Thursday, October 4, 2012

Snakes on a Plane, Snakes on a Train, Snakes in a.......


You guys certainly rose to the occasion on this giveaway!  Thank you all for your hilarious comments, stories and wild ideas.   LOVED THEM!  It's a blast to see how a little thing like this picture can get your creative stories flowing.




 


I appreciate all of your comments, ladies.
Thank you for taking the time.

Here's the highlights of the comments;


Ellice -  Yes, you are a total success if grossing me out is your aim.  And the orange tree is LOADED with more blossoms.  Smells incredible. Very happy here in the hot Texas sunshine.

Kathy- Welcome!.  You absolutely should get your ears pierced.  Though that explains how you're able to part with all of those amazing earrings you make.  And yes, you're right, thankfully, those snakes aren't real.

Lela- ewww, I hate snakes too!  You came closest in reality to what TSMIMITW was actually doing  But Texas sun tea?  Um, sounds tasty, but no, sorry.

Skye- What are you talking about?  I tried to contact you via your blog to find out but got nowhere.  Waaaait- are you just messing with me?  But hey, even though I didn't knowingly do anything I'll gladly take credit for making you laugh.

Alice-HAHAHAHAHA!  You've done away with Mr. First?!  Guys- she murdered off the Most Interesting Man in the World! Totally cracked me up. You do tell a good story with that twisted thinking. TSMIMITW appreciated the promotion, btw.

Greer-  Hissed on one sip of Texas Tequila!  Hilarious! I'm asking...how do you know?  Fried a bit, have you?

Tracy- Yes, yes to everything you said.  I'm loving the lack of all things football.  You have no idea just how much. Or maybe you do.

Juliette- You're so right....what a fantastic studio that little stone building would make.  We can dream, can't we?

Marina- A prop for a tv show maybe.  An Arts and Crafts segment with the SMIMITW hosting, showing 101 things you can do with a dead plastic snake.  hahahaha  But nope, no magic, witches or occult shenanigans around these parts.

Cynthia- Well see if there was 50 of me it would explain the massive amounts of organic ice cream I can consume.  I like your idea.  "no, it wasn't me who ate that gallon of ice cream. It was one of my 49 alter egos!"

Willow Janet- Welcome!  Thank you for the awesome tip! We're not far from there at all.  Looking forward to checking it out.  Are you near these parts as well?

Super Petra- Your beads do look wonderful because they are wonderful!  Yup, gorgeous sunsets and the occasional foot-rub.  Mr. Wonderful 2 stumped you, did he?  hahahaha

Kimberly- YES PLEASE!  I very much do want to see your pictures of real snakes in jars.

Flotsam Kim and "E"- E, your hopping snakes story is very funny.  It made me laugh to think of it!  Kim, my pleasure to mention your beautiful new shop.  Wishing you every success with it as well as with FlotsamTide.

Quisnam-  HAHAHAHAHA  what makes you think I'm coherent and not a mess?

Coffeefreek53- Where to even start with replying to your comment?  hahaha.  No backing away slowly for me, I will turn and run like crazy, screaming like a hysterical girl the whole time.  Well, no, I usually keep a cool head till after the fact but then I'll scream like a girl.  They do BBQ everything in Texas, everything! Will let you know how I like BBQ snake when I've had a chance to try it. :)

Bond girl-  Are you saying that keeping the first pair of every new style (the prototype) isn't standard practice?  I've been doing it wrong all this time?!  Ok, so now we all want to hear the second grade snake story.  Please do tell.  And if I thought a jar of fake snakes would keep real snakes away, you can bet I'd have a fence of them!

Melinda- Thank you for the helpful info on poisonous snakes of Texas.  hahahaha.  I did Google it!  Ewwww who wants to eat green snake?  ack. Oh, Texans, that's who!
Snakes on a bun!  Too funny and fits perfectly with the theme.

Lucie-  You know I hadn't even thought of making molds from those snakes.  Thank you-  good idea.  Maybe a bracelet that wraps around your arm.  A room full of monstrosities?!  Yikes! No wonder that still creeps you out.  Actually, that sort of thing creeps out TSMIMITW too. He has no fondness for mutant anything.  So not to worry.

