More on the blowing my own horn theme!

Yes there is another interview ... You can learn even more about me by going to the Story Beaders blog .

Storybeader makes jewelry but you don't just get a piece of jewelry you also get a poem (haiku) writen specifically about the piece to accompany it! Deb also posts interviews of one 'blogger' every Friday. so scroll back through her Friday archives to learn more about other etsy artists who blog!

(And here's your useless piece of info for the day ....for those of you who don't know where the term blog comes from it's a contraction of the term "Web log".) Yep that's what we are all doing we are writing logs on the web for the world to read....

The Guardian of Balckbeard's treasure has been listed and Scurvy McSkull comes complete with a story too...
Will My beads continue to some with stories... doubt it!

Time to blow my own horn!

This necklace was designed for the Art Bead Scene January challenge. The January challenge was to design a piece of jewellery using the painting Irises by Vincent Van Gogh.... The necklace on the left was my entry. I was picked as designer of the week this week! Here's the blog!


I also have just joined a couple more street teams on etsy... One is the Artisan Beaders Group, one of my favorite beads is one of their feature friday picks, and last but certainly not least one of their members featured me in her blog Simply Shiny .

I'm still having fun making jellyfish beads this is my latest... I was trying to make something vaguely heart shaped and ended up with a perfect (in my opinion!) skull. So in keeping with the skull theme ... It's called Guardian of Blackbeard's Treasure. And will show up on etsy in the next couple of days! Can't you see the eyes nose and teeth ....

Where's Waldo?

Who, & what is Waldo in this story? Well Waldo is a bead... Waldo is a bead made out of something that is then wrapped in Double Helix's silver glass triton. Triton is one of their idiot proof glasses anyone can get this to strike! Well I made a bunch of beads last summer and they flew out of the gallery as soon as they were made into bracelets... so I thought I need to start making stock for next summer.. I don't care if it's - 30 and you can't stand up straight because of the ice.. it's time to start thinking summer!


So I grabbed my stand by 'ivory' and made some beads wrapped in triton... they didn't seem to be as yellow as I remembered from last year.. so I pulled out a rod of Opal Yellow and made one bead with an Opal yellow base that bead is Waldo.... I can't find poor Waldo... Can YOU? It might be the one in the middle ... actually in the photograph there is more of a difference (but I think the difference is that that bead is slightly bigger...) than there is to the naked eye. What I'm wondering is can you use any glass as a base and then wrap it in triton and reduce it and have it come out the same?

I tried effretre's fossil which is quite grey.. it comes out a bit darker but still very yellow... does this glass turn all the opaques yellow?

My free glass

Well I have my 20 rods of free glass... It's all Moretti (effetre) and vetrofond (& yes I looked up the spelling on those words!) Actually I think there is at least one rod of CIM too. There is a nice mixture of
colour and lots of odd lots!
17 of the rods even came labeled with lot number and colour! However the three on the right are anonymous! The middle one is a lavendar filligrani However I have no clue what the other two are... the orange one is quite pretty the pink might be a pale CIM... which means it will maintain it's colour but don't waste time seeing if you can encase it... I have so many huge broken beads with CIM that I don't even bother trying anymore! The orange might be tangerine sparkle....

As for the clears... so far I've used a couple of rods of the 006 will try the 006XC today. The second rod of 006 had at least half an inch of scum on it... the first one was great....

For anyone who is totally confused read more here!

One World One Heart Giveaway

I am joining the One world one Heart 'contest' (click the blue logo if you want more info) To win you must leave a comment on this post of my blog (with enough info that I can send you an email if you win! Anyone can enter but you must comment on this post...

The draw will be made on Feb 12 from everyone who has commented on this blog... I will send you an email telling you that you have won my Thousand Veils Heart.. It's about an inch high. At that time please send me your address and I will mail you the heart. (I am willing to ship it anywhere)

If you want to enter at other sites there is a list of participants on the One World One Heart blog as of right now there are 286... mine isn't there yet!

This is the description on the organizers blog....

The original idea behind this giveaway event was to bring bloggers together from around the world who may never ordinarily meet. It closes the gap of the blog community and enables us to interact, discover new and wonderful people, and in the process possibly win a prize or many prizes along the way...This is more than wanting to win something.......that is only the means.......in the end it's about finding kindred spirits. Someone who may be fairly new to blogging, not sure how to navigate, find others and have others find them....Some are long time bloggers and in some cases well known in the art community. Whatever the case it brings all of them together...We are not solving the worlds problems nor are we curing anything nor are we changing the world. We are merely generating a closer community between humans through blogging."

