glasfaden

coffee time

noreply@blogger.com (glasfaden) — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 23:56:25 PST

It was dark the last days and so was yesterday, when
I took some photos for the new necklace. But this one
reminded me of a Polaroid shot somehow. So, I added
a frame. It's not the style of my shop, but I'm just
loving it ;)

walk!

noreply@blogger.com (glasfaden) — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 14:48:09 PST

Today was a beautiful day. Actually I could have ride
my bike, if I had have (let) repaired the tires (they
are mighty old - so, the back one is now broken). But
I haven't! I'm considering to change the tires myself,
but since I haven't even changed the inner tire once,
I'm procrastinating it... But I felt I need exercise. I've
been missing it since I couldn't ride my bike.

more photos

I decided to go to the city on foot. I thought along the
way. Thinking, that I didn't manage to turn my anger
into something positive lately and how I let it used my
energy up. Things haven't gone smooth the last days,
but hey, they are here for something good, I think.
There are some lessons I should learn from.

(I got a forwarded mail from a friend lately. I just
looked up on google for the origin and found out, that
some things are screwed up in the mail LOL
Anyway, I'm agree with most of her life lessons.)

anger

noreply@blogger.com (glasfaden) — Sat, 14 Nov 2009 11:45:48 PST

Sometimes a short phone call could ruin my mood for
a whole day. Like this noon. Afterwards I felt the urge
to walk to calm me down instead of the cleaning I've
aimed for this morning. So, I did. I went to the forest
and walked around for about one and a half hour.

The forest was inspiring as usual, but the walk couldn't
really calm me down. I feel somehow really exhausted.
Ugh!!! I'm considering to ignore any phone calls or even
to unplug the telephone on my free weekends...

looking forward

noreply@blogger.com (glasfaden) — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 15:31:07 PST

The flyers, the posters and the tickets for our next gigs
are ready. We will sing at three different places and three
great musicians will be accompanying us. I'm looking
forward to those gigs! I'm practicing diligently at home
under my son's supervision - he's an expert since he
knows the songs quite well from the choir weekend :)

listening..

noreply@blogger.com (glasfaden) — Sun, 15 Nov 2009 02:54:50 PST

.. to his songs - that's what I'm doing the whole day
while I'm working through my paper piles today. I
love the oriental touch in his songs. This one makes
me dreaming...

fish casserole

noreply@blogger.com (glasfaden) — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 14:44:18 PST

.. that's my meal for today :) My son never wants to eat
fish, so I only cook fish, when I'm alone. Normally I'm
pretty lazy and buy ready fish casserole, which I only
have to put in the oven. But yesterday I've bought fresh
pollock and created my own. I buttered the casserole, put
the fish in the casserole, salted, peppered, then covered
with chopped garlic, mozzarella, tomato and onion cubes,
some more salt, olive oil on top of it all and off in the oven
until the mozzarella turns brown, spread some chopped
parsley and chives afterwards and served it with rice.
Yumm...

Hope, you had a great weekend. I'm wishing you a great
start of the new week tomorrow!

what a day

noreply@blogger.com (glasfaden) — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 17:06:28 PDT

It has been a busy week for me. It's school holiday.
Because my boss is having a holiday too, I worked on
the B&M store each day except for today. So, I thought
my son could finally invite friends to play today and he
did. Two of his friends were here the whole day long.

I made some fresh ice tea (green tea with lemon and
sugar) for them. Since it was still hot (hot ice tea..
funny :)), I served them in mugs. And since I only have
some boring blue Ikea mugs, I needed something to
mark them, so that the boys won't mix up their mugs.
I then made wire tags with their initials to hang on the
handle.

