spring?

I discovered these lovelies poking their heads out of the mulch by my front door.

The daffodills are coming!! A very welcome relief after the many, many snows this winter.

I saw the first of the woodpeckers last week too, no robins yet.




Well, the beading is complete!! I hope to get the bracelet completed today, then it will be on to new projects!!

The egg is also progressing, and I've been painting the feet for the two new birds.

into the fray.....

catching up.....

This is the latest piece of silver clay finished by DH...(ok, he finished his part about a week ago, it just took me forever to get the chain put on it!)

Each of the little stones in the center of the shamrocks is a natural emerald....not a big one, but REAL!

I really like this piece. Seems that each one he does now days is another totally different form.

He has a truly awesome cross design that he is working on now and trying to get the design "features" solved.



I've been working on this piece.

By using different sizes of beads I've been able to create an interesting texture in the surface.

This is actually going faster than I thought it would, and I should have it finished this week sometime.




and as promised, here is the status of the egg.

When I'm working on it the pattern doesn't seem to be nearly as clear as it is when I take the pictures. A true example of not being able to see the forest for the trees!

Its really hard to tell in the photo, but on the lilly side, clear over at the far left there is one lighter blue bead which is the edge of the top petal of the lilly...a milestone of sorts on the chart!



I was notified that this critter (and several other rabbits we've done) will be included in the March issue of Bears and Buds!

I'll post a link here when the issue comes out.



At long last, another finished afghan square.

This one went through several "frog ponds" at the beginning as I just couldn't seem to get the guage right to make it come out to 12 inches!

I started a new one last night. No pattern, just fooling around, so we'll see how it goes.




How about a nice hot dog?

Elphie didn't care for yesterday's windy, cold weather, so she appropriated the blanket that DH uses to cover his feet in the evenings.....oh, and isn't it a pity that she has no toys? Just try to get a dog to pick them up and put them away....way worse than a kid!!



You can read more about this picture here

let's just say, its not a pretty picture!









3 more arcs complete, and more adjustments made to the REAL piece count total....ok, I was DEFINATELY brain dead when I did this originally!!

The taxes are done and in the mail.....HURRAH!!!

need to spend some time today doing the monthly computer maintenance .... writing picture files to CDs, cleaning up old files, etc., etc.

ONWARD!

uh, must have been brain dead....

when I figured the first number for the quilt pieces.

Guess this is why its good that I'm doing hand stitching and cutting as I go.

I had calculated that I would need twice as many of the little 3 1/4 inch squares as I actually need.....DUH! ONE per arc, not TWO!!

Anyway, yesterday I got all the rest of the arc pieces set up and started pressing the yellow for the squares too.




Stitched 2 more arcs....we're on the home stretch of these!!

Worked on the bracelet and the egg too, just didn't take any pictures.

The time in the photo studio today was taking pictures of the rabbits I have made to send to an on line magazine. Third time is the charm, I've got one rabbit being very uncooperative.....its hard to get a good picture of a blue rabbit against a blue background, so I had to set up twice more with green (which was sort of "eehh") and hot pink (well, there's a lot more contrast at least). I'll be editing those pictures to send off, and I'll post them here too probably tomorrow.

I "flaked" on the taxes yesterday, and the finishing on some silver pieces DH did....my back was aching and I didn't want to sit in the chair required....hope to do better today.....

into the fray!

mooooooving along.......

DH has been busy again!

These earrings are made of the art clay.

Two hearts on chain for each earring, one heart is polish and one has a brushed finish (which he just discovered how to do). Each little heart is 1/2 inch by 1/2 inch. The total "drop" on the earrings is about 1 1/4 inches.



This one has a yellow sapphire set in it (pretty!)

The heart measures 1 inch by 7/8 inch, and hangs at an angle off the chain (notice the pretty design work on the bail too).



And this one measures 1 1/8 inches by 1 3/8 inches. It has a really interesting textured pattern too.

There are 3 more silver pieces that are not finished yet, so there will be more pictures soon.


Meantime, I have been working too.

Here is the progress on the lapis bracelet. Using some bugle beads along with the seeds on this one to give a more interesting texture.



And here is the progress on the egg.

The top of one letter has emerged in the pattern, so that letter is now complete. The lilly is coming along nicely too.



And of course the LepBearCon.....

in this picture he is completely stuffed, but I will be unstuffing his body to stitch on buttons.

