Beth Nouveau

Some hooparific new hula hoops in my etsy store!!

2012-01-29T21:59:00.000-05:00

Hello everyone,

I hope you have had a fabulous weekend. I have decided to postpone the post about my new earrings for a few days. The weather here has not been conducive to taking photographs... so that post will come in a few days.

It did occur to me today that I haven't posted any of my new hoops for sale. These are available in my etsy shop, dystructiondesigns. I can also design any custom hoop that your mind can imagine, if you email me. I have several colors of vinyl, gaffer, and sparkle tape. All of my hoops coil down for travel and are guaranteed to not come apart while hooping. I design all my hoops so that the gaffer tape is placed slightly over the edges of the sparkle tape, which extends the life of the hoop from chips and tears.

I named this hoop chakra power, due to its roygbivp glitter tape pattern. I love how the rainbow colors blend together when you hoop with it. The black tape is super grippy gaffer tape.

This hoop is named flowbot and features teal blue sparkle tape covered with black gaffer tape. Also very grippy and made to last.

This pretty hoop is named bubblegum and features silver sparkle tape with light pink and purple gaffer tape.

This hoop is named arrrrrr due to the jolly roger skulls flag design. This is the grippiest hoop I sell. The jolly roger hockey tape is the grippiest of all tapes. It is overlaid with hot pink and white gaffer. This is an excellent hoop for beginners. Gaffer and hocky tape are less likely to rip than vinyl or glitter tape.

I also started designing mini hoops! Minis are a lot of fun to play with, especially if you're in a rut hooping with a single hoop.

This set of two hoops is called dragonfly twins. They feature pink or purple mirror tape covered with teal gaffer tape. The mirror tape makes the hoop almost appear made of chrome metal, since it is so smooth and reflective.

These rainbow twins feature all colors of the rainbow in both glitter and gaffer tape. These are so pretty, as the rainbow colors blur into each other when moving.

i love these so much I have to post a second photo.

Mini hoops can be made at almost any diameter you wish.

Enjoy the rest of your weekend! Happy hooping..

xox

New Customer Photos added to the gallery!

2012-01-23T02:09:00.000-05:00

Hello all,

I have been a busy busy bee, designing some new earrings that will debut this week, and creating a gorgeous LED hoop for my friend and hoop performer, Sea Jae. You can take a gander at some of her performances here. She photographed many of the photos in my gallery. I can't wait to post some pictures and a video of the new hoop! I will be selling custom LED hoops in my etsy hoop shop soon.

I also added some customer photos to the gallery. I am fortunate to know both of these gals, who were sweet enough to send me some photos! If you have some earrings from my shop, feel free to email me the photos at bethnouveau@gmail.com and I will add them to the gallery!

This is Alexis of ak47designs on etsy. She designs gorgeous yarn falls. I will be blogging about her shop soon!!

This is the gorgeous Lauren, who happens to be an incredible aeralist! I love her dermals!

I hope all of you have a wonderful Monday and great week. I will be posting photos of the new stuff soon!

My new site is live!

2012-01-12T23:30:00.000-05:00

Hi everyone, My new website is live!! Point your browsers to http://www.bethnouveau.com. I still have some optimization left to do, and I am going to switch my blog back over to wordpress due to compatibility issues.... but enjoy! I particularly love the new photo gallery.

Blessings,

Beth
xo

On growth and resolutions...

2012-01-06T13:44:00.001-05:00

2011 was such an incredible year of growth for me both personally and professionally at BethNouveau. In addition to all the new customers I served on etsy, I also continued to spread my brand by wholesaling my work to brick and mortar stores. Around eight new stores across the nation began carrying my jewelry in 2011, including the official boutique of Anusara yoga at Wanderlust festival. I can't count how many tiring evenings I spent cranking out piece after piece until 3 in the morning, collapsing into bed with glue still on my fingers and clothes. While I am INCREDIBLY thankful for the business, I began to realize that level of productivity is not sustainable for me in the long run, and in the fall, I began to slow my shops down. In addition to running a business, I am also in graduate school and have 2 dogs, 2 cats, 2 aquariums, a snake, a boyfriend who lives 3.5 hours away, and I like to stay fit!! In 2011 I began training for a marathon but unfortunately injured my ankle in October (but thankfully maintained my fitness level). I also backpacked the appalachian trail in the smoky mountains, covering 75 miles in 5 days in July and finishing the AT section from Georgia to Mt. Rogers, VA.

I sit here on a still January evening contemplating the incredible whirlwind that was last year and think about where I want to go this year. A couple goals from 2011 are wrapping themseleves up as I type: my website will be finished within DAYS, and I have a host of new inventory to add to my shop with more new ideas still hatching in my head. My good friend is scheduling a photo shoot with several models, and these new fun photos will be added to my listings and website... So what next?? Well a marathon is certainly in the works for the first half the year. With the exception of illness and injury I have been diligently training for 9 months now. Unless something catastrophic happens, I hope to finish a marathon by May. And I feel awful about how lacking my yoga practice has been the past four months. An ankle injury doesn't lend itself to sun salutations... so it is time to get back on the mat religiously as well.. I also hope to graduate in the latter half of this year and move on to the next stage of my life, wherever that next stage takes me... hopefully with my beau in North Carolina.

But what goals do I have for myself creatively? This is where I feel most lost. I'm not sure what direction I see my art going, in particular BethNouveau. The grizzly rooster craze is over... THANK GOD... and I worry that feather earrings may be a trend that some now find outdated. I hope that my work can remain progressive despite the passing trends. Can you believe I was selling grizzly hair clips back in 2009 on etsy!!!!!

In this next year I definitely hope to spend more time designing new creations for BethNouveau, hopefully implementing elements of sterling silver wire wrapping and gems/stones, which have been unexecuted ideas of mine for some time. I also want to spend more time creating for me and knitting/designing knits. I barely have time anymore to make something for ME and I can't tell you the last time I knit something or even wore a pair of feather earrings.

So yes, 2012 shall be a rededication of all around creativity, going with the flow of wherever the universe takes me.

xo, beth

A little coupon for my blog readers and facebook followers..

2012-01-04T23:25:00.000-05:00

Hi all! Wow, two blog posts and it's only January 4th!! Maybe I will keep up with my blog this year after all.

I am just posting to notify you of a little coupon I am running in my etsy shop. Use coupon 10OFF to get 10% off any purchase.

Thanks for reading and sweet dreams!

xo

beth

A new website format is coming!

2012-01-04T01:23:00.000-05:00

Hello everyone! Happy new year!!

I apologize that it has taken me so long to get back on my blog. I have been so busy designing jewelry that blogging has fallen by the wayside.

I do have some exciting news! Within the next week, I will be launching my new website, complete with a gallery of all my work. I have recruited the skills of my friend Kelly of faeleaf designs who is a graphic artist/fashion designer for Pendleton Mills and SeaJae, who is a professional photographer.

I can't wait to show you how it looks!

Keep your eyes peeled for the update.

Blessings,

Beth

Hooray for Spring!

2011-05-18T15:09:00.004-04:00

Spring has sprung, and here in South Carolina that means the heat is on. Temperatures here have been in the mid-to upper 80's now for a few weeks and I'm already dreading the sweltering misery that summer will bring.

I have been furiously knitting away at a crossover cardigan featured in Noro Knits a few years ago.

It is a cross between Myrtle....

And Butterfly...

It is basically the butterfly sweater bottom lengthened to myrtle length with the myrtle hood and sleeves. So far it looks great! I have completely finished the body and hood and I'm working on the sleeves.

Here's a shot of me blocking the body

In other news, I have been creating some hoops for my shop, dystruction designs... There are some really pretty hoops on there, but my favorite one is this rainbow glitter and gaffer tape hoop:

I really didn't want to sell hoops, but considering the sheer cost of buying tape to make myself some, I have decided to casually list some on etsy to pay for the supplies. Hoop tape isn't cheap, as I am discovering!

My hooping has come a long way since the fall. Lately I have been working on reversals, knee and one legged hooping, and incorporating more dance into my hooping style. Here's a shot of me one legged hooping.

I have also been playing with FIRE too :) :) Which is extremely exhilirating!

As far as bethnouveau goes, I finally got around to making some new designs last month and have been slowly listing them on etsy.

The super long grizzly rooster feather fad is starting to tone down a bit, which is nice, because those feathers are impossible to find, especially in purple and blue. I do have a few colors left, but those are flying out the door!

Some of my new designs:

Vamped Out - Super Long Bright Red Grizzly Rooster Feather Wire Wrapped Earrings

Limon - Super Long Green and Yellow Grizzly Rooster Feather Wire Wrapped Earrings

Serengeti - Blonde, White and Tan Copper Wire Wrapped Earrings

Blanca - White Peacock Feather Fringed Earrings.

All of these can be found in the shop!

Thanks for reading, enjoy your week everyone! xox

Oh my how the days go by....

2010-12-09T17:29:00.001-05:00

Hi everyone,

Wow, I can't believe it's been five months since I last posted (!!!) I feel so bad for neglecting my website and blog for so long; however, I have been doing really REALLY well. I am progressing well at school and my etsy shop is doing better than I ever would have imagined. I am incredibly thankful for each and every customer and order and I feel blessed to have made a niche for myself in the etsy marketplace.

Each month of this year has become progressively busier and I find that I have less and less time to create anything new. I have heard other artists discuss this and thought, "Oh, that will never happen to me". Over Thanksgiving break I was able to crank out a few new items for the etsy shop, which you can view below.

These are called Phoenix Igniting and feature rooster and peacock feathers attached to a fabric backing and set in gorgeous bead caps

These are called Pegasus and feature white schlappen strung on either gold, copper, or silver chains.

These are called Persephone and feature irridescent and black schlappen strung on silver chains.

These are called Rapunzel and feature locally sourced, CRUELTY FREE rooster feathers strung on silver chain.

These are called the golden peacock and look awesome with some gold jewelry!

I got some of the photos from my pinup shoot back in April and I am so happy with how they turned out... I have posted some of those below :)

Can you say Lucille Ball? I love it!

I've also been knitting a bit. Mostly small projects.. I did finish another Ogee Lace Wrap

I'm also working on a myrtle and butterfly crossover sweater that will look incredible!

Au Revoir!

Under the weather.. but not out of commission

2010-07-08T11:07:00.002-04:00

Hi everyone,

I've been fighting a sinus cold thing since yesterday which has left me dizzy and weak. Yesterday I slept till nearly 6 pm! Today I'm marginally better, and determined to be productive without pushing it :)

On Monday evening I *finally* got around to finishing a couple patterns and adding them to the website and to ravelry for FREE!!!!!. The patterns I have added are:

the foldover cropped cardigan shrug!

my furry rave gogo legwarmers

(as requested by a couple burners on ravelry)

my perfectly flared legwarmers

and last, but not least

my dropped stitch scarf

(a great stashbuster)

A bunch of people have already downloaded the shrug, and I am really excited to see how the projects turn out :) I proofread the pattern carefully and I'm crossing my fingers that there weren't any mistakes. I feel like the calculations might be confusing for some people. Pattern support is provided free at bethnouveau@gmail.com.

In other news, I attended Floyd Fandango this weekend in Floyd, VA and had a wonderful time. Sam Bush is an incredible bluegrass musician and I was one of the only hula hoopers there, so I didn't cringe every time I dropped my hoop :)

I don't think I mentioned this yet, but I purchased an LED hoop from trickconcepts and I ADORE it.

It's so bright!

This month I am working on vertical on the body hooping, the barrell roll, the vortex (which is supposedly easy but I struggle with it), and bringing the hoop up from the knees. Slowly but surely I will master them all :)

sweaty me, hooping at a festival :)

ah funny hooping faces

I will leave you with a few shots of some new wire-wrapped feather earrings I put in the etsy store.

The Kingfisher - I LOVE THESE

The Bees Knees - These look great wrapped in yellow wire. Talk about DRAMA

The Sandpiper - Understated, the photos don't do these justice. LOVE THEM

Peacock Jamboree - Very colorful

Butterfly Wings - more superbright color. I Love peacock body feathers!

That's all for now. An update on my current knitting projects will follow soon.

happy creating!

xox

Ch-ch-changes

2010-07-06T12:34:00.000-04:00

Hello everyone,

I will be posting a fun blog tomorrow, but I wanted to post my new shipping policies on the blog in hopes that everyone will see it.

Here we go:

All my items are made to order. I occasionally have the item already in my case and ready to ship.

I hate doing this, but to preserve my sanity, I am giving myself 7 days from the payment received date to make and mail your earrings. I have resisted doing this, but its becoming inevitable. Lately I have had way too many evenings up till 2-3 in the morning and sometimes even 4 or 5 in the morning filling orders, which is interfering with every other aspect of my life, including my day job. Items will still VERY OFTEN be shipped within 3 days of your payment, and SOMETIMES the next day. If you need an item for an event coming up or if you need it rushed, convo or me at bethnouveau@gmail.com BEFORE placing your order and I can generally accomodate you. Once Fall arrives, and my school/teaching schedule really intensifies, I may have to change this policy again. I've become a zombie during the day and I've become chronically late to everything, so its time to make some changes. I hope everyone understands. I pride myself on being a fast shipper, and during easy times I will still hustle. But I won't pull these late nighters anymore! Last night I was up till 3 in the morning and it was impossible for me to wake up this morning.

