Just a beautiful photo!

Saturday evening I went to the Indiana Dunes State Park for an historical look at the beach house/pavilion.  There was a tour guide from the DNR who explained the history of the building itself – begun in 1929 and opened in 1930 – and plans for the future of the Dunes.  Part of this tour was to watch the sunset from the rooftop!  You know I couldn’t pass that up.  Even if there is rarely any beach glass at this beach.  I took several – testing out the new camera skills I’m trying to learn (I promise a real update soon!) and stayed after the tour to watch the final colors on the beach.

This is one I took:

It’s not perfect, but I’m learning!

Will try to keep up…

Happy Easter to those who celebrate!  Easter has always been low-key my whole life, and I like to keep it that way.  I let my kids go to their dad’s – ok, they go over there if they want, they’re 24 and 18! – where they make a big deal out of the baskets and everything.

I went to the beach (naturally!) and then to my friend’s house for lunch.

Some photos from today:

Trying to hide, but I spotted it!  Beautiful color, perfect shape and wonderfully frosted and rounded!

I’ve been moving away from just picking up any glass that I can use for jewelry, as I don’t think my hands are going to let me do that much longer or at least not very often.  So now I go for the pieces I love… vibrant colors, perfectly frosted or just plain interesting shapes.

I also look more and more for crinoids and other fossils:

This was so little!  It actually made me think I need to bring tweezers with me to pick up some of these things.  I kept losing it in the rocks.

A little white heart!

And the full of today’s stash:

A productive day.  Although I realized I cannot go glassing in jeans and I really, really need to knock off some pounds.

I promised an update…

Been a while since I last updated.  My fingers finally feel well enough to do more than a few lines of type.  Unfortunately, I do have my first joint nodule.  It is slightly painful to the touch, but harder to deal with is the thought and looking at it, seeing it there.  And knowing not only is it not the last one I’ll have, but that it will be there forever.  For those who might not know, I was diagnosed in Oct. 2008 with Rheumatoid Arthritis.  Sero-negative RA to be exact.   I made a bracelet last week for the first time since November.  And I learned I cannot do a whole piece in one night.

But I shall cope, as I always do.

This is the bracelet I made last week:

A close up of the glass and beads:

The black matte beads are made from lava.  I thought that was pretty cool, considering we usually think of the beach glass as being hundreds of years old sometimes.  Unfortunately the package did not say where the lava came from!  The other larger black bead has tiny flecks of iridescent white, silver and blue.  I love those beads!  Of course the rest of it has several Swarovsky Crystals, cat’s eye beads and other glass beads.

Since that’s the only piece of jewelry I’ve made in a while, a few photos of the glass as I find it and after its been cleaned up at home…

I love the frosty-ness of pure white.

Small piece of china or pottery with just a hint of the original pattern.

This is the second bottle bottom I’ve found with an “M” on it.  This was only about 3/4 of the bottom, and also had a small “2″ under the M which the first one does not.  They were also found within a few weeks of each other.  I just found, via a seaglass site I follow, a website that has definitions of the markings on old bottles.   Still have to look it up.

A pretty, green piece.  Upside down in this photo, as I found it, with a deep “g”.  Another one to research!

This has to be my new favorite piece.  It’s a beautiful, deep turquoise, very thick, wonderfully frosted and rounded.  Definitely a keeper.

Hopefully I’ll be able to keep this up much better in the future.

 

I promise I’ll update soon!

It’s been a rough few months, with the RA.  Last night I made my first bracelet since…. November?  Something like that.

I’ve only been to the beach two or three times since then as well, but I do have photos!

Tonight I’m going to a class (week three of six) about living with a chronic illness.  My goal in that class this past week was to create a bracelet, since I am now in remission.  It hurt a bit, but I did it.  So I will be taking that bracelet with me tonight, to show I met my goal!

 

my attempts

Quite a while ago I posted a photo of some glass flowers someone else had made.  I thought they were the coolest things.  So tonight I attempted to make a couple…

I’ve also seen a couple of trees made out of driftwood recently.  Once at the Save the Dunes gift shop and another somewhere online.  So I attempted that too.  The jury is still out on that…

Tomorrow, I take my grandson to meet Santa.

not quite smooth sailing

It has been, and will probably continue to be, a rough week.  Starting a new RA drug, and weaning off an anxiety drug do not make make for easy days.  Or nights either for that matter.

