Saturday, December 29, 2007

3 Days Till New the New Year

Wow. How lagging am I in my blogging?
I hope everyone had a super-fantastic holiday season and will ring in the new year with wonderful (attainable) goals and a peaceful heart.
Deep huh?
:-)

Not a whole lot going on here that's NEW....
You know, I do about the same things all the time. Make beads, make dinner, do laundry...

I did run across something on the Etsy forums that I thought was worth noting. If you've not had the Etsy "experience" this might help you better understand a little what it's all about.




One of my goals for the new year is to BLOG more. If there's nothing exciting going on in my life well, I can try to MAKE something exciting. Right?
Take care till then and HAPPY NEW YEAR!!

Monday, October 22, 2007

Monday Monday....

Oh HELLO!
It's been a long time yet again.
I've been busy with shows--just got back from the Twin Cities Bead Bazaar. It was great to meet the ISGB North Regional people and see some familiar faces there. Thanks to all the people who bought beads and had wonderful feedback for me. Those comments carry with me and keep me going! :-)

I've got to get to the torch, I just thought I would post this email that my friend Amy (Amy's Creative Bead) sent because it's pretty darn funny!
Have a great week and I hope to see some of you at the
Treasures/Des Moines Area Bead Expo this coming weekend! It's gonna be GREAT!


THE NEXT SURVIVOR SERIES

Six married men will be dropped on an island with one car and 3 kids each for six weeks.

Each kid will play two sports and either take music or dance classes.

There is no fast food.

Each man must take care of his 3 kids; keep his assigned house clean, correct all homework, complete science projects, cook, do laundry, and pay a list of "pretend" bills with not enough money.

In addition, each man will have to budget in money for groceries each week.

Each man must remember the birthdays of all their friends and relatives, and send cards out on time.

Each man must also take each child to a doctor's appointment, a dentist appointment and a haircut appointment . He must make one unscheduled and inconvenient visit per child to the Urgent Care (weekend, evening, on a holiday or right when they're about to leave for vacation). He must also make cookies or cupcakes for a social function.

Each man will be responsible for decorating his own assigned house, planting flowers outside and keeping it presentable at all times.

The men will only have access to television when the kids are asleep and all chores are done.

Each father will be required to know all of the words to every silly song that comes on TV and the name of each and every character on cartoons.

Each man will have to make an Indian hut model with six toothpicks, a tortilla and one marker; and get a 4 year old to eat a serving of peas.

Each man must adorn himself with jewelry, wear uncomfortable yet stylish shoes, keep their nails polished and eyebrows groomed. The men must try to get through each day without snot, spit-up or barf on their clothing.

During one of the six weeks, the men will have to endure severe abdominal cramps, back aches, and have extreme, unexplained mood swings but never once complain or slow down from other duties. They must try to explain what a tampon is for when the 6-yr old boy finds it in the purse.

They must attend weekly school meetings, church, and find time at least once to spend the afternoon at the park or a similar setting.

He will need to read a book to the children each night without falling asleep, and then feed them, dress them, brush their teeth and comb their hair each morning by 7:00. They must leave the home with no food on their face or clothes.

A test will be given at the end of the six weeks, and each father will be required to know all of the following information: each child's birthday, height, weight, shoe size, clothes size and doctor's name. Also the child's weight at birth, length, time of birth, and length of labor, each child's favorite color, middle name, favorite snack, favorite song, favorite drink, favorite toy, biggest fear and what they want to be when they grow up.

They must clean up after their sick children at 2:00 a.m. and then spend the remainder of the day tending to that child and waiting on them hand and foot until they are better.

They must have a loving, age appropriate reply to, "You're not the boss of me".

The kids vote them off the island based on performance. The last man wins only if...he still has enough energy to be intimate with his spouse at a moment's notice.

After you get done laughing, send this to as many females as you think will get a kick out of it and as many men as you think can handle it.

