Rocks rocks rocks!

Some people have a thing for shoes, some for fancy cars, me, I have a thing for rocks. I just can't help adding more and more to my collection. There's the baggie of petrified wood chunks sitting on my window sill, the way too many picture jaspers I just can't help but add to my collection because the scene in them is too stupendous. Here's the latest addition to my collection: These are called marra mamba tiger iron. They're from Australia (marra mamba would sound great with an australian accent wouldn't it?). And they've got this great sparkly glow. Ah my rock fetish.

Sorry it's been a couple of days. I wrote half of a rant about horrible children tearing toys away from Devera at the book store...and then slept on it and realized that's going to happen all the time. She's even going to be the horrible child doing the ripping some times too. Oh well. I will write about how fun it is to get follow up emails from customers. First of all, they're usually so happy they just had to write. That's a big ego boost right there. And then to learn a little more about everyone besides a name an address and a credit card number. Fun fun!

Something's in the air

It's interesting that February and March are always bridal time for me. I guess everyone's planning a spring or summer wedding. It's fun though - I love working with brides. They're always so happy and excited (ok so a couple of them are stressed out) but they're fun to talk to. I get to see wedding dresses and hair do's and bridesmaids, and learn about all kinds of interesting places. Some of the excitement rubs off on me. Probably the neatest was a bride (actually it was a groom) from Norway that I created some pieces for. It was really fun - he sent me photos of his city and told me about all kinds of neat stuff. If you've got stories to share about where you're fun, I'd love to hear them.

Room with a view.

Let's see if I can find a fun picture for you. There's got to be a contraption photo laying around here somewhere...Oh, here's one: Here's the view out of the window in my studio (can you tell it's in the basement?). It's kind of funny - every so often the neighborhood cats like to come by and see what I'm up to by peeking in the window. It's a great spot for some African violets, except in the summer when they get absolutely fried. That reminds me - I should probably water them before they become crispy critters. The little jar on the right is all of Dave's reject beads. They're fun to look at because they're all so colorful. PS - Happy Mardi Gras. Hope you celebrated like you were in New Orleans! I, myself, gluttoned out on king cake. I'm so ill now!

Happy Sunday

Here's the Sunday Devera photo. It's a couple months old, but still shows the little booger that she truly is. Who knew that the toy basket would make a perfectly lumpy seat?

Packaging Hell - the results show

Well, I got my new boxes in yesterday.....and well.....hopefully they'll grow on me. God knows they better since I've got about 15 bajillion of them now. Here's how it all turned out: What do you think? I guess they're better than what I had before. I was thinking, I can swap out the color of the tissue paper inside the box for like christmas and valentines day - that would be pretty cute. So there are 2 things I'm still hoping to do for these little guys - I'd like to get tags that have my logo on them, so people know where they got this lovely gift from. And, I've got this great idea for little "about me" pamphlets that will fit in the boxes and have lots of big juicy photos. Of course that's all more $$$$, but hey, since I'm not spending 4 grand on a torch now, I've got money to burn, right?

If only I had won the powerball...

So, I've been researching this new technology for torches that's beyond cool. Instead of running on extremely explosive propane, it runs on water. Somehow it splits the water molecule and creates a flame out of the hydrogen and oxygen. Pretty cool huh? I'm not really excited about having a full propane tank in my studio - I don't want to blow the place up. So I was getting really excited about the whole technology and found a model that I liked. Of course they put the prices in the VERY back of the literature - $4 grand! Yikes. Oh well...back to the drawing board. Maybe I should look into acetylene instead of propane. On a completely unrelated note, I found this cool web site last night, The Delocator. Type in your zip code and it shows you a list of all the independant coffee shops within 5 miles of you. I'm a huge fan of little coffee houses (this is Portland, after all) and walk right past Starbucks to go to my favorite one. Devera and I even have a little Sunday routine of going there while Dave is sleeping in for a little hot (well, lukewarm) cocoa. Amazing factoid from the site, there are 53 Starbucks within 5 mile of my house. Ok, I'm going to have to find that out about McDonalds too to compare...check back. Edited to include.....13 McDonalds. Wow, now that's a statistic!

