Corinabeads

Pretty in Pittsburgh

2010-05-24T19:56:00.001-07:00

I'm writing this blog from Pittsburgh, where I am teaching two one-week classes...I came one day early to adjust to the 3 hour time difference, and ended up walking most of that day, looking at houses, and trying not to get run over. I was THAT close about three times, before it dawned on me: people here don't stop for pedestrians!

Look at this picture:

The traffic light is obviously meant for cars only, and you would assume that if it's green for the cars going straight, it's green for you you too. Well, in theory, but that doesn't mean anything for the cars turning right, and they don't stop for anything. In Washington State, even if you jaywalk, cars stop for you. So, if you don't hear from me anymore, I might be part of the Pittsburgh Pavement....

Especially since I didn't pay all that much attention to the streets, because my eyes were glued on the houses. In the Northwest, most houses are modern, or, if they are old, they are close to falling down (okay, well, it's not THAT bad, but in my everyday life, there aren't that many buildings worth oogling over.). The houses here all look ancient ("historic"), haunted, and a bitch to move into. Take a look with me:

What I found remarkable about this (rather modest) apartment building was the BIG name (Thames Manor) - and the fact that you can clearly see that powerlines going across (there is barely a picture here WITHOUT powerlines) - I counted them, and the average number of lines was TEN.....I don't know why that is so remarkable to me, I guess I'm just imagining the mess this could make during one of our famous Northwest Storms....

Toward the end of my many mile (seeming) walk I came across an Art Fare...with many strange animals around every corner:

Those that don't move, and those that can't reach high enough:

I hope that my beadmaking students will reach a little higher - we will see.

A little while ago someone asked me why I hardly ever show pictures of classes or students. The simple answer is: when I teach, I don't think about much else, and taking pictures is usually not high on my agenda. Also, I never think it's all that interested for the people who are not in the class to see pictures of people they don't know.... So, that's why I don't show pictures, the only one I have for now is the outside of the Pittsburgh Glass Center:

Not a hugely attractive building, but great atmosphere. I will show pictures from the inside later this week: in case you ever consider coming here and take one of there very reasonable priced week-long classes, you can get an idea what it looks like.....

see you soon!

Another one of those tests

2010-05-21T22:35:00.000-07:00

Just checking whether I can post from my iPad

2010-04-25T01:07:00.001-07:00

I haven't updated in while, and in MY life, that's actually a good thing. Unless I don't update for over two month, THEN there's reason to worry....thanks for checking!

Underwater Inspiration

2010-04-05T21:16:00.001-07:00

The pictures below were taken at the "Maui Ocean Center". Probably not the best "almost underwater photography", but for the Canon Mini-Dude, not a bad job. If THESE pictures don't inspire anyone to make aquarium beads, I don't know what else will. Hmmm, maybe BETTER pictures, taken from a Scuba-diver. I sure wish I could do that. Tried it once many years ago in the Red Sea, but my ears were hurting like crazy after only 5 meters, so, that's unfortunately not a view of the world I will ever get to enjoy. Thank God there are Aquariums for poor people like me...and it's still a dream of mine to take a group of beadmaking students to an Aquarium - and then return to the studio and make what we saw....maybe some day out of Graceful Customs studio, the Monterey Aquarium is close enough....and in many ways more interesting than the Maui Ocean Center....

This picture was taken outside, where the fish were swimming in a shallow basin. Wish I could create the light reflections in glass...

The next fish (Angelfish??? the Aquariums identification plates were few and far between...) is perfect for the "raking technique" of fish in a bead - stacking dots to achieve the various colors and then raking through it into the slender fins - versus making a murrini, like for a clownfish...

The next one would definitely be a murrini....
(I just had to laugh at myself - when a beadmaker visits an aquarium, he/she thinks of how to MAKE the fish. When a Japanese visits and aquarium, he/she thinks of how to PREPARE the fish ("Hmmm, this one would make perfect Sushi...). I had two Japanese boyfriends when I was in College, so I know what I'm talking about.