Crankypants- Welcome! I will mess with Texas, I promise.  How could I not?  Snakes in a jar, the latest teenage fad, eh?  What will they come up with next?  hahahaha

Gretchen- Welcome! hahahaha if you only knew how completely unlikely it is that TSMIMITW would go to a gypsy fortune teller, you would be on the floor laughing.  But the idea of snakes in a jar lowering our mortgage rates could help me quickly learn to love me some snakes!  Then I'd get the hubs out there wrangling a bunch of snakes that we could take to our real estate closing.  Oh wait, the people might all run out of the room screaming (like girls) and leave us with a pile of unsigned papers and snakes.  Yikes!


  Now for the real story. 
 Not nearly as entertaining as those you guys came up with.

See these pretty hanging baskets.....

 



They graced our front porch at our Illinois home.
Every year the birds would make nests in the pots, 
meaning we had to chase the birds away or drown the poor little nest when watering, 
which clearly wasn't going to happen.  So we put rubber snakes in the pots.
VIOLA!
Problem solved.
Upon moving, I never gave those snakes a second thought, 
I mean, why would I?
Until that romantic moment on the balcony.....
this ladies, is a man way of cleaning dirt off of rubber snakes.
hahahaha.  I find it hysterical.
Yes, he was quite pleased with himself for a. fishing the snakes out of the pots and
b. thinking of a no fuss way to get the dirt out of all the little textured snakeskin crags and crevices.
Guess this actually demotes him down to the third most interesting man in the world, eh?


So it's actually
Snakes on a Plane
Snakes on a Train
Snakes in a Flowerpot
(so not scary at all, eh?)


Oh winners?  You want to know about the winners?

For those of you around for my first giveaway,
you might remember that I let you all choose the first winner.
The commenter who gets the most reaction from the other commenters is the
winner of prize #1 

we all know who that is....

Congrats Greer of VintajiaAdornments!
You will receive the earrings made with Petra's wonderful components. 

Ladies, I just couldn't decide between the rest of you.
Loved the variety of scenarios.
Thanks so much for sharing your creativity about those snakes.
To be fair, I thought the only solution was to resort to the tried and true method,
of names in a hat.
Or a stainless steel bowl to be precise.
No, I didn't photogragh it.
Trust me, I didn't cheat.
Though only the commenters who specifically commented 
on the snakes got their names in there.

The first name drawn....

Alice! 
You will receive the bracelet.

The second name drawn....

Melinda!
You will receive the glass necklace

last, but not least, the third name drawn....

Bond Girl!
You will receive the cocoon pendant.

Ok Ok, you know I always have a bonus winner.....
This time it's "E"
Just because any time a sweet first grader
concocts a story as charming as hopping snakes,
she's a clear winner in my book.
There'll be a surprise prize for little miss "E".

Please send me your addresses via email or convo
and I'll get your goodies out to you next week.

 Now onto other things.
Imagine my delight when we got internet service set up in our
 temporary digs.  
I was (and am) soooo thrilled to be able to give some sorely needed
attention to my neglected blog and etsy store.
Then to my horror to discover as I attempted to post a picture to my blog,
that I have used up all of my space on blogger and was unable to 
post even one more picture!
What?!
I didn't know there were any restrictions to how much space you have 
available to you on Blogger.
Did you guys know about this?
One of my blog mentors, fanci mentioned to me when I first started out
to use small pictures. She adjusts the size of pictures taken in her camera settings.
I'm thinking it was merely for ease and speed of uploading pictures.  Not so.
Anyway, I'm giving you all the heads up to be aware of the size of pictures you're posting 
before you too run out of space and can't upload one more picture.
There is an easy way to deal with it if you do run out of space.
  $5.00 a month buys you more.
I am also now resizing my pics to a smaller size in a photo editing program
 so they use less space when posted.
And maybe I won't post 1,239 pics in each blog.  Disappointing to you, I know.
Well, we'll see about that.  You all know I'm all about the pictures.
Well and the words.  Always lotsa words. 

