I copied from my Flickr.

Basically, I wanted to see how the colors would look on polymer clay. I first applied a combination of two colors on three separate sheets of unbaked dark gray polymer clay using three different kinds of color median. I originally wanted to try to replicate the look of a glass bead using clear liquid polymer clay, but things didn’t exactly turn out the way I planned. This was in fact the first time trying to use the liquid stuff. I will have to experiment more at a later time. I ended up sanding off the original layers of color and ended up repainting them several times more times after they were baked.

I cure all my pieces in the Ranger Ink Melting pot. Although, I have an extra toaster oven, I don’t have the need for it. I usually work really slow and I don’t mass produce pieces at this time.

So on to the colors. The royal purple one on the left was painted with Pearl Violet Lumiere and Metallic Gold Lumiere. The middle one is painted using Polished Pigments by LuminArte. There are several layers of about 4 different colors here, which are: Copper Penny, Gold Dust, Cranberry, Black Cherry, and Sunburst. The reason why I say that I am doing a color study, rather than a paint study is because the last bead on the right is using the Ranger Ink Alcohol Ink. The colors that I used was the gold mixatives and Wildplum. I

I have lots of ideas bombarding my head right now. This is the first time that I actually used any kind of paints or inks, well okay, early when I started polymer clay I did use some stamps and inks. But really the first time that I painted an entire piece of clay. I am salivating over all the possibilities.

I’m sort of hitting a brick wall with an idea right now. Hopefully, before we head off to the library party, I can break through that thick wall. The B man participated in the summer reading program. He read over 40 books this summers, with my help, of course. The party isn’t until 1:00 and I really want to finish two polymer clay projects before we go, one being my sushi windchime. It’s been sitting unbaked for a couple months now. I had finally found a nice smallish size windchime that I was able use with my pieces.

I am planning to add some more clay pieces onto the beads to liven them up. Although, I love how they look, they definitely need something more.

I love you so much Den.
You are the father to our two most beautiful little boys.
You are my best friend and soul-mate for life.
Thanks for choosing me to experience this crazy thing that we call life.
Here’s to many more years of happiness, loves, and whatever challenges that we will come across.

I love you! Your wife. Susie

I am almost done building the office that I have been working on for the last month. I’ve been a free member now for few months, and have been practicing my building skills working as a Research Assistant for the last month and a half. I am finally starting to feel much more comfortable with the building tools. This week I started dabbling with the Linden Scripting Language. There is a high learning curve, but it was so addicting and extremely, that spend I most of my free time (not that I have much), on Second Life. I have also started to feel the urge to purchase a small plot of land, but I haven’t yet received my first pay check, and plus I need to save my money for the Clay Carnival. I really enjoy the the building part of it, but I need to remember that the main reason why I am here is mainly see how it influences and impacts learning in an education arena.

This week is super busy in real life as well. I have to bring the parent’s snack today for Elden’s class. I also made some yummy cupcakes to celebrate his birthday in class. I decided not to have a big birthday party for him, other than the small class celebration and a small family thing with the four of us. Wednesday is his actual birthday, but his class is only on Tuesday. Another reason why we decided not to have a big party is because he really doesn’t anyone, excepts the kids that he has class with. We did buy a few small gifts that he will get to open tomorrow. Wednesday and Thursday are my work days at Brennan’s class. Thursday I also have to bring snacks for his class. I know some mom’s love preparing snacks for class. I sort of enjoy it, but when they are back to back like this, it can get sort overwhelming for me. I am definitely not one of those moms that bake yummy homemade stuff. I usually end up going straight to Trader Joes.

I dd not pre-order the Harry Potter book and now I sort of regret it. Not that I would have gotten a chance to sit down to read it. Maybe I will read it on when we go to our little vacay to Vegas next month. We really didn’t know what to do. We will be taking our yearly Yosemite trip in October and will also be heading down south to San Diego in November. We opted out to any beach locations, since what’s the point in that when you just live a couple miles from the ocean. Vegas is always fun and it really is getting much more kid friendly these days.

