My finished beadwork necklace sampler trying out many of teacher, Liz Printz's, techniques, full and detail.  I think I may yet add dangly pieces but here it is so far.  Here is the beginning of it.

I am teaching a class this weekend on how to make torsos at AnnMarie Garden.  Today is get it all together day.  I need a class handout, of course.  And my printer isn't working well.  On-line chat over an hour with HP did nothing to help that along – just made me frustrated because I had to deal with my spaghetti cables and 1 – 2 minutes waits for replies in the "IM" chat.  I didn't get it fixed.  I pulled out an old printer (if you can't go through, go around).

Was going to go to an opening this evening, but it's going to rain so Husband drove the car with A/C instead of the motorcycle to work (tons of sense to that) and I'm not wanering out for a 2 hour 1 way drive in my non-A/C card when it's soup waiting to turn into "severe weather" this afternoon.

I'll save the story of the gorilla clogging the toilet for another day.

BUT:  I do have the rest of the day to now play with beadworking and my kiln load…I made ceramic beads…here comes some new jewelry.  So all is not lost.

Then I read Christine Kane's recent post, "Overcoming Overwhelm:  5 Practical Secrets to Peaceful Productivity," and laughed out loud at:  When creative types get to ask themselves, “Well, what do I feel like doing now?” you can pretty much bet that nothing good will come of it! She's good, is Christine, and I definitely should do another retreat with her.  I feel a need for nourishment of soul and her retreat does that for me.  I also feel a need for "upleveling" it as she calls it – all I need is $$$.  And I'm thinking maybe I should treat it like school and just pay for learning things it's going to take me three times longer to figure out on my own.  I dunno – can I do that locally without a mentor?

Anyhow.

I wound up buying a new card for my camera and it works just fine.  Only $40, much less than I paid for the much smaller card that died.  I gave up on retrieving the photos – nothing was crucial.  Some of it was sad (you just can't recapture that very moment ever again with little ones, but I think I got the best ones off before the card died).

I have a full kiln load to unload a a full iln load to create because I have an order from wholesalecrafts.com that I need to fill.  But today is jewelry day and I'm going to go play. (to the right:  the focal of my next beadwork project, using one of my own ceramic focal beads that I've had around a long time, and a "failed" glass bead that looks great slumped).

thought for the day:  Tao changes very quickly…When things go badly, those who follow Tao seek the causes and correct them.  If the problem cannot be corrected, they shift the entire frame of reference so that the relative importance of the problem is diminshed or eliminated….avoid fixed routines…do not stick stubbornly to ideas or patterns.  Tao is formless, constantly creative and relentlessly in flux.  Those who follow Tao seek to change with it.  Deng Ming-Dao, Everyday Tao:  Living with Balance and Harmony

Touchstones: remember who you always wanted to be.  Each one individually hand made and one of a kind to be placed on your desk, in your garden, under your pillow for sweet dreams.  $5 each.