The Charmed Life: July 2012

Tuesday, July 31, 2012

Pumpkinella -- Wild Thing of the Pumpkin Patch

Pumpkinella was the Wild Thing of the Pumpkin Patch.

Photo by Visitor7

Nights, she'd string together a boa of leaves, wrap it around her neck a few times, and take off for an evening of drinking, dancing, and driving the farm cart fast.

Photo: Geograph Britain and Ireland

Her name was legendary among pumpkin patches near and far,

and many a pumpkin in distant lands longed to spend just one night
with the vivacious hard-living Pumpkinella.

Then, one fine fall day, a car pulled up beside the pumpkin patch, disgorging what appeared to be an army of small children.
Each had a quest:
to choose the perfect pumpkin to carve for Halloween.

And what could be more perfect...
than Pumpkinella?
She was chosen quickly, unceremoniously
dumped in a wagon, and hauled to the
checkout where here measurements
were taken and she was sold for a handful
of coins.

The other pumpkins wept.

That night Pumpkinella underwent a ritual endured

by so many of her sisters before her.

Her brains were scooped out, dumped on baking sheet,

and toasted.

Lips that were once the finest in Pumpkin History

were re-carved into a crooked grin.

Her eyes, once long-lashed and outlined

in vegan organic eyeliner

were now defined by the blade of a pumpkin carving set.

A candle was placed where her brain once resided.

Pumpkinella was Pumpkinella no more, merely a front

porch jacqueline o' lantern.

But when the festivals were over, and Pumpkinella

was tossed in the compost heap, a few seeds who

has been missed in the mass scooping trickled out...

to make new Pumpkinellas who would dance and drink and sing once again.

Pumpkinella can be found on etsy.

Monday, July 30, 2012

In the Garden of the Blue Maneki Nekos

A maneki neko in front of a business is said to beckon business with its left paw upraised.

And one in a home is said to beckon wealth with an upraised right paw.

Photo by Ryan McD

But a maneki neko in the garden brings a different kind of wealth ---

Photo from edenpictures' photostream

Flowers that bloom in abundance, seeds that fall to the ground and multiply into fields of blossoms...

Photo from dwstucke's photostream

...nests where baby birds flourish, feeding on the flora and fauna growing around them.

Photo by Jonathan Zander

And when you think about wealth, isn't that what it's all about?

A maneki neko bouquet can be found on etsy.

Friday, July 27, 2012

Soup's On... or a Soupcon of Beadery

Welcome to my stop for the 6th Bead Soup Blog Hop Party. My partner, the lovely and talented Dyanne Everett-Cantrell, sent me my "soup" ~ a focal bead, a clasp, and some goodies to go in between. (You can find Dyanne's blog here.) My task was to create using the elements she gave me.

To be perfectly honest... I was stumped. For one thing, I've never worked with a clasp this large. I usually make bracelets and pendants and earrings and charms... and didn't think it would work for those... which left me in the Wide Wide World of Necklaces.

Dyanne recently started lampworking and made the focal bead herself. In fact, it was her first focal ever. I wanted to do it justice.

Its shape and colors seemed very Salvador Dali-esque to me, and for a while, I thought that's how I would go.

But how else would I evoke Dali? I found some cool mustaches on etsy, but they were shipping from Israel and I, of course, had agreed to ANY REVEAL DATE AT ALL... meaning today -- the first reveal date.

So it was back to the Bead Cave...

...where I panicked.

(In the Bead Cave, no one can hear you scream.)

I needed to make something eclectic, something not-too-symmetrical, something that made me try new things but was still me, so I thought I would make a triple-strand necklace.

That probably sounds like a no-brainer to many beaders, but I'm a wire wrapper. I am crimp bead challenged. I failed jump rings 101. I'm not a pretty-things kind of jewelry designer. And I rarely plan ahead. I have a story in my head and then I jump in and start making.

So I thought and I thought and I thought.

I dipped into my stash of aventurine and ordered some cool Swarovski crystals.

And then I started. Three separate strands, each different and unique, all blending together. Here's what emerged.

A strand of aventurine and seed beads...

...a strand with the green lampwork beads and sterling chain and the aforementioned Swarovski crystals...

...and a wildly eclectic strand...

...with the focal bead at its center.

Put 'em together and what have you got?

A little chaos...

... followed by order...

... followed by matching earrings.

I knew exactly what I wanted to do with my silver beads and talking charms. An anklet! I would...

... and wish that I hadn't dropped the last bead...

...only to have the cat run off with it...

...and drop it down the floor heater.

Remember that part where I said I didn't plan? Well... even without that last bead, and even if my ankles were half their size, I was going to need more inspirational talking charms and some more of those silver beads.

Back to the Bead Cave for me.

But for you... get on the Blog Hop Train (AKA The Bead Soup Blog Party) and see what other beady delights await!

Buggy Thoughts

If you want to live and thrive, let the spider run alive. ~American Quaker Saying

Nothing seems to please a fly so much as to be taken for a currant; and if it can be baked in a cake and palmed off on the unwary, it dies happy. ~Mark Twain

We hope that, when the insects take over the world, they will remember with gratitude how we took them along on all our picnics. ~Bill Vaughan

When the bee comes to your house, let her have beer; you may want to visit the bee's house some day. ~Congo Proverb

The spider's touch, how exquisitely fine!
Feels at each thread, and lives along the line.
~Alexander Pope

Why didn't Noah swat those two mosquitoes? ~Author Unknown

Cockroaches really put my "all creatures great and small" creed to the test. ~Terri Guillemets

Some primal termite knocked on wood;
and tasted it, and found it good.
That is why your Cousin May
fell through the parlor floor today.
~Ogden Nash

The mosquito is the state bird of New Jersey. ~Andy Warhol