Monday, October 01, 2007

Monday Monday

Over the weekend, Quentin (6) and Owen (5) insisted that we watch "Yellow Submarine"


While they weren't too impressed with the movie itself...."What is this movie ABOUT, Mom??"...the MUSIC in the movie left it's mark! This morning before school we played the "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band" CD and Quentin says, "Mom, I think I'm going to be a big Beatles fan!"

HA! Thata boy!! He's been dancing to the Dead for years, now we just gotta get him making beads! :-)
Incidentally, eventhough we turned "Yellow Submarine" off about 1/4 of the way through (Owen was already asleep anyway) I got a lot of new bead inspiration from the movie. Stay tuned for some of those!
In the meantime....
Eventhough
Peter Max
didn't do the art for "Yellow Submarine" as some people might assume,( Heinz Edelmann did) Peter Max is a fabulous artist (one of my very favorites!) and his website has more than enough eye candy for ANY Monday!!
Have a great one, see you soon!

Thursday, September 20, 2007

Heineken Dance

Kristi from LE turned us to the Heineken Dance.
Here's what we (Me, Matt, Quentin and Owen)look like when we're doing it.....
(Sorry...had to remove this, it was annoying after a while and there was no pause button. You had no choice but to hear it every time you logged onto my Blog! )

You can't even TELL I have those herniated discs!!! Must be the beer!
hahahahahaha

Wednesday, September 19, 2007

New Button on eBay


Hey hey hey, I have a new button on eBay ! I just love it, I hope you do too!



That's all for now, I'm going to help Search & Destroy (AKA: Quentin and Owen) clean their room. I'll be in there the better part of the evening I'm sure. The question is wether I make it OUT of there!!! Tune in next time to find out! :)

Saturday, September 15, 2007

Valley Junction Fall Art Market


HellloOoOo~
Just wanted to post the vendor map for the Valley Junction fall Art Market. The weather should be PERFECT so come on down! Hope to see you there!


Sunday, September 09, 2007

Monday Monday....

August 6th, was the last time I posted here??? Holy frijoles bead people!! Time flies! The kids are in school and it feels like I have less time now than ever! What's the dang deal? Doctor's appointments have been keeping me busy for one thing. Do you do that? Wait until everyone is in school to do all your Dr. stuff? Top that with the EXTRA Dr. stuff for my stupid herniated discs and well, I'm sure my insurance people LOVE me! Pffft!
Anyway, I still don't have a whole lot to say....
I'll remind you of my upcoming show (for those in the area):

Valley Junction
Fall Art Market
Des Moines, Iowa

September 16th 2007
11-5pm




Pray for nice weather please. The first year I did this show it was HOT HOT HOT, the second year it started of COLD and stayed windy most of the day although the sun did come out....third time's a charm. Sunny and 75 please, that's my order for the day! :-)

If you're hungry for more BLOG stuff, check out these blogs:

Aarvark Art Glass Blog

And
Cindy Couling's Blog





More from me coming soon--I hope!
Have a great week!!

Monday, August 06, 2007

Today


I know that I've been bad about posting, and I haven't even put up any pictures of the Gathering, but I will soon.
I ran across this auction from
JavaBead on eBay.
It's got some of my beads in it! They are older ones, but there's a "Hobnail Rainbow-Go-Round" in there. Funny. (P.S. I "stole Javabeads pic for this post--just so you know where the credit is due. I wish I could take pics like that!!!)

That's all I have for right now. I am lame I know, but it hurts to sit here. I've got two herniated discs in my neck or some dumb thing! I go to get an epidural on Friday that I hope will make the pain ALLLLL go away. Cross your fingers for me!
I'll talk to you after that!
xoxo

Friday, July 20, 2007

TGIF

It's one day closer to the Gathering!! Only 6 more days for me! Some people are leaving earlier....but that's ok. I'm excited about my own time line. :-)



You only have until midnight tonight to get my Etsy "Beads Made To Order" at 1/2 price! There are still some left if you're interested!!

Here's some other new stuff that's going up on Etsy.




They will be sold seperately, so that's cool.

