The Great Sock Upheaval

All was fine in the Kingdom of Socks. There was a certain balance; an equilibrium of sorts. Then, all was shattered when my husband got new socks. All of a sudden, there was a shift of power; a coup. My socks were now disgusting and dingy. Their degree of whiteness just wasn't up to par. What was previously the status quo, was now considered substandard. My socks were crushed.

My socks will rise again. My socks have experience and longevity on their side. My socks have been around since 1996. They have mountain biked, roller bladed, jumped out of an airplane, climbed mountains, scaled walls of ice, run a marathon, and survived two marriages; nothing can keep these socks back. No cotton tube sock can stand up to a microfiber sock with 1% lycra that even wicks sweat away from your foot!

My socks will prevail. They already lasted longer than my first marriage and if this keeps up . . .

Ophelia's Revenge

A poem can express a thought, a feeling, or describe a moment, frozen in time. It can tell a story, paint a picture, or prove a point. It can rhyme or not, have long lines or short and has an economical use of words. A poem can whisper, sing, shout, chant, mumble, or buzz. Here is mine:

Ophelia's Revenge

He calmly and silently
waits for her.

She plunges in.
He surrounds her.
He pulls her down
stopping her breath.

She strains to scream,
but he swallows the sound.
His force is too strong.

She flutters her arms
and kicks her legs,
thrashing him,
but he just absorbs the blows
and drags her down.

She reaches to hold onto something,
but he seeps from her hands.

She lunges away from his grasp,
gasping, flailing, and struggling.
She forces her head up.

With every stroke,
she slides upon him
pushing him down.

She beats him with her arms and legs
and his spray covers her.

She moans
and pulls herself to the sand
quaking and shivering.

Gift Basket Donation

I just finished my donation for our JET TEAM's Wedding Challenge bride's gift basket donation. (Wow, is that a mouthful!) I just got these really cool biwa stick pearls and I thought it would be neat to use them just as very simple pendants with just a little accent bead, so I made one in each color. Autumn can keep them all for herself if she wants, or she can share with her bridesmaids.

Muddin' in the Minivan

I've got a really long dirt (and mud) driveway. Almost a quarter of a mile long. And I love to drive really fast down it. Now that the snow is melting, there is a really big mudpuddle down at the bottom of it. I love to drive as fast as I can through it and see how high I can get the mud puddle to spray. It's probably not good for the van, but it sure is fun. The other day I sprayed the mud up over the roof of the van. It was really cool! The kids are always really impressed. My husband. . . shhhh . . .doesn't know. And he certainly can't tell by all the mud that's on the van. Or the mud that is sprayed like twenty feet up the trees on the side of the driveway.

Craft Show Crappiness

Slogging through the mud to set up and pouring rain, what could be better for a craft show? Oh yeah. . . twenty other jewelry sellers and several of them selling really cheap stuff, and let me tell you, most of the people in my area like really cheap stuff. Not all of them. Some appreciate quality handmade sterling and gemstone jewelry, but a lot of them like $5 earrings. Whatever. My faithful customers showed up and I'm grateful for them. I shouldn't feel too bad. The poor lady next to me took in $29 and the table was $25. Ouch! I tested out my new display and it worked really well and I can hide behind it if I want to and totally avoid people I don't like. I made some new contacts, handed out my business cards, and talked about my website. The bad news is, about half the people I talked to don't even have computers. (Our craft show crowd is an older crowd.) I also debuted a new necklace design that everybody loved. (But nobody bought.) :(

Craft Show Craziness

Once again, craft show season is starting and of course, I'm not ready. My craft show is Saturday and instead of organizing and pricing like I should be, what am I doing? Creating new necklaces! I can't help it. I had some really great ideas and I just had to make them. I was on track for awhile. I mailed out my postcards, so at least I did my promoting, but as far as pricing and labeling goes, it's a free-for-all. So, I will probably be scrambling at the last secong to get everything ready. I do have a new display that I will be testing out. One of the articles I read said you should have your jewelry at different levels. Well, I don't know if they will even be able to reach mine. I have this three tiered thing and I don't actually know how high it will be once it's on the table. And have I mentioned that I hate craft shows. I mean, I like my customers and they are great people, but I'm just not good at selling. I'm mean my jewelry is nice, but I'm not pushy or aggressive. If someone can't make up their mind, I don't pressure them. I feel very awkward trying to talk someone into buying a piece of jewelry. They either like it or they don't. I don't like it when people do that to me, so I don't want to do that to anyone. Plus, I have to stand up all day which is just tiring.

