Design This – Grandmother’s Necklace

My custom birthstone necklace has been ordered to represent mom and dad and the kid(s) as I anticipated, in addition it has also been used to celebrate close circles of friends. It was one of these customers who asked if I could modify the design so that it would work as a Grandmother’s necklace. She needed five birth months represented and didn’t just want them added to the central crystal section of the necklace.

I told her that depending on the necklace length, I was confident that I could do this and got to work. My customer wanted an 18 inch necklace made with silver plated findings and figaro chain. After a bit of experimenting so that the spacing between the sections was balanced and not cramped and so that all of the sections would show at the front of the necklace, I had a design. Actually, this request was not as difficult as many of the custom requests that I receive because my original design allows for a lot of flexibility.

So if my original birthstone necklace design doesn’t quite meet your needs, please feel free to contact me and explain what you are looking for. I’ll be happy to give you an estimate based on your specs for your own customized piece.

Baseball in Waco

Sometime during the first week of August each year, Little League baseball comes to Waco, TX. Waco is the headquarters of the Little League Southwest Region and hosts the Southwest Region Tournament at the baseball complex behind region headquarters.

I have just returned from spending a bit over a week in the record breaking heat in Waco. “Why?”, because my husband was invited to umpire at the Little League Southwest Region Tournament this year. I wanted to show my support of his accomplishment and help out when I could. The volunteers took good care of the players and umpires and even though the temperature was over 100 each day, none of them fell out from the heat. Fans were encouraged to stay hydrated as well and seemed to follow this advice. I was able to pitch in and help clean up the stands after each game.

The umpire assignments rotated them through the different positions during the tournament. My husband called the plate for the semi-final game between the Colorado state champions and the Texas East champions. (Texas is so big it has two “state” level tournaments, one for Texas East and one for Texas West.) The team from Texas East beat Colorado in an exciting and close game. For the finals between Texas East and Louisiana, my husband was assigned to rotate out with another umpire on the right field line. This is where he was at the bottom of the seventh inning and where some of the action occurred on the game winning play. (Little League tournament games are six innings. This game was in extra innings because the score was tied at the bottom of the sixth.) A clip of this play was uploaded to YouTube. The first minute of the clip shows the lead up to the last play, the final hit and my husband calling the ball fair. The hit resulted in a triple, but with an overthrow by Texas East at third, the batter scored the winning run. Louisiana now goes on to represent the Southwest Region at the Little League World Series in Williamsport, PA.

The fans really get into the excitement of the tournament. Fans of teams often have matching t-shirts, some had matching jewelry. I wore my baseball gathering pins several times and one fan wore an elaborate handmade hat to the semi-finals and finals. All in all, in spite of the heat, a good time was had by all.

Thanks for the Treasuries - July 2011

Seven different Etsians let me know that they had featured one or more of my items in a treasury during July. Eight July treasuries included one of my items and one treasury included one item from each of my two shops. You can see a collage below of my items from EDCCollective and EclecticSkeptic that were featured during July. (Click on the collage to see a larger view.)

I really appreciate being featured by the treasury makers. To thank them, I have listed below (in alphabetical order) links to the 7 different Etsians that let me know that they featured at least one of my items, as well as an item from their shop or profile that I like.

Enjoy window shopping and please click on the shop links of anything that catches your eye.

artefyk
This shop carries mostly jewelry and home decor one of a kind Polymer Clay and beaded items.

BellaVioletta
This shop owner does an amazing job of upcycling materials from everyday life and turning them into gorgeous goodies.

CarrotPatch
Unfortunately this shop seems to have closed up since I posted, but here is one of her sold items, a cute flat wallet or business card holder.


CorkyCrafts
Look no further for gifts for a wine connoisseur who happens to appreciate unique hand made items.

IntoTheLight
This shop carries a large assortment of beautiful, affordable fused glass jewelry & accessories.

