falling into the sky

Friday, April 27, 2012

My Messy Workshop(s) or This One's for You Brenda Sue

Let's start at the beginning, where all good stories start. My mom taught me to do crafts, basic sewing and basic crochet when I was really young. Then Aunt Alice taught me to knit and embroider. From there, I was hopeless. I have embroidery thread and yarn that I have hauled around with me to many houses and four states. The beading thing started back in 1994 when I got my first issue of Bead & Button, it was around issue 9 or 10. I was an old hippie girl, and still had a few stray love beads, but this was a whole new way of thinking, and that just made it worse. Since then you will see all the places I have gone by the depth of my messes.

First - The Bead Room

This is short round me at my bead sorting table. I don't work in this room, it is a spare bedroom, but I am supposed to put all my purchases in here, and then sort and sift and put away. Naturally, there is stuff all over the house but mostly in here, waiting messily for me to put it away.

Here's a close up of the table

containing everything from bead boards, to twine to Future Floor Wax to seed beads, glass beads, stones, pearls and glue. There are also stray findings, brass stampings and odd craft supplies.

Here is the sacred bead shrine

where on the right are seed beads, wood and shell beads, cabs and donuts and glass bead strands. On the left are lampwork, pearls, semi-precious stones, precious gems, findings and throughout, there are other miscellaneous beady treasures.

Here are a few more patient, unorganized beads and supplies, waiting for someone to get off her lazy beading behind and put them away.

Now for the room we affectionately call "The Warehouse".

These are bulk supplies, paints, paper, wood, soldering supplies, polymer and metal clay and related tools and miscellany. There are also several boxes of wire and jump rings for wire wrapping and maille work, as well as metal and acrylic sheet, just in case I need them.

Here is the other side of The Warehouse.

These are my favorite papers, glue, paints, pens, ephemera, printmaking supplies, etc. And peeking out from behind my favorites is my alleged workroom. For most folks, this room would be a front room, a living room, but for me, it is the workroom. I only work there when my health permits me to spend time sitting up straight. When I am feeling icky, I just sit in my lazy boy and work as much or as little as I can.

Here's a better pic of my workroom with me actually in it!

This room contains my drawing table, my bookcases (all full), my often-used supplies, my metal work table and my sewing and fabric area.

The drawing table

Complete with baskets of ink, pens and stuff, and a little pink pig heat tool.

The metal work table (the book in the foreground is a drawing journal complete with a personalized floral cover)

The sewing area (as well as the unofficial observatory)

And finally (I'll bet you are ALL glad to get to this point.) the dining or photo room (this one will get cleaned first!)

As you may have figured out, there are only two of us in this big ol' house. We have three bedrooms, two bathrooms, a front room, a dining room, a kitchen, a great room, a covered back porch and a giant garage. So of course, we have spread out all over. Hubby has a spare room and the garage, and some of the stuff in the Warehouse is his as well. We also share some, but not all tools. I am really picky about my hammers cutters and pliers, and hubby is cranky about his power tools and he claims ownership of the kilns. (We all know that is sooooo not the case, but he has to claim some real estate for himself. He is endlessly and endearingly indulgent of my craziness.)

So that's it. Unfortunately, I didn't have anything on tap that I could display due to other pending blog hops, so stay tuned for those. Here's the list of blog links with a big shout out to the wonderful Brenda Sue at B'Sue's Boutique! Happy Hopping to all you Bloggers!

