Thoughts About the January Journal "Page"

Whenever I have a project to do but no specific design in mind, thoughts come into my head at the strangest times.  I usually keep some sort of writing material with me so I can jot down notes or sketches.  Awhile ago I decided that my format for the Bead Journal Project would be a small felted vessel but I wasn't sure if I'd have a specific theme or if I would just play it by ear each month.  The ear thing won out, so I'm just letting ideas float into my head about my life, feelings, concerns, goals, etc. while I try to visualize translating those ideas into bead work.  I don't know when I'll be able to make my first vessel - it had better be soon though, since I will still have to bead it after it's dry.

I didn't want to lose track of the thoughts I had about my January piece so I made a few sketches.  This probably isn't the final sketch - version 2 replaced version 1 rather quickly.  But I thought I would document my process here.  There may not even be a final sketch on paper, as I may change my mind while I'm in the beading process itself.

I had every intention of making the vessel today.  But I was having a strong feeling about organizing my office, so rather than spend the day in the wet lab, I started attacking the piles of stuff that have prevented me from working efficiently for ages.  Here's the first part that I tackled.  How on earth does a person let things get as out of control as this?!  Well, at least now I can walk into my office without tripping on something - yay!

I still have a very long way to go, since I kept finding distractions such as laundry, the need to eat, mom wanting to go out for a cappuccino, and marveling at discovering things that I thought had been "lost" forever. Like a bag full of Czech pressed glass leaf beads...

Since I started this post I got interrupted with making and eating dinner, sorting through more stuff that was in the piles that I removed, watching a bit of TV, discarding more stuff, and now it's time to hit the sack.  Maybe I'll dream about another design for January's journal vessel.

Until next time, have a happy and creative week!

Wooly Weekend Weather

We've been having quite some weather all week - this weekend it was rainy. Yesterday was kind of a kick, it reminded me of the weather I was familiar with back in New England. It would pour down rain, then stop, then the sun would come out for a bit - next thing you know it was pouring again. Toward the end of the afternoon I finally went out my back door to see what was going on outside. I wish I had gone out earlier, there were probably a bunch of these off and on during the day. Unfortunately, by the time I got my camera and came back out again, it had mostly faded.

I decided it was time to take mom out to Starbucks for a jolt of caffeine, and stopped on the way to try and catch this piece of rainbow.

But the prettiest sky I got to see was while we were sipping our cappuccinos - the sky was continuing to clear in places, just enough for the setting sun to splash a tiny bit of color around.

Today, it was raining and overcast all day - no sunshine for me - but that was OK, since I was down in San Jose at the glass institute. It was "Super Sunday", which is a 4-hour practice session for my torchworking students where I'm available to answer questions and to help with any issues. I brought a bunch of my own glass with me and managed to make a couple of beads myself. By the time we were finished, I really wanted to get home and hop on the torch. But alas, it was time to rid mom of her cabin fever and get her out of the house for a bit. This evening, I'll have a chance to satisfy my "make stuff" urge - I have another vessel that I have to embellish. I made it last night, which was lots of fun. It was pouring again last night, and the rain on the roof of my "wet lab" makes a ton of noise. It was rather mesmerizing...

Here are some of my students during today's session. There's usually a bit of chatter going on during these sessions, but today I think everyone was really concentrating on the glass.

Here's Melissa, cooking some sauerkraut - ah, I mean melting down a bead. :-)

And it looks like Lisa is about to make a 2-color twisty.

Here's Bonnie, about to pull out some cane.

And here's Yoshiko at the torch. Check that out - how on earth did I manage to snap this picture right when her bead was between the 2 arms of the lamp?!

The kiln was nice and packed when we finished - I think it was a pretty good day.

And now it's time for me to get mom motivated so we can all go out for a good Chinese dinner - yum! Have yourselves a happy and creative week ahead!

When the frost is on the punkin...

