New stuff

I finally had some time to make a few new things and take some new pictures. Here is the Sterling Silver and Pearl Om Pendant.We've had it for a while and it sells well at the Saturdsy Market in Eugene- a big Om sort of crowd.

The shawl pins have been selling so well that I thought I should come up with some other designs. This is the popular Groovy Flower Power design made into the Groovy Flower Power Shawl Pin/Hair Pin.

The aluminum really works well for these because it is so light.

The Aluminum Spiral Dragonfly Shawl Pin

The Big Lightweight Aluminum Groovy Flower Pendant.

I made this design that does well in sterling silver but I have had a couple of customers request a larger version in Aluminum. So here it is.

I am off to the Saturday Market tomorrow, motivated after skipping last weekend.The weather says it should be more comfortable. We'll see.

Thanks for all the nice comments on my last Rodeo Meltdown post!

Rodeo Meltdown

After the parade on Saturday Henry and Max wouldn't stop asking to go to the Rodeo. We live 2 miles down the road from it and can hear it at night. When our friend Hannah asked if we wanted to go with her on Sunday I relented because at least we could do it with friends. Nick wisely refused to go because he knew it would be unbearably hot and he doesn't do well as the whitest pastiest guy on earth in hot weather.( No disrespect to my handsome, dear cowardly husband ).
"I performed a situational analysis and decided it was not a good idea."
He was correct in his analysis, as usual.
The plan was to meet Hannah and her 2 boys at the entrance on 11th street. Apparently our plan was too vague and when we arrived at the entrance to the rodeo she was not there. After waiting for about 15 minutes in the 90 something blazing hot heat with my two somewhat patient boys who were starting to fall apart I decided to go in and leave a message with the person working there. We got seats in the shaded part of the stands where I could watch the entrance. Hannah finally arrived after wandering around the parking lot looking for us. Her kids were happy and excited .
Max and I and Hannah and her boys were enjoying the rodeo events but Henry after 5 minutes started whining. "This is boring. When are we going on the rides? I want to go on the rides. When are we going on the rides? Can we go on the rides now? When are we going on the rides? It's hot. I'm hot. When are we going on the rides. This is boring. Isaac ,do you want to go on the rides? They have rides. Do you want to go on the rides? When are we going on the rides......"
I relented and decided to go get the shaved ices that we were eyeing because it was indeed so very hot. So Max went with me while Henry stayed in the stands. The line was very long and not moving. After 15 minutes of getting nowhere I aborted that decision and we got some Kettle corn at a ridiculously high price.


My return without the cool refreshing ices was not well received by my charming son.
But look how exciting the rodeo is!It's the rodeo queen rounding up the bull.


The rodeo clown who Henry aptly noted is also a football player.
I don't know how these rodeo folk kept up the energy in the heat without just passing out.


This was pretty exciting. Lynne Payne "The One Arm Bandit" from Oklahoma takes his well trained horse up onto the top of the trailer. He actually rode it like this in the parade.He is standing on his horse on the top of the trailer. He appears to actually have two arms as far as I can tell but I never saw him close up and his website doesn't say.

Then he brings out the Buffalo!

And drives them up on top of his trailer with just the sound of his snapping whip!
While I was quite impressed as well as Max, Hannah, Isaac and Eben, Henry was just temporarily distracted from his main obsession- the rides.

So I gave in and he got to do two rides. I was really surprised that he wanted to go on the roller coaster so badly.He met the height requirement but Max did not.

Before the ride starts.The excitement builds...

Where is Henry? He is in the first front car but you can't see him because he has slid all the way down and is holding on for dear life and using his legs to keep him straight against the front to stop himself from sliding all the way out. He is reliving my childhood roller coaster trauma that made me unable to go on roller coasters ever again. But he liked it! No trauma for him.

They really enjoyed the motorcycle ride. It was so blazing hot that I had to put a spare pair of shorts down on the seat to protect Max's legs from getting burned.

When the rides were over Henry really wanted to leave and go home. Max didn't want to go. The line for the ices was gone so we decided to get the ices and go sit in the shaded bleachers and watch more rodeo. Well that was a parenting mistake. Henry was so tired he could barely walk. Max insisted on holding his own ices. Henry was too tired to walk up the stairs to the shaded part and insisted on sitting in the heat on the bottom. As I was carrying the big bag of kettle corn and backpack and helping Max climb while carrying his ices, it fell out of his hands and he completely lost it. Then my hat fell off and through the bleachers, caught in the net with the ices spilling on to it. It was at this point that I got to my senses and knew it was time to leave. So in a panicky voice I quivered to Hannah: "We have to go now". Hannah and her happy, perfectly behaved children waved goodbye as they continued to be enthralled by the rodeo.

I held a crying, tired hot cranky Max down the bleacher steps, got Henry and stumbled towards the exit. We got about half way to the car when I realized I just needed to stop. Luckily the Evangelical Children for Jesus booth was right there. I asked if I could hire one of their teenagers to carry my stuff to the car while I carried Max and dragged Henry.They kindly refused to take money and helped me back to the car.

I was never happier to get home.

