Bead Soup Blog Hop 8

It's here!  The big reveal.  First a huge thank you to Lori Anderson, who despite ongoing pain and illness has managed to pull the whole thing together beautifully as always :).

Now on with the show.  My partner this year was polymer clay artist Allison of BeadsByEarthTones.  Polymer proved a bit of a challenge to me as I had not worked with it before and perhaps did not do as much homework as I should have.  Not doing my homework resulted in a broken focal, I'm soooo sorry Allison.  Note to self, polymer clay does not like you to try and make the hole bigger.  Here is the lovely soup Allison sent me.  Funny that we both talked about liking earth tones and both ended up sending spring mixes :).

 I love lots of small packages!  Opening all the tiny packages in my stocking was always my favorite part of Christmas morning.

 

 Nice cool spring soup from Allison.  Isn't it yummy?

 

The first piece uses the luscious green fabric pictured above to sting a focal that I made.  It also uses the awesome copper clasp Allison made.  I have not cut the ends yet as it is a git for my oldest daughter's first Mother's Day tomorrow and I want to make it the length of her choosing. 

 

Here is a close up of the fantastic clasp...

 

 

 

The second piece has given me fits.  This is the second attempt at it and I'm still not pleased.  It is coming apart again today and being remade into something a bit simpler.  I like a challenge and will continue to work at it.  This one does not do the soup that Allison sent me justice at all.  I haven't even added her polymer pieces to it because it just wasn't working.  (And blogger dislikes the image so much that it won't even let me attach the one that is right side up, lol.)

 

 

 Here is the soup I sent to Allison, she did awesome things with it, be sure to go see her at the link above.  Oh and if you love her polymer pieces be sure to stop by her Etsy shop too!  I must apologize to Allison again for breaking the focal she sent, I was to be the centerpiece of a copper bracelet in 18g and I apparently got a little to rough with it while trying to make the hole larger :(.

 

Acccck, blogger will also not let me put up the participant list.  Here is the link to Lori's awesome blog Pretty Things, you can find the list there, HOP ON !

 

Happy Mother's Day to all the mamas out here hopping about.

 

Where have I been?

I can't believe it's been such a very long time since I have written.  I apologize for my absence, sometimes life gets crazy you know, and things get put to the side.  Then all of a sudden your realize how many things have been pushed aside and that you need to start picking the pieces back up and getting back to your version of "normal". So here we are in 2014 in my 45th year of life, picking up and moving in a forward direction again one step at a time:)!

So what was I doing in all this time away anyway?  The list is long but I will paraphrase.
We had some big ongoing family issues involving one of my kids mental health. That for now have settled down, they were a lot to deal with for me and my family and I took a lot of destress days.  The good news is that as these issues have progressed through the years I have grown and destress days are shorter than they used to be and I recover much faster than I used to.

We had a death in the family.  On the day of the funeral my son was staying with a friend of ours, her internal defib unit malfunctioned and he was the only one there to call 911 and then call us for help.  She was shocked 18 times in a half hour and was quite sure she would die, the good news is she is fine. And my son was honored at the annual county fire convention as a hero in the county and also given the Liberty Award by our Senator.  He was embarrsed by the entire thing but we were proud of him.

Hubby had shoulder surgery for a torn rotator cuff in the spring, it's been a long painful recovery for him and now he may be facing another surgery as a MRI has revealed two more tears.  He has not been able to work since last May, somewhere around the time of my last blog post.

There was a major home reno going on, you know the story these things always take far longer than predicted and that ate through most our summer.  I wish I had taken before pics, unfortunately I only have progress and after pics, lol.

Then November 1 I had to take a "real"job again and have been struggling with how to fit everything in, and being angry with myself for not having focused more on my biz so that I had to take a job outside the home. Finally after three months I am starting to find a bit more balance. 

And then or course came the holiday prep and holidays, winter weather, and a baby shower for my oldest who is expecting at the end of this month.  Can't believe there is going to be a little person in this world calling me Grandma or that my husband will be a Grandpa.  It's a boy folks, and I can't wait to meet him!

Through all this I went through some huge creative dry spells or times when there jsut wasn't time and it left me feeling a little empty and not knowing why. But now I know and am back at it! If we are facebook friends you may have seen some of my recent beads there. I also had my most successful show ever this summer, that gave me the confidence to apply for bigger shows this year.


I tell you all this not for pity, or as an excuse but to say that whatever it is you are going through you can recover by putting one foot in front of the other and stepping forward.  Some days you will take half a step others you will take ten. Your things may be feel bigger or smaller than mine but we all have "things" that can change our path and throw us off course.  The point is just because you got off course it doesn't mean you have to stay off course, it's up to you change direction and find the path again.  You can do it, and if you need a cheerleader while you are taking those steps, drop me a message I'd be happy to cheer for you as you find your way back.