Hump Day

I haven't really created anything new in the jewelry department in a while & I thought that it was because my muse had run away (again). Well, he/she has been wrecking havoc on the silver market. I really haven't kept up with the spot price of silver, but decided that I needed to send in some of my scraps & order a little more silver wire & silver sheet. I go strolling (not literally, I just like to use an active action verb to describe me sitting on my booty & looking at the computer) over to one of my favorite silver suppliers. Holy what????? Wow!! $28.00 an ounce for silver?? That's just the spot price, I still have to pay for the fabrication which takes it to about $32.00 an ounce. I was going to order a small sheet of silver & it would cost about $115 for that one little sheet. I remember ordering the same size sheet maybe a year ago & it cost me about $40 for the sheet. I don't see the price of silver going down any time soon, so I'm going to hold onto my scraps for a little longer before sending them in. It wasn't that terribly long ago that silver was down to $8.50 an ounce...maybe 2 years ago. Did I stock up?? Noooooooo, because that's not what I do. That would require forethought & planning, something I've never been accused of abusing. I hope it doesn't get to $50 an ounce like some are predicting, but it keeps on marching upwards.

Not much happening around here. I've been doing a little more yard work & have managed to fill up my yard waste bin every week for the past 3 weeks. As the weeks go by, I'm slowly exposing my house & I think now people can actually tell that there's a house behind the nandina, azaleas, squirrel landscaped trees. Hopefully I'll get 2-3 more trees taken down this week because a friend of mine is going to bring over his bow saw to help. He told me not to try it with my little miter saw....I think he's afraid I'm going to hurt myself, then he'd feel all bad & everything. I don't mind, I managed to get him to accept a gift of jewelry for his wife in exchange. I think he wants me to do a teddy bear necklace for her, so I've been working on a little design. I don't want the standard teddy bear silhouette, but want to keep it somewhere between traditional & well....my style. What good is making a teddy bear if I can't take a torch to it?

A dear friend of mine took me to dinner last night. It was a local seafood place & they have $5 appetizers on Tuesday nights. I had the mussels & the beef carpaccio. The mussels were really nice in a chile & lime broth....perfect for bread dipping. The mussels were cooked nicely as well. I was very disappointed in the beef carpaccio, especially after the accolades I'd read in various reviews. It was very, very bland & seemed to be missing the acidic element that was necessary for seasoning & balance. It looked to just be a little pile of lettuces, parm cheese and a couple of onion ringlets placed onto the beef with an herb olive oil drizzled around the plate. It desperately needed the balsamic glaze as was mentioned on the menu. Maybe it did have the glaze & my palate is not delicate enough to pick it out, but it tasted like lettuce, onion & raw beef with herbed olive oil. I had eaten there before & was pleased, but this one just fell short for me. Although not on the $5 menu, the next time I'll order the mac & cheese with crabmeat. I think that would make my tummy happy.

I'm still enjoying my art therapy class. This week wasn't as hard as the previous ones & I get to make a fun stuffed monster. I have't even started on my monstah, but I've been working with paint, gesso & glue; you know, the fun stuff. I'll post a pic of my monstah after I create him & name him. I did say I was going to post a pic of the Christmas cards that I'd made, but I forgot, so I'll have to do it later.

I think that's all for now. Sorry I don't have any pictures, but I'm going to charge up the battery & start clicking. I'm headed down to meet a few friends of mine, one of which is an artist. I'll try to get photos of a couple of his pieces & post them.

I'll try to have pictures the next time around.

Play purdy!!

Pam