Speaking of...

...Wednesday...

What? I'm sure someone was. Somewhere...




So, as we have established, it is Wednesday. Today I should have a mondo-sized coffee next to me because it is insanely busy (I mean, I only get to type about 2 or 3 words here before I have to answer the phone again. Sheesh!). In fact, I could use some booze in my coffee, that would help a lot, I'm sure. But I have no coffee left, and I have no booze. How sad.

Oh lighten up. I'm just joking.
Sort of.

Speaking of coffee... I think we have a coffee stand for every 10 persons in this town. They are everywhere. 15 years ago we had maybe three latte stands. They multiply. Like rabbits. Or weasels. (Starbucks is a weasel, in my opinion. No offense, but I am not a fan...) Anyway, a couple years ago I read in the paper that we had something like 256 coffee stands in our county. Which pretty much means in this city, although there actually are a few in outlying areas. I'm sure there are at least another 100 now. It's crazy.

Speaking of stands...I used to pick my coffee stands by proximity. To where I lived, where I worked, that kind of thing. There was an awesome one near where 911 used to be housed (the Public Safety Building morgue basement (used to be the morgue, once upon a time. Cheerful? Not.) I went there primarily because their coffee was okay, but their chai tea was fantastic! They made their own - none of that boxed Oregon Chai crap (sorry, but again, not a fan). Then the owners sold the place and it no longer had that fabulous chai tea. There was much weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth but they finally told me if I didn't stop doing that they were going to call the police, so I quit. And quit going there.

Then our office moved (thank goodness, because now we have windows! Although, we are near the rendering plant now, so it often stinks to high heaven out there.) There is a coffee stand kitty-corner-ish from there, and I started going there just because it was so close. And they had pretty good coffee. But then the girl who used to work mornings left and the owner took over and for some reason she wasn't open half the time in the morning. So I stopped going there, too.

But then I "found" this place.



It is 5 minutes from my house so I can actually have coffee to drink on the way to work! Which is great. And the coffee is great, and reasonable priced. But now I'm sad. Yes, sad.
And not just because I am at work without booze.
No, today I am sad because my favorite coffee girl is leaving.

This is A--. (Names have been shortened to protect the silly.)


She is almost always here when I come through for my "usual". I haven't had to tell her what I drink for the better part of a year (I am such a creature of habit...although she has, from time to time made special, interesting and tasty suggestions for me!) But A-- is leaving to move onward and upward in the world. She has taken a job that hopefully will parlay into a good career for her.
But I will miss her. And her sunny smile. (And her lattes!)
I am lucky, however, that the other girls there are nice as well and also excellent latte makers!

But speaking of A's last day...to wish her well I made her one of my funky, chunky necklaces:


This is a really cool glass pendant that I got at Wonders of the World downtown. I have no idea how they do it, but it looks like flames on the back, which is fun.


Speaking of fun (not)...Secret Agent Man and I are working on putting in a big flower bed out front. I don't think I'm going to quit my day job to work in landscaping, but it is kind of sucky hard painful rewarding. I am taking pictures, hopefully I can post the finished work soon.
The best part of that will be that we are done! Yea!

So...what are you speaking of on your hump day?

Beauty of Spring Necklace

A little behind on my blogging for beads... but I am finally posting.

The theme this time around was "The Beauty of Spring". I decided on these lovely "Peek-a-Boo" porcelain beads from Artbeads. I also used a variety of Swarovski bi-cone beads, in different blues and greens. I wanted something that had some layers, yet was light and airy feeling. This is what I came up with.



I love the combination of colors, which made me thinks of blue skies and new green leaves. Seemed perfect for spring. Or summer, even, because it's kind of a beachy combination, as well.


I have worn it a couple times and get good comments on it. It was fun, a little different than my usual stuff.

Go here: Blog for Beaders, to see more designs and some fun projects.

Necessary Legal Stuff: I have received the above mentioned products from Artbeads.com and am honestly reviewing them. I have not been paid for my endorsement.

Spring Fever Necklace

A while back (has it been that long??) I said I was working on a necklace using some of the pretty, pretty beads from Artbeads.com. Well, I finally got it done! It turned out to be fairly labor intensive, plus I haven't had much time to work on it, but I think it was worth it.

I used these Czech glass flowers and these Venetian glass beads and these Olive green ("Army" green) glass beads and a whole bunch of these Rose Swarovski crystals and these Olivene Swarovski crystals. Along with some old peachy-pink glass beads I had laying around.

It kind of represents my desire to be done with winter and get on with spring!








Necessary Legal Stuff: I have received the above mentioned products from Artbeads.com and am honestly reviewing them. I have not been paid for my endorsement.

Jewelry

I finally FINALLY! got some jewelry listed in my secondary Etsy shop, olive hue 2! Over the next few days (and weeks) I will be listing more. It's been fun, if not a lot little time consuming. I really like making jewelry. Hopefully I can make stuff that has some appeal to people other than myself!
I started making jewelry a couple years ago when I kept finding stuff I liked in catalogs. Most of it was listed as "artisan" and "one of a kind" and had a hefty price tag included! So after finding one particular piece I really wanted but couldn't afford, I went out and bought my own beads and made my own version!

These new ones are a little vintage, a little steampunk, really girlie, and fun.

New Ideas, Sunday Drive and Old Lady Glasses

[First off, this picture has nothing to do with anything except I think it would be funny to see my Buster Kitten in a variety of hats...but he would claw my eyes out if I actually tried anything like this with him and then he would slink off into a corner and not speak to me for days. Well, he doesn't really talk to to me, but you know what I mean. Anyway, I've done a little series of drawings with Buster in a variety of hats. This is my Eatser Buster. He would hate this one most of all.]

So, I have decided I'm going to try getting into the glass pendant necklaces like I see on Etsy and other places online. I have noticed a lot of them are using art papers and Japanese papers, which are really lovely, but I'm hoping that I can maybe do one better by using some original art work. I've noticed florals seem to be popular. But what do you all think? What kinds of pictures/art/images do you think would be nice/fun/cute/pretty, etc (and by that I mean sell a lot)?

On a different note, the weather was great today! It was 58 degrees outside and it's hard to believe that we had 4 inches of snow last week! I am feeling much better than last week, so we took a long drive in the country. Then we came home and watched this movie, and then this movie. Phew! That was a lot of violence and action and car crashes and dead bodies (I read that "Shoot 'Em Up had a body count of 108!) and wow, what a ride! Definitely better, for that genre than the last intense action movie I watched (see this post).

Tomorrow is my 2nd day off and I am going to get the dreaded bi-focal...I already have to wear glasses most of the time, but it's gotten so that I can't use just my "regular" glasses at work because I can't see anything close. I have these in the tortoise/green and I like them ok, and I have these in dark red, but they are way too dark for my face. So hopefully I will find something I really love. We'll see!