blue monday

Sunday was a very lazy and hazy day, I didn't do much besides hang around, take a nap, eat and lay around again. I truly felt like a cat. I had really wanted to get out and explore the neighborhood and the woods, but the rains kept coming and I really didn't want to chance taking the camera out in the deluge. Or myself for that matter. Rubber boots, I need rubber boots. Well, its Monday--I've got to get started on something. I pulled out one of my favorite geometric panel projects to recreate, this time using two shades of aqua blue. I love this design, its fun yet elegant with curves and lines, a project that I never get tired of doing.


Thankfully, the motivation team showed up! Chocolate, big coffee (the first of many) and some tunes to crank out. Gotta get the boogie on in the shop and get the blood going. Today's playlist included some Zeppelin, some old Seger and Metallica. By the way, I sent the husband out this morning to get some items at the store with a request for a chocolate bar thinking he would bring home a regular sized 69 cent Hershey. He brought home this mega size 3.5 ounce hunk of sugar and cocoa, that's nearly a quarter of a pound! The man is truly brilliant and doesn't even realize it.


This is as far as I'd gotten by this afternoon. The center is a clear glass bevel that I shape with the glass grinder so its no longer square but follows the curves of the pieces next to it. The remainder of the pieces have been hand cut and waiting for me to grind them down to fit-step one will be done... I think I'll just have to send that boy out for another candy bar.

What's new for Sunday and the uncoming week

The rains continue here in West Tennessee. Earlier, the little dry valley behind our house was a creek, before nightfall I could see it was a river. Good thing we are high up on a hill with no chance of flooding.

We had a slight break in the clouds and I was able to get a couple of shots of a new owl I had just got done. I love the color of the eyes. They are glass globs in a tangerine orange color. I bought these from ArtfulMosaicSupplies on Etsy. The owls I make where inspired by two things-they are closely related in design and construction to the stained glass cats I make and a dear friend of mine has been asking me to create single birds that she would be able to display and sell for me at her bed and breakfast along the shores of Reelfoot Lake in the northwest corner of Tennessee. We've been birding friends for years.

I also had a couple of visitors in my home studio this afternoon. I create and sell from my studio along with my Etsy shop. They were asking about the possibility of me creating a custom piece for their home. Custom work is always exciting for me. I could tell he had a bit of Wisconsin in his speech. We got to talking about different things and I mentioned that I was from Michigan...wouldn't you know it, so was she. She was from Dearborn and I grew up not far from there in Southfield but spent most of my teen years south of 8 Mile Road and knew Dearborn and Detroit very well, although my memory is hazy, its been 20 years since I left. Small world. We chatted about how much Detroit has changed. It was really nice to talk to somebody from 'home'. I would really love to able to take a trip up and see for myself before too many other great buildings are tore down and the place becomes totally unrecognizable.

Meanwhile, I'm waiting for a glass delivery this week so I can start work on a cabinet door insert for a local client and I need to make a custom black kitty for an Etsy buyer. I didn't have enough black glass when I created a couple of other kitties for her recently. I'll add a couple more black kitties to my Etsy shop since I got wiped out of cat faces in the past week. It'll be a kitty making marathon.

And I've decided to continue my store wide sale for another week.

Saturday night cat party

Well, they don't really party, its more like a sleep over...and over and over.

This is their couch, we gave it to them to destroy at their leasure (its terribly uncomfortable). You can see how much they love it-in more ways then one!

I'm giving the sun away

Where is the sun? I haven't got a clue. Here in West Tennessee we haven't seen the sun in days. We've got a front that has stalled out so that means several more days of heavy cloud cover and lots and lots of rain. I like rain--its liquid sunshine. Tons of flowers are in bloom, the trees are fully leafed out, the woodland ground cover is think and lush and the birds continue their songs seeking mates for the nesting season.

But what about the sun? I'd like to give this sun suncatcher away. I've removed it from my Etsy shop just for this occasion. It measures 5 3/4 diameter, that's 14cm. Its crafted using orange, red and yellow textured glass and adds a bit of brightness to any window.

To enter this giveaway, simply check out my Etsy shop and take a look around. Tell me what item is your favorite, it can even be an item that I've already sold. If you don't like anything in my shop--that's o.k. too. Let me know what you would like to see me make (or try to make).

Post a comment with your contact information. On Wednesday, May 6, I'll randomly pick a winner. Easy peasy. I'll contact the winner of the sun for a shipping address and away it go. This giveaway it open to shipping addresses in the U.S. and Canada. Thanks and good luck!!

Imagine living right on the water

Just around the corner from where I live in Tennessee is a little colony of houses that sit directly on the water in a quiet cove off the Tennessee River. These are 'regular' homes with dining rooms, bedrooms and baths. Unlike a house boat, these homes have no motorized power and cannot be used for travel. But, you can store your boat in your floating house garage. Each house floats atop large blocks of foam. Two long steel arms anchor each house to land and allow each home to rise and fall with the level of the river. Each house also has its own gangway for access to land.

These homes are registered annually with the state's fish and game department, just like any boat or jetski. Permits are no longer being issued for new development of these types of homes.

I wish I knew someone who owned one, I'd love to take a peak inside any of them. I'm sure there are some funny stories from people who own them, imagine getting drunk and loosing your footing and going for an unexpected dip.

The hummers are here!

No, not the rolling gas hogs, but the lovely flying jewels that grace North America from spring until fall. This year marks the earliest arrival to our location in Middle/West Tennessee since I started keeping track of their arrival times in 2000. We had our first male Ruby-throated on the evening of March 26, 2009. The females have yet to arrive here. Right away I started cooking up a batch of hummingbird 'food' since the flowers that are their primary source of food in the form of nectar have yet to open. Small insects are another staple of their diet. I will continue to feed them throughout their time here, which is usually October.

I've never felt the need to purchase 'hummingbird food' but have always made my own. There is no need to offer them the artificial coloring that comes in store bought mixtures!! Here is my recipe:

Bring 4 cups of water to a rolling boil
Add 1 1/4 cups granulated sugar
Return to boil and boil for 1 minute
Allow to cool then fill your feeder~simple and easy. Store unused mixure in the refridgerator.

Next time we'll talk about the proper way to clean a hummingbird feeder~NO SOAP, just hot water and bleach.

From the sky to the water with a detour to the polar ice cap

I finally completed my biplane project and soon it will be flying off to the buyer. I added some hand painted features near the propeller to give a feeling of 'movement' to the piece, not always easy to do when working with glass.

After working on a couple of small projects I felt it was time to recreate one of my favorite projects~a Koi in a water setting with lily pads and lily flowers. I've been dragging this one out it seems like. I started on it last Saturday, March 29. It took me two days to select the glass, a couple of days to cut all the pieces and now a week later I'm at the stage where I can start wrapping all of the pieces in copper foil to prepare for solder.

But....in the meantime, I got side tracked with another project. Its a stylized emperor penguin with its chick. This one came to me the way some projects do, doodling while waiting for pictures to upload. I'm not quite sure how it will turn out, my chick looks more like a chickadee! Live and learn, I say, the next time I'll be able to make some necessary changes to the design, but it will still be a cute.