Bats and Queens and Nerdery.

Is "nerdery" even a word? Spell-check doesn't think so. I suppose "nerdiness" is more appropriate, but spell-check doesn't like that one either. I've always wondered... Is it a good or bad sign when you make up words? Does it show cleverness, or make you sound stupid, like you're not smart enough to know the real word? I suppose it depends on the context. Oh yes, and Marilee? Squaredelles. Yeesh.

Anyway, yesterday was nice and productive, mainly because I blew off doing my homework. I strung two great necklaces, including my own personal bat necklace. I was going to string a third, but the beads didn't quite work out, gotta come up with something else. I'll probably do that tomorrow. I also came up with another possible way to do the Nightmare Eyes bracelet, which I will work on tomorrow, too. I will not be defeated! Oh, the other necklace has the word Queen in its name, hence the Queens in the title (that and I've been watching Dr. Who, and I just saw an episode about the queen being coroneted, so there you go).

And the nerdery comes from me being a total nerd and spending $10 on a magazine about Guild Wars, my on-line game of choice. I basically spent that money to get the "free" miniature. I mean, sure, the concept art and articles are fun... but mini-pets! I love 'em! Nerdery also comes from reading more Gaiman. I wasn't too impressed by what I read last night. Other People might have been good if I hadn't figured out the central conceit one page into it. Ah well. I'm still holding out hope for more good stories later in the book.

I'm now going to go nerd it up in my video game!

Hello? Powers That Be? I'd like my Autumn back, please!

Bleh. It's 80+ degrees today, and windy. My friends in NM have been complaining of wind, too, and I know wind is contributing to the CA fires, so it feels like there's just this huge wind blowing across three states. It could at least have the decency to be cool, and bring some rain with it. It doesn't feel at all like October. I have a feeling that I will not be wearing my cloak for Halloween, which means I have to decide which dance clothes I want to wear instead.

The Nightmare Eyes bracelet project isn't working yet. I may have to come up with some other way to do it. I'm considering trying to come up with a concept that uses these red nailheads that I have... but first I'd have to find said nailheads. I'll probably let the whole idea simmer in my head for a bit and work on something else instead. I'd kind of hoped to have it done before Halloween, since it has a creepy vibe, but then again, nightmares are creepy all year 'round.

Tainted Love

Once again, I am not happy with today's picture-taking endeavors. I think I'm going to upgrade my camera soon. The one I'm using now is cool, but I think I want something with a higher mega-pixel-ness to get more detailed shots of beadwork. I'm going to spend some time this week doing a little research to see what models have a good customer satisfaction rating, and then make my decision.

Anyway! The above is my latest necklace, Tainted Love. It's a spiral rope accented with green gold stone, firepolished glass, and of course, lampworked hearts by Joan "Mothwoman" Eckard. Green and black if my favorite color combination. When I first started making jewelry, almost everything that I made was green and/or black. I've since branched out quite a bit, but I do like to return to my roots every now and then. These incredibly attractive heart beads, with their dark sparkly core inside a lime green casing, made it very easy. The rest of the necklace pretty much built itself around them.

The picture I tried to take for the Gallery didn't turn out that great, so nothing new there this week.

I had a fairly busy weekend, as evidenced by the lack of blogging. We spent a few hours visiting my family yesterday, which sort of sparked my new-camera-lust. This week should be pretty busy, too, especially since it's 4pm on a Monday and I haven't done any of my homework which is due tomorrow, or studied for my test. I'd better get cracking!

Technically, it's Saturday now.

Well, Friday just totally slipped away from me. I spent the whole day with Chris! I need to have more discipline if he's going to be home, and do my work before I start goofing off with him. Today was a really nice day, though. Early in the afternoon his former co-worker Rene, who also runs our D&D game, called and asked if we wanted to do lunch. So we all went to this new Greek restaurant that opened just down the block. Ohmigosh it was so good! I was stuffed for hours afterwards, and I didn't even get baklava. It took forever for them to bring the food, but otherwise the service was great. We had two servers keeping our drinks full and whisking away empty plates. And our waiter was so tall. It was another one of those trying not to stare situations!

Anyway, the cool thing about going to lunch with two programmers who've spent the past couple years working together, is when you make an off-handed comment about maybe switching to a better shopping cart, they come up with tons of ideas on how to improve your site. So assuming Chris doesn't start a new, demanding job right off the bat, there may be some awesome additions to www.erthefae.com soon!

I did finish the necklace I was working on today, which means tomorrow I need something new to make at D&D. I think I'll do a bracelet, a specific bracelet that just popped into my mind. Usually I talk about inspiration after a piece is finished, but tonight I'm going to tell you the inspiration first! The other night I had a very strange dream, where I was in my parents' neighborhood, on the way to their house, and there was a huge storm brewing. The clouds were swirling dark grey, and in the swirls, there were shadowy demonic/ghostly shapes with glowing red eyes. This was not a new thing to me, as in my dream I said "I always get scared when the storm clouds look like that." That image has been in my mind off and on all week, along with other, more disturbing ones that I haven't even wanted to talk about. But the demon-clouds will make for a cool bracelet, I think. And they may pop up in a book someplace, just like the other two vivid dreams I've had in recent months.

I'd like to ramble on more about dream imagery, and the awesome music that played while I blogged (Radio India by Wench. I dance to their Voodoo song all the time, but I forgot that their other stuff is great, too), but it's past 3am so I'd really better get some sleep.

Of Piranhas and Ghost Stories.

Image: Angry Piranhas

Angry Piranhas! is a necklace that I made some time ago, using this set of really awesome piranha beads by Chase Designs. Piranha beads! How often do you find something like that? My only complaint is that I'm not a huge fan of the brown color of their bodies... But the beads themselves are just too cool. Wicked little fish with giant teeth!

I've been reading my way through Fragile Things. There's nothing like a good short story collection, be it by one author or many, to keep me happy. I can sit down and read whenever I want, but not get sucked into a huge plot that will keep me from getting anything done. So far, A Study In Emerald has been the best, it made me smile the entire time I was reading it. There's just something about stories set in Napoleonic through Victorian era England that I love, and adding Great Old Ones into the mix is a recipe for happiness. So far there have been a lot of ghost stories, too, which is entirely fitting for this time of year.

I love ghost stories. When I was a pre-teen, I had a book called Ghost Words, at least I think that's what it was called. I can't find it in Amazon, so either I've got the name wrong or it's long-since out of print. I can't remember the author's name, it was just some young adult book that I picked up at a used bookstore, and it entranced me. I read it three or four times, and I'd probably read it again if I still had it. Somewhere along the way I lost it, or maybe decided I'd outgrown it. It was a very sad little story about a girl who had been given a name that her mother saw on a tombstone, and the ghost of the girl who had originally had the name. I was captivated by the horror of the ghost's existence; there was some passage where her foot started to fall apart or something like that, and I loved the creepiness of it. It shaped a lot of my current taste in books, to be certain.

I think that the main appeal of ghost stories is that whether the ghost is malicious or benign, there's always a sense that they are a ghost due to some sort of tragedy. I'm very drawn to tragedy in writing and roleplaying (to the point where I mock myself for it), and ghosts fulfill that need perfectly. Not only was their life cut short for some reason (for ghosts are rarely people who simply died of old age), but now the spirit lingers on in life for some reason. It's quite touching.

Someday, I hope to write a really good ghost story, but until then I'll settle for reading the works of better authors.

Snow Angel.

Image: Snow Angel

I'm in a much better mental state today than yesterday. Thanks go out to all my friends and family for their encouragement, thoughts and prayers. I tend to be a real worry-wart, so I appreciate everyone's patience with me freaking out over something which is shaping up to probably actually be a good thing in the long run.

My first priority today was updating erthefae.com. The above image is my most recent lariat, called Snow Angel. I'm really happy with the fringe I designed for it. I'm sure I'm not the first person to do that particular configuration of fringe, but it's new to me. I love how it evokes images of feathers. I want to work it into some other jewelry, probably involving faeries and more crystals, for a decedent Gothic look.

