Tangible Tidbits 2010 #11: Once A Good Girl, Always A Good Girl...

It seems my "good girl" status has remained intact, even after being out of school for nearly two decades (I got my master's degree in 1993)! I got an A- for my mid-term grade and a 13.5 out of 17 on the quiz in my class at MSU! :D Mom's response was that I "never liked those minuses." I told her anything with an "A" was fine by me. My father always said anything lower than a "B" may as well be a "Q." :p

We had our demo and studio time on cuttlebone casting this week. It took me two tries to get mine to turn out right...at least I wasn't the only one. It will eventually be a sterling silver pendant, although right now it looks like, as the teacher said, "a sculpture...silver with rocks!" There are small stones in the bottom of the pan where we pour the molten metal into the cast, and the silver leaked through my cast into the stones. There was more than enough to make my piece, so the excess metal that leaked out the bottom kind of formed a base for the "sculpture" and also hardened on some of the stones. It actually looks pretty kewl, so I took a picture with my cell phone camera to preserve it before I cut the "base" off. It's now the wallpaper on my phone. ;)

On the techy side of things, I traded in the HP Deskjet I had here at home for a shiny, new HP Officejet 6500 all-in-one printer/copier/scanner/fax. I'm so excited! I got a $50 rebate for the trade-in, plus I had something like $78 in Staples Rewards dollars accrued from recycling used printer cartridges and previous purchases -- I got my business cards and letterhead there, plus other miscellaneous office supplies -- so the machine ended up costing me $108 WITH the 2-year warranty! :D PLUS, I returned four ink cartridges I had bought for the old printer and didn't use, for which I was refunded more than $140! So, in effect, the printer was FREE! LOL Only in America, folks! :p ;)

Been busy with requests for earrings lately. I still have a bunch of projects "in the wings" that haven't had time limits on them and/or are especially challenging for one reason or another. Don't worry (you know who you are if any of them belong to you), I haven't forgotten any of them! I have a notebook with everything written down -- one of my purchases at Staples ;) -- so nothing gets lost in the shuffle. :) There are also a number of jewelry-making contests coming up in the next couple of months that I want to enter, but I have to create items especially for them. Hopefully, I won't miss any opportunities due to time constraints. :\

Have a good week, one and all! :D

Tangible Tidbits 2010 #8: Email-hijacking Gremlins?

Just wanted to post/send a quick note (really quick this time, I promise! LOL) to let you know that the new Focal Piece of the Month is FINALLY up! Sorry it took so long to get it up this time around. I usually shoot for the updates around the 23rd-25th of the month, since the site first went up around Christmas, but due to personal issues on my end, AND the webmaster's end, AND some mysterious email-hijacking gremlins -- is Mercury in retrograde, by any chance? Just checked...no, it's not :o -- this project was just NOT destined to happen in a timely fashion! :p Therefore, this version of the Focal Piece of the Month will probably stay up through the middle of April, rather than change it again in a week or two.

Anyway, I've been super busy this weekend working on my PowerPoint presentation on Steampunk/steampunk jewelry for next Friday night's mid-term critique. Check THAT off the list of things to do! :D Cleaning up my class projects currently for the teacher to review. I felt pretty bleak after class on Friday night with everything I had to get done this week and I didn't feel my work was progressing as it should. Still have the readings to do for the quiz and my 10 weekly drawings. Everything will get done on time, as always. Hopefully, my grades and work will be to my father's standards...anything lower than a "B" may as well have been a "Q" as far as he was concerned. ;)

Back to work! Have a good week!

Tangible Tidbits 2010 #7: Short & Sweet...Well, Not That Short!

Sorry I'm a bit late this week, but Mom had her surgery on Tuesday and that kind of took center stage focus since the end of last week. She did well, although it was a long night, since the surgery started and ended later than expected, and we are now waiting to find out when she can be released from the hospital -- in the middle of the third snow storm this month! :p I'm trying to keep up with everything the best I can, but the next 4-6 weeks of her recovery will increase the level of chaos in my life.

I attended the Bead Society of NJ meeting last week. Nice party. Check out the Swarovski(R) Crystal earrings I made for the exchange in the GALLERY section of the Store if you get a chance. ;)

Still working hard on my class at Montclair State. The new Focal Piece of the Month helped me jumpstart my research for the five-minute oral presentation I have to do in a few weeks for the mid-term critique...mid-terms already? :o The new Focal Piece should be up on the site in the next week or so. Sorry, that's a little late, too. **hides**

As always, please feel free to pop in and leave a message or comment for me on the website blog. It would be nice to get some activity going here (or there, if you are reading this via the email newsletter or the Facebook Fan Page). For those of you who know me from my message board days, remember "The Sharing Threads" at MR/ARD/5LYF? I was hoping the blog would evolve into something similar to that, only maybe a little less "heavy." KG is back...tell all your friends! LOL ;)

Until next time, "TTFN...ta ta for now!" (Gotta love Tigger!)