I'm inserting this little update in here just in case any of you 
somehow discovered I blogged..........
 arghhhhhhh 
 I discovered after posting this that I'm not showing up on anyone's blogrolls
where I normally show up.
Wondered why, 6 hours later I hadn't heard a thing.
Hours and hours of research and I still don't know how to fix that.
Possibly something about my feedburner.  Huh?
What's a feedburner?
So I'm putting it out there- 
A PLEA FOR HELP!
Do any of you know why I've disappeared
from blogrolls?
Waaaait, did you guys remove me from your blogrolls? 
Ack, now I'm frustrated and embarrassed.

Update 2-  It's been a number of days since I posted this.  I've tried everything
I can think of to correct the blogroll situation on this end.
Obviously nothing has worked.  Sigh.
It appears that when I ran out of blogger storage space
and purchased more, that something changed
  in the way my URL is recognized in the existing blogrolls. 
Looks like if you would like my blog to continue
appearing in your blogrolls, that you might need to re-add it to your blogroll list.
Much obliged if you choose to do so.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 

Random side point-This is what my nails look like when I'm not working alot.
And the reason I'm showing this picture is because it's 
uber (oober for Numinosity Kim)
important to use up some blogger space on this pic



let's pretend that the cuticles are in better shape 
and that I don't have those funky irregular nailbeds.
Please just take note that all the nails are looooong and the same length!
All 10 of them!
Wowee.
Of course, they don't look like that now, though,
 cuz of this....




 Boho Chic Hoops with Pink Drop

You might recognize these hoops as the tin pieces in my box lid studio photos of a previous blog.
Sterling earwires, headpins by Havana beads, slightly oxidized with dimples.




Discoveries of Ancient Pompeii

Three shades of Baltic amber, luminous light aqua teardrops, embossed brass, 
wired up, oxidized and sealed with micro wax.  
I am so pleased with these it took all my self control to list them,
even though technically, they are a prototype and I could keep them with no guilt.
Right Bond Girl?





Bits and pieces of stones, shells and glass.

I know!  What's with all this color?
They are already spoken for. 




You Nailed it Salsa Hoops

with Petra's ceramic nails floating in beaded multi wire hoops.
Color color everywhere.  Could it be all this sunshine? 



 
   Cool Waters of the Grecian Pools

These are some of the luscious labradorite beads from the
Bead and Button Show.
Yes, they really do have that amazing blue flash! 
The faceted briolettes are also labradorite,
 but with interesting inclusions along with the flash. 



 
Travels Through Time Assemblage earrings

Vintage watch rounds, not faces, dials, maybe?
Upcycled tin, aged acrylic floral beads, embossed brass,
red headpins by Havana Beads and
the cool double headed speckled headpins
by Numinosity beads.
Oxidized, waxed and colorful!





Nailed Double Hoops with Ceramic Nails and Garnets


Petra's nails adorned with wee bits of highly polished garnets 
to provide visual contrast with the highly textured nails
and grungy hoops.
Now those look a bit more like my usual dark fare, eh?




Hands of Time Upon My Ivory Rose

You saw these last post.
I added some matte olive green seed beads
 and wrapped antiqued copper wire round about the bullet casing
to provide texture and contrast to the smooth cool casing.
Now they look done to me.
As do these...




The Thorn That Pierced My Heart

The addition of wire wrapped pyrite beads
and vintage petal headpins made these look complete to me.







Love Birds

Adding the beaded green leaves finished these up too
since the last time you saw them.





Pods of Porcelain

I decided to wire wrap some antiqued wire around the bottom arches 
and it added just the right amount of texture to make these look done. 
 I like how that texture compliments the texture of the upper discs 
and ties the design together.




Born With a Silver Spoon in Her Ear

More of that fantastic embossed brass which has the feel of antiquity to me,
paired with faceted briolettes of rutilated quartz, one of my all time favorite stones,
and tiny little silverplate spoons.  
The color of the mixed metals 
combined with the complimentary textures is so pleasing to my eye.
Simple yet elegant.  


I also made a set of 5 simple stacked bangles





Amazonite, pyrite, labradorite, agate and glass beads.

I made these bracelets oval, which is my preferred shape for comfort and wearability.
The wire is not so stiff that they can't be re-shaped though if someone prefers round.
Photo taken on my creepy new manne hand which I am kinda loving.
It's a man hand with gold paint flecks all over it so I had my doubts.
But I think it looks pretty good in the pictures, 
which of course was the whole point of a new manne hand.


