Get your BoHo Bliss on

Deryn is teaching an online jewelry class that is sure to be a ton of fun and a true learning experience.
Click the picture above to check out the info to sign up.

Facebookin',shoes and sharks

Facebook been berry berry good to me. (Old SNL joke).

I have reconnected with some old friends and family members of the foster kind.
Also some old classmates. One of my classmates from my time at Oak Hill Academy boarding school and I are doing a seed swap. She actually owns a tree farm and we got to talking about my greenhouse and heirloom seeds.
Today, this came for me and it is just the bestest package of seed I have ever recieved.
Look at all those little envelopes filled with future deliciousness. There are fruit tree sedds, nut tree seeds, herbs and vegetables. And some flowers. She also sent a bag of black walnuts to eat, and some of her favorite recipes to use them in.
And a sweet card with a pup and a kitty on it. Thank you so much Elaine. I'm so happy to have gotten in touch.

Went to the big city Tuesday and bought these on clearance. I'm rockin' now baby.
Danckins, hey for 11 bucks I'll teeter around like I've been drinkin' till I get used to them, heck I teeter around for a lot less than that deal.










Okay now ya gotta hand it to this guy, He lost his arm, probably to a shark. Now did he just mope around feeling like "oh I lost my arm, I'm gonna hide my hideous stump?" Nooooo
He totally OWNS that shark !

Erma Sez......

"These earrings look so juicy, I could just pop them in my mouth".

A few months ago I was flipping through a beading magazine and saw an ad for these lucite beads that just popped off the page. The color was so rich and vibrant.

I immediately thought "I wonder if I can get them in a rainbow pack".
And golly gee if they did not have them packed just like that.
Orange, blue,deep pink, light pink,green,yellow and white.
Bad thing was they have a minimum order or they throw an extra charge on there, and their shipping was high. But I had to have them so I ordered. They are gorgeous.
Good thing is, I have been seeing other lucites that are pretty juicy too.
They are fat beads, but being lucite, they are light. Even when paired with all brass findings as these are.

Erma is sporting "Orange ya glad to see me"? in the first photo. And in the second she models, "Lollipop Hearts".

One World One Heart Blog Event

CLOSED. Heidi # 142 from Digital Misfit is the winner of the door prize.




It's that time of year again peeps, time to wing our way around the blogosphere. Stop in and look around. Introduce yourself and say something about each others blog. A worldwide event to bring us bloggers a bit closer and to share a piece of each others hearts.

Lisa over at A Whimsical Bohemian has generously hosted this event each year and this will be the fifth and final year. So please try to visit as many blogs as you can, and please visit HERE to read the rules about this event and a link to all the fabulous blogs all ready to be visited.

Here is a bit about what we are doing :

"One World One Heart is a worldwide event for bloggers only. It gives all those who blog a chance to meet and mingle and form connections with those they may not have otherwise met from all over the world. In the past 4 years this event has grown to over 1,000 participants with lasting friendships (and even one love connection) formed along the way. Think of it as a GIGANTIC open house allowing you to travel without ever leaving your home........going from blog to blog(in various countries) seeing the wonder each one has created and meeting all the fabulous people behind those blogs. As a bonus each blogger participant will offer up a "door prize or prizes"....just for dropping by, saying hello and seeing their world. It's really that easy."- Lisa

Last year there were hundreds of blogs signed up you could visit and I got to a few hundred but could not make it to every one, this year I have a personal challenge to try again.

Sooo please look around my humble blog, I took a bit of a break from posting for awhile, but I am back.
My blog generally deals with our life out here in the woods. We have 4 Jack Russells, and there is my husband Larry and me, Diane.
We live in a house the two of us built and we try to live as richly and frugally as possible.
I am an artist and I also design and create jewelry. I love to cook, although I am a low carber mostly now. We also have a garden every year and I grow in my greenhouse also.

For my fellow bloggers I am sharing a chance to win this necklace, "Have a Little Heart"... thank you for stopping by and please leave a comment about my blog to be entered for a chance to be picked by random number generator. Please be sincere in your comment, and please do not cut and paste the same "hello, I like your blog, bye" comment on each blog.
We be VISITIN' don'tcha know.
Oh, and if your contact info is not active on your profile, leave it in your comment....let the winging around commence...

