Still Lots going on and a Winner!

I know it’s already Friday. Were does the time go, I’ve been bad about blogging, the lack of it. So about last weekend I have to say it was Great. Thank goodness for that extra day off. I headed out to Diane’s studio in Clackamas OR for Stephanie Lee’s Chain Gang class on Saturday. Loved it! Loved it! This lady is just an Awesome person and artist. Learned so many new techniques. I have been doing soldering for several months now, with a soldering iron, but today I got to play with a micro torch for the first time.

Now I have added that to my list of tools I Need. Along with the Metal Bench Grinder. Makes short work of grinding the bezels I made. Found another use for Paster of Paris.

So as the day wound down the group headed back out to the round Cedar house in Diane’s back yard. As it came to my turn to do my wish and intention. I said that I intend to finish my bezel creation, still working on that intention,

and my wish was that I would have been able to get into the class on Sunday but it was full. WELL, as the group was heading back into the house Diane mentioned that she had a cancellation and the person on the waiting list has not gotten back to her. Would I want the spot. I jumped at the opportunity. So this is were I’m thankful for that extra day off.

The weather we had that evening, on Saturday, was just like a great Midwest storm, thunder and lightning. Living back in the Midwest as a kid, I loved those storms. It may be kind of odd but I would go outside and sit on the patio and just let the storm rumble through me, figuratively. So that is what I did Saturday night. Went out on my back deck and soaked it all in, literally it was raining along with the thunder and lightning. Though my cats aren’t too fond of the storms. They go and hide under the covers in the bedroom.

Ok so back to the classes. Sunday was the Junk Drawer metalsmithing class.Ok, first on a side note these classes I took were smaller class sizes, 9 students, than those art retreats of up to 26 students. Much more personable. Everyone got to interact with each other. Great group of ladies. In this class I learned a couple more techniques. I have to say I learned a new way to use ALL of my rubber stamps and StazOn ink pads that I have, on metal.

Use of Metal Alpha stamps on solder. Another tool item for my list. Made more bezels.

Alright, thank you for reading through my ramblings. I would like to thank all of you who visited my sight and left comments.
I have pulled the lucky winner out of my hat, ok so it was a bowl.

The winner is - Becca

Hope everyone has a Smashing Day.

P.S. It was not until Tuesday after work that I got my lawn mowed and yard work done.

Goodies and Giveaway

I have more memory. Not for my brain but for my camera. Got time to delete several photos, so that I could add more to it.
Here are some of the mail goodies I received while I was gone. The great tag kits from Michelle’s swap.

My song quote chunky book. Already has a spot on my shelf.
So here is the stack of trades I got from: Mindy, Hitomi, Jan R, Gloria A, Linda H, Jacki K, Nancy Lynn, Julie A, Ruth A, Judy H, Kathy L, Marvadell Z, Michelle R, Andrea F, Debbie W, Bridget L, Susie G, DJ, Kathy E, Janie S, Angie M, Debi B, Stephanie, Margo and any one I may have missed Thank you for trading with me. I enjoyed the whole experience.

Coming up is a three day weekend. Got to love those holidays. I need it. Heehee. The short work week is good. The evenings I've spent doing laundry, working on keeping up with my swaps and making up for time spent away from my two kitty cats, Jasper and Tiger.
Though I’m sure my new friend Charlene from Chicago will need even more time, she has 9 cats to give extra attention to since she was away. We had got to talking while on the cruise and she told me that there are not many people who get her when she tells them she has 9 cats. I totally did. We connected shared stories and pictures. Her and her husband own a couple bead stores in Chicago, Briolette Beads and more and Caravan beads. They have been going strong for 13 years.
So that extra day this weekend I will spend mowing my lawn and pulling weeds. Hope the weather holds out. Though I do get to have a fun day on Saturday taking a Stephanie Lee class at innerstandings.

I hope everyone has a safe and happy Holiday weekend.

On my trip while we were in Skagway I was suppose to have an excursion to do some flight seeing and Dog sledding. Though with the weather the way it was, pretty much cloudy with rain, snow and showers all day and the low hanging fog. It was cancelled. Very disappointed, so looking forward to that. Since I did not get to see the doggies at the camp I went into town and brought one home with me. I named her Cruiser.

So on to my giveaway. I have this lovely 8 x 8 album kit.

How can you win ~
Post a comment here.
Make sure that I am able to reach you via an active blog or email address.
Starts today and ends May 29th.

Lucky winner will be drawn the morning of May 30th.

Here is another picture of just on pile of my scrap booking stash that I still need to go through and organize.

Thank you for visiting my little corner of the blogging world.

Melissa :)

Happenings while I was gone.

Of course the mail keeps coming and amongst the stack of everything, catalogs, a couple bills, and junk mail, there was some good stuff. I am currently hosting a couple swaps so I received some packages from participants – Keep those coming.
I received a package from Michelle Cummings who hosted the tag kit swap. I had sent mine off the week before I left for vacation. Great turn around time. Here is the picture of all my tag kits. Such goodness in each.
needing to empty at least one of my memory cards before I can take any more photos. That tells you about how many photos I took on my vacation.

I also received the Song Quote chunky book from the swap I was in on the BookArtz group. Great to see all the different songs everyone picked. Also photo to follow.

While on the cruise there were the informal trades going on. Luckily I heard about them in time to create some ATCs and charms to trade. I was happy to trade with who ever.

Got to bring home this little suit case. Read on and find out what was in side.







On to more pics from the cruise. Some of my class projects and others of the cruise. Enjoy!


The first project was this fat book. We made using Tims Grunge board for the covers. Inside are the new papers from Heidi Swapps line. I think it is called Travel.




Below is the lovely tin that all the embellishments came in. the book fits so nicely. I have not done any filling of my pages yet. Though I am sure what goes in it will be from my Alaska cruise.


















Tim's new Idea-ology line. We got to work with and make some charms or necklace pieces. What ever we wanted, it was pretty much free time to create with these pieces.






All the fun stuff to create with and the cute bag it came in.









Ok, can you say loving Grunge board. this project we took a plane out wood framed mirror and added strips of grunge board to it. After we used the paint daubers on the grunge board and distressed it with sand paper and other tools.





Picture frame. We used the fragments and glued them to pictures that Tim printed out relating to our cruise to Alaska. then trimmed around the fragments and glued them all over the frame. Not sure what picture from my cruise I will be putting in it. I have alot to choose from.





Tim surprised us with having a rubber stamp created just for this cruise. So the stamp fits just so nicely in the little suit case. He told us after they were made he had the plates returned to him so no more could be made.










Some of the goodies I bought at the on board Emporium store.



















Ok, so while on the cruise these are some things that I ran into.





Big Waves. Definetly found out that my porthole window IS leak proof.







NCL takes Free style cruising to a new level. The Deck 14 level.










What a piece of Glacial ice looks like up close.






Some great chocolate covered Strawberries delivered to our rooms from Jim at Scrapmap.






And New friends. We found the lifestyle room on board for us to go and create while not in class. Gloria, Lisa, Earlene, Nancy, Astrid and Debbie W. Creating away.



A shout out to my new bud Gloria, the lady on the far left, it is her Birthday today.

So if you have gotten this far Congratulations. You get to hear about the give away I will be doing tomorrow. So come back and read even more.

Tah tah for now.

Melissa

I'm Back and Important News





Ok, with all the hundreds of photos and hours of video I took over the course of my vacation. I did put some out on my flickr site.

To more pressing matters.
There are two bills that are coming up in the House and Senate that will change copyright as we know it.They were shot down once before because of action against it --- but now they are back as bill numbers H.R. 5889 The Orphan Works Act of 2008 and S 2913 The Shawn Bentley Orphan Works Act of 2008
If you or someone you know post any family photos or any photos online. You need to go to this website arts and crafts law to find out more information. Then go here and send in this letter if you want to protect your rights. I ran across this on Claudine Hellmuth’s blog. Thought I would pass on the information.

This is text from the Illustrator Partnership web site:
Due to the lack of publicity about this bill, the most innocent victims of this plunder – those who put images online - are still completely unaware of it. Who am I talking about? Average American families who have enjoyed the internet as a way to share the happiest, and even saddest, moments of their lives with their friends and family across the country, and even around the world, through the wonders of technology. Google has already said they plan to use these orphan works in the millions. Why should companies like this be allowed to harvest our property from private web pages, blog sites, share sites and the like?

Here are just a couple photos from my vacation. Many more to come.

Me with Tim at the Welcome Reception.

Can you tell, it's me with Glacier Bay in the back ground.

Thanks for stopping by.

Melissa