Adjusting to a new schedule....

A. on her first day of preschool. 1-2-3- PICKLES She came up with that and thought that it was the funniest thing in the world!

At Playdough station at preschool.
John has finished his blue guitar, at least someone is getting some crafting done around here! As for me, it has been about adjusting to our new busy schedule with A. going to daycare two days a week and preschool two days a week. I am waiting for the substitute teaching to kick in, haven't had a job yet. I suppose it is too early in the school year.

I was wondering what I was going to be able to do crafty wise after my CT surgery. Well one part was necessity since I taught my Jewelry 101 class at JoAnns, and the other part was wanting to give a gift to a friend. So jewelry making it is. I am also jumpstarting my Etsy Shop over there on the right. So here it is one of my first bracelets since my surgery...
Need a gift for under ten dollars??


OK I suppose I'll share his latest with you.

This latest project is a Semi-Hollowbody guitar. It has a solid block of maple in the middle running from the neck to 3/4 of the length. The rest of the body is hollow. It's curly maple with blue dye that is fade to dark blue on the edges. It's finished with 5 coats of Nitrocellulose lacquer (So far). It still needs to be sanded, and buffed to get that 3d gloss for the maple. It has to dry 3 weeks before I can do that.

The electronics get installed through the "F" holes in the front. I have to pre-wire everything and fish them through. Without dinging the finish. Should be interesting. The hardware will all be gold color, including the frets.

This was a fun project, it took longer to build then the solid body guitars.

-j

Party Pics...

A. with the pink sparkly guitar her Dad made for her.
A. waiting to put her new fish in, note the pink gravel. :-)
Introducing Collotta a SHE fish but we call her a HIM. DD made the name Collotta up. DD with her new guitar, with pink sparkles.
Playing some tunes! When she opened the amplifier she said "Daddy, it must be for you!"

DH is working on a guitar for DD. It has been drawn up by DH, and made to fit her. The neck is Purple Heart wood, for now the body is pink however at some point that will have pink glittery sparkles ALL over it!!!! The wiring will all go through the small

hole in the back. She will have her own electric guitar that really works!!!

Whole week gone by....

Has it really been since last Sunday for my last blog post? Where has the week gone? Well let me share a little with you...
My Nights:
Mon - Taught Jewelry 2 at JoAnns
Tues. - One free night I had, spent with A. and put her to bed
Wed. - We had our MOPS meeting and we painted glass plates and they turned out AWESOME!
Thurs. - Tonight A. had her dance recital, what a trip and a half to watch three year olds dancing on a stage with real lights and curtains too.
Fri. - I am having a Tastefully Simple party. I have about 12 people coming to my house tomorrow night for a taste testing party.
Sat. Am - I am going to Make and Take and we are making meals for and with a pregnant friend. Should be fun.
So yah it has been a busy week albeit a fun one.

What have I been doing craft wise? Well the painting a plate was VERY fun. In fact it was so much fun that I think I might want to start a new craft endeavor! haha. However I have been working on a serious side of my business this week, in all of my spare time, literally. I have been trying to figure out how to take REALLY good pictures of my crafts so that I can start an ETSY.com shop. And so I can have better photos on my blog as well. I have a new found respect for people with blogs that have awesome photos. The whole photo taking is an art in and of itself. I found a great blog tutorial which has been helping me a lot. Plus I LOVE the sense of humor this person has. It's been slow, I want the results right away, but it is coming along.

What has Dear Hubby been doing? Well he in literally all of his spare time, finished building his second guitar!!! I have an affinity for this one. I love the all wood look and he now has a name plate that a guy at work made for him - very cool I might add! That is GOLD POLYMER CLAY inlay FOLKS, DH and I figured out how to do that!!!!

Living on the edge...

We decided to go ahead and have a plumbing company install a new hot water heater and sump pump, both of which have never been replaced at our house to the best of our knowledge. The were both about 10 years old. However the plumber discovered that our hot water heater had started to leak due to some rust at the bottom of it (one disaster diverted, as our basement is partially finished and we don't want to ruin the flooring.) Then he did the sump pump and we had an emergency back up sump pump, however he discovered that the back up wasn't working probably due to the fact that the battery was dead (another disaster diverted). Although it will put a dent in the check book we are happy we replaced both. Not only did we replace the pump we also opted for a special emergency back up that runs on water power and we never have to worry about having a charged battery back up - nice! It actually taps into the home water system before the shut off valve, so you can still shut the water off to the whole house and it will still work - neat!
Better pictures of the guitar that John is building...
He is building the neck from scratch too, which is proving to be a bit challenging, under the black area is a grove with a metal rod in the neck to help keep the neck from warping, all guitars have this ( I did not know that - until now).
The neck with another groove, that will later be covered up.
A good picture of the wood grain.

MOM...What's For Dinner?????

I love Taco night!!!!
Even though I am a vegetarian, I do still make some meat meals for Dear Hubby. Above is the ground beef for the taco meat. If you are wondering what I had in mine, it was red kidney beans.
This is how I was able to make dinner, I put DD in front of the T.V. - Dora to be exact. For some reason, dinner time/late afternoon time is a bewitching hour for us and TV time seems to be about the only thing that works and allows me to make dinner. The grain on John's guitar (the second one he is building).

John Finished....

The guitar he was building....