I wanted to make some crepes for lunch, but I didn't
have enough eggs. I decided to take the boys to the
supermarket, as I didn't want them to do something
crazy at home. So I sent them out of the door, I went
out myself, closed the door, put my shoes on and...
gosh! I didn't have any key in my pocket! Arrrghhhhh!!
Something must be wrong with me - I have never locked
myself out of my apartment for the last 20 years and
suddenly it happened twice within a few weeks! And of
course, I haven't deposited a second key to a friend.
Again, I had to call the fire department *sniff*

So, that was the bad part of the day. But! There was
luckily also a good part of the day as well :) I got two
sales and.. I was three times on Etsy front page today.
Unbelievable!! That has never happened to me before..
Thank you, moonovermaize, 3FUN and joojoo! Also my
big thanks to rawartletterpress, felicitycrew, joojooland
(yes, it's the talented Afi, who runs joojoo and also the
PersianGarden), Lori411 and slinkymalinkicat, who
have brought my items to the front page in this month!

Oh,.. and my showcase on Paper 'n Stitch is up since
last Tuesday.

i'm back

noreply@blogger.com (glasfaden) — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 08:45:22 PDT

..and am still exhausted!

On Friday we drove to Wildhaus in rain (well, I did't
care much - after not driving a car for at least 3 months,
I enjoyed it regardless of the weather). On Saturday
we had a wonderful sunny day after the fog had gone.
And yesterday the morning was cloudy, the afternoon
was sunny, but as we were on the road, the sky was
getting darker the nearer we got to Lake Constance -
the rain had said farewell and welcomed us back.

Although compared to the last choir weekends it was
a high emotional one, as always there was plenty of
yummy food, laughters and of course also enough work
in the kitchen, which was done in no time with many
helping hands...

This time we had a member, who could share some
exercises of her kinesiology knowledge as a warm-up.
We got a new song for our next gigs (a tiny Christmas
'tour' ;)), which we've finished learning in that time
but still needs lots of fine tunings, of course.
And as per usual I had lots of heat while singing - while
the others had to wear pullovers and socks, I sat there
barefoot in my T shirt...

My boy was sometimes bored, but most of the time he
enjoyed it. He was either spending his time with us singing
and doing the exercises, helping in the kitchen, or busy
on his own - playing with his game console, reading,
tickling the girls or playing soccer with the choir director.

Hope, you've got a great weekend too!

changing

noreply@blogger.com (glasfaden) — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 04:04:28 PDT

Changing weather, so I'm changing my banner too :)
My Etsy shop and here. Well, actually the reason was
I was browsing my banner folder, wanting to have the
same one for PaperNStitch. Yes, for the first time in
2 years I'm doing marketing outside Etsy - running
from 10/27 to 11/22 (now that I finally have enough
stuff in my shop ;)).

But I'm wandering.. back to the banner. Well, I didn't
have a bigger version of the last banner. As I saw my
very first banner (well, actually it's a pre-version of
my very first banner on Etsy), I fell in love again with
it. So, I decided to take it as my new banner. Icy cold
is all that I can say ^_^

So, let's take a Hokkaido soup to get warm again :)

Wanna make one? I can't give you an exact recipe - as
you know, I never follow any. But these are in this
soup: Hokkaido pumpkin, potato, onion, water, vegetable
stock, cream, salt and pepper (pepper! Normally I never
put it in pumpkin soup, but my son wanted it so and it
tastes just great!). As decoration on the soup I have
a borage flower, a Jiaogulan leaf and some chive.
Guten Appetit! :)

t.t.t.

noreply@blogger.com (glasfaden) — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 05:45:56 PDT

Two things I love today..

left: a ring, that is big enough at least to be worn on
my forefinger. Shall I keep it or shall I list it? Hmm..
right: a stack of fabric I've bought this summer. All
cotton or wool, except for the flowery one. I normally
don't like poly fabric, but it looks so gorgeous, that I
couldn't resist. They were all marked down, either rest
pieces or sorted out. Hope, I have enough courage to
sew myself something this winter.

Talking about winter.. is it also suddenly winter where
you are? It's kind of crazy to have 7°C just after 17°C
about two weeks ago.. (or was it three weeks ago? Time
flies too fast, that I cannot keep up!)