Life is just a bowl....

of cherries picked from your own trees. It's cherry time here in Philomath. The Royal Anne cherry tree that we planted when we first moved here in the front yard has outgrown it's semi dwarf description and is abundant in sweet lovely cherries that are easy to pick. The sad old neglected Bing still continues to make a bunch too further out in the side field that used to be a maintained garden.



Henry built his own Lego (duplo) rollarskates today.




Here's a close up. They look great but don't function quite that well. He's working on improving the design.



We recently had out new shed insulated and drywalled. Henry was obsessed with painting it and I thought he meant the outside. Then I realized he wanted to paint the inside. So I gave him his markers and paints and crayons and when I returned he had created this wonderful whimsical murals." These are guys with three heads."

The two guys in the middle are having a "mean guys club" and the happy guy below has an "X" across him " because he is happy and can't be in the mean guy club."

We had a bit of a tantrum when Henry insisted he need the ladder so he could paint on the ceiling too. Somehow that seemed to cross the line of my permissive parenting style. My little Michelangelo will have to wait until he is a little older to do his Sistine Chapel.

I am happy to say that I am NOT at the Saturday Market today. It is expected to be in the mid 90's again today and I suspect iot will be hotter than that in the late afternoon onmy sunny corner. Since it is Country Fair weekend and most people will either be there or staying cool I chose not to suffer for little money. I finally finished a wholesale order this week so I'm feeling comfortable and not in the poorhouse .

I took the kids to the Philomath parade this morning. It was a great small town American experience and I wish I brought my camera to do some good blogging. They have it every year on this weekend because it is the Philomath Frolic and Rodeo weekend. While Eugene is having it's big hippy Country Fair weekend, Philomath is having it's redneck rodeo fun. Lot's of cowboys and horses and rodeo princesses, logging trucks, fire engines, vintage cars, Karate for kids , high school robotics, high school drag racers and every local business with a float.

All of them throwing candy to the kids.

Good times!

Marty!

We had a favorite visitor come for a night last week.
My dear old college chum Marty came all the way from Hawaii and drove the 10 or so hours straight from the San Fransisco Bay area just to spend a sweet night with us.

It was fun as usual catching up on each other and sharing gossip about mutual old friends. i realized that I have known Marty since 1981! 27 years just doesn't even seem possible. But it is. And we still still look the same (thanks to Clairol for me)-just a little more worn.

Happy 4th of July!

Here's some good ol' American fun!

We took the kids to the annual 4th of July Anyone Can Join Parade in Corvallis. We decorated their bikes and they rode for a while. Then we stopped to visit with some friends and eat candy. henry must have been eating some sour puss candy.

The backyard fireworks was last nights festivities. Tonight we are heading to Aidan, Lauren, Amy and Ryan's BBQ party.
The fun never ends here although the exhausted parents could really use a nap.

You say aubergine and I say eggplant...

I just listed these Purple Frosted Like Beach Glass earrings. They kind of look like jewelry berries hanging from the branch.

Here is the matching Purple Frosted Like Beach Glass Pendant. Not quite as dramatic a picture. Oh well. They can't all be winners.

I've been trying to add all the different colors we have in this style earring and pendant when I have the time. There seems to have been a shortage of time.

Nothing new and exciting here. I went to the saturday Market in Eugene to sell yesterday. I was dreading it because they predicted it to be 95 degrees. I foolishly had high hopes because the Olympic Trial s and the Bach Festival have just started for the next two weeks so there should be lots of visitors in town.

Well they were off by 5 degrees. It was 100 in the shade by 4:30. I was in the sun although covered in my booth. It was brutal. Sales started out decent but died quickly because any sane person would not be there shopping. The highlight of the day was when one of my fellow marketeers broke out the cooler with melting ice and we stuck our feet in it. I tried to keep my suffering in perspective by thinking of our brave soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan working in warmer temperatures and carrying all their protective armour and gear while risking their lives.

I am a wimp.

Butterflies!

Our butterflies emerged from their cocoons the past two days. It's been very exciting.I didn't intend for the kids to take them out of their butterfly tent but Henry went ahead and did it when I wasn't paying attantion. The butterflies are very docile and interested. Probably because we are in the midst of a cold snap (unlike the rest of the country) and they want the warmth of the kids hands. That's my uneducated guess.

Lots of Hearts

This is what 50 special order heart pendants look like. This is an exclusive design I made for the Chloe Dyuck Memorial Fund. It is a special organization that raises money for research for pediatric congenital heart defects. I was approached by Michele who created this fund in honor of her daugher Chloe. The heart is larger on one side to represent the typical defect. The lines of the pendant sort of spell out Chloe which is loosely based on the logo she created for the fund. You can only purchase this pendant though their fund. It was an honor to be a part of this project.

With the success of the two shawl pins that we have been selling on Etsy I was motivated to come up with another shawl pin design. This the the Aluminum Celtic Heart and Swirls Shawl Pin. I sold my first one this morning!

On the home front we are in a zombie parent daze as Max has had some sort of typical childhood virus this weekend that includes intermitant fevers and now an itchy rash. He is fine during the day and has tons of energy but has a lot of trouble staying alseep at night.
The seasonal allergies are penetrating my usually awesome generic Allegra prescription which is also adding to the zombie lifestyle.
But I'm not complaining... really....
Life is good, just hazy.

