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My friend, Kathie, came down from Chicago last week…we torched for 10 days straight!!  It was so much fun having a torch buddy, I really enjoyed having her here.  We made glass beads & enameled beads.  You can see a few of the enameled beads sitting in vermiculite in the pic below.  I can’t wait to have more friends come over and torch.

Here’s Kathie making one of her gorgeous baroque beads.

Well, recently I took a class with Nancy Tobey, the Queen of Boro (in my opinion).  It was amazing!!  She was so wonderful and an awesome instructor.  I learned so much.  I know people say that a lot but I really did learn a lot AND I got great color out of myboro glass consistently for the very first time.  For those that don’t know, boro glass is pyrex and considered ‘hard’ glass.  It’s a lot stiffer glass to work with and I always found it more difficult to get colors but I did get some gorgeous colors in Nancy’s class.  As soon as I get the rest of my beads back from the studio where we torched (Indy Flame Art—great studio…BTW!) I’ll post them here for you to see.  Here are some from the first day.  I will probably never (never say never–right?) totally go to the ‘dark side’ as they say in boroland but I will do lots more playing and experimenting with that glass to expand my repertoire.

We arrived late and checked in at the Quality Inn in Fuquay (pronounced FWA-QWA not FU) Varina.  Once we were in our room we quickly gave it the once over and immediately we both decided we needed to check in somewhere else.  Our room was disgusting…dead bugs smashed on the back of the bathroom door, perspiration stains on the sheets like they hadn’t been cleaned, dust layers on the floor thick enough so you couldn’t see the carpet—YUCK!!  I could go on but you get the picture…

So, for the next 45 minutes we tried to find another hotel in the nearby area that had 2 double beds but they were all sold out due to some conferences in town.  We finally lucked out and found a vacancy at an Embassy Suites (owned by Hilton) about 30 minutes away.  We didn’t really care about the drive just as long as it was clean.  And we lucked out because my husband had racked up some Hilton Honors Points so we ended up getting our 3 night stay for FREE–can you belive it?!?!?  That was a huge savings because the room rate was $139 before tax–WOOHOO!  We immediately checked out of our reservation but decided to stay the night since we couldn’t get our money back for that night.  Needless to say, that I didn’t sleep well in the filth.  Next morning we get up early and decided to do some shopping until we could check in at the Embassy Suites. 

We found some quilting stores (Kathie creates some amazing quilts) and a knitting store.  We both recently started to knit so that was fun looking for neat patterns and luxurious yarns.  Of course, we spent way too much but that never stopped us before–lol!!  Each night we ate at the restaurant located in the Embassy Suites. It had the best food.  I even ate grits for the first time EVAH!!!  They were cheddar and garlic grits and I was very surprised that I liked them, I mean LOVED them.  I never thought I would like grits but Kathie told me to trust her and try them and she was right.  They kind of tasted like risotto to me.  I’ll probably never eat them again but those were delicous!

Saturday and Sunday we spent learning Shari Slonskis’ glass beadmaking techniques from Canada.  Our class was held at Marilyn Perazas’ nice, quaint studio.  There were a total of 6 students and it was so much fun.  Shari shared some wonderful tips and tricks with us.  We blew shards and made some cool beads, lots of off mandrel pieces and even an arrowhead.  I can’t wait for the temperature here to go down so I can play with all the new techniques I learned.

After the class was over, we went back to our hotel and decided to go see the new Harry Potter movie in 3D.  It was so cool!!  Go see it if you haven’t yet.  It’s awesome!!

We checked out of the Embassy Suites the next day and decided to drive straight through again.,,it was an easy drive and the time flew by as we discussed what we learned and reminisced over our trip and shopping excursions.  It was a great road trip and I can’t wait until the next one.  Kathie and I usually take a trip each year but this year we might even take another one.  I had a wonderful time and really enjoy traveling with my good friend.

Ok, so what's up with women driving their men around?  I'm not saying it's a bad thing but it seems to be growing exponentially.  I just got home from the grocery store and was sitting in the parking lot on the phone for around 10 minutes or so, as I watched about 8 out of every 10 couples the woman was the driver.  What's up with that?  Are we driving Mr. Daisy now.  I'm no exception.  For years, when my husband and I go out together he just slides right into the passenger seat…never asks if I want him to drive or can he drive…nope he's just riding along.  Once I would just like him to say 'hey, I'll drive today', just once.  I would love to be a carefree passenger once in a blue moon!

I'm thinking he's probably assuming I want to drive since I work from home and don't drive all that often but it still would be nice if he asks every now and again.  Even when I did work outside the home, I still drove us around on the weekends.  And today after seeing all these other woman driving their men around, it got me thinking.  When did this start?  Why is this happening?  Do we just love to drive or do they just want a FREE RIDE…no obligations, no stress, no hassle?? 

I'd love to hear your comments…

Anyway, while researching which loom I'd like to buy, I came across this video on YouTube.  I thought it would be a great project for fabric woven on a rigid heddle loom since the looms aren't very wide.  It looks easy and what a neat gift or housewarming gift idea!

What do you think? Leave me a comment…I'd love to know!

They were both unsuspecting and hate their photos being taken. Chanel found a nice comfy place on the sofa and I know she's saying…"Mom, enough already with the flash!!". And you can kind of tell what my hubby was thinking… Oh well, they better get used to it because they're likely going to continue to be some of my subject matter in the upcoming pics.