Anyway.. three weeks ago my son told and showed me,
how one of his friends always draws himself. I then asked
him, how he would draw himself, and also, how he would
draw me. These are the results. I was looking quite grim,
eh? And he said, my glasses are because I'm sitting too
much in front of my computer *nudge, nudge* LOL

Look at those shadows of the Calamondin (which is blooming
at the moment and those flowers have one of the best
scent!). Oh, how I love autumn...

teal or not teal

noreply@blogger.com (glasfaden) — Sun, 18 Oct 2009 10:48:15 PDT

I mixed glass again yesterday. This time I got a better
teal than yesterday. More blue rather than green. Also
darker than the standard turquoise that I have. Not
sure, I'm happy with it yet. I think, I still want it a tiny
little bit darker.

As you can see on the right photo, the glass rods look so
different than the finish beads. As rod they look rather
transparent. Playing with the heat, it'll turn opaque.

Mixing glass is a time consuming procedure, but I enjoy
it - it's like a meditation :)

mixing

noreply@blogger.com (glasfaden) — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 23:40:46 PDT

The last two days I've been mixing colors of my glass.
The difficulty of mixing glass (at least as an unexperienced
person as I am) is that you can't see the result immediately
like mixing watercolors. And sometimes glass changes
it's color depending on the heat, so even if you can see
the color of the glass rod, you'll never know, how it
comes out as a bead. Very tricky!
On top of that I'm a creative chaotic person, so the
result of my experiment is random. If I'm succeeded,
then it would be some kind of one-of-a-kind color ;)

I have some color combos for my Trifiori necklace in
mind, for which I e.g. don't have the right teal ready.
So, I tried to mix it myself. On the first day I got
dark blue with a hint of green (the darkest one you see
on the photo) instead. Yesterday I got hm.. how should
I call it.. dark mint? It's the flower bead on the middle.
The color I have in mind should be a bit more blue than
this. Somewhere between the three colors on the front
left triangle. I'll continue mixing on Saturday.

Speaking of flower.. the choir will have a tiny gig on the
celebration of the Constance in Flowers tomorrow night.
Four songs. I'm looking forward to it. Since I missed the
choir session last Monday because of the parents-teacher
meeting at school, it feels like I haven't been singing for
ages..

I'm wishing you a Happy Weekend now, as I won't be
online tomorrow. Ah, maybe tomorrow morning...
I hope, I'll be able to grab a TWest tomorrow morning.
Another thing to look forward to ^_^ Jetty - one of my
fave photographers on Etsy -, has listed two new prints
in her shop today. I tell you, I have two sketches ready
with her caterpillar - SO inspiring, yes!! It'll be hard to
pick one of them, as I just made one on the main T this
early morning.
(edit: I did it - just in case you're curious ;))

Anyway.. have a great weekend, my friends!

the truth

noreply@blogger.com (glasfaden) — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 12:32:07 PDT

Do you wanna know the truth the reason why I've chosen
yellow for this necklace?

Well,.. I've picked the wrong glass rod - that easy LOL
I thought it was light green. On fire finally I realized,
I got the 'wrong' color. But 'coincidence' can be so
lucky - I'm really loving this electrifying yellow.

a dance

noreply@blogger.com (glasfaden) — Sun, 11 Oct 2009 07:31:03 PDT

I've uploaded some more videos of the Indonesian
Night on YouTube. This one is my favorite dance ever
since I was a child. It's called Tari Saman, originally
from Aceh.

a medley

noreply@blogger.com (glasfaden) — Sat, 10 Oct 2009 03:58:40 PDT

After hesitating for a while, I finally made an account
on YouTube. I'm not a video maker and my equipment
is pretty poor (it's only my digital camera with low res).
But I want to share some highlights of the Malam
Indonesia (Indonesian Night) with others, as I think,
the students, their tutors and all other participants
have done a fabulous work in a short time.

This is the first video I've uploaded. It's the final medley
of Sigulempong (Nord Sumatra) and Yamko Rambe Yamko
(Papua). I've missed a bit of the beginning, but I hope
you enjoy.