That's it for giveaways and box lid jewelry.
Phew.  Did it seem like it took forever to get through all the words?
I know blog words are all ya'll's favorites. 
(notice the Texas speak? eh? eh?)
And now for some blog news.

Wanna win a free Personal Wellness package?
I sure do!
So I'm entering the giveaway for it here



I'm just hoping if I win one,
that I can have wellness and eat organic ice cream.
Shouldn't be a problem, right?


In honor of the first, second or possibly third most interesting man in the world's romantic nature,
 which inspired this giveaway,
I shall leave you with this






so long for now.
enjoy





21 comments:

  1. there really was a legit story behind those snakes. wow.
    , im so sorry blogger's giving you grief. you know i've been blogging tons for a couple of years now and never come across anything like this.
    i love the gorgeous earrings! especially the embossed brass- i think that's lamp banding. SOOOso pretty.
    not only are my nails and hands a mess, i bite the filthy things. ugh. even when they're clean, ugh. im very impressed with yours.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. yup, a legit story. not a particularly fascinating story, but hey. I liked it. :)
      Yes, blogger is giving me fits. some people are getting blank screen, not even the old posts. sigh. Thank you for your efforts in trying to help me figure it out. This one has stumped everybody!
      That fabulous banding is available from Pipnmolly's etsy shop. I love working with it! Recommend you get yourself some.

      Delete
  2. FANTASTIC new earrings!!! Love them all, but especially the Discoveries of Ancient Pompeii - W-OW!! Such beautiful colours. Thnak you so much for making my nails look as wonderful as they do xx
    Congrats to Greer - someone had to do well to match the snake tequila gag, didn't they?!! I do hope she enjoys her Janet and Petra Show earrings!! Well done to Alice, Melinda, and Bond Girl too - and of course, there had to be an extra something for little E and her hopping snakes!!
    Wow - YOUR nails are looking amazing! Or - they were, before the earrings!! Ditto Fanci - mine are utterly revolting too!!
    Good luck with the house - looking forward to seeing some pics.
    xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo :O)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Aww thanks. Thank you for making such wonderful nails that make my earrings look good.
      I wish I could have given something to all of you who commented. For being chosen at random, these ladies did have quite the stories, eh?

      Delete
  3. OHHHHHHH I'm so excited! I can't wait to receive the cocoon pendant! Congrats to Greer, Alice, Melinda and Little E too!!! I'll convo my info.

    I love all your new earrings. They're gorgeous. My favs are the Travels Through Time Assembledge earrings. I would have so much trouble listing them!
    Your nails look fabulous...mine never look like that anymore.
    Good Luck with the house and we are all anxious to see pics.

    The fear of snakes story:
    I was never afraid of them until we were walking home from school one day and one of the boys picked a dead one up off the road and threw it in my direction. I froze and it hit me in the face. EEEWWWWWWWW When I recovered, I chased him to his backyard and smacked the crap out of him. We both were grounded by our parents.

    LuAnn aka Bond Girl

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. bahahahahahahaha love it! he deserved a good smacking! Was it worth being grounded for?
      Thanks for sharing. still laughing...... :)

      Delete
  4. Yay, I'm so glad to be a winner! Congrats to all the winners--it was fun to read all the comments. Janet I do have you in my blog list but your post did not show up there. There are about three or four on my list the same way. I posted a question on Blogger Help, but of course I never receive a response. Blogger has sucky service in terms of tech issues. As for the photos, yikes, that's scary, but good to know for the future. Your nails look fabulous! Mine are never the same length and most of the time they are splitting or chipped. I've sorta given up on them. And wow, your earrings are fabulous!!!! Do you stay up late making these? Thanks for another fun post, and I'm so glad to finally know the 'real' story of the snakes.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. ugh, yes, getting help from blogger. I've tried everything I can find out to do and enlisted help and still nothing. Thank you so much for letting me know that it's not just me having issues like this. Though, I'm sorry that others are having the same frustration. Truly maddening. Please let me know if you find anything out. I would sure appreciate it!
      Thank you for the nice comment about the real story. Very gracious of you. :)

      Delete
  5. Look at all that gorgeous new work!

