Beadin' It Up!

Glass fans, today is for you! Bead haters, click away now. You have been warned.

I have been busy on my torch, including a really great class this past weekend, so I thought I'd share the fun with you. I'm doing something else fun tonight, so maybe I'll have TWO things to talk about in ONE week.

Nah, never happen.

I had a friend who ordered two frogs and a ladybug for his young daughter. I haven't made a satisfactory ladybug yet (although the teacher of the class chose my first effort bead to go on a necklace for her stuffed animal), but here are the two frogs, one blue and one green. I hope she likes them. Need to get crankin' on that ladybug!

The glass shop where I buy most of my glass has a great necklace made out of all red, white and black beads. I was inspired by this to rip it off shamelessly. Here's what I have so far. The pendant (front left) was actually going to go to my beloved doctor, but I don't like it, so I'll be making her another one.

These beads are all made with silvered glass, that crazy expensive stuff that I love so much. On the left is a pendant that's decorated all in silvered glass except for the pink swirl. Silvered glass fumes the underlying glass, so you can only see the true color of the base bead under the pink.

The four beads on the right were all made with Triton and light purple transparent. I simply have not figured out how to tame Triton under a layer of clear glass, although other people have no problem with it. I keep getting a weird orange color. I described it to someone this weekend, and she made a really funny face at me and said, "Orange? Really?" Yes, I'm a freak.

The four in the middle worked out more or less as planned; I may make earrings out of the matching ones.

The beads in the picture below are my recent experiments with color reactions, which is another particular passion of mine. The three on the left use turquoise, purple (called EDP or evil devitrifying purple because of the difficulty people have in working with it) and copper green, all of which are highly reactive. Until recently, I was skeered of EDP because I've ruined beads with it. Now? What the heck, it's just glass, right? Every bead is a learning experience. And I managed not to ruin those three, or the one on the right, or the one on the bottom left, all of which used EDP.

The one on top is powder pink with rubino decoration, really nice looking. I'll have to pick up some more of those colors to play with them. On the bottom left is copper green and silver pink. I'd like to try copper green and silver blue and am requesting that my handy dandy glass shop stock some so I can try it.

The bead set below is the original one I made for a co-worker. After talking further, we ended up with a different design for her, so I still have these, looking for a happy home. The base bead is blue (messy glass), with a twisty of yellow and silver pink.

The necklace below is one I made for myself in a bunch of different colors I liked together: turquoise, pea green, violet, cobalt, pink... just all sorts of stuff I wear. I made it long so I can loop it around twice.

These are a bunch of black beads. On the left, a spare of a cross I made for a friend. On the right, a suggestion from a friend (he has the one that's not etched), and I kept this one. Then he and another friend asked if I could make a cross like that bead, so I did (sorry for the knot on the bottom of the bead, can't be helped). On the bottom is a black and yellow bead requested by a friend who rode in a LiveStrong challenge.

Next up is my new favorite bead. I got some new silvered glass this weekend called Aurae. I lovelovelove it, and here is why. This is a white bead with Aurae decoration.

Another view of the same bead. I only hope I can replicate it, because this one will probably leave me very soon, and I want my own.

Here are the beads I made in class this weekend. The instructor, Andrea Guarino, was amazing. She was personable, such a great beadmaker, and so generous to share the techniques that are the backbone of her business (not that any of my beads look like hers, so she's in no danger from me). These are Saturday's beads. The two to the left of the hearts are ones I made at home on Saturday night -- I was that fired up.

And these are Sunday's beads. Notice how many fewer there are on Sunday. These are a lot more complex. The one on the upper left (which, again, looks nothing like one of Andrea's) takes her an hour to create. It's called a Sea Garden. The two in the middle are called Galaxy beads, and the one on the right is an Ammonite.

Same beads, flipped over so you can see the other sides.

If you really like the bead pictures, make sure you're checking out my twitter feed; I post pics there whenever I make a new batch of beads, and lots of those pics never make it to the blog.

I Love a Halloween Challenge!

It's not often when you're charged with helping someone celebrate a holiday for the first time.

It happens when you're a parent, but then those people don't remember the celebration.

For Halloween this year, I had the great joy and privilege of helping someone celebrate Halloween for the first time as an adult. One of my co-workers , named Pei-Yeh, was here from Taiwan, and she was fascinated by the holiday.

I invited her to my house for the day with lots of plans in store. First up: my friends Matt and Becky came over, with many tools and stencils and a hollowed out pumpkin. Becky is the ultimate craft queen: she can sew (being a lifelong quilter); she can crochet; she papier-mache'd their Halloween costumes. She also, not surprisingly, is a crackerjack pumpkin carver.

Unfortunately for Becky, hubby and I had gotten the world's most difficult pumpkin the day before Halloween. Warty and thick-skinned, it resisted any tools we could throw at it: pumpkin tools, steak knives, paring knives, even a hammer/screwdriver combo. This explains why our pumpkins turned out thusly. You guess which is which.