Have you ever had a REALLY important email that you were either trying to move to a "SAVE" folder or mark as "flag for follow-up" and instead marked it as SPAM--thereby deleting it forever AND blocking the address??? OMG I DID THAT!! I'm a little beside myself on that one. Any ideas? Share them with me PLEASE! Actually ANY time you'd like to share ideas with me, I love to hear them!

If you're near here, or willing to travel, you should check out our
Iowa Fringe Festival .

Cool stuff for us Theatre/Artist types! :-)

Ok, I'm off....hope everyone has a great weekend.

Sunday, July 15, 2007

Monday Monday

Wow it seems like just yesterday that I posted here. NOt the case I guess huh?
Nothing too new and exciting to report I guess....
I'm dealing with some SERIOUS neck/shoulder pain. cast your sympathy votes here please! :-)
Wanna see my Iowa State Fair entry?



Only one this year as I have just been too busy! It's in the Fine Arts too, not the Arts and Crafts. I was too late to get into Arts and Crafts. If you go to the Iowa State Fair though, be sure to check OUT the Arts and Crafts section because there will be many an entry from our fine Iowa Bead Society members! :-)
Speaking of the Iowa Bead Society, I'm off to get my supplies ready for tonight's meeting.
If you're interested, you can check out the Iowa Bead Society website here.
Hope you had a great weekend!
See you soon~

Thursday, July 05, 2007

Happy after the 4th!

the time has just FLOWN by! I don't know where the days go, but it's easy to use them up getting ready for a show. Then the in-laws came (from Boulder) yesterday took us to dinner and then took the kids and my van to Kalona. What a whirlwind. I stood in the middle of the room today staring at the TV thinking that maybe I should turn on some Sesame Street--just for the noise. I almost forget the days when I would have had some of MY music at the ready for "quiet times". I think I have the Robots soundtrack, Fisher Price sing-a-long songs and Veggie Tales in the CD player right now. Wow. So, what to do with this freedom? I don't know but I think it's really cool that my house has been clean for almost 24 hours. I'm amazed.
ANYWAY....so cousin Betsy is gettting married on the magical 7-7-07. We're meeting up with the kids/grandparents for the wedding and then we'll be back home.
Am I rambling or WHAT?
Yeah, ok, well, I'll send you

HERE




You'll get lost in the links if nothing else. What a comprehensive site. I could spend days!

I don't know what else to say for right now. Aren't you GLAD? :-)
Hope you had a safe and happy 4th. I think I was asleep by 10!

Thursday, June 21, 2007

This is some serious HAL kinda of technology! WOW!





Day Before Friday...

Moo cards and MySpace and Blog Tags OH MY! I tell you what, trying to keep up with the cyber Jones(es) can be a full-time job in and of itself! It all takes so much time that I don't know how people have any time to do the stuff that they blog about!
Just yesterday by some random wrong turn on my own blog management page I found out that dear, sweet, talented Angelina Beadalina (Angie Green) had "tagged" me. Pretty sneaky sis! I'm not totally hip to all of this new Blog stuffs, I just know how easy it is for me to get lost in the Blogs and sea of interesting bits of tid (aka: tidbits!).
So now that I've been tagged, I'm supposed to tag five other people. Wonder if they have to be bead people? Probably, Bead people are the best anyway! :-)

My first choice for a tag would have been cool Cathy Lybarger of Aardvark Artglass. No matter what kind of day I'm having, Cathy's blog makes it better-especially helpful on BAD days! That's a true story too! I'm not just saying that! Anyway, wouldn't you know, she's already been tagged (see, I told you she was cool!) so.... (and these are really in no order of favorites or anything like that, I love you all equally for different reasons!!)
I would give you Lori Ramotar of The Royal Bead but if she has a blog, I can't find it. SO....how about another Lori? Lori Peterson aka Loribeads. Lori is so cute and talented! Her blog is here. Be careful in those Crocs, Lori!! :-)
Whew....ok, well, there's ONE out of the way. I'll get back to you on the others.
There are also QUESTIONS that have to be answered in this whole tagging process. I don't even have time to answer all of the questions now! I'll answer this one though, since it's my favorite and the easiest.