Teddy Tucker has settled in

Teddy has a name we didn't even know about. Last summer when we got him, the vet handed me a little envelope with his tags in it. I didn't look at them until a few weeks ago when I thought I should put his shot dates on the calender.
Inside I found an ID tag with "Teddy Tucker" engraved on it. hahaha Little Teddy Tucker is what we call him now.
He has settled in very nicely.


I've been working on some items for the shop and finished this today.
I love old watch parts.
This has small pearls, tourmaline rondelles and metallic seed beads.

Metal Head

Been working in the studio. I love to work with metal even though I don't have the "right" tools.
I cut copper pipe and pound it flat. I use leftover romex (copper electrical wire) from when we wired the house.
But as one of my internet idols said, it can be a good thing to be challenged like that.
I sure would like one of those dapping blocks though....

Made these today, I'm thinking something along these lines for One World One Heart blog event starting the end of this month.

Turquoise scarabs, garnet chunks and green agate.

I have this friend.....

She is such an inspiration to me. She is a survivor.

When I made this piece, she fell in love with it. Then I added the necklace parts. So she wears it now, around her neck. I am honored. 'Early' has a special meaning here. It is very important to be early sometimes. I love you, my suzyQ sista.

I gave up "low fat" and lost 38 pounds.

I gave up trying to lose weight with low fat and calorie counting. I found it kept me way too focused on food. And being focused on food was one of my problems in the first place.

You know how much I loved to cook. And I still do. But I needed to lose some weight (still need to lose more) but I am pleased to be unfocused on cookbooks and tons of recipe sites.
Yes I have cookbooks for sale...if you want to learn more, email me.

I am low carbing and loving it. I read about insulin resistance, and it fits me to a T.
So sleepy after eating, craving carbs, scale goes up and down, a real chunky monkey around my tummy, butt and thighs.

Most common signs that may mean you are insulin resistant:

These depend on poorly understood variations in individual biology and so are not found in all with insulin resistance.

1. Fatigue.
2. Brain fogginess and inability to focus.
3. High blood sugar.
4. Intestinal bloating – most intestinal gas is produced from carbohydrates in the diet, mostly those that humans cannot digest and absorb.
5. Sleepiness, especially after meals.
6. Weight gain, fat storage, difficulty losing weight – for most people, excess weight is from high fat storage; the fat in IR is generally stored in and around abdominal organs in both males and females. It is currently suspected that hormone production in that fat are a precipitating cause of insulin resistance.
7. Increased blood triglyceride levels.
8. Increased blood pressure. Many people with hypertension are either diabetic or pre-diabetic and have elevated insulin levels due to insulin resistance. One of insulin's effects is to control arterial wall tension throughout the body.
9. Depression. Due to the deranged metabolism resulting from insulin resistance, psychological effects, including depression, are not uncommon.
10. Acanthosis nigricans.
11. Increased hunger.

(info list taken from Wikipedia)

So after doing a bunch of research I decided to cut the carbs. I never ate a LOT of sugar per say, but the thing is even brown rice is pretty carby. Also most breads that you buy from the store and even if you bake your own, the flour you use can be carb laden.
So I have been learning to cook in a bit of a different way and to just eat what I know I can eat.
Basically I cut rice, potatoes, wheat and corn flour, oats, any type of sugar ie: honey, syrup, molasses.
And some veggies, like corn, limas, peas, onions.
I limit some of these foods to just once in awhile while others I do not eat at all.
But I eat. I love the food I eat. And I have lost 38 pounds since July while not counting calories or measuring anything.
Here was my dinner tonight.

PIZZA!!!
This I made on one of these:

Each one of these tortillas has 12 grams of fiber and just 5 net carbs. I eat 2 a day. In the morning I eat one with a scrambled egg, mushrooms, spinach sausage or bacon and some cheddar cheese. Along with a protein smoothie.

Then maybe one for lunch with turkey or ham, chipotle mayo, lettuce, banana pepper rings and cheese. Or one for dinner with pizza toppings. That right there is 24 grams of fiber, just in the tortillas. I have not really upped my exercise that much. I get on the treadmill a couple times a week, play with the dogs, stack wood, do stuff around the house. I have some little Dickie Simmons Sweatin' dvd's that I do once in awhile.
Oh, and one of the perks is, Larry has lost 10 pounds.

One World One Heart coming soon !

Lisa, over at A Whimsical Bohemian is once again for the 5th year, (sigh* for the LAST time) the ONE WORLD ONE HEART Event.

