Doctor's visit, and a New Bracelet

And the two have NOTHING to do with each other.

But 1st, the weather. We are having the MOTHER of all thunderstorms right now. Big booming thunder, pouring rain (that sideways kinda rain), low rumbling thunder, and lots of lightning. So far, the power has only gone out once, and that was brief.  It has been very overcast all day (but still 96 degrees, of course) - but at 4:30 I noticed that there was suddenly no light at all in the bedroom except from the bedside lamp (and the computer, and the TV...) - I looked at the windows, and it was just pitch black outside. And one minute later, the storm just seemingly came out of nowhere, full blast. Naturally, Bailey is now in hiding in my closet.

OK - Now the story about the new bracelet:

Future bracelet, 10 AM, Sunday, 7/11/10 - these are 16 gauge sterling silver rings made from square wire:

Bracelet, 3PM, Sunday, 7/11/10. This is the tryzantine (trizantine) pattern, a variation of the more well-known Byzantine pattern, using 3 rings at a time instead of 2 (that's a fairly basic over-simplification). I love how just changing from rings made from round wire to those made from square wire can completely change the look of the finished piece. And those of you who know me well know that my motto (for almost everything) is "the bigger the better" - so I am always going for the heavier gauge rings, and the wider weaves.

Different view of my new bracelet: There is no clasp yet, because I forgot to bring any home with me from the shop. So I will add a clasp tomorrow, and tumble it, and as they say on Etsy, "wallah!"**  I will have a shiny new bracelet!

I learned this weave in school last month - but it was a really quickie lesson, and I only made up one tryzantine unit, and packed it away with the rings, waiting for the opportunity to start in on it when I felt a little better. And I had left the handout directions at the shop - because who needed them? Well, I'll tell you who: ME. Because I am no longer 22 years old, and evidently can't remember what I had for lunch yesterday, much less directions to a new chainmaille weave I briefly worked on 5 weeks ago. So I spent about 2 hours on the computer yesterday trying to find a free tutorial, and finally, "wallah"! And I was able to make the bracelet.

Oh - and speaking of Etsy - I have many, many new listings in my shop - things I have made over the past 2 years and never gotten around to photographing (ugh) and listing. I spent all day last Saturday (7/3) photographing the stuff, and most of 7/4 and 7/5 doing the listings, and I have been gradually adding 1-3 items a day to my shop. Still have about 40 things to add!

I saw the THHS (Tall, hot, handsome surgeon) for my first post-op visit this AM (cue the tiny violins: he was in Cancun, lying by the pool, last week. And yes, I was eavesdropping as he was telling one of the nurses about his vacation as he was running between rooms, seeing patients. What of it?)

THHS says I am healing wonderfully, but he is very concerned about my persistent laryngitis/hoarseness. On the day after surgery, as he was discharging me from the hospital and explaining stuff, and telling me he would be putting off my normal 1-wk post-op visit until 7/12 because he was going to be "on vacation" blah blah blah He told me that I would be hoarse for up until 3 weeks, and not to worry. So, I haven't been worrying, because the 3 weeks isn't  up until 7/15.

But upon hearing, or NOT hearing, as the case may be, my voice this AM, he told me that he was concerned, and that in all the years he has been doing this surgery, he has only had 2 patients who had ultimately required cortisone injections INTO THEIR VOCAL CHORDS to restore their voice.

Excuse me - into their vocal chords? And as he is telling me this, he is miming a giant needle going in through the front of the neck - so I guess it is done under fluoroscopy? Who knows...

Then he says, and I am NOT making this up: "Why does everything weird always happen to YOU?"

Gee,.. THHS thinks I'm special! ♥

So he started me on high dose steroids to try to reduce the inflammation (woo-hoo - here comes the mania again!), before we start driving needles into my neck, and is standing up to leave -- because he is so far behind because of having been on vacation last week, boo hoo hoo ... and I told him that I had a few questions -

So he sits back down, and answers all my questions - one of which was about returning to my daily walks. Because Bailey and I had been walking 3 miles a day every day up until the day of surgery - and while I am not ready to do 3 miles tomorrow, I wanted to know if I could start walking again.  Except that last week, I suddenly developed this killer pain in both my heels - it's there when I get out of bed in the morning, but only when I step on the heel, and goes away after I have been up and walking for about an hour. But OMG, it is some bad pain - and stairs are the worst.

So he diagnoses plantar fasciitis. Great - that little devil can be a real bitch.

But he tells me that I developed it because I had been really working out my feet on those long walks, and the inactivity for the last 2 weeks is the cause, and that we have caught it early, and that the high dose steroids he prescribed for my voice will also fix the plantar fasciitis. And that I should wait one week, and then very gradually start building up my walking again.

And I am to call him in 2 weeks if I still have either the hoarseness OR the heel pain.

THE END.