Well, last night was calm. No rain or wind. But holy smokes, we woke up in a frost-laden deep freeze! OK, OK, so you folks who live like Nanook of the North are laughing at me for being such a wuss. I can't help it, my blood has thinned out since I left Connecticut ages ago. And after just having looked at the weather that they're having in my former home town of Newington, CT, there's absolutely no difference between here and there. Sheesh!

My poor Niki was totally freaked out about the frost - she's afraid of just about everything and I'm sure that in her little doggie brain, something really bad happened to her stomping grounds overnight. I, on the other hand, was thrilled. After I donned my jeans and fleece pullover I headed out to the back yard with camera in hand. Here are a few scenes that are very rare in this neighborhood...

Perhaps these will inspire some new beads, or perhaps a "frost-covered" vessel. I'll just let the images float around in my brain for awhile. Funny thing is, we have oak leaves all over the place but I'll be darned if I can find the oak tree in the neighborhood that's shedding onto our yard.

Now it's time for me to get back to work. And it's time for you to go have yourselves a happy and creative day!

Brrrrrrr!

It was cold last night. I mean, I live in the San Francisco Bay Area and we're not used to temperatures going down below freezing. And since I've become an "old fart", I've been sleeping with socks on when it gets cold. I forgot 'em last night - not good, since it was a very cold rainy night. Some time in the wee hours I was dreaming that it was freezing rain and when I looked outside the entire neighborhood had become crystal city, all encased in ice. I'm glad THAT was just a dream - that stuff is very dangerous. I experienced more than one ice storm in my life, having lived in Connecticut. But the hills that run along the eastern edge of my home town of Fremont were covered in snow, and that was NOT a dream.

I was working this morning, but at around 12:30 p.m. I went to the post office to mail out some beads. I took my camera along and drove down to the southern part of Fremont where I could get some pictures of the snowy hills. By that time, the occasional sun and a bit warmer temps had started to melt what was left of the white stuff. But it still looked pretty, so I wanted to share. Do you feel a yodel coming on? ;-)

It was still very gloomy when I was out with my camera, so no blue sky for contrast. I got a bit carried away with the camera, and snapped a few more pix around town when I was heading home.

In the picture below, I was zooming by our local park.

It was kind of funny - while I was stopped at a light, I took the following picture because I liked the trees on the right. The guy in front of me saw my camera in his rear view, and seemed to get rather upset. As we made our way down the road, he pulled into the right lane to let me pass him, then immediately got behind me. I kept on driving, and then pulled into a left turn lane. Sure enough, he pulled into that lane behind me. I lifted my camera again to take another picture of some other piece of scenery ahead of me, and I guess that was good enough for him. He must have decided that I wasn't stalking him, because he pulled back into the "go straight" lane and left the scene.

Here's the scenery I caught after I turned the corner. Being from New England, I haven't seen anything that can hold a candle to the foliage display that I was used to seeing back there. But my heart still does a bit of pitter-patter when I see trees with leaves that are other than green.

Shooting while driving isn't a good thing, though. Not only are my pictures fuzzy, it's probably worse than texting while driving. Sshhhhh! Don't tell anyone...

If we get more rain tonight as predicted, we may have more snow up there tomorrow. Since I have to drive down there to pick up my unsold goods from the gallery and get paid for what I did sell, I'll bring my camera along again just in case. And maybe I'll spend a bit more time out of the car taking some decent "around town" pictures. Fremont has some very quaint neighborhoods considering the fact that it's just another suburban California town.

Now I'm going back to work. Stay warm, and have a happy and creative day!

Irons In the Fire

Since I'm taking a quick break from packing for my trip to Miami, I'm going to give you a sneak peek at some of the projects that I'll be starting when I return in a week. I'm not leaving until Wednesday but I have to teach a class tomorrow night, so I thought I'd get a jump start on trying to figure out how many suitcases I need to take.

