave me a comment and I'll put you in touch with her.  She really does fabulous work.  Her window treatments are all over my house and I'm really glad that they are.

Yesterday Marty and I went to Bead Fest, Valley Forge, PA to check out the show.  I hadn't been to a Bead Fest show before.  It was a pretty good show.  Not Tucson quality but a pretty good show.  I'd  guess there were about 110 vendors split between beads, findings, glass and tools.  Of course, I spent too much money.  Here is the collection of things that I bought:

I'll show you the pictures when I get all these made into something.  It doesn't look like much now and it's kind of hard to see but there is a lot of beautiful stuff there.

I wish I could work on it all now but I'm off to pack so I can head back to Phoenix.

Etsy BNR

OK, you remember my rant last week about Etsy BNRs and my struggle over whether or not to design and make some lower priced items?  Well a couple of my items are being featured in the next round of that BNR.

My multi blue bracelet is being featured for just $64.00

And, my copper heart charm necklace for $40.00

For Etsy sellers, if you buy either piece, one of your items will replace mine.  The rules are listed on the BNR.  For others, you can just buy the pieces.

Of course, there are lovely items handmade by other artisans also being featured in the BNR.  There are some lovely pieces for sale.

We'll see how this round goes but it is probably my last BNR.