As far as shipping times go, please allow up to 14 business days (not including holidays and weekends) to receive your order after I ship if you are in the US. I have had international orders take up to 1 month to arrive, although most shipments to Canada, the UK, and Europe arrive within 7 days. If you have not received your order in that time frame (14 business days for US, 30 days for Int'l), PLEASE convo me before leaving negative feedback and I will ship a free replacement. All US orders have delivery confirmation.
I will overnight or 2nd day earrings to you (at your expense) if you need them immediately for $19 within the continental US.

The most amazing thing EVER crocheted

2010-07-05T12:49:00.001-04:00

Crochet Mario blanket whole
Originally uploaded by Gege_Crochet

Wow.. I am amazed :)

More posts later, kids ;)

What is in a name? My pinup shoot.. and more ;)

2010-06-11T09:37:00.001-04:00

Hi everyone!

This is a very long post!

I have been in the process of redoing all my etsy listings. I have been making three major changes. First, I have been giving all of the earrings names. This has been creative but stressful since there are 68 pairs up right now. I've been trying to name a couple a day in hopes that after a month everyone will be named. I have also been updating my tags with more information so that my titles can be less cluttered. So instead of
"southwestern native american style parrot and peacock feather wire wrapped sterling silver pierced earrings" a new listing reads "The Rainbow connection - Colorful Wire Wrapped Feather Earrings". I think its much cleaner and simpler and will definitely result in less confusion on my end when people ask questions about my work. If anyone out there has any naming suggestions for the remaining pieces, by all means send me a message :) The last change I am making is I am making most of my items customizable. I previously allowed customers to switch out the color of wire or ear hooks but now each listing has a note about the customization possibilities available for that piece.

I have been trading up a storm. I am SUPER excited to say that Chelsealynnxoxo of etsy (and flicker + twitter + youtube) has done some modeling for me. She also made a gothic makeup inspired tutorial on youtube you should check out. I sometimes like to (poorly) do goth makeup at shows and asked her to make me a tutorial of a look I saw on a magazine cover. Here's a link to her tutorial.

Here are the modeling shots of her wearing 'The Rainbow Connection' Earrings.

Thank you, Chelsea!

If there are any other ladies out there with modeling and photography skills, by all means send me photos of you in your earrings. Your photos will be put in my listing with a credit to you!

I am SUPER excited to announce that I recently did a photoshoot myself with the extremely talented Kellyn Willey of Pinupgirl! Cosmetics in Atlanta and my earrings are now featured in her store! Ages ago, when Pinup! was located in Little Five Points, my girlfriend and I went shopping there and I admired the photographs on the wall. I was still living in Virginia at the time, and didn't get an opportunity to do a shoot. Once I moved closer to Atlanta, I still admired Pinup! from afar by perusing their website and myspace pages but once again, a trip to Atlanta never materialized. Kellyn contacted me about featuring my earrings in her store and the trade was on! I don't have my shots back yet, but I posted some photos my friend Julia took of the shoot with her iphone.

The earrings in this shot are now sold in the store and are aptly named "the pinup pair".

They did an INCREDIBLE job with my makeup.

Once I get my shots, I'll absolutely post them up here. If you're near Atlanta, check her out! Even if its just for hair and makeup. The experience was absolutely incredible.

I recently vended my earrings at a small festival and did fairly well with it, so I plan on carrying on the tradition at future festivals. I plan on attending Floyd Fandango in Floyd, VA over July 4 weekend. If you're there, look for me! I'll be walking around with my jewelry case. I posted some crappy photos taken with my iphone. Sadly (or not sadly?!), my case is now nearly empty from the Pinupgirl! shoot and the festival. I'll definitely have to restock before Floyd Fandango.

Floyd Fandango is a beer and wine festival held right off the Blue Ridge Parkway, featuring over 15 wineries from the VA and NC regions and 10 microbrews along with amazing entertainment. This year, the artists I am dying to see are Sam Bush (one of my favorite bluegrass artists) and the DJ Williams Projekt from Richmond, VA (blues/R&B). If you're near Virginia, I hope to see you there!

In the month of May I knocked out some more hiking on the Appalachian Trail. Mostly in Nantahala National Forest in North Carolina but also some in Tennessee in Cherokee National Forest.

Creepy Fire Tower on Albert Mountain

Total White out at the top! And the entire thing was shaking from the wind. Very spooky!

Do you even recognize me? Haha

Have a WONDERFUL weekend everyone!

xox

How could I forget?!

2010-05-30T20:10:00.000-04:00

I can't believe I forgot to post this, but last month a pair of my earrings made it to the front page! I've been so busy, I forgot to pat myself on the back about it :) Unfortunately I wasn't at my computer that day, but I did get a screeshot with my phone.

The pair that made it are the red/green/yellow amazon single parrot feather earrings you see at the bottom right. Recently, they were also featured on etsy's Treasury east!

I feel so blessed to be part of the etsy community. This year has been bountiful and good to me. I am incredibly thankful for every customer and friend I have made!

Here's my latest pair of earrings. These feature amazon parrot feathers on sterling silver ear wires with a silver chain and parrot feather on an ear cuff on one of the earrings. Very versatile and different.

I also changed my etsy banner. I like it! It's very simple. Now to revamp the website.. haha. I feel like I'll never get around to that.

Happy Memorial Day weekend, everybody :)

Let me off the ferris wheel!

2010-05-24T14:49:00.000-04:00

Hello everyone. This post has been long overdue! I have just now got my computer life back together after having my hard drive crash. Luckily I had everything backed up. This entire process has made me realize how insanely dependent our society is on computers and technology in general.

This past weekend we hiked at Table Rock State Park here in South Carolina. It was hellaciously hot. The view was wonderful, however.

View of the Table Rock Reservoir

steep!

So insanely steep!

I took some photos from my recent move I thought I'd share. I have a LARGE, BULKY 120 gallon saltwater aquarium that is quite difficult to move. I really wanted to reveal how to move such a monstrosity. I have moved this aquarium SIX times since 2003. I may, in fact, make an eHow article since the tutorials on moving aquariums are not very thorough. The quality of the photos isn't fantastic as I only had my iphone available.

Before the move...

First, you need several large rubbermaids to put the live rock and water in. Try to save as much water as possible or you'll have to make up new water at the tank's new location. Newly made saltwater is very caustic and shouldn't be added in with coral.

Start draining the water into the rubbermaids with a siphon and distribute the rock evenly throughout the tubs. I had to use 6 - 45 gallon tubs to hold all my rock and water. Once the water level drops, the siphon will not work well, so you will need to use a pitcher to remove the water.

Moving some live rock. You can see my purple urchin on one of the rocks

Save the loose coral, fish, and invertebrates. You may want to bag these up individually. If I'm just moving across town I will place all the (nonaggressive) fish in a bucket and seal the lid. I have also done this with coral although I don't recommend it if yours are particularly delicate or if you're moving more than a few miles away. Definitely bag them everything up seperately (as if you were buying it from a store).

While the water is draining, start removing the equipment. Moving is a good time to get all your equipment squeaky clean. Wipe everything off and box it up. Once you've drained the water and removed all the inhabitants, you'll want to decide what to do with the sand.

Almost empty...

Overflow box, piping, and chemicals packed up and ready to move

My EuroReef Protein Skimmer waiting to be cleaned

Depending on the strength of the people physically moving the tank, you may want to remove all the sand and place it in its own container. Don't let it dry out or you'll kill the precious colonies of bacteria and have to re-cycle your tank's nitrogen cycle again. If you have a deep sand bed, the bottom of your tank is not made of tempered glass, or if your tank is older, definitely remove the sand, as the weight of it could crack the bottom of your aquarium. Move the aquarium slowly, not elevating the bottom too much.

We moved it slowly with the sand still inside.

Thank you to my movers Dave and Brandon!

View of the equipment inside the stand (sump, return pumps, ballasts, etc.)

Tank inhabitants in covered plastic tubs

Tank and stand loaded onto a seperate truck

After driving to your new location, place the tank on the stand and set up all the equipment (but your light) but don't turn anything on. Slowly add the water back and reset up your rock in temporary positions. You wont be able to see where you're putting anything so just get the rock in there for now. Add your fish back to the system. Add in your coral so that they're spread out. After you set up your rock you can put the coral in their final locations. After everything is added, put your light on top, plug your equipment in and troubleshoot any leaks or issues.

After moving my tank this year I had some leaks in the return tubing and it had to be completely re-glued. I waited a few days to aquascape my tank. I recommend doing several water changes during this time to remove the detritus that will have been kicked up.

Happy Monday, everyone!

Oh my, it's been so long

2010-04-26T16:34:00.000-04:00

Hello everyone.

It has been so long since I posted last. My computer crashed, making my online life a bit of a mess. Other than that, not a whole lot has been going on. I have been spending most of the recent sunny days outside, knitting during my lunch breaks and hula hooping when I get home from school.

For those who aren't into hula hooping, I encourage you to GIVE IT A TRY. I was skeptical at first.. I was horrible at hooping as a child, and revisiting the hobby didn't sound appealing. Over the years, as a joke, I'd run and pick up a flimsy child's hoop at walmart, and it would (of course) almost instantly crash to the ground as soon as I tried to swing it around my waist. Many of my friends started hooping and insisted that it was fun and relaxing and that the modern adult hoops would stay on my waist fine. Finally, at a festival a few years ago, I picked up a friends hoop and after many drops, I could finally keep it on my waist. Now, I'm learning a few tricks every couple weeks and I love it!

A few recommendations: 1. definitely buy or make an adult hoop. There are loads of tutorials online on making a hula hoop. 2. get on youtube and watch some hooping videos. These have been immensely happy. I have used tutorials made by safire and caroleeeena. Safire has a few up on youtube, and she encourages you to go to her website to purchase more. They are kind of expensive. I really really like Caroleeena. Her tutorials are free and she has such a silly, giving, sweet spirit that transends through the video to you. She also does hooping workshops in my area and I hope to attend one in the future. So pick up a hoop and give it a try!

Recently I entered some of my scientific images into a science as art competition here at school. One of my images was chosen for 4th place. Here are some photos I took of the event:

My image of oyster shell membrane walls is in blue

My image of autofluorescent bryozoan colonies tied for 4th

The exhibit

I really liked entering this contest, because SCIENCE CAN BE ART. I constantly encounter art in my daily life as a scientist.

I went hiking last weekend up Grandfather Mountain near Banner Elk, NC. The leaves are still absent from the trees there, but I got some great photos anyway. I'm looking foward to spending more time outside.

Here are some new additions to the etsy shop:

These feature red/blue/green/black parrot feathers hung on closeable clasp style earrings OR sterling silver ear hooks. I'm switching all the light earrings to closeable clasps unless you specify you want sterling silver.

The light ones tend to come off my ears easily. If you choose to have the sterling silver hooks, definitely use an ear backing!

These feature fluorescent lime green parrot feathers set in sterling silver ear hooks OR closeable clasps.. your choice :)

Lately I appear to be on a lime green kick... These earrings feature lime green and black striped grizzly rooster feathers lightly wrapped in black wire and set in gunmetal colored ear hooks.

Enjoy your Monday everyone!

xox

Here's to sunny days and dispositions...

2010-04-06T22:13:00.001-04:00

Hi everyone, I apologize for not posting for awhile, but this weather has been so absolutely gorgeous that I have spent just about every second possible outside. I generally blog during my lunch break at work, but those lunch breaks are now taken outside on a blanket with some knitting. The positive is that I have completed quite a few projects.

The first project I finished is a cute knitted cropped shrug that I designed. The pattern will soon be available on ravelry for sale. Here are some photos.

I made it with 3/4 sleeves as I ran out of yarn to make full ones, but I like it!

I absolutely love the back. The sleeves were made with raglan shaping.

I love this yarn, Rowan "ribbon twist", colorway "mole".. now discontinued.

As far as etsy goes, I haven't designed a lot of jewelry lately as filling orders has been taking a lot of time. I did design these earrings on the left for a customer as a custom order. I liked them so much, I added them to the shop today. They feature peacock swords lightly wrapped in black wire and set in sterling silver ear hooks. They're about 4-5 inches long and just hit the top of the shoulders.

I hope everyone had a lovely Easter holiday. I took a ton of pictures of the rural Virginian countryside around my parents home. Here are some of the highlights.

View of the Peaks of Otter in Bedford, VA

A gorgeous house and stream in Colton's Mill

Another view of the house

A gorgeous farm and greenhouse near Colton's Mill

View of the dogs in front of my parents gorgeous cherry tree

Enjoy the weather!!

xox

Of shoes and bed linens

2010-03-25T11:40:00.000-04:00

I have wanted (for awhile) to post about some products I love..

For the longest time I coveted the purple segment flats by Blowfish. Their designs are so cute!

These shoes are so insanely comfortable. I would love to get them in black suede.

I have also been coveting these bed linens, made by BlissLiving Home.

I adore the Icelandic Dream collection, although it doesn't match anything in my house.

I also really like this collection called Amelie Green, which also doesn't match my decor :)

Their collection called Corina, however, DOES match my room...... and I really like it!

Today's feathered offering features grizzly rooster feathers set in silver cones and hung on sterling silver ear hooks. I actually made these a long time ago but have been too inundated to list them.

