Amazing Creation

The creative world and the people in it amaze me over and over with ideas and creations. I don't window shop to copy but to be inspired to do better by all the lovely or fun work out there. While these are not certified diamonds they sure are cute. I found them with a simple search of the word diamond on Artfire in handmade.

Did you find anything great today?

Almost Here

Just one more day and then Halloween. I have the candy ready for the little ones coming to the door. I will have a treat for the ones with hair supplements like colors or glitter, the masked ones, the princesses, fairies, skeletons and super heroes. It is all about the kids and then it will be over and we can all move on to the next holiday which is one of my favorites, Thanksgiving, and we will have a houseful.

So Gray!

This picture shows our sky right now. The sun is actually there but covered by all the dirt in the air. We are under a high wind warning and that stirs up the dust in the deserts all around us.

This puts a layer of dirt all over everything -  cars, outdoor furniture, just everything that is outdoors. As visibility drops it can get dangerous to drive. If you combine the visibility issues with the wind problems for high profile vehicles and the freeways become much more dangerous.

It is supposed to continue for the next several hours and our temperatures tomorrow will be about 20 degrees lower, that is in the 60's. The only good part of this is that we may get a bit of rain.

This is....

This is Lisa. She has two beautiful boys. You see one of them here. She is married to my son. The day they married was one of the very few times I saw my husband and son in tuxedos. They looked so handsome. Lisa had a birthday last week and being my strange self the last little while I didn't get her birthday post with her picture up. Since she rarely holds still to get her picture taken at family gatherings I got this from her Facebook page. I had to. Who can resist a laughing baby?
Happy birthday Lisa and many, many more!

Something Good

As grumpy as I was yesterday I do have something I am enjoying lately. The weather here is lovely right now. High 80's may sound warm to some but around here it feels nice and comfortable. I can open all the windows and the sliding patio doors, get all my ceiling fans going and the house is very nice all day. It just feels so good when you can breathe fresh air instead of recycled cooled air all day and all night.

So Tired.

I am so confused. Last week my energy levels were up. I felt optimistic and got quite a few projects, home and crafty ones, done. This week I am stuck again. I feel tired, not motivated. Every day this week it was lunch and a nap and then waking from that with a yucky groggy feeling in time to start thinking about dinner. You know, or maybe you don't, it was the kind of week where in the mornings the thought of walk in tubs instead of stepping over was sounding good. Here's to a better week.

Never Again

Never again. Those are the words I heard this weekend. A guest room is being painted and carpeted in my house to make a cozy place for visitors. For at least two people we will have a bed rather than air mattresses on the floor. Jim's home office was moved from that bedroom to the formal dining area of our living room. We don't do formal often enough to keep that space as is anyway. The move involved taking down the head damaging chandelier and putting up a new ceiling fan with a light fixture on it. the ceiling fan installation did not go real smoothly even though Jim is a very talented handy guy. The box said "The 5 Minute Fan". The box lied.


So now there are two things that will happen here when hell freezes over, I find an eye wrinkle cream that works or pigs fly. The first is laying a travertine stone floor and the second is installing another ceiling fan.

House of Night

I never knew about the mother/daughter team, P.C. and Kristin Cast, that write the books in theHouse of Night Series until the other day. So far the series includes the titles Marked, Betrayed, Chosen, Untamed and Hunted. There is lots of excitement among the fans this series since the next book, Tempted, is due to be in stores before Halloween. Aimed at the teen reader the series explores all the topics relevant to that age group with a vampyre twist thrown in.

To keep their House of Night fans up to date you can find out all the latest in the usual spots on line. I have the video embedded for you here. If you want more than that you can hear an audio of the first chapter and browse the latest on the House of Night Fan Page on Facebook.



What are you waiting for? Click the links, explore and enjoy. I already did.

Lighten Up!

I have found a fun place to help me build great room with lots of choices to set my own style. That is I guess if I ever really set my own style. I change my mind a lot. It is the Gemini in me. What seems perfect one day needs to be freshened up the next.

Lighting goes a very long way to creating a feeling in rooms I have discovered. I have only purchased a couple of the lamps in our home. They are pieces that I love. Others have been hand me downs or gifted or ugly contractor standard things that came with a house when bought it and not always what I would have chosen for myself.

What would I choose? Well let's do my favorite thing. You know a bit of browsing or internet window shopping.

I would love to have this bathroom light fixture on the right in my own master bathroom. What do I like about it? I like the finish of the metal. I like the number or lights. I also like that the shades are facing down. I think having the lights down puts the light where you need it and is easier to keep clean. If you have a smaller room I saw these in variations of two or three lights. Another reason I like this is the shape. Curved designs always seem to appeal to me.

Moving on into by bedroom I don't know about you but I want a pretty beside lamp. I like to read in bed and having a lamp on the nightstand would be perfect. I have a lot of blue in my room and this one on the left would fit right in. For a tiffany style lamp the color on the shade is a bit softer than some of the stained glass shades with lots of bright colors. It might be a bit large for that purpose but I do like it. What do you think?

It is just one of my strange ways of thinking that I guess that I like bedrooms and living room lighting and furnishings done in more traditional styles and desk or office area lighting and furnishings with a more sleek or modern feel. That is why this metal, jointed desk lamp is my third choice to show you today. I also like this kind of lamp for sewing areas too. You can stretch it out or swivel the lamp to get light just where you need it. That is something much needed and very convenient for this old bifocal wearer.

Did you like window shopping with me today?

Reminded

I was reminded yesterday that I did not post one of my infamous birthday pictures for my youngest daughter on her birthday earlier this month. Since I wished her a happy birthday on her facebook page I thought I had it covered but I guess not. Here she is for her moment of fame with her children on a visit to Arizona last year.