The picture is poor, but I just love these Unicorn fish. The one on the left looks like something from Cirque De Soleil, don't you think?

One of the problems with taking pictures of fish is that they swim so darn fast....I never get more than either the head or the tail of this fish, the colors where incredible....just too fast.

Okay, enough of fish, I LOVE all the plant life (oh, I guess half of those "plants" are fish after all, what do I know?!)

This next picture is my favorite of the bunch, the plant looks "out of this world", as if it's stretching into a starry sky. Amazing!

Hope that some of these might inspire you to take a "dive" into the world of Aquarium beads...Now I just hope that someone from Orlando will invite me for a class, because that's where America's most interesting Aquarium is located....

A quick trip to the Easter Island

2010-04-05T00:23:00.001-07:00

This Easter Sunday I thought I would take a quick drive to the mall to get something I needed from Sephora, and maybe take a peek at the new Apple iPad at the Apple store. I was totally prepared to be stomped down by the shopping hordes - but to my great surprise (and intellectual pleasure): 95 percent of the stores were closed: Religious Observance overruling Commerce.

But there was some stomping going on anyways, and luckily I had my Canon Mini-dude on me to capture the dangerous moment:

Dark faces were lurking in the lush green

and all kinds of bizarre flying objects:

and hopping things:

and utterly strange things:

Did I hit my head at the mall and went into some kind of psychedelic Coma? No, I entered the Mall at the Rainforest Cafe entrance:

But with all the majestic elephants, colorful birds and oversized mushrooms, my favorite creatures by far were these two:

absolutely amazing

2010-04-04T22:39:00.001-07:00

Here are the pictures I promised in my newsletter, you can find more at the artists website.

Never Wash Your Hands?
It'll take him four hours to do one hand. He then photographs it for posterity. I cannot imagine how he does it, the eyes are so remarkably lifelike. It took him 10 hours to do the two-handed Eagle picture.

I hope you enjoyed these as much as I did!

Death and Taxes

2010-04-01T00:38:00.000-07:00

Okay, nobody has died during the preparation of my taxes, but I sure felt like killing something...I HATE having to do this every year, and after laboring two or three days solid over entering deposits, debits and credit card splits, I promise myself that from now on I will enter my numbers faithfully every day. I have promised that for 10 years now, and it has NEVER happened, and I finally figured out why: I would have NOTHING to complain about. I guess we all make our bed, even the uncomfortable tax-bed.

I'll hope to be done tomorrow and move on to more interesting blog-topics - cheerio!

Think Pink

2010-03-30T23:21:00.001-07:00

The last weekend of my trip to Hawaii I spent on Oahu, for a 2-day private class with an old friend, Ama Nishi.

When I walked into Ama's studio I just about had a fit of some kind - nothing bad, mind you, but a happy fit of some kind. Ama didn't mind me taking pictures and showing them to you on my blog. I'm sure that each one of you will have a different reaction, anything ranging from "oh, how CUUUUTE" to "wow, that's nuts". But even if you walk more on the "that's-nuts" kind of life, you might want to look beyond the color and see all kinds of ways to organize, store and decorate your own studio.

So, let's take a trip into the pink universe of Ama Nishi:

Some of you might love the idea of having windows with a view in front of you - my personal opinion (based on experience) is: DON'T. Any kind of bright light coming from straight ahead is going to make it more difficult to see your flame. If you can't set your torch up any other way, make sure to get blinds.
As for the TV above, I am jealous - it even swivels depending on where in the studio you sit. But again, miss nagnag would say that it's mounted too high, and if you have to look up that much to watch TV, you might seriously hurt your neck. I am a huge fan of watching TV while making beads, and if the wall/window in front of you is too short for placing a TV without endangering the screen through flying pieces of glass - cover the screen with a pane of glass.

Wow, I am still impressed at the attention to detail in the studio decoration; the bundles of fake cherry blossoms could be very inspirational, I am already itching to light the torch just looking at those. As for the curtains, you better be VERY sure that they are attached properly, floating pieces of fabric are not a good idea anywhere near a flame. In my studio, I actually did the opposite, I removed ALL the different curtains that were on the windows new my workbench. It looks bare and slightly ugly, but it makes me feel much safer. Your choice!