Have a happy Thursday, everyone!

xox

Spring is on the mend

2010-03-16T14:57:00.000-04:00

Spring is finally upon us! And I know I'm going to get blasted for saying this, but the winter was way too short. Since I finally "got" snowboarding, I have been craving more snow!

The coming of spring brings the return of a new passion, backpacking! I hope I can get outside soon and do some serious hiking. The flowers are blooming here in South Carolina and its about 60 degrees and sunny.

I am finally linked up as a designer on ravelry! I received my confirmation email this morning. I also added my free pattern to the ravelry pattern store. You can check out the pattern here if you have a ravelry account... And if you don't have a ravelry account and you knit, what's wrong with you?!

I enjoyed the spring-y weather yesterday by taking Mercury for a walk and playing fetch in a nearby field. He was sick again over the weekend and was hospitalized for hemorrhagic diarrhea. I won't describe it here, but the title should give you an idea of how awful it was. He's doing better, though, and I hope that his health will improve back to its original state.

Here are some feathered offerings I have placed in the store. The ones to the right feature rooster hackle feathers wrapped in copper wire and set in copper colored ear hooks. They're very small (less than 4 inches) and are now in the etsy shop!

These earrings have been a huge hit! They feature grizzly rooster feathers in two colors, black schlappen, and irridescent peacock swords wrapped in silver coated wire and hung on sterling silver ear hooks.

I also got some feathers in stock I was missing for awhile and added some items back into the store that had been hibernating.

Both of these feature parrot feathers hung on sterling silver ear hooks. Very simple and pretty!

Happy Tuesday, everyone. I hope you are enjoying the great weather!

My First Pattern is up!

2010-03-16T02:56:00.000-04:00

Hi all!

I have finally gotten around to adding my first FREE pattern for the button up seed stitch cuffed fingerless armwarmers. Just redirect your webpage brower to http://www.bethnouveau.com/ and go to patterns. I have also added the pattern on ravelry. If you're on there, search for user bethnouveau.

Its extremely late, but I just had to post that :) I've been working on it all night!

goodnight!

Life after moving

2010-03-15T23:36:00.000-04:00

I'm all moved into my new place, and it's definitely about time for a blog. I've really missed an internet presence these past two weeks. I kept my shop open during the move and was able to fill orders sporadically (often sitting in my car, in the post office parking lot).. oh the glamorous life of an etsy seller. hahaha.

I have been itching for awhile to post about my recent trip to Blacksburg. I was visiting friends and attending a drum and bass/dubstep party thrown by the massive sound guys from http://www.massivesound.us/. I am graciously allowed to host my website on their space. I really loved seeing my friends who have also moved away, many of them to Washington, D.C. I used to frequent DC a lot, but haven't been able to in quite awhile as it is so terribly far away.

The guys threw a drum n bass/dubstep reunion party. If you like those genres, feel free to check out a mix from that party by my friend Steve (Class A), here. There are many many good mixes on the massive sound website. Definitely check them out.

While in Blacksburg I got to frequent some restaurants I love. I got my raw oyster and sushi fix at Poor Billy's Seafood Restaurant.

I stole this photo from their website. They have excellent (although pricey) sushi. I also love their pan seared tuna.

We also frequented Boudreaux's and I got an excellent crabcake sandwich one day for lunch and a delicious sunny-side up egg served with meat marinara over a english muffin for brunch another day. One of my good friends, Cassie, is a waitress there and it was wonderful catching up over such delicous food. I really miss Boudreaux's a lot. They used to (and still do) throw awesome parties.

I also got some hiking in while in Blacksburg. On Saturday we went to Falls Ridge Nature Preserve in Ellett Valley. You can find more information about the preserve here. There's a trail map here. Its a very easy hike and was deeded to the Nature Conservancy in the 70's.

Taken from the Nature Conservancy website:

A large Indian settlement was located upstream of Falls Ridge Preserve on the North Fork of the Roanoke River, but the only direct evidence of Indian activity has been the discovery of a few white flint arrowheads. In 1823, the Governor of Virginia granted to the Birchfield family 700 acres of land, encompassing part of the present day preserve. A local family, the Dudleys, later acquired the land and used it not only for farming but also to operate several enterprises: a wool carding mill, general store, post office, lumber milk gram mill and a livery. In 1939, a kiln to produce burnt lime was installed at the falls by Harry Dudley. Calcium carbonate cliffs (travertine) deposited by the stream were blasted loose, crushed and carted by mule to the top of the kiln. Traces of this operation can be seen near the falls.

In addition to trails, there's a large open field where I like to picnic and play fetch with my dogs. It's a lesser known hike in the area, and I rarely see other hikers when I visit. The Roanoke Times wrote an article about Falls Ridge recently. You can read about it here.

I also made it out to Buffalo Mountain near Floyd, VA. Buffalo Mountain offers a spectacular nearly 360 degree view of the surrounding area. It's a very short hike that goes steadily up. There was still much snow on the ground here.

Mercury loved it!

Off in the distance (in the center of this shot), you can see the lonely peak of Pilot Mountain near Mount Airy, NC.

Miss Venus and I

I will post more tomorrow..

Night everyone!

Remember to Breathe...

2010-03-04T22:19:00.002-05:00

I have had (yet another) whirlwind of a week. I am in the process of moving to a new residence. I'm leaving my adorable house for a townhouse. I'm going to miss the garden and the yard. I will not miss the extra money spent, mowing the aforementioned lawn (many many many times), or the neighborhood..... moving is very taxing on me, as I'm sure it is on everyone. Regardless I have had some time to crank out a couple little feathered hatchlings in the store.

These feature parrot feathers in three colors set atop black curled duck feathers and set in sterling silver ear hooks. Very bright, huh? I'm trying to shoot for some brigher earrings for spring and summer.

These feature peacock body feathers set atop bright yellow parrot feathers. I really cannot get enough of peacocks. Every single feather is interesting in its own right and there's so much variation! These also feature sterling silver ear hooks.

I hope everyone has a lovely weekend! This is my last blog for the week. I'm heading to Blacksburg, VA to visit old friends (and cart some of my junk to my parents house.. haha).

Enjoi!

Musical perfection...

2010-03-01T02:09:00.002-05:00

Hi everyone,

I hope you all had a great weekend! I had an awesome weekend. I went to see muse and the silversun pickups in Atlanta. They were AWESOME. Perfect sound, great stage presence... Both bands played every song I wanted to hear. It was phenomenal. They are both EXCELLENT live.

Here was the silversun pickups setlist:

Growing Old

Twinkles
No Secrets
Royal We
Future Foe
Substitution
Panic Switch
Lazy Eye

Here's the muse setlist as taken from their facebook:

Uprising

Resistance
New Born
Map of the Problematique
Supermassive Black Hole
MK Ultra
Interlude
Hysteria
Nishe
United States of Eurasia
Feeling Good
Guiding Light
Helsinki Jam
Undisclosed Desires
Starlight
Plug In Baby
Time Is Running Out
Unnatural Selection
Encore:
Exogenesis Symphony: Part 1 (Overture)
Stockholm Syndrome
Man With A Harmonica
Knights of Cydonia
I found a photo of the setlist from twitpic:

Chelsea modeled her earrings for the site. I love her shots, she's so pretty!

I didn't have time to post any listings this weekend. I'll post some this week.

Goodnight, all!

xoxoxoxo

When it rains....

2010-02-27T00:44:00.001-05:00

Hi everyone. It has been a whirlwind of a week since my last post. Unfortunately due to illness and other circumstances I was unable to get the listings up that I wanted to. On Wednesday I noticed that my older collie, Mercury was limping. I thought he had broken or injured his leg. While palpating his leg, I noticed blood on his fur. After rushing him to the animal hospital, he was diagnosed with bladder stones. The xray revealed SEVERAL of them both in the bladder and urethra.

I left him there for surgery on Wednesday. He's happy to be home but he's terribly tired and the incision looks painful and sore. I am VERY thankful it was something simple.

The latest pair of earrings I posted tonight feature grizzly rooster feathers in multiple colors, peacock swords, and pheasant hackle wrapped in silver coated wire and hung in sterling silver ear hooks. They are long long long. Definitely the longest pair I've made so far. They're about a foot long. I *love* them and I'm making me a pair!

I really like the long earring look and will make some more like these!

The purple grizzly rooster really pops the swords out, huh?

I also really like the silver coated wire :)

I would like to give a shout out to Chelsea!

She recently purchased some earrings from me and gave me a shoutout on youtube. She makes makeup tutorials. I am definitely going to check those out the next time I'm getting dolled up because I am horrible at doing my makeup! Thanks Chelsea!! The earrings look AWESOME on her. I told her they look way better than they do on me and enticed her to take some photos for me as my model. hint hint!! :) I hope you love your earrings, Chelsea!

Goodnight everyone. I've had a loooooooooooooooooong day!
xoxooxoxox

Sick day blahs..

2010-02-23T23:13:00.001-05:00

A cough I seem to have picked up over the weekend has festered into a full blown cold. I stayed home from work today in bed, eating ice cream paired with a delicious tart that I made on Sunday evening. Icecream and pastries probably aren't on the list of foods to eat while sick, but I did anyway ;)

Rustic Berry Tart

This recipe is improvised from one I found in Fine Cooking magazine. Because I made many improvisations I am posting it here.

Crust:

1 cup of all-purpose unbleached flour
1/2 cup of all wheat flour
(If you don't have all wheat flour, just use 1 1/2 cups of regular flour)
2 tsp granulated sugar
1/2 tsp table salt
11 Tbs Butter (thaw to almost room temperature)
1 Large Egg Yolk
3 Tbs milk

Filling:

1 Package (~12 oz) of Frozen Mixed Berries thawed to room temperature
1/4 cup granulated sugar
1 Tbs all-purpose flour

To Finish:
1 whole large egg, beaten
granulated sugar for sprinkling

Combine flour, sugar, and salt and lightly mix with a beater. Cut butter into cubes and add to the flour mixture. Mix on low speed for 2 mins until the lumps are under pea sized.

In a small bowl, mix the milk and egg yolk. Add this mixture to the flour and mix until dough is soft. Remove dough from bowl, form into a flat disk by hand and place in the refrigerator for 15 minutes. You can make this dough up to 3 days ahead of time and store in the fridge.

While this sits, preheat oven to 350 F.
Remove berries from packaging, drain, and mix with sugar and flour in a bowl. After 15 mins, bring the dough out and let sit for 5 mins at room temperature. Flour a counter or surface to roll the dough on. Roll the dough out until its about 13 inches in diameter and transfer to a baking sheet or cookie sheet. Add the berry mixture to the center and fold the dough over the berries, making a 2 inch rim

Brush the dough with the beaten egg and sprinkle sugar over the dough and fruit

Bake for 27 minutes or until dough is golden brown

This evening I have finally started to feel a little better and had a chance to list a pair of earrings on etsy.

These feature black and white rooster feathers hung in sterling silver ear hooks.

Goodnight, everyone! Back to bed for me!

xox

Of a weekend filled with collies and cooking..

2010-02-22T23:42:00.002-05:00

Hello everyone,

I hope you had a wonderful weekend!

Mine was extremely busy. Venus was in her first dog show. She didn't get any points, but I wasn't realy expecting her to. Some of the best collies in the country were present. I was trying to expose her to the lights and the crowds and the thousands of dogs. She carried herself quite well!

I hope to handle her myself at her next show, which will likely be the Charlotte dog show in April.

Handling a dog in the ring is no easy task, believe me. There's a lot more that goes into it than meets the eye. A good handler can make or break a great dog. For instance, I watched a gorgeous dog perform poorly on one day of the show with a particular handler. The second day the handlers were switched and this dog won its class.

After the dog show Saturday, we chilled at the house and made sushi and drank Sapporo, which is "Asian Budwieser" as Dave says, but whatever, I love it!. I haven't made sushi in quite a few years but have wanted to for awhile. I have been accumulating dishes and bamboo mats which were crying to be used! I tried (unsuccessfully) to use the (non electronic) rice cooker you can see in the photo which was a Christmas gift.. I tried to make sushi rice in it and had to throw it out and start over. The rice was gummy on the outside and crunchy in the center.... Neither the directions on the bag of rice or those that came with the rice cooker were correct to use with it. It was wholly frustrating. I don't think my stock pot is large enough for it to work properly. We had to improvise a bit to get perfect sticky rice and make it on the stove...

Items on the menu included spicy tuna, spicy salmon, california roll, some nigiri, and I attempted to make a caterpillar roll (with imitation crab since I couldn't find eel) that ended up being too big and ended up breaking. The eel sauce recipe was a bit too sweet also. I'm hoping that the next time I make this roll it will be banging! We ended up eating the last bit of fish as sashimi since we ran out of rice. I wanted to tempura fry some of the rolls but ended up being too worn out. Next time I will also make the sauces and cut the veggies a day ahead since that takes the most time. I actually over-bought fish and ended up feeding a bit of the fish to the dogs, who loved it.

I didn't post any listings today. I think I have bronchitis and just didn't feel up to it. Tomorrow, for sure!

xox

A jewelry discovery...

