Things Have Been Crazy!

Things have been a little crazy at my house lately. I am getting that "I really need a break" feeling lol! My oldest (19) just left for a trip to Tahiti which kind of freaked me out a bit lol! Its not a vacation but a research trip for a college biology class. (Ya I know, if you have to work, you might as well do it in Tahiti lol). This was his first time flying and his first time out of the country so it was a little hard on mom! However I am so glad that he has the opportunity to do something like this! He will be back in a couiple of weeks.

My youngest (almost 16) is learning to drive. I have to say I was a lot more nervous with her than I was with my son (because I know both of my children very well lol!) and I have been very pleasantly surprised by how well she is doing! Still nerve wracking but not nearly as bad as I expected!

Summertime is always busy with all the added outdoor activities (since its only nice around here for about 5 to 6 months of the year we have to sqeeze all the fun stuff into that time lol). I am also working on REALLY cleaning out the house, all the STUFF that has accumulated over the years that we don't use needs to go! And working a day job and finding time to make new pieces on top of all of this is proving to be difficult. Not to mention doing a semi regular blog post.

I am working on a whole new technique and am really loving it (in what little time I can squeeze out lol). I have taken up metal etching and am beyond thrilled that I can now combine my love of metal and jewelry making with my love of drawing. AND I can also use this combined with bezel setting my cabs etc so its really the best of both worlds. I am sooo excited lol!

How to Cut Rocks Step Three

Sorry it took so long to get back to this, the holidays were a bit crazy and since we are now short one person at work (with absolutely no plans to replace him for at least a year) I have been working more too. This is tough because even though I like my job I would rather be designing and making jewelry so having less time to spend doing that and promoting my store does not really thrill me. Although the extra money is always a good thing lol!

So we left off at the trim saw. The next step is cabbing the stone. This takes a little more skill and time although there are some tricks to make it easier. This step requires lots of water instead of oil to avoid heat. You do want to make sure all of the oil is off of your stone. We use a bucket of kitty litter and a brush. Then wash well with warm, soapy water. (The large round object in the picture is a vibratory tumbler. We use this for all of the odds and ends left over from the trim saw . After several weeks it gives us highly polished stones that the kids at the gem show go nuts over). So we have our lovely almost oval trim sawed stone and we are going to start grinding it to a 15 degree angle with the machine on the left. This machine does not have removable belts, the grinding wheel has tiny diamond pieces embedded in it. This spins at a high rate of speed. A plastic apron is a good idea with this machine as the water you use to keep it from getting too hot sprays in the direction of your body not the wall. Also eye protection is a must. Here is one of the tricks of the trade. The grinding wheel has a natural 15 degree angle so that you really don't have to do any fancy calculations to get it right. Remember that oval we drew on here with the magnesium stick? This is where you want to grind it to. This is the back of your piece and the angled portion is the front. When you have it to the right size and before you begin to grind your dome you need to put it on a dap stick. I am going to leave off here because I need to take pictures of the dap stick and how it is done before I can continue. (Remembering the camera is always an issue for me. When I head for the rock club I usually have two toolboxes and my purse, and since it is winter my coat, gloves etc. I'm lucky I remember my name on some days much less the camera lol!). This is a good stopping point as I will be able to finish hoe to cut rocks with my next post on this subject in a couple of weeks.

Etsy Artists January 3rd 2008

PATEREEVES
This artist on is fairly new on Etsy but I have to tell you I was so impressed with her bead work. I also thing that she is seriously underpricing so if you want to get in on a good deal I would head over to her shop soon as I am sure she will eventually raise her prices to what the work is worth. I don't have the patience to do detailed bead work like this and I admire anyone who can follow a pattern that turns out so beautifully. Her monarch butterfly looks soo real that you just expect it to fly right off the page. Can you believe that this is made out of beads. Just blows me away. I usually only post two pictures but I really couldn't resist putting one more dragonfly up as they are some of my favorite bugs. They are beautiful in nature and I think that this artist has captured that beauty in her wonderful beaded creations. Enjoy!

Update on our Puppies (Finally)

Well it is New Years Day and I finally have a small breather as I am waiting on the turkey to finish cooking so I am going to do my long overdue update on the pups. We have sold four puppies, Zeke our smallest puppy, Hope and Bluto went to the same home, and Mo was the first to go. While I do miss them, being down to four pups is much easier to manage.