I've made some purchases in the last few weeks with the intention of including them in my fiber pieces. I have a small collection of ceramic pieces by Lisa Peters, which I acquired when I was at the Bead & Button Show. I'll be using several of them on wearable pieces, perhaps with some of my glass beads as well. When I saw this pair of orange lips in her Etsy shop, I just had to jump on it! I'm probably going to incorporate it into a bag. I've got some rather wild ideas about what the bag will look like, and I just might make some glass eye beads to go with it.

On a more conservative note, I couldn't resist these crackle white raku donuts from MAKUstudio. I'm definitely going to put them on a vessel - I just haven't decided yet if I'm going to put both of them on the same vessel or if I'm going to make a separate vessel for each of them. I've already made a glass bead to go with one of the donuts, and the other will have some components that I haven't used on a vessel yet.

Here are some of the fibers I've chosen to work with - Merino wool, Harrisville fleece, hand-dyed (not by me) variegated silk, and a commercial ribbon yarn that I've had for a few years - along with my glass bead. I'm not going to show you the other components - it'll be a surprise. :-)

This is going to be an extremely earthy vessel... or two. I can't wait to get started on these new projects!

Before I resume stuffing my suitcase, I want to dedicate this post to my brave and determined fur kid Peanut. Last Friday while hubby was out walking the dogs, Peanut's left hind leg gave out on her and she collapsed. After they got home, her leg was shaking, she couldn't put any weight on it, and she ended up tossing her breakfast. That continued for awhile with additional vomiting, so I took her over to the animal hospital. They did xrays, gave her pain meds, put her on an IV to replenish her fluids, and kept her overnight. They determined that she was vomiting because of the sudden onslaught of severe pain. She has arthritis and bone spurs around her knee, with a possible torn ACL, so we scheduled knee surgery for her that's supposed to happen this Thursday. But she bounced back - as she always does - and to look at her now, you'd never know there was anything wrong with her. She's jumping around and very happy. Perhaps she decided that at 12 years old she didn't want to take a chance with the surgery. Whatever it was, I'm incredibly relieved!

We've almost lost her 3 times to pancreatitis, she has epilepsy, she had surgery on her other knee almost 4 years ago, she had an infection that required intramuscular injections three times a day for 2 weeks, and she's such a trooper. Hat's off to you, Peanut!

Now go have yourselves a happy and creative week! I'll be back from Miami on the 27th with undoubtedly lots of inspiration.

A Little Foot Stompin'

No beads or fiber today, but I'm going to share a tidbit of personal info with you... in my "former life" I was a musician of sorts.  Yep, I started playing music by ear when I was 3 years old.  I had one of those little one-octave toy pianos - think Linus - and I could play the melodies of all my little kiddie records.  About 10 years later, my folks gave me a small Hammond organ for Christmas/birthday (they're 3 days apart).  And a few years after starting music lessons and loving it, I got the "almost real deal" Hammond - a model B2.  It was like the B3 without the Leslie speaker.

Some of my fondest memories of that period of my life are of the times when my cousin, Art Ross, would come over and we'd jam.  He was a fourth-generation fiddler and also played guitar a bit.  He couldn't read a note of music, but oh did he have an ear!  When he played his fiddle, I would accompany him on the organ;  when I played lead on the organ, he would accompany me on the guitar.  Here we are way back then - Art was 27, I was 15.

Art and I had different musical backgrounds and experience.  His repertoire consisted mainly of French Canadian fiddle tunes; mine comprised various genres - pop, folk, latin, big band, rock & roll, and on and on.  One of my "show-off" songs was Tico-Tico.  This song wasn't originally meant for the organ, but even way back then it was my kind of music.  This is the way Tico-Tico was originally intended, performed here by Carlos Barbosa-Lima and Berta Rojas.

I decided that I had to teach Art to accompany me on Tico-Tico, since I was the one "showing off" - you know how 15-year-olds can be.  Often times, we'd have friends and family over at the house for impromptu get-togethers or planned parties.  When Art and I played Tico-Tico, we'd bring the house down.  