Snow Angel is the light counterpart to a previous lariat, Fire Dancer. I bought both sets of Robert Jennik's spiral beads at the same time, with the intention of making lariats. It can be really hard to find paired artist beads of the right size to be lariat ends -- usually they're smaller, intended for earrings. I really love how these flat spirals look at the end of a highly textured spiral rope lariat.

I also posted Angry Piranhas! in the gallery. I'll talk more about that tomorrow, though.

Update Postponed

Today my husband was told that he's being laid off from the job he's held for 9 years. They still want him through December, and there's a severance package involved, so we're in no financial danger. Nonetheless, change is always hard so we're both very stressed out. I spent the first half of today worrying about whether or not he was going to lose his job, and the second half dealing with my feelings over it actually happening. And hey! Now I have to go take a Chinese test. Must focus...

Due to this, the website update has been postponed. I couldn't settle down enough to break out the photography equipment today. I should hopefully be able to tomorrow, but I won't make any promises. I do have to say that I'm really, really happy with the lariat that I'll be posting. Still trying to decide what I want to add to the gallery, though.

Night Into Morning.

My night owl traits are back in force, as evidenced by the fact that I'm here blogging it up at 2am. I haven't done this for a while. Today was an atypical day, however. Chris was home from work, but I had a lot of work to do so we didn't goof off much. This was the first day of my new effort to stay on a schedule, and I have to say that I got a lot done. I did an insane amount of Chinese homework, lots of housework, finished one necklace and made significant progress on another. All this, and we went out to dinner with a friend and spent 1 1/2 hours at the restaurant.

What I haven't done yet is read Fragile Things. It's still sitting there, in the Barnes and Noble bag, tempting me to say to heck with sleep and stay up all night reading. If I didn't have a test tomorrow, I'd probably give in.

Anyway, the good news is that it will only take me about 5-15 minutes to finish my homework tomorrow, and then study a bit for my test (the tests are easy, so it won't be much studying). I should have plenty of time to update the site. Hurrah!

Blogging About A Zillion Things!

It's been a very interesting weekend so far, so I have a lot of little things that I want to talk about. Let's go over them in no particular order.

Today Chris and I went back to Barnes and Noble, which had a much more reasonable Sunday afternoon crowd. He picked up his science book, and I bought Fragile Things, by Neil Gaiman. I'm so happy that this book is finally in paperback! Granted, I've already read a few of the stories, but the vast majority are new to me. I'm really looking forward to reading them, especially since I know at least one of them has a Lovecraftian vibe (I read the first page of it one time when I was stranded at B&N, but then I got un-stranded right after I started it). Oh, and I'm really hoping that the creepiest story that I ever read is in there, so I can make Chris read it.

Afterwards we took a trip to Target for boring necessities, and I decided to look for clothes. It is almost time to put away my Summer clothes, so I need some Autumn stuff. I didn't see much that grabbed me, though. To be quite honest, a lot of the clothing that's being marketed at my demographic is downright ugly. Not just ugly, but so unflattering in cut that it's destined to make me look ugly. However, they had some blouses that looked nice enough, and this one line by some designer named Alice something, which had a really nice Victorian/Edwardian Gothic feel to it. There was this gorgeous black blouse with lace and ruffles and a high neck... and of course, they didn't have it in my size! I WILL own that blouse before the end of the month, and I WILL wear it with my elegant black velveteen skirt, and I WILL look smashing.

Oh yes! And this morning, when I woke up, I had the pleasant surprise of seeing Night Shift at the top of Art Bead Scene. This humble little blog got a shout-out in their "As The Bead Turns" blog post about blogs. So yes, I am blogging about how another blog blogged about me blogging about bat necklaces last week. Anyone want to blog about me blogging about this? :P

Anyway, Art Bead Scene has really been inspiring me to use up more of my stash of art beads. Yesterday I worked on a really cool Gothy green necklace, but the tiny lampworked hearts that I'm using didn't want to hang straight. I'm hoping that I can find a way to make them play nice, because honestly, I don't think I have anything else that matches the rest of the necklace... whoops! More on this story as it unfolds.

In other weekend news, and continuing with the largely overwhelming theme of things Gothic and/or Lovecraftian, the excellent people over at the HP Lovecraft Historical Society have just posted a teaser trailer for their next movie: The Whisperer in Darkness. While that's honestly not one of my favorite Lovecraft stories (honestly, I think the main two characters were kind of stupid and set the standard for characters in horror movies making dumb mistakes), I'm excited to see the movie. Note that while Call of Cthulhu was silent, this production is one of those new-fangled talkies. Clearly, this is so they can attempt to portray the eerie buzzing voice that forms a central part of the plot... I've not decided yet, based on the trailer, whether it would have been better to leave it the imagination. What I have decided is that I like the starkness of the title/logo.

In completely unrelated rambling, I saw a simply gorgeous woman at the grocery store today. She was middle-aged, with tan/olive skin and dark hair, slender. Though her looks were not what most people would consider exceptional, I was very struck by how she was dressed and how she carried herself. She had a long sage-green skirt with darker green trim along the bottom. Her top was a dark forest-y green with a touch of olive, sleeveless and low-cut. This deep neckline was largely taken up by a bib necklace of disks of paua shell that reflected the green of her clothes. I find that Trader Joe's is a great place to see women with stunning fashion sense, and today was just one of the many days when I've found myself envious of how beautiful and put-together someone looks!

One final thing: my weekly website update will probably be this Tuesday, not Monday. Chris is off of work tomorrow, so I'll be hanging out with him instead of doing photography. I may possibly have to push it all the way back to Wednesday, but only if my homework takes longer than I expect it to.

Stupid Book-Signing!

For whatever reason (probably has something to do with our insatiable bibliomania), Chris and I always end up going to Barnes and Noble whenever we have some sort of special occasion. As tonight was his birthday, we headed off in search of books after dinner. Upon arriving there, we found the parking lot packed. At first we attributed this to it being 7:30pm on a Friday, and there being two popular restaurants who share their parking lots with B&N. That was before we noticed the gigantic Laura Ingraham bus and the van and canopy and such from a local political news radio station.

I'm not a fan of crowds, and I am a fan of being able to actually browse the shelves in the bookstore, so I said "Hey, let's just drive across town to the other B&N." But no, Chris was not having any of that. He boldly declared "Laura Ingraham is not going to prevent me from buying a nerd book on my birthday!" Please note two things: Neither of us have any idea who Laura Ingraham is, nor did we have any opinion of her prior to this night. Also, Chris likes to buy and read non-fiction science books, which I affectionately call "nerd books" or "geek books."

When we got inside, we found that the store was packed with Laura Ingraham fans, and the store had some sort of thing going where you had different colored tickets, and you couldn't get in line to get your book signed until your color was up, and oh hey, hope you weren't looking for video game magazines, because we put a big radio station banner over them and have the author standing in the magazine section. PHEH! Oh, and of course, if you're not in line, feel free to stand in the "New Releases" section of the Sci-Fi/Fantasy category, because it's not like any fan girls might be looking to see if Gaiman's "Fragile Things" is out in paperback yet.

I quickly got frustrated at my inability to look at things that I might want to buy, so I wandered over to join Chris in nerd land (I did find that "The Ladies of Grace Adieu" by Susanna Clarke was in paperback, and I decided maybe I would buy it if Chris bought anything). The only people in his aisle were actually looking at books, but the end of the aisle was blocked by the signing line. He found a book on the brain's ability to read (see, nerdy) and decided that's what he wanted, but he also wanted to look at religious books for some reason. Hey, guess where the line was? That's right! Right through the Religion section!

And that was when we decided that enough was enough. Chris put his nerd book back, and we left without even looking at the bargain books. The place was just too much of a zoo. Honestly, I do not think our B&N is big enough to handle such a large book signing... When you have to place the author in the middle of the magazine section and wend the line through the aisles, something's wrong. And when your customers can't get in to look at the books that they would very much like to buy, something's wrong. The whole situation left me feeling very disappointed, as we hadn't been on a book shopping trip in forever, and I really wanted some new reading material. I guess we'll just hit the store again sometime later this weekend.

Otherwise, everything is peachy-keen and I'm looking forward to spending my Saturday gaming and beading!

Moving right along.

