Happy Anniversary

Today is my grandparents' 62nd wedding anniversary! It's so nice to have one more thing to celebrate when you're wondering if this will be "the last one" for one of your loved ones. My grandma's birthday is coming soon, marking the beginning of the birthday season for our family. Every little party we can cram into a calendar is great!

The girls have been doing their usual crazy stuff. The little one scraped up the back of her neck goofing off around the bricks of the fireplace and the bigger one got a dose of road rash when she sneaked out on her bike without safety gear. I guess some things they just have to learn on their own. Our schedule has been crazy, too. We had some very special guests spend a weekend with us--my husband's folks from North Carolina drove out here. We were constantly on the go, it seems. The next weekend, we participated in the National Wildlife Foundation's Great American Backyard Campout. Oh, that was a blast! The weekend after that was Independence Day and our garage sale. If you recall that star-spangled necklace that I posted back in May, I wore that and got several compliments. I made some earrings to coordinate while I played cashier in my garage.

I made a few other things that I simply haven't had time to photograph and post until today.

Here's a pair of earrings that I love for their "rockabilly" character:

I finally made some earrings to go with the "Solar Flair" necklace and bracelet set. The photo makes it almost impossible to tell, but there is actually an orange bead on each earring, not another red one.

When I bought a dress at Old Navy, it turned out that I had a lot of glass beads that matched it. I wanted to use up as many beads as I could, so I put together a long necklace that could be doubled for a shorter one. I made earrings at the same time so I wouldn't have to play catch-up again!

This morning, while the girls were in Vacation Bible School, I made another necklace/earring set and a "goes with anything" kind of bracelet. The pendant is ceramic glazed with turquoise and brown. I paired it with amber glass beads and reconstituted turquoise chips. The glazing on the pendant reminded me of peacock feathers and the turquoise chips reminded me of something much more North American. I'll call this set "Horse Feathers." Because I can.

Here's a close-up of the pendant's front:

I started dabbling in some macrame jewelry, mainly for some children that I know who are highly allergic to metals. I even got some quality mother-daughter time in when my older daughter wanted to make a bracelet with me! Yay! I started to dabble with a few different items and this is one of the outcomes:

I like the way this little handbag turned out, but it launched a whole new mess of ideas. I'm on a desperate hunt for a specific type of purse handle that I can modify into a long beaded, ribbon strap. I want to try a black boucle yarn with the jewel-toned ribbon yarn. I think that would be dazzling. And I want to try a chunky bead or something on the front. As long as I keep it all very close to the whole jewelry thing I've got going on right now.

Before I close, I just have to mention that I've been playing around with my website. I modified my "Coming Soon" page so it will have my sun logo and mention when "soon" is. I still have some playing around to do to make the site more interesting, but I don't want to invest too much time (and Excedrin) into something that is going to be COMPLETELY different come February of next year.

Well, that's everything to date! I've got to get ready for my grandparents' anniversary dinner now.