April Brings. . .

Snow! And more snow! And the forecast calls for more snow! This week is my spring break and it is very cold and snowy. Here in "Big Snow Country" in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, April is a month of extremes. The temperatures in April could have an 80 degree difference. One day, it could be -20 and the next day it could be 60. Not unheard of. We could get twenty inches of snow, or six inches of rain. The problem arises when the rain falls before the snow melts. Then we get flash floods. One year, the town down the way became an island because of the floods and they released the kids from school to go fill sandbags. Because of the aforementioned, April also brings mud. Not your run-of-the-mill-mud either. Filled-with-organic-matter, fecund, stinky mud. We just built a house last year and we don't have a yard yet, so we will have 23 acres of mud when the snow melts. Yipeeee! And it looks like a moat is forming down near the bottom of our driveway. I'm not sure "moat" is what we were shooting for when we put the culvert in. So, when April is over, we have mosquito-filled May to look forward to.

The Wedding Challenge

A challenge? I'm all for that. I was so excited to have this week off so I could work on my wedding challenge set. The 2008 Wedding Challenge is sponsored by the Etsy street teams: JET (Jewelry on Etsy team), EtsyFAST (Fiber Arts Street Team) and Etsy Greetings and it's a way the get the word out about buying handmade. Each team is putting together certain aspects of the wedding and then posting them in a Flickr pool for all to see. I actually had an inspiration that evolved as I started working. I found these really elegant pod shaped pearl/shells and I thought they would be perfect for this. I thought I could dangle Swarovski Crystals with the Aurora Borealis finish off the bottom, interspersed with some freshwater pearls- a nice dangling cluster. Then, I wanted to do something special for the necklace rather than just dangle the one pod down the front. Then, I was struck with the front toggle idea. I've been meaning to do one for awhile, I just hadn't yet. I dug through all my toggles until I found a fancy, dainty one and my necklace was born. I'm always up for a challenge.

Featured Etsy Seller: Stormy Designs

Stormy Designs is a polymer clay artist who comes from a long line of artists. Talent seems to run in the family. She creates unique art, sculptures, art jewelry, and accessories. She claims to have been "pushed" in to polymer clay by her friend in Australia, but she was already struggling to find the beads she wanted and needed to make her jewelry, so it was bound to happen. She loves sculpting, using inclusions like spices and glitter in her clay, and experimenting with textures and techniques. She is never idle and is always thinking up something new!

She is a proud and active member of the EtsyBloggers Street Team and the Polymer Clay Artist Guild of Etsy.

Check out her blog:
http://www.stormydesigns.biz/blog/
Check out her website:
http://www.stormydesigns.biz/
The two pieces pictured here are currently for sale at her shop at:
http://www.etsy.com/shop.php?user_id=5272765
To click on her shop link, go down to the labels. That one will work.

Another Snow Day

Well, most people think it's spring, but here in "Big Snow Country," winter is still going strong. School was cancelled and we got a bunch of snow. I don't know exactly how much. It was really windy, so it drifted a lot in some places and some places were bare. In one part of our garage, where we put our shoes, something is messed up with the ridge vent, so when it is really windy and the wind is horizontal, the shoes get filled up with snow. That is the only place that snow comes in- right on the steps- right in the shoes. That will wake you up in the morning. My father-in-law came to plow, and he got stuck, so my husband went to go get him out with the skidsteer, and he got stuck. I stayed inside. Eventually, they got out. While I was inside, I got two phone calls, from two different ladies saying they wanted to buy some jewelry. They called me. How cool is that? I guess my promoting is paying off. I was more than obliging. And I think they will buy some more and tell their friends. Awesome. I also had some time to make some cool Tagua nut pendants. I love these because they are so earthy looking, but the colors are so vibrant.