Happy weekend to you!

rock garden

noreply@blogger.com (glasfaden) — Sun, 11 Oct 2009 12:50:08 PDT

I haven't given my collection a name. I've been thinking
of "stacking stones" or simply "stacked", but then it
won't really suit for the ring, as it's not stacked (yet ;)).
But last night "rock garden" came across my mind. I think,
I like it.

Here's the first batch of my collection all together till
yesterday. More are coming each day (when I come to
torching). I told you, I LOVE this collection :)

Hope, the rain will stop and the sun will comes out again
over the weekend, as I haven't photograph all of them.

I'm wishing you a nice weekend!

unbelievable..

noreply@blogger.com (glasfaden) — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 04:30:20 PDT

.. that my shop ~~has now~~ had two pages (well, hopefully
will last not too long, as two items are reserved ;) thank
you for your support, Jacqueline!)!! Some of my friends
from the EuropeanStreetTeam members must still
remember the time, when it was "the shop with only one
item" LOL

I just listed a glass ring this morning. My kind of ring
- bold and simple. If only I had a bigger mandrel, I'd
make one for myself to be worn on my thumb.

clear water

noreply@blogger.com (glasfaden) — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 12:42:15 PDT

My new collection is about simplicity and imperfection -
a homage to nature and also to show my love to transparent
glass.

The first necklace, Clear Water, is now in my shop.
But I'll be listing more the next days. Stay tuned :)

new beads

noreply@blogger.com (glasfaden) — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 08:43:37 PDT

This is a sneak peak of the new beads for my new jewelry
line (I really, really love the collection - I can hardly
wait to show them to you ^_^).

I'll start listing them this week (but I better not promise
anything, as the weather is not on my side to take good
photos today.. I hope for a better one tomorrow). So,
just stay tuned!

guilty feelings

noreply@blogger.com (glasfaden) — Sun, 04 Oct 2009 01:02:32 PDT

On Saturday evening I went to pick up my son from his
father to go with him to an Indonesian event. Luckily
I went there early enough, so that I met them on the
way (well, they were on their way to me at home - a
misunderstanding -, but they noticed me from the car
and called me, while I was per usual going with my
invisible blinker on, too busy with my own thoughts..).
So, my son jumped out of the car and we made our way
to the event.

Before we got there, we must wait on the barrier until
the train passed. There was a neat old lady in a red
jacket, looking a bit confused, as if she wanted to go
down the busy street. But then she turned over, picked
out a piece of paper of her handbag and asked a cyclist
in front of us, either she would be able to catch the
train and showed him the paper. He said, she just missed
her train a few minutes ago, and suggested her to go to
the station and ask them for another train connection.
The barrier was opening, we passed the railroad crossing
and went into the building to buy our tickets. But then,
we were half an hour too early. The counter would be open
at 6 o'clock, so we couldn't buy the tickets yet.

So I went to look for the lady again. I have half an hour
to keep her accompany to the train station, which is not
far from there. She was still standing on the crossing,
asking other people for help. I went to her and offered
her my help. She was relieved, thanked me and walked
with me to the station (my son followed us slowly a few
steps back).

On the way I took a look on that piece of paper she had
shown the cyclist before. I saw, it's a connection to
Lugano, printed today. She had even two connections.
She had missed the first one, but the other one she
will make it. I then asked her, either she already had
a ticket, as we could then take a shorter way to go
directly to the track. She opened her handbag, took out
her wallet, which was empty except of three papers - a
play card (it looked like a card from a memory game to
me), an insurance card (I should have take a better look
of the name on it and the name of the company *sigh*
first mistake) and one more thing, which I don't remember
anymore (a photo or something else). No bank card, no
money. She was baffled (me too!) and stopped to walk.

I asked her, either she has relatives or friends here
in Constance - no, she said, she came far, far away from
up north (later she mentioned Travemünde, which is almost
on the most northern border of Germany - I wondered, how
she got here, but I didn't ask.. second mistake). I
suddenly felt helpless, didn't know what to do next. I
decided to take her to the information counter on the
station (in front of the station a police car was parked,
but nobody was there *sigh*), without knowing exactly what
should happen next.

