time for true confessions

no matter how you may think you will keep a normal schedule, when you have more people in the house, some things just don't happen

for me the past two weeks, it has been this blog that has gone wanting

I don't regret that for a moment

and here's why:

I've had a visitor from California here with me -- a dear friend, adopted mom and amazing woman!

which also meant that Mr Cute and his mom and dad here almost every day to spend time and share a meal

it has been a very special time for me, and a privilege to have her here

all that said, it wasn't that we didn't do anything!

for instance, there was Halloween

which involved the making of some interesting faux pumpkins out of 1 gallon plastic jugs with a big Sharpie marker

then we filled those with water and dropped a glow stick inside

instant spook factor!

these would be my Christmas cards for this year

they are all ready to be signed, letters inserted and then sealed and stamped -- while my daughter was here working on her scrap book pages and my friend did some wonderful watercolors, I got these all finished

and this is finished too

I really like the way this bib style necklace fits around the neckline -- one of the best ones I've done in a while

work on this project has resumed too

the bead embroidered triangular medallion is all finished, and now I'm working on the peyote stitched "beads" that will make up the rest of the piece

I started out making long straight pieces, but it was clear that was not going to work to create a smooth curve around the neck

so I took those all apart and have started making some more cone shaped pieces that I like much better

this piece is finished and has been entered for jurying in the show I made it for

now we wait to see if it gets in

so I've started working on the next piece which is in the "create the background" stage where I put together all the mixed colors for sky, mountains and field before I start adding trees, a barn and an awesome rusty old pick up truck

these were the last roses of summer --- earlier this week we had a real frost, and I spotted these when I went to the mail box -- beautiful, but sad, we've had a long warm fall, and I'm sorry to see that go

and this arrived in my mail box yesterday

if there was any prior doubt, evidence that the federal government thinks I'm getting older!

actually I'm really, REALLY happy to get this card -- it means a net impact of giving me a $439 a month raise in my income because of one single factor -- my cost for health insurance will go down

that factor alone is letting me entertain the idea that I might be able to replace our aging van with something smaller and newer -- I'm pretty happy about that

time to get back to work on projects -- at this time of a year there are a whole lot of them that I can't show you yet!