Wire Wrapping Insanity

The sun was shining...

Birds were out gathering nesting materials...

And I took some time to sit down and get into obsessive wire wrapping on my porcelain pendants...

This is what my work space looked like...

Some of the close up detail of the pieces I'm putting up on Etsy for sale:

This makes me feel good since I haven't had time to really sit and enjoy myself like this for a while...

And there are lots of ideas too so I'm ready to get into the studio to make new porcelain pendants to go with the Vintaj pieces.

Makes me think too - I've got some more images to upload...

Probably going to stagger them though...

Any feedback on my updated Etsy shop would be appreciated...

Wire Wrapping Insanity

The sun was shining...

Birds were out gathering nesting materials...

And I took some time to sit down and get into obsessive wire wrapping on my porcelain pendants...

This is what my work space looked like...

Some of the close up detail of the pieces I'm putting up on Etsy for sale:

This makes me feel good since I haven't had time to really sit and enjoy myself like this for a while...

And there are lots of ideas too so I'm ready to get into the studio to make new porcelain pendants to go with the Vintaj pieces.

Makes me think too - I've got some more images to upload...

Probably going to stagger them though...

Any feedback on my updated Etsy shop would be appreciated...

Taking Time to Become Small Again

I have been in dire need to find my inspiration.

I'm usually pretty easy to entertain - I like a lot of things...

Today is officially the first warm day of spring that I have encountered.

Thank you sunshine and longer days for helping the garden start to emerge.

My friend Kim introduced me to blood root a few years ago.

It is so wonderful to see so early in it's growth.

The way the leaf hugs the emerging bloom is so expressive and warm feeling...

When I was a wee little girl I always thought there were small people around in just about every nook and cranny.

I would go into the garden and imagine that I was about 3" tall and would wander around in there within my head - and of course I could jump very high and fly if needed.

So to find my inspiration today,

I have taken a breath and jumped in again - just for a visit...

This is what I saw...

And something from my childhood...

From my Grandma Neal's old farm:

This old wooden thing...

I am not quite sure what is is used for.

My sister April thinks it was used with the horse saddles or bridles possibly.

We used to climb all over it and jump off of it.

I like the way it looks in my garden now,

and can't wait to see it within the garden as it comes into bloom...

Taking Time to Become Small Again

I have been in dire need to find my inspiration.

I'm usually pretty easy to entertain - I like a lot of things...

Today is officially the first warm day of spring that I have encountered.

Thank you sunshine and longer days for helping the garden start to emerge.

My friend Kim introduced me to blood root a few years ago.

It is so wonderful to see so early in it's growth.

The way the leaf hugs the emerging bloom is so expressive and warm feeling...

When I was a wee little girl I always thought there were small people around in just about every nook and cranny.

I would go into the garden and imagine that I was about 3" tall and would wander around in there within my head - and of course I could jump very high and fly if needed.

So to find my inspiration today,

I have taken a breath and jumped in again - just for a visit...

This is what I saw...

And something from my childhood...

From my Grandma Neal's old farm:

This old wooden thing...

I am not quite sure what is is used for.

My sister April thinks it was used with the horse saddles or bridles possibly.

We used to climb all over it and jump off of it.

I like the way it looks in my garden now,

and can't wait to see it within the garden as it comes into bloom...

Warm Fuzzies

I have always been in love with nature and with animals.

I especially loved my stuffed animals and toys as a young child.

I used to spend hours playing make believe with them.

Dave and I both really enjoy the holidays - and now with Chloe we can really get into them!

We had Chloe's picture taken with the Easter Bunny a couple weeks ago on a whim.

I hid (she is in a "mommy" phase now) while Dave took her to see Mr. Bunny...

This was one of the pictures I snapped of Dave being a goofy dad...

Needless to say I gave away my hiding place by laughing so much at the picture.

Oh, and Chloe wanted to stay with the Easter Bunny...

