Wedding Day!

Dream.  Love.                                

I've been hiding a pretty big project for a while, but now I can finally share it!

My sister-in-law got engaged last July.  The wedding was set for 7/7/14 (love the date!) in Greece and my family was looking forward to an amazing trip.  Especially Big and Little, who had fancy new dresses for their roles as flower girls.

As if that wasn't all exciting enough, back around Easter, my sister-in-law and her fiance asked me to make charms that could be attached to their wedding favors.  I was incredibly honored, and thrilled to do it.  They had great ideas about what they wanted, so between that and a few suggestions from me I was off and running!

It started with 100 circles, each 7/8" diameter, in copper and aluminum.  Here they are after I've removed the protective coating and counted them (more than once) to be sure I had enough!

First, I hammered each one with at texturing hammer.  Then the aluminum ones were stamped "DREAM" with a swirl design, and the copper blanks said "LOVE" with a heart.  Fortunately for my sanity, the bride and groom wanted things a bit whimsical so the design stamps didn't need to be perfectly aligned and exactly the same from one charm to another!

No matter how often I washed my hands after adding color to the words and designs for depth/contrast, they still looked like this for about a week.  Well worth it, though!

Finally, I punched a hole in each charm, curved it, and added a jump ring and channel round Swarovski crystal (blue for the aluminum, red for the copper).

The final result -

All that was left was for me to get them safely to the wedding, which was being held in Greece.  I had many a nightmare about being stopped at security with a box full of metal in my carry on, let me tell you!  The wedding invitation was packed in there right along with the charms, just in case, but I made it through security in three different countries/airports without getting flagged.  Not sure if that's a good thing or not...on one hand, I got them there without a hitch but on the other, yeah...I just carried a whole lot of metal on two international and one domestic flight with no questions asked.  Apparently a whole lot of tissue paper can confuse the x-ray machine, in case you're wondering.

It was a huge relief to hand them over to my sister-in-law so she could take them to the florist.  Next time I saw them, they were at each place setting at the reception attached to bouboniera (traditional Greek favors given at celebrations like weddings and christenings, filled with koufeta - Jordan almonds).

Congratulations to my sister-in-law and her new husband!  Wishing them a lifetime of happy dreams and much love.  And of course I have to add a shout out to their gorgeous flower girls for doing such a great job.  Mommy is very proud of you!

They say absence makes the heart grow fonder...

Silence is not the absence of something, but the presence of everything.    - John Grossman

I'm beyond impressed at the ability so many bloggers have to put something out there, sometimes as regularly as every.single.day.  And it's stuff people enjoy reading, they aren't just typing out the phone book or sharing obscure poetry (although I'm sure, somewhere in the world, there's an audience for even that).

I haven't posted in almost a month.  Obviously, I am not one of those people.  But if the quote I cited above is true, then I'm very present, right?  That's got to be worth something.

I find blogging to be something of a challenge.  It feels strange to write about myself, and the things I'm doing.  Why would anyone who doesn't know me want to read about it?  Does the fact that Little is finally getting the hang of spelling, or that Big has started her state standardized testing and, for the first year, isn't stressed to the point of tears, mean anything to anyone outside of my family?  Confidence has always been a sticking point for me.  I'm not especially interesting or worthy in my opinion; I'm just a wife and a mom who does what has to be done.  To me, the fact that my house is clean and my kids are, too, along with them being healthy, well-fed, and reasonably decent human beings, is just every day kind of stuff that anyone could do if she wanted to.

Which, I suppose, brings me back to why I blog even though I don't love it.  I started designing jewelry so that my girls grow up realizing that who and what they are is good enough.  That they have the ability to do anything and everything they want in life if only they're willing.  That you don't need to wear a tiara or a cape (or both, if you'd like!) to have super powers.  And the blog is an extension of that, where I get to explain some of the behind-the-scenes stuff and keep a record of the process.

The hope is that they grow up with a quiet, strong confidence in themselves.  I want them to have what I still struggle to find on a daily basis.  I'm getting there, with their help, and this is my way of returning the favor.