Once finished with the carving, Pei-Yeh wanted to see my torch and watch me make a bead. I had previously made her a necklace using some beads I made:

So now, since I had a frog bead that I needed to make for a friend, she went out to watch. Here is what I made; it's probably the best frog I've managed to make thus far.

Once finished with melting glass, Pei-Yeh and I changed into our Halloween costumes and prepared to go trick-or-treating with Son the Younger and one of his friends. Since they are 16, we hoped to blend into a crowd of teens. Here's a pic of me and Pei-Yeh in costume:

Here's my sweet baby boy... doesn't he look cute?

And this is his friend the Evil Clown, who took great and horrible glee in scaring older children all over our neighborhood.

We had a wonderful time trick-or-treating, and no one question Pei-Yeh's age, although I got a funny look or two and one snide comment.

After the trick-or-treating fun, we headed downtown. In Austin, that means 6th Street, which is party central. I've never been on Halloween, simply because it's such a zoo. It's a great place to people watch on any ordinary weekend, and the street is barricaded on weekends to allow for foot traffic, so on Halloween? On a Saturday night? With perfect weather? Fuhgeddabouddit. And I would have, had it not been for Pei-Yeh. But what the heck, I'd never been, so off we went.

We left early, arriving around 9pm. There were plenty of families and lots of older folks to be found. I would assume that as the evening gets later, the average blood alcohol gets far higher, the younger set comes out to party, and the costumes get wilder. I was more than happy to come early and go home early. Still, there were some great costumes.

The Shrek family. Notice that even the baby is dressed up. How cute is that?

This guy was on stilts and had some serious stilts skills. He was as comfortable on stilts as I am on my feet (and more so some days).

I'm not sure what this guy is, but it's a cool costume.

Pei-Yeh was delighted to pose with Yoshi.

And tell me this isn't the greatest group costume ever: the entire cast of the Mario games!

I've spared you a couple of the other pictures I took, like the dancing fat man who painted himself blue. Suffice it to say that Pei-Yeh thinks all us Americans are crazy.

I'm not sure she's wrong.

Loving God: Good, Better, Best?

My small group recently finished a study called Morph, produced by my church. There are four modules, and we did the first one, called Love God. (If you click on the Morph link, you can create and account, view the content, and even print it for yourself.) I'm also reading Francis Chan's Crazy Love, which is life-changing if you're willing to allow it to be. And I'm trying.

After a pretty intense 8-week study, I had a sort of idea of how I was supposed to love God. And there are some people in my church who seem to do it pretty well. One friend, Karin, is one of those people who is LOUD in her love for God. She dances, she "AMEN"s in church, she writes of her passionate love for God on her blog.

Last night I was reading a chapter in Chan's book about people whose love for God outshines anything else in their lives. These are some crazy life stories. I asked God last night: why don't I love you like that, with that passion, that intensity, that fire? Help me love you more completely, God! Bring it on!

I got kind of a weird answer. Seems I'm not my friend Karin, and I'm not those other people either. I'm not wired like them; I'm wired just like me. My love may show in different ways. I'm not sure how that works yet, but I'm working on it.

While I was praying last night, and doing my best to listen to God instead of doing the babblebabblebabble that I'm usually guilty of, I heard Him... I heard Him tell me what I told you above. And then I heard a slightly different "voice," similar but different, that I knew wasn't God the Father. Somehow I realized instantly that this was the voice of Jesus. He told me that living with His love unleashed in my life doesn't tie me down; it unfetters me. It FREES me. I had this mental picture of shackles -- cuffs -- falling off my wrists and ankles. Then I remembered a well-known verse: "I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me!" (Phil. 4:13)

The next morning, when I woke up, I read the next chapter of Chan's book. In it he says that "our talk doesn't match our lives. We say things like, 'I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me,' and 'Trust in the Lord with all your heart.'" Um, W O W. Someone trying to get my attention?

There is power in these statements, in these promises, and we leave it lying there. We don't trust in God. We don't know that we can do all things, so we don't go into areas that require any more than our own puny strength.

I have one life. One. One life on this earth, and it's short. I don't want to settle. I don't want to forget the power that I've been freely given, the power that Jesus died and rose again to bestow on me.

God, please don't let me forget again.

What I Did on My Summer Vacation (All of Them)

This post is shamelessly stolen from Vince's blog since I don't have an original bone in my body and I'm not ashamed to admit it. And I like maps and find it interesting to see where other people have been.

So here's where I've been:

visited 16 states (32%)

I've driven from Texas to California by both the northern and southern routes, thus filling in all those states, and I've driven to Illinois and Florida as well. I've flown to Hawaii and New York for fabulous vacations.

Unfortunately, the rest of the US remains untouched. I hope to make it to Alaska on a cruise next year with my fun aunt who's celebrating a significant birthday. I guess the rest of the country will have to wait.

What am I missing that I must see? Where have you been? Create your own map, post it and tell me -- or just post a comment telling me how many states you've been to.

