A Little Color Inspiration

While I'm finishing up my pieces for the Bead Hoarder's Blog Hop I thought I might take a moment to share a little color inspiration. My brain has been in a pink mood all year long. I can't shake it. If you look at my color palette board on Pinterest you might notice that little trend. Pink pink pink, sometimes with green most often with gold. I knew I was going to HAVE to make something in those colors soon or people were going to think I was pink obsessed lol

It saddens me Pinterest no longer allows sharing pins at least that I can find - this photo was pinned from the blog Romancing the Home ltd, I really miss having all the info pertaining to the pic being attached to it.

I read somewhere pink is the color of healing and health. With the tinglies and the numbness in my hand, NOW is as good a time as any to listen to my brains persistent call for pink. Making jewelry for the Hop was difficult at first not being able to feel, dropping dropping dropping - first the beads then the tools and finally the necklace itself as I was holding it up to check length, sighs. But as I worked the stress eased and some of the strength came back so I dropped fewer beads, stopped dropping the tools and only dropped the earrings once or twice (ahem). PINK was definitely what I needed.

Pinned from Tumblr, never did find the originator but I love the soft colors of fruit and flower pics this one is gorgeous

Next weeks post will be early as the hop is on Saturday, hope to see you then! I've got some pretty pinks to show you :D

Thanks for stoppin bby!
Til next time!

Beads, Cameras, and Computers

Almost sounds ominous doesn't it? Maybe more so if you have a daughter who is in the midst of creating a digital drawing of an evil sea creature. She used to write slasher stories in creative writing, now she channels that energy into hearts that eat their way out of the chest and evil mermaids. I have come to the conclusion it's her way of dealing with stress and uncertainty, it's her release. The scarier her creation is the happier she becomes, we all should have such releases.

I've finally gotten the computer, printer and time capsule networked and everything is wireless! Yea me! Those few necessary wires are hidden away so it all looks very clean - at least there aren't loose wires lol Clean is relevant!! The only problem is, while I was tucking away those few wires and stashing the surge protector, I whacked my elbow on the corner of the computer desk. It hurt, not as much as it could have, but my left hand (I am left handed) has had numb and or tingly fingers with intermittent loss of fine motor skills i.e.: I drop things if I rotate my wrist and can't quite feel the stopping point when using pliers. If I touch my elbow where I whacked it I can send an electric jolt down my arm into my fingers, that was actually kind of fun the first week, but now I'm ready for it to heal up and give me back my hand. I did a little research over on the Mayo Clinic website and it looks like when the swelling that is affecting the nerve goes down my hand should return to normal. My neck and shoulders have also been extremely tight lately, which I'm sure is a contributing factor.

Art has always been my release (wonder where the kiddo gets it from?) so I thought I'd work on my Hoarder pieces, I had been putting it off waiting for the feeling in my hand to come back. It's going much slower than I'm used to and making matching wire swirls is a little tougher than normal but I can feel the stress levels easing. Looks like I will actually have a couple somethings to show at blog hop time, I was starting to worry I wouldn't.

I know I've been running late with my blog postings the last couple weeks, numb fingers makes typing interesting too lol I laugh but I do apologize for my tardiness. So, last post I promised I would write about the beads I received from Lori as winnings from Bead Soup 7. Lori sent these awesomely sweet vintage beads.







Aren't these all just gorgeous little things?! Thank you Lori! PJ Tools I appreciate you! One can never have too many pretty things :D

Thanks so much for stopping by!
See ya next time!

Happy Birthday America!

It's the Fourth of July, Independence Day here in the US. I had planned on sharing the goodies I got from Lori this week but my camera batteries died and I had a ton of other things going on - I started writing that post half a dozen times, writing and rewriting and finally I thought FIREWORKS! That's the blog post I should be sharing. Thank you Lori, for the awesome box of sweetness, I'll write about it next week :) Enjoy the show!!



HAve a wonderful holiday weekend!
See ya next time!

Creatively Speaking.......

