Redneck Mansion

Saw this through a link, through a link and through another link at Honestly...WTF. There are some fun stuff here and you can get lost in the links if you're not careful! :)

Too funny! But....it could work if you know a good welder!!! LOL

Happy Halloween!!!

Sunday Quotes and 1 More

Calvin Nicholls is a paper sculptor, one who does an amazing job with the media he has chosen. Look at the wonderful animals he creates with a few sharp implements and a flat sheet of paper.

New Architecture?

Have you seen this building? Do you want to live here? Pizza delivery would be near impossible!

Filip Dujardin is the photographer that "built" this place. Read how he does it and then start dreaming of your new home. ;)

Friday Night Spotlight

Once again, my friends at OnlineAuction.com are offering some of their cool items for you to peruse.

From findings there is this wonderful electronic book, Record A Story - T'was The Night Before Christmas. Record a story or a message with your own voice or with those of the children, family members and/or friends. Their voices and loving messages will be kept and treasured year after year, and many years later! Can be played over and over again. A wonderful Christmas gift for those special people in your life. Click Here to see the book.

Next up is davendeb1178. Deb is a new Avon representative and wants to make you look pretty for the holidays. To add to your Avon collection or see what new products they have, go here to talk to Deb about those lovely Avon gifts for friends and family.

Kornkountrytreasures is offering a great deal on a Columbia Hunting Game Vest, XL. This hunting vest is just in time for hunting season, or if you have a hunter in the family and they need an early Christmas present, now is the time to get it!

Yogibear66 has come up with one of the best presents for any little one on your list. Sesame Street's Cookie Monster will make any kidlet the happiest one on the block for Christmas or a birthday coming up soon.

I would like to offer up a lovely little necklace for those times when you just want a little bling.

Thank you for dropping by and doing a little shopping!

Niobium

What is that you say? It's a hypo-allergenic metal for those who have metal sensitivity. Here is a great article about niobium and learn the method it takes to color the material.

I use plated surgical steel in all my earrings. If you find a pair(s) you like at my store, I can, and will gladly, change them out to clip-ons or niobium. There will have to be an added cost for the niobium. It sure ain't cheap.

Here is a pair of earrings, by jewelry artist Michael Mara of Shimmering Dreams Jewelry, using niobium metal.

"Blue Targe" Hammered and formed Niobium earrings.

Oooooo.....I WANT one of these!!!

NESTREST.

Click on the link. I can't seem to get a picture uploaded. You'll want one, too!!!

Crocheted Rocks?

It sounds strange, doesn't it? But...check out this LINK and see what happens when you put together vintage cotton thread and ocean washed rocks. Bet ya want one now, right?

Hopscotch

Just when you thought it was safe to go out on the sidewalk....

Red Spiders

Here are a few red and silver Christmas Spiders I finished tonight. These little things work up fast and if you're not too creeped out by them, I think they will do well for the PAC show.

Next is blue, but I have to go buy some blue beads and crystals. I can't believe I'm short on blue. I started out buying mostly blue beads when I first started classes and now I hardly have any.

Oh My! I HAVE to go buy beads...this is a terrible thing and I'm sure I'm going to die if I don't. *did you hear the sarcasm there?* teeheehee

Sunday Quotes

Green Spiders

Worked on more Christmas spiders this evening. I had these great glittery green beads and thought they would make some wonderful spiders. Added in some different green beads and crystals for legs and bodies and put them all together. What do you think?

These are a bit smaller than the others I made earlier. As a Christmas "ornament", they aren't too heavy and the green ones will blend into the trees, like most spiders. I will be making some other colors to match different colored trees. These are so much fun to make!

GIF Fishing

I've been having fun looking for GIFs today. Funny kittens and puppies, strange Halloween "things" and getting a start on the Christmas stuff. I still need to find some Thanksgiving backgrounds that I can use on my store. Gotta keep up with the holidays! ;)
I got these from Mike's Free GIFs.

Here is a little stick guy that doesn't seem to be having a good day fishing.