As soon as we got there, the Chinese looking man at the
counter started to talked impatiently to the lady, saying
"I've given you the two connections, so that if you miss
the one, you could still take the other one, which will
be leaving in ten minutes. Go there!" I told him, she
doesn't have a ticket. He answered me, she just have to
go into that train. I (didn't want to speak to them in
front of her) showed her the underpass and went back to
the counter. I told both of them, that I thought, she is
confused, don't have a ticket nor money with her. The
same man answered me, they can do nothing for her.

My blood started to boil. They got a phone, they need
only to call a police or ask anybody else, there were no
customers waiting - so how could they just sit there and
say, they could do nothing?!! I yelled at him "You could
call a police!" and ran out again, looked, where the lady
was (she didn't went to the underpass, but went nearly
the Swiss station and was asking a man again), I went
to the other side to see, either the police is now in the
car (nope). Again, I felt helpless. Then I remember there
should be kind of a shelter service on the back of the
station normally and went to the back side. It was closed
early today, as it is the German Unity Day (but maybe it
was a service room for something else and I just didn't
look properly..). I wanted to go look for the police once
again, as the man from the counter went towards me and
told me, if I want to help her, then I should took her
to the train, and that she is a Swiss citizen, so they
should take care of her.

Somehow I couldn't think clearly anymore. I'm worried about
the lady (pretty odd, as I don't know her at all and don't
know, either she told me a fairy tale or not..) and I don't
know, how to help her - that made me insane! His statement
is not the same as hers (she is not from Switzerland according
to her statement before. Third mistake. My head felt fuzzy!).
I went to her (she was in the station again, talking to some
women) and told her, I'll bring her to her train. She followed
me. As we got there, I told her to go in and take a sit (she
asked me, either I come with her - I said, no, the train will
start soon and I have to go). Then I went to the conductor and
told him the story in a short version (a lady in red jacket
wants to go to Lugano, no tickets nor money, seems confused
and she now sits in his train). He looked at me with a big
questioning mark on his face, but politely answered me, that
he'd noticed it and will look for her. So, I left. I took a
last look through the windows, either she's sitting there
somewhere (yes, she was) and I left with my boy and went to
the event (it was already 6:08 pm).

Yet, I feel guilty. I took an action, but I didn't follow my
instinct till the end. She didn't speak confused, but in one
or another way, I believed she was. I should have insist, that
those men on the counter call a police for help. She could
have been missed somewhere.. But maybe I've just watched too
much movie..

Anyhow, I hope, she's doing well, where ever she is now...

missing

noreply@blogger.com (glasfaden) — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 18:15:41 PDT

As I was editing the photos for my last post, I've been
missing some photos of the whole week before. Then
I realized, I've set the date of my camera wrong - I
was a week behind! Just now I've found them again,
but now I don't remember, when which has happened
- duh!

A friend has mentioned spaghetti made of zucchini in
her mail, as we were talking about zucchini recipes
(she got another recipe, which I have to try one day).
That reminds me of the Spiralo, which I've got as a
present a while ago and was never been used. So, a
few days later I've made some zughetti with a very
simple cheese sauce. My boy normally doesn't like
cheese sauce, but with the zucchini he did :)

Today I found a peacock butterfly was sitting on the
window, which I left open when I went to work. I love
the texture on it's closed wings (but, eek! - high time
to clean my window, I suppose..).

nostalgic

noreply@blogger.com (glasfaden) — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 17:05:05 PDT

Last week I've watched my boy and his class preparing
the performance for the first-graders several times.
Each of the them got a role either as an alphabet or as
a person at the school (it's a combined class of 2nd and
4th grade, so only the forth grade pupils got the speaking
roles). My son danced the sock dance (he was really good
in those difficult steps), played the role of the janitor and
an alphabet (he told me, he loved to play theater).

Saturday was the big day for both sides, the first-graders
and for my boy and his class. It was a great success.