Messy Workshop Blog Hop Links

Brenda Sue Lansdowne, B'sue Boutiques

http://www.bsueboutiques.typepad.com/

Robin Delargy, LooLoo's Box

http://looloosbox.blogspot.com/

Kim at CianciBlue

http://cianciblue.blogspot.com/

Jennifer Jazwick-Smith, Hudathots

http://hudathoughts-jennifer.blogspot.com

Mary Shannon Hicks YOU ARE HERE

http://www.uptwnsh-fallingintothesky.blogspot.com/

Tracy Swartz

http://tracyswartz.com/category/blog

Jacqueline Marchant

http://jaacquelinesjewels.blogspot.com/

Lynnea Perry Bennett

http://designsbylynnea.blogspot.com/

Terry Matusyk

http://pinkchapeau.wordpress.com/

Laurel Steven

http://laurelsteven.blogspot.com/

Dr. Brassy Steamington

http://drbrassysteampunk.blogspot.com/

Pamela Takeshige

http://www.crittersandthings.blogspot.com

Kris Lanae Binsfeld

http://www.cherishdesigns.wordpress.com

Outre Art

http://theartistspaintbox.wordpress.com/

Linzi Alford

http://www.magpieintheskyspoilheaptales.blogspot.com/

Deb Davis

http://naturaltreasuresbydeb.blogspot.com/

Tamara Jones

http://irrysistablejewels.wordpress.com

Harry Wood

http://www.oscarcrow.blogspot.com

Gerry Nickerson

http://gersgems1.blogspot.com/

Elizabeth Owens-Dwy

http://www.thepolymergeek.blogspot.com/

Georgene Lockwood

http://sylvanavintagedesigns.wordpress.com/

Charisa Sloper

http://www.blog.obsidiansoda.com/

Jennifer Justman

http://soulsfiredesigns.blogspot.com/

Beanzie

http://the-vintage-heart.blogspot.com/

Mary Deis

http://mdeis.blogspot.com/

Cheri Reed

http://creativedesignsbycheri.blogspot.com/

Sondra Kolner

http://scrappybydesign.weebly.com/index.html

Sonya Ingersoll-Stille

http://www.dreaminofbeads.blogspot.com/

Lori Anderson

http://www.prettythingsblog.com/

Sandra McGriff

http://skyescreativechaos.blogspot.ca/

Shelly Joyce

http://www.aujourlejour-shelly.blogspot.com/

Joan Williams

http://www.lilrubyjewelry.wordpress.com/

Kashmira Patel

http://sadafulee.blogspot.com/

Deb Beechy

http://beetique56.blogspot.com/

Ginger Bishop

http://lilmummylikes.blogspot.com

Kelli Jacobson

http://creativemoonjewelryandthings.com/

Natalie McKenna

http://www.grubbi.co.uk/

Andrew Thornton

http://andrew-thornton.blogspot.com/

Mary Govaars

http://mlhjewelrydesigns.com/

Kate Mulligan

http://mulliganstewjewelry.blogspot.com/

Lisa Lodge

http://pineridgetreasures.blogspot.com

Tami Luchini

http://ssprocketsmetal.blogspot.com

Monique Lula

http://www.moniquelula.com/blog/

Lee Koopman

http://stregajewellry.wordpress.com/

Jayne Capps

http://mamasgottodoodle.blogspot.com

Susan Lloyd

http://designsbysusan-dbs.blogspot.com/

Cynthia Wainscott

http://www.exoticperujewelry.blogspot.com/

Stephanie Amanti

http://www.stephaniesjewelrybox.blogspot.com/

Alicia Marinache

http://www.allprettythings.ca/

Sam Hamp

http://hampgirl59.blogspot.com/

Lennis Carrier

http://www.windbent.net/

Thursday, April 12, 2012

Commenting into the Great Void

OK, I'm still cycloptic, and my back hurts, too. I do have medical professionals on the job now, however. Hopefully, I'm on the mend!!!!! I did discover a little anomaly in my blog settings, though. For all of you who have tried to comment and were unable to do so, I think I fixed it. Let me know on Facebook if any of you have further problems. Here are my three latest pieces. I already posted these on Create+Connect+Collaborate and Creative Bead Chat, so I apologize to those folks for posting again, but this post is for friends and family :) Hopefully, I can get around to posting regularly soon if the health issues get better!

Friday, April 6, 2012

Where in the world is Shannon Hicks??

I have been kind of invisible except for the very occasional comment here or there, the last couple of months have just been crazy for me. I bent some kind of crazy way my back resisted and it hurt for three or so weeks. Then my eyes started to bother me. I thought, "Allergies, no big deal!" Used the drops and they felt somewhat better but they never really improved significantly. Then a week ago, my right hip and leg started to hurt so much I couldn't sleep, probably from the aforementioned back aggravation. My poor back has been injured so often, I should be an exhibit in some lab.

Soooooooo... this past Saturday, my eye started to hurt, bad. It felt like gravel at first, then like jagged glass, complete with searing pain from light, and I can't see through it when I do manage to pry it open. The back improved some, but is still kind of miserable, especially if I move in a non-back-approved way. And the eye is not feeling much better, all despite multiple visits to multiple doctors and multiple encouragements and eye drops. I have an MRI next Wednesday for the back. I also have a return to eye doctor central for the sliced/ulcerated cornea that they tell me is healing. I am a miserable unit, and though I have done some beading, mostly by feel and using my one good eye, LOL, I can't even take pix right now because the light hurts too much. Anyway, I can't even see to edit them.