Last week we went to FL for a Disney vacation with Dave's family for the first part of the week, then my dad's family the last few days. Well, our first official day was spent at the Sarasota Memorial Hospital with Chloe. We went to visit granny there (Chloe's great grandmom), but Chloe was throwing up and was getting dehydrated, so we spent the entire day in the ER with her instead. This is her when we were leaving to drive back to the hotel - she was feeling much better after the medicine and fluids.

Monday was our Magic Kingdom Day. On the Ferry Boat ride to the Magic Kingdom, Chloe was standing up and she liked the way the rumbling of the boat made her feet vibrate. She sure has Dave's eye expressions - oh, those eyebrows!

I always wanted to get a job in Disney as one of the characters (one of the chipmunks preferably), but thought that it would be way too hot in that fur. So instead I just kept holding onto that love of my stuffed animals, and the fact that these living stuffed animals lived in Disney and really help make the experience super magical... I think Chloe is following the same path. She just melted into this character (playhouse Disney?) and didn't want to let go. And the people inside saw that and they really gave her a lot of attentions. Usually kids this little are way too freaked out to want to be near the characters. Not Chloe...

This picture is a bit blurry, but it was one of my favorites. I think I can see the happy in my eyes and knowing that Chloe was just hanging out on my shoulders looking around, trying to fight sleep while we were in the parks.

And on our final night, on our way out of the park (can I just comment that I was not a happy camper at this point. I have always hated not having "just another day" in the parks - with family. I miss being with my FL family every day, and I usually end up getting all teary and crying - such a mess sometimes...). Well, we were walking towards the exit of Epcot, and we just happened by where there were a bunch of the characters lined up and people were going in line and getting to see each and every one of them. Well Donald Duck (up to this very moment, my least favorite character - I can't stand the voice... but lucky for us, the actual people/ characters don't talk) saw Chloe and me looking in the window at them, and he came right over and put his hand up to the window, and Chloe put hers up to his, then he blew her kisses... It was such a moment. It was one of those "magical" moments when something just happens, and it makes everything seem all better and that you wish you could freeze it in time and just stay there in that perfect moment for just a bit longer.

So now that we're home, I'm happy to be home.

I'm delighted to see that my garden is starting to peek at me through the dreary soil.

The grass seems brighter green, and the trees are in bloom with flowers or with buds.

I have ideas for new work, but frankly, I feel no urge to make anything.

I want to clean. I want to de-clutter. I want to give myself a clean slate to work with.

So, I'm looking forward to getting an I-phone for my birthday/business to help with the de-cluttering of my technology side of procrastination. Once I get it, I will be able to upload things so much easier and then I will hopefully feel a bit more connected to the world outside of my house and procrastination piles that surround me in every room...

I hope that you are getting out too...

Warm Fuzzies

I have always been in love with nature and with animals.

I especially loved my stuffed animals and toys as a young child.

I used to spend hours playing make believe with them.

Dave and I both really enjoy the holidays - and now with Chloe we can really get into them!

We had Chloe's picture taken with the Easter Bunny a couple weeks ago on a whim.

I hid (she is in a "mommy" phase now) while Dave took her to see Mr. Bunny...

This was one of the pictures I snapped of Dave being a goofy dad...

Needless to say I gave away my hiding place by laughing so much at the picture.

Oh, and Chloe wanted to stay with the Easter Bunny...

Last week we went to FL for a Disney vacation with Dave's family for the first part of the week, then my dad's family the last few days. Well, our first official day was spent at the Sarasota Memorial Hospital with Chloe. We went to visit granny there (Chloe's great grandmom), but Chloe was throwing up and was getting dehydrated, so we spent the entire day in the ER with her instead. This is her when we were leaving to drive back to the hotel - she was feeling much better after the medicine and fluids.

Monday was our Magic Kingdom Day. On the Ferry Boat ride to the Magic Kingdom, Chloe was standing up and she liked the way the rumbling of the boat made her feet vibrate. She sure has Dave's eye expressions - oh, those eyebrows!