Yesterday I decided I needed that break.  And since it was sunny I didn’t want to waste a chance to go glassing.  Who knows how many more nice, sunny days we’ll have. 

I’ve been re-thinking my whole glassing needs.  Yes, it really is fun and relaxing to make jewelry and other items with what I find.  But just finding great pieces, and coal and tiny, tiny snail shells is more of what it is all about for me.

Amazing.  An old clear, a tiny blue, a couple of green, a fossil, a milk glass, just sitting and waiting.

Two reds in one day is almost unheard of around here.  Will admit though, the zebra mussel shells drive me insane.  They’re everywhere, and so invasive.

Seafoams and another blue.  And that’s not even all…

A true aqua.  Tiny shard, but so vibrant.

And an antique, or at least very old, fishing lure I believe.  It’s wood and I’ve never seen one like this.

There were more fun finds, maybe I’ll load those photos sometime… but a beautiful day back to my real reason for glassing.  And it ended with a visit with the best grandson in the world…

no beach for me in a while

I think I’ve only been to the beach once since September.  That’s pretty sad for me.  But with a major RA flare up, it just wasn’t happening.  The desire is there, but the body isn’t.  I’m on a new med now, an injectable, so hopefully soon I’ll at least be able to get one or two days in before it gets covered in snow.

I have made some new things, actually, quite a lot of few things if I look back at old posts.  Bracelets, of which I’ve sold four offline, made one for my daughter, made a necklace for myself.  So at least I can say I accomplished something.

I’ve also gotten a little bit of Christmas shopping done, go me.

I’m hoping this Saturday (if I can fill up the gas tank!) to go to a place that might be interested in selling my stuff on consignment.  I have to call the manager tomorrow to see if/when she’ll be in.

But here are some of the items I’ve made:

Did I ever show this?  Quite a lot of work in this.  I’ve priced it on Etsy at $75.  A lot of glass and tons of seed beads went into this. I call it “Night at the Opera”.

This is still for sale as well.  7.5″ bracelet in pink and white.  Silverplate chain.  The round beads are pretty cool, they’re called “miracle beads” because they are an odd iridescent kind of bead.

Another bracelet, I called it “high tide”.  Greens, blues, turquoise, lime, with a seafoam glass on gold filled chain.

Just a pretty glass picture I took the last time I was at the beach.  And ok, I lied.  My last time there was Oct. 12 or thereabouts.  Still a long gap for me.

I swore these beads were red when I made this.  Turns out they’re more of a reddish orange.  But its still cute.  The black beads are vintage, there is also Swarovski clear crystals on there (the orange are Swarovski too, as are most of the crystals I’ve been using now).

My daughter’s set.  Bracelet and matching earrings.  Hard to tell its a really pretty purple.  My main problem with taking photos is I have only northerly light coming into the room.  Leaves for a dull photo, and flash just makes it worse.

Fall colors.  Lots of browns, rust, burgundy, orange,a little green and cream.  I also started making a different style drop of bead as well. 

And for something completely different… If a guy was bold enough this could be for him as well.  I can’t remember the length of the chain, but it can be extended or shortened I know that.  Maybe I’ll wear this to work tomorrow…

This, I made for myself.  That’s my grandson’s name.  I had found the most beautiful piece of light aqua heart-shaped glass, attached some aquamarine and clear Swarovski crystals to it and the letter cubes!  Love, love, love it!  And, a woman at work liked it so much, she asked if I could make one for her daughter.  Who has a son named Noah.  And was born in March. 

Here is her necklace.  With a white glass heart instead of an aqua.  I only had one aqua heart, and that was for ME!  I’m considering making one for my daughter in law as well.  But I did buy her another pretty necklace from Etsy, so we’ll see.  Maybe for her birthday in January.

Apparently, I didn’t take any photos of the black and orange braclet I made for a coworker.  I’ll have to see if I have any pics of that at work.  But here are some little trees I made.  I will probably make more, and the same person who had me make a necklace for her daughter would like a white pair with blue/aqua crystals… so I’ll probably do that over the weekend.  We’ll see.