2010-02-18T12:34:00.001-05:00

I recently discovered the most beautiful metalwork artist named Jade Gedeon. She sells her jewelry in a shop called 'We Dream in Colour'. Here is her artist bio:

Jade Gedeon's influences range around the world. Owing much to her family's nomadic lifestyle, Jade enjoyed extensive exposure to a myriad of nations and cultures growing up. Born in the United States, raised in Trinidad and now living and working in Essex, Massachusetts, she had most recently made her home in Australia. A graduate of the Pratt Institute, she decided to put her art background to work in 2002, and has been making wonderful jewelry ever since.

I absolutely adore the begonia necklace and earrings.

This is the type of metalwork I would like to do in the future... A ginko leaf would be lovely in this setting, wouldn't it?

Today's etsy offering features teal/turquoise colored beads and brown/black/white pheasant feathers hung on sterling silver ear hooks. They are about 2 inches in length. Very dainty and pretty!

xox

Delicious Apple Galette Recipe... and some more feathered hatchlings

2010-02-17T13:45:00.001-05:00

Happy Hump day!

As promised, here is the apple galette recipe, taken from Yoga Journal.

The only modifications I used were: granny smith instead of golden delicious (for a more tart galette), and I added 4 tbsp of sugar to the apple filling instead of 2. I also used 1/2 regular flour, 1/2 whole wheat flower for the dough.

Vegetarian Apple Galette

Dough:

2 cups flour
½ teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon sugar
¾ cup cold unsalted butter, cut into small pieces
1/3 to ½ cup ice water as needed

Mix the flour, salt, and sugar in a bowl. Cut in the butter with a fork or pasty cutter, leaving some peasize chunks. Sprinkle in the ice water by the tablespoon and toss with a fork until you can bring the dough together in a ball. Press dough into a disk and refrigerate for 15 minutes. To form a galette, roll dough onto a lightly floured surface into a 14 inch irregular circle, about 1/8 inch thich. Fold into quarters and transfer to baking sheet. The dough will be larger than the pan.

Filling:
1 ½ to 2 pounds apples, peeled, cored, and thinly sliced
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon grated lemon zest (if you do not have a small grater, a serrated knife rubbed against the outside of a lemon skin will do just as well)
Juice of one lemon
4 tablespoons sugar
¼ cup melted butter

Preheat oven to 400°. In a bowl, toss apples with cinnamon, zest, juice, and 2 tablespoons sugar. Mound the apples in the center of the dough, leaving a border 2 to 4 inches wide. Fold the edges of the dough over the apples, overlapping them as you go, partially or completely covering the apples. Brush the top of the dough with the melted butter and sprinkle with the remaining sugar. Bake until the crust is golden brown and the apples tender, about 45 minutes.

I finally uploaded the photos I took of the apple galette!

This is the step where you fold the filling into the dough

I wish I had taken a photo of the final product. But I was honestly so excited to eat it I forgot to!

As I mentioned before, I made royal icing this weekend. The recipe I used called for 1/4 cup of water mixed in. This was way too much apparently, because I kept dumping in more confectioners sugar, but still didn't get stiff peaks after several minutes of beating. The final product didn't hold the shapes I used and ended up looking gloppy. I read that royal icing can be tricky... I'm going to try this again with less water next time.. At least my boyfriend enjoyed eating it!

Clearly my cake decorating skills need some work as well.

Here's for first attempts! I hope I can look back on this later and laugh.

This is the pair of earrings I listed today.. These feature gray parrot and rock dove feathers clamped and finished in sterling silver ear wires. Rock Doves are birds that are indiginous to Europe and are often used in fly tying.

All orders (of course) come in a Tiffany blue gift box for gift giving and storage.

Have a great Hump day everyone! xox

More Snow!!

2010-02-16T22:42:00.001-05:00

Hello everyone! I hope everyone had a great Valentine's Day! I had a relaxing long weekend with my boyfriend for the holiday. It snowed about 6 inches from Friday to Sunday evening. I absolutely adore the snow (in case you didn't figure that out by now) and it was really hard to tear myself away from the mountains when the weekend came to an end. The dogs really love the snow. I hated bringing them back to South Carolina and our lack of winter-wonderland-ness.

Collies are completely in their element in winter weather.

Venus has a much thicker coat than Mercury despite her young age.

I baked a chocolate cake (from a box due to time constraints), some lemon icebox cookies (from scratch from a Martha Stewart Recipe), and a large heart shaped cookie with royal icing (also from scratch). All three were delicious.... even the boxed cake. I've actually never made a boxed cake before, and was happy with the results. It was great with vanilla ice cream. The lemon icebox cookies received many many compliments both at work and from my boyfriend. I will definitely make those again!

This weekend I got some quality snowboarding in for the first time in a couple weeks. I'm already fiending to go out again. I didn't realize how highly addicting it is until now. My previous experiences with snowboarding were not pleasant. This year I had a wonderful and patient teacher (my wonderful boyfriend). I think it may be as addicting to me as backpacking. In the summer months I anxiously scrutinize my calendar and the weather forecast, planning weekend getaways into the woods. Now I'm doing the same thing! How fun!

My wonderful teacher :)

I couldn't ask for better weather. The view from Beech Mountain is breathtaking!

I plan on going up for a few night sessions over the following weeks since my weekends are going to be otherwise busy. I know this weather wont hold for much longer.. spring is around the corner!

I added more earrings to the etsy shop today. I'm still attempting to add an item a day to the shop during my lunch break at work. I'd like to increase my inventory to 50-60 items.

These earrings feature parrot and parakeet wing feathers set in a silver plated cone and finished with a sterling silver ear cuff. They are about 3 inches long and the cuff can be worn high up on the ear or lower. The photos don't do this item justice. The feathers are a bright green/yellow/teal color. Lately I have been serving as model for the site. I keep fairly weird hours and I doubt I could convince my friends to come over at 11 pm for a photoshoot. I really like this little ear cuff a lot. I hope it finds a good home!

Happy Tuesday everyone! My Virginia Tech Hokies just beat Wake Forest, claiming a #2 ranking in the ACC!

Goodnight!

xox

A productive week follows a blissful weekend...

2010-02-10T14:32:00.003-05:00

Hello everyone!

I hope you all had a wonderful weekend and beginning of the week. Happy hump day!

I had a great weekend. On Friday I did some chores but spent most of the evening knitting the leaf socks I have diligently been working on. I'm almost done!! I am working on the instep and have about 4 more inches to go. I hope to knock out the rest (or close to the rest) this weekend. I love long projects, but I will be happy to finish these! I will definitely post some pics of me wearing them. Friends and family have already asked me to make them a pair. Which may happen at a later date. I'm definitely sick of working on lace patterns for the moment!

On Saturday I surprised my beau with a couples massage as an early Valentine's Day gift. We left the house for 45 minutes, during which time the masseuses were setting up shop in my living room. After a leisurly drive through country roads he didn't recognize, we drove back to the house (much to his confusion). We both enjoyed the experience. In fact, I was so relaxed after the massage I didn't want to do anything else. We did go see Avatar 3D. I really liked it! I recommend seeing it in 3D before its out of theatres!

On Sunday I baked an apple galette. A galette is like an open faced pie. It was really good! I used both whole wheat and unbleached white flour in the dough. There's no shortening in the dough and not much sugar in the filling, so its a reasonable healthy dessert. I will post the recipe on here soon with some pictures!

Recently I re-evaluated the way I was running my etsy shop and altered both how I list items and my listing strategy. Since then I am noticing an upward trend in sales. I also decided to alter my pricing scheme, lowering the prices on most items, and slightly raising the prices on items that take me a long time to make, such as the flighty suede feather earrings. Those take me about an hour a pair to make and are very tedious, so I raised the price on those slightly. I did lower my prices on about 1/3 of my inventory for items (including the wire-wrapped earrings) that are easier for me to make. Also, some feathers are very hard to find and expensive, like the yellow, red, and green amazon parrot feathers. The prices went up on listings featuring those feathers. Definitely check out the shop for the changes I made!

I added another pair of new earrings today. These feature peacock body feathers and black rooster hackle, wrapped in black coated wire and finished with sterling silver ear hooks. Wire wrapping is a new obsession of mine (if you couldn't tell). I keep finding creative ways to wrap feathers with wire!

I am also going to post some more photos of earrings I designed and listed in the fall. These feature pheasant and rooster feathers wrapped in black wire and offset with gunmetal colored ear hooks. They look cute on!

Alright, that's all I'm going to post today. Have a great hump day! I'll be snowboarding with my beau this weekend for his birthday! I can now go on a blue run!! I'm so excited to go back. Everytime I got out I get better and better. I don't have any special Valentine's Day plans (to my knowledge).

Love!

xoxo

More of my little hatchlings...

2010-02-05T13:46:00.002-05:00

As promised, I am listing an item a day from my recent creations. Here's todays listing. These earrings feature gold, teal, and green colored peacock sword feathers atop purple hen feathers and finished with sterling silver ear hooks. These are so bright and look great on. I know they will find a good home! I may make a pair for myself.

I love these gift boxes. I got them from Nile Corp.

Here are some of the other wire wrapped earrings I made this fall that are featured in the etsy shop.
These are made with duck, pheasant, peacock, and rooster feathers.

They are wrapped in copper coated wire.

Have a great weekend everyone.. stay dry and GO SAINTS!

Crossing my fingers for some more powdery snow

2010-02-04T14:17:00.002-05:00

Hi everyone! I got my favicon to finally work!! If you go to my main website (http://www.bethnouveau.com/), and look to the left of my url in the address bar, you'll see my little peacock logo. Also, if you have an iphone, I now have an iphone logo. I found instructions on how to make it here. I took a screenshot today with my iPhone to show what it looks like. To add my website to your home screen, just load up the site in your safari browser, then add me as a bookmark to the home screen. I'm so happy that I got these to work, because for some reason they didn't work before when I tried.

I'm really excited that we're going to get more snow this weekend! I just hope that the front makes it southward over the mountains to my house...

I added some new earrings to the shop today. They're made with black and gold / yellow pheasant body feathers paired with black rooster hackle and wrapped in black coated wire and finished with sterling silver ear hooks.

A sad sort of day

2010-02-03T16:47:00.000-05:00

I hate starting posts off on a negative note, but today I'm going to do just that. Monday was a very sad day at my house. I found my outdoor kitty, Kona, dead in my yard. It was horrible. The ground has been frozen from all the weather we're getting, so I have not been able to bury him yet. I hope to do that this weekend, if the weather holds.

Here's a picture of the poor little guy, taken when he was a wee little guy, at a cottage I used to live at in rural Virginia. I don't have the words to say how much I'm going to miss him. Just last week he was following me and the dogs as we took a walk around the neighborhood. Kona was MY first cat (my family did have one cat), and he is the first of MY pets that have ever died. So its been hard to get through. It makes me appreciate how short life really is, and to never take anything for granted, because you never know when your life can radically change. This has made me become more mindful of every moment I have spent with coworkers, friends, or pets since then.

I have added some new earrings to the etsy shop. The pair I added today is made with pheasant tail feathers, hackle, and some body feathers. The earrings are orange, brown, and tan colored. They are wire-wrapped with black coated wire and hung in sterling silver ear hooks. I will be adding one pair a day for the next week, so keep your eyes peeled in the shop for those!

I just realized I haven't posted many of my wire wrapped earrings here on the blog, so I felt like I'd share some photos of those with you. They are all available on the etsy shop as well as my personal webpage store. The store on my webpage doesn't have all my inventory (yet), but I'm working on it.

These are made with natural grizzly rooster feathers overlaid with peacock body feathers and wrapped in purple wire, set in gunmetal earring hooks. These have been fairly popular and I have received many compliments!

Have a good rest of the week everyone. Be in the moment and be kind to one another..

xox

Old hobbies rediscovered....

2010-01-29T11:36:00.001-05:00

Hooray for Friday!

I am stoked that the weekend is practically here. I did not have the most productive week, but they can't all be perfect. I am very excited about taking up the piano again. I played often for about eleven years and took lessons, but quit playing as an upper classman in college as I didn't have access to a piano. A few years ago, a friend of mine gifted me a korg 5500 electric concert piano. I was happy for the gift, but trepidatious about playing again. What if I forgot how to play? What if I wasn't any good anymore? So the gift sat unused for quite awhile. Recently I realized how silly it was that I had not at least tried to play something, so I pulled out my sheet music and plugged away. After a few practice sessions, I haven't fully regained my previous prowess, but I'm well on my way! I have been fiddling with some Beethoven (Moonlight Sonata, Fur Elise) and Chopin (I love his Nocturnes!). I have also been playing the works of one of my favorite new age pianists, David Lanz. If you are into new age music, definitely check him out. I personally find Yanni to be a little cheesy, but David Lanz is a very gifted composer and pianist.

We have been having some warmer days here in South Carolina and this has led me to start thinking about spring. Last spring I planted an organic vegetable garden and was fairly successful.

It was my first garden. I planted carrots, lots of hot peppers, green pepper, cucumbers, tomatos, watermelon, squash (yellow and acorn), zuccini, lemongrass, corn, and several herbs in pots. My plot was rather tiny and I learned a lot about the proper time to pick vegetables. I ended up with a LOT of tough cucumbers and squash that sat too long on the vine! I also learned about the importance of spacing plants apart. I had some problems with the squash crowding out the other plants. This year I want to widen my plot and be very serious about growing my own produce. I want to succession plant and be smarter about my planting strategies. So this week I started to plan out my new plot and on the next beautiful day, I will re-till and wait for spring!