Image: Baby Bat

My current bead project is moving right along, and will definitely be done in time for next week's update. It's all light colors, as opposed to the dark hues I've been working on so much lately. It's good to change things up every now and then. Not sure what I'll do next after this, except that I need to string a necklace to go with a specific cool-weather top. I've had the beads picked out for a while and just haven't taken the time to put it together. I also want to come up with one or two more things for the Art Bead Scene contest. Naturally, I've already entered Baby Bat and Night Shift.

Chris came home sick from work today, so naturally our Wednesday night game is off, but I'll probably bead just as much if not more than I would have if I was gaming tonight. Chris is very low-maintenance when he's sick, mostly he just sleeps. It's so much easier for me to take care of him than for him to take care of me; I always have him going to the store for cold meds, more Kleenex, and foods that are easy on my pooooor ravaged throat. Heaven only knows why he puts up with me!

I've gone a little batty!

Image: Night Shift

In the spirit of the season, I've made a couple of bat necklaces. The first is Night Shift, pictured above. It features a pewter bat by Green Girl as the focal. The second is Baby Bat, which has a lampworked bat and accent beads made by Joan "Mothwoman" Eckard. In both cases my goal was to make a nice, Gothy bat necklace that wasn't in stereotypical Halloween colors. After all, loving bats doesn't mean that you also automatically love orange! I'm very happy with both necklaces and feel a strong desire to wear them all over the town for the rest of the month. I think I'll have to make myself a bat necklace now!

I tried something new with the pictures, zooming in so that only part of the necklace stand is in the image. It seemed like a better idea in my head than it turned out to be in actuality. I'm starting to develop a strong loathing for that particular necklace board. I like the black velvet-y one much better, but neither of these necklaces would have looked good on it.

In honor of today's batty necklaces, I have to share these socks. Knee highs with bats on them! How cool is that? I plan to make a Sock Dreams order sometime this month, now that it's about time to put the sandals away for the year... The hard part is going to be not going overboard.

Autumn Musings.

Ahhh, I'm loving this beautiful Autumn weather! Last night I actually had to break out a blanket for the bed. My girl cat Lira likes to get under blankets; when I still lived with my parents, I had a waterbed, which was of course nice and warm. During the Winter, Lira would spend pretty much every night under the covers with me, curled up right between my knees. Now she contents herself to spend a few minutes snuggled up against my chest before moving on to her usual nighttime haunts; but for those few minutes, she purrs like a motor-boat! So sure enough, last night I wasn't in bed for more than 10 minutes when there she was, pawing at the blanket to get me to let her in.

Another great thing about cool weather is that it's perfect for hot drinks. We had some delicious tea last night, and I'm sure we'll have more tonight. It's also about time to buy hot chocolate again! Mmmm. Chris makes coconut rice for me sometimes, and it doesn't quite use a whole can of coconut milk, so I love to mix the remainder into hot cocoa for a creamy treat.

The other great thing is that when it's not too hot in the kitchen, Chris cooks his delicious marinara sauce. Just tonight he made a huge batch of it and we had our neighbor over for a big pasta dinner. I am SO stuffed.

I tell you these things now, because in a couple of months I'll just be grousing about the cold and how much I hate it. This is my proof that I'm not always negative!

Yesterday's take-along project turned out to be a lovely new spiral lariat. I don't know if I'll finish it in time for tomorrow's update, but it's unlikely. It will definitely be ready for next week, though!

Beautiful Weekend

Wow, I woke up today and found out that it is gorgeous outside! Makes me want to ditch gaming and go hang out in the park with my beads. I mean, gaming is fun and all, but we play in a CAVE. There's not a single window in that back room. It's supposed to go back into the 90s during the week, so hopefully I'll be able to enjoy this beautiful weather a bit tomorrow.

Last night the laws of physics and I had a disagreement as to how the beads should hang in the pendant I was working on. Since physics won again (I'm pretty sure they cheat!), I'm setting the pendant aside and working on something else for the weekend. I just haven't decided what that is yet, so I need to go into the beadroom and cook up something cool.

Various and Sundry Things

Today I finally get to all of the things that I've wanted to post about, but have been too busy to collect my thoughts on.

First! Isn't the above Greenman awesome? My equally awesome mother made him for me a couple of weeks ago, and I keep forgetting to post a picture. He's made out of polymer clay, with a dusting of mica powder on the face. Eventually I'm going to hang him on the wall, but for now he's sitting on my desk, guarding one of the many stacks of books.

Second! As you may already know, I love to write. My work to date includes assorted novels and short stories (all of them unpublished, sadly); roleplaying gaming columns; reviews of movies, comic books, books, and whatever else that I feel I can get away with reviewing; some of the text on the LL-BFAC site; bios and artist statements for several of my beading pals; and of course, all of the text on my site and this blog. Armed with all of that experience, I've branched out into the world of writing website text and such for others. My first client is Hollyrose Aromatherapy! I had a lot of fun re-writing her product descriptions. Oh, and by the way, I highly recommend the Patchouli Woods scent if you decide to order anything.

Third! Art Bead Scene's challenge theme this month is "Gothic Queen." Needless to say, this theme appeals to me a lot, and of course, it's perfect for October. I am all kinds of jazzed. So far I've entered Dark Lady of the Depths and Devil Duckies! Be sure to look at the other entries, there's some great stuff up already and the month has only just begun.

Fourth! I am working on two other exciting things that I will post about as they develop.

Cruisin' Right Along.

Things are going well in my world right now. I'm keeping very busy with beading, side projects, and class. I haven't had much time for writing, but that's okay, if the inspiration gets too strong, I'll make time. There are a few things I'd like to talk about here on the blog, but they involve hunting down links and writing long paragraphs, and I only have a couple of minutes... So I'll get to them tomorrow, when my evening is pretty much open.

For now I'd just like to say that I have one awesome necklace ready for Monday's update, and one more in the works, and other ideas percolating in the back of my head. Percolating is a fun word, by the way. I don't drink coffee, but I still like to say "percolating."

About The Gallery.

As I mentioned yesterday, it's high time that I turned some attention to the Gallery section of my website. For the longest time, it was empty. Then I put my 2007 LL-BFAC project in there. And ever since then, it's been untouched. Well, no longer! My new goal is to add at least one item a week to the Gallery, whether it's something new that I've beaded, or an old treasure that deserves to be shown off.

Today's additions are things that you may have already seen, if you've been reading the blog for a while. My 2008 LL-BFAC project, Flaming Teeth; Beautiful Brown Birthday Bauble; Lady Aerelin's Prize-Winning Flower Garden. Next week I plan to photograph some more of my collection to share, unless I've made something new and cool. You just never know!

That's all for today! Right now I've got to go finish the necklace I've been working on, and study for Chinese class tonight.

October Already?

It's hard to believe that it's October. I can't exactly say that time is flying, because honestly, now that I've been busy with homework and side projects and ad tracking and whatnot, the weeks have felt a lot longer. But it still doesn't feel like it should be October already. Not that I'm complaining, mind you. I love October! The weather cools down a bit, which means I can start to bake again. The stores are full of candy. And at the end of the month, I'll have another convenient excuse to wear a costume. All in all, it's a great month.

And today certainly feels like the start of October. Outside it's grey, with sporadic drizzles of rain. It's that perfect temperature where you can walk outside in a t-shirt and not feel hot or cold (that's Fall weather for a desert dweller like me). Of course, all of our trees are still green. My neighborhood is full of palm trees, pines of various types, eucalyptus, mesquite and palo verde, none of which lose their leaves. There are a few varieties of tree in Tucson that shed their leaves, but most of them turn yellow and drop rather quickly. We have none of the beautiful, dramatic colors of the Eastern states. But hey, did I mention... t-shirt weather?!?

In other news, my site and e-mail are once again behaving as they should, and all is right in the world. I don't have any new jewelry for today, so I think I'll update the sadly neglected Gallery instead. Tune in tomorrow for more on that.

Site down again.

Not sure what is up this time, but I haven't been able to get into my e-mail for at least the past couple hours, and my website also seems to be down. If it's not up when I get up in the morning, I'll definitely be rattling my host's cage. In the meantime, I guess I can be glad that all the ads I had running expired today, so it's not like I'm missing out on any click-throughs from them ;)

Sorry to have been so quiet lately, been kind of busy. More about that throughout the week. Right now I'm pretty tired.