Soon thereafter Art got married, and over several subsequent years he and his wife had 3 children.  Patrick, Art's middle child, was 8 years old when he asked his dad to teach him how to play a tune.  So began Patrick's foray into the world of music.  He and his dad spent a lot of time playing music together and competing in regional fiddle contests.  Unfortunately, Art met an untimely death when he was in his early 50's,  and I am still very saddened by this.  

So why am I chatting about this today?  Patrick and I are Facebook "friends", and a few days ago I had the pleasure of seeing his FB link to a video that he uploaded to YouTube.  And it gave me goosebumps!  I wanted to bring him to the attention of my fans and followers, so here's Patrick playing his own improvised version of... you guessed it... Tico-Tico.

Not exactly what you'd expect to hear from a fifth-generation French Canadian fiddler - but oh, cousin, YOU ROCK!

And now I'm off to prepare to teach tonight's bead making class. This is the first week of my latest Beadmaking 1 and Beadmaking 2 classes in San Jose and I need to be on my toes, so to speak. 

Have yourselves a happy and creative day!

Imagine, if you will...

...a table piled with glass rods just waiting to be turned into something new, something organic, something wild and crazy...

That's the picture that I had planned on posting today - my new glass stash. Unfortunately, my hard drive decided that it wasn't going to happen. Nope, not today. No pictures for you, Shirley. Not gonna happen. I'm done. It's over. Sayonara!

Some days I just hate computers. Since my torch is being much friendlier than my non-bootable laptop (I'm borrowing another one to write this little rant), I'm heading out to the bead lab to put that new stash of mine to good use. And maybe, just maybe, I'll be able to get pictures of today's creations and show you the real deal. I mean hey, words just can't describe the little nuances that happen in the torch and the kiln.

I'm off to create... Have yourselves a wonderful day!

Another WOW!

In my last post, I included some comments about and pictures from the inauguration.  The crowd picture made me think, "Wow!".  I received this link in an email, and was so amazed by this that I had to share.

When you click on the link to this picture, use the zoom tool to zoom in on the crowd.  You can pan through the crowd, and you can really get lost in that crowd!

Amazing Photo of the Inauguration

I'm off to the "wet lab" for now.  Enjoy your Friday!

A Time of Hope, a Bit of Reflection...

I watched the ceremonies today with tears in my eyes, a heart full of hope, and a feeling of wonderment.  I thought back to my childhood when things were very different, and reflected a bit on how much change has occurred since that time.  We are still on a journey to overcome the injustices that happen in our country, but if we work together we can continue to make progress and help make our country and the world a better place.

And regarding this image, all I can say is... WOW!

I found some very old pictures from my childhood - they were taken back in the... dare I say it... 1950's (ouch!).  When we moved into our first house, the first neighborhood kid I met was Nancy.  I didn't understand why her parents never allowed me into their house, but despite that situation we became really good friends.  I have often wondered whatever became of Nancy - we moved to a different town when I was 12 and I lost touch with most of the "old gang".

Here are me and Nancy, sitting at the table in my back yard - and then a subset of us kids in the 'hood.  Many many happy memories from that time in my life...

And now I'm heading to my "wet lab" to sink my fingers into some wool.  May you all have a happy, productive, and creative day!

  

'Tis The Season...

Every year I indulge a bit and buy myself a Christmas present. Things are really tight this year, but I couldn't let the tradition die. My little package arrived in the mail Tuesday, and I was just tickled pink! Or maybe I should say tickled red... After having put together many Treasuries on Etsy in which I included some of my fellow local artisans, I wanted to patronize their shops. I now have 3 lovely peace cranes hanging in my silk ficus tree in the family room, with a few mini-cranes nestled in a pile of little ornaments next to my rock candle. Thank you Nancy McNally, i.e., localcolorist, for making such lovely art! If you folks aren't familiar with Nancy's peace cranes, you MUST check them out!

Localcolorist Permanent Peace Cranes

Here's my John Lennon peace crane hanging in the ficus. I also purchased the Annie Lenox peace crane - she's red and gold as well. The third crane is the Maya Angelou crane, which has blue, green, pink, and dark rose flowers on a white ground. She's a beauty!