“Five snacks you enjoy:"
Snacks. Something near and dear to my heart! You know, I think the question is posed in such a way to assume that you only eat snacks OCCASSIONALLY....that you ENJOY them as you would a fine wine after an anniversary meal. Maybe not.
Anyway, I do enjoy snacks. Daily. The more I think "snacks" in my head, the funnier it sounds. Like if someone were to come to my house and ask, "Do you have any SNACKS?" Uh, yeah...we have some. That's pretty much ALL we have.
ANYWAY.... (Hey, blame Angie for this...she's the one that tagged me!)
1.) Skittles
2.) Popcorn (a more traditional snack food)
3.) Chocolate (Brachs/Dove/Hershey's)
4.) Chips and dip (has to be Anderson Erickson French Onion dip. If you live way West or way East, you may never have had Anderson Erickson dairy products. If you haven't you should seriously consider a trip to the Heartland.)
5.) Cereal (Kix, Honey Nut Cherios, Fruit Loops) out of a cup--no milk.

Well, there you have it, at least for the snack question.

In case you're wanting to know the other questions, they are:


What were you doing 10 years ago? (you know THIS is going to be the last question answered!)

What were you doing 1 year ago?

Five songs to which you know all the lyrics

Five things you would do if you were a millionaire

Five bad habits

Five things you like doing

Five things you would never wear again (HA! This should be, "Five things the people in your life WISH you would never wear again!")

Five favorite toys


I'll be back for more later. I need to make beads!
ox
Tera

Wednesday, June 20, 2007

BUSY BUSY BUSY.....

"Busy, busy dreadfully busy....you've no idea what I have to do...." (from Veggie Tales)
Ok....
So Owen turned FIVE on Monday. He's living proof (as are probably all five year-olds) that time does INDEED fly by. What's the dang hurry?

Anyway, I am trying my hand at video. I'm really only putting these here for my Mother-in-law's sake. You know how hard long distance relationships can be (she lives in Boulder, we're in Des Moines--that's IOWA for those of you who might not have heard!). It's especially hard for Owen with his Grandma Lorna. He figured out that she was "lucky" #7 on my cell phone speed dial....yeah well, I've since had to change that. In case my MIL wants to sleep in a tad later than 5:30am our time (which is 4:30 am HER time)--I thought it best for everyone.

So here are some videos I took with my camera on Owen's birthday. Remember, I'm not a professional. I don't even play one on TV!
















This is basically just a test post. I may have to remove these later....
Hope your week is going well. Between Birthdays and Art Center classes and Art show preperations....I'm kinda wiped out. I need a nanny!
:-)

Friday, June 15, 2007

Friday

Where did the week go? No matter I guess--TGIF!

Ok, here's one for ya. Keep in mind that this is just a prototype, but Owen (he's 4 until Monday!) may have discovered a cure for brain freeze!


Its the world's first Anti-Brain Freeze helmet! Best when used in conjunction with a FORK and a friendly, cheering monster.
Works well with all frozen yogurts, sherbert and Ben & Jerry's.

That's all I have for now. If I don't get back, have a great weekend. Happy Father's Day.

Monday, June 11, 2007

Monday Monday

Hope everyone had a great weekend! Mine was pretty uneventful, but Saturday the weather was BEAUTIFUL! Not one lick of humidity...well, I AM in Iowa, so I suppose there was SOME... But I spent the whole day pretending I was in California! :-)



This is just a quick on the fly post, and here's what's on eBay"







All of my friends are back form Bead and Button, can't wait to see the stashes! I'll be back later. I've got some Etsymom stuff in the works I wanna post for you!
Peace~
Tera

Sunday, June 03, 2007

Today

WOW! How the time does fly! I've been busy planting, making beads, trying to keep all of my children together in places where I can find them....(Hmmm, what did she say?) and here's something:




Glass Spring into Summer SALE!