I made these for them today -

Sculpey clay hearts, with the handwritten word Love and a crystal.  I'm going to add a cord so that they can wear them as necklaces.  The plan was to try something new that I could possibly add to my jewelry designs, only to realize that while I'd bought the clay, I had no tools to use with it!  So I did the best I could, just to see how I felt about the process.  Props to people who do this a lot.  I'm going to have some serious muscles in my arms from conditioning this stuff!  It was sort of fun to play with, but I'm not sure I want to invest in the items I'd need to really make an attempt at a marketable product.  Regardless, the kids will be excited.

They'll be home any minute.  Can't wait to see their smiling faces!  Unless, of course, somebody got hit, kicked, yelled at or stepped on during the bus ride, or has too much homework.  In which case I'll be seriously tempted to chase down the driver and ask if he'll take them back now, instead of waiting for morning.  :-)  Just kidding, but I will be locking myself in a bathroom in that case, for a little Mommy Time Out.

Have a wonderful day!

Science: It's a Girl Thing

Girls can do science!  Putting together a tri-fold board presenting your results, on the other hand, is something of a challenge.

- me, last night (and in reality, probably more rudely put than that)

Big has a science project due next week.  She came up with a topic, made hypotheses, came up with a workable procedure, and conducted the experiment itself just fine.  Now it's time to summarize the results, type everything up, and put together the presentation.

This process was accompanied by much growling and complaining and gnashing of teeth.  And that was just me...I'm not sure how Big felt about it.  I assume close to the same since the evening ended with a mess in my living room and a kid who locked herself in her room far, far away from anything resembling either the experiment or her mother.

It's morning now.  Just after 7AM on a Sunday, which is an hour no one should ever have to see, in my humble opinion.  But here I am because my brain didn't get that memo and has been racing all night.  Major thoughts about the science project debacle, minor ones about a custom jewelry order I had all ready to ship out today but decided wasn't quite finished.  So I had to completely unpack it, make the change, and box it all back up.  Shredded packing material is nice and cushy, but gets EVERYWHERE, by the way.

Mission accomplished on the shipment (I like to get the small jobs out of the way so I can focus all of my energy on doing my best worrying about the big ones!) so now I can get back to telling you about last night.

We left off with Big locked in her room.  I was sitting on the living room floor, surrounded by various pieces of paper that somehow had to find their way onto a display board.  The gold standard trifold (the mere mention of which strikes terror in the hearts of most of my mom friends!) was too large for what Big had planned.  She hated having all of that empty white space so we'd tried something different, and basically it backfired.  As the architect of that particular plan, the outcome was obviously all my fault, as was everything else from her hatred of broccoli to the melting of the Polar ice caps.  When I screw up, apparently I don't mess around according to my kid.

Slowly it occurs to me that my child's love of and aptitude for science was being overshadowed by the fact that she fails Glue Stick 101.  A perfectly good experiment about which she'd been completely excited just five minutes prior was in pieces around me because she's can't attach one piece of paper to another piece of paper and make it look pretty.  Really?  Not on my watch.

I'm not proud of it, but what I ended up doing was reprinting the messed up pieces, fixing a few poorly cut and/or glued spots, and laying everything out so that it sort of filled the board.  All Big needed to do was actually glue everything in place.  Which I then went up to her room and told her I would help with in the morning.  Earned me MAJOR mom points, I even got hugs out of the deal.

It's done now.  Looks good, if you ask me.  But more importantly, the science part is solid and she still wants to work in a related field - marine biology - when she grows up.

I'm working on a custom piece right now, a charm necklace celebrating a young lady who, to quote her mom, is "a viola playing fencer who wants to be a malacologist (they study snails) and play with the National Symphony."   I'm having the best time working with that!  Who wants that kind of creativity squelched by a two inch tall tube of glue?  So keep on doing science, and all of those other unique things you do, girls...Mom's got your back when you need it!

Since I'm not even ready to give a sneak peek at that necklace, I'll leave you with another charm I just shipped out (not the one that had me up all night!).  This one shares more of those positive vibes I'm constantly sending my girls' way, hoping they'll sink in via osmosis or something.

