Peaceful Sunday

Yesterday was a lazy Saturday, had a Pampered Chef party in the evening which was a nice distraction. Met a bunch of really nice ladies. This morning we all went to church. The weather is a bit drizzly with the sun trying to peep thru. After church I took my daughter out for lunch, which we seldom do. We tried a new restaurant that served BBQ - it was delicious.

Lounging around right now, waiting for laundry to finish, to start another load. Plan to work on my work area in a bit - need to finish up my work surface and organizing my crafting/beading materials so that I can be more productive in the coming weeks. I have so much stuff I need to get listed on eBay and Etsy. Tonight I will getting together with my girlfriends and playing "Nerds" (card game).

Hope everyone else is having a peaceful Sunday as well.
Thanks for visiting my blog.

The day after

It is with fatigue that I am writing this entry. Down right pooped. Status post system overload. Dead tired.

Arrival in Henrietta occurred around 2:15 and it seems that arriving later, rather than sooner, proved to be a good idea. It was overheard that the place was mobbed at the start of the show. There was a drizzle of traffic when I got there and very few remained at the end. I stayed until "last call". Every penny of my budget was spent (I shall not reveal the amount lest the reader thinks me a fool). Suffice it to say that I could have broken the bank and spent ten times the amount of my budget very easily.

There was a HUGE selection- mostly semiprecious gemstones, all of beautiful cuts and dimensions. Strands and strands of them covered the tables. Every color that you can possibly imagine was represented. The glory of God never ceases to amaze me. A majority of the gemstones are naturally occurring, with man's intervention being the cutting and polishing of them to further bring out their lovely features. Others have intriguing patterns enhanced by coloration, dying and stabilizing techniques.

It was hard to pass up this opportunity and in hind sight I wish I had tucked away a bit more cash. You see the pricing on almost everything was 50% off the label/retail price plus 15% more off the half-off. This was outstanding considering the prices of many items. The most expensive strands I looked at were over $150 and of course my eye was drawn to some of the more costly items. However, I did not indulge in them or I would have broken my piggy bank of a budget. They were modest choices I had to make so that I could leave with more than a couple of strands!

Traveling was expedient due to the sunshine and clear roads. Always I kept an eye out for deer. With so many cornfields between here and there they had many hiding places to burst from. The day started off overcast, followed by a glorious variety of interesting cloud formations, ending with a wonderful sunset.

Dinner was served at the Cracker Barrel restaurant on Hylan Drive. It was mobbed with customers as it was evidently supper time for many others, as well. I had chosen to eat little early in the day so that I could treat myself to a "special" meal and that is how I spontaneously chose this place. A rest was needed and my belly soon was filled with country fried steak (gravy on the side felt less guilty), fried okra, pinto beans and cornbread. Iced tea to drink and applesauce for dessert. Briefly, I almost felt like I was in West Texas again.

No road trip worth it's salt is without a jaunt off the main trail, and that is exactly what happened. It was after dark and one wrong turn...the next thing you know I am 15 miles west and I don't know how many miles north, of where my brother and his wife live. I am a hard-headed sort so I was determined to find the place no matter what! I did but it was quite late in the evening, past when it is respectable to visit someone. Their welcome mat was out nonetheless.

It was good to see them both and the puppies, too. We chatted for about an hour, a good cup of coffee, a potty break and then I was on my way.

While traveling to and fro this day, I so fully enjoyed my Ipod. Katy had let me use her "converter" so that I could listen to the Ipod thru the stereo and it sounded so good. There is something about pleasurable music and driving that soothes my savage beast. I could drive endlessly in this state. Recollection of my trip cross country for Taylor's graduation a few years ago occurred, wherein I drove for hours after hours listening to CD's with no interruption. Some how it transports me to a different level of consciousness, no substances involved.

This ends my prattling about my outing, weary body as a reminder. Now it is time to take a quick nap before waking the kids and starting another day. There are distinct benefits to early rising and getting Todd off to work at 5. I can understand why my mother always had her "me" time before we arose in the morning.



A picture of my cache....wait till ya see what comes from this pile of stuff!

I'm baaaaack!

Since my last entry, it has pretty much been life as usual with the few variations each day will bring. The weather has been lovely for the most part, unlike the beginning of our summer this year. All around me there are babies being born and others surrendering there lives to eternity. God truly remains faithful through it all when we (I) let Him. He keeps speaking to me about being kind and loving to one another, so it seems that I have been falling short in that area - I ask His forgiveness for anyone I have wronged along the way. I know He is faithful in this as well and peace settles knowing God is the guardian of my heart, mind and soul (again, when I let Him). Surrendering my will can be difficult, at best, on many days - even though it is my greatest desire to do so, that human-ness gets in the way.

