Our train trip to visit cousins in southern California

Last week we took a big long overdue vacation to visit our cousins Peter, Victoria, Harry and Charlotte. They live in Altadena ,CA. Ever since Nick’s cross country train journey in February he has been hooked on First Class train travel.

The excitement builds as Max,Henry and Nick wait at the train station for our train to arrive.

It was awesome hanging out in the Parlor Car.

The guys played a round of “Munchkin”-a sort of board/card game.

The views on the train trip were wonderful. This is a shot from the dining car looking
at what I think are spinach fields in central California.We had a family sleeping car.We all
slept fairly well but I would compare it at times to be being trapped in a padded cell with monkeys.

We went to the California Science Center on Friday which was a great deal at my favorite price-free.

Max, Henry and Harry at the Science Center.
The next day we surprised the kids with the trek to Legoland in Carldbad. The drive took
an hour longer than expected due to  traffic. Gee what a surprise-NOT. Henry was feeling somewhat car sick. Upon arrival we stepped out of the car and started walking towards the entrance and Henry made a spectacular human vomit fountain of fluorescent orange Cheetos. It got all over him, my legs and Max’s feet. He just missed the shiny nice Escalade we were standing next too but left them a delightful surprise to step over to get into the driver’s seat when the owners returned from their day at Legoland.  (We did attempt to wash as much of it away with water as possible.)After cleaning up we continued once again.

Here is Nick in front of the impressive Lego miniland display (the best part of Legoland
in my not so humble opinion.) Let me just say that the cost of entering Legoland was far
from my favorite price. As a cheapwad the $250 entrance fee for the 4 of us, which included a one child free coupon and AAA discount, was a harsh way to begin the day. And it never really lived up to that fee for me.
.
But the kids had fun. Here are the happy cousins.


All the ride lines were 45 + minutes long. This was the only ride we did all day.
The kids aren’t really that into rides so luckily it wasn’t that big a deal to them.

Henry is examining his new lego set.

Peter and Nick relaxing while the kids continued to still have massive amounts
of energy running around .

Back at home the cousins played Legos and Harry was also impressed with Henry’s wii skills.

Henry took this picture of Victoria and me on the morning we left. It was really great
to spend time with them in their new home.

All my pictures were taken with my smart phone because I didn’t want to carry around another camera. It was hard to really capture the scenery out the window of the train or the constant movement of the kids.

I believe this is San Luis Obispo.

Klamath Lake area with Mount Shasta in the distance.

Back home in beautiful Oregon.

New big and small shawl pins and flowers

Here’s the new anchor design as a brass shawl pin in the shop.

I’ve been getting requests for larger sized pins that would work well for long hair.

So I made a few of these Big Treble Clef pins and brought them to the Saturday market 2 weeks

ago and they sold quickly. I’ve now added the copper version into our shop. It would work well

on a bulky shawl or scarf or in big heavy long hair or dreadlocks.

Here it is in my hand for a size perspective . I’ve been spending some time reading

the Long Hair Community Forums and unTamedTresses to see what customers an

d long hair afficionados have to say about our hair forks and sticks. Most of it is good stuff.

Aluminum while light isn’t great for heavy hair but works well in some types- like mine.

But until you try it in your own hair it’s just too hard to know for sure.

I also made a new Little Copper Treble Clef pin meant for light fingering weight lacey shawls or scarfs.

I’ve been reaching the end of my supplies of these lovely Czech glass flower beads. Some of the colors I use are no longer available. But I got nice amount of

these sweet translucent pink flowers and  my favorite peridot colored glass leaves.

Spring happenings in the garden

Long before I had kids I was an ambitious gardener.I am so glad I planted to these

yellow iris bulbs so long ago that continue to come up year after year with no help from me.

This busy bee is enjoying the foxglove that reseeds itself and randomly shows up

in different places every year.

Ahhh- so soon if all goes according to plan and I don’t count my chickens before they hatch

or my cherries before they ripen we will be gorging ourselves on Royal Anne cherries

from the tree we planted right in the middle of the front yard the year we first bought

this place about 18 years ago.

Anchors away

I have been wanting to come up with a good wire design for an anchor pendant.

Things have slowed down enough that I had time to experiment and now have the silver and brass version in our shop.

I liked the way it looks like rope adding a nautical flavor to the design.