What I Love: Today and Always

After a too-long blogging hiatus -- come on, we're all busy, but really? there's nothing to say? And yet I can carry on a conversation with a friend for two hours -- what do I come back with?

Well, with love, of course.

What do you love most? What do you love best about today? And what do you love best about your life in general?

I was thinking about this last night, but yesterday was just too busy a day to write a thoughtful post like that starting at 11pm, so any readers I have left (hi, Daddy!) had to wait one more day.

I'm sure you felt my absence for that one more day.

Without further rambling, here's what I love best about today:

• It's raining. We've had a lot of rain lately, but as hot and dry as the summer was, I'm gonna love the rain for a long time.
• I got to go to lunch with a co-worker and two customers, all of whom I consider friends. Some days my job is pretty amazing.
• Tonight I get to meet with my small group, which is a great bunch of people that I get to love on and learn about God with. Some of them are folks I haven't known very long, but I really enjoy them.
• Before small group, I'll be cleaning up my house. I love it when my house is clean. (I don't so much love the process, but the product is fantastic!)
• Small group ends early enough that I'll have a little "me" time. What will I do? Will I make some beads on the torch? Read? Catch up with some Mythbusters on the DVR with my teenager? Do some beading? I don't know, but having an hour or two that I can do whatever I want makes me very happy.

And here's what I love best about my life:

• My family. I have a husband who truly couldn't love me any more. I have two sons who couldn't be more different than each other -- and who are both amazing in their own unique ways. My dad calls himself a curmudgeon, which is true, but there's no curmudgeon I'd rather spend time with: he's as fun and funny and charming as he ever was. My sister, as different from me as my sons are from each other, is one of my best friends, and her hubby and kids are fantastic. My in-laws are wonderful. Even my crazy extended family, all 173,897 of them -- they're a lot of fun. That's a lot of stuff for my first bullet point, enough for a whole post!
• Some of the silly material things that I enjoy: my house, my car, my cell phone (my first smart phone, and oh my gosh, how did I ever live without one?). Sure, I could do without any of them, and I have. But I'm thankful for them, just the same.
• My health. In the last few days I've heard a lot of stuff about people that aren't healthy. A friend's mom is being treated for cancer. Austin's iconic homeless cross-dresser Leslie is hospitalized with a head injury. A four-year-old girl in Uganda needs treatment for a seizure disorder. I mean, sure, I have migraines and rosacea, but in the big picture? No big deal.
• My friends. I have some really amazing friends. I've had seasons of life without close friends, so I try not to take them for granted.
• And, of course, I love God, who I consider to be the source of everything listed above, plus the other dozens of things I didn't list. I don't love Him as well as I should, but I'm trying to do better.

What about you? What are you thankful for? What are you loving about your life, today and in general?

Should The Church Play It Safe?

I'm glad I go to a church that doesn't, but I'm speaking here of The Church in a Biblical sense as Christ did, as His bride.

My church has been doing a series on sex, the rationale being that everyone else is talking about it; why shouldn't we? Topics were GodSex, MarriedSex, SingleSex, UnfaithfulSex, and SameSex.

That's right, we actually talked about homosexuality in church.

My church has a large homosexual population. We're a seeker church, modeled after Willow Creek (both original pastors came from there), and a lot of people who have been burned by church or who never set foot in church feel very comfortable there. The flip side is that we end up with a lot of messiness. [Tongue in cheek] I'm sure Jesus never had that problem Himself. [/Tongue in cheek]

For years, this has been the elephant in the room. It's a topic that's easy to mess up. You can alienate the gay population, or you can alienate people who see themselves as believing in Biblical truth. I would not have wanted to be in the shoes of my pastor yesterday. He restricted himself to a 15 minute talk, then interviewed three people from our congregation who struggle with same sex attration (two women and a man). Unfortunately, I can't embed the video, but you can click here to see it.

One of the staff members sent out an email asking people to wear a white t-shirt if they would commit to pray for these folks as they courageously agreed to be interviewed. She said she would be on the front row praying through all three services. I joined her on the front row for the last service. Hearing what these folks went through brought tears to my eyes. There was a lot of emotion in the room, even for the normally emotionless last service.

How does your church handle tough topics? Do you talk about them head on or shy away from them?

Life is Fragile

It's not like I didn't know that, but I got quite a reminder today.

After I'd been at work for an hour or two, my hubby called me. He'd been talking to some of my former co-workers (we're all still friends) and found out that the wife of one of my old managers passed away last night. She was young and it was very unexpected, and it leaves my former manager as the single father of their daughter.

I went by this afternoon to visit with everyone, and a couple of the guys had gone to see him over lunch. He's not going to be himself for a long time, I think. I wish there were something tangible I could do to lessen his suffering, but of course there's not.

On the way back to the lab where I've been working, I ran into an acquaintance whose wife died several years ago. He hadn't heard the news, so I told him and we talked for a bit. He and my old manager have been acquainted for years, but of course this is something he would never have wanted to have in common with anyone.

Never leave anything unsaid, folks. Tell your loved ones how you feel. Don't wait until tomorrow. It might not come.