1 2 3 Sale!

I am having a sale in my shop on Etsy!

Buy 1 item, get 10% off
Buy 2 items, get 20% off
Buy 3 items, get 30% off

And so on....

There is lots to choose from. Polymer clay pendants, gift tags, necklaces, buttons and more!

See you there!

It's Friday!!

Finally! It seems like forever since I had a day off of work. While I am very grateful that I have a job, when so many people do not have one, it seems at times as if I never truly get any time to myself. The last few months I have been either working at the clinic or "working" at home trying to get everything done. I have a list a mile long of things that have to be done, and no time to do anything.

My husband put in the garden yesterday since it was raining and he got home at 11am. We have 4 varieties of tomatoes, green peppers, zuchinni (seeds), cucumbers, and this year, leeks! My raspberry jungle is quite out of control (no time to thin this year) and I should have quite the bumper crop. I just hope this year that it is not raining everyday like last year. It seemed that every raspberry had little black spots on them.

Today I have to do the banking, grocery shopping, and take my son's new cell phone in to the store. Apparently even though it is a 3-phone family plan he cannot call me. His phone thinks it's number is mine. He tries to call me and gets his own voice mail. Weird. My husband and I can call each other and him, and he can call my husband. Just not me. And really, that was the whole point of it, since he is now 18 and I want to be able to reach him and vice versa as needed. Sigh

I think today I am also going to try to cut the rest of my bamboo canes into sections. I got half way done last weekend and ran out of time. Plus my dremel gets a bit hot since the bamboo is quite hard. It tends to grab and kick, which loosens the "nut" (sorry do not know the right word) and then it just will not spin. Once I have the sections cut, I will be shaping them and sanding them. Ohhh and drilling the holes, cutting the cords, drilling the holes in the wood circles I hang them from, and so on. Hmmmm...I might get a little caught up in it and forget to go to town! Maybe I had better do all that first.

Here is to a (hopefully) productive weekend!

Monday again

It is Monday again, and it feels like the weekend never happened. Have you ever had one of those? Not fair, really! I had so many things I needed to do, I never really had any time to myself.

I did manage to finish my bamboo windchime (see previous post) and start cutting more canes. My dremel starting to kick and buck (the bamboo is very hard) so I had to stop only half way through. I still have 4 more canes to cut into sections, then I need to shape, drill and sand all the sections. I plan on measuring out all the cords I need, and drill all of the hardwood circles too.

I have some "ideas" for unique clappers and pieces for the bottom for the wind to catch. So far, using the pieces of the bamboo I cut out of the sections as the windcatchers seems to work fine. I just do not want to make them all look alike.

My husband and I went to the garden center to buy the plants for my vege garden yesterday. Apparently here in our area, I was about 2 weeks behind everyone else. So many had bought them the beginning of the month then had to replace them all due to frost kill. So end result? I did not get any romano tomatoes, zuchinni or even the peppers I like to plant. We ended up with 2 varieties of tomatoes I have never tried (Heinz and another one), and bought a pack of zuchinni seeds. There will be lots of time to have those grow, so I am not worried about that.

Hubby did not plant them in the garden yet, he had a headache when we got home, and I was too busy trying to clean house and a million other things on my "to do" list. As it is going to be raining tomorrow, we will try to get those in the ground then.

I have to work all week, so will not have much free time. So I hope you all have a wonderful week!

Bamboo Windchimes

Finally! After months of preparation and practice, my first set of bamboo windchimes are up in my shop on Etsy!

1 2 3 Button Sale!

I am having a sale in my shop on Etsy!

Buy 1 set of buttons, get 10% off

Buy 2 sets of buttons, get 20% off

Buy 3 sets of buttons, get 30% off

And so on :)

(Percentage off is on the price of buttons, not including shipping)

These buttons are all handmade by me from polymer clay.

Prepping for Summer

The next couple of weeks are going to be very busy. I spent the weekened cleaning out my freezers and making jams and jellies with the remainders of last year's strawberries, and most of the blueberries and raspberries. I think I have 2 large bags each left of those. I also ran out of pectin and have to buy more before I can finish those off.

I also weeded my flower beds, and thinned out my nursery beds. I do believe I literally have hundreds of little oriental lily, and muscali bulbs. Once the tulips are completely done, I will go through those as well.

When the lilies are finished blooming this year, I must remember to colour tag the stalks for when I clean out those as well. A couple of years ago I had planted a few white-based oriental lilies with my vibrant bright red ones, and ended up having some really lovely colours. Burgandy, pumpkin orange, yellow and one that was so dark it looked black. I wonder what I will have this year?

