lo and behold

there’s a bead shop! 

Would you believe there’s a pretty darned nice one less than a mile from my mom’s place in Florida?  There’s not even a bead store a mile from my house at home! 

So, I went to “just look,” and it turns out I remembered that I was desperately lacking seed beads in blue and purple tones.  And a few others that just couldn’t go home without me – or me without them. Plus I picked up a few tubes of basic black.  Can never have too many of those.  I love these large tubes and I usually can only get them on line.  A lovely souvenir, I’d say!

 Dolphins or seed beads?  Seed beads or dolphins?  Hard to say which was the highlight!  

I also really like to stop at the Beadin’ Path when I’m in Maine, and I sniffed out a couple nice shops when we were in Montreal a few summers ago.

What’s your favorite bead shop on the road?

I’m reading a lot of blogs these days (and really enjoying it), but I need a more organized system.  I currently use the Feeds thingy on Internet Explorer.   What blog readers do you recommend?  I use Windows on a PC. 

As far as I can tell, the main choices are

I don’t know if this makes a difference, but I am NOT a     blogger, so I don’t have access to that whole system. 

All suggestions/advice is welcome.

Thanks!  

I had one living grandparent when I was growing up, and my kids have four.  I know they are lucky, and I know the kids treasure the relationships they have with their grandparents – as do the grandparents treasure the kids.  The downside:  all the grandparents, and the cousins, too, are no closer than a plane ride away.  And not the same plane ride, either - that would be too easy! 

So, they fly to us and we fly to them, and we manage to get everyone seen at least a couple times a year.  We all rack up a lot of frequent fliers miles, and I am grateful that we are able to do it, and so far, the grandparents are able to do it, too.  The travel for the older folks has gotten harder over the years, I know that.   

One of the grandparent destinations is Florida.  We can hit both of my parents with a flight to the southeast coast between December and April.  We haven’t done it in a while, and my mom has been pushing for a trip to Disney. 

I’ve been reluctant.   I just don’t know if I can stomach the crowds and the commercialism. But this year we got closer.  We crossed into the city limits of Orlando and visited Discovery Cove, a part of Sea World where you can “swim with the dolphins.”  My mother treated her other grandchildren to a similar experience at Miami’s Seaquarium, and she’s been waiting until my youngest was able to meet the height requirement.  Turns out at Discovery Cove, there is only an age requirement, and we were good to go. 

The plan was that only the kids would do the dolphin thing, but at the last minute, all three grown-ups decided to fork over the extra money and pucker up.   

One of the attractions at Discovery Cove is an aviary where birds come and eat out of your hand, or rest on your head, whichever they feel like.  

The exorbitant admission price to Discovery Cove includes a second park, and we chose Aquatica – SeaWorld’s Water Park, and went the next day. We had warmer weather on that day than any in the last two months.  It was a total success.  And no lines. At all.

Here’s Isabel . . . .

. . . .the bottom of this baby!  See those closed tubes at the top, before the big drop? I could not handle that, but I did go on quite a few others!  It was a blast. 

1. On the way home from the airport, give in to the craving for McDonalds. 
2. Enter the house and remember how much I enjoy coming home to our recently renovated home:  the colorful kitchen, the functional mudroom, the convenient but out-of-the-way laundry.  
3. Review the mail and find a surprising thank-you note and some fun magazines.
4. Curl up on the couch to read magazines and fall asleep.
5. Continue sleeping while kids and hubby make their own dinner.
6. Wake up. Put kids to sleep.
7. Spend several hours researching ideas for next vacation.
8. Enjoy the comfort of sleeping in my own bed.
9. Sleep late because it’s a SNOW DAY!
10. Take the auto-replies off my email.

And with that, I’m back.  Time to unpack and start the laundry. . . .

I’ve had very little Internet access during the past week – a welcome break for the most part, except that I just spent a few hours catching up on blogs, only to discover that I’ve missed a lot, including a great giveaway from Kerry Bogart.  Congratulations, Michele!

Here’s a glimpse of what I haven’t missed: 

Relaxed mornings.

Fun afternoons.

Getting to know a new cousin.

Wish you were here! 

It’s school vacation here in Massachusetts, and I’ve flown the coop!  Gone to visit the grandparents in Florida.  Back in a week.  Will send postcards. 

My daughter Isabel reached into the hat and pulled out a name: 

Adrienne Campbell  - Yeah!  You won the surprise giveaway.

My daughter Rachel reached into the hat and pulled out a name: 

Kate from Organic Odysseys – Yeah!  You won a bead crochet bracelet. 

Please get in touch, and we’ll work out the details.  If the bracelet I originally posted isn’t the right size or color, there are lots of options. 

Special thanks, too, to everyone who entered by adding my RSS feed to your blog reader.   The best part (for me) is that hopefully we’ll stay connected and a bloggy friendship will grow.  

This was the first give-away I’ve done on my blog, and I liked it!  I want to do it more; I’m thinking maybe once a month.   One blog I follow, The Vintage Pearl, gives things away all the time, and I love the spirit behind it . She says, “Let’s give one away!” and I hear the generosity and fun in her voice.  I’ll take her as my model. 

And, I’ve been reading about all that One World One Heart stuff. WOW!  I thought about participating in the event, but it seemed overwhelming.  Next year, though.  Talk about giveaways! 

Happy Tuesday!  