I’ll be adding the copper version too as soon as I get some decent pictures.

Sterling Silver Anchor Pendant - Wire Rope Anchor Necklace

Brass Anchor Pendant - Wire Rope Anchor Necklace

Meet my new employee

This my new best friend and co worker , the Zebra Thermal Label printer . He doesn’t have a cute name but I really felt he needed some googly eyes. I’ll entertain any name suggestions…


He sits on my out of control messy desk/ work station connected to his friend, the Stamps.com scale, and spits out beautiful cheap labels for our packages. We finally made the leap to online postage and it has been awesome. It saves us money and time and makes me feel professional. I’m in love with shipping our orders now.

Taking it Easy

Sometimes you just have to sit down, cuddle and wait.

The universe seems to be pounding the message into me that every day is a gift and and to appreciate every moment.

Message received.

Mommy and Me Mother’s Day Jewelry

With Mother’s Day quickly approaching I thought I’d add some nice Mother Daughter (or Son) sets to our shop:

Mother Daughter Celtic Tree Silver Pendants

Mother Daughter Celtic Heart Pendants

Mother and Daughter Celtic Cross Necklaces Set

New Endless Eternal Hoop Earrings in the shop

We had a flurry of requests a couple of months ago for our designs to be made in the “eternal” or “endless” hoop style earrings.

This design lent itself perfectly to that style earring. But it actually turned out to be a little trickier than I thought it would be.

I discovered that I need to make the side that goes through the ear a little longer to compensate for the thickness of the earlobes.

When I made it all even the design on the bottom wasn’t centered and hanging in the right spot. So that’s why it looks a little longer on one side.

I searched the web looking for other similar styles to see if they had the same balancing problem and how they solved it. But I couldn’t find anything similar.

I’m still relearning how to use Photoshop on Windows 7 . I haven’t quite figured out the best way to kick up the contrast  to really make the picture “pop”.

Sterling Silver Endless Hoop Fancy Loop Earrings - Silver Wire - Eternal Hoop

The Great Egg Hunt and Mimosa Shindig 2012

The weather was perfect, almost dare I say too hot.

 

We had an abundance of candy filled eggs, cute kids, delicious treats and mimosa’s for the adults.

Max’s 7th Birthday Party

Complete with an Angry Birds chocolate Safeway Cake and fun at Wacky Bounce.

My baby boy turned 7 yesterday.

How I Lost My Blogging Mojo

and am trying to get it back.

It all began when Nick, my IT guy ,made a new lovely computer for me and then updated it to Windows 7.

Previously I had been totally in the blogging groove and had gotten comfortable with Windows Live Writer to quickly whip out a post and add pictures.

And now it is all different although somewhat similar and my non techy brain requires a steep learning curve before I can figure this whole thing out.

Next came the great flood of 2012 in which all but 1 road to our was cut off by flooding and that road was iffy with high water and down to a single lane because half of it fell apart.

Then Nick left on a 2 week journey east for his father’s funeral. You can read about his adventures on his blog –The Mechanical Philosopher

During this time I was the temporary single Mom. And then sadly a good friend’s husband passed away. So Nick and I were both attending funeral’s at opposite sides of the country during the same period of time.

I added a new Little Celtic Heart Sterling Silver Shawl Pin to our shop .

And a Little Celtic Tree Sterling Silver Shawl Pin.

And a Large Celtic Copper Hair Pin or Shawl Pin.

And a few other things that I am too lazy to add to this messed up blog.

We finally took the long overdue leap and signed up to Stamps.com so that we can do online shipping. It’s been a challenge trying to create a new shipping system and I already have sent the wrong order to the wrong person.But I think I’m getting the hang of it.

So that’s my exciting life’s update. Damn you windows 7 for taking me back to the beginning of learning how to blog again! (Maybe my next post will have my pictures all crammed together on the other side of the page.)

Snow day!

It doesn’t happen often here in the Willamette Valley.

I’m not a snow person. I’m not a skier or skater. I’ve always been terrible at making and throwing snowballs.

I become paralyzed with fear when driving in snow.

But it is pretty – for a short amount of time.

Happy New Year!

Well it’s back to work time, getting the kids and me used to waking up early and back to school. Coffee has been my good friend.

 

And here’s the New Years gratuitous cute kitty picture. She loves my chair.