One problem I had in particular was towards the end of the growing season my tomatos had whitish spots on their skins. The variety of cucumber I planted was also not the best, and I will be more selective this year about choosing the type I plant. I also accidently ran over my watermelon plant with the lawn mower early in the growing season (June). To my surprise the watermelon grew back, but the fruit that was produced was super tiny, about the size of a large grapefruit or a coconut. I did eat it. It was, in addition to being adorable, very tasty!

Many of my herbs (and my now ENORMOUS lemongrass plant) are overwintering just fine and I anticipate they will take off this year. Here at the university I attend, we have an heirloom garden that sells its seed. I will be visiting their gift shop soon to make some purchases.

Have a lovely weekend, everyone! I am excited about the snow and plan to go snowboarding with my beau

xox

Another completed knitting project

2010-01-26T15:13:00.000-05:00

I completed a cute pair of buttoned armwarmers back in October. I got the yarn, Araucania Copihue, from Purl's Yarn Emporium. It's made of 100% alpaca and is oh, so soft.

The pattern is one that I made up myself. The glove part covering the hand and thumb gusset are knitted in seed stitch. The sleeve is stockinette, and the cuff is seed stitch again.

The little button is a stoneware ceramic one I made myself. I have some green ones that are similar in the etsy shop. I do have some extra blue ones like these if anyone is interested, feel free to message me to set up a trade or listing on etsy or sale off etsy.

I do miss having access to a kiln to make more of these.

FINALLY!

2010-01-25T22:52:00.000-05:00

I have been waiting, longing, hoping, and LUSTING for an Audrey Kawasaki print for so so so so so so long.. try YEARS! I am thrilled to announced that I FINALLY ordered one. Her art fills me with a mixed bag of emotions: envy, lust, heartfelt longing, and speechlessness. Her art creates vibrations within me that I can't quite describe. Her art print sales were generally limited to a limited run (between 50-150 or so), which generally precluded me from getting one. However, after seeing a bunch of her art being flipped on ebay, she altered her practices to a TIMED presale, and thus I was able to make a purchase!

This is the print I chose, Hyakki Yakao, which is named due to this Japanese folklore of the night parade of one hundred demons. I love the expression on her face and the delicate whips of hair around her face. I have my wonderful boyfriend who was at a computer during the presale. I botched the time of the presale and then tried to buy the print on my iPhone which wasn't working. He graciously stepped in and enabled me to get the print. If he hadn't been around I would have had to hurriedly find a wifi spot!

Oh and I said I would post some snowboard pics, so here I go..

Mercury wasn't sure what to make of me sliding down the ice

Mine is the pink one, obviously... ;) I *love* my hot pink bindings. Its hard to believe my boyfriend picked out such a perfect board for me, huh? He has wonderful taste.

I haven't been talking about crafting very much on here lately.. Sooo... what have I been working on. I am *still* working on the green leaf socks. I have finished one and I'm almost halfway done with the second.

Let me tell you they are slow going to knit!

I'll post final pics when they're done once and for all. Next on the list to knit: A cute longsleeved shrug that hits just below the chest with a rolled collar knit up in Rowan Ribbon Twist in color mole.

Until we meet again my friends!

A bustling sort of month...

2010-01-18T16:43:00.000-05:00

Hello everyone! I hope all of you had a fabulous new year!

I had a wonderful new year! I was in Denver, Colorado. It was lovely spending time with old friends who have recently transplanted out there. There was snow everywhere and the front range looked particularly lovely. The weather was frosty cold and the skies were blue, which is perfect weather to me. My only regret is that I didn't make it out to the mountains to drive around, but I was only there for three days, so my time was limited. For new years dinner, my wonderful boyfriend took me out to Rodizio Grill, a Brazilian steakhouse. I don't normally eat very much meat (if at all), but I definitely overindulged as the food was delicious! We were in Colorado to see sound tribe sector 9 (sts9), and their sets were nothing short of awesome.

I also got to see my wonderful girlfriend Lexie, whom I spend far too little time with. Everytime I see this girl I wish I could just go home with her or kidnap her and drag her here!

Here's a shot of us at the show in our getups. The hat is one I made from Ysolda's urchin pattern. I *adore* it. i want to make a purple one to match the scarf in the photo. The banded hair pieces are ones I made for myself but I have subsequently listed some in the shop here. I have also made a white pair listed here.

I will subsequently list some ear cuffs as well, but haven't had the time.

This year I have finally gotten in some snowboarding time, after wanting to go out for years. This was preceded by my awesome boyfriend buying me a snowboard, boots, and bindings for Christmas. I absolutely adore it. It's black and hot pink, which is just about my favorite color combination. He has also been teaching me, which is so sweet of him. I will post some photos soon.

I hope you all have a fabulous January!

Oh, and aren't we adorable? xoxoxoxo

Have a Very Merry Christmas!

2009-12-25T22:38:00.002-05:00

I hope all of you are having a fabulous Christmas!

That's all I want to say :)

xox

Freefall into winter!

2009-12-01T09:29:00.007-05:00

I realize that I haven't posted a blog in quite a long time. This fall, I bit off more than I could chew, so to speak. I was teaching two sections of anatomy and taking an upper level graduate course in biotechnology that took about 7-8 hours of my week with homeworks and exercises. It was honestly exhausting. I think I did less crafting and internet stuff this semester than I have in quite awhile. I had less time this semester than even during my undergraduate years. It was THAT crazy.

I did get outside some in the fall, despite spraining my ankle and having car troubles. I also got a new puppy, a little tricolor collie girl named Venus. She's adorable. The lab I adopted did not work out. His needs were well above the amount of time I could provide. After working 8 hours a day in the summer, I would come home to a frantic dog that started destroying the deck on the house I rent. I then kenneled him during the day, which worked, but his mood would never relax and calm down in the two months that I had him. I worked through obedience and took him running almost daily, but he still wouldn't calm down, and knowing how busy my fall would be, I surmised that the best thing for him would be to find a home where someone could give him more attention. I felt very sad about it and it was a very hard decision. Mercury became very attached to him. Venus has been a joy. She is very intelligent and stubborn and cute.

Here's a photo from a hike I did with my boyfriend and dogs. I am holding (the then) tiny Venus in my arms. She's quite big now.. about 3/4 the size of Mercury. I predict that she's going to be huge!

My boyfriend took me skydiving this semester, which was an intense experience. I loved it! I'd love to go again. I posted a couple pictures below.

The freefall and jump were honestly quite frightening. I did love the parachute part.. There's something serene about floating over the earth...

Thankfully, next semester, I will not be teaching OR taking classes, so my hopes are to finish all the unfinished projects around my house and start some new items to list in my etsy shops.

I will be posting some photos of my projects soon!

xoxoo

Hooray for spring!

2009-05-01T16:03:00.003-04:00

I'm so happy that spring is finally upon us! The last push of classwork ended this week, and I'm VERY excited about finishing the website and updating my etsy shops with new products!

I did well in school this semester and my research focus is tightening a little bit. For the scientifically-minded, I'm going to run an ELISA next week and look for mammalian cytokine homologues in our oyster model. Very fun!

I have adopted a new dog, although his tenure at my home may be temporary. He's a black lab, 90 pounds, and so far he gets along well with my dog with the exception of some food and toy aggression. I have solved that by reinforcing my dog's role as the pack leader and by feeding them separately. What is more pressing is that he is hell bent on chasing my cats when they turn their backs on him. For instance, if I let him in the house, he will run at them until he hits the wall at the back of the house, hitting it with a smack. He's way too rough when playing with them. He has sniffed noses a few times with them and I've been reinforcing any behavior on his part when he is calm around them. I know that prey drive isn't necessarily something you can train out of an older dog, so I'm going to try it a little bit longer and see what happens. If it's obvious that he can't be housed with them, his previous owners are going to send him to a Labrador rescue. While this would make me sad, I know that they will be very strict on whom they give him to and he will find a good home where there are no cats to aggravate him.

Well I have to run but I'll blog some more later about everything that's going on!

Etsy shop updated.. and now on ebay!

2009-03-10T20:39:00.002-04:00

Hi all... I updated BethNouveau on etsy this week. I added some vintage bird wall hangings and boxes and some earrings. Check them out!

Aaaannnd, apothecarie is FINALLY up and running!

I made a group of hilarious vintage-y greeting cards last week and took photos today. Those will be put into Dystructiondesigns (on etsy) reallllly soon. Hopefully tomorrow!

I also created an ebay shop today for my jewelry. There's more of a Southwestern/hippie crowd on ebay and I think that my earrings will be very successful on there.. well at least I hope. There are TONS of feathers and bird skins I'd like to buy, but I spent a ton of money last month on new feathers (which I haven't even used yet) and the etsy shop has been really slow since January. Outputting more earrings (even if it is on ebay) will give me more money to buy more feathers. I have some great ideas!

I am just rolling along, aren't I?

The website is still halted, but I am going to work on it TONIGHT. I am stumbling around with the zen cart. I don't know SQL and I haven't been able to find a tutorial on using the thing!

My goal is to have the website up by the end of the week (I've said that before, though, huh. hahaha), even if I can't get the shop to work.

Next week is our spring break, and while I'll be here working for the good part of the week, I am taking off on Wednesday to go see STS9 in Asheville. I'm soooo excited!

A Hitchcock-themed looooong rainy (and snowy!) weekend

2009-02-27T10:56:00.002-05:00

This past weekend was extremely rainy, and thus my plans to get a lot of hiking done were foiled. The rain was highly conducive to crafting, though!! I spent most of the weekend decoupaging, knitting, crocheting, and revisiting several Hitchcock films that I adore. The first I watched was "Topaz", a lesser known and less popular, less Hitchcock-like film. This film received very poor reviews when it was released, but I happen to like it a lot. The film is a fictional cold war tale of espionage wherein a French spy working for America tries to unveil a missile plot between Cuba and Russia. I highly recommend it if you are into older movies, are into the more popular Hitchcock films, or are just looking for a older (but new to you) movie to watch. I also watched "North by Northwest" and "To Catch a Thief", two other favorites.

I really want to buy the coveted but rare criterion dvd collection, "Wrong Men and Notorious Women". It is no longer made and racks up a pretty penny on amazon (between $170-300 for a mint opened copy). It's on my to purchase someday list. It includes the thrillers 'the 39 steps, 'rebecca', 'notorious', 'spellbound', and 'the lady vanishes'. Incidentally, I have not seen any of these films... maybe someday!

I have nearly completed the items created from vintage bird atlases that I mentioned in an earlier post. I have posted a photo of one of the creations.

I hope to get all of them on etsy later tonight. Note that I am releasing a limited number of the hanging plaques. I was only able to find about 8 of these at the craft store, so only ONE plaque of each type of bird will be available! I plan to list about 4 out of the 7 total plaques tonight. I want to keep one for myself ;)
The little lacquered boxes (that I will be posting), however, I will be producing a lot of.

These items start as pages from a vintage bird atlas. Some of the birds are cut directly out of the atlas, and others are photocopied and shrunk/stretched. The quality of the copies is indistinguishable from the book. I had them copied at a professional copier. Next, the images are carefully cut out and decoupaged onto a painted box or plaque. Next, several coats (20-30) of decoupage medium and lacquer are applied, and the items are sanded in between coats. The plaques are attached to a lovely shiny strand of ribbon for hanging.

If I can find more plaques, I will be making more! But I do plan on making a bunch of the boxes.

I also crocheted a hat for a friend's birthday and started working on a sweater for St. patrick's day. It is the 'Sloane' sweater from Lisa Shobhana Mason's "Yarnplay". Her blog can be found here. Interestingly, I began and finished this sweater a looooooong time ago... only to realize that I didn't check my gauge like a true amateur. The sweater was enormous. I am happy to note that it only took a weekend to knit up, so not that much time was wasted... and I learned a very valuable lesson... CHECK YOUR GAUGE! The rather large sweater vest sat in my UFO bin for quite awhile. Two days ago I got the pleasure of frogging all of it and starting over. Instead of knitting the two sides separately, I am knitting the sweater in the round, and making it a tad bit longer, since I am longwaisted. I will post pics as I have them. I'm about 30% done! I am knitting it in Rowan Ribbon Twist, colorway "rabble". It will be perfect for St. Patty's!

As if the weekend wasn't idyllic enough, on Sunday it started snowing. FINALLY! Since moving to South Carolina, I have watched in irritation as all my Virginia friends and family have been repeatedly doused in snow this winter! How truly ironic (and unfair) that the year I move away from Virginia, the state gets a ton of snow! I remember last year I was wearing shorts during the winter, the temperatures were so warm. Oh well, I finally got my wish! It snowed about 4 inches.. enough for school to be canceled on Monday... which led to much more crafting (and cleaning).

That's the view from my craft room window. I love sitting in that room and dreamily watching the birds at the feeder. It's very soothing. I love it even more covered under blankets of snow. This photo was taken at 7 in the morning. By noon, nearly everything melted.

I also spent about 2 hours yesterday baking some goodies which I have shown below.
I made some red velvet cupcakes (from allrecipes.com), oatmeal spice raisin cookies, and chocolate chip cookies. Definitely enough food to keep my mouth busy for awhile.