“Lampworking allows me to be a ‘writer’ or ‘poet’ or ‘painter’ in glass because it is possible to give so much detail precisely.” - Gianni Toso

Many, many, many years ago, I got an MFA in poetry.  I struggled with actually calling myself a poet, but I spent 2 years of my life practicing, and it was a very worthy endeavor for me.  I had a few poems published (the first was actually published BEFORE I got the MFA which had been a wild hope for me – I was immensely proud and excited when it happened. ) And then, I started to write for money,  and I had children, and yada, yada, yada; I haven’t written a poem in years.  Unless you count making beads . . . .

I have described my attraction to working in glass as going from “black and white to color,”  and in some ways, it feels like an 180 degree turn in my creative life, but look at that, Maestro Gianni Toso thinks it’s pretty much the same thing – and suddenly, I totally get what he means:  the small form, the compact canvass, the weight on each word, as on each drop of glass, each minute spin or tilt of the mandrel.  It’s the same practice.  Getting into the zone and making something small and perfect. 

The quote came from the Carlisle School of Glass in an email I got last week.  They are hosting a class with Toso, what they are calling a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.  I didn’t even know who the guy was, but I gotta love someone who can talk about language and glass that way.   Turns out he’s a glass master from seven generations of Murano glass masters.  And he’s Jewish – or at least he makes ceremonial Jewish glass art, so I assume he is.  That’s very cool, to me. 

Here’s how the class is described: 

This class will focus on developing each student’s personal glass language by building a vocabulary of glass techniques, and exploring its use in developing one’s personal glass language. 

How awesome does that sound?  I’m not going to take it; it’s very expensive, but even more so, I don’t feel ready to take a class with a glass master.  But maybe I should . . . .it’s probably filled by now anyway.

In the meantime,  I’m going to remember that quote and think about it often, let his words guide me. 

While party hopping and sipping soup in the blogosphere earlier this week, I came upon some good giveaways, in addition to my own.  Take a look at this one, and get yourself in before the deadline of February 14.   

Erin from Treasures Found is showing off her Valentines love with these cute necklaces.  Get the details of the giveaway here.  She’s also got a challenge going on until the end of the month, so no reason to be bored! 

Lucid Moon Studio is giving away three things:  a $25 gift certificate to ArtBeads, a darling resin owl pendant made by Lucid Moon blogger herself, and a copy of two different beading magazines.  The details are at the end of her long-ish post, but don’t rush through.  Linger over the story of her experiments with resin and the gorgeous photos of her necklace that is just perfect for Valentine’s Day.  You won’t be disappointed. 

Wait, I just realized if you all enter, I’ll have a lesser chance of winning myself!  Forget it.

Spirit Rattles is giving away a lovely soup cup of beads pictured below.  You have to comment on her blog by Sunday at noon. 

And don’t forget about my giveaway.  Enter by February 15 at noon by subscribing to my RSS feed and leaving me a comment that says “I RSS’d you”.  I’ll have two winners; one will get the lavender and blue bead crochet bracelet pictured (it’s quite a bit more sparkly than the photo shows) and one will get a surprise! 

Good luck - happy weekend!

Let me just say, I think I visited 50 blogs yesterday.  It was like eating potato chips, it was a feast, it was a drug;  I just couldn’t stop.  I was bleary-eyed, my tired fingertips bleeding, and I just kept going.  One more . . .Just one more . . .Just one more.  I kept thinking I was close to the end, and then I find another and another that I hadn’t yet seen. 

And let me just say, I’m having one of the happiest hangovers I’ve ever had.  Thank you again, Lori Anderson, for such wonderful opportunity. 

Over the next few posts, I’d like to reflect more in depth on some of the art and artists I met during this blog fun.  Since I’m treating this whole period in my life as a personal art school, I really enjoy the process of gathering other artists into my fold and thinking about how I am like them and how I am different.  I feel like it all contributes to my own sense of voice and vision in what I’m doing. 

So, of course, every single piece of jewelry I saw was lovely.  Really.  Not a dud in the crowd :).  But this one photo keeps coming back to my mind. 

This necklace was made by Cindy Wimmer using beads she got from Lyn Foley.  I would love to hold it in my hand, to see how heavy it feels, to see how it moves.  I like that it’s a substantial piece, but it’s also trim, and short.  I can’t really figure out how big those gemstones in the back really are, and I don’t think Cindy mentioned what gauge wire she used.  She called that wire technique “chunky herringbone weave” so I can investigate it from there.  I am also simply enchanted by those empty links between the lampwork and the gemstones.  I don’t know why, but I think they are brilliant. 

As an aspiring lampwork artist, I know that I want to make jewelry with my beads.  I also know that I want the beads to be the main attraction.  I love sterling, and I love glass and silver, but I don’t like the way, for example, the sterling beads in a Troll bracelet (and others of those variety) compete with the glass.  I also don’t love too many glass beads, one on top of another (though I have definitely seen exceptions which I will talk about later). This necklace seems to strike the perfect balance.  The sterling is there in service to the beads, yet it is unique and beautiful in its own right. 

One thing I tried on my Bead Soup necklace was making my own jump rings.  I simply did not have the size I wanted, so I quick did some coiling and cutting.  I cannot say they were successful at all.  The cut edges were a ragged mess and I felt like I was ruining my wire cutters, even though I’ve bought what I think are good ones.  I’ve been eyeing a class at Snow Farm by metalsmith Joy Raskin, and now I’m seriously thinking that it may be my elective this year. 

I still have thirty-ish blogs to visit and I’m sure I will get to every one! 

PS.  RSS my blog before February 15 and tell me in a comment that you did it, so I can enter you in my giveaway.