I always wanted to get a job in Disney as one of the characters (one of the chipmunks preferably), but thought that it would be way too hot in that fur. So instead I just kept holding onto that love of my stuffed animals, and the fact that these living stuffed animals lived in Disney and really help make the experience super magical... I think Chloe is following the same path. She just melted into this character (playhouse Disney?) and didn't want to let go. And the people inside saw that and they really gave her a lot of attentions. Usually kids this little are way too freaked out to want to be near the characters. Not Chloe...

This picture is a bit blurry, but it was one of my favorites. I think I can see the happy in my eyes and knowing that Chloe was just hanging out on my shoulders looking around, trying to fight sleep while we were in the parks.

And on our final night, on our way out of the park (can I just comment that I was not a happy camper at this point. I have always hated not having "just another day" in the parks - with family. I miss being with my FL family every day, and I usually end up getting all teary and crying - such a mess sometimes...). Well, we were walking towards the exit of Epcot, and we just happened by where there were a bunch of the characters lined up and people were going in line and getting to see each and every one of them. Well Donald Duck (up to this very moment, my least favorite character - I can't stand the voice... but lucky for us, the actual people/ characters don't talk) saw Chloe and me looking in the window at them, and he came right over and put his hand up to the window, and Chloe put hers up to his, then he blew her kisses... It was such a moment. It was one of those "magical" moments when something just happens, and it makes everything seem all better and that you wish you could freeze it in time and just stay there in that perfect moment for just a bit longer.

So now that we're home, I'm happy to be home.

I'm delighted to see that my garden is starting to peek at me through the dreary soil.

The grass seems brighter green, and the trees are in bloom with flowers or with buds.

I have ideas for new work, but frankly, I feel no urge to make anything.

I want to clean. I want to de-clutter. I want to give myself a clean slate to work with.

So, I'm looking forward to getting an I-phone for my birthday/business to help with the de-cluttering of my technology side of procrastination. Once I get it, I will be able to upload things so much easier and then I will hopefully feel a bit more connected to the world outside of my house and procrastination piles that surround me in every room...

I hope that you are getting out too...

Will Facebook and Twitters of the web2.0 world kill classic blogging?

It has been quite a while since I have blogged here. Well the reason is not that I was so busy that I did not find that couple of hours every week to write.. it was not that I was exiled into the Gautamano bay, and had no access to internet… it is not even the fact that I was not active on Internet… in fact, I was never so active on the Net, ever since I first started browsing around 15 years back, as I was last 2 months.. then what stopped me from blogging??
Blame it on the new sexy babes in the online space – Facebook and Twitter. Since the time I got active on Facebook and Twitter, I hardly find time for any other thing online, especially writing at one go and blogging about 500 words of my thoughts. I am all over drooling over these babes and I have access to them from my mobile phone too.
Though the core feature offering of Facebook or Twitter is ‘Status Update’ it has transcended the update feature. People update their status, remark on others update, follow, write on walls, poke, gift, buy&sell, etc, etc, etc… thus it eats into every one’s internet time.
While the internet broadens day by day in terms of its offerings, and evolves from 1.0 to 3.0 versions of web, the user’s time has fairly remained static. The number of users is increasing – but how much has the average internet time of a user increased. The increase would have been at expense of time spent on other activities, but also now since the user has a lot of options on the net, the time spent on each option would have decreased, with the new options taking more of their time
Also the access to Facebook and Twitter through the mobile phones, is sounding the knell for more time intensive online activity like blogging, wherein the user best experiences it when browsing from a computer/laptop and also should be having access to the systems to type out around 500 words of their thoughts.
I am sure most of the fringe bloggers would soon fade away from serious blogging… and would he happy to type in a few lines called micro-blogging (phew… the next in thing could be micro-mini-blogging). Only a few would survive, and I want to be one of them.
I wish that my fancy for Facebook and Twitter are a passing phase, and soon would settle into low involvement in terms of time spent on these sites
In the meantime, I get back to my work; and hope that the classic blogging strikes back, and come with some innovative stuff
Cheers
Santosh