MInnesota Crafting and Farmers Markets

7-21-2014
We have been in Minnesota now for 2 weeks.  I finished my first week at my new assignment and was welcomed by friendly folks in a beautiful new clinic.  We did manage to get some antique shop browsing and flea market shopping for new jewelry creations for the Etsy store. I have finished some earrings and  have done about 5 resin filled pendants that are currently drying, which is a great new way to use the antique watch components.  Mitch has also started showing our jewelry at the local farmers market.  We are not sure this is the best venue but it is great exposure.  We have learned of several flea markets and craft shows that will be going on while we are up here that we will be looking in to.  Just don't want to take  too much time away from grand baby time.  We just missed one in Anoka where I am working that would have been a great one to display at.  Oh well next time. Found some great old bus tokens in a second hand shop that are working out great in some designs.  The centers were all cut out into different shapes that we were told corresponded with the different routes.

Having a blast reconnecting with my youngest grand daughter.  She is a very smart little girl and is such a joy being around.  Good to spend some adult time with  youngest son and  daughter in law.  It has been  quite a dry spell in between visits.
Otherwise all is good.  Loving the Minnesota green.  It is always so pretty up here and if not for the winters would be very tempting to be up here more.
Here's the latest I have pics of. Some are in the boxes to go to Farmers market..

Wire Wrapping, Silver Shopping in Mexico, Rock Shopping in Texas

6-23-2014  It has been a very busy month.  We started by going to an International Living Conference in Puerta Vallarta, Mexico and had a blast going local and finding best deals on Taxco  silver.  It will be showing up in our designs very soon. Finished a custum order using a Taxco silver box chain and it looked great!  We got back from Mexico and started our long awaited oldest  granddaughter time ( we have youngest granddaughter time starting in July) and together we found a great  rock shop in Dallas called The Rock Barrel.   After a couple of  hours  in their shop we came out with some great stones to incorporate into our jewelry and I finally found a wholesale supplier for sterling silver wire. Which brings us to the wire wrapping-  I sat down with a beautiful turquoise green agate and wire wrapped it in the sterling silver wire I got from The Rock Barrel and was quite pleased with it.  The piece is now for sale in our Etsy shop.  It  is great fun to let your creativity take flight when you start to design a piece of jewelry and  currently it is done under the watchful eyes of a 7 year old.  Please check out our latest in the Etsy shop as we have added quite a few new pieces.  Have a great  week!

wire wrapped agate

Custom Order Turbo
Shell &Taxco Silver

New Zealand Turbo Shells

New Zealand Paua,shells
with Hawaiian Jobes Tears
and silver beads

 Fun and Funky Glass Bead
Earrings

 

Settling In At Arlington

5-25-2014  Good morning and Happy Memorial Weekend.  Hopefully you are enjoying the long weekend. Please take some time to honor those who have served our country in the past or present, alive or who have given the ultimate  sacrifice.  To all we say thank-you  to them and to their  families.

We have been very busy making jewelry since we arrived at our new temporary home base.  With me  having a break from working I have pitched in to help again.  I have included some pics of the earrings I made for the special ladies that I had the privilege to work with in Lubbock.  I tried to capture each ones personality in the choices of  design and I think got pretty close.  I have also included some new  designs that are in the shop.  I have been experimenting again with the natural stones and redesigning old pieces of jewelry.  I had hoped to take some silversmith courses  while on work break but unfortunately the classes are 18 weeks long and we won't be here that long. Someday I intend to find a class we can attend.  I have seen some beautiful work come out of the Arlington Gem and Mineral club.   I am back to trying some wire wrapping and finished a pendant I like.  This is an area I need to  work on, it is fun and a great creative outlet. 

I promise to try and do better on updating the blog .  For now here are the pics  I promised.

SURVIVING DUST STORMS AND MAKING JEWELRY

5-4-2014   Goodmorning.  I apologize it has been so long since last post but the internet connection and the wind in West Texas  do not go well together.   We  have been  trying to survive major dust bowl days  dust storms out here and continue to  try to make  jewlery when the  RV is getting  shaken about. We got thru it and will be heading back  to Fort Worth area next Saturday.
   
Life partner  has been  doing most of the shop  jewelry  while I have been busy making  gifts.  I finally got to sit  down yesterday  and make some for the shop.  It had been awhile since I had  made spirals in  wire  work and laughed how long it took me  to make some decent ones.