This project is on hold until the end of next week as I must make a trip to the fabric store for buttons and a few other items and I'm not going until then.




79 arcs complete! Today I will set up the pieces for the last of these. Then, its on to cutting the yellow squares for the ends of the arcs.


I have tax work that needs to get done still, so its on with that this morning and hopefully back to creating later today...........

off again, on again, back again, egg -- AGAIN!

Well, its back to working on the egg as I got another email saying that "perhaps" the pre-Easter show would come off after all.......ok, maybe its just as well to finish it anyway!!

So last night I started in on the top half and did about 3 rows.....pictures tomorrow



Meantime (back in the studio), DH has been working on more awesome silver pieces.

This latest one measures 1 1/4 inches wide by 1 3/8 inches tall. The purple "dangle" in the center is a facetted amethyst briolette (1.5 carat of amethyst).

Isn't this the neatest chain on a heart shaped necklace?

I was going to put a PayPal click and buy block in here, just in case someone would want to purchase this, but the software nuances evade me, so I'll just say if you are interested in owning this piece, email me directly and we'll work it out. (Email to: webspinner51 AT yahoo DOT com)


A trip to the local JoAnn's yesterday resulted in a wood piece to make into a "pot of gold" for the LepBearCon, some leather cord for some polymer necklaces we're working on and a number 7 flower nail on which to practice making frosting daisies. Quite the eclectic group.




72 arcs complete -- 2 dozen to go

time to get to it.....

working a little.....

Started in on this new bracelet yesterday afternoon.

So far, except for the bezels around the big stone and two of the rounds, all of the pieces I've stitched down are lapis.

I've not done a lapis bracelet before, and since aside from the little flecks of pyrite it has no matrix pattern to follow, I'm having to create my own.

This is also the first time I've used anything other than seed beads on what will be the "back side" of the bracelet (notice the groups of 3 lapis tubes at each end in the picture)

Lots of work to go on this one.



Finished all of the stitching on the LepBearCon.

Don't you love the pointy toes?

So now he's waiting for joints and all that.

I had some clear glass eyes the right size, so I have put on layers of gold glitter and green for his eyes.....those should be very different! Also found some roving that I can use to put a little beard on him too.....

More pictures to follow as this progresses.





71 arcs complete

today's to do list includes laundry and taxes and a doctor's appointment for DH....we'll see if I manage anything else...........

limited progress.....

well, the egg project has been been put aside for now. I received a note from the pre-Easter show that I had planned to take this to, telling me that show has been cancelled.....soooooo, the egg goes to the "freezer" for much later work since there will be no "market" to take it to this year. This was definately a bummer.

I spent some time working on the LepBearCon yesterday. I have the body, both legs and one arm stitched together. It is pretty interesting to see how the various fabrics we put in this are working together.




there are now 69 arcs of the quilt stitched. Before long I'll have to make some decisions about the football shaped pieces that go in the center of these.

Finally received the last document that I needed to do our taxes so I will be working on those this week....(can you tell I'm thrilled? -- NOT!)

time to get moving.....

which came first?

its hard to tell, as we seem to have both eggs and birds in the works!

This is the progress on the egg front and back. I am going to start working toward the top now and finish up the bottom at the end....

I'm taking this tack for 3 reasons.....
1. I want to pull the whole piece upward on the egg so the bottom edge of the leaf doesn't get lost on the bottom
2. I may run short of the darker blue beads before the whole thing is finished and if I know that before I finish the bottom I can make a minor design change
3. Going around and around with just blue is boring.....


and this is the toucan all stitched

now he's ready for stuffing and finishing, which means I'm actually going to have to do something about his feet. DH did the wire forms for me, but I still need to wrap them with the floral tape and do the multiple coats of paint. Guess I'll get to that starting today.

I starting cutting and stitching the Lep-Bear-Con yesterday afternoon. It looks pretty good....pictures to follow soon.

There are only 56 DAYS to the Nevada City Show, and lots of work to do!





finished 5 more arcs since Wednesday, which makes a total of 66 -- only 30 more to do!

....back to work.....

egg progress.....

and here we are.

Yup, I'd officially say this is a "miniskirt"!

I have only 3 more rows to do to finish the bottom of the second letter on the back, and about 8 rows to finish the bottom of the leaf on the lilly side....