So, I'm kind of pouty right now, and I'm trying to tell myself that my upcoming 60th birthday is a good thing. And I really do think it is, I have never had too many issues about age, stopped dying my hair because I'm into the grey, never wore much makeup. I've always been kind of a little round hippie goddess, so I'm really hoping my 60's will get better. I want to live every day, just as I always have, and though my body seems to be misbehaving, pool season is coming soon, and I am ready to get a bit more fit and a lot more sunny.

Needless to say, pics to follow, really. I promise, just can't promise when. You can see my March 4 a month pictures, some pendants I finished and photographed in March, the last before the eye injury.

Friday, March 16, 2012

The Past

Ok, it appears that I have kind of dropped out of sight on the net, no blogging, insufficient posts to my Flickr groups and my Google pics, and just generally been, well.... missing! So, I thought I'd share where I have been.

I joined the Four a Month group on Flickr to make myself learn new techniques, and boy have I been doing it! I've been making mixed media pictures with all kinds of new methods, scanning them, and then printing them or editing them in my drawing and painting software and then printing them. Then I shrunk them down and put them in some commercial pendant blanks and resined them. Now, I am going to get into my own metal, polymer and/or metal clay blanks soon, but each technique takes time to perfect, and I am not going to rush anything. I will be putting the 4AM pendants up on here and on Flickr after photographing them.

I'm also beading a triple spiral, which is a lush and gorgeous technique, and I have a beautiful pendant that I just made that will go with it pretty well, I think. I've also been doing some crochet coasters, dishcloths, scarves, slippers and gloves in the evenings when it's hard to see to bead. So, I'm busy all the time, and things are getting done, but I just have neglected to share.

The first thing I'm going to share here is a bit of good news. A couple of months ago, Linda Britt and I started talking about creating a "My History" board on Pinterest. We were going to do our own, then see if our online friends might like to do it as well. We thought it might be fun to share who we are as well as what we create. So, as always, life kind of got in the way for both of us, hubbies with health issues and the day to day things that seem to take precedence over good intentions, along with some procrastination on my part.

The procrastination on my side came because I have very little in the way of pictures of my past. I have moved many times, (MANY times), have had some destruction from a vicious stepmother who wanted to wipe all memory of me from the face of the earth, and I lost a lot of things in Hurricane Katrina. So, to try to find pics or mementos from my past is going to be challenging, but here comes the good news.

My brother and I have been estranged since 1996. There was a lot of craziness over the years, and though I have always loved him, I just had to be away from him for a time. So, a few weeks ago, I found him on FB, contacted him, and found the craziness is now gone. We are working on repairing our relationship, and he has sent me some pics from his life and from our younger days. I am very happy to be working this out. He is very important to me.

I also had a few family pics that I rescued from everything, so the work begins on getting the photos scanned, the memory cards uploaded and the photo-editing done. I am also going to get pics that my kids have, and more will follow.

So here are the teaser pics, raw and unedited. Stay tuned for more pics, and the results of all the art projects.

Grampa Zig and friend with the Thunder Road car from the roaring 20s. It had no seats in the back to allow room for more bootleg whiskey to be transported! On the back of the photo it says "Huba Huba" (sic).

Grampa and me in 1952 - I was less than a year old. Yes, when I was born, Truman was president.

My Grandma Avis, but Ziggy always called her Rosie. circa 1939 or '40

Friday, February 24, 2012

The Bracelets are Ready!

A few weeks ago, I found out about the 7000 Bracelets Blog Hop. It is a fun hop, for a good cause. Check out the button on the right to see more about this wonderful event. The theme for this was denim/blue, and the bracelets needed to be adjustable so that whoever receives the bracelets can wear them. Those were the only rules, and so it opened up a wide range of possibilities. I decided to start with the denim idea, and made some fiber and denim rolled beads. Then I made some seed bead spacers/bead caps. Then I added some denim lapis end beads and lots of copper for some subtle bling. I had so much fun, I had to make a second, similar bracelet using turquoise beads. Here are the bracelets.

The Denim Bracelet

The Denim Bracelet on my chubby little wrist

The Turquoise Bracelet

I didn't model the second one, but you get the idea, LOL. Anyway, here's a list of the talented artists participating in this great cause. Enjoy the hop! I know I can't wait!

Elysian Studios and One Kiss Creations

The Studio Sublime

Crafty Hope

The Gossiping Goddess

SilverRose Designs

Firefly Visions

Pink Chapeau Vintage Jewelry

Michelle Mach

Pine Ridge Treasures

Backstory Beads

Adventures in Creativity with Lorillijean

Carefree Jewelry by Lisa