Summer Kickoff Craft/Vendor Fair

Well, I just jumped in with both feet and signed up to vendor in 2 craft fairs. The first one is at the First Christian Church in Bellflower, 17003 Clark Avenue on July 16, from 12-6 pm. I have a lot of work ahead of me to get some more inventory. They told me the jewelry market is flooded but my paper crafts should do well. Let's hope so. I guess I'll switch gears over to my wall art and cards for awhile. The 2nd fair isn't until October 8, so I still have some time to get ready for that. But boy, they are popping up all over the place. I joined a group called the Boutiquers and they have all the information on all of the crafts fairs happening. I guess I better get busy!

Happy July 4th to America

You know, it's hard to believe that there are men and women out there willing to give up their lives to protect our country. A lot has changed since the Viet Nam war, thank goodness. At least our country is more supportive of the soldiers. I know many charities that do things for them. I belong to a card swap, and I really don't send cards to anyone, so there is this charity that takes handmade cards and sends them to soldiers, or people with cancer or some other life threatening illness. I send all the cards I get from the card swap to this charity. I made a circus theme card for the first swap (it was birthday for kids theme) and a tie shaped card for men's birthdays at the second swap. Now I have 20 cards to send to this charity. Looking forward to it. Here's a picture of the Kid's Birthday card I made:

It makes me feel like I contribute something to someone in need. I really do enjoy helping people that need help. Hope you had a happy 4th of July. Our church picnic was a blast, good BBQ'd hamburgers and hotdogs, cookies, chips and of course watermelon. They had balloon launchers that I had never seen before, and boy could they send those water balloons a long ways. It was fun!

Exciting News!

I sold my very first piece of jewelry on Ebay. My Swarovski Crystal Heart Saphire Blue Pendant necklace. I really needed this. My spirits were starting to dampen. Now, I feel like there's a light at the end of the tunnel and hope. The world is nothing without hope. Thanks everyone for the encouragement. I love reading and responding to your comments. Our blogging group is now up to 92 members. That's a lot of blogs to read, so I may not get to all of them as soon as I would like, but I'll try.

Wire Wrapping

My jewelry hasn't been selling on Ebay, so I decided to take a look at the kind of jewelry that was selling. "Nada", "Nothing", "Zero", boy was I dismayed, but that day in the mail the Deluxe Thing-a-Ma-JIG showed up. I've had fun playing with it and finally got a necklace turned out. I'm not sure if it's my style that people don't like or if I'm pricing things too high or the real problem, is probably not much is selling. I may have to try the craft fair route. But I don't think I have a high enough inventory for that. What would be the right amount. I have 18 necklaces and 5 sets of earrings and many, many bookmarks, some cards and a couple of wall art hangings. I'm not sure which way to go at this moment. Any suggestions would be appreciated.

Jasper Necklace with my new Thing a ma Jig.Deluxe

 I got this new thingy that helps you design and make your own connectors and designs for chains. This is how it turned out, not too bad for a first time. This is a Jasper pendant on a silver plated chain necklace with Curly Q's linked into the chain.

Matching Earrings

1. These are the matching earrings.

These are the matching earrings for the blue/green/silver cross stuff.

Zebra Cross Necklass

I still have to make the matching earrings to go with this, but thought I would post a pic of it anyway. My new cross creation.

Children

Does anyone else out there have grown children? You know, you never get to stop being a mom. My son called me with some disturbing news regarding his father and my daughter and yet he gets upset when I react to it. 1. If you don't want a reaction, then don't tell me someone has hurt one of my children. 2. Mom's react. Sometimes, we may even overreact. 3. I love my children so much that I would do anything and everything for them. I feel like I have to be mother and father to them because their dad turned into a ******** after our divorce. He has caused great emotional trauma to my daughter and still does so today and it's really hard for me to just sit back and watch it happen. We live 1,700 miles away with our daughter inbetween us. Even though she's 21, I still just want to rock her and hold her and tell her everything is okay. Of course, she won't let me. Very frustrating being a parent of grown children that are going through painful times and you can't do anything about it except just be available. Do you know what I mean?

Cowgirl Rodeo Cross Necklace

For some reason, this necklace looked like someone interested in rodeo's would wear. I love the color combinations and the cross is absolutely stunning in real life. I think it turned out pretty good and have received a lot of comments on it. What do you think? It took me about 3 hours to make and of course, as usual, I did it in the middle of the night. I usually make my jewelry sometime between 2 am and 6 am. I have chronic insomnia, so don't get much sleep. Here's the necklace:

For my sister - the Beach Comber!

My sister lives in Long Beach, WA and loves to walk along the beach picking up beach glass, shells, driftwood and everything else. She is quite talented in the craft area. She's starting to make windchimes with some of the seashells she's picked up over the years. She's also found a lot of agates on the beach. So, to cheer her up, I made her the beach comber's bracelet with a little bit of everything. Hope she likes it. It is pretty full and dangly.