Anyways, how is that for random jibber jabber?

I can’t believe Mr. Elden will be turning two in the next coming week. He is growing way too fast. Today, he went poop by himself on the toilet. He has been pretty much going pee-pee for several months, but we still keep him in his diapers. I am not quite sure when to let him wear undies, although yesterday he chose a pair of Brennan’s undies to wear over his pj’s. Too cute! We have also been weaning him from mamam this past couple weeks as well. He is doing fairly well. We sort of have him trained that when he tries pull up my shirt and Den is around, I say ask daddy. Dad promptly tells him no and gives him a mean look. How sad, huh? We are so mean. But I can pretty much only use that when he is around. Although, I have tried telling him that I am going to call daddy and tell him. LOL! I absolutely enjoyed and was so blessed that I could breastfeed both of my children. But it is definitely time for me to have my big old body back. I need to start getting back into fitness, like I used to.

So I am not really good about keeping track of all those milestones, but I can say that he is healthy, happy, and seems to be right on track, if not ahead. He is on the small, scrawny size, but he is crazy active. He climbs up like a little monkey that he is, runs around like a midget madman. and keeps up right next to his big bro.

Another big celebration coming up for us, is our big 12 year wedding anniversary. Can you believe it? I sure can’t! I will most likely write more about my wonderful, sweet hubby, Den in the end of this month, when it is actually our anniversary, but I just wanted to express how much I love this smart, nerdy, yet very witty guy! He is a fabulous father, although I wish he would stop leaving his dirty clothes in random spots. Okay, I am just being funny. Because of him, I get to stay home with my little guys.

This page was actually part of the “Book of Dreams” challenge by Artsymama. Yes, I started it that long ago. The only thing that I did was the background, the nest was some advertisement from St&*$ucks, and the grass was a mailing from Aquent (back from my freelance ad days). It sat for so long. I tried to work on a couple weeks ago, but it was just not going anywhere.

Yesterday, I had the opportunity to briefly chat with Teesha Moore from Zettiology at the Carson “A Stamp in The Hand” show. I was so jazzed that she shared with me a little bit of her creative process of her journals. It was definitely the inspiration that I needed. I definitely would love to one day attend the ArtFest, but I am excited that I will participating in Clay Carnival Las Vegas ‘07. I purchased three of her collage sheets. They definitely made me feel super happy.

I also chatted for awhile with these really nice ladies from YanKiwi. They are a newish stamp company based in sunny CA and also specialize in what they call GWO (gorgeous wee ones), unique embellishments for all your artistic and crafty needs. I picked a couple bags of these rather cool botanical buttons, and used it on this journal page.

I had to really hold myself back not to purchase any stamps. They are really detailed and the impressions are very deep, which would be great for polymer clay.

Anyways, I am so happy that I finally finished this page. I want to fill the rest of the pages out as well.

I finally completed a few scrap layouts as well. I started about three of them in May, but of course, I never finished them until today.

This was at a time when we just barely found out that my mom had to have colon surgery. Thank goodness, she was fine. There is a back story to this as well. About 5 years ago, she had a routine Colonoscopy. The Dr. founds small precancerous polyps, but told here she didn’t need to worry about it back then. Fast forward 5 years, she had another routine Colonoscopy. The polyps grew even more, and resulted her having to having surgery. Again, I am thankful that the overall results were good for her, but had she the taken care of it 5 years ago, she wouldn’t have even had to have surgery. She was very lucky. She hates that I blog, but I really feel like it is important for me, not just mentally, but creatively. Blogging is very much a creative outlet as well.

I am so excited for my parents as well. They recently celebrated their 38th anniversary. And to celebrate this as well as their recent retirement, they will be going on a river cruise in Russia. How totally cool is that? I am so excited for them and can’t wait to see the pictures that my dad takes.