Fungi

During a lovely afternoon walk today with hubs and dog, we came across this beautiful orange fungus. Also known as Chicken of the Woods, it is a bright spot in the forest. You can learn more here about this fungus and some of the other things that grow in my woods.

Some cool arty links I found today

I am still catching up with my emails from being gone this weekend and came across a few that were kinda interesting.

Matthew Cox uses X-rays and embroidery thread in a very creative and innovative way. A little strange, a little cool, a thought that comes into your mind that asks, "Why didn't I think of that?"

I get a newsletter from AllFreeBeadedJewelry, a site that has TONS of ideas and DIYs for making your own jewelry. Lots of fun ideas!

Cat

After scolding one's cat, one looks into its face and is seized by the ugly suspicion that it understood every word. And has filed it for reference. ~Charlotte Gray

Only because you know it's true!

Another Great Weekend & Sunday Quotes

The weather was great, the food was fabulous and PAC members and guests are magnificent! We had so much fun this year! Telling stories, laughing 'til we couldn't laugh any more, working on art, there was joy in the building all weekend.

I was able to work on a necklace I promised Judi last May I would make for her and she went home with a lovely new piece of wearable art. I love doing commissions, especially when I can work directly with the person who is going to be wearing the piece I make. She was VERY happy with it. I'm glad. :) I would love to show you this piece, however...my camera ran out of battery power before I was able to take a picture of the completed necklace. As soon as I can, I will get a picture up to show.

I met new artists this weekend and was able to teach a short class in Zentangle. Now I have more people addicted to the art of Zentangle and I am not alone. Muwhahahahahaha!!! These weekends are so fun just walking around the tables and seeing what everyone has brought to work on. The variety is amazing and so is the art. Because of the camera thing, I have no pictures from this weekend. Check the Portland Art Collective blog to see what some of the other members, with operating cameras, have posted.

From differing conversations that filled the room, I heard this memorable statement from PAC member Debi Koenig: "I have a faulty spider."

Happy Halloween Month!

Friday Night Spotlight

Tonight I'm at my annual retreat at Menucha. Pronounced meh-nu-ka, it is a beautiful estate, purchased many years ago by the First Presbyterian Church. Portland Art Collective has been having our art retreats there for five years. It gives us all a chance to get inspired and depressurize. Meuncha even has retreats for one or two people, the perfect place to get away and restart your soul.

And since I'm talking about arty retreats, now is the time to start planning for next year. Save your pennies and think about taking some classes from either of these events in 2012:

Teesha and Tracy Moore run Artfest, one of the best art retreats. Hover your mouse over the Artfest Annex on their front page and pick something that looks interesting.

Sitka Center lives on the beautiful Oregon Coast. A wonderful place to learn. Check out their classes from this year to get an idea of what may be coming in 2012.

Art and Soul has been host to inspirational mixed media retreats for thousands of creative souls, a place to discover unconventional art techniques. The Portland, Oregon event has come and gone, but there are two more earlier next year.

If you have a place to go to get away from it all for a couple of days, look in to it. Time spent with your Muse can help bring out that creativity that may very well have been laying dormant for awhile.

Knitting

I'm slowly teaching myself how to knit. Well....I know how to knit, I just don't know how to do anything else. When I went to Oregon Flock and Fiber a couple of weeks ago, I found this great yarn. In order to knit the scarf on the label, I have to learn how to purl and yarn over.

Ok...I had bought a book to teach myself all the cool things in knitting some time ago, but haven't really started in on any projects yet. (I think the cool weather kicks in a kind of knitting gene that gets us all wooly fingered.) The book is Teach Yourself Visually - Knitting by Sharon Turner. If you're looking to learn how to knit, take a class and learn from someone who knows. This book is a great reference for those stitches you have learned. And then, practice, practice and more practice. Make a bunch of scarves and you will get those stitches embedded into your head.

So today I sat myself down, between loads of laundry, and purled, dropped a yarn over, did a yarn over and purled a stitch again. I'm getting pretty good at this and I think I'll have a cool looking scarf in the end. Instead of using my Link yarn from Berroco, I found another smaller yarn to learn this technique. I'm happy. Pictures will be here when I finish up this scarf.

