Playing with fire and swinging hammers
I just added five rings and a gorgeous charoite pendant to my Etsy store this evening. On September 29 my store will be in the Jewelry Showcase. These are the new items in my store. It’s been a couple of weeks since I’ve been able to get into the studio so it may [...]
Check it out! Momi has a new web site at http://www.maikaiola.com. There you will find her fabulous photos turned into greeting cards, photos, and canvases. Maika’i Ola is Hawaiian for the good life.
We put up the site real quick so right now it’s limited to just greeting cards. If you see a photo you would like in something other than a greeting card, send her an email.
You know we’ve all wanted to do it. Whether it was the muscle car from high school or an old Bronco. First you don’t have the money, then you have a family and you definitely don’t have the money. The kids grow up and all of a sudden you have all this free time on your hands. Well, not exactly a lot of free time, since Zac is still in high school and while Malia is at TU, she still makes the trip home quite often.
Then you have to have the room to tear a vehicle apart and store all the pieces and parts! Since Momi has moved her business into the Blue House, we now have a place to work!
So we pulled the trigger. We found a 71 Bronco that was partially taken apart by a father and son who also wanted to rebuild the Bronco. It does give you pause and make you think if you too will stop short of getting the Bronco completely rebuilt.
We plan to strip it down to the frame and rebuild it from there. This pukey yellow/gold has got to go! The girls wanted baby blue. Zac and I wanted red. Momi asked about candy apple red. I think we decided on bright neon orange! Though that could change between now and the time it actually gets painted!
Need to do a budget too. One columnd for things you will have to have like new rubber weatherstripping, hoses and a paint job. Big beefy tires (33 inchers) and some cool rims! Then a column for like to have like headers, dual exhaust, and a tilt steering wheel.
When we get done, we will have learned a lot and Momi will have the coolest delivery vehicle in town!
Well the High School Hockey season is done. The Broken Arrow Tigers varsity team lost in the first round of the playoffs to the eventual league champions. Last year we graduated seven seniors and lost seven additional players who either moved out of town or went to play hockey elsewhere. It made for a tough season since several of those who moved away would have had a huge impact on the varsity squad.
Because of the loss of varsity players, it also meant that several jr varsity players had to move up and fill those empty spots. At the beginning of the season it looked like we might be lucky if we won a handful of games. We ended up finishing the regular season in second place. The players made huge improvements during the regular season.
For the jr varsity in the first thirteen games we were 0-10-3. We ended up winning the last two games of the regular season to finish 2-10-3. In the playoffs we made it to the championship game. With three of our best players out of the lineup due to an injury, an illness, and a school function we battled to a 2-1 loss. Oh, what could have happened had we had everyone there for the game.
So this now means I have more free time on my hands and can get back into the studio and start making some more jewelry. I will have to work that into my spare time from the other projects I have picked up! LOL.
There just isn’t enough time in the day…
That’s Hawaiian for Happy New Year!
There’s a lot going on around here. Malia just finished her first semester at the University of Tulsa. She’s doing great and enjoying all of her mechanical engineering courses. Though chemistry was a bit rough on her. I think chemistry was the class that taught her how to study for college. Studying for college is much more difficult, even if you did graduate 43rd out of 1060. Over the Christmas break she spent a few hours working on her 93 Bronco.
Zac started the New Year off with a bang, as he marched with the Broken Arrow Pride in the Tournament of Roses Parade. They had plenty of activities to keep them busy. Momi and I stayed home and saw more of him on TV than we would have seen if we went to Pasadena.
2009 is going to be a great year. Our prayer for you is that it brings plenty of opportunity and success your way.
This weekend the Pride of Broken Arrow stormed into the Bands of America Super Regional in St. Louis and left with all the hardware. As you know our son, Zac, is one of the three drum majors for the Pride. Eight high school marching bands from Oklahoma made the trip. They included Broken Arrow, Piedmont, Jenks, Putnam City North, Sapulpa, Stillwater, Westmoore, and Heavener high schools.
Fifty-six bands from fourteen states (Arkansas, Colorado, Georgia, Illinois, Kansas, Kentucky, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Nebraska, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, South Dakota, and Tennessee) performed in the preliminaries on Friday night and Saturday morning and afternoon. Fourteen of those bands advanced to the Saturday evening finals.
One of the bands I found the most enjoyable was from Jackson Academy, Mississippi. This band was only 20 members strong, with seven of them being in the color guard. At one point during the show each member of the color guard was also playing an instrument.
In class competition Piedmont HS won the Class A championship. Marion Catholic HS from Chicago Heights, IL, won the Class 2A championship. Broken Arrow HS won the Class 3A championship. Broken Arrow also won all three awards for their class, Outstanding Music Performance, Outstanding Visual Performance, and Outstanding General Effect.
Piedmont HS did not finish in the top fourteen in the preliminaries, so as Class A champions, they had an exhibition performance during finals. In the finals we knew there would be some very good band performing. Blue Springs HS made it to the semi-finals of last years Grand National competition. Marion Catholic HS is continually one the top bands at Grand Nationals.
In finals competition Paul Laurence Dunbar HS from Kentucky finished third with a score of 83.8. Marion Catholic HS finished second with an 84, just two tenths of a point more than Dunbar. Broken Arrow HS finished first with a score of 87.4. The Pride also captured all three finals awards for Outstanding Music Performance, Outstanding Visual Performance, and Outstanding General Effect.
My hammered silver rings have been selected as Jewelry of the Day today. There is a companion ladies ring to match the man’s ring. These are great rings either by themselves or as a set of wedding rings. They are currently available at my Etsy store.
I just put eight items in my newly re-opened Etsy store. To celebrate I have also changed the theme of my blog. The featured items in my store can be seen below.
Enjoy.
Do you have a jewelry box full of old jewelry you no longer wear? Well it’s time to go through it. Who knows, you may find a hidden treasure you’ve long forgotten. When you find rings, necklaces, earrings, bracelets, or whatever that you will no longer wear put them into a recycle pile. Then have that pile of old non-wearable jewelry made into something you would wear today.
I recycled a couple of old 14kt gold rings and a 14kt gold pendant into this gorgeous pendant for some dear friends of ours. For this piece I added a beautiful green variscite from Utah and a green tsavorite garnet. The diamonds and rubies from the rings and pendant will be made into another piece of jewelry. This is also the piece I mentioned I was finishing just before we left for Hawai’i.
If you would like for me to recycle your old jewelry into a new treasure, please contact me and we can make arrangements. I will make multiple sketches based on any ideas you may have. Then I will create the new piece. Any and old unused materials will be returned along with the finished piece.
I will be launching a new Etsy store on September 1st. A few of the items that will be available are silver rings with various gemstones, an onyx and carnelian cuff bracelet, and a tropical sunset pendant/pin.