The pickle pot

It's got a cool name, doesn't it?

What on earth is this goofy contraption? I'm sure you're asking yourself that right now. Well, if the solder gods have smiled on my and I haven't melted the shit out of a piece I've labored for hours on, it goes in the pickle pot. The pickle is a strong acid that eats away all the black oxides that form on the metal once you've soldered it. A couple of minutes in the pickle and the piece is shiny and new.

Usually you use really nasty chemicals as your pickle, but I found out that you can use citric acid instead and it works pretty well. It takes longer, but now I'm not breathing in nasty nasty fumes. There are enough nasty chemicals in the world, no need to add more.

Ahhh, Sundays

I'm not really in a silversmithing mood tonight. The solder gods are not smiling on me tonight, so I think I'll post a Devera photo instead.

We're reading Sector 7 by David Wiesner. If you haven't seen his books before, they're awesome. Tuesday is my favorite. Why we don't own that one is beyond me. His books are really fun because they don't have words but really rich pictures, so you can just tell the story as you go along. Devera will even open up the pages and point to things and babble along.

Yesterday was Devera's first trip to the library. You should have seen her eyes light up when we got the children's section. Not because there were so many books to read, but they were on shelves that looked like were all in the wrong order. And only Devera new the correct order they should be in. So she spent a good 30 minutes grabbing a book from the H's and toddling it over to the A's. It was a great game of memory for me...10 seconds to remember what shelf she grabbed the book from and where the hell she put it so I could put it back when she wasn't looking. Ahh, such fun. Hey, she was having a good time though. And we found some good books while we were at it.

A Prayer to the The Solder Gods

Here's a photo of my silver solder:

See those little teeny tiny specs of metal? Well, those specs of metal melt at a lower temperature than silver does, so they're what hold the pieces together. Bet you didn't know that, huh?

These little pieces love to blow around when I turn my torch onto them, or move just a smidge out of the way when it's just about to melt. They also like to melt only on one piece and not solder both together. (This, OF COURSE, has nothing to do with my abilities with the torch!) So, every time I have to solder a joint together, I say a little prayer to the solder gods to gain their favor and make my solder flow perfectly down the seam. Maybe I should make a shrine and give offerings every time I sit down at my bench. Or, maybe I should just practice more. Hmmmm.

Packaging Hell

Who knew picking packaging could put you in one of Dante's circles of hell? So, I've run out of my little boxes, and it's like I need to make a life altering decision...do I just re-order? Maybe there's something better out there? Should it have my logo on it? Is it recyclable? If I pick this one, I don't have to buy ribbon - is that bad or good? Good lord, it took me 4 agonizing days to figure out what to order. But, I think all my agonizing has paid off. I found some really unique boxes from Italy, bought some incredibly beautiful ribbon (I won't tell you where from - you'll laugh). And ~~~~ I'm going to be happy with my decision ~~~~ at least for the next 500 orders. I'll post a photo once they come in.

I'm a crappy writer

So, yeah, after doing this for a couple of weeks, I've realized that I'm a pretty crappy writer. I don't have a whole lot of interesting stuff to say no real insight on how to live a better life. I'm more of a visual person - surprise, surprise. I may not say much that's interesting, but I see lots of interesting stuff, and take lots of pictures. That's much more fun than talking about the flashlights they gave us at the chi chi restaurant. Good think I've got a camera with a gazillion pictures on it to share with you. This is what's sitting on my bench right now. I've got two really cool pieces of picture jasper that I'm turning into a necklace and bracelet. I've started making my own chain too, so it's really completely from scratch. Give it a month or two and who knows, I may actually have something finished to show you.