**Yes, I know how to spell "voila".

Copper Clay

We offered a class on working with copper clay at the shop yesterday; we offer Art Clay Silver classes all the time - an introductory one, and lots of advanced one, but this is our first foray into Copper Clay.

Same instructor (Angela Foreman), who is a fantastic, patient teacher.

Copper Clay has a few basic, but strategic differences from Art Clay Silver, so I am glad I took the class. I had bought all the materials ahead of time, and toyed with the idea of just starting to play with it on my own, but I am definitely glad I didn't.

We started by learning how to make molds for the shape you want your piece to take; this was fascinating, and so easy!

You can make molds from so many things - sea shells (mine is from a real scallop shell), buttons (and you can find some new or antique buttons with terrific shapes and textures for the Art Clay process), beads, and so many other objects. And the molds work for any of the Art Clays - Silver, Copper, Bronze, Glass (glass clay is brand new!).

After we made our molds, we started working the clay, and then pressed it into the mold. One difference from Art Clay Silver - the Copper Clay is much quicker to dry out than the silver, so you have to really have your idea all ready to go, and work fast. The copper clay is not very amenable to rehydrating with water so you can continue to work with it once it starts to dry.

This scallop pendant used about 30 grams of clay - at a fraction of what 30 grams of Silver Clay would have cost! You can see how thick the pendant is - this is from using the mold. You don't have to use molds; you can use the rollers and roll out and cut your clay, and texturize it just as you can with Silver Clay - just gotta move fast!

After drying the pieces on the hot plate (which takes a long time when the pieces are this thick, you do a little sanding to remove the rough edges. In the greenware stage, the copper clay is MUCH softer than the Silver Clay, so the sanding goes very quickly (and you have to take care not to just sand off a chunk of your new project!

After sanding, the piece needs to fire in the kiln for 30 minutes, and at a much higher temp than the Art Clay Silver, so Copper Clay isn't really suitable for torch firing.

Once out of the kiln, you can brush them (which is what I did) to achieve this look, or oxidize with liver of sulfur, or tumble - or use the polishing cloths....there are a variety of finished looks you can shoot for.

We also learned how to layer Silver Clay items on top of the Copper ones - it was just a great class!

Bead Embroidery, Pt 2

I'm still on hold for Bead Embroidery - the teacher wasn't able to get by the shop this week to tell me what to do next

Here is the picture of the 2 smaller focal beads, that will go on either side of the larger bead shown in the post below this one.

I'm hoping the teacher will make it by this coming week, and I can work on this cuff next weekend. This weekend, I brought home some leftover chain projects from when I was at school a few weeks ago. Oh my, looking up that link made me realize it has been a full month since I got back from school - where does the time go? There's just never enough time for all the works-in-progress, and all the ideas!

So many beads, so little time....


And I took a really fun class today - copper clay. Will try to post about it tomorrow.

New Endeavor

I'm learning bead embroidery; I had my first class just a couple of days before my surgery, and only remembered enough details after the surgery to get the bezels beaded onto the focal beads.

As with ALL my projects, I never start small.

This will be a wide cuff bracelet, and this gorgeous focal bead from Etsy's Aneurythm will be the centerpiece.

I don't honestly know how she let this bead go - it is stunning - I can't believe all the colors in it, and I have a huge choice of colors to work with in the cuff, thanks to her!

These are the 2 smaller focals which will sit on either side of the large one - I have also beaded their bezels (but forgot to take a pic) - I used delicas in a deep brick red for these 2.

And now I am in a holding pattern, waiting for the teacher to come remind me what comes next. All I know is that I get to combine a huge variety of seed bead colors and sizes, and shapes for that matter, as I am going to use some bugle beads and some triangle beads, in a crazy glitzy freeform pattern, which is just my favorite way to bead.

Yay freeform! Yay asymmetry! Yay chaos!

Boo logic, rules, and order!

Gross surgery photos

Yeah, they're graphic.

If they bug you - don't look!

I had my anterior cervical fusion (repair of the ruptured disc in my neck) on Thursday, 6/24.

Discharged from the hospital 6/25-

This is how the incision looks today (6/27) - lots of swelling, a little bruising, and a lot of allergic reaction to the dressings.

These are just the steri-strips ----

When I was sent up to my hospital room from the Operating Room, I had a much larger "hypoallergenic" dressing covering these strips - which the doctor and nurses swore I could not possibly have an allergic reaction to.

So when it started to itch and burn at around 6PM that night, they refused to remove it.

You can clearly see the big square red blistery reaction I am had to this dressing.

And over there on my left shoulder  (on the right in the photo)- NICE blistering from the dressing!

The nurse (it was a different nurse by now - the morning shift) actually freaked a little when she saw it when she took the dressing off to change it when they were discharging me.

Unfortunately, I couldn't talk her into just leaving the steri-strips, and she put another, different, "hypoallergenic" dressing on this mess

Which I removed as soon as I got home.