Here's a picture of the 2 white and silver minis, which were a complete surprise. They're perfect in my little ornament heap.

I actually started writing this post on Tuesday, and while I was in the middle of it I got the Treasury "blue box" on Etsy. Here's the treasury I put together. I thought that tranquility would be a nice subject for the holidays.

Now I'm off to bed. It's almost 1:00 a.m. and I just finished up the food prep for Christmas day. I'll be having a few folks over in the early afternoon, and then there will be 9 of us at dinner. I'm going to make my annual peppercorn-crusted salmon filet. I got the house all stinky earlier on Wednesday making the brine in which it will soak for about 8 hours before I finish preparing and baking it for dinner. Geez, that liquid smoke stuff sure smells funky - and it really hangs in there! But oh, the salmon is divine.

I just finished making 2 loaves of pear bread, 4 dozen oatmeal scotchies (cookies), cranberry orange bread, 4 dozen cranberry oatmeal pecan cookies, and a really tasty salmon spread to go with the brie, goat cheese, pate, and roasted red bell peppers with cream cheese. I'll be serving all that up Christmas afternoon - anyone want to stop by for a snack? C'mon down! We no longer exchange Christmas gifts, I just do a lot of cooking and baking and have folks over for food and conversation. We all like that much better.

And so I will leave you for now with heartfelt wishes for a peaceful and happy holiday season, whether you celebrate Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, Yule, or no holiday at all. Joy to all of you!

Falling In Love All Over Again...

Nope, not talking about a person here... I'm in the process of FINALLY putting up some Christmas decorations. I have some "buildings" that light up, all having some sort of personal meaning to me, and this year I've put them on my fireplace hearth in the family room. I used to put them on the top of my rolltop desk, but we moved that desk into the front room of the house that's used as an office/library. Since they're now on the hearth, there's a jumble of electrical cords/plugs, extension cord behind all those buildings that looked rather unsightly, so I decided to cover them up with something. It occurred to me that I have a "wicked huge" stash of fabric from my quilting days from which I could probably find something appropriate. I keep the main portion of my stash in a dresser that I quit using as a dresser years ago, which is now in the "library". Off I went, rummaging through the drawers - and I had to exercise a great deal of discipline to grab what would work and get the heck out of there. But I had to stay just a little while to fondle some of the gorgeous fat quarters and half-yards stored away... wonderful jewel-tone batiks, bright florals, greens with leaves and trees in every shade you could imagine... ooooohh, aaaaaaahhh. Now I want to make stuff with fabric. Geez, just what I need - another distraction! I have a show coming up in 2 months and I just CAN'T get involved in another medium right now. But oh, how beautiful these things are - and I can see them in bags, clothing, wall hangings... it boggles the mind! OK, enough of THAT, Shirley! Here are a few of the dresser drawers I was drooling into.






Of course, I found the perfect fabrics for the "background" of my little village - how could I NOT in this pile of stuff?

So now I can finish up my decorating while I'm listening to my Afro Celts CDs. These folks are wonderful - in fact, I put together an Etsy Treasury that was influenced by their song "Rise Above It". You can hear this song on YouTube HERE. And check out an Afro Celts performance featuring Johnny Kalsi (Dhol Foundation) HERE - wild! Anyhow, I was on the torch the other day listening to "Rise Above It", and I started dreaming up this treasury. I caught the blue box last night, so here it is.

I really enjoy putting treasuries together - I always find new artists to add to my list of favorites. And, of course, it's always a thrill when I see the gold star in the list of treasuries. Carol Dean Sharpe of Sand Fibers has a great idea. Whenever she is featured in someone's treasury - which happens very often, her work is gorgeous! - she displays that treasury, then displays an item from the treasury curator's shop that she likes. Perhaps I'll borrow her idea and show more treasuries on my blog. I'm a hopeless treasury addict!

OK, I'm off to finish my decorating - then it's time for a cappucino break. Happy Sunday to you all!

BRRRRRR!!