The Creative Glass Guild of Etsy (CGGE) is pleased to announce our

FIRST ANNUAL TEAM SALE!

DATES: June 1st through June 7th

TIMES: 3pm EDT (Noon PDT, 9pm GMT) on June 1st through Midnight EDT June 7th

FOR: Glass enthusiasts and buyers







I THINK the easiest way to find all of these great Etsy Glass people is to do a general search for "CGGE" on Etsy. Lots of great stuff at great prices with lots of free shipping! :-)



In other news, I have yet to show you Star Wars mailbox pictures, and I KNOW you've been waiting for them.....(haha) so without further ado:






























There was a really cool "Make My Day" thing that happened right after the boys put their letter in the box....a lady in an automatic wheelchair rolled up to put HER letter in the mailbox and I said, "May the force be with you!" and she said, "Well, to you too!". I got it all on video. It was cool. Not too many times when it's really appropriate to say that. OR...actually maybe it's ALWAYS appropriate, and we should all just say it more often.
Maybe I'll make a bumper sticker that says:
MTFBWY
Weird? Ha! I bet a lot of people would think I was trying to say something about the days of the week.

What else? Don't know. Can't think of anything else right now.
Just remember, when in doubt, let the Wookie win!

Wednesday, May 30, 2007

I say it's my BIRTHDAY!



It's my Birthday! Happy Birthday to me! It used to be that Memorial Day was the always the 30th, no matter what day it fell on. Then it was changed to make it a holiday for everyone. Ironically, ten years after I was born, my brother from another mother was born on Memorial Day as well! Neat!
Abyway, I've been meaning to update here for days--so many things to tell you, but for now (20 minutes before I have to leave to take the kids to school) I'll just say have a great day! I make be back later!

Thursday, May 24, 2007

STAR WARS STAMPS

OooH whoo tomorrow's the day. The postal ladies said to be there when the doors OPEN.
Later on today I'll take pics of the boys by the R2-D2 mailbox....
Or, maybe I should wait until after we BUY the stamps.
Either way, I hope the Leia stamp wins as the most popular....it will be reproduced for single sale later on in the summer.
I have more to say, but no time to say it.
I'll be back later (what a relief huh? HA!)

IN the meantime, you can check out the Star Wars stamps
HERE

Oh! And these are new on eBay:




Saturday, May 19, 2007

New Stuff On Etsy!

Lots of new stuff going on Etsy from me this weekend. Many "Bargain Bowl" beads! Check them out.

Other than that, I haven't done much today. Some laundry and cleaning--who needs to read about THAT?
Tomorrow we'll see "Shrek the Third" (I'll let you know how THAT goes) and then to the Valley Junction Spring Art Market. I do the one in the fall and I love to go to the spring show to actualkly SHOP and check out the other competition--er, I mean VENDORS! :-)

Should be great weather for them so that's good.
Blah Blah blah....I'm blabbing. I'm gonna go take a shower.

WHAT MADE MY DAY:
OH WAIT! I almost forgot! I painted the mailbox post PURPLE! My husband had NO say in it what-so-ever. I made an executive decision! I know some people have more creative mailboxes/posts than just plain purple, but it was at least a step in the right direction! I ended up at the end of our long driveway with my kids and a bunch of neighbor kids gathered around me. They all wanted to help paint, so instead of letting them do the post, I gave them rocks! Pretty cool. Now I have some art rocks for my garden AND a painted mailbox post. My poor husband is worried about what I'm going to paint next with the leftover paint! Mwahahaha! I have some ideas...don't worry!

Wednesday, May 16, 2007

Make My Day!