Zacharia is our teddy bear, both in looks and in personality. He is a great big ball of four and since he has a naturally bobbed tail when he is running away from you he really does look like a bear cub. Must be all that fuzzy fur. He just loves for you to love on him and is usually the first to greet you.

Lizzie (Elizabeth) is the only female left and is also the smallest. Her fur is more sleek than the rest of her siblings so this also makes her appear smaller (She is not as fluffy lol!). She is a very happy go lucky dog and very active. She has no fear of anything either. I can't decide if this is a good thing or a bad thing. And if you are wondering yes she is behind my vegetable garden fence. They are still little enough to squeeze thru the "bars" and seem to take great delight in doing so.

Alexender (the Great) is another sweetie. He looks up at you with big brown eyes and you just melt lol! (Have I told you how spoiled they are?!). Always willing to please he also has an adventursome spirit and is often the first one to get into something new. As you can see in this picture he is trying to figure out what this fountain is and of course he has never seen a fish before.

Last but certainly not least is Boo. He is a blue merle and he has one blue eye and one brown eye. He is our most gently and laid back puppy and he is also the biggest puppy. He has such a sweet personality just kind of waits to see what the rest of the pack is going to do before joining in.

They are all paper trained and have just introduced them to the outdoors. They absolutely love it and went out in their very first snow storm today. They love being outside and don't willingly come in on their own even when it is snowing. We have to train (bribe) them with treats and occasionally chase one down to get them all back into the house. They really needed the exercise, the kitchen is just not enough space anymore. Much easier to do with four than eight though. This also cuts down on the amount of mess I have to clean up which is of course a good thing for me. We are hoping that their new owners show up soon because every day I get a little bit more attached. However we live on a city lot and seven dogs is out of the question lol! Three is really pushing it. I am very glad our back yard is fenced! This will most likely be our last litter also so that makes it a little harder. This is Liberty's third litter and I think she probably doesn't want to do this again either.

Update on the Puppies 4 weeks old!

I apologize for not updating on the pups sooner but as they grow they become a HUGE amount of work. I spend more time cleaning up newspaper and mopping my floor than I do anything else. (not really true because I spend more time playing with the puppies than cleaning up after them, which means I spend most of my free time on the kitchen floor doing one or the other lol!). Any way they are growing by leaps and bounds and have started eating semi-solid food. This is a real relief for Libby because not only are their tiny claws like razors they now have teeth and are NOT afraid to use them. We have succumbed and named all eight of them. We have Zachariah, Lizzie, Hope, Zeke, Mo, Bluto, Boo, and Alexander. Zeke is still the runt and half the size of his brothers and sisters, but he more than makes up for this with attitude and will cheerfully jump into the pile every time even though he always ends up at the bottom. We have introduced them to chew toys, however they still prefer to chew on each other most of the time. We do frequently pull Zeke out and carry him around when the rest get to rambunctious because despite his attitude he just cannot defend himself all that well from the some of his much bigger brothers. Bluto and Mo are both just BIG puppies but so sweet and cuddly. Hope is the talker, she just is always making noise about something. Boo is just a sweetheart and Alexander is a huge bundle of friendliness. Lizzie is a sweetheart and loves to come over and cuddle and Zachariah will do anything for attention. Needless to say they are all terribly spoiled already. I will have another update soon. From the top left we have Zachariah, Lizzie, Alexander and Hope. Next week I will have individual pics of the other four.

The Puppies are Finally Here!

Well, the puppies have finally arrived. Quite frankly I was pretty sure that they were never going to get here! We have a total of eight puppies. Two are blue

merles (the speckled ones) and six are black and tans. We have six boys and two girls. She had the first one at 3:45 am and the last one at about 8:30 am. They are all healthy and doing well.

As you can see Liberty is being a good mommy. We keep the puppies in a box with a heating pad when she is not nursing and cleaning them. Since we have two other dogs and not enough room to just keep them separate this works the best for us. Although Liberty is a pretty laid back dog she has decided that she really doesn't want Blackjack around the babies. (This is actually a bit amusing as he is terrified of the babies and runs whenever we show him one) So he is hiding out under the computer desk at the moment until she calms down a little.

She doesn't seem to have as much of a problem with Ella being around the pups as long as one of us is close by. As you can see Ella is making the acquaintance of one of her siblings. She is very interested and VERY cautious. Fortunately she has had experience with a prior batch of siblings so she is not totally freaked out. Well I will be posting an update on the pups next week and probably every week until they go to their new homes.