I feel as though I'm in a bit of a slump. I'm not sure why, I have plenty of ideas and many many more sketches ready to go but I just don't feel like making anything.....so I signed up for Lori Anderson's bead hoarders blog hop. No swapping involved in this one, just the willingness to dig into your stash and find some little bit of "precious" you've been holding onto for "Just the Right Project" You know the ones, you just HAD to buy it, it was soooo gorgeous - too gorgeous to actually use or just too cool and when you got home realized it was in a style you don't do, or the idea in your head was above your expertise level or in a technique you really wanted to learn but haven't yet - yup those beads! I have a few of those too lol What better way to jumpstart the process than to just do??



So I got to digging and here's what I found in my stash. An Aventurine donut (I have TWO) there for awhile it seemed everyone was doing these really cool things with donuts. I could never quite wrap my head around a design so never bought one. Then I won one, so I thought maybe I just hadn't really tried to design anything and pulled together an inspiration board, inspired me enough to BUY a second one. Never followed through on the design …. hangs head, I know BUT it gives me a pretty to work with in the hop!



Item number two a vintage strand of plastic pearls - this has been in my stash for DECADES!! They're pretty, I used some to make a crown for my oldest daughters Halloween costume way back when and back into the stash they went, I can't even remember the original reason I have them, given to me, bought, I don't know. They could just as easily be a sacrificed strand, I had at one time several strands of vintage "pearl" necklaces that I had picked up at the GoodWill draped over my vanity mirror - they're on the wall over the sewing machine now :) Anyway, all the cup chain designs floating around right now (I swear sometimes it seems like people are plucking ideas from my head lol) have given me a few ideas to kick around.



Third in my stash is this sweet key. My son bought this for me for Christmas a couple years ago, it is loved but not a clue as what to do with it - My Aunt likes to shop estate sales and sends some of her finds my way. This charm holder was part of an over tight hand made necklace - I think possibly used as an eye glass holder but the pattern in the design is a perfect match to the key! I took my saw to the key before I thought to take pics and I don't want to stress the key by removing it again just for the sake of a before shot so keep in mind these were two separate pieces before I decided they NEEDED to be together!

Depending on how quickly I can design and make I may add more but considering the donut and the key are something of a challenge for me already I'm going to stick to only committing to these three for now and hope I have enough time to really do them and the hop justice.

Thanks for stopping by!
We'll see ya next time!

The Wire Goddess Team

I'm on the Wire Goddess Team on Etsy. It's a group of wonderfully talented wire workers, their art works are ever inspiring and I'm proud to be among them.

Todays post (making up for missing last week!) is brought to you from one of our members. It's been awhile since I've shared a treasury and this one is worth a share.

Don't you just love the King Arthur Bear? and that jewelry, just gorgeous isn't it? Little works of art :)

Oh, btw, my new computer arrived yesterday! Paige has been wonderful sharing hers with me for the last eight months and as a small thank you I bought her some hand spun yarn and decals for each of our laptops so we can tell them apart. Since her birthday is coming I had her do a little shopping around for what she wants while she was at it :) It's been a very good day!

Thanks for stopping by!
See ya next time!

Care to Dance?

As you know my poor old Mac died back in October ....sighs, I loved my Mac but it was seven years old and even the best Mac is still a machine and parts fail. At the time my younger daughter had just bought a new Mac laptop and so has been letting me share with her. In essence I broke in her new computer, she is such a good kid! well......... Guess what I just did??

If you guessed just bought a new Mac... you're right!! I probably could have saved a little money and bought another desktop - we know from experience they last 7-10 yrs. Longer if you don't mind the os being obsolete, my old 90's Bondi Blue still works, it just GROWLS and takes its time, freezes at will and is generally too old to do ANYTHING online lol But, having used a laptop for the last several months I have gotten quite used to being mobile and I like it! Judging by the length of time my kids have had their Mac lap tops I feel safe in making this Mac purchase and I am soooo excited!

Order confirmation estimates I should have my new baby in 2 or 3 days!! Happy Dancing with me yet? If not, why not??

Keeping this weeks post short and also apologizing for missing last week! oops!! Not really sure how I managed that, I was busy but not THAT busy, guess time just got away from after having prescheduled several posts before. I should write a few posts and keep them in draft for times like this. I think I've said that before, might actually be a good idea!

I'm off! Thanks for stopping by! See ya next time!

What a Very Nice Start to my Week!

I log on to the computer to check my mail this morning and I notice a convo from Etsy.  In short: I've blogged about your wirework. How nice is that?! Thank you!


Love My Art Jewelry: Using wire creatively