Date night recap

Well, ClarkLewis was a nice meal, but a bit, um, pretensious (sp?) for our taste. When they hand you a flashlight so you can read your menu...kind of makes you scratch your head a little. Fun night, though. The best was that Dave bought me flowers and baked me cookies for date night. A very sweet night! Here's Devera's note to you: n mm mk,,4jkkrdgb.j /v I think you need a decoder ring to figure it out, though. Here's the latest photo. Devera got a hair cut. Toby desperately needs one. Enjoy your Sunday - we're off to Farmer's Market!

Date Night

We've managed to stash the kid away for the evening, so Dave and I are going out for a nice dinner at Clark Lewis (fancy schmancy northwest cuisine, or so I've heard). It will be nice to be able to go out and not have to pick up dropped forks, napkins & books...make sure the candle is a safe distance from Ms. Grabby hands...and run a vacuum cleaner under our table before I leave. I haven't put a cool site for you to look at in a long time, so here's one: My First Baby Grow A beyond cool woman in the UK who hand embroiders kids clothes. I stocked up on all kinds of her goodies for the little ones in my life for Christmas - she customized all of them and they were beyond cool.

Ok, now I can exhale...

I've been holding my breath for the past 2 days until I heard that my package made it safe and sound to California. It's hard not to breathe for two days - you turn pretty blue. But, yes, it's safe and sound in the gallery owner's hands and "AMAZING" by her description. So, all's well. Time to go celebrate with some icecream!

Whew - a couple of days rest

Boy, those last couple of days wiped me out. So I decided to take a couple of days and sit back and watch about the least brain cell using television possible (American Idol) fall asleep at 8:45 and otherwise recharge. But I'm starting back up slowly. It's no good to get burnt out on stuff you love - defeats the whole purpose. Since I'm well aware I'm not going to be making millions off of this I really try to make sure it's a lot of fun. So, after my couple day break I'm back to the drawing board. Got packages to ship, order to fill, trades to trade, STUFF TO DO. At least it's fun stuff (most of it!) Let's see if I can find a silly Devera photo for you...ahh here's one:

Here goes nothing!

Ok, I've just printed out the postage and got the box ready to ship off to the gallery down in California. I've got my fingers crossed that she likes them - and even better - that she sells every last piece of silver she's got. Here's a sneak preview of the goodies she'll be showing: Nice, petite, and subtle, huh? I just love the stone. I wish I could get my hands on some more of those jasper beads. Hmmm - I'll have to look into that. But for now, I'm crashing. Cross your fingers along with me, and I'll keep you posted!

Medieval Torture Device?

Kinda looks like it, huh?

Just attach the clamps to somebody's fingernails and you're well on your way! Actually, this is my soldering station. The little clamps hold things together why I apply heat to them. The funky black thing is actually a block of charcoal - it absorbs all the oxygen from the air right around the piece so you don't get as much nasty black stuff called oxidation on your piece.

Learn something new everyday, don't you?

Hope you all had a great weekend.

And, yes, Mom, I'll post some baby pictures for you.

Liquid Sunshine

Good lord - is it ever going to stop raining? Doesn't feel like it! I'm pretty sure there's moss growing on my car now - wierd concept, huh? The only thing that keeps me going on days (weeks, months) like this is pure unadulterated caffeine. That's why there's a coffee shop on any block. When I used to work downtown there were seriously 6 coffee shops withing 3 square blocks of the office. They should really just pipe it through the streets like they do water and power. Fun site du jour: Black Bags I broke down and got this sock monkey one.

Petal to the Metal!

Uh oh... The little gallery I'm going to be showing my stuff in wants some goodies early to take advantage of Valentines day. So that pulls off 3 weeks from my nice, attainable schedule. At least I set a nice attainable schedule to start, so that when it turns into a big hairy schedule, I can still get it done. But she's really excited - so if she's excited then I am too. She's really getting some nice stuff - by far the best set of pieces I've put together in a long time. So, if you can make it to the J Randall Smith Gallery in Auburn, CA check it out for me and report back! Ok, gotta go - I got lots of stuff to do!!!!