Wishing you a day full of dreams, life, hope and love!

You Are My Sunshine To the Moon and Back

There's a party goin' on right here.
A celebration to last throughout the years.

Speaking of celebrations, it seems to be making the rounds on Facebook that this is "National Daughter's Week".  I've never heard of it so I did what any self respecting truth-seeker would do...I Googled it.  While singing Kool & the Gang in my head, something I will now be doing for at least the next few hours.  There's a reason so many weddings and parties end with that song...you take the party with you.  But I digress, as usual.

Google had nothing confirming this "Daughter's Week" business as an official thing.  Which is good when I think about it.  First, I've got enough Mommy Guilt about other issues...I am, after all, about to serve baked potato wedges to the only two children on the planet who don't like french fries (HOW are they mine again?).   I don't need to realize I've been neglectful of my daughters' special "holiday week" on top of that.  Second, why only a week?  Why not a month or a year or a lifetime?  There's supposed to be a starting and stopping point for celebrating those always amazing, often annoying, children of mine?  But what if  I want to do that every.single.day?  Because I do.  The girls would certainly be thrilled to hear that.  When you're their age it's not a REAL celebration unless there's cake, so if I'm celebrating then we get to have one.  Every night.  Right?  Um, yeah, that's not going to happen.

Instead, I avoid the sugar coma and dental bills and celebrate them in my own, non-cake dependent, ways.  The kids see them as just "regular stuff we do" rather than as celebrations, but to me each of them is worth treasuring.  We read stories at bedtime and go on weekend "working breakfasts" at Wegmans (world's best grocery store, for those of you not lucky enough to have one where you live) where we catch up on reading and homework and each other's lives while we nibble.  I put notes in their lunches on big test days or other special occasions and sneak kisses and hugs whenever I can manage.  Big, especially, is in a major "NO KISSES!" phase but if I ask nicely she might deign to allow me to fake it.  Both of them took fifth birthday trips to Disney World with me.  We do breakfast for dinner when their Dad is out of town, have tea parties on weekends, and flash each other the ASL sign for "I Love You" across crowded rooms.  Big is "my sunshine" and I love Little "to the moon and back", songs and books and sentiments that go back to when each of them was an infant and have lasted ever since in our day-to-day lives.

Developing all of those little traditions that help define my relationships with my girls has made me realize that my parents did the same in their own ways, way back when.  We had Wednesday dinners out as soon as my dad got home from work (ahhh, I miss the York Steak House!), Dairy Queen sundaes on hot summer nights, the annual vacation to Disney World.  Does anybody else remember E-ticket attractions?  I never thought of those as rituals that made four people a family but that's exactly what they were.  I'm constantly amazed at how much I learn about being a daughter the longer I spend being a mother.

In honor of National Daughter's Lifetime, which is a holiday I can get behind, here's a little something inspired by my girls, an aluminum crescent moon riveted to a brass cog and hand stamped "To the Moon & Back" -

A "You Are My Sunshine" pendant is tops on the to-do list, and I've got an ASL "I Love You" stamp that has definite possibilities, too.  Just so that they never, ever forget they've always got a cheerleader named Mom in their corner.  Even if she does serve them glorified french fries with dinner.

Big and Little

Sisters are different flowers from the same garden.

Right now, I'm thinking it's more of a jungle than a garden.  My two little hooligans are upstairs arguing over Lego sets...it's definitely not coming up roses.  Hard to believe sometimes that I actually wished for this!

If I haven't mentioned it before, I have two daughters.  Big is 10 and Little is 7 (and would definitely be giving me the stink eye if she knew I'd called her "Little").  When Big was born, I was so glad she was a girl because I knew absolutely nothing about little boys.  My nephew was only four months old at the time and we lived several states apart, so I didn't have a whole lot of experience with that flavor.  "Snips and snails and puppy dog tails" frightened me.