Variations on a theme

I sold a Treble Clef Shawl Pin last week and it suddenly dawned on me that I should make other shawl pins. My Celtic Budding Spiral designs lends itself perfectly to this so -ta da! I love that.

Here is the Celtic Budding Spiral Shawl Pin. And I already sold one too!


This is another old design I resurrected for a pendant. The Big Aluminum Spiral in a Circle Pendant. It sells well at the Saturday Market.

These are our pet caterpillars that we orderd with our butterfly house. They arrived about 10 days ago as tiny little 1/2" caterpillars. They grew and grew and then hung themselves upside down and started making their chrysallis.It took a lot of convincing and explaingin to the boys not to touch and move them around or they will fall and die. More updates to come...

We opened the door to our bedroom yesterday and this is what we saw.

New photos and nerdiness

We had a temporary slowdown for a couple of days of our Etsy sales which gave me some time to take some new pictures of stuff. I had been meaning to take some better pictures of these Sterling Silver Celtic Hearts and Swirls Earrings. While I was outside on our backporch taking pictures the kids came out. Henry starting picking flowers and laying them around them jewelry and said I should take the pictures with the flowers to "make the earrings more beautiful".Once again the boy was right. Usually I find these types of pictures too busy but I think it works! And it has gotten a lot more views than it used to with the old pictures.

What is this industrious man doing? Mixing up his peanut butter of course with his Ryobi cordless drill .

And why,you may ask as others have asked of late who have gone to into our bathroom, is this ancient calculator in there?

Well our nightlite bulb burnt out and we didn't have any replacements. So Nick pulled out this calculator from his collection of old calculators and plugged it in and put it on "88888888888888" to get maximum light. We have finally bought replacement bulbs but we kind of like it now and haven't removed it yet.

Nerds!

It's like a heat wave.....

We have had a few days of unusally hot weather for this time of year. The underzealous weathermen were completely wrong however about their Saturday prediction of it going down by 10 degrees to a more comfortable 80-85. So I was not quite prepared to be tortured at the Saturday Market yesterday . It reached a high of 95 in the shade. I know this because my reserved booth space is across the street from the time and temperature sign . It was brutal but luckily the crazy customers did a lot of shopping. So it was at least worth it to sweat like a pig and sit in a coma all day long.
We knew the heat was coming so I made the wise and exciting purchase of this silly rainbow double kiddie pool with slide (that I daydreamed about all day yesterday). Luckily my tool nut husband had the electric airpump to get that sucker blown up easily. The kids have been having lots of fun but I thought I'd share some golden moments of them fighting at the end of the day :

Henry gets in a good wack.

But don't worry Max got in a few good shots too! They were both crying and screaming hysterically while Nick and I watched as they worked it out.

And here they are back to playing peacefully side by side, their shiny black heads burning in the sun. I didn't fully realize that Legos can float and the potantial for kiddie pool fun that entails.

This is my new friend "The Lounge Chair". I intend to spend a lot of time with him.

I bought two and Max is enjoying lounging with his popsicle. Luckily they clean up easily. (Both chairs and kids.)

On a cooler day Max was enjoying the new used Bubble Mower we got for $1 at the thrift store.

Max really got into painting his favorite toy, the blue beatle. Sadly he is lost right now and we cannot find him anywhere.

The rhododendron I planted about 10 years ago i9n front of our house has finally bloomed for the first time ever. It's a boring pale white but I'm still happy to see it. I have done nothing to take care of it so I don't blame it for not blooming sooner.


The wild purple iris' are popping up all over our property now.

Messy Mayhem Mother's day

Life has been hectic. Pre Mother's Day sales have been pretty crazy the past two weeks. Our normally messy house reached some new levels of insanity.

Here are some examples:

Of course the kids don't care. Henry is happily playing with his Legos amidst the clutter.

Another view of the stuff all over the place.

Here is his "mummy car" that he insisted I photograph.

The past two weekends have been pretty successful at the Saturday Market. Lots of hanging vases were sold.They make a great Mother's day gift.

I saw a funny snarky T-shirt worn by a customer:

"If I want pointless conversation I'll let you know."

I made sure I did not say anything to the fellow.

We were so busy with the market and Etsy orders last weekend that I screwed up 3 orders.
Two international sales that I quoted First Class shipping rates on got packaged in Priority boxes. It was too late when I got to the Post Office and realized what I had done to go back home and repack and it wasn't worth the extra effort. So instead of a $7.20 rate it was $25.50. Oops. I'm going to have to reprimand the employees. (ME!!!)

But the biggest mistake was sending out an order to the customer instead of to her Mother as she requested and we said we would do. we received a very disappointed message from the customer when the package arrived at her home a few days before Mother's Day instead of at her Mother's home. I apologized profusely and sent out a new package with an extra free item in it and sent it express so that it could get there before Mother's Day. I told the customer to keep the earrings that went to her home too. Now they can have matching mother/daughter earrings. Not what she intended. She was very good about it all.

HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY!!!!!

I love you MOM!