See the picture of my dad on that huge wooden structure? This man just turned 69 years old. For the past year and a half or so, instead of hiring someone to paint their house, he has been building these elaborate scaffolds, which takes about 3 months to build. He does this because it is fun for him and just so he can paint around the windows on the second floor. That structure was I believe his 3rd or 4th scaffold.

This face pretty much sums the personality that my son has. He is strong-willed, fierce, and when he makes up his mind that he want to do something a certain way, he tried his darndest to do it his way. I don’t that it is either a good or bad thing, but I guess just part of his personality, which can definitely make it tough for us as parents.

So this is how pathetic I am. I started this layout in January using some super cool holiday paper, and it’s now July. I added a few things, but really wanted to have the swirls showing. I added those epoxy pieces because I’ve have them in my supplies for over two years and I was sick of looking at them. I seriously want to just throw away all my supplies that I have collected over the last few years and just throw them away. Don’t get me wrong, I love purchasing scrapbooking supplies, but I get tired of looking at them when they sit unused, but again I can’t get myself to get rid of them. Yes, I am naturally a horder. But seriously, I really do need to organize the items and donate them to a local church or something. I did sell some stuff recently at a couple garage sales, but I still have way too much stuff. I am sure you all can relate to this.

Okay, so just one more layout and then I am out of here. I need to work on some Second Life stuff, and I still want to finish a polymer clay cane that I have been working on the last couple of days. Tomorrow we will be attending a fun family concert at the park in the evening, so I need to get some rest too.

This was Elden at Brennan’s school. We would usually hang out for about 20 minutes or so, before leaving because he really, really wanted to stay and play with all the toys. Now that he is in summer class, he is totally digging it. It is really simple, just the way that I like it. I would have used rickrack, which is what I usually use in all my layouts, but I have all this other ribbon that needs to be used.

I think other than donating some stuff, I might have to organize it and maybe give them away here. I wonder if anyone would be interested. I have lots of leftover rubons, letters, chipboard, ribbons, and other stuff. Hmm…

I should have posted my wonderful and fun goodies that I received from Melissa Kojima last week, but I have been busy with the kids and actually have had an awful sore throat combined with terrible conjestion. And plus, I have been lazy about blogging. I must attribute that to the summer. LOL!

Before I rant about our fine health insurance, I will first post the wonderful goodies that I received. You should also check out her work. She draws very elaborate, detailed work and specializes in political type illustrations.

Sorry about the bad photo. I really need to set up a small photo studio to take pictures of all my crafty stuff. I mostly take pictures outside, but it is usually in direct lighting. I need a tent or something.

Lately, I have been drawn to the artwork of Sharon @ Norah. Here is her Flickr and this is a link to her blog. I love discovering new artwork. It is wonderful when people share their artwork online, and in general. Not only is it such an inspiration, but it is also gives me a sense of confidence to share my artwork as well. Art is meant to be shared. If you make art, why don’t you share your creations to the world? Do you think that what you make is not good enough to share? Do you feel this a small piece of yourself that you want to keep private and to yourself? Or maybe you are just plain too busy to share?

I think as I get older my allergies seem to be getting worse. They mostly act up when there is some sort of weather change, not that there is much of a weather change out here in Sunny So Cal. But really, when the weather changes from slightly cool to hot, or vice versa, my eyes and top of my mouth start itching, and my nose starts running. It gets to the point that I have to stick two rolled up pieces of toilet paper up my nostrils, to stop the drip. It is not a pretty sight. The allergy medicines that I have used in the past work okay, but I needed something much stronger for what I had. Of course, when I went to the Dr’s, I was told that I can’t do much about it and that what I either have is something viral or could be my allergies. The Dr. also prescribed me some allergy medicine, but my fine insurance HMO Blue Shield, covers 0% of allergy medicine. I have been suffering long enough with my allergies, so I was not about to shell out $60 for something that may or may not work anyways. I ended up purchasing some regular over the counter medicine, but now I developed some sort of earache. I suffer more at night. It was definitely the worst on Wednesday. When I laid down, my throat was filled with so much phlem, and I ended up coughing so much. So what do you think I did?