I have listed more items on Etsy, mostly vintage stuff I found.  The above trees I’ve listed on a new site I’m trying out, called Shop Hand Made (www.coolerbythelake.shophandmade.com).  I’m beginning to be disenchanted by Etsy.  Well,  I have been for a while now.  I still like it, but there are getting to be way too many “professional” shops out there.  Such as shops from Asia that are selling tons of things way below what an average home-shop can sell for, and now I’ve even heard of designers – clothing for instance – selling there.  Plus, there are even people who if their item hasn’t sold on Ebay, are just transferring the photos over to Etsy and selling it there.  They don’t even bother to re-write the description.  Still says “this auction is for…” and such.  Just not what I want to be in.  Plus there are probably 10,000 shops on there now, if not more.  And it’s swamped with beach glass.  So, we’ll try out this new venue for a while, and I’ll see if that little shop is interested.

and more photos…

I’ve taken so many photos lately, with both my own camera and the work “nicer” camera.  I’m hoping to get a new camera for myself soon too.  Nothing too fancy, just with a better telephoto and higher MP.

Finds from an “after work” relaxation hunt… 8-27-10

This was part of that find.  Tiny shells, fossils and unusual rocks.  And a fish scale (I think).  The round rock-looking ones with the hole or lighter center are called Crinoids.  I think I’ve mentioned them before, fossils of sea creatures something ilke 350 Million years old.

With a penny for scale.  If you look closely at the rock just below the penny, there is a tiny round circle.  That is also a crinoid fossil embedded.

Not sure what kind of stone this is, but I loved how it has so many different textures going on.  Not to mention the two colors.  I actually find quite a few stones with two colors like this, the center’s ranging from very light to very dark.

Two very small pieces of china found, one found that night, the other found the next day.

The rest of these were found over the course of the two days, Friday night and Saturday morning. 

These are kind of unusual with the way the black is kind of embedded in the white stone.  Some have a lot, some barely any (top left).

I love these bluish ones.  Been finding several now that I’m actively looking for them.  No idea what they are either.  I really need to get some kind of Great Lakes rock identifying book or something.

Another unusual color we find sometimes.  Range from light lime green to a darker kind of mossy green.

Rocks embedded in rocks.  Or more likely, ground down cement like the kind they used to make sidewalks with.  Remember trying to roller skate on the sidewalks when they were bumpy?

Pictures never do these justice.  Again, I’m not sure what they are, but they look like some sort of crystal or quartz.  The ones that are cracked have a sparkle to the center.  I pick these up every time I see one, I love them.

Other samples of not-ground-down “quartz” or whatever they are.  You can see the upper right, large one that has been cracked open, that whole area sparkles.

Chunk of black pottery.  Have different sized pieces and different patterns.  You can not see through it like you would a dark olive color glass.  I also have found some of the same material that have a fluorescent orange line painted around them.

Sometimes I’ll find pieces like this, which some call slag rock.  I don’t know their real name.

Tiny bottle filled with really tiny shells!  It’s almost full, added two more today.  Hope to fill the bottle totally then permanently affix the cork.

Last Saturday morning’s finds… 8-28-10.

Yesterday’s finds.  Two beaches.  Slim pickings since the waves were 6-8 feet.

Today’s finds.  Some nicely rounded pieces, but nothing exciting.  Only one really good was this:

A pretty small piece,  originally I only saw the green parts.  It wasn’t until I got home that I saw the tiny pink rosebud.  The “yellow” behind it I think is more just rusty than a yellow piece!

Might take more photos later or tomorrow.  My daughter’s boyfriends dad told her I could borrow his metal detector!  I’m excited about that!

waves

We had soem pretty high waves on Lake Michigan yesterday.  High enough for the surfers to be out and coming in from Michigan, Ohio and even Alabama in addition to Illinois and Indiana. 

I borrowed the camera from work to take all the photos yesterday.  I also went to our Marina beach in addition to my regular one.  I rarely go to the Marina to look for glass, it’s good for pebbles and rocks, but very rarely do I find any good glass.

On the calmer side, within the harbor.

And because the waves were so high yesterday, I think I’ll head back out again today!

too much going on

I’ve been too swamped at work to make anything new, much less go glassing or update.  I’m in charge of our booth at our county fair, today and tomorrow are the last days finally.  It runs 10 days and trying to find people to man the booth for those days at four hour shifts for 12 hours is not easy.  And since its my job, I have to fill in where there is no one available

Hopefully soon I’ll be able to get back to the beach.  Of course I hope it cools off some too, we’ve been in the 90′s with very high humidity for almost two weeks straight.  It’s supposed to cool down to the 80′s tomorrow.  With the coming of fall and the end of summer storms there should be some good glassing coming up!