Class 'n' stuff.

So, Chinese class was pretty small tonight. I'm not sure if a lot of people just happened to not show up, or if they all decided it was a rough class and quit. Most of the cool people were still there, though, so it's all good. We had our second test and other than not remembering the character for the name Yu, I think I aced it. And even though I knew most of the words in the chapter that we started tonight, I learned some new things about grammar, which was great.

One thing that I like about class is being able to see what other people are wearing. Lets face it, most of my socializing is with gamers, and most of them wear shorts and t-shirts, which is fine, but not very inspiring. My Chinese teacher, though, has a very good sense of style. Her outfits are always well put-together and the colors and styles that she picks are good for her complexion and build. My classmates have a pretty wide variety of fashions, and tattoos, too, so there's always something visually interesting to look at. I just hope they don't think I'm staring at them for weird reasons!

At this point, I'm trying to decide whether I want to work on jewelry right now, or write some, or just goof off and play video games. I had a very busy day, with homework and housework and class, and now I'm ready to relax.

Dark Lady of the Depths

Here's the one necklace that I managed to make last week, Dark Lady of the Depths. I really love how she turned out. She looks even better against a black background, but doesn't photograph well that way.

There are a couple of elements at play in this necklace. One was my desire to make a Goth mermaid necklace. Something about the focal bead seemed rather Gothic, and I don't know if it's the dark pewter, or the aloof expression on her face. I'm very happy with how I achieved a darkly elegant look without using much pure black.

The other element is the silver teardrop pearls. I acquired them some time back. They were part of a traveling bead box that was making the rounds of members of my bead forum. I want to say that they were added by my late friend Helen from FL (not to be confused with my local friend Helen, who is thankfully still very much alive. Apparently people named Helen have a tendency to be awesome. Keep this in mind when naming your daughters!), but I can't be sure of that. Anyway, I liked the color and smooth shape, so I kept them for my own. I've tried to use them in several projects since, and they never quite fit. The shape didn't line up with the beads I wanted them next to, or the shade of grey wasn't quite right. I grew very frustrated, because they were beautiful and I wanted to use them. After my most recent failure to work them into a project, I thought about these blackish Swarovski pearls, and how pretty they'd look with the stubborn drops. When I brought home the mermaid, that settled it. They had to all be together. I added the shadow crystal Swarovski bicones and black mother of pearl chips for extra interest. The result is a very harmonious blend of silvers and black.

I'm over halfway done with a woven necklace that utilizes another Green Girl bead, and I also have plans for a necklace with a cool faux jade vintage glass cab that I picked up in NY. Plus I've been working on my book, and tonight I danced for the first time in a while. It feels good to be doing all of these fun, creative things. Of course, I should have been doing my homework.... I guess I know what tomorrow holds for me!

Class and things.

Tuesday through Thursday is turning into a rough time for me! Chinese class itself is very easy right now; I already know all the words and grammar rules that we're learning, so it's just a matter of practicing how to say and write them properly. Honestly, I get pretty bored in class. But there's so much homework! I feel sorry for anyone who has made this class part of a full workload. The homework isn't even that difficult, it's just very time-consuming to write all those characters. As such, a good chunk of my daytime on Weds and Thurs is spent doing the homework that was assigned Tuesday night. It doesn't help that we have a game on Wednesday nights, which really can't be moved because everyone already planned their work and class schedules around it (yes, it's that good).

In other news, I had a lot of fun on Talk Like A Pirate Day. I indulged in a little pirate speak, and cobbled together a makeshift pirate costume, which of course involved a lot of jewelry. I really do enjoy any excuse to dress up in a costume. Was it just me, or was there less of a big deal made about Talk Like A Pirate Day this year than there was last year? Are most people pirated out after three Pirates of the Carribean movies? Is the trend slowly dying out? Are the ninjas winning?

On the bead front, I've only made one necklace this week. I got distracted by aforementioned homework, and working on my book. I think I'll spend some time in the beadroom this weekend, looking for new inspiration.

What I made for myself.

Image: Lady Aerelin's Prize-Winning Flower Garden

I simply had to make this necklace for myself! Actually, it all started with an idea that involved a faerie pendant from Green Girl Studios, and I couldn't decide whether to make the necklace for myself, using colors that would match the faerie outfit that I got at the NY Ren Faire, or if I should make it in other colors to sell, or if I should buy another pendant and make two. Then I realized that this beautiful faerie, by Mavis Smith, went really well with the colors of the outfit, and that decided it. Now I can use the Green Girl pendant to make another one to sell, and I have this one for me!

I wore the necklace to the Sept Best Bead, and I got a lot of compliments. The necklace wasn't even done yet, I still had to add the final strand. Each strand is wrapped around the previous ones. There are four strands total, a plain one to form the core and three embellished ones. I used three colors of Japanese seed beads in size 11 and 15, numerous pressed glass leaves -- vintage and modern -- one style of pressed glass flower, Swarovski crystal butterflies, and two different colors of lampworked leaves by Joan Eckard. It's much more free-form than my usual work, and it was a little hard for me to get used to the chaotic array of leaves, but the look really suits the nature of a faerie, don't you think?

Lady Aerelin's Prize-Winning Flower Garden is one of my entries in Art Bead Scene's September contest. This month's theme is "When Beads Collide!" and the challenge is to use beads created by two or more artists. I also entered Faerie Bride, and an older necklace of mine, Purple Dawn. I hope to manage one or two more submissions before the end of the month, if my muse cooperates.

Oh, and by the way? YARH! I can't wait for tomorrow :D

This week's new lovelies!

Image: Lost Tribe, necklace of lapis, jasper, bone and glass.

Have you ever done something which you were proud of, for reasons you can't quite put your finger on? This necklace is one such thing for me. It was an inspiration that grabbed hold of me a couple of weeks ago, and kept hanging on until I went to the bead show and bought the cord I needed to tie the pendant together. It all came from me wondering what to do with those jasper beads, and thinking that I ought to put them with something blue, because brown and blue is rather popular right now, and then I remembered the lapis donut, and then it all fell into place in my mind.

And I just love it!

I mean, I'm thrilled with the necklace, how different it is from much of my other jewelry, and I'm thrilled with the picture, because it came out so sharp, even if there are some weird reflections. I'm also thrilled that my idea to tie beads together to make a pendant worked, because sometimes things that make a lot of sense in my mind don't work out as well in the real world.

So mosey on over to my website and have a look at Lost Tribe! And while you're at it, you can also see Faerie Bride, which I'm also happy with even though it photographed very poorly. And Shamanistic, a pair of earrings which just happens to match Lost Tribe.

Caught up on an idea...

Any of you out there who are also creative types (and I have a feeling that's most of my readers!) have probably come across the same problem I'm having right now. You see, I have this nice idea for a necklace, using one of the pendants I bought at the bead show this past weekend. The only problem is, I need a specific shade of orange seed bead, and I don't have it! I can see it in my mind, and I somehow convinced myself that I do own it, but I've checked, and I don't. I tried an orange that I do have, and to be honest, it looked awful. So I'm stuck, unable to act upon this inspiration until the next time I order seed beads.

The problem is, now that I've been denied the chance to fulfill this inspiration, I'm totally caught up on the idea. The necklace is what I must make. And it's not like it's even the best idea that I've ever had, I'm just being stubborn. All the beads I have, all the techniques at my disposal, and yet I can't move past this one silly idea. Hopefully I'll get past it tomorrow, otherwise I won't be able to take something to work on during the game tomorrow.

Since beads are frustrating me, I've been working on my book tonight. Book 4 is plodding along slowly, because I'm not quite sure what I'm doing with it, I just missed my characters. It is going to be a fun experience to write about NY, though, drawing upon all my visits there and my feelings about the place. I just wish I had an excuse to send my characters to The Planting Fields; now that was a magical place. Just this week we received a package from my MIL with pictures from the trip, including one of Chris and I standing on a rock with a copse of trees behind us. Sure wish we'd taken a picture of the gateway to the faerie realm, though. Maybe Chris has one on his phone. Next time I'm bringing my camera, darn it.