LarkspurStudios
This fused glass artist "paints" with powdered glass to create unique fused glass pendants.

TexasHillCountryArt
Find Fredericksburg area wildlife & wildflowers, greeting cards, an occasional acrylic painting and some tropical vacation art in this artist's shop.

EclecticSkeptic Turns Two

Terrible twos? Not on your life, I’m sure this next year will be the “terrific twos” for EclecticSkeptic and my customers. To get the “twos” off to a terrific start for my customers, I am offering a sale to celebrate this second “birthday”. To find out the details, visit my facebook business fan page.

EclecticSkeptic carries a wide variety of whimsical through whimsically elegant flying pig items. These include altered photographic art of flying pigs on note cards, holiday cards, bookmarks and clocks. You will also find flying


pig necklaces, earrings, zipper pulls, tie tacks, keychains, cufflinks and pins. EclecticSkeptic also carries a small selection of goodies for the math and/or science geek.

EclecticSkeptic officially turns two on August 1. Remember to visit my EDC business fan page to find out how to participate in the sale going on that day.

Here is a toast to “terrific twos” and a great BIG THANK YOU to all of my past and future customers for your support.

Get Linkified

Do you ever run across a link that you want to follow, but it’s not clickable? While there are several reasons for this to occur, when it does you have to copy the URL, paste it into the address bar and hit return in order to go there. Independent of the reason for the nonclickable link, wouldn’t it be nice to never have to go to all of that trouble again?

If you use Firefox, there is a great add on that makes nonclickable links clickable. No copying and pasting, just click on where you want to go. This Firefox extension is called Linkification. It is easy to install and has worked wonderfully for me since I added it about a year ago.

To be clear, this makes nonclickable links clickable when you are using Firefox as your browser and have installed Linkification as an add on to Firefox. Linkification will not make a particular URL clickable for people not using this combination. To make that happen, you would most likely need to have access to the code behind the text and often that is not accessible. (I have seen info recently that there may be similar solutions for other browsers, especially Chrome but I have no experience with them to verify their existence or usefulness.)

So, soup up your surfing. If you use Firefox and don’t have Linkification installed, I highly recommend it. I have found it to be useful and reliable.

Embrace Your Geekness Day - 2011

Are you in need of a fun, quirky reason to celebrate today? Then join in and celebrate "Embrace Your Geekness Day" this Wednesday, July 13, 2011. (This holiday and many others are copyrighted by Thomas and Ruth Roy, aka WellcatHolidays.)

What better way to celebrate than to buy yourself some jewelry from EclecticSkeptic to show off your geeky side to others? Be proud of who you are. Fellow math geeks will get a kick out of seeing your pythagorean theorem or fibonacci necklace. If you are a science geek, embrace it with a pair of hydrogen atom earrings.

Have fun, no need to hide your abilities and interests. Embrace your inner geekness today and every day.

Thanks for the Treasuries - June 2011

Five different Etsians let me know that they had featured one or more of my items in a treasury during June. Four June treasuries included one of my items and one treasury included one item from each of my two shops. You can see a collage below of my items from EDCCollective and EclecticSkeptic that were featured during June. (Click on the collage to see a larger view.)

I really appreciate being featured by the treasury makers. To thank them, I have listed below (in alphabetical order) links to the 5 different Etsians that let me know that they featured at least one of my items, as well as an item from their shop or profile that I like.

Enjoy window shopping and please click on the shop links of anything that catches your eye.

artefyk
This shop carries mostly jewelry and home decor one of a kind Polymer Clay and beaded items.


CocoCocoa
Look no further for lovely hand knit and crocheted hats, headbands and even jewelry.

KellyEMarra
This shop specialized in big, bold, chunky statement jewelry and spirit wear.

LarkspurStudios
This artist fuses "paints" with powdered glass create unique fused glass pendants.

MagnoliaSurprise
Crochet and Needlework for Home, for Baby, for You!