Torch & Jewelry GNO, or rather GNI

Wendy came over last night with cake mix & icing (God bless her for saving me so I could make a birthday cake in time for my Mom!) and 2-bite brownies.  I'd be willing to take the 3.5-4 hours to make the Italian Cream Cake (on a weekend, of course) for Mom, but she just wants the yellow cake box mix with chocolate icing.  So that's what I made while helping Wendy eat the brownies.  I think Betty Crocker should double the size of the box mix so you can make two pans and still slurp up half the mix, but I had to settle for whisk drippings.  Once the pans were in the oven, we headed to the studio.  Happy Birthday Mom!  I hope you had a great day and I enjoyed cooking dinner for you tonight!!!

Wendy fired up the torch and made a ton of beads in three hours while I strung up jewelry.

I like floating necklaces and with the mini-crimps (yes, even those are sterling silver), they are much easier to make.  The Swarovski crystals I used have an AB finish, so they have that cool metallic glint which blends right in with the special Striking Color glass I used to make the dots on the black beads.  I LOVE how this glass reacts and changes into so many different colors after I have heated and cooled it a dozen times before putting the beads in th

e kiln.  I also made some matching earrings.

Then I made this necklace with a bunch of different really cool seed beads I bought at the bead shows in Tucson last February.  My beads in this necklace also use the same Striking Color 

glass (Brad Shute makes this by hand and it has a lot of silver in the recipe, which causes these great reactions!), but just wrapped

clear base beads.  I heated and cooled these beads many more times than the black ones above, which is why they are creamier, with more ambers and gorgeous green.  

It also has a really cool square toggle clasp that I don't think I have used before now.

And lastly is a pic of the updated hair cut.  I was ready for a change, so before showering yesterday I put my hair in a ponytail and cut off around 6-7 inches.  Afterwards, I got Todd to hold my hand mirror so I could see the back better to shape/stack it up.  

I'm pleased with how it turned out and have received compliments that it doesn't look like I cut my own hair, so that was positive.  It is just long enough to tuck behind my ears.  

Three words for this winter:  Need.  More. Scarves.