The afternoon at Cuba Lake on Monday was glorious. It was wonderful to be able to share my dear Aunt Kate's 75th birthday. Grasping the physical age of this woman is difficult for me, she will be forever young in my mind. She has been a second mother to me all of my life and invested a great deal of herself in me. There will never be a way to repay her, except to extend to others what she has extended to me and my family.

Fending off the drive to bead has been unsuccessful to date. I have such a compulsion to do this constantly that I have to discipline myself not to, and when I give in it is hard for me to stop. The picture with this entry is of a memory wire bracelet I just made and I think it is fun and kind of funky. The randomness of color and the dangles at each end are interesting to me.



Tuffy kitty was licking his chops after finishing off the drizzle of milk left in my cereal bowl. It seemed fitting to capture that moment! He is quite a character - mauling the dogs when he gets a chance and eating dog food along side of them. Dozer is funny ( the rottie) - he will growl at George (the lab) and not let him partake in the food, yet will stand by Tuffy, defending the bowl for him and to keep George away. The dynamics between these animals is endlessly entertaining.

Looks like another nice day today - I am off to Rochester on a day trip JUST FOR ME! Rings and Things (a beading website) has a traveling bead show and I will be attending for the first time! Can you tell I am excited? As I mentioned before, my addiction to beads/beading, may prove to be dangerous to my pocket book. I have set myself a modest budget and will have to shop within my means. Of course, I have my secret stash of cash via debit card from the proceeds of Pampered Chef.....hmmmmm. Stay tuned as I report the outcome of the day. My camera is going along in hopes that I won't be banned from photographing my outing.

Thank you for visiting again - please feel free to leave a comment!

My, how time flies...

It has been days since I have blogged - multifactorial...Let's just say today is a much better day than some since I was last here.

Have managed to do some beading this week - trying also to set up my work area in the other room. Trying to get everything set up, organized, close at hand...right at my finger tips...ya know what I mean!

It will be sooo nice to have a little work shop - then I will have to reorganize the ebay/Etsy stock. I already have a nice set up for printing labels and packing items. I have a stack of boxes 6 feet tall...Probably need to start searching for small boxes again.

The weather is drizzly and cooler the last couple days. But I guess after having a few sunny days, I'll take what I get...At least it wasn't snow! That will be coming soon enough.Some mornings have been very foggy, things appear very ethereal then; peaceful, calm, like I wish it could stay that way for a longer period of time.

Today's musings...

These nifty pics were taken by my daughter a few months ago... she has a great eye for photography. For my birthday she had another pic of my jewelry framed ... it is treasured!

Today was a bit of a red letter day, in that I allowed myself to do some beading!!! Yeah!


Now that the fast has broken I won't be able to help myself and will be creating more this evening. The hubby has gone to work on his race car, so it's just me and my beads! I didn't even have to cook dinner --- I used my "don't want to cook" sigh and we went to the Kopper Keg for supper.

This morning I stayed up after Todd got off to work and did a little puttering. The dogs have been needy for some reason today and have required more frequent petting than usual! Mid-day I went and ran a few errands running to Wellsville and Alfred. I had to take Todd's computer to get worked on and it was a blast from the past being on the ASC campus again... the help desk happens to be in the Allied Health building. (ASC is my nursing college alma mater)

The sun has been bright and beautiful, perfect temperature, balmy breeze all day. My only regret for this day was not hanging any laundry out. The weather is supposed to be great again tomorrow, so that will be a good project for then.

Had some folks pick up 6 0r 7 garbage bags of clothes I had weeded out. Freecycle is a wonderful thing!

Well that's it for today... must bead ... must bead... must bead...

Etsy

I am up way too late, especially after recovering from some kind of bug...however I have not spent much time on Etsy in the last few days, so I thought that I would read messages, catch up on forums and join some new forums. I also was getting "advice" about my blog. Part of this was viewing the blogs of other Etsians. This is really interesting.

One of the suggestions is to cross reference other shops on the site to encourage activity. So you will find a link to my friend Laurie's shop, Cutethings6. She and I "met" on eBay (where I also have a store, sweetcindylou62) and we just sort of clicked so we have maintained a relationship for quite a few months.

We enjoy keeping up with each other's lives and when I chat with her, I almost feel like we have always known each other. This is one of the awesome benefits to this type of business - the networking and fellowship that can develop between people that would have otherwise never met.

So take a minute and look at her site...she is really creative and has great vintage stuff...I have been a customer, myself, a number of different times and have always had excellent experiences!

http://www.cutethings6.etsy.com