Dang, it's cold out there...

OK, all you folks who live in 4-season locations have no sympathy for me, I know - BUT... Since having moved to the San Francisco Bay Area 30-some-odd years ago, my blood has thinned considerably. So this arctic blast we're getting is doing a number on me. I was putting trash out last night and by the time I got inside, my nightly blueberry tea ritual was more appealing than ever! We've got snow all over the Bay Area. Check it out in the pix posted on SFGate. I'm particularly fond of this one in the Carmel Valley - that's a bit south of me, and snow is very unusual there as well.

Snow in Carmel Valley

Now I'm tempted to load my fur kids into the car and haul them off to the hills to see this strange white stuff we call snow. To my knowledge (they're both rescue pups), they've never seen it before. This could be fun - but it'll have to wait until tomorrow, I'm going to be cooking up a batch of beef stew before I go teach my class tonight. They're probably just as happy where they are. After I finished my breakfast this morning I went back into the bedroom to make the bed, and there was Peanut - playing in the snow was not on HER agenda...

And Niki is STILL in her "waiting for the mail to come" spot in our front room...

Once again, tonight is the last night of my latest 4-session Beadmaking 2 class. This one went by so quickly - we had classes 2 nights a week rather than one so we wouldn't bump into the holidays. So we'll be doing some complex twisties, floral cane, and applying flowers to beads. This has been such a fun class - I'm really glad that these students have joined our SGB Norcal group! I'm bringing my camera with me tonight for sure.

I'll probably be making more "color of the year" demo beads tonight. Yesterday I did pull out some of my yellow glass, but I noticed that I had a leaf sitting on my work table - a real one sent to me by the wife of an old college buddy of mine from Connecticut. Rather than do a bunch of yellow beads as I had intended, I made a leaf with my yellow glass layered with several other colors. I think I'll send this leaf bead to my friend who sent me the real deal. She'll get a surprise for sure! Here's the real deal along side of my leaf bead. It was a real challenge keeping this one from cracking without overheating it, but it was fun. I'll be doing more of these for sure!

And now I'm off to the kitchen to get my stew going. I have to leave for class in 2 hours - yikes! Have yourselves a warm and cozy evening!

Eat Eat Eat... Shop Shop Shop...

What a feast! Last night we had a big turkey dinner - I love Thanksgiving turkey dinners!

My stepdaughter Alison brought over the fixings for her "annual pumpkin cheese cake" and put it together in our tiny cramped kitchen. She employed the assistance of her friend Rob - gosh, I love seeing a guy working in the kitchen.

While the cooking was happening, we got a phone call from my stepson Adam, who lives up in Portland (OR) with his lovely wife Ines. Gosh, we sure miss them! Alison couldn't pass up an opportunity to chat, and she's great at multi-tasking...





So today is Black Friday and I've decided to help some of my favorite vendors get into the black today. No, I won't be Christmas shopping - I'll be heading over to the International Gem & Jewelry Show to replenish some of my jewelry supplies. I have a show coming up in February and I'm completely out of some components that I need. So I'll go fight the crowds - yeeha!



Here's what I'll be dealing with later this afternoon...


And then tonight I'll start making more jewelry, yeah! I have so many rocks in my stash it's crazy!

Speaking of Black Friday, I've put every item in all 3 of my Etsy shops on sale today! If you're out there shopping in cyber-land, come and see! I have all of my beads on sale at Jumping Jack Glass, my jewelry is on sale at Shirley Cook designs, and my fiber art is on sale at Flames & Fiber.



Tomorrow I'll be heading down to the Kaleid Gallery in San Jose to help put up our glass ornament installation. This is a show/sale put on by the San Jose Glass Artist Alliance. We're installing ornaments to cover a 60-foot wall! I can't wait to see it completed - that's an amazing number of ornaments. I'll definitely bring my camera for that event.


So I'm off to fight the crowds, and maybe I'll come home with a few unexpected treasures. How fun is that?!

Have a productive Friday, everyone!