Okay, I admit, I don't quite know what to say about these guys - but Ama made them herself with Polymer Clay. What I like about is the fact that someone can handle multiple hobbies/passions. It's so easy to get carried away with making beads, sometimes I think we all should step back and revisit those things we liked to make BEFORE we got bitten by the beadbug.

The color pink is not only residing in the purely decorational items, but it also infested the lampwork related things, like the lids of a variety of frit jars. Can you tell that Ama is an "ingredient horder"? You should see her collection of PRESSES (which I won't show, for, well, personal reasons...)

Okay, this is hands down the funniest studio outfit I have EVER seen. Do YOU know anyone who took the time to sew a (fuzzy) oxygen tank cover? I'm still speechless. The pink gorilla is just icing on the cake.

The fake pink rose is far away from the flame, and again, very inspirational. Ama bought a tutorial on how to make a rose murrini - but it came without any kind of instructions on how to USE the murrini. Looking at a "real" rose might help her figure it out. In general, it's always better to look at the REAL thing rather than a rendition in/on a bead.

Handknitted wrist warmers in Hawaii? ??????????? At least they are pink...I forgot to check the feet for matching socks.

I admit that I was pretty scared sitting on this chair! So far, I have managed to burn almost any chair I have ever sat on. But Ama just shrugged off my concernes, "don't worry, I can always upholster it again..." I am starting to worry, a beadmaker who knits wrist warmers, sculpts fairy dolls and upholsters chairs. I am getting an inferiority complex.

Oh, but the next one hits the jackpot, handsdown!

She even took the instrucions label off before spray-painting it. I not only don't have a PINK fire extinguisher, I don't have a fire extinguisher period. Maybe I'll go shopping tomorrow. Wonder where they sell them?

Some more miscellaneous items, without comment. I think I ran out of things to say.

Oh, did I say the fire extinguisher was the top? I have two more that aren't bad either:

Okay, THIS one is definitely to top of "Things Pink" in Ama's household (I was assured that no animals were harmed and the retro-fitting of this Maltese...)

I hope you got some sort of inspiration/amusement out of this little trip into Pink-country - If Paris Hilton shold ever decide to take up beadmaking, she should take her first lesson in Ama's studio. Aloha and Mahalo!

New test from a frustrated Blogger

2010-03-30T19:49:00.001-07:00

Another test with an external editor Todd found for me - where is the picture going to end up? If it's below this sentence, I am ecstatic and will be Dancing with the Dogs for the next hour...

almost out of Aloha-land

2010-03-29T02:16:00.000-07:00

I haven't forgotten about my new passion of blogging, just got a little too busy for a few days. I left Maui to fly to Oahu (Honolulu, for those overseas people who think Hawaii is all that - just Hawaii, that's what I used to think at least), for a 2-day private class with an old friend of mine, Ama Nishi. Tomorrow, or as soon as I have a little time and an internet connection, I'll post some pictures of Ama's studio - I have NEVER seen such devotion to a color. It only takes one word to describe her studio: PINK. You won't believe it!!!!
Tomorrow morning I'll fly back to Maui, then home to Seattle, where grey skies and drizzling rain are awaiting me. Hmmmmm, I have lots of clothes, shoes, lampworking tools, I could just stay here...but then again, the dogs are waiting, Sheri will have cleaned the house, Todd is a few thousand miles closer, so, I'll guess there are enough reasons to spite the wheather.....so, till I write again, have a good night, or a good morning, wherever you are! Gute Nacht!

Comments to posts

2010-03-26T13:56:00.000-07:00

I wanted to thank everyone for their comments, I realize that it's rather complicated to post those. Unfortunately I haven't figured out how to REPLY to comments, so, if you have a comment that requires or desires a reply, please EMAIL me!

