More Route 66 Photos

Beautiful Blogger Award

I had a nice surprise and was awarded a "Beautiful Blogger Award" along with several other bloggers listed by Visual Journey Photo! Thanks so much and I enjoyed viewing all the photos on your blog, too!

Plum Dreams Coming True

Finally, five years of nurturing fruit trees and keeping them alive through heat waves, this year we get plums, lots of plums. They don't keep long, so I made jam! By choice, these babies have not had any chemicals sprayed, so they are not perfect and that's fine with me! Just like Joni Mitchel said in her song.... "give me spots on my apples, but give me the birds and the bees". These are Bruce plums, really tart.

Plum Jam Recipe:

6 cups chopped pitted plums
6 cups sugar
1 box sure jell

Wash pint size mason jars and lids in dishwasher sterlize (heat) mode.

Measure 6 cups chopped and pitted plums into 6-8 quart pan (heavy bottom stainless - non aluminum). Add 6 cups sugar and box of sure jell. Bring to rolling boil over high heat, stirring continually. Boil 1 minute, simmer for 5 minutes while continuing to stir. Remove from heat. Skim off foam. Fill sterilized pint size mason jars to 1/8 inch of tops. Wipe rims, cover tightly. Boil jars 5 minutes in large pan (tops covered with the boiling water). Remove and cool -- the tops will pop in after a few mintues.

Are you comfortable Dazy Dog?

Route 66 Blow Out - Sapulpa

We will have a booth at the upcoming ROUTE 66 BLOW OUT, June 5th 2010. Dichroic Fused Glass Jewelry, earrings, pendants, recycled wine party sets with wine bottle dishes and wine charm sets. Plus pottery and much more! See you there!

Backyard Fruit Trees

'Gala' apple tree.
'Methley' plum tree.
Nectarine 'Sweet Pearl'
'Bruce' Plum tree.

They actually have fruit this year! The last two years we have had a late freeze after the blossoms, but this year -- no late freeze. Hopefully they will make it all the way through the elements this year.

Brady Art Festival - Art and Soul of Tulsa

It will be a three-day art show/event taking place on Brady Street between Boulder and Boston, and Main Street between Brady and Cameron, May 14, 15, and 16. Brady is a part of the old brick town of Tulsa. Now we also have a new Baseball stadium located there - OneOK Field. More photos later...
This photo is from another show, but we will be setting up the tent. Much more to display this year, as we are building up inventory!

Crime Fighting Was Never so Good Looking...

I can here the Phil Collins music in my head now... Just watched Season One and had to post this.

Whew! It's a Lot of Work to Grow Your Own Food

Tilling, weeding, fertilizing, planting, watering, keeping pesky rabbits at bay, pesky bugs, pesky diseases, heat waves, pesky mosquitos (when you go out to harvest what you've been able to grow), and the list goes on. Why try a vegetable garden then? Because it feels good to harvest something from the earth right in your own yard, tastes better too. Also one can control what goes on the plant, like no chemical insecticides, etc. Even with apartment or condo living, a cherry tomato in a pot can be fun, or some lettuce plants maybe. It's work, but rewarding!

Sailors Sailing, Blossoms Blossoming, Spring has Sprung

Even though the winds were gusty to 25 or 30 mph - these sailors were ready to go sailing after waiting all winter.

Crabapple Tree and a Gala Apple tree (below) that I planted 5 years ago.
Sure hope I get to see some fruit this year.

Plum Blossom - First Signs of Spring

This is one of two plum trees in our backyard. I hope we do not have a late freeze this year -- last year it froze the blossoms and no fruit that year.

Working the Kiln for some New Earrings

I'm working to build up some inventory for an art festival in May - "Art and Soul of Tulsa" in the Brady Arts district by the Local Art Matters people (more details on that later).

On these earrings, I measure and carve the glass in equal sizes for each pair, then place a pure silver wire in between the two layers of glass. After it is fused then the ear wires attach to that loop. In this method there is no need for special glass epoxy. This is also a special glass that does not burn off the dichroic layer with the heat of the silver wire.

Upcycled Wine Bottles and Wine Glass Charms

We've recycled our glass bottles for years, but now since I have the kiln, I can now UPcycle! I now have a couple of special molds that you melt or slump the bottles in. The kiln heats up to over 1400 degrees and then slowly cools. The mold makes a handle of the neck - they are actually a good size for a cheese tray. I thought I would make some wine charm sets to go with. Complete party set - a fun thing to make! I have put a few sets for sale online here.

Starting to think about Spring

We've had some record breaking cold spells, and February has been about 6 degrees colder than average everyday. However today is sunny and so I'm breaking out the catalogs!

Critter Tracks

It's kind of fun to see who's been where... one cannot normally tell.

Rich blues in this Etsy treasury

My blue dragonfly glass pendant was featured in this treasury by Etsy artist elhombreylaluna. The blues look nice together! Lovely.

Seasons Come and Seasons Go

Last Summer
This Morning!

Featured on Etsy Front Page

Had a nice surprise this morning when I checked Google Analytics. My views shot way up so after looking at craftcult.com -- which tells a shop if they have been featured on Etsy -- I saw that I had been. My celedon green soap dish. It's only for 30 minutes or something like that, but the traffic is high. Very nice surprise! Thanks much to StonesinBloom Etsy shop!

New Kiln is Working Out Great!

For a while it was too cold to run but I'm working in lots of firings. So far, so good! It took some experimenting and some sad days of things not turning out. Some research and questions to local experts helped me iron those out. You can save different firing programs -- most have several steps and speeds to different temperatures that take several hours -- then the cooling periods (annealing). So far, I have three different programs now that are stored in the kiln's computer that are working great!

uPSIDE dOWN

I've got real skills and I've been helping myself to the birdies' sunflower seeds!