Ring out the old,
Ring in the new.

Here is a piece of Tiramisu for you!


Have a safe and Happy New Years Eve!

Merry Christmas Eve everyone! I've got my lasagna in the frig (it's overnight Lasagna) ready to pop in the oven tomorrow night in time for my Daughter's visit. Today I took the dogs for a long walk in a local forest. It was so nice, warm and sunny with about 3 inches of fresh new snow. And that is all the snow we have. Which, by the weekend, will be melted away.

I am anxious for my Daughter to arrive, we will have a quiet but lovely Christmas night together.

I want to say again, Merry Christmas, Happy Hannukah and Merry whatever you celebrate. Peace be with you.






Ha, Rosie had to sneak in and Holliday is asleep on the couch. We just returned form a long walk in a local forest. It was so pleasant today.

Holiday Greetings!

I have many readers of my blog but by far most of them are European. I want to thank-you, all of you, who read this and have supported my work throughout this past year. Here's to you my friends! A toast for warm Christmas Greetings, from my house to yours! xx

Santa & Snow Flakes

Santa is on his way kiddo's! Here is a live Santa Tracker. Click SANTA.

I love this and could spend hours making snow flakes, here is a link, you will love it too:

Make your own snow flakes HERE

I'll be back in the morning with some pics from my house...happy holiday's to you all. Please drive, fly or ski safely to your destinations!

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Running about town this morning getting last minute things for my Christmas dinner. I'm not sure when that will even happen if it will be the 25th or the 26th. Depends on my Daughter and when she gets here. Poor thing, she's been sick for 3 days now. Possibly food poisoning. And that is not fun. Blah. But I did make her happy. I found a dress that she'd bought earlier on sale for $35. She paid $55. It was originally around $80. I bought her the $35 one and she can take back the one she bought. She hasn't wore it yet so it's no biggie.

I bought myself a new dress too.
It's black...and low in the back.
And black stockings...heels...

That's all I'm sayin...

A new bracelet today. In my shop. Here ya go...I made one like this a week or so ago and it sold right away (thank-you!), thought I'd make another one similar.

Gotta go. Ciao. Oops, the bracelet is HERE.

I could write about the beads I made yesterday but instead I'm going to tell you about a cool blog I stumbled across somewhere today. She has a free downloadable link to some fun Christmas tags. So I downloaded it. Too much fun! Enjoy!

LINK TO BLOG

Here is what they look like. The colors are toned down, a lot. But if you like the pastel look then these will work for you.


I just had to get something wrapped up right away so I could use one of the tags.


And because I'm a sucker for nice wool mittens, I have to show you some I found one day on the web while I was surfing around. These came from some Russian woman that lives in Canada. She made them herself. I do believe they are the nicest mittens I have ever found. And only $26. How could I pass that by?

I couldn't.


I'd best get busy. I've got some last minute jewelry items I have to make. Ciao.

My Cheat Sheets are on SALE for $15!

Heads up my glassy friends. I put my Cheat Sheets on SALE! That's right, if you haven't already got one of these, now is the time to grab one. This is a limited time only sale...not sure how long it will last or when it will end. You can find them HERE. Thank-you and have a great week!

I had a little time yesterday after making beads so I took my dogs for a long walk (brrr, it was cold out there). Holliday came back with a bad case of bed head, lol.


Afterwards I made some tasty treats. Most people call this type of cookie Mexican (or Russian) Tea Cakes. My Grandmother called them Pecan Fingers. I don't know where or how the name change came about, all I know is that is what she called them, my Mother called them and now I call them that. No matter what name they go by, they are delicious and something I've had every year during Christmas for as long as I can remember. Funny thing though, when I was a kid we didn't get to have any until right before Christmas. My Mom would spend weeks baking loads of cookies and treats but we always had to wait. She'd put them in the freezer.

Now? If I make em, I eat em, lol.

All That Glitters

is ruby and gold...


These are always some of my most favorite beads to make. Ever. All the colors blend so nicely together. Sadly, the best one cracked and I had to toss it. :-( If you need a little glittery sparkle in your life the beads are HERE.