In the spirit of focusing on the positive things that happen in my life, I'm thinking of starting a little section called, "Make My Day". Actually....the thing that REALLY gave me this idea was an email from a customer that I got yesterday after receiving her recent order. I don't have a picture of the necklace she bought, but it matched the "Abacus" bracelet she bought a while back.
Anyway, what she said in her email was this (I hope she won't mind my posting this!): "I got the necklace and earrings and I love them. I could wear them with a cow turd and I'd look great because no one would notice what else I had on!"
That is just about the funniest thing I've ever heard! I told her I should incorporate that into my logo! haha.
Anyway, that made my day. Thought I would share that with you.
Since that was actually YESTERDAY'S "make of the day", I should think of something for today....
Well, my little boys and I went to the park after school today and right when we got there I found a little Lego guy. That was pretty exciting for Quentin (6) because he's WAY into Legos. It was even a guy he didn't have, so that was cool. Don't worry, there were no other kids there that it could have belonged to. I could have left it in case someone came back for it but...I think my karma is safe for taking it. Ground scores are good.
Here's what's new tonight on eBay:




Ok, that's all for now, I've gotta go make some beads!

Tuesday, May 15, 2007

New Wheels

Hope everyone had a nice Mother's Day. Wether you are a mother, or have a mother, I think Mother's Day is nice. FATHER'S day is overrated. haha
ANYWAY...
Thought I would show you my new ride! I've been in desparate need for quite some time now, but I hate buying new cars. When the air went out on the old blue Bonneville, that was the last straw. If I can't have a Volkswagon Bus....this is probably the next best thing.




Someday I WILL have a Volkswagon Bus--and hopefully I'll be able to get Peter Max to paint it-- but for now, I have to say that I'm rather fond of the keyless entry and air conditioning! I'm saving up my money now for the purple neoprene seat covers and the DVD player for the Caravan. Yeah I know....

I guess there's no other new news from me. Gearing up for Idol tonight. Vote for Melinda please-she's my poll pick! I win a whole bead stash if she wins!!!

That's all for now, talk soon~

Wednesday, May 09, 2007

Goo Shoes

you know...you turn your back on the four year-old for two seconds and he winds up in GOO SHOES!



For those of you who may want to make your own goo...for shoes or stress relief or whatever :

1C room temp. water

1C Glue ( regular school glue- 1C=two bottles)

Food coloring

1 1/3 C warm water

4T Borax (powdered-found with the laundry soap)

____________________________________________

Mix the first three ingredients in a bowl, then the second ingredients in a separate bowl. Slowly pour glue mix into 2nd bowl but do not mix together. Roll glue mix around in Borax solution 4 or 5 times then life glue mix out of Borax solution and knead for 2-3 minutes. There will be Borax solution left over--you do not need to try to soak it all up with the glue mix.

That's it. You have goo! I woudln't say that it's non-toxic--doesn't SMELL non-toxic anyway. Don't eat it. This goo is akin to those containers of stuff you get out of the 50 cent "gumball" machines at Chuckie Cheese etc. Hours of fun. Don't let it get on the carpet! :-)




Tuesday, May 08, 2007

New Blogger Blog!

Well hey--so I think I may get on THIS blog bandwagon for a while! It just might be easier than doing my own blog "by hand" on my website. Hey....I still pull weeds in the garden and sew buttons back on and recycle, I just need as much computer help as I can get!
ANYWAY....so hello! It's MAY already!! (My birthday is the 30th for those of you keeping track! ha!) For now I'll just take up where I left off on my web blog, I won't make too many formal introductions, that may come later though.

What's the new around here? Well.....let me show you!



Can you BELIEVE what some people give away to the Salvation Army? Made IN the USA circa 1978! Yeah baby!! We really needed a new kitchen table and when I went in the other day and found this.....I knew it was mine. I was even fully prepared to pay $80 for this set--- I think that would have been my largest one-time SA purchase to date, but when I went back to buy it, it was on sale for 50% off!!! Wow huh? Notice the chairs all have wheels....they swivel too! Great times!
In other news, Quentin (6) can SNAP! Yeah, it was a pretty momentous accomplishment! Now we just need to get him to tie his shoes!
I've been having a lot of fun on Etsy http://www.etsy.com . If you have never been there--please go! It's awesome! There are a few artists in particular that I've grown QUITE fond of (to put it mildly):
I don't think I know anything else for now. We'll see how I feel about this new blog thing....I may have to go back to the old fashioned way of doing things.