And fortunately enough, I guess, the most pain I'm having is from the dumb allergic reactions. I am also madly itching under these steri-strips, so I know there will be a hot mess under there when they come off a week from tomorrow.

Surgery over, and I am fidgeting at home

Just received a nice comment from my buddy PD, and since I am up and fidgeting around, I decided to go ahead and post.

Surgery was Thursday, and went well according to the doctor.

He discharged me from the hospital yesterday at 7:30 AM, but the nurses didn't get around to actually getting me out of there until 11 AM. We had to go to the hospital to get my meds filled, and were home around noon.

I have a real sore throat - partly from the breathing tube, but according to the doctor, mostly because a lot of scar tissue had accumulated around my windpipe from the previous surgery, so he spent a lot of time in that area vigorously cleaning out the scar tissue, so I may have a sore throat for up to 3 weeks. I know I have an unbelievable case of laryngitis - no one can hear a word I say, and it feels to me like I am screaming at them.

My fried Kathy has been staying with me - it was her husband who came down (with Nummy) and took care of me when I was really hurting last month. Kathy taught a few classes at my shop earlier this week, and then went into caregiver mode for me, but I am so used to being on my own, that she is pretty bored! I know she's ready to get back home, too. She'll be heading back to the mountains tomorrow.

So not a whole lot to report yet - I'm taking my steroids (to reduce the inflammation) and dilaudid for pain, although I'm not really having much, other than a slight headache. And I am putting cortisone on all the allergic reactions I am having to the dressing they put on my neck, that they swore to me was hypoallergenic and could not possibly be burning me in the middle of the night on Thursday after surgery. So they refused to remove it, and when the nurse took it off at 10:30 yesterday AM, it was blistered and red everywhere, and looks like a bad poison ivy today. And feels worse.

But I shall live to blog another day -thanks for everyone's thoughts and concern, and thanks for asking, Pam!

School is over :( :) :(

Just finished a week @ William Holland Lapidary School - I took advanced chainmaille, again, because I have an advanced chain addiction.

Saw lots of old friends, made some new friends- and had a terrific week.

Here is almost everything I made during the week - several pairs of earrings and a bracelet didn't get done in time for the traditional Friday morning show-and-tell. The projects below that still have paper clips attached to them are WIPs -  the 2 uppermost ones are JPLs, or Jen's Pind; one in 14 gauge GF rings, and the other in 20 gauge copper, silver, and GF rings. I can only do so much JPL without taking a break from it! It can drive you crazy! Plus closing those 14 gauge rings was a little tough on my hands.

The silver WIP near the bottom of the tray is the very beginning of a 3-row sterling silver scarf-type lariat, made with teeny tiny rings - when completed, it will be between 6 and 7 ounces of sterling silver. In other words, lots and lots of rings!

I usually am more productive during these weeks @ William Holland - I stay up until 2 or 3 AM working on stuff, and get up early and chain some more, and chain straight through meals while everyone else is eating.

But this week, between my pain meds and my pain, I just was dragging. And that is the reason for my smiley and frowny faces on the title post - I'm glad the week's over, because I am so tired and drained, but I am sad, because William Holland is always a blast, and I always learn so much!

And here is my favorite project - one which didn't make it into show-and-tell. I made this bolo tie, from scratch, for one of the chain teachers - and he wouldn't take it off for show-and-tell, but he did strut around showing it off. I made the dichroic glass cab, and then cut the enamelled copper blue and yellow rings I used to create the bezel, and then I glued the bolo gizmo to the back -

The lucky receipient is the husband of my chainmaille teacher, a big fan of bolo ties. We call him "Lord of the Rings" because he cuts all the thousands of jumprings that we demanding students as for during the week, and he tumbles all our finished projects, and he also helps his wife with some of the teaching.

And he also makes these incredible lead castings of ant colonies:

This is a casting of a bull ant colony. What you are seeing is actually an inverted colony - the portion of the casting that sits on the table is what was at ground level, and then the colony branched out below it underground - so you are seeing the actually colony and its pods upside down. Bill painted this bull ant casting a lovely black and gold color. He puts these on little rotating lazy-susan type bases, and you can spin them and see all sides of them. This black and gold one is at the bead shop.

This is a casting of a fire ant colony - again, what you are seeing is inverted from the way it was in real life (before the hot molten lead was poured into the colony!) Look how much busier, and more frantic, the colony structure is. I love the blue color on this one - it matches my living room perfectly!

These ant colony castings are works of art, in my opinion, and I wish I had more of them. Bill has really cut back on the number of these he makes - the lead is getting too heavy!

I'll be driving home tomorrow, and then I have my pre-op appointment at the hospital on Monday. Then back to the bead shop Tuesday.

Here's hoping the surgery doesn't sideline me from chaining for too long  - I'm anxious to get back to my WIPs!