And this is what DH finished yesterday!

He had done the 3 leaves a while back and then couldn't figure out what he wanted to do with them next.

A couple of days ago, inspiration struck, and he created the flower shape, attached it with a whole new technique, then used the gold leafing technique to put the color in the middle of it.

This piece measures 1 5/8 inches from leaf tip to leaf tip across and 1 1/8 inches from the bail to the leaf tip up and down.

NICE!!





and this is what we woke up to this morning.

Oh joy, more snow. It is pretty I must admit. But this morning it is COLD, so we will be waiting until later in the day to venture out for a grocery run.

The toucan is progressing nicely. I got one of the three tail feather pieces stitched, turned and closed yesterday. I hope to get the other two finished today.

Only 58 DAYS to Nevada City! (my daughter tells me this is the one show we do that she wishes she could go with us to....me too!)




finished another 2 arcs last night, so now there are 61 complete. I will have to set up some more today.

Also on today's "to do"....show applications for some future shows -- some as far away as September...

......into the fray!

Is it a mini skirt yet?

I'm guessing that would be the next step from the cummerbund.

Worked on this for about an hour last night....on the front at the right hand side you can see that I have finished the bottom edge of the lilly petal on that side too.

On the back I'm about 5 rows away from finishing the bottom edge of the second letter.

I can tell that once all of the graph work is finished and I'm into just filling the bottom with blue beads that I'm going to be in trouble as boredom sets in. Maybe I'll alternate between top rows (where there's more graph work to do) and bottom rows. Of course there's always a bracelet or two, a couple of necklaces and at least half a dozen pins on the drawing board if I get desperate!





This is the progress on the toucan. I ended up adding an additional piece to the tummy gusset to accomodate the changed beak. Also note the new wings. The last pieces to be stitched are the tail feathers .... red and black .... which I will work on today.

This shows great promise of being finished in plenty of time for the Nevada City Teddy Bear Show in just 59 DAYS!

We spent some time yesterday working on the design and layout of a new critter --- A Lep-bear-con --- for an online contest. This was actually a lot of fun, and probably a first for one of our designs. Usually one or the other of us does the design and pattern, but this one is truly a collaboration even there. I'm looking forward to putting this one together, which of course gives me extra incentive to finish the toucan!





59 arcs complete ... tomorrow I will definately need to get out the iron and the fabrics and set up some more strips for sewing.

Its cold, foggy, snowy this morning, and we're going to stay in and work on projects today!!

marching along....(to the beat of a different drummer?)

ok, maybe it just the 2 day sinus headache that I'm hearing.....

but I did manage to get some more work done on the egg.....


and what looked like a belt has been upgraded to a cummerbund (ok, this is another of those words....to me it sounds like it should be spelled "cumberbun" ... obviously the hearing to seeing link is seriously broken ....)

anyway, the egg is coming along. I almost doubled the width of the band, but it didn't take as long. These things get easier as they progress.



This is the Miner's Foundry where in 59 DAYS the Teddy Bear show begins!

I worked on the toucan some yesterday. Both body sides are stitched together and the back seam is complete. The next step is the tummy gusset. We're moving along...






2 more arcs done on the quilt for a total of 57. At this pace I will have to set up more pieces by the end of the week....its a good thing!





Aren't these nice?

We've decided to have a go at a small veggie garden this year, and during a recent trip to the store, they had these seed packets on special for 10 cents each, so we induldged.....yes, I know, only the ones on the right side are veggies ... beans and beets (lots of B vitamins?) That's because we usually buy plant starts for tomatoes, and its too early.

The flowers are an attempt to perk up the back part of the yard with some color.

Today is laundry day, so I'll be getting my "stair master" work out....fun

the pattern emerges......

on the back....



and on the front.

I can actually see the bottom edge of the first letter on the back, and one of the petals of the lilly on the front.

This is time consuming however.....about 2 hours to do the 7 rows I did yesterday.

The toucan project is coming along. I have both wings done and the 2 body side pieces are put together. Its coming right along!

There are just 60 DAYS left to the 24th Annual International Teddy Bear Convention in Nevada City!

I did work on a couple of other things yesterday too.


To see the discussion about this, go here




And you can see my bit about this (and a little political commentary) here




I finished 2 more arcs for the quilt last night, so now 55 are finished.

time to get with it, I need to do some ebay listings today.....