When Little finally came around, again I hoped for a girl.  By this time I knew plenty about little boys, and while they still scared me it was now for different reasons and not because I was worried about taking care of one.  Why I wanted another girl had everything to do with my own sister.  Sure, we spent a lot of years as the "crab grass of each other's life", to borrow a phrase from Charlie Brown, but eventually we grew up and for a long time now I've been proud to call her not only my sister, but my friend.  I wanted that possibility to exists in my own girls' lives.

Sometimes I see glimpses of that possibility.  They were four and seven here, and a little put out that I'd managed not only to catch them holding hands, but to have everlasting photographic proof of their momentary lapse in reason.  We were in "The Happiest Place on Earth" (if you can get past the thought that there's a giant talking mouse in the house!) so they were feeling pretty friendly.  That's not the norm.  Even now, a few years later, we're still definitely talking crab grass.  But it took me until I hit college to figure it all out, so there's still hope for them. (By the way, did you know you could ferment the seeds of some crab grass to make beer?  I didn't!  Always gotta look for the up side; after all, I make stuff aimed at encouraging strength and love, right?  But I digress.).

The reason all of this sisterly love business is swirling around in my brain is that my current jewelry project is a necklace for my own sister.  She saw a piece I'd made and asked if I could modify it a little for her.  I love custom work.  It's fun to bring my own designs to life, but I like taking someone's vision and seeing if I can turn it into reality for them.  Plus, there's an added bonus.  I don't get to see my sister much these days.  Making something for her that encourages love and hope and life and dreams, knowing she'll wear it close to her heart now and again, is sort of like being able to hold hands with her for a little while.  Someday, hopefully, my girls will grow up to realize the amazingness of that.

Love and Bravery

A coward is incapable of exhibiting love; it is the prerogative of the brave.

- Mahatma Gandhi

The bravest person I know lives next door to me.  You wouldn't think it to look at her.  She's a petite, well-mannered, white-haired mother of five, grandmother of twelve, who walks with a cane and has a soft-spot for Starbucks.

Long story short (since it's not really my tale to tell), she's quietly and with great strength been battling cancer for the past few years.  At this point, her doctors say there's little they can do.  They might be able to give her a little more time with treatment, but she wants her remaining time with friends and family to be quality rather than quantity.  And there's that "prerogative of the brave"...she loves those around her enough that she can face the end bravely if it means having even that little bit of time with them.  Let me tell you, from the traffic in and out of her driveway these days, they love her back in equal measure.  Her children and grandchildren are taking time out of their own lives to visit her in droves.

It works the other way, too.  Not only does love make us brave, but we must be brave in order to love.  Because loving someone puts us in a position to get hurt.  We become invested, and face the very real possibility of losing that person.  My children are in this position right now although they don't know it.  My neighbor and her husband have nicknames; they are my daughters' "next door Nana and Pop Pop".  The girls have no idea that she's sick (they think nothing of her greeting them at the door in her pajamas at lunchtime; pajama day is something to aspire to among the elementary school set) .  At some point I'm going to have to explain, and I have no idea how.  It will be the first time their little lives have been touched by the death of someone they love.

But for right now, I'm trying to focus on the positive.  I'm trying to learn from her grace and bravery and love.  Appropriate given that it was just Valentine's Day.  Despite everything else she is facing, she had the usual bag of goodies for each of my girls.  There hasn't been a holiday or birthday in the four years we've lived next door to them that she's missed.  We brought them gifts, as well.  Chocolate heart-shaped cookies with icing and sprinkles for Pop Pop, who is also known as "the Cookie Monster", and a little something special for Nana...

It's a textured copper circle stamped NANA with two rosebuds.  Twelve pewter bali beads represent her twelve grandchildren.  When I made it, I wanted to honor the garden that this amazing woman had grown and cultivated with such love for so many years.  She cried when I explained that.

She convinces me every day that Ghandi was right; bravery is intertwined with love.  It's a lesson I hope I've learned, and that I am determined to teach my daughters.  May they grow to have that much grace and strength every day of their lives.  Let them be brave enough to love, and love enough that it gives them bravery.