My Iris's are also going to have a banner year. They are huge! I even ended up with a totally white one, which I did not plant. Hopefully that will stay white and multiply!

Three of my little spring phlox plants had spread out so much I had to divide those and move them over by the driveway. There is an area of the front flower bed that struggles to grow anything but weeds, so I figured why not put them there? They should do nicely I think.

A neighbour of mine was also clearing out some of her flowers, and offered to give me a bunch of lily of the valley plants. I traded her for some of my lilies. There were some volunteer wood violets in the bunches she gave me, so hopefully those will spread too. They are a nice purple colour.

I even found some very strange flowers in one of my nursery beds. I have no idea what they are, or how they got there. They are a nice white flower, and look like a star. Similar to a columbine, or star flower, kind of a hybrid of the two. I did not take any pictures this weekend, as I am waiting until I am done before I do.

I have to work pretty much every day for the next two weeks, so that drastically reduces the time I can spend in my yard or on crafts. The garden got tilled, and next weekend I have to go get my tomato, zuchinni, and pepper plants. I might even try some onions again this year. They are very potent when I do grow them, and as we prefer the large sweet onions I tend to "forget" to buy them.

My Obi !

Here is, somewhat belatedly, my gorgeous birthday gift from my sister. Isn't it simply devine?

Congratulations!

Congratulations to the winning artists of the PCAGOE Team May Mica Shift Challenge!!

Artbylin
Marcia Palmer
Jan Geisen
Silver Gate Studios
Jill Kollmann

And congratulations to the winners of those who voted!

Aprilee Lawson
Cindy James
Diane Wong
Jennifer Morgan-Cheng

To see the full post, please check out http://www.pcagoe.com/

Mica Shift May Challenge

Here is the beautiful treasury including all the pieces entered into the PCAGOE Team challenge for May. Aren't they all simply gorgeous?

Happy weekend!

Yesterday was my birthday and against all odds (having to go to work and all) I had a lovely day. It started with the best present of all, my son remembering! Then, my friends posting happy birthday on my facebook wall, and when I arrived at work, my boss and co-worker sang to me. They also had made a little sign and hung it on my computer. A bit later, they had put in a little notice on each Doctor's day schedule so that they and the nurse's could see it. It was a bit embarrasing though LOL

After I got home from work, my mom, dad and my sister both called. It is so nice to hear their voices. They still live in Winnipeg, and I do not get to hear from them very often. I try to call them as often as I can. I moved here about 5 years ago, and was able to go back for a visit last year. In fact, it was for Mother's Day that I went to see them.

My mom had made me a lovely frog blanket for my birthday. She crochets, and wanted to be able to hug me, so by making me the blanket, it feels like she is hugging me whenever I snuggle up to it.

My sister sent me a lovely trio of garden yoga frogs, and an awesome Obi! It is absolutely gorgeous! I will take a picture of the frogs and the Obi later this weekend. Today, my husband and I are going into London for a shopping spree. He and my son need clothes, we both need books, and I definately need to get some new Birkenstocks. My pair from last year are a bit stretched and nasty. I think this year I will buy 2 pairs, that way I can rotate them.

I am still trying to find a source for wood, to make the circle bit to hang my bamboo windchimes from. I thought that I had some cherry wood coming, but the man who had it, had already split it up for firewood. Not impressed. Ah well, I will find something soon I think. I did tell my husband that perhaps I should look into buying my own scroll saw so that I can cut my own.

Here is a picture of the other necklace I had made to put in my Etsy shop. I call it Stars Crossing. Since I am trying very hard to not use too much metal in my work, the ribbon being looped over an end bead for the clasp seems to work quite well.

The Challenge is On!

The May challenge for the PCAGOE Team is Mica Shift technique. It is a really cool way of getting extra dimension to your polymer clay pieces. The short explanation? You use polymer clay that has little bits of mica in it (already mixed or mix it yourself), and use something to make impressions in it. Something like texture sheets, or stamps. Then you very carefully slice away very thin slices, until it is pretty much flat. This leaves a 3-D image in the clay. Once the piece has been cured, you sand it and buff it. It looks like it is all lumpy, but instead it is really smooth.

Here is my piece for the challenge, and if you look closely you will see what looks like little oval holes in it. In reality, it is very smooth and flat.

By clicking on either picture, it will take you directly to the listing in my shop for this lovely, hypo allergenic, metal free necklace.

If you would like to see the rest of the entries, just go to http://pcagoe.com/ and you can vote for your favourite one! Voting starts today and ends on May 7th!

Oh, and the contest for the Mother's Day gift giveaway is still going strong!