And one more thing - most of the images I post are larger than they appear in the rear view mirror of blogspot, but if you want to see the original image, just double click on it...

I' didn't know I had it in me! Tech-wiz Corina

2010-03-26T13:41:00.000-07:00

I can't believe it - I actually moved the image of my parents underneath the text by editing the html code. I feel like I made a hollow paperweight with lifelife florals in a hothead, or something impossible like that!

Blogspot Frustration

2010-03-26T13:28:00.000-07:00

Looks like I'm not the only one who is having problems with the layout on Blogspot, so I followed someone's advice and opened a Wordpress account, but somehow that seems even more complicated. It puzzles me that a big company like Google can't come up with a really easy to use interface....maybe I should send Todd to work for them, he's a computer programmer and I bet he could figure that out in less than a day.

So, for now, I'll stick to blogspot, and take the "thinking from the bottom up" as a challenge, and it will influence my brain in a positive way.

Since I am trying to figure out how to move an image inside of a post, after posting it, I am adding a random picture - my parents in a "love-bear-hug". In general, I avoid showing pictures of people, because, in MY opinion, looking at pictures of people you don't know is rather boring. Even looking at pictures of ME would be boring for most readers, I think. The reason I like the photo of my parents is because it shows LOVE in a very tangible way. My parents have been married for over 50 years, and they still feel that way about each other (and express it all the time). That's nice, and it makes me feel warm and fuzzy to look at that....I hope that YOUR relationship with your partner still makes you want to hug that way.

Okay - inserting a picture and moving it within the post didn't work for me. It highlights, but it doesn't go anywhere. Maybe I should give Worldpress another try. And I thought blogging would be fun - not agony. Rats

2010-03-25T20:36:00.000-07:00

A couple of things I found at "The Mall" that could be used for bead inspiration!

The first one is a beaded purse, nothing I would want to be caught dragging around, but I can always appreciate the technical aspect of it. Get's me into the mood for my project of "The perfect aquarium bead."

And this would be a great stringer decoration.....on a "neutral colorscheme"...

2010-03-25T18:31:00.000-07:00

Yesterday my friend Barbara took me to the beach, but on the way we stopped at a Mall to do what? Shopping? Well, the first three stores I walked by where Louis Vitton, Cartier and Tiffany's. The chances of me finding something I could afford where next to zero, so I focused on the FREE beauty - the layout and decoration of the Mall itself.
Whenever I write about something and post pictures, I ask myself - what can someone else possibly get out of this? Just showing that you're in a beautiful spot can have one very undesirable side-effect: people can get envious - and any kind of negative feeling like that can influence the "universal energy" towards a person (that sounds kind of new-agey, but I really believe it!), so, creating envy is NEVER my intention, so I hope that I can create some kind of positive feeling instead.
What I really liked about this Mall is that they really went to great length to establish an atmosphere are relaxation, where nature is drawn into a very artificial environment. So, it's time for some pictures: (oh, I think I have already fallen into the trap of the blogspot layout - the first picture was supposed to be UNDERNEATH the text...oh well).

Maui Mall Musings

2010-03-25T15:26:00.000-07:00

2010-03-25T13:53:00.000-07:00

One of the most puzzling things about Maui for me is the weather. It seems like this island hosts all possible weather patterns at once, except maybe for snow. The picture on the left is a good example of how this looks like: wind, sun, rain. Somewhere. On this trip I seem to be located under the raincloud, mostly. It's still lovely, and it makes me feel right at home.

2010-03-24T23:15:00.001-07:00

Okay, it works (I still have no idea what the result looks like...). Now I have to figure out how to post a picture (since that will be the main focus of my blog), so, gimme a sec here.

Ah, picture works too, just a bit smaller than I thought, considering that I picked the "large image option". Maybe blog spot has some kind of built in censorship and didn't allow to super size this image because it's kind of boring. I'll try harder with the next one....

Aloha from Maui

2010-03-24T23:02:00.000-07:00

I have NO idea how this blogsport thing works, so, I won't waste much time writing, but just create a short little sample sentence.