I had four trumpeter swans fly over the house the other day. They are so white against a blue sky. Thrilling!!!! Spring is on the way, even though we’re freezing our buns off here. We’re going to have a warm-up for one day, then it’s going to be frigid again. I keep looking at Intellicast’s 10 day forecast, hoping to see a real warm-up, but there’s nothing to cheer about yet.

My latest drawing is progressing. He’s laying in water, trying to cool down. I’m just about ready to start putting in some color.

Some new beads, I’ll be putting these on Facebook,

What is it about a northwest wind in the fall sounds different than it does in the summer. A summer howler brings a welcome relief from the heat, while a howler this time of the year makes a person shudder. It just sounds cold and depressing. Winter is on its way, but at least we don’t have the snow that other places are getting, thank goodness.

I have some nice bird photos to show, a cardinal pair and a pileated woodpecker,


If you’ve never seen a pileated woodpecker, they are HUGE! About the size of a crow.

I had fun watching this cardinal. I have a hose running to a fountain, and it froze, leaving the bottom bowl covered with ice. The cardinal landed on it and was skittering all over trying to keep his balance.


Free entertainment, LOL!

I finally got around to listing some beads, and this is my favorite,

and some laughs for the day,

I am SOOOOO glad I decided to replace our central air unit now instead of next spring! Hot and humid weather on the way, but I’m trying really hard not to complain, since it’s the end of August, and there’s not too much warm weather left for us.

Life is good right now, the boys are fed and watching wrestling, I just finished listing on Etsy, and I’m listening to an Alan Jackson show. Just love his songs…

Some of my latest creations:

Meanderings tonight…

A story in Health news about mothers who can’t afford diapers, http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-204_162-57596030/affording-diapers-a-problem-for-30-percent-of-moms-study-suggests/

I wonder if they know that disposable diapers are a fairly recent development, and I wonder if there are any store that even sell cloth diapers any more. But then, when my kids were babies, I bought yards of flannel and made my own cloth diapers. 

My Peruvian daffodils were blooming, and they make for such a pretty striking flower,

I’ve had a pair of Sandhill cranes in my pasture for the past week, and they’ve been upsetting the dogs with their calls. I love to listen to them.

I’ve been getting the jewelry bug lately. It’s been years since I made jewelry, and I have bins and bins of supplies, so I thought I would get everything out and give it a try again. My wire wrapping skills have suffered, but I’m getting the hang of it again. Here are some pairs that I have in my Etsy shop,

and some of my latest beads too,

I had to place an order with Double Helix, since they just released a bunch of new test batches of silver glass. I’m going to have fun playing with them!

My goofball Pyr and son, Christian,

What a warm day today! It was misting, and I didn’t even need a coat to do chores. If it weren’t for the drought conditions, I could really enjoy global climate change.

I’ve been really getting into making the focals again, and I really like these two. The first one is such a pretty buttery glass. Unfortunately, it’s a Vetrofond glass, and they’ve gone out of business. They made some of the most wonderful glass, and a very nice variety.

It’s a meanderings post today. The other day we had a mixture of rain and snow for a bit, and both Suka and Pyr were loving the cool weather. The only problem? Pyr, with that long heavy coat of his, just soaked up all the wet sand.

But after he got all dried out, Christian and he relaxed in the recliner,

My nephew has bought his daughter and her new baby up. She’s a little doll, and here’s Scottie helping with her,

Speaking of Scottie, he and a couple of the other kids were out in back digging a hole, or so I thought. Here’s a part of what they actually did, two deep holes with a tunnel connecting them. I am so glad that Christian was out back and saw that. The tunnel is collapsed now, after a little lecture to the kids on how dangerous it was.

I’ve been doing some experimenting with my beads, and trying to paint kanji symbols with enamels and silver paste. This one turned out rather nicely,

And I finally finished with my percheron drawing!! Note to self: NO MORE BLACK HORSES!!!!

Today’s headline, “Early Christian Text Discovery Reopens Debate, Was Jesus Married?”

A piece of papyrus (unauthenticated) the size of a cell phone shows someone named Jesus referring to his wife. That would be like 1800 years in the future, someone coming across a piece of paper saying John was killed, and automatically assuming it was talking about John F. Kennedy. Just as there was more than one John, there was more than one Jesus. That’s why the Bible referred to him as Jesus Christ, or Jesus the Nazarene, or Jesus the Messiah, to distinguish him from other men named Jesus. My little history lesson for today.

Gorgeous day today!!! Brisk NW wind, 69°, no bugs, I should go out and do some barn cleaning or something, but I’m seriously lacking energy. NEED COFFEE!!

I’m trying to get organized (a never ending process, sigh) and keep better notes so I can try to duplicate beads that I really like. Part of that is testing different combinations of Galaxy stringers. That’s what this is, with each color combination put into my glass catalog. The dots on the beads help me keep track of which one is which.

I’m also trying to get some different color combinations in my focal beads. Here’s a blue one from this a.m.,

But gosh, I love the striated sandstone and earthy colors, like these,

And here’s a couple of new big hole beads,

Starting Sunday, I’m going to try ebay again. It’s been quite a while since I sold on there, so I’ve been playing around with my listing program to remember how to use it. :(

Here’s some that I’ll be listing,


My nephew bought his 5 yr. old granddaughter with last week when he came up, and we took her out when we did chores. I thought the safest place for her to be would be up on Christian’s shoulders, both because of how little she is, and all the fresh cowpies. She’s the prettiest little girl!


Pip gets into moods where she wants to play, so here’s some photos of her and Suka playing, and yes, they are playing,

And here’s Suka and Pyr playing,