I participated last year, along with over 1,000 other bloggers worldwide and had a blast. I met the most wonderful fellow bloggers and quite a few are followers of my blog now. And I theirs.

Follow the link above, to find out more about this wonderful blog hop party. There are a few rules, but not many and I promise you will have a blast if you join up. Come visit beautiful, creative bloggers. Get to know them through their blog. Visit a little piece of their world. See what they are up to. And there will be door prizes!

So if you are a blogger, come get in on the action. The whole shebang starts on January 30th and ends on February 17th. There will be places to visit all over the world. And tons of eye and heart candy.

My Immigrant Mother loved this country.

'I recognize you in my dreams' by Diane Wagner

This is a mixed media piece I did to honor my mother on Mothers Day this year.


When I was growing up, I never thought much about patriotism. I just went along, taking this American way of life for granted. I learned about the Constitution, The Declaration of Independence, and the Bill of Rights in school, but did not pay much attention, maybe just enough to cover my ass in case of a quiz or test.
As I got older, I went about my life, at times happy and at other times not so happy. I've been dirt poor, and at times pretty well off. I lived most of my "under 18" life as a ward of the state. Tangled in a system that gave me a number, a social worker, court dates, foster homes and I thought, not much else.
School was a blessing to me. Something that I could excel in. I loved learning about some things. I felt that it was something constant in my life when not much else was.
I even got accepted on a paid scholarship to a private boarding school. I never did graduate though. I went back to my old stomping grounds on a school break, and never went back. I often wonder how things would have turned out if I had.
I took some college classes, at a community college that accepted me without a GED, saying they would help me acquire one. But I never did. I left because I was raising two small children without much help from anyone. I made some good decisions and plenty of bad. But I look at it as a life. We all have one, and this one is mine.
I also look at my life in this country now. The other day some friends were talking over on facebook about how people define themselves by their race. And that your heritage should never be forgotten but that once you are born here or become a citizen here, you are an American. I am happy to live in this country where our fore fathers had the wisdom to pen the Constitution, and the Bill of Rights and the Declaration of Independence. Where I can be free to live as I want, say what I want and worship as I choose.
I am made of multi-cultural stock, 1/2 Cuban, 1/4 English and 1/4 Irish. But I am 100 % American.
My mother came here from a Communist country. She was able to marry my father and come here. Just in the nick of time, or she would not have gotten out. She came with the promise to bring my sister here, leaving her with her father, my mothers first husband. But then things shut down. No one else was allowed to leave, and my mother never saw her first daughter again. my sister was 7 when my mother left her, and I was 7 when my mother left this earth. I have never been able to find my sister. As far as I know, she is still in Cuba.
My mother loved this country. And even though I was young, I knew this.
She studied and took the test to become a citizen, she struggled with the language, she took the Oath of Allegiance. She was so proud. I know very little of her language as she wanted to only speak English in our house. Except when her Cuban girlfriends would come over to play Canasta. Then she would make an exception. I would sit and listen to them. Strange sounding words and sounds flying off their tongues at it seemed 90 miles an hour.
I know a song, how to count a bit, and a few phrases. I took some Spanish in high school but I left school early that year.
When I was little I would not eat the Cuban dishes she would make. My dad liked Cuban food so she would cook black bean soup, Cuban pork sandwiches, and every once in a while she would take a whole day and make tamales. She would stock the freezer with little foil packets. Inside would be the meat and ground corn wrapped in a corn husk. I refused to eat any of it.
Now, I can't get enough.

Blog Scam going around. DO NOT open links.

I received two of these emails today. At first I was not sure what it was so I wrote to Shannon, and then I got another one saying it was from another blogger. I looked up the group sending it and it is indeed a scam.
Apparantly they are going around to blogs and getting emails from comments left then mailing you with an offer and saying the blogger who owns the blog where you left a comment recommended you.
See below:

Hello D W,

Your contact Shannon Steen-Larsen invites you to participate in an iPad review program.
Marketing research companies are looking for individuals who are interested in reviewing the new Apple iPad. The testing period lasts one month, after which reviewers can keep the device as a reward.
To see more details or to register to our program, follow the link below:
http ; // www. btinc group . com

Thanks,

The Beta Testing Inc Group
___
This message was intended for ( they put my email addy here) then gave Shannons fake email here.

Please be careful and if you get any of these send them on to your spam folder or delete.
Why oh why can't people leave other people the hell alone?