Back to the book for me. I'm going to take pictures tomorrow before the game, or sometime Sunday afternoon, if I'm not at a party all day.

Busy Bee!

My muse continues to work overtime. Last night I finished the very lavish necklace that I was making for myself, and today I strung two necklaces, both of which have beads that I bought this weekend and dual focals. I'll probably do some photography tomorrow, unless, of course, I get caught up in homework. This week should be a nicely varied update. Tonight I'm going to work on an ivory and orange floral necklace, if I can find all the right colors in my seed bead collection. Better start looking, it's almost time to leave!

Musing on Inspiration.

Image: Contemplation, spiral rope necklace with double focal

When developing a specific product line, such as a seasonal collection, it's important to have some sort of unifying theme. I could never limit myself to a single theme, so for my Fall Line I decided to have a few specific color ways and elements that I would focus on, for a look that is coordinated while still allowing each piece to stand on its own as a little work of art.

The three main trends that I homed in on while observing well-dressed people and store displays were earthy browns, sharp black and whites, and variegated grape tones. All of these held their own appeal for me, so I decided those would be the palette for my Fall Line. You've already seen some great browns and black-and-white pieces; I'm having a bit of trouble finding the perfect purple beads, however.

With colors out of the way, I turned to styles. Spirals are always an element in my work, hence necklaces like Contemplation (above), and bracelets like Organic Treasure. As for leaves, they pretty much go without saying, as they're a part of my work no matter the season, and are extra-appropriate for Fall. This means I've gone a little wild with leaves lately. You can see them as a focal in Medeine, dangles in Faerie Gold, and a main element in Moonlit Garden. Dangles and movement are favorites of mine, too, as seen again in Moonlit Garden and Faerie Gold, and also in Pan's Grove and Forest Singers.

Just creating new jewelry utilizing old favorites isn't enough, though. Luckily my muse came through with a new fascination: dual and multi-segmented focals. I first became captivated by the possibilities of this technique when I made the Beautiful Brown Birthday Bauble way back in May. I explored a different possibility with Dragonfly Pond. That settled it: stacking various beads to form a focal point was addictive. I could coordinate different colors and media for an even more unique look than usual, and give myself an excuse to buy even more lampwork, carved beads, and cute pendants. Life is good! You can see this concept illustrated in Medeine, with the lampwork and accompanying leaf dangle, and Contemplation, where a lampworked bead accents the bone pendant, and in Pixie At Rest, where a lampworked flower and silver pixie combine for a very illustrative focal. Next week's update should contain two variations of this exciting new theme.

I have to say, I'm always at my happiest when I'm inspired, and this last month and a half has been downright blissful. I look forward to sharing the fruits of my muse's whisperings with you in future days!

The Latest From Erthe Fae Designs!

Today marks my return to weekly updates, which will be on Mondays for now. There are four beautiful new items up on my site.

Moonlit Garden -- Pictured above. Black and white leafy-floral necklace strung on chain. I find the design to be very classic, and I cannot count the number of things I've seen in the stores and on-line that would match it perfectly.

Contemplation -- A beautiful spiral rope with a mermaid pendant, accented by a small lampworked bead. Worked in earthy colors instead of the aquatic hues most commonly associated with merfolk.

Faded Light -- Crystal bracelet in a light golden hue. Very subdued, and a nice compliment for several other items already on my site.

Forest Singers -- Earrings with lampwork beads, crystals, and the cutest little bird charms.

Tomorrow I'll discuss the inspiration behind my recent work.

Show Report: 2nd Annual Fall Best Bead.

If I had to pick a slogan for the Fall Best Bead show here in Tucson, it would be, "Great For Shoppers, Not For Vendors." Of course, Crystal Myths would never accept that tagline, as it would scare away the potential sellers, but that's what I'll always think when the show comes up.

I had a fun time at the show on Saturday. Chris and I got there sometime between 11:30-12 and found the wholesale registration table. My favorite local beadmaker (and to be honest, one of my favorite beadmakers in general), Margaret Zinser was right across from there, so my first stop was her booth for hugs, catching up, and seeing what she had that was new. One of the things that I really like about Margaret is that she is always trying new things. What really captured my eye this time was the black double-sided beetle bead with all the accents done in silver Precious Metal Clay, but that was out of my budget. I'll be saving up to treat myself to one in the future, though! As much as I loved the new beads, I decided to buy one of the first beads of hers that I saw on-line and loved, back in 2004... The spiral teardrop. It's a good thing that I did, too, because she's probably discontinuing them. You can see the one that I picked in the center of the above image.

There were a lot of great vendors at the show, and we had a few hours until gaming, so Chris suggested that we do the tried-and-true "walk through first, decide what we want, then go back and get it." Of course, it was hard to exercise any self-control, due to the table full of the work of what must have been about 20 super-talented Japanese beadmakers. The lampworkers in Japan have such a different style from the ones here in America, and I am always captivated by their work. However, budget once again prevailed, and I did not buy anything there. They tend to have an even bigger selection in February, so I'll probably treat myself then. Even Chris saw some beads that he would wear, so he may also indulge next show.

I really wanted some small but attractive focals, so my first stop after the walk-through was Green Girl Studios. I'm a big fan of Green Girl, and in fact, I already have a lot of her pendants, but I wanted to pick up some more. You can't make them out too well in the photo (they're the pretty pewter pieces), but don't despair: you'll be seeing a couple of them in new necklaces within the next couple of weeks. I really like the tree pendant, and I might try to make it into a more masculine necklace. We'll see what the muse decides.

For more nice focals, I walked across the aisle to Lillypilly Designs. Heidi does great work engraving shells and various other materials. I picked out half a dozen pretty shell pendants, in various colors. I might keep the blue and brown one for myself, because it would go perfect with this skirt I bought in NY, but the rest are strictly business! I already have inspiration for the orange and ivory one, and the green and white. I know what beads I want to put them them, so now I just have to figure out the perfect design.

The other thing I really wanted was some pretty pressed glass. I'd picked up some nice things in NY, but I'd noted that I was running out of good blacks and whites. Bokamo Designs came through with some unusual Czech beads for decent prices. The black and white ones filled my need for medium-large interesting shapes in those colors, the mottled ivory is very versatile (looks great with bronze!), the green ones are just fun, and the agate-y looking ones at the top are what convinced me to stop and shop. They're gorgeous in person. I think I'm going to split them up, use half with the orange and ivory Lillypilly drop, and half with this carved carnelian dragon that I bought back in February.

Although I'd originally intended for my only present to myself to be the teardrop from Margaret, I simply could not resist the green faerie from Bickley Studios. I mean, come on! It's a green faerie! And I'm me. It's not like my logo is a green faerie, or like I was wearing a necklace with a green faerie pendant. She really is irresistibly beautiful, and she was just one of the lovely faeries and mermaids that were displayed on the table. The decision was easy for me to make, however, as she was the greenest, and I think I have some crystals and vintage leaves that will coordinate nicely with her.

Now, as for my reasoning for my personal slogan for the Best Bead: the items that you see above are just the tip of the gorgeous bead iceberg. There were a lot of very talented beadmakers at the show, with simply incredible beads. I didn't even mention the black glass bead with the silver metal dragonfly on it (now I did!), nor did I mention all of the big-name artists, nor did I buy any stones or seed beads or vintage, though I had opportunities to get all of those. There was a great selection. What there wasn't was a great crowd. Despite it being a Saturday afternoon, there were few shoppers, and even the really popular vendors who are swamped in Feb had space in front of their booths. A couple of sellers seemed decidedly unhappy, and I feel bad for anyone who traveled really far for what seemed like a dud of a show. I really do think that it's nice for Tucson to have a show sometime other than February, but I think they're trying too hard to make it a second February show. I honestly believe that the show must only be good for those who live in or near Tucson, or who can score cheap airfare and then crash with a local friend. For anyone else, it has to be too much cost for the amount of sales that they make.

I, of course, had a wonderful time. I didn't buy anywhere near what I do during the main gem show season, but I did pick up enough great things to spice up my Fall Line and keep my muse entertained until the big February stock up.

The week of updates is complete!

I hope you've enjoyed this week of daily updates. I had fun doing it and may have another one in the future. To wrap it up today, I added three more items:

Organic Treasure -- A spiral rope bracelet with a carved stone focal.

Growing Things -- A crystal bracelet in one of my favorite combinations, olivine and bronze.

Harlequin -- A classy black and white crystal bracelet.

Yes, I'm finally listening to the rest of the world and making black and white jewelry. I'm not a huge fan of the color white (probably because I look terrible in it) and I usually only use it with bright colors. But I've seen so much great black and white clothing lately, that I just had to make jewelry that would go well with it. I have a great necklace for next week's update, in black, white, and silver.

Tonight I'm working on a present for myself, a reward for all of my hard work on my website and classwork this week. Not that I really need to rationalize making a necklace ;) I had hoped to maybe complete it in time to wear to the Best Bead Show tomorrow, but it's turning out to be more time consuming than I thought. I might be able to get it partially done and wear it anyway.

As referenced above, I'm going to the Second Annual Fall Best Bead Show here in Tucson tomorrow before D&D. I plan to pick up some focals, maybe some seed beads, maybe some pressed glass -- I'm really running low on larger black beads, and I'd like to stock up on some more browns. We'll see what I find. Expect a show report on Sunday!

A Personal Favorite.

I have to say that I'm happy with everything that I've made so far for my Fall Line, but this one, Faerie Gold, is really a favorite. The addition of a few dangling leaves takes this already beautiful spiral bracelet to the next level. And the colors are, of course, pure Autumn. I'm looking forward to doing more bracelets in this style... though they may not be in Fall colors. Though I have various orange, yellow, brown, and red leaves, they're all side-drilled and wouldn't look good dangling like this.

I also added a crystal bracelet to the site today, Sophistication. I wish that the picture showed the detail of the button, it really is beautiful. I have a weakness for black glass buttons, I buy them whenever I see them, and then I use them almost as fast as I buy them. Also, I'm enjoying black and brown as a combination for Autumn. You've already seen it in the Pan's Grove earrings, and the Ancient Treasure bracelet. I'm planning to have at least one necklace in the same colors, I just haven't quite settled on a style for it.

Today's Cool Thing is Mary Tafoya's Moth Girl Spirit Pin. She's so cool, with her vintage leaf wings!

I've got a new toy!

Today I discovered the joy of Polyvore, where I created the awesome collage you see above. Polyvore lets you browse through a seemingly endless selection of clothing and accessories, to create fashionable collections along any theme you can imagine. If you decide that you want to buy the outfit, you just click on the image and it gives you a link to visit the shop that sells it. Best of all, you can grab images from all over the web, so if your favorite dress isn't already there, you can add it! This means that you could select almost any item from Erthe Fae Designs and pick out the perfect outfit for it, just like I did for this image.

And what is the gorgeous necklace that inspired this fashion frenzy? A little piece I like to call Medeine. Spring colors were supposed to be big for Autumn this year -- I haven't noticed that actually being the case, but it didn't stop me from creating Medeine, a serene blending of ivory and soft greens. Even if you can't find any Autumn fashions to pair the necklace with, neutrals like ivory are looking good for Winter. Plan ahead!

Medeine is today's new item, of course. I also did some general website maintenance today. Tomorrow should see one or two more items added, depending on how long my homework takes and how much time I spend Polyvore-ing it up.

New jewelry is here!

Oh yeah! Now we're talking... There's new jewelry up at Erthe Fae Designs! Are you excited? I sure am!

First, the earrings that I posted last week, Pan's Grove.

Next, the adorable necklace that you saw on Saturday, Pixie At Rest.

Finally, one of the many luscious bracelets in my Fall Line, Ancient Treasure.

And there's more where that came from! In fact, every day this week, I'll post at least one new item from my Fall Line. That means there will be updates tomorrow, Thursday, and Friday. Then I'll take the weekend off, and return to my regular weekly schedule, with more new jewelry on Monday!

Another Teaser...

While I am enjoying the professional feeling that having an official "Fall Line" gives me, I am by no means going to go to a strictly seasonal-line-based business model. It's certainly nice to have a wonderful selection of jewelry that coordinates with the styles that are "in" at the moment, but as an artist I also have to follow my muse. That means that there will still be some pieces that are in whatever colors and styles tickle my fancy. This is one of them.

A tiny Sterling Silver pixie rests beneath a lampworked flower bead by Jennifer Kelting, surrounded by a garden of vintage and modern flowers, Swarovski crystals, and Sterling beads. It's all strung on super-fine Sterling chain, upon which the beads can slide freely. Bright blues and greens blended with the clean neutrality of white hearken more to the crisp colors of Summer than the subdued elegance of Autumn. Pixies are contrary creatures, and wear whatever color they like, no matter the season.

I entered this necklace in the August Art Bead Scene contest, which had a Midsummer Night's Dream theme. I didn't win, which is a shame because I really wanted those Green Girl beads! Nonetheless, it's always fun to participate in ABS's challenge and see how other artists interpret the theme. If you want some eye candy, check out the flickr album!

Consider yourself teased...

Just a little hint of what's to come next week. These earrings are made with some of the cool beads that I picked up in NY... At first I thought that they were wood, or petrified wood, but closer inspection suggests that they're jasper, maybe from the Picture Jasper family, according to a friend who is more knowledgeable in stones than I am. I picked the two most attractive, close-to-matching beads from the strand, and accented them with Czech glass and Swarovski crystals for a classic black-and-brown combo. Black and brown and black and bronze are two big combinations for my Fall line. It just looks so rich and elegant.

Trying to stay on top of it all!

Back in July, when we planned our NY trip, it seemed perfectly reasonable to me that 4 days after returning from NY, I could start college, and that two days later I could update my website with my new Fall line. That was plenty of time to unpack, do laundry, take photographs, and catch up on things, right?

What I didn't count on was being sick! I still have the remnants of whatever hit me while I was on the plane. My throat isn't back to normal and even the minor spiciness in pizza sauce makes me cough... pizza sauce! The problem is that I really haven't been able to take it easy. I even had jury duty on Monday, though luckily my group was dismissed at 9:30am.

The good news is that I've been well enough to go to Chinese class and stay focused, and to keep my apartment from falling into shambles. The bad news is that obviously, my blog and website have fallen by the wayside. I have a whole bunch of things to photograph, and no energy to do so. I'm going to try to tackle that today, in addition to doing my homework.

The debut of my Fall line has obviously been pushed back... Tuesday, September 4th looks pretty good. I'm really excited about the new designs and color combinations and materials that are incorporated into this line. I hope to post some preview photos this weekend, just to whet your appetite.

Back to normal.

Well, I'm feeling almost all better today, which is great! Yesterday I managed to get a lot of work done, so today I had the freedom to enjoy feeling more like myself. Mostly I spent it catching up on e-mail, forums, and blogs, but I've also been thinking about writing. I hope to spend some time working on Book 4 today. By the way, the working title is "The one that I wrote in WordPerfect, because Word sucks." It's something of a misnomer: every book I've written has been written in some version of WordPerfect. I just titled it that to tease Chris, who was in turn teasing me about using WordPerfect. He has this silly idea that I should stop using a program I've enjoyed for 10 years, just because, in his opinion, Word is better. Men!

All word processor snobbery aside, I also intend to bead today, in fact, I want to start as soon as I finish this post! I was working on a really cute spiral rope necklace before I left NY, and it's almost done. I need to finish it, so I can make some bracelets and earrings and maybe more necklace, all for the debut of my Fall line. I sure wish I'd done some more beading while I was in NY, especially while I was watching TV. I did manage to get a bit done, though, and of course, I bought great supplies for future projects!

Once I'm more settled into my routines, we'll see a return to Today's Cool Thing, Friday columns, and photos. The blog has seemed quite drab lately! In fact, Today's Cool Thing shall be... MapEasy! When my husband had to do a "team building exercise" (ie, play spy games) in Washington DC last month, he was provided a really cool MapEasy map of DC. I love this thing! It's cutely illustrated, looks easy to read, and has all sorts of points of interest, restaurants, and stores on it... including bead stores! Oh, and it's made out of tear-resistant, waterproof paper, so it can take all sorts of abuse. I fully intend to buy one for Providence, and for any place else that I set my books in, as a handy reference and source of entertainment.

Home again, home again

I'm back in Arizona! My last few days in NY were far too busy for me to find any time to blog, and my first two days home were far too sick for me to find energy for anything other than sleep and Dr. Who. I'd felt this sickness coming for days, and although it's annoying to be under the weather when I should be unpacking and getting back into the daily grind, I'm glad that I managed to stave it off until I left NY. I wouldn't have wanted to miss out on all the fun, and the time with my in-laws. Oh, and the delicious food. Mmmm, Exotic Mango Chicken.

On Thursday, we went into New York City. I simply love NYC. Yeah, it's crowded, and dirty, and some parts of it smell funny, but it's still an awesome city. I love window shopping. I love people watching. I love looking at all the cool old buildings, with their frescos and other architectural niftiness. I love glancing at the menus of the restaurants I pass by, knowing that I'll never, ever eat there. Oh, and I love Chinatown, which was our main destination for the day.

In all fairness, I most disclose a certain amount of hypocrisy. Chris's stepfather didn't want to go spend all day shopping with us in NYC, but he did have breakfast with us before we left. There was a TV in the diner playing news about the toy recall, so naturally our conversation turned towards China and its business practices. We complained about poor quality control, bad employee treatment, how they're driving other countries' industries under, and how our country blithely goes along with it... and then we took off to Chinatown, where we purchased cheap goods from China... *sigh* Well, ok, a lot of what I bought actually came from Japan, but I am still a freakin' hypocrite.

My problem, of course, is that I want to like China. I enjoy learning Mandarin. I love Chinese food (and while I realize it's highly Americanized, the inspiration had to come from somewhere, right?). I'm a martial arts movie junkie. Etc etc. It's hard to accept that all of these things that I enjoy come from a country whose policies and actions I can't really support.

Moral quandaries aside, I really did have a good time in the city. It was a pretty nice day, with just a little rain, so we walked the entire way from Penn Station to the store we love, Pearl River. I'm not sure exactly how far we walked, but I believe it was something like a zillion blocks. In fact, the only way I can justify all the food that I eat while I'm in NY is by pointing out how much I walk while I'm in NY! Anyway, Pearl River is the only place we shop in Chinatown, because it's the only place we need to shop. They seriously have everything there. Clothes, food, dishes, knick-knacks, musical instruments, furnishings, housewares, everything. And not just imports from China, but also a lot of stuff from Japan, and maybe a couple of other Asian countries. All of this is held in a clean, bright, well-organized store. We must have spent a couple of hours there, getting things for ourselves and presents for our friends.

All that walking and shopping built up some hearty appetites, so we made our way over to Singapore Cafe. If you read last year's NY trip report, you'll remember that we absolutely loved that place. It was just as good this year. Delicious food, food service, and incredibly fast for a sit-down dinner. If you go there, definitely get the lemonade iced tea to drink! It is delicious and refreshing.

After dinner, it was time to make our way towards the theater for the Blue Man Group show. We arrived there with over an hour to spare, so we went around the block to Barnes and Noble, where Chris and I picked up some reading material for the flight home, and I also got a cute plush dragon, made out of that soft chenille fur. We got done right in time for the show. I really enjoy Blue Man Group's music, so I kind of wish that the show had been more music and less... stuff, but it was still a lot of fun. By the time the show was done, we were all tired enough to take the subway back to Penn Station, then we took the train back to Long Island and were home somewhere close to midnight.

Well, this post is getting way too long, so let's do a quick rundown of other things I did while in NY: We saw my sister-in-law's band, The Good Luck Affair, play at a local club. I don't have the exact URL, but you can find them on Myspace. They're a rock kind of band, but Grace plays violin, cello, and sax on some songs, which changes things up a bit. We walked the Brooklyn Bridge, which was kind of cool, except I was exhausted so I kept wondering if I could close my eyes and walk on auto-pilot. We went into Little Italy and ate delicious dessert. Coincidentally, we were in Brooklyn right when the fire at the Deutsche Bank fire started, so we saw a lot of fire trucks going by. Luckily we were not anywhere near the fire itself.

In a way, I'm glad to be back home, with my kitties, and my beads at hand, and my friends nearby, and the ability to just laze around in quiet... But I also can't help but miss NY, with all of the fun things to do, the great people to do them with, and the delicious food to eat when we're done.

Close to Nature...

I am so tired tonight! Today we went to The Planting Fields, which is an old estate from the early 20th century. The grounds are full of lawns, trees, and gardens of all sorts, not to mention greenhouses. All the buildings were closed while we were there, but that's ok -- as much as I wanted to see the inside of the Tudor-style mansion, the outdoors were amazing. I love to walk beneath the shade of the trees, admire all sorts of plants that we never see in the desert, and watch huge butterflies flit from flower to flower.

There were many cool moments which I'm simply too sleepy to describe right now. Suffice it to say that I found myself feeling very inspired (it's a shame that my book doesn't really take place in a natural setting, but at least I can use the inspiration for leafy jewelry!), and we've vowed to dedicate an entire day to the place next visit.

That said, I'm going to sleep now. We're going into NYC tomorrow and I need my energy for that!

Another day in NY...

It's funny, but I seem to blog more when I'm on vacation than when I'm home. I guess it's because there's less to distract me. I'm not on AIM (though I could be), I don't have most of my bookmarks, I hate playing video games on the laptop, and I only have a limited selection of beads and books to distract me. When people are home, I tend to be off the computer socializing, but when I'm alone, it's easy to grab a few minutes and post.

Of course, it also helps that I'm doing more of interest than I do at home...

Yesterday and today have been pretty peaceful. Yesterday we went to the store that my brother-in-law works at and ate some pizza from the great place two doors down. The funny thing is that they're in two different towns. I guess that at some point on that walk, I was standing in two different towns. Maybe the little street between them is the border? Anyway, although I'm generally not a fan of NY pizza (having lived out West my entire life), this place makes a delicious Sicilian, and their garlic knots are to die for. After dinner, we went to The Simpsons Movie, which was just as silly and pointless as we expected it to be. The theatre we saw it at was disgusting, though, and I doubt any of us will ever go back there. They hadn't even cleaned it before our showing -- there were still cups in the holders at a couple of seats!

Today we haven't done anything yet. Chris is out doing errands with his mother, whereas I decided to stay home and get a little beading done. I've made two of the crystal bracelets that I packed beads for, and I think I'll start the spiral necklace. We're going out for dinner tonight, though -- kebabs, I think. Mmmm. I love Middle Eastern food, and it's not too common in Tucson.

Back to the beads I go!

Site and Stardust!

As of this morning, erthefae.com is back up and running. Yay!

Last night we went to see Stardust. As you may already know, I am a huge fan of Neil Gaiman. I've been looking forward to this movie ever since I heard about it, as have Chris and his mother. The three of us went together for a late-night showing, and we were all positively thrilled by the film.

First, I must say that the movie takes a few liberties with the original story, but most of the changes were fitting for a movie. Some things were omitted or streamlined to save time, and they added some action to make the film more exciting. Certain characters and events are all together missing, and the ending is completely different than in the book, I think partially to make it more climactic (the addition of an action sequence), and partially to appeal more to Hollywood (changing the very end, making it less bittersweet than the book). However, all of the important elements are still there, and the film stays true to the tone and message of the original graphic novel and novella. The look of the movie, too, is very much like Charles Vess's artwork from the graphic novel, and my mental images from reading the book (which I read first).

The scenery was beautiful, as were the costumes. The special effects for magic, and the makeup on the witches was all pretty convincing. The swordfights were not that impressive, but they were at least believable. And the performances were mostly great, though the witches sometimes seemed to be overdoing it a bit. Robert De Niro comes close to stealing the show with his great portrayal of the airship captain; you really have to see it to believe it.

Over all, if you are a fantasy fan, you owe it to yourself to go see this wonderful treatment of one of the best modern adult fairytales.

Site status and more NY fun.

First things first: my web host package is still active, it was just my domain name that was down. I've just paid to renew it, but since they're not open on the weekend, it probably won't be processed until tomorrow. Hopefully they'll be quick about it, I always hate having my site down!

In more pleasant news, I'm still having a great time in NY. On Friday we went to Ace Handicraft, where I got some more great beads. They always have the coolest glass! In addition to glass beads, I picked up some carved horn, an almost dzi-style pendant, and a carved stone knotwork pendant. Chris also got a few clasps for his maille bracelets. The people working there were as nice and friendly as ever, and really admired Chris's work (the conundrum weave bracelet that he always wears has garnered a lot of attention so far this trip).

Yesterday we went to a Renaissance Faire in upstate NY. We didn't know about it until we got out here, but luckily I had packed some dance clothes, so between that and what I bought at the Indian import store, I was able to cobble together a decent costume which was appropriate for the 80 degree weather. Chris had no such luck, but he's not as obsessed with such things as I am anyway.

We had a really fun day... Little traffic on the drive, and there was a lot of beautiful scenery along the way. The weather was perfect, warm and sunny with a little breeze to keep it pleasant. The Faire itself wasn't quite as large as the one in Arizona, but it was still big enough to keep us entertained until almost closing time! Several of the vendors and at least one performer also do the AZ faire, but mostly it was different shows and shops. It was held in a forested area, which was so wonderful, a lot more appropriate than our desert setting, and also less dusty! Our faire is always either dusty or muddy.

One of the performances we saw was Dextre Tripp, who also performs at the AZ Faire. We love his show and had to share it with my mother-and-law, who really enjoyed it. We also saw some belly dancers (not as good as Syrene from AZ), a band called Karpathios, a pretty cheezy illusion show (the tricks were nice, but the spiel was lame), and a kind of cool knife throwing and whip trick show.

Shopping was great. I love shopping at these events, but after 9 years at the AZ faire with some of the vendors never changing their wares, it's not as exciting as it used to be. Seeing all these new-to-me vendors was a ton of fun. There were different weapons, different musical instruments for Chris to admire, and lots of different clothes for me to drool over. Plus various artwork and jewelry. The artwork was great, the jewelry not so much. I ended up with an amazing two-layer handkerchief hem skirt of hand-dyed silk, and a matching top of hand-dyed silk and hand-dyed handmade felt. It's simply gorgeous, with a flowing, faerie-like look and feel to it. I can't wait to dance in it. Chris got a blue-glazed porcelain ocarina and a cool woven African hat with an Asian look. He wanted to get one at our faire, but they were all sold out, so he was really happy to find one out here.

There were a lot of people out in costume yesterday, even several wearing full armor. It was also nice to see entire families dressed up. Oh, and there was one cool guy in a 17th century courtier outfit, very nicely put together. He was at the hand-dyed silk booth at the same time as me, so I overheard part of his conversation with the gals there about his costuming. I didn't catch any details, but his enthusiasm was apparent. It was cool to see something a little different from the usual medieval-style and fantasy/gothic costumes that are so prevalent at faires -- not that I mind those at all, it's what I usually wear!

I'm hoping to maybe even be able to swing a visit to that faire every year that we're out here, since it spans the time that we tend to visit. Only going to ours once a year is just not enough!

Well, I've babbled on enough. After I clean out my purse and find all the business cards, I'll share links to some of the vendors we bought from or admired.

Site Down!

I was certain that my webhost package didn't expire until after I got back from NY, but I can't get into my erthefae.com e-mail tonight, and my domain is showing as parked. Great. I don't know if I'll have time to deal with it tomorrow, so I'll have to hope that they do business on Sundays.

Other than that, it's been a great day.

Watch this blog for updates as to the site's status.

It's raining on my parade!

We hit Long Island yesterday, and almost immediately set out for some bead shopping. I revisited Bead Market in Farmingdale, where I once again went wild on vintage. They had so many cool things that I just couldn't resist. I can't wait to get home and design with them!

Next we hit Beads and Stitches, which my mother-in-law thought was new, but I know that I have some beads at home with their label on it, so I think they'd just moved to a new spot. It was a pretty nice spot, in an older house. Very spacious, well-lit, and what looked like a pretty nice class room area. I was initially excited to see that they still had a good assortment of seed beads, but I ended up being enticed by their stone beads! I got some sardonyx, some wood or maybe petrified wood, some sort of purple stone, and also some glass briolettes. You may have noticed that I don't normally use stone beads, but these really spoke to me for my Fall line. It should be fun to see what I can create with them.

After that we took a quick trip to a nearby mall which had an Indian import store, which means lots of belly dance clothes! I got all kinds of cute skirts and tops that can be worn for dancing, Ren Faires, or just looking great. I was all excited to be able to wear some today, because yesterday was beautiful so naturally I imagined that today would be, too! Oh, how disappointed I was to wake up to cold, rainy skies! I'm going to have to wear pants, or at least a heavy skirt.

Today we're planning to hit Ace Handicraft, my favorite Long Island bead stop. I'll post about that trip this weekend.

More from NJ

Well, let's see... I've barely seen the sun all week. Apparently it's been pretty hot and humid out, but I've been inside until evening every day. The evenings themselves have been very pleasant, and last night there was a huge storm while I was sleeping (I'm a light sleeper, so I woke up a couple of times to the sound of rain against the window, highlighted by the rumble of thunder and the flash of lightning). The haze in the sky is a uniform grey, like a fuzzy blanket stretching from horizon to horizon. There's none of the depth and darkness of the monsoon clouds that are probably even now gathering over the mountains in my home city of Tucson.

All waxing poetic about the weather aside, last night I tried yoga for the first time. It was a pretty interesting experience and left me feeling loosened up and even a little tingly. This afternoon I have just a little ache in my abs and back, not too different from what I have the day after a good session of dancing. I don't know if yoga is something that I'll take up, but it's always nice to try something new.

My beads remain packed up, I'll probably break them out tomorrow when I return to my MIL's place. I think we'll have a little time until she gets home, and her kitchen table is always a good work spot for me, thanks to a nice overhead light. I think next time JoAnn's has a 50% off coupon, I'll go buy myself one of those super-compact Ott travel lights for occasions like this. At this rate I doubt I'll get to all half-dozen projects that I packed, but I never really expected to anyway.

My next post will be from the exciting land of Long Island.

I know I haven't shared any Cool Things lately, so here's an awesome one that Chris and I found this week. Check out the Elder Gods necklace by somk, and then be sure to browse the rest of her gallery. She has the most awesome Lovecraftian jewelry ever, as well as some equally awesome Celtic, Norse, and fantasy jewelry. We're hoping to save up and get ourselves Cthulhu wedding rings, maybe as a 10th anniversary present. Ia Fhtagn!

Checking in from the East Coast

I'm blogging from the exciting land of New Jersey. How did I ever live without my laptop? It's so nice to just sit down, connect to a wireless network, and still be able to conduct business and stay in touch with friends and family no matter where I am.

I had a great time at my step-sister-in-law's wedding, and I got a lot of compliments on the necklace that I made specifically for the event. I don't have my digital camera with me, so I'm afraid I won't be able to show that off until I get home in two weeks. We do have some pictures from the wedding, though, so I might share those at some point.

The lighting's not great here for beading. I should have packed my Ott-Lite, but I was really running out of room in my luggage (hence not having the camera). Packing used to be a lot easier when I dressed more casually. So much of what I like to wear now is handwash, or at least line-dry, so I can't do a lot of laundry while I'm gone. This is the price of my vanity!

I think next week is when I'll go bead shopping. If you remember my posts from last year, I found some really great beads on Long Island and in New York City. I'm hoping for some great finds this year, too. I'd like to get back out to the one shop that had table after table of vintage. I've already used up some of the best things I got there.

That's all for now. I started my next novel while I was in the Chicago airport (I'd already finished my reading material), and I'm trying to get some work in on that today.

On my way out!

Goodness, have things been busy for me. I'm leaving for NY within the half-hour, so I figured I'd better make at least some sort of post before I go. I probably won't have a good chance to blog again until the middle of next week, as I'm spending the weekend at a wedding and the first part of the week at a house I've never been to before.

I'm taking a ton of beads with me so I can make some beautiful new things while I'm gone!