I used store bought icing (out of laziness). I'm no expert baker by any stretch of the imagination, although I suppose I would love to be!

View of the chocolate cookie dough. These turned out reallllly good. The bowl is from the Nigella Lawson Living Kitchen series. I love the entire Nigella set. They were designed with Terence Conran. Definitely check the series out online. the bread bin is vintage, and purchased on ebay.

I thought I would also post a photo of the cats, who have been absolutely nuts the past two weeks. I apparently have a mouse living in my attic. The cats spend long hours in the bathtub and in the laundry room, their little kitty ears cocked, listening to sounds within the walls. I have heard the mice myself. With all the feral cats around my house, I'm not surprised that they have moved in the walls. I hope for their sake that they don't end up inside.. my cats are lethal!

Little Jeepers is particularly taken in with the mice.

I am stalling a bit longer on the website. I am not totally satisfied with the design just yet, and to make matters worse, there's a problem with my digital SLR that I think is going to be very costly. There seems to be a hex on me and digital cameras. I either lose them, break them, drop them in the toilet, or have them stolen out of my bags. All the photos in this post were taken with a digital camera that I dropped in the toilet. The flash is faulty, but it still takes photos. My digital slr has an issue with the autofocus. It's going to cost a couple hundred dollars to fix :( Since I'm broke, this will be on the back burner for awhile. I did, however, borrow our lab camera (a canon Rebel) to finish my store photos to hopefully enable me to get the website up this week. I am crossing my fingers!

Finally, let me say that the month of February was ROUGH although extremely productive. The only thing that has kept me centered has been yoga. My yoga practice has grown by leaps and bounds this year. I have practiced for a few years, but not in any serious fashion. This past new years I made the commitment that I was going to commit to enhancing the flexibility of my body and mind. I find that my practice at home (in addition to the course I am taking) has been absolutely beneficial to my growth (and sanity). When I get on my mat, I feel all the bullshit fade away, and the layers of stress fall off my body like an onion peel. I am looking forward tonight to returning to the mat, after a very stressful and long day here at work/school. Lately I have been using the Gaiam Rodney Yee Power Yoga Dvd ($15 at target). I *love* his sequences and his way of explaining how to deepen the poses. Very calming yet effective.

So with that, I will say namaste and goodnight!

Website is plodding along

2009-02-21T01:29:00.004-05:00

Well despite the INSANE week that I had this past week in school, the website is plodding along.
It was a terribly productive week. I am thankful for productivity, but it was exhausting and demoralizing in the end because I was literally busy all day every day (9 am to 2 am) for one week straight. I had a presentation, a case study, several meetings, and some other school and lab duties... BUT, the week is over, and I did well on the above mentioned presentation and case study.. aaannnd I got over 100% (with extra credit) on my parasitology test last Friday, so my hard work has paid off!

So about the website...

I'm not sure how I feel about it. I'm a super-perfectionist and the site just isn't quite there yet. There's a bunch of white (maybe a little TOO much) and while I spent a jazillion hours making my graphic, I feel like I could have done a better job with that too. I keep telling myself that its been years since I've used photoshop and I can do a site update soon and that savvy with graphic design comes with practice. My goal for now is to get the site up even though some sections will be skeletons for now (such as the patterns section which is going to require me making pdfs). I recognize the need to just get it up, because everything else in my life is suffering due to my lack of time. I now know why people hire someone to do this! I may make one more major set of changes before putting it online, changing a lot of the white to a darker color. Right now its so pastel-y. Color is such a tricky thing.. knowing how much of a color pops a design or makes it look cartoony... its a delicate balance for sure!

I will *hopefully* go live next week sometime. I still need to create my store and register/link my domain name.

My next project (website wise) will be to create a flash photography portfolio with all my work. I am sure that will take me forever as well.

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I haven't listed anything on etsy in awhile largely due to the fact that I have been waiting (impatiently) for a macro filter to arrive in the mail. I ordered one, but the seller (from Hong Kong) shipped me a UV filter (which is pretty much useless since I already have one). My weak link on etsy, in my opinion, are my photos. The focal length of the lens that I have is too long to take intricate photos of my jewelry and the lighting in my house is fairly poor. My next major purchase will be a flash setup. The nikon speedlight is very nice. One of the school newspaper photographers has one of these and wow.. the results were great!

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I made a fairly large purchase on ebay this week. I purchased a new hp photoprinter to print, and hopefully eventually sell my artwork and photographs. I am so excited for the opportunitiy to use it!

Website frustration ..and new little ideas hatching

2009-02-17T21:25:00.004-05:00

I have been mostly absent from this blog for quite some time because I have been hatching some larger ideas.

First, I am launching a full website very soon. I have made the preliminary design, made the images and menus in photoshop, and I've started the content. It will include this blog, free knit patterns I have designed, a full online store that sells all my products, links to my etsy stores, a link to my online photography portfolio, and other stuff! I am primarily doing this because I am missing a huge market for a lot of the items I sell, such as my jewelry. I was prompted to do this a few weeks ago when I noticed a few sellers both online and on ebay selling items of a similar nature (feathered earrings, etc) who were having quite a bit of success. While I love etsy, the crowd that a lot of my jewelry caters to (the hippie earthy crowd, those of Native American heritage, and the Southwesterners) has a larger following on ebay and online... having a home base will greatly help me.. also, it will help me sell to people who aren't either on etsy or ebay..

I'm excited about this, because it has really been YEARS since I have dabbled in webdesign, and I have longed to get back into the saddle for quite a while. The process is taking me FOREVER, not because I am rusty on the html (although I am), but because I am trying to do the entire thing in dreamweaver, which is honestly not very intuitive (to me). I think my site will be awesome because it won’t just be a blog layout (like many folks have), but a full website with frames, links, and a lot of content).

Right now, I’m hung up on slicing up a screenshot of what I want it to look like with photoshop and exporting the pieces to dreamweaver. Relearning the new photoshop cs3 has also been a pain in the rear, because it has changed significantly since the last time I used it (photoshop 6!!!) and because I have been extremely picky about what I want the page to look out. However, I am excited that I am about to get to the “content” portion, which I am an old pro at. I designed a banner and avatar for my etsy shop, BethNouveau, which is up, and I am asking my girlfriend Kelly to design me one of each for DystructionDesigns. She is also launching her site, www.faeleaf.com soon.. so keep your eyes peeled for that!

I have also been hatching a TON of ideas as far as my etsy shops go. I don’t want to reveal much, but I will say that a vintage bird atlas is my newest inspiration for a series of items that I will hopefully post before the end of the month. I am also working on some apparel and recycled/handmade cards for DystructionDesigns. Finally, I am adding a third shop into the arsenal. Several months ago I became OBSESSED with the notion of creating ALL NATURAL, HOMEMADE beauty products. Soap, shampoo, body wash, bath salts, bath oil, bath bombs, bubble bath, facial scrubs, lotions, body oil, gem-like soaps and makeup are among the items that I have already concocted recipes for. The best part of these products is that they are all natural and sustainable! The jury is out on whether parabens (found in many body products) are bad for you, and the EPA has shown that sodium laureth sulfate (a surfactant found in practically every bath item you use) is often contaminated with known carcinogens due to how it is created. I have started selling these products at a small hair salon in Bedford, VA called “Hair, Then, and Now” and I gave many of them as gifts this past Christmas. The response has been overwhelming.. everyone has loved them! The name of the new shop is called “Apothecarie”. I hope to post some items within the next couple weeks.

School and life have been rather exhausting lately. I have started my first sets of experiments and I have been so busy that when I get home, I often literally pass out because I am so tired. This has confounded the website creation process as well.

Keep your eyes peeled for goodness in the future!

xox

the sweater that was too large and etsy updates

2009-01-28T23:32:00.008-05:00

I worked feverishly between October and December 31 to finish the Noro Knits "Butterfly" sweater. My plan was to wear it on New Years Eve to a concert I was attending (Sound Tribe Sector 9 live at the Tabernacle in Atlanta, Georgia, to be specific). I was only slightly off gauge ..not enough to make me think that it would make a difference in the garment size.. The sweater turned out to be ENORMOUS. My friend's boyfriend could wear it and it look normal on him. Here's a shot of him sporting the sweater..

In particular, the shoulders were quite large. i have a fairly petite upper body and I suspected the sweater might end up being kind of large when I started the pattern. It looks fairly dumpy on me. I'm very disappointed. I looked on ravelry, and online and I saw that many other women made this sweater.. but none of them look to be as petite as me.. so my plan is to frog out the sleeves and the shoulder sections of the front and back pieces and cut about 2 inches off at the armpit seam. The sweater is lovely though. I lined up all the colors and I think it would look great on someone who is larger than me.

I also love how the banding of this particular colorway turned out.

I created a new etsy shop less than a month ago, Beth Nouveau. All of my earrings, jewelry, and vintage-y stuff are now in there. Dystruction designs is going to be the storefront for my recycled DIY clothing and punk gear. I split them up out of an OCD need of mine to organize things completely, and also because I felt like my clientele for both shops would probably not comprise of the same people.

Expect an update to Dystruction designs soon. I am working on some GREAT rockabilly retro tops and dresses. I added 10 pair of earrings to my BethNouveau shop tonight. Head over there and check them out! Here are some photos:

Fluffy black rooster saddle earrings

Peacock sword Earrings

This is just a sample.. there are so many great earrings.. Be sure to check them out, some are one of a kind!

I have recently delved into the soapmaking/aromatherapy world. I made some great bath salts and soaps as gifts for family and friends this past Christmas. I plan to share those products with the world soon in a new etsy shop devoted to soaps, bath salts, earth friendly shampoo, conditioner, lotion, body oil, and body wash. I have a lot of ideas. I can't wait to make some products!

I also reorganized my craft space, so I will post some photos of that soon. Perhaps tomorrow.

Goodnight!

<3

Mercury and I

2009-01-14T17:42:00.002-05:00

Mercury and I
Originally uploaded by shelivesforthemountains

Mercury and I from our hike this past weekend at Springer Mountain, Georgia, at the terminus of the Appalachian trail. View other shots from the trip on my flickr account by clicking on this photo!

ugh

2009-01-14T16:52:00.002-05:00

i didn't realize that wordpress is not compatible with commerce ventures, so I guess i'm back on blogger for the time being. At least on here I can alter my code without having to pay money. The good news I have is that I am going to host the website portion of bethnouveau on my friend's space, hopefully next week sometime. I have started designing the layout in dreamweaver and photoshop.. so keep yer eyes peeled!

sizzle and pop

2008-12-10T01:41:00.004-05:00

I've been doing well, despite my lack of an internet presence the past few months.

I am close to completion of the "Butterfly" sweater in Noro Knits. It's soo lovely. The chevron pattern is great!

I updated my ravelry account today for the first time in a YEAR. Find me on there, user BethNouveau

School is going great.. I have one more assignment till I'm done for the semester

I published a painting, a photograph, and two works of prose in Semantics this semester. I'll do a scan of the spread once its published (in a week)

I'll post photos when I get them!

Oh where, Oh where?

2008-08-26T20:30:00.003-04:00

I disappeared again from the net... and now that I'm back, you should know I'm firmly relocated in a new state! I started graduate school, and it is going swimmingly. My new house is adorable.. and my life has finally shifted to "Drive" from "Neutral".

Crafting & art have been a low priority in my life for the past month, but I have a ton of projects in mind, including publishing some of my art in the Clemson student run publication, "Semantics". Ill post more about that later.

But I'm back, so expect some more posts soon!

The forest is my element

2008-07-14T14:10:00.004-04:00

I went hiking again this weekend. This time to McAfee's Knob, off route 311 in Catawba, VA. This is, hands down, my favorite hike in Virginia. The first time I went here, it inspired me so much that I decided I wanted to hike the entire AT (Appalachian Trail). My career track (and lack of money) have prevented me from carrying out this wish in its entirety. I have hiked 120 consecutive miles of the AT in Virginia (in 10-30 mile sections over the past couple years), and I plan on going on section hikes while I finish my education. At the moment, I work out of town during the week, so its very hard to make it back home on Friday with enough time to pack and set out on the trail for a weekend trip.. so these have been abbreviated for awhile... but soon (one month) I will be in school again, living in one place (not two, as i do now), and I will be able to simplify and hike again... And after I graduate I will hopefully be financially stable enough to take off a summer and hike the entire thing.

My heart grows restless when I am apart from the forest. I feel it within me always. I crave returning there, and I always leave a hike with a sigh of frustration that I can't continue onward... but I remind myself that the AT will be there when I graduate, and I have to prioritize my education first..

Anyway, the hike started out in the pouring rain and thunder.. I love a day hike through the rain.. it's invigorating and very sensory and you see so many animals that normally hide during the heat of the day... like salamanders and turtles. We saw a lovely male box turtle about halfway up (at 2500 feet).. It's amazing to think that he will spend his entire life on this mountain.. he's miles from a road. Imagine the serenity! At this point, the rain leveled off. The view from the top was great.. kind of hazy, but it made for a surreal landscape.

This is Sakari, my troublesome pup. He has had some aggression in the past with Mercury, my collie. But he's so protective and doting over me that we work it out. He's a very cute dog.

Mercury was in a rather snippy little mood on the hike, as I accidentally closed his tail in the car door (and didn't realize it for a few minutes). He got over it, though, and we cuddled at the top.