Z'oodle Book Prep

I'm almost ready to get volume two of my Z'oodle Color Book Journal off to the printers. I've worked hard this week, between errands and chores, to get everything set up. There seems to be as much computer work as there is drawing time in getting these books out. After the printing, I have to punch the holes for binding, punch the half rounds for the pocket pages, tape those pages shut on the bottom, collate and then coil bind them all. Packaging comes next and I have to get some colored pencils to include with each Color Book.

I worked up a sample book today to see if I liked the position of the drawings and things actually came out right the first time! I love it when that happens! Here it is. I've been coloring on it to show potential customers that they don't need to keep it black and white.

Z'oodle Color Book Journal Volume 2.

Hank Williams

Just heard his new song.

GOOD FOR YOU, HANK WILLIAMS!!!!

UPDATE: Free download of his new song for the next couple of days at Hank's website.

Sunday Quotes

Did your mouth start watering when you saw the oranges?

New Brooch

Friday, while at the PAC Play Day, I finished a little brooch I've been working on and off for the past few weeks. It started with a small floral antiqued silver plated stamping. From there I attached it with a Swarovski marguerite and silver bead. A row of vintage sequins is next, held down by the same silver beads. Followed by 2mm AB finish clear crystals and clear seed beads. When finishing off the piece, I decided to bring the purple of the sequins out to the edge with some purple lined blue seed beads.




I think it turned out quite nice. What do you think?

UPDATE: I have now listed this little brooch at my store.

Friday Night Spotlight

Today was a fun day. It was Play Day at Collage with a few members of my art group, Portland Art Collective. Lots of laughter and awesome art was to be had. We always have a great time on our Play Days. We catch up on what we've been doing, work on art projects, buy some great goodies from the store and have a fabulous lunch at the Thai place down the block.

Today we talked about Pinterest and tried our best to explain what it is. They describe themselves as an online pinboard. Whatever they may be...they are bad and good all at the same time. Good because you can see what other people are trending and find some cool stuff. Bad because I just spent an hour and a half looking at all the cool stuff before I got to this post. Addicting does not even come close to what pinterest does to you! Have Fun!!

More Spiders

I'm having fun making more spiders. These are really creative endeavors. I spend more time looking for the beads to make these little critter than I do making them. I've got little plastic bags filled with "body" beads for about 7 or 8 more spiders and I think I could get about 5 more bags filled right away, too.



The blue spider has painted wooden, polymer clay and glass body beads. The red spider has a wooden block, red lampworked bead and faux pearl for the body. I found these wooden blocks at Petco, in the small animal (rats, guinea pig, etc.) toy area. They use them to chew on. When I saw them, I thought they would make fun pendants, earrings and/or bracelets. They do pretty well for spiders, too!

My Spider

I've been thinking about spiders since I went to 365 Spiders. It's that time of year again, so I have spiders coming into the house to make their new homes. They get picked up and put right back outside. The old woodshed is the perfect place for them.

After getting some more Halloween earrings made up this afternoon, I went on to make my very first beaded spider. Thanks to Amy for her inspirational webby creativity.

Here's my "gold" bug.




I didn't have any bugle beads with holes big enough for the wire I was using, however I learned from Amy's spiders that any bead will work. Out came the gold beads and colored lined seed beads. I've been keeping all my onesie beads for a "one-only" necklace, but thought these little spiders would be perfect for these "only" beads. A gold colored corrugated bead, matched with pierced wood and amber crow beads make a great body. This was a fun project and I think I will be making more.

Spiders and Beads

Relax, it's not a scary thing, unless you really are scared of spiders. I appreciate and like having my spiders around. When I find one in the house, I capture it and put it out in the woodshed. The spiders and the bats are good about eating up all the nasty bugs I don't like.

This post is about Amy and her challenge to make 365 Spiders. I got her link from Craftside, a crafty newsletter I receive in email. Amy has been very busy and has created spiders for the last 253 days. She is on the down hill side of her year and I applaud her for doing this. I know the feeling of accomplishment she will have at the end of her year.

Check out all her spiders and how she used her beads in unique and remarkable ways to create these fabulous arachnids.