She turned 27 this year and like me this birthday kind of bothered her. I didn't mind turning 30 or 40 or even 50 but for some reason I remember being rather depressed on my 27 th birthday. Maybe it has something to do with being firmly in your late 20's and being forced to accept that in the eyes of the world you are expected to be a competent grownup. You have to spend time worrying about all those adult things like auto insurance, health insurance, caring for kids and hoping for the best in their education, taxes, spouses, home, jobs and on and on and on. You believe that this is drudgery is your life for the next 50 to 60 years or so.

However each stage from wife to mother to grandma, from busy house and jobs to empty nest has its own joys and challenges and it will all be okay. Like I did, Cindy will get over this slight bump and get very comfortable with who she is and how old she is. I am certain of that.

Do you remember an age that really bothered you? Why? I love when my readers share their stories. Tell me yours.

Just for Me

Well not actually just for me. I suppose I will share these with Jim when I fix dinner. These are one batch of my oven dried tomatoes. I put olive oil, salt, pepper and dried basil on them. I am looking forward to using them as appetite suppressant pills or rather appetite satisfaction pills on my homemade pizzas, pasta dishes, stews and whatever else crosses my mind when I get them out of the freezer this winter.

Do the experts, who ever they are, still say that tomato stuff is good for heart health especially for men? If so I got you taken care of honey.

Great Weekend

My weekend was busy and fun and I hope yours was too. On Saturday we went up to Payson. That drive seems to be a regular one for us on the weekends. We stopped at the fruit stand again as they were getting ready to close for the day. When a tired vendor of fruits and vegetables is getting ready to pack up and go home it is a good time to shop. We got almost 2 cases of tomatoes, a case of apples, some pears and some potatoes all for $10! I have spent today making tomato sauce and trying out drying some of the tomatoes in the oven. Tomorrow I am going to make some apple pies to go in the freezer for Thanksgiving when we will have a houseful.

Sunday was spent getting cars washed and going to the Cardinals game. We were treated to seats in a suite by Jim’s boss. (Thank you Tony!) It was a nail biter fourth quarter but the defense really saved the game. It was so much fun to be in the crowd on a winning day.We had a small brush with fame after the game. We ended up at the elevators at the same time as John McCain and one of his daughters. Jim shook his hand. I didn’t get the camera out and ask for a picture because I figure every one needs a day off. We wondered later if senators have some secret safety products to protect them when needed when they are out in public. There were some quiet guys in suits around but I really don’t know if they were part of his group or not.

Silly Sounds Making Smiles

Do you ever run across words that just make you smile?

Once I wrote a post on the EtsyBloggers team blog for a shop named Hello Pineapples. Just saying it made me grin. Then there are the cute things kids say. For example last week on our way to dinner in Tooele with our tenants my granddaughter asked, "Why do they have two willas?"

What was it that put these silly things in my mind today? I ran across the word Kettlebells. I think it would make a good replacement word for others that should not be said in front of the little ones in your life.

What words make you smile?

You Choose Dear

We recently got a new television. The old one died and I didn't think it was really old enough to do that. In the process we had to or rather Jim and the sales guy discussed the merits of plasma tvs vs led tvs vs lcd tvs. The whole thing made my head spin. In the end I really did not care which one we got. I love computers but other electronics are not what I get real excited about. Now that we have lived with the new tv for awhile I admit I like it and the picture is great but I probably would have thought that no matter what we chose. The one we got is a le…. no maybe lc… oh never mind. When we watch football Jim says he can count the blades of grass. Me? I am usually just listening and knitting so it might as well be on radio.

Autumn Leaves

This picture says fall to me. It was taken in October a couple years ago on a trip we took between Utah and Arizona in Zion National Park. We had stopped to take pictures at a view point of the cliffs there. I looked down and saw the beautiful autumn colors in this bush and it was added to our collection of pictures of the day.

If these colors and shapes say fall or autumn to you let me show you some of the items for sale on ArtFire that echo these things.

How about a pair of earrings from the shop Button Divas?

At Heather's Handmade Creations you can find all kinds of seasonal cards.

In Whimsigals shop based in the Southern Hemisphere where it is spring she offers this lovely Autumn Leaf Brooch.

Last but by no means least, in one of my favorite art forms, this stained glass suncatcher from Blessings - Glassworks. Beautiful isn't it?

So tell me what says autumn to you?

This post is part of the Blogfire Guild's biweekly blog carnival. The carnival will be published tomorrow on the guild blog. To read other posts in the carnival or to find out more about the guild check out the guild blog.

Are you interested in becoming a seller on Artfire? If so I would be honored if you used my referral link.

Wednesday

The middle of the week feels so strange when it starts your week at home. We spent Sunday through Tuesday in Utah and now we are back home on a Wednesday that feels like a Monday. Jim went off to work this morning and I got caught up on laundry and other things that pile up even when you are away a little while. There is still no magic housekeeping fairy here to do things while I am gone. 

We did have a good time with those that we were able to see. Don't tell Hilton Hotels but we had three stowaways in our room on Sunday night. They think it is a special thing to come to the hotel and spend the night with the grandparents.

something new

I have always disliked the look of the few fonts available by default from Blogger. They all seem cold and businesslike.

A couple days ago I saw the little button on my desktop for Windows Live Writer. My distractible self went off on a couple hours of exploring the possibilities. I wondered if I could use lots of fonts with this software? Guess what? Every font on my computer can be used and shows up on Blogger.

I like the script styling and dare I say cozier look of this one. I think it fits me much better that Courier, Times New Roman or Georgia. What do you think? Is it easy on the eyes and easy to read?

I like it for now anyway and I hope you do too.