I of course took the obligatory feet-hanging-over-the-drop-off shot that so many people take. I don't consider it cliche, and I post it here..

I spotted many blackberry, raspberry, huckleberry and blueberry bushes along the trail.

The forest was so rich and alive after the rain! The flickr page with all my hiking shots from this (and future) trips is linked here. I have decided to move from webshots for these shots. It seems like there are more people on flickr who are interested in this type of stuff.. So goodbye webshots!

Too cute

2008-07-13T14:51:00.001-04:00

I started working on the Isadora scarf from Hip Graphic Knits.

It is coming along swimmingly!

I love the interplay of colors. It is made with kidsilk haze yarn from Rowan. I only have 4/8 skeins I need to make this project.. but I will finish it as I get them! It's kind of an expensive scarf.. the yarn is $12 a skien (x 8 = $$$$$).

Little Jeeper-shnitzel was resting on my handmade crochet doormat last night, and I had to take a picture. She's such an adorable little angel! This doormat was made from a pattern in Debbie Stoller's Stitch and Bitch crochet book.

I see that Not Only Mom also made this mat.. I used some different flowers than what were recommended in the pattern, and instead of using the jute for the rug (it fades and doesn't wear well), i used needloft plastic yarn (found in the crochet section at Micheal's). It has worn well.. I washed it in the washer on delicate and it came out clean and like new!

Ashley Paige patterns make me growl and half marathon plans

2008-07-10T17:07:00.005-04:00

I finally finished the Blue suede bikini from Ashley Paige's Sexy Little Knits. This is the 3rd project I have made from the book.. I was initially impressed with the patterns in the book.. I made the Little Mermaid and hippie tops and both turned out nicely, but this project has left me wondering whether anyone bothered to proofread at all.. I looked online when I first started the project, because the bikini cups looked kind of large (kind of is an understatement, they were huge) I decided I was going to hack this pattern to do it right...

I found several other blogs with complaints of the same nature. Nimble Fingers and Sexy knits both made the bikini and had to revise the bottom (I'm so glad I read their blogs first!). I patterned my bottom after a cute pair of undies I had, making it more of a "full coverage" type (I have a big butt for a skinny chick). I finally finished the bikini last night.. And I'm NOT happy (yet).

When I tried the bottom on last night, it stretches in some areas (around the ties and the crotch) that look rather unappealing. I have decided (in lieu of frogging it and starting over) to sew some darts in those areas, that will tighten it up a bit. I originally neglected to sex in the elastic around the crochet edge, but I am definitely going to do that now.

The places where I have the pins is where I'm going to make a small dart.. It looks kinda dumb on the item laid out, but makes the bikini bottom fit like a dream on.. so I'm gonna cheat and do it :)

The cups also look a little big still... despite me taking the needle size down to a 4 (two sizes) AND removing some of the rows at the bottom.. I'm not sure if its how the bikini is modeled or due to the size of my breasts.. Lets just say that I now know why they chose such a skinny model with well endowed breasts... If I had modeled it it would have looked stupid! And I'm a normal size. Grumble........ I'm going to grab a bikini from my drawer and see if I can use one as a pattern...I may need to redo the bottom of the cups..

So this item stays in the UFO bin for now until I can revise these three things... I anticipate I'll finish next week, so check back for finished pics of me modeling the bikini ;)

I've been working on another item from the UFO bin as well. It's a pink and black felted skull makeup bag I have conceived for my etsy shop. I am at the final stages and plan to finish it tonight... The hardest part will be overlaying the intarsia pattern of the skull tonight... I'll be sure to post pre and post felting pics.. I always love those!

Here's a shot of a sunglass case I made for a coworker. I may post the pattern on here.. The ceramic button is one that I made.

I haven't mentioned this earlier on here (although my friends have heard about it a lot), but I've been training for a half marathon since March. I plan on running the Richmond Suntrust Half Marathon. Those plans have been sidelined due to an ankle injury a few weeks ago. I think I'll be ok, though.. the race is in November. After a really good run a couple weeks ago I developed sudden debilitating ankle pain. Within a few days it was gone, so I ran again. After one mile it was aching. After four miles, I couldn't run anymore. When I got home I couldn't walk. My ankle was swollen in between my ankle and my heel. I have taken about two weeks off. to rest Last night I ran 2 miles as a test to see if I could. There was no pain afterwards, but I was conscious of how tightly I laced my shoes (maybe the reason for my injury to begin with). I also had a fairly intense yoga workout last night. I haven't done yoga in ages. I'm not naturally flexible, so any lapse in my stretching routine sets me back to square one. It's very frustrating, but its something that I've dealt with my whole life. I've always been able to run forever, but never done a split (or come very close). When I move I plan on joining a yoga class.. my study alone isn't really going anywhere..

A fabulous 4th!

2008-07-08T16:23:00.001-04:00

I had a most fabulous 4th of July filled with friends and good live music..

Notable acts were Dave Matthews Band, STS9, 311, Crystal Method, Primus, Thievery Corporation, Lotus, and the Pneuma Trio..

Summarized from here, one attendee witnessed 'watching rapper Snoop Dogg, "him, not his staff," sorting his the waste from his meal into separate bins for recycling, composting and landfill trash.'

Attendees were conscious of recycling and global issues.. almost everyone recycled and composted..it was amazing! People CAN change!

Sherwood forest was an AMAZING concept.. there was a meditation path, a gong (be mindful people), and hammocks everywhere for mindful relaxation..

This festival allowed me to SLOW down... It was one of the best, if not the best festival, I've ever attended..

I have a headache right now so I don't feel like posting a long post about this festival, but it was FABULOUS.

Two of my most favorite people in the world got engaged there, and my favorite band played a FOUR HOUR SET.

Amazing.. I will be back next year...

Pics and an extended post to follow.............

stolen from another blog

2008-07-08T11:34:00.001-04:00

"The real owners are the big wealthy business interests that control things and make all the important decisions. Forget the politicians, they're an irrelevancy. The politicians are put there to give you the idea that you have freedom of choice. You don't. You have no choice. You have owners. They own you. They own everything. They own all the important land. They own and control the corporations. They've long since bought and paid for the Senate, the Congress, the statehouses, the city halls. They've got the judges in their back pockets. And they own all the big media companies, so that they control just about all of the news and information you hear. They've got you by the balls. They spend billions of dollars every year lobbying -- lobbying to get what they want. Well, we know what they want; they want more for themselves and less for everybody else," ranted the comedian whose routines were studied in graduate schools.

"But I'll tell you what they don't want," Carlin continued. "They don't want a population of citizens capable of critical thinking. They don't want well-informed, well-educated people capable of critical thinking. They're not interested in that. That doesn't help them. That's against their interests. They don't want people who are smart enough to sit around the kitchen table and figure out how badly they're getting fucked by a system that threw them overboard 30 fucking years ago. You know what they want? Obedient workers -- people who are just smart enough to run the machines and do the paperwork but just dumb enough to passively accept all these increasingly shittier jobs with the lower pay, the longer hours, reduced benefits, the end of overtime and the vanishing pension that disappears the minute you go to collect it. And, now, they're coming for your Social Security. They want your fucking retirement money. They want it back, so they can give it to their criminal friends on Wall Street. And you know something? They'll get it. They'll get it all, sooner or later, because they own this fucking place. It's a big club, and you ain't in it. You and I are not in the big club."

I took this from a customer, http://nikkisioux.livejournal.com/

Its so hot!

2008-07-01T15:04:00.003-04:00

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It's so hot out! I can't stand having to run errands around town.. blah.

This weekend we are going to Rothbury festival in Rothbury, Michigan. It's near Ann Arbor. I hope its not terribly hot. We are volunteering for Shimon Presents.. I'm not sure what we're doing, but probably assisting ticketowners or taking tickets.

I saw this amusing cartoon on creators.com today. I constantly frequent that site during my downtime at work. I like the lifestyle columns.

This next part is gross, but its pertinent to dog and cat owners...

So if you don't like gross stuff, don't read unless you have a pet.

Today Mercury was digging at his fur on his chest and when I separated his fur I found several foxtails (burrs) embedded in his skin, beginning to abscess. Look at the damage they can do:

Make sure you check your pet for these pesky pests after they go in the woods. Merc-a-doodle is much more comfortable without them attached to his skin...

An appalachian sort of weekend with a pot of gold at the end

2008-06-30T12:46:00.003-04:00

I had the most lovely weekend.. it makes me sad that its over.

I was going to go backpacking, but an ankle injury Thursday eliminated that option. Instead, I hung out in Blacksburg, saw some friends, and went for a short hike on Sunday with friends.

Dragon's tooth is a hike that I have done many many times. I particularly like it after a rain, as lots of critters come out that you normally might not see.

It began to rain as we began the drive out to Catawba valley, Virginia, but the rain subsided as we began the 5.2 roundtrip mile hike. About 2/3 of the way up to the top, we spotted this little salamander

A short bit later, I nearly stepped on his little guy:

Thank goodness I had my eyes to the ground! He was about the size of nickel.

When we got to the top, the clouds had broken, and the sun was shining. We were the only hikers at the top, so it was very peaceful.

You can spot McAfees knob in the distance, and the Peaks of Otter can be viewed beyond that (although it didn't show in the photo).

I went with my good friends Bryan (a friend from high school), and Kelly (faeleaf from etsy, a good friend of mine for several years).

Dragon's tooth is a GREAT hike if you are in the Blacksburg area, and it is on the Appalachian trail.

I also took along the pups, but sadly didn't take any photos of them. They were too busy bouldering and running wild through the woods.

Kelly showed me some blueberry bushes growing along the trail. If you look closely enough you can see some unripened berries. I ate a few ripe ones and they were delicious.

I also spotted many sassafras trees. The roots can be boiled to make sassafras tea.

When we finished the hike, we came out into the parking lot to a BEAUTIFUL rainbow that spread across the whole sky.

And on our drive back, we could see the spot where the rainbow touched the earth.. We did not go looking for a pot of gold, as seeing this rainbow was rewarding enough.

It's not terribly visible from the photo.. I need to buy a really good camera..

The rest of the evening was spent bathing Mercury and two of my cats that somehow have fleas...

I also watched a cute movie called "The Watcher in the woods"..

Have a nice Monday everyone!

¡Cómo Excita!

2008-06-24T14:34:00.001-04:00

Another project that I forgot to mention that has been in my head is a set of t-shirts for a business run by my friend and coworker Kathy. The restaurant is Jumbo Family Restaurant in Lynchburg, VA. I had my friend Rabbit (who is a freelance graphic artist and an excellent crocheter and potter) take the current logo from the antique sign from the 50's and make me a lovely graphic image.

I think she did a fabulous job!

My job will be to take the image and screenprint it on t-shirts for the waitresses, and make a set that the store can offer for sale to its customers. Today, Rabbit sent me the image.. Now its time to put my gocco to work!

On another happy note, some of my buttons have found a home. I'm doing a trade on etsy for some lovely lavender-ish handspun yarn. I haven't done much trading up until this point, but it something that I want to do in the future.

In conclusion, I can state that today is going MUCH more swimmingly than yesterday ;)

Somethin's gotta give

2008-06-23T16:02:00.001-04:00

Ugh its only a few days into the summer and I'm sick of it already. I think I need more structured activities to keep me focused. Working on the crocheted blanket is starting to irritate me. You can't make 140 squares quickly, even if you crochet around the clock..I'm getting antsy and I'm only 1/3 done at best. I think its time to switch things up a bit..

Here are some shots of the Little Mermaid top from Ashley Paige's Sexy Little Knits book. The pattern was easy and fairly true to form, although the top stretches out a LOT.. and I'd like to make a smaller tighter version.

I also made this cute remote control holder for my living room. I used an intarsia pattern from the Graphic Knits book (can't remember the authors name) and extended it several inches on both sides and crocheted a border. I felted it in the washing machine, turned one end up, and sewed little compartments for the remotes. This project was so easy to make and I really like the way it turned out.
Before felting and folding:

The finished product in use!

I also took a shot of the bag I made Kelly for christmas. I used Blue Sky Alpacas bulky.. I love the feel of that yarn.. I'm going to make myself one!

These skull armwarmers were one of the projects I started AND finished on our three week trip around the country. Being in a car driving for four days straight can really help you finish some projects.

I really don't like the skulls on them. I didn't know how to sew in designs on top of knits until recently.. when I made these skulls I was trying to like cross stitch them on.. I think the skulls, while rather rustic, kind of suck.. so they will be replaced when it gets cooler out.

Ay yi yiyyy

2008-06-19T11:07:00.001-04:00

I need a new layout for this blog. I am seriously contemplating a move to wordpress, where I'd have a lot more freedom with how things are laid out, etc. That is another project for another day...

I have been crafting up a storm for etsy, selling 1-2 items a week, which is nice, because it has allowed me to re-up on supplies. I purchased a bunch of new feathers and shells, which will develop into some lovely earrings and necklaces soon.

I went to bonnaroo this past weekend and had a lovely time. Notable acts were Jose Gonzalez, Sigur Ros, Pearl Jam, Iron and Wine, Tiesto, and the Disco Biscuits.