We  celebrated  daughter in law and grand baby birthday this past  week.  This time of year seems busy  for birthdays  as  sister in law and  good  friends  birthdays  are happening soon also.  Thoroughly  enjoyed  watching  our newly 2  year old granddaughter open  gifts.   Oh, to  recapture that sense of joy and wonderment.  The one  thing I truly miss this time of year are the forays into the garden centers and working on a garden.  I guess we will have to live thru others labors from now on.

Here's  wishing you calm days and lots of sunshine.  Here are some of the gifts I have been making an some of our new  listings on Etsy.

amethyst and  silver beads

 Rubies in Up-Cycled, redesigned necklace

 dainty blue and gold dangles

 Our moto

Wedding gifts  for friends

JEWLERY MAKING IN AN RV

mandddesign@facebook.com

3-23-2014  Goodmorning!  Spring has  arrived by the calender we are all awaiting it in  reality. It continues to be a big  dust bowl here in west Texas and we are all  suffering  with allergies  because of it.  However the weather has  been  fine  for life partner to be busy in the jewelry making business.  He has  produced  several nice 
pieces this past week.  We  are finding that  crafting in the RV is not as  hard as  we thought just  difficult if both of us are trying to  work at the same time.  One of the reasons we  bought this model was  for the built in desk area  which  we knew  we would need for the jewelry.  We were not ready to give up the living space to buy a bunkhouse  which  would have given us another room  for our  crafts.  We will see if that  turns out to be a good decision.  For now we are  doing fine and  loving the  full  time RV  living.  It continues to come with  surprises  such as we have found out that  our next place in Anoka, MN all the RV parks close Oct 15th ( help  we needed thru the 30th!) and that  the park we  were planning to stay in  May- early July back in Burleson is now not taking monthly  rentals. Now we  get to start looking again!  All that said we are still glad  we made the decision to  go mobile.  Enjoy the Spring  sunshine and here is  hoping for  rain.
 Here are some of life partners creations  from the last  week from our new smaller work area.

New Zealand  turbo shellsAdd caption

an old Mikey Mouse watch re-cycled into a great,fun pendant

beautiful  up cycled watch  with rubies

A gorgeous  day in rural Texas- note the yarn bomb

Work  shop in the RV

I will leave you  with these  very  wise  words to live by

WE'RE BACK!

manddesign@facebook.commanddesign@facebook.com3-8-2014
It has been a while since our last blog.  Life got very  busy for a while.  We  decided with our life style it made much more sense to go mobile.  So we furiously went  thru our home, sorting out things to give away, keep and sell. Had 2 big sales and put the house up for sale all in 3 weeks.  We bought a beautiful 39 foot fifth wheel which is now home and workshop.   We just  got our our  jewelry  supplies out and I got several  pieces done today.  It is interesting going from a large workshop to a small desk in a fifth wheel , but we bought this fifth wheel  because it had the desk  area we could work in.  After all  you  can be creative anywhere.  We look forward to some beautiful places that will  inspire our jewelry.    For now we are staying in Lubbock again while I help out a community clinic. I have enclosed some of our new pieces.  Please  visit the Etsy store and take a look around and share the site with your friends.  I will be talking soon on how we are doing in our small workshop and sharing some new ideas  so  stay tuned.

our new home

 Life partner in new kitchen

New Designs

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!

1-11-2014   Wishing all of you a wonderful and blessed New Year!!  Our time seems to not be our own anymore.  We have been very busy the last several weeks coming back home  for a brief time and trying to get  chores  done.  Our New year has  been blessed with the news life partners cancer is still in remission! Thank-you again to the docs at MD Anderson.  We have also made the  decision to sell our home and become mobile.  We have talked  for years  about going back to the RV life style and since we seem to not be in our actual  brick and mortar home much we thought now was the time.  So  here we go sorting thru a lifetime of memories and "stuff". It is definitely bittersweet but yet exciting to start  another chapter of our lives.  No  worries though we made sure our new fifth wheel has room for us to continue in our creating of jewelry for M&D design.

Sine we have not had much time to create I thought I would share some pictures of happy clients who are  showing off their new unique pieces from our collections.  It is wonderful to see people enjoy our creations.  Remember to continually checkout the Etsy shop for new listings.  Again may this year be a year filled with wonder and love.