Plans for today? Well, run to the post office and maybe a little shopping. Then a long walk/run with the dogs. Our weather this week has been terrible until today. I didn't take the dogs out all week until yesterday and even then it wasn't pleasant. With winds blowing around 30MPH and temps in the 20's, the wind chill was cold. My hat wouldn't even stay on it was so windy. Obviously, we didn't stay out long. Just long enough for them to burn off some energy. Hopefully today will be better, it's not windy at all and it's a crisp 18*.

Have a great weekend!

Temptation

Ahhh, there's that word, the word so many people have trouble with. I'm going to tempt you today with a couple of things.....

First, I made cookies yesterday. MMmmmmm, good cookies too. Wanna see???


Tempting as they are, I was good, I kept only a few. The rest are already boxed up to be given as a gift.

And secondly, my newest bracelet. I adore this...the colors go so perfect together. Maybe it's hard to capture that with a camera but when I am looking at it as I move it back and forth in the light, it just sparkles. The silver, blue and golden tones of the brass are, well, lets just say this, YUMMY. Just like my cookies! ;-)





You can find my sparkling Snow Flake bracelet right HERE.

Ciao...

Post n run to the post office....

Snowflakes, I love them.....you can find all the snowflakes you want right HERE.

Frivolous Flowers Tutorial is DONE!!!

For more information, please click HERE.

Had a lovely weekend working on the torch off and on and getting the dogs and I out for some exercise. But the weather changed late yesterday and now it's rainy, foggy, damp and crappy.

It was a productive weekend finishing up an order for a Canadian customer (Hello, you know who!!! And, thank-you!), working on my tutorial (it's basically done, I just need to proof-read it) and making some beads for my etsy shop. And here those are, they are FUSION, I always love how these turn out.


And best of all, look what came in the mail this morning!!!


I can't wait to play with it this afternoon! Whoohoo! Snow flake beads tomorrow! LOL....

And I saw this on a blog somewhere and I thought it was so darn cute.


I may just have to do this but I have no family aside from my Daughter and I got her a plane ticket for Alaska for Christmas and she already knows about it but I guess I'll have to find some little thing to wrap up for somebody because this looks like so much fun. Tedious, yes. But still, I want to do it.

I guess I'd better grab a bite to eat for lunch and fire up the kiln. Happy Monday, have a great week wherever you may be.

Last weekend my Daughter and I took our annual December trip over to Minneapolis and Stillwater. We stayed overnight at a hotel in Stillwater that is a sister hotel to the one my Daughter works at. We get a great discounted rate so we always stay there. We had a wonderful time shopping, laughing, eating at some great restaurants and enjoying some fun Mother/Daughter moments. The best part is spending the last day in Stillwater, a small city both my Daughter and I love. It's a wonderful place full of Victorian flavor from days gone by. Many many old mansions now turned into B&B's line the streets. There are also many privately owned homes as well. I adore Stillwater and if I didn't love Alaska so much and could afford to live there, I would.

These next few pictures are from around the downtown area.




My favorite art gallery in Stillwater, Studio 3.


If I had a lot of money I would love to have this chest and the teapots in the following 2 photo's.





Many places decorate for the Christmas season and where ever you go, it's just beautiful, especially when snow is falling.




A view of the city Stillwater, Minnesota with the St. Croix river that divides Minnesota and Wisconsin.



A view of Main Street.


Rooftops - I love rooftop photo's. I would liked to have taken more time to get this a perfect shot but it was cold and there people coming and going and we were probably in the way. But, I still love this, it makes me think of what old European cities must look like during winter.


These are the steps we climbed to reach the top for these photo's. And behind me there were just as many more going up. It was steep and slippery and I was pooped by the time we got to the top but it was so worth it!



I'm almost done with my sculptural flowers and button tutorial. All I have left to do is proof-read it. I may get to that today, we'll see. But right now it's time for me to get to work cleaning beads, dipping mandrels, etc. so I can finish up early enough to get out with the dogs this afternoon. Ciao...

Busy! Busy! Here it is Wednesday already! I had a fab weekend in Minnesota with my daughter, pics coming soon, I promise! But for right now, here are some things I just put in my etsy shop...you know where to find them if you need them! Thanks! Enjoy the rest of the week!