I love this photo of the wall

I am blocking some squares for the blanket I'm making.. I took a shot of those for you to see

And here are some shots of my bookshelf where my owls stand guard over my crafting books

I love the little wind-up chick. I got him at pier 1.

I made a TON of buttons to put on etsy. None have sold yet, and I can't figure out why. I think they are so darling! Most of them are leaves of some type. I also made a few sun medallions. Maybe I need to turn them into projects ... the leaves would be adorable as buttons on a bag.. and the sun medallions would be great on a scarf... hm..

ahh i'm back

2008-06-10T11:28:00.001-04:00

Okay, I'm back......... I haven't blogged in ages, for to a few reasons. First, I applied (and was accepted) to graduate school. I'll be moving to Clemson, SC in a couple months. This will be the biggest move I've ever made. Its 5 1/2 hours away from where I live now. That may not be much to some people, but I've been used to my Blacksburg bubble for the past decade. ... but its time to move on and I'm excited about a change.

I've also been crafting up a storm and haven't felt like breaking the creative reverie long enough to post to you all. My etsy site has grown, and I have created a lot of lovely stuff for sale, friends, and myself. I've also been writing some songs, and working on some ideas for paintings. It seems that my creative consciousness has finally awoken. I posted some photos below of the items I've made.

The final reason I have not been posting is I had (still have to a degree) a bit of pain in my wrists... either tendonitis or carpal tunnel.. i'm not sure which, I haven't gone to a doctor. It was very painful back in December. So I'm trying to chill out on the typing/clicking, etc. I have to do a large amount of typing for my job (and will have to do even more for school), so I've tried to downplay this in my personal life as much as possible. I've given myself a few months to heal, and haven't had any numbness or pain for awhile, so I will start posting again. Hooray! It's nice to be back :)

I bought the large gocco with my economic stimulus check (Thank you, President Bush). Did I just say that? I am so excited about the possibility of creating shirts and lithographs and whatever else I want to. Expect some screenprinted items to show up in my etsy shop soon.

Ok now for photos of what I've made

I posted a few of the items I sell below:

the flighty ear cuff has been a good seller, as have the peacock fringe earrings. I guess people are more into buying jewelry than knit items. That's fine, I'll keep the knits for myself ;)

Here are some items I created that are not for sale:

This was my first lace project. It took me about 6 tries to get it right!

Prefelted hat

I made this hat with the "Pretty in Punk" book, and ended up giving it away to my friend Jenny who blows glass. She made me a lovely bead set that I will put up soon for you to see. She is going to teach me to make lampwork beads, something I have wanted to learn for awhile!

This was my first crochet project. As you can see it turned out great!

I finished all of the items I was working on back in December. I am now working on a couple items..

I am making a crocheted blanket (the color bar blanket in Stoller's Stitch and Bitch crochet book). I have finished 1/3 of the squares for it. I'll post a photo tomorrow. I'm also working on the blue bikini from Ashley Paige's Sexy little knits book. I had to/am continuing to revise the pattern, which is wayyyyy off. I don't recommend a beginner trying it. I've been on both of these projects since April and I am very antsy to finish. I'm going on a long road trip this weekend to Bonnaroo music festival, so a lot of knitting will probably get done.

Happy Tuesday!

Bethie

Where am I?

2007-12-20T23:18:00.001-05:00

Other than holiday shopping/knitting madness, making etsy orders, mailing out ebay orders, and applying for PhD programs has taken up a lot of my time.. another blog to come soon.. as soon as Christmas is past us..Wish me luck in my applications.. I have my fingers crossed for VCU, UGA, or Clemson!

Happy holidays!

Knitting news and Glen Alton

2007-11-13T18:23:00.001-05:00

One more square left on the blanket! I can't wait to finish it.. working on one thing hard for a month and a half makes me antsy to move on... although I do have to repair a tear.. last night I accidently cut the largest square when I was trying to unstitch it from another square. This will be my first lesson in repairing a hole, I suppose. I still hope to have it done by Saturday for our game versus Miami, which I should be able to easily do. I am feeling a bit wishy washy about doing the scalloped border. It may be a lot of work for something that may look out of place. I think what I will do is knit a test corner and sew it to the blanket to see how it will look... Thoughts?

Here is the blanket so far. Last night I knitted some of the squares together and today I finished square 15/16. I will start the last square tonight.

On Sunday I took Mercury and Hunter's dog, Sakari, on a nice walk through Glen Alton. If you have never been there, you should make it a point to go... It's a lovely old 300+ acre family farm that the government is now turning into a nature retreat. Here are some photos from the trip.

The stables at the back of the property. There's a watchtower at the top where you can climb up into and play lookout..

This is one of Mercury's favorite places to come visit.. so many smells and sights! A collie on a farm is about as novel as a labrador in the water..

I love the swamp area. There were still water lilies!

This is the pond as you first enter the property.

And on the drive home, I saw something most unusual!

I will post the rest of the pics up on flickr soon... and if you are near Blacksburg, VA... go visit Glen Alton! I read the government plans to strip the barns and turn them into nature centers and play areas for children... quaint, yes, but the barns as they are now are a part of our heritage.. the family farm is disappearing! I was able to get some lovely shots.. I hate to think how crowded this place will be in the future.. although I am thankful that our government stepped in to save this place. I am even more thankful that I have a place like this I can visit.

Here are photos from a Bloody Mary picnic we had last year there.

RAVELRY!

2007-11-13T16:03:00.001-05:00

I was invited to join ravelry today! I have been waiting for a few weeks for my invitation... now it's time to get my butt in gear and post some stuff on there!

Pumpkin Pickin' (old), FSU victory, and stitch and bitch!.. w00t w00t

2007-11-12T15:38:00.001-05:00

We beat FSU this past weekend in football.. what sweet revenge for the Sugar bowl loss in 2000! I had 7 (rowdy)guests come down from all over Virginia and Maryland.. It was quite fun! The above photo is of me and John, who is my bestest friend :)

I love this one of me on the 20 yard line... Yes, I rushed the field after the victory ;)

It was really good seeing my hokie brothers and sisters recovered from the events of April 16th..

My first stitch and bitch went really well! I had 5 guests! I hope more girls come out to the one this Sunday.... for details, check out my facebook page!

Now for a post I meant to put up awhile ago, but forgot.....

I neglected to post photos of Me and Merc's pumpkin patch visit.. So here they are! The one above shows the dye job I got for halloween.. before it faded :(

This one is my favorite... Mercury loves donkeys and other members of the equine family.. There is a donkey that lives up the road from my parents whom Mercury visits on a regular basis. He barks at the donkey, who brays back in return..

Is this not precious?

moments

2007-11-08T12:04:00.001-05:00

I feel terrible! I woke up this morning at 5 am with terrible abdominal cramping and nausea.. I'm not sure if it is remnants of my flu virus or if it is from the new medication I am on. I still feel washed out.. at noon.

Today I have decided to post some moments from my bedroom so you can get to know me better. Moments? You ask.. Let me explain. I am very design-conscious and easily influenced by my environment. But often something about a room will 'click' and make me feel peaceful. May it be the color arrangement or layout of the items, it makes me feel balanced inside. These are what I call 'moments'. And here they are!

This is a view of the 'clutter' on my writing desk. Yes, WOW, my walls are lilac purple. I wouldn't have it any other way! I have some old photos of my family and my burning man ticket suck in the Scherenschnitte frame. I want to learn how to do this type of papercraft. There's a photo of Mercury as a pup, developed by me in the darkroom. And don't you just LOVE the porcelian girl on the fence! It ties into the art nouveau feel of my home.

I love this poster. I got it when I visited the Pompidou Center in Paris in 2002. You can barely make out my chococat lights that hang above my window.

Isn't this armchair a find! Especially for $20! I got it at a model home auction in Lynchburg. Sweet, huh? This is my little knitting nook. Note the basket of yarn below.

By my bed.. one of my favorite areas!

Here I keep books of a spiritual nature.. I really love the chococat lamp.. don't you!

The best part is at night.... ciao!

My VT hokie afghan & party photos

2007-11-07T23:04:00.002-05:00

I took a photo of how the blanket is coming along. I blocked most of the pieces last night. Tonight I am blocking the center square (which is actually 4 small squares).

Tonight in ceramics I threw two substandard pots :( In my defense, I am recovering from the flu... but it still makes me depressed. .. it makes me feel like I've gone two steps back.. in comparison with the pot I threw two weeks ago. I guess I need to keep working at it! I will post a few pictures of my completed works next week. I glazed a couple cute things tonight... hopefully they will turn out OK after being run through the kiln..

I decided to post a few pictures from the party (to cheer me up). Here you are!
Here's a shot from under our carport. Hunter made a spooky spider web! My mom loaned me a freaky witch to hang on it. We strung spider eggs throughout it and hung little lit pumpkins on the web. It wasn't really what I had in mind, but I'm just glad that Hunter actually decorated something.

Here's a shot of Molly (a panther) and Ryan (David Bowie aka Ziggy Stardust)

The second is of Jason (Tiger Woods), Christyne (not yet in costume), Ziggy, and Me!

Zach (Carl from Aqua Teen), a KT bug, Ziggy, and I on my bed

Me (notice the pinkish hair? It took 2 1/2 hours at the stylist to achieve and most of it faded by Halloween :( ), Molly, and Kate (a character from Nighmare before Christmas)

I wish I took more pictures of the decor of our home.. We did some cute things in the kitchen.. and we made some great apertifs and spooky treats!

We made baba ganoush (eggplant hummus.. delicious!), lentil dip, and cupcakes with creepy frosted/candy designs on them. They were devoured before I could get a photo!!

That's all for now!

Mishka Mittens is bat shmitten

2007-11-07T00:42:00.002-05:00

Ahh.... I meant to post this awhile back and forgot... While decorating for halloween I hung some bats from our ceiling fan.. and Mishka was obsessed with trying to bring them down.. I took several shots.. these were my favorite

I love the ones of him in mid-jump!

I also took a shot of him in a rare moment snuggling with Jeepers, the newest feline addition to our home.. She is so adorable. It's hard to picture someone dumping her at my parents home, isn't it?

Although they look cuddled up here, Mishka took out a 1/2 inch chunk out of Jeepers ear tonight while 'playing'.

Well as far as my knitting projects go, I am 13.5/16 (As in, I have completed 13 1/2 of the total 16 squares) completed with my Virginia Tech afghan. I am blocking some of the pieces and I plan to have it completed and assembed by Saturday for our game against Florida State. I also found a lovely scalloped border to make separately and attach to the blanket next week. That will certainly take awhile!

I also took several photos of my Halloween costume and the assembling of that. Here's a photo of Me, Molly, and Alex, at my home for the halloween party. I will post pics from the party later.

Parts of the costume that were homemade:

My bat ears (knitted free hand and felted and attached to a headband)

The pics are as follows 1. Pre felted inside of ear 2. Pre felted outside of ear 3. After felting!

My corset (which ended up being a total last minute project due to me buying the pattern for plus sizes and having to return it for the regular sized pattern) - Made with simplicity pattern

my bat wings (totally freehanded by me, stuffed, and sewn)

my leg warmers - totally freehanded. Everyone loved them so I will need to post a pattern up here soon.. I plan to make another pair like this in black and hot pink.

That's all for now! I will post more later

FINALLY

2007-10-18T11:59:00.000-04:00

I got this thing up... at last.. after saying I'm going to do it for over a year... I think I will start out by posting pictures of everything I've made so far (which is a lot).

I am currently working on a few things at one time.... I tend to take on too many projects.

1. an afghan for football season (16 squares total, 4 x 4, each 9 inches)... I have finished about 11 out of 16 squares... The center is a large VT logo inside an oval... I'm actually about to go get more yarn so I can finish... once I'm done I will post yarn info, pics, and instructions.. I think it's going to be cute... The hardest and longest part will be making a border for the entire blanket to help it hold its shape...I can tell I'm going to have a problem with some of the squares..

2. A cute felted remote control holder for the sofa knit in lion wool... I adapted a pattern from a book.. I will post that on here also..

3. I made the 'mermaid top' from Ashley Paige's 'sexy little knits'... all that was left was the ruffle border.. and then Hunter spilled cappuccino all over it... so I had to wash it several times... then the book mysteriously disappeared.. so I had to go to Barnes and Noble and type in the instructions in my phone (didn't have ANY money at the time because of the 7,000+ mile road trip)... I started working on the ruffle, got frustrated with the phone instructions, and stopped... well GUESS what I found in my truck!! ... the book! So I am going to finish that up soon.. its going to be too cold to wear it :(

..............
The blanket in particular has been taking FOREVER... largely because the intarsia takes forever (I'm new at it and the pattern is intricate).. and partly because I am taking classes at the community college. I am taking a portfolio developing course for my photographs (and since all my old negatives mysteriously disappeared I had to start over).. This is discouraging because I havent been in a darkroom in years. Hopefully, though, if I apply myself at it, when I move in the summer, I can take my own darkroom equipment (Thanks mom and dad, best Christmas gift EVER!) and set it up. I am also taking ceramics (A lifelong dream of mine - I took a class as a child and LOVED it) and have been rabidly working away at that also. I still can't throw a pot worth shit, but some of my coil and slab pieces aren't too bad. Some are pretty darn good, actually! We glazed last night, which was fun. I'll have to put some pics of that stuff on here as well...

till next time!

xoxo

b