Curling

Tonight is the annual Engineers Curling party... One of the things about curling in this event is it seems like the worse you do the better your score is.... after the end is finished you pull a piece of paper out of an envelope and score according to that... things like the team with a rock closest to the hog line gets 3 points... Or the team with the shortest lead gets one point... I will have to play lead this year... that is a guaranteed point!

Last year was a Hawaiian theme so is this year... one of the organizers must have spent too much money on their outfit last year so are using it again this year! I will be wearing the same dress as last year except it's shorter now! It was a long dress that I actually bought in Hawaii... However



The slit up the back got much slittier when I tried to curl in it... Not sure that being 5 inches shorter will make it any more curling friendly! This was the picture prier to curling last year... We will look very similar this year! The ones at the top were taken this year.. I need to find my manual so I can figure out how to use the self timer!

We did not win... we did get home before the worst of the blizzard hit yesterday! And the shortest lead is no longer worth a point.....

Roller Ball Finger

I think this will be the next computer generated 'ailment'... Actually my husband pointed out that it's actually a scroll wheel... but Roller Ball finger sounds so much classier than scroll wheel...

The top joint on the second finger on my right hand now screams at me every time I reach for my mouse... even clicking hurts.. I'm sure it's all the scrolling while I'm reading posts in the forums.. trying to stay educated... and not playing games that's doing it! But if you get right down to it what it really means is I am spending too much time on the computer and not enough time making beads, windows and jewellery!

The Picture of the heart has absolutely nothing to do with this post... It's new and I like it ... I really like the patina on the copper... while I was playing with chemicals




I managed to also etch the glass... I think this is a much nicer etch than I get using glass etch... but i doubt if I can do it again.. also I think it spent 3 or 4 days living in various chemical baths!
( do I remember what I used ... YES do I remember the order I used them in NO!)
Sounds yummy doesn't it!

Cupid finds a Heart

Cupid finds a Heart is my latest listing on Etsy... Looking at this bead I'm not really sure that Cupid has found his heart.. He's got one heart the one he is 'living' o, but he appears to be trying to get round the bead to see if there really is another heart hidden on the back...

Both Cupid & the heart are little copper cutouts... I use the small craft punches for scrapbookers... unfortunately most of the available punches are way too big... and they seem to be getting bigger! This is a white heart that has copper cutouts think the copper is about 28 gauge sheet and then is decorated with Thompson enamels ...

I did a quick search on cupid and it turn's out that there are actually two cupid's in mythology one is a lively youth who delights in pranks and spreading love. The other is know known for his riotous debauchery. Somehow I think we've combined the two into our modern day interpretation of Cupid...

However you want to interpret Cupid... he does seem to be a represntative of Modern Day Valentine's day ...

I'm a Winner...

Well sort of... I entered a quarterly 'bead contest' at Artistry in Glass a Canadian Glass Supplier in London ON. I actually entered one of my favorite beads... this is not the same view that was entered...

and was the runner up in the Intermediate category... Pictures of winners Reading the fine print on the web site I believe that the runner up is actually a name drawn from all the entries.. so I could have entered a pile of frit and still won!

What do I win 20 rods of glass (their choice) as long as I order something before the end of March and pay the shipping on the order. Actually I do need some clear glass ...

Should we take bets on what my 20 free rods are... are they going to be a selection of the most popular glass rods they carry, a sample set of the new cool colour rods (in my dreams!), or 20 rods of a colour that was discontinued because no one bought it, or I suppose if I order 5 -10 pounds of clear 006 Effretti they might just give me an extra 20 rods of that!

What do you think... lets have an unoffical poll, suggestions not listed above are welcome!

Eating Habits

When we travel my husband will always order Clam Chowder or Fish Chowder if it is on the menu... to keep him company I have started to order pulled pork sandwiches! To some degree the more expensive the restaurant the weirder the bowl of 'soup' is! On the other hand the pulled pork tends to improve with increase in price!

Googling chowder this morning... I find that there are basically two 'main' types of seafood chowder

• New England clam chowder
  
• Manhattan clam chowder

The new England style is a broth the Manhattan style is suppose to be tomato based... I like corn chowder... as I'm not a real seafood fan....

With pulled pork the difference is barbecue VS vinegar... It's a location thing just like with Chowder.... I like the barbecue ones... I did have a home made vinegar marinated pulled pork sandwich in Hateras Village... Way to much vinegar for me.. but the owner was so proud of it that I had to say it was great! If you can find pulled pork on the menu in Canada it will be the barbecue style... Here's a bunch of recipes from About.com .... I'm sure if I tried them all I'd find something that I liked!