While I was watching them, I had to think, how fast time
flies. Just three years ago my son was the one, who sat
on the bench with his Schultüte (a large cone field with
sweets and other goodies for the first day at school) and
satchel as a first-grader. Now he's one of the oldest at
school and this time by next year he'll be at the secondary
school already. Time flies..

what's up

noreply@blogger.com (glasfaden) — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 01:03:57 PDT

School has started the second week of the new year,
so I'm juggling with the daily grind. In addition to it all
the divorce process is now on going (it's not a surprise,
as I knew this is where it would end since the first day
of our seperated living 5.5 years ago, yet it still bugs
my mind). So, even more paper war and appointments
to arrange. I never like appointments with lawyers nor
the feeling 'I have to fight for my right', but I'll no longer
take it easy about this..

Outside, the weather has changed. It's getting colder.
In the garden the mildew was about to spread all over.
The zucchini plants were covered with the white powdery
thing, got yellow leafs and so on, so I've decided to do
our last crop and throw plants away before the mildew
spreads to other plants. The zucchinis are still small
this time and there are some flowers I can use too, so
I've decided to make tempura - yummm.. we LOVE
Japanese food! ^_^

In the studio I'm experimenting for something new. You
can see part of the experiment on the photo below. The
ideas are still a very intangible. I have to see, what
is possible, what not. Our dining table is already
half-covered again with my experiments, yet no end
in sight.. (well, sometimes it takes me years to turn my
ideas into something real). On the other side, I always
managed to make some beads for my trifiori necklace,
so that I can stock up my shop. I hope to pick up felting
again soon - now, that it's not so hot anymore..
I also have to think seriously about making a light box,
as it's getting darker each day - even in the brightest
room (my studio).

On the right of the photo above you can see some crystals,
which I've found on the bottom of the plastic mug after
I pour my etch liquid back into the jar. I have to admit,
I left it the liquid open in the mug for a few days, so I
don't know either this is normal or not (I never look into
the jar). I love the structure in there. Wish, I have a
microscope - I'm in the mood to dig microbiology at the
moment...

inspired

noreply@blogger.com (glasfaden) — Sat, 05 Sep 2009 10:28:50 PDT

Have you ever thought, that what you are doing is
kind of useless? Well, I do that often. So did I this
morning.

It's my turn again to sweep the court yart etc. It
was still windy. So, I was asking myself either I really
should sweep all the leaves away - new ones would
come by while I was sweeping... I've decided to do it
anyway (and I don't regret it).

The view when I was going downstairs was not so
pleasing. It has been storming and raining nearly
the whole evening yesterday. So, leaves, petals, pods
and more were lying all around. But then, it's all about
finding those small things in our life to make it more
beautiful, right? Time to open my eyes for those
beauties...

The colors of those 'nature junks' on the steps are so
brilliant and inspiring. I've saved some of them while
I was sweeping. As I was finished, I took them upstairs
and started to arrange them on a blank canvas (which
I've bought years ago and never managed to take my
time to paint on it). A tiny caterpillar (as well as some
other tiny creatures) was hiding in one of the buds and
I saw it later on my arrangement. It took it's way to a
twig and stay there till I was finished with my photo
session (I hope, it didn't get too dizzy while I moved
the twig around).

This was my first arrangement. I'm thinking of selling
some of my photographs, so I'm gathering photos I
love at the moment and thinking, how I'd print them.
But that's another story...

Anyway, this arrangement has inspired me to the next
one (you might remember, that I keep seeing faces
whenever I look around). I've rearranged the things a
few times until I'm satisfied with the result.

I really like the last arrangement (even though the pod
was falling apart..). It's kind of a self portrait, I think.
Not sure, but I see me (with my old, big glasses LOL).
Okay, I admit, she looks prettier than I ^_^

Viva La Vida and more is running on the background
while I was arranging the troves. Of course :) I got it from
their site here - the live version, kind of best of album.

So, let's stay inspired, friends!

wolfsblood

noreply@blogger.com (glasfaden) — Sun, 06 Sep 2009 01:07:25 PDT

No full moon, yet I couldn't sleep - something was in the air, the moon has been calling for me... - it must be my wolf's blood :P

left: 12:21am CEST, right: 04:26am CEST