Sunday Quotes

"Why Beads Are Better Than Chocolate"

1. 100 grams of chocolate has 588 calories, but beads have zero calories.

2. Beads don't melt in your hands while chocolate can become a real
gooey mess.

3. Beads don't give you acne, so your dermatologist likes them too.

4. Beads don't give you cavities, so they are recommend by 9 out of
10 dentists.

5. Beads are caffeine free though some of us lose sleep when we
dream of that next bead creation we plan to make.

6. Beads come in a rainbow of colors, and chocolate only comes in
white and shades of brown.

7. Chocolate can get crusty and funky when not fresh, but beads get
better with age.

8. Etiquette requires that you share your chocolate, but beads don't
have to be shared.

9. An average 10 gram tube of good seed beads is $3, while a pound of
good chocolate can go for $50.

10. While chocolate has endorphins, beads can make you happy without
making you fat.

11. Beads are hypo-allergenic while a lot of people are allergic to
chocolate.

12. Beads last forever while chocolate is usually only around for
few minutes.

13. Beads can be recycled while chocolate is gone when it's gone.

14. It's impossible to find a string of chocolate to match your
outfit.

15. Beads don't trigger migraine headaches and instead are proven to
relieve stress.

Shopping in Sandy

I live in a small town east of Portland, Oregon. Highway 26 runs through the town and carries many people to Mount Hood and the mountain communities. Not a lot of people stop in town and support our local businesses. Except for a few restaurants and gas stations.

I believe in supporting my local businesses. They are the backbone of this country, and in this economy, we need all the small business we can get. Here are three links to a few of my favorite places. If you're ever in my area, first, let me know, and then do a little shopping. You won't be disappointed.

Dita's Chocolates. THE BEST chocolates in Oregon, all in one place. I can't tell you my favorites because they are ALL so good! To go along with the wonderful chocolate, you will also find great wine from Oregon and Washington. What could be better?

Designer Yarn is right around the corner from Dita's. Sherrie's litte shop has as much yarn as she can pack into all the walls and corners. All the colors and textures are a joy for the senses. She has everything you need to knit/crochet those winter socks, a warm shawl or a hat to keep your head warm. Classes will teach you everything you need to know about how to work those knitting needles or crochet hooks. Specialty yarns can be found on the shelves or ordered for something specific you are looking for.

A couple blocks down from Dita's is Chariteas. A bright and cheery tea shop. A great place to go for lunch, or a snack, and a warming cup of tea. Many different teas line the shelf behind the counter and you can ask for just about any kind of blend. So nice! After lunch, walk around and scope out the beautiful teapots they have for sale. If you liked that blend they made for you, order up some loose tea to take home to brew yourself.

I have just scratched the surface of the places I like to shop and support. I hope you feel the same about your local small businesses. And if you haven't been out to see what might be new in your town...what's stopping you?

Friday Night Spotlight

This week we have an eclectic mix of links.

DraggonTagger has something everyone will want to wear this winter.

Neck Snuggie Warm Autum Fuzzies
This will be great for those winter fashions. Keeps your neck warm in style! The loop goes over the flower button to hold it closed or you can use your favorite brooch in the middle of the flower to hold it in place. Machine washable, gentle cycle and low heat for the dryer or lay flat to dry. Neck Snuggie

YogiBear66 will keep you busy during the winter with this tote.

Scrapabilities Deluxe Scrapbooking Tote - Blue
This Blue collection includes items remarkable for their beauty, depth and versatility, making each one perfect for scrapbook layouts, creative frames, handmade cards, gift tags and so much more. Perfect for everyone from the beginner to the most experienced scrapbooker, this kit makes a wonderful gift for any occasion. Scrapbooking Tote

If you're looking for some doodle fun, click on the next link and watch your doodle come to life. Draw a stick man

Do you like Halloween? Do you like Christmas? Do you like Folk Art that specializes in Halloween and Christmas? Go see what Spooky Time Jingles has to offer.

Lastly.....let's see who has deleted themselves from the gene pool lately. The Darwin Awards

Halloween happens in 30 days....are you ready?