new bead designs?

I just ordered some eyes from a place called Eyeco not the 35 dollar dragon eyes. Just some eyes to use as cabs in some bead art. I don't know what I'm planning but we'll see.

Insert snow picture here then imagine how giddy I'm getting because I'm packing for a month on Maui at the end of February!

Hey, guess what, it's snowing!

Before November 2011 and...
January 25 2012.

Same view, same trees out there...same car parked in the same spot. That little shaded spot right above the daisy on my computer is the window to the Subaru. The second, slightly whiter blob in the background is the giant mount of snow that's been moved out of the driveway this winter. Granted, not all of that snow moving has been by hand, much of it pushed by front loaders...thank goodness.

It didn't stop snowing last night

Do you really need another picture of my car the big square lump of snow to believe me... you wouldn't even know if I reused a picture!

I need a cat sitter, I'm going to spend a bunch of time in Maui! The mental lists have begun... fly to Juneau or take the ferry, fly to Seattle, fly to Maui. (recover from nasty lung infection caught on planes)... play in sun and surf, get some beading for next summer done, do some fancy yoga, learn to surf?

Take one set of warm clothes for transition between planes and volcano hikes, take skirts and dresses for hot weather, take a pair of shorts because you don't wear skirts and dresses as much as you imagine.

Gather thoughts.

that's better

100 gallons of heating oil in the tank, less than 500 bucks! I was pretty tense about not having a 'savings account' of fuel...after the truck left, I realized that the tension wasn't worrying about keeping warm, I have the wood stove and electric heaters. It was about feeling irresponsible for running out! The ghost of Dad insists that I keep the walk shoveled and is apparently obsessed with keeping the fuel tank filled too.

Yoga tonight, good stretching, shaking with effort and then... tears during corpse pose?? Sigh.

EE 2

That is the error message that a toyo stove shows when it's had a "mis ignition". Why do these thing wait until the first real cold snap?

Wood stove is blazing, waiting for daylight around 8:30 to go dip the oil tank. I had a full tank last spring and the stove burns about a gallon a day when it's burning a lot. That suggests to me that there's still fuel in the tank... that would not be a good thing. That would mean the solution is more difficult and more expensive.
Burn baby burn, it's all up to you right now!

Hours later... 15 gallons diesel in tank.

Hiked out to Norman's property to get into the v.w. van that stores "lots" of clean fuel jugs. No go, door to van wasn't budging even with some vigorous hammering with my trusty rubber mallet. So I got the other not so clean jug out of his storage container on the other side of the property... awfully glad the snow is frozen enough for surface scampering.

Next to the diesel store to buy two more jugs (total of 3 at 5 gallons each) and then to the hardware store to buy a funnel because the new spouts on the new jugs are next to impossible to use mid winter with only two mitten covered hands.

Woodie woodstove kept it plenty warm in here, the oil stove doesn't need to kick on yet.

I am really glad to live in town with 3 different ways to heat my home, this could have been pure hell instead of an annoying inconvenience!

Gwenn Seemel, portrait artist

"Non-folk contemporary art tends to get a little convoluted and inbred. These artists choose to overlook the larger community and focus instead on peer acceptance. They make art for other artists or for a creative intelligentsia, effectively shutting out the average person."

This woman has had me dancing all over her blog reading and learning, what a great way to spend a soggy Sunday!

new stuff!

Trying to get a jump on next summers gallery sales by starting a load of new cuffs... and maybe even finishing a few!

Trying to photograph black beads on black fabric with a shiny background is silly, so I put the birds on my beading mat to see if it doesn't look better. I like the retro look of the old wood door back ground but the mat is better, really.

Both kinds of cuffs seem to sell pretty well, abstract gemstones (with pearls of course) and pictures of birds and flowers. It's a very good thing because doing one or the other all the time would be mind bending. Not a lot of bright colors in the rocks and pearls designs or in the big black birds. Not a lot of glitz in the flowers. Balance and all that rot.

I have noticed a lot of blogs lately that are like anthologies or the Utne Reader. Collections of other people's works and examples of inspiration. Many are just a picture with a link back to where that came from...and that might be another photo of the same thing with a link to somewhere else. Like passing around flash cards or something, interesting.

It is NOT a resolution, sheesh.

It's keeping a good attitude for the winter months. Starting with the 10 days of sun salutations at Ekhart Yoga. I'll be doing more than one a day, but it's the daily habit I want to keep up. I get stiff and sore in my upper back and shoulders shoveling snow and moving firewood from here to there to here to there.

I'll be getting my teeth-flossing habit restarted too. It really works to prevent "that" lecture from a dental hygienist and the one we have here is fierce. Oh and it's good for the teeth and gums.

Walking with out the dog sucks and is even worse when it's a sideways slush storm day so that will be a weather dependent git through the winter habit.

The return of Snowzilla. Snowmageddon II.

or how one small bag of sand made me giggle and laugh and scream with joy.

Yup, it's back at about an inch an hour. The flakes are falling so thick and fast I actually choked on one when I took a breath, little f-ers. The road wasn't plowed this morning when I tried to get back in to the driveway so the car got high centered on the berm as I drove in. So I dug and shoveled and... spun the tires making it worse. Then I shoveled the berm out of the way so I could back up a little and... spun the tires making it worse.

Not enough ashes left in the wood stove to make a good path of traction. Spin spin spin.

Looking out the window an hour later, I couldn't stand it so I went out to at least re shovel what I had already cleared. Then... *pop* on comes that lightbulb! There was a bag of sand in that unused dog house up there under that great big tree.... through that waist deep snow and, YES!! 50 pounds of sand. And the angels did sing and there was much rejoicing, at least in my head.

Shovel shovel, sand sand spin spin shovelsssssss sand.... Car is in its spot, the giant back hoe came by and pushed the berm away and the angels in my head sound a bit like Jimmy Buffet.

Start your new year with some happy snoopy dancing!