    Congrats to the winners!

    And you're still on my blog list, but it didn't tell me you had a new post. I just dropped in and saw it.

    Didn't know that about the pics either! Weird.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks much, Lela! Glad to hear you found the giveaway results post all on your own. You have filled me with hope! :)

      Delete
  6. You are on my blog list... but as two weeks ago. This current blog comes up when you open that though. A lag somewhere.
    Love what you are doing with the banding. Especially, the Ancient Pompeii and the little spoons.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks so much, Pipn for helping me out with the blog research. Really really appreciated!
      Thank you! Aren't those little spoons wonderful? I was able to purchase them from a friend who was thinning out her collection of bits. I absolutely love using your banding. It's so versatile. As I mentioned to Fanci, people- you gotta get some while Pipn still has some available in her etsy shop. It's great stuff to work with!

      Delete
  7. Yay! I can see your blog again... and now I can see the photos now. I love your new work, and I am so thrilled to have won your fabulous necklace! Thank you so much for having this amazing contest!
    Bird-scaring snakes... HaHaHaHa. I was so sure I saw that green one on the "Texas Good-Eatin' Snakes" site.
    Congrats on your move. Hopefully things will continue to go smoothly!
    xoxoxoxoxo

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. so my blog is actually working better for you? hmmm. maybe I've found my way into an episode of Twilight Zone, blogger style.
      Aww you're welcome! What makes you think you didn't see that green snake on that site? It might very well be there. And if I ever see a real life snake bbq place, believe me, you all will hear about it!

      Delete
  8. Keeping my fingers crossed that your blogger issues are done, I will re add you on to mine again. Thank you so much for making little Miss E a winner, she is over the moon and so excited. I will have her drop by and comment soon. Your earrings are incredible, I literally got so excited seeing these posted.... (of course you know which ones are my favorites though :) <3 always

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you so much. Sadly seems I'm not alone with the blogger problems. So glad E is happy about winning a little something in my snakes giveaway. I think she'll like what's coming her way. hmmm yes, I do know which ones you like. :)

      Delete
  9. No new post on your blog kept saying my bloglist. I thought you were deep in your house hunting so you couldn't blog...that was before I read Pipnmolly's blog post yesterday saying you had a bug with blogger... I didn't know that thing about size of images, I'll be careful, and I hope everything will smooth out for you with blogger.
    I love your new batch of earrings and especially "Cool water in the Grecian pools" and "Born with a teaspoon in the ear" I have a passion for teaspoons, and tablespoons too I admit, I don't collect them, well I have a few but I just love the thing :D

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Wasn't that wonderful Of Pipn to mention my blog? So very generous of her.
      Thank you for the kind compliments. These little spoons are so adorable, quite irresistable. It's gonna take all my will power to list them which is my plan for later tonight. We'll see how that goes, eh? hahahahaha

      Delete
  10. I found it finally! What a bunch of wonderfulness and wow, I had no idea about the blogger limit. Were you not resizing your pics at all?
    Every time I see your skillful wire manipulations and concoctions I am just amazed at the imagination in your assemblage earrings. I have the supplies right here in front of me but I've never quite managed to get that elaborate with any sort of aesthetic success.
    Aren't Petra's pieces a gas to play with? I should have gotten some nails but was thinking I had so many rusty metal nails already but they look great and are of course lighter too. Maybe I need a pair of yours with nails. Speaking of nails those are some amazing ones you're sportin' there. I think you must have someone else doing your work for you!
    xo

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. so glad you found me and I noticed that you already rejoined my blog. Thank you! I hope it solves the problem. No, I didn't resize them one bit. So I was uploading huge pics, 40x32" type of stuff! egads! What was I thinking?!
      Don't sell yourself short on your assemblage earrings. They're wonderful! I couldn't agree more. Love working with Petra's components, and yours! Well I do believe you still get to choose something from our latest trade. Would you like a pair of nailed earbobs?
      hahaha. See that's the thing, I wasn't doing any work, not this type anyway. Only the type that made my feet and head hurt. The nails are history. :/

      Delete

I love to hear what you have to say. Thanks for taking the time to leave a comment.