I ended up going back downstairs and clayed until the sun came out. Although, I was so exhausted I ended up feeling so accomplished. I will definitely take some pictures over the weekend. It did get carried away a little bit. I really enjoy making canes, but sometimes I don’t know when to stop.

The boys are doing well. They have been both enjoying summer school. Nothing else really new with them. Elden will be celebrating his 2nd birthday at the end of this month, and we will also be celebrating our 12 year anniversary. We are planning a small summer vacation in August, after Den gets back from presenting a paper at Oxford. We just don’t quite know what. We also plan to join the YMCA. Brennan will be attending school 5 days a week in the fall and I think the Y will be perfect for me and Elden. I can drop Elden off, while I go work out, swim, or even study a little bit in their facilities. I know that I told myself that I would go walking on the Strand while Brennan is off at school, but most days I have been going back home to do household duties. That seems to be the only time that I can get them done. Plus, I accidently ran over my jogger stroller and one of the wheels sort of just broke off it’s axle. Very bad. So um, ya!

On that note, I think I will stop writing now. See you later. And if anyone is reading still, thank you for visiting!

Here are a few random goodies of necklaces that I have created in the last couple of weeks. The top two were my latest. I think they are such happy, summery pieces. These two were based on an idea that I had sketched out about a month ago or so. I wrapped about an 8 inch piece of 20 gauge wire with pieces of 24 gauge wire interspersed with a few beads. I love the amber glass flower beads. I love the simple look of the necklace which is mostly beaded with tiny seed beads. The polymer clay pendant is a thick slice of a patterned cane that I made, but didn’t take a picture of because I was so excited to use the cane up and it was so late night.

I was so frustrated with wrapping the wire that when I made a second necklace with the same cane, I ended up just putting glass beads on it. They both have such different looks to them. It is neat to see a simple change to a piece will give it a totally different look to it.

This was part of a cane that was made into a big focal point bead. I really didn’t do that great of a job wrapping the cane. There are a lot of seams that I didn’t smooth out. The amber glass bead was one of my first bead purchases and probably one of my favorite beads that I have seen. One day if I ever get into glass again, I will be able to make something like this gorgeous bead. The silver tribal-like tube bead goes quite well with this simple necklace. It was definitely a fun piece, but I am not sure if this is something that I will repeat.

I’ve been wanting to try my hand at beading two strands. This is one of favorite pendants, which was done in Mokume style. I also had leftover clay to make the beads. This is probably the last of the donut pendants. I think I am totally over them. Although, I did like them, I think the pendant was just a tad too big. Maybe if I scaled down the size a bit, then it could work.

I would really like to focus on perfecting the designs of the first two and making that my signature style. I truly feel that it reflects who I am as a person, fun and happy.

I might have mentioned these books before, but they are definitely next on my list to purchase. This book, “The Art of Polymer Clay Creative Surface Effects: Techniques and Projects Featuring Transfers, Stamps, Stencils, Inks, Paints, Mediums, and More”, by Donna Kato just recently came out and I doubt that any of my local or university libraries carry it yet. I keep renewing her first book from the library because it is just that inspiring. The other book that I really want is, “Making Polymer Clay Beads: Step-by-Step Techniques for Creating Beautiful Ornamental Beads“, by Carol Blackburn. There are so many cool ideas on making beads. Very inspiring as well. I haven’t purchased any books on claymaking as of yet, and was holding off. But I think they two would be a great investment.

I don’t think I will be making anything clay-related this week because I have a lot of work-related stuff that I need to finish. Brennan did request that I make him a Blues Clues necklace, so that is on my first thing on my to due list.