Still Alive

Oh Internet, I am so sorry for not being around lately. A lot is going on this time of year and we have a new member of the family, so I have not been typing much.

I do have some pictures to show you and that will have to do for now, but I promise to return soon.





Teddy .



Teddy, Ricky Pickles and Mikey in their poopin' pen, they have a pet door
on the screened porch to go to their pen so they can go out at night to do
their thing.

Ricky Pickles posing.


These two big leafed plants are wild rhubarb. I did not plant them, a birdie
did it for me.


That Brown door goes into my studio, we will be building a small deck
next week in front of that door so I can paint outside.


These are leeks left from last winter.


Foxgloves and hyssop.


Iris I planted last year.


Potatoes I grow in bags.


Columbine.



The Clematis has totally covered St. Francis.


Poppy, I planted this 4 years ago.


Poppy plant.


Teddy loves his new Dad.


Just plain wore each other out.


Teddy is happy to be home.

Ricky Pickles gherkins removed. Getting ANOTHER JRT !

Last Monday Ricky Pickles went under the knife and they took out his little gherkins. He wasn't happy about being at the vets. After thoroughly giving the nurse Holly all the Hell he could muster (wagging his tail the whole time) he allowed her to take him to "the back".
I hate the sound of that. You know back where all the "stuff" happens.

We dropped him off at 8 am. and I called at noon to check on him. He was awake and Holly told me she had never seen a dog look sadder than when he woke up and we were not there. She said we could pick him up after 3:30.

We both went in to get him, although I am the only one who did the dropping off. I think it was a guy thing. Larry did not want to be in on sending Ricky to "the back".

When we went into the "sleeping it off" area, there he was, in a cage, sitting on a blanket. Looking like he did not have a friend in the world. Then he looked over and saw us and his little face lit up.
He slept the whole way home just about and Jack and Mikey were very glad to see him.

Yesterday was a bad day though, he threw up the night before and laid around all day. I called the vet and she said it might be some gas buildup as he was crying a little when he would go up and down stairs and when I went to put him down off my lap. So we gave hime a tiny bit of pepto and he is a lot better today. Ran after his teddy bear about 10 times through the house.

So while I was talking to the vet I mentioned that we have the 3 of these guys and she asked if we would want one more......ACKKKK!!!!!
I said "my husband would kill me, tell me more". She said "Teddy" is a short legged JRT that has a little problemo with small children. And is 10 months old, White with red hair on his head, neutered, short haired, a total sweetie that loves to give kisses. His owners have a small child and just did not have time to help him get over the jealousy thing.
I said I would mention it to Larry but I could make no promises.
I kiddingly said to Larry "well, the vet tried to pawn another dog on us, but I said you would kill me if I said we would take it". And I started to walk away......
"what kind of dog"?
"oh, a jack russell, very sweet she said, I'm starting dinner now".
"wait a minute, how old is the dog"?

Well it went on from there, and we are picking him up tomorrow. Good thing we just bought 250 feet of new fence.
These are pictures of Teddy from the rescue site. His owners brought him in and asked that he be put down if the vet could not find a home for him.

Totally Affordable Custom Clothing.

Awhile back I was contacted by eShakti inquiring if I would like to review an article of clothing from them. "OF COURSE" I said after checking out their website. I was impressed with the designs. Very cool stuff. But what REALLY hooked me was the fact that they will customize any piece of clothing for only 15.00 Totally an awesome thing.

I know so many women, myself included, that are just not a specific size. Long arms? Not a problem? Big butt? Hey, that's Okay ! Short torso?
Pear shaped? How about finding the perfect dress but you want it sleevless but it has long sleeves? Well eShakti will just send you one without sleeves. See some pants you love but the legs are too short? Send your leg measurements. Customize it Baby!

I chose a beautiful cotton tunic with embroidery. You know the hippy in me. I received it promptly. And I tell you, it is such a beautiful color.
A dusty rose with gorgeous roses on one side. I have worn it a few times now and had three women ask me where I bought it.
The cotton has a silky feel to it, and the overall stitching is very sturdy. I have hand washed it, hung it to dry, and ironed it without any problems.

They also sent a really chic natural jute flower pin for my jean jacket. Made from jute, burlap and seed beads. I love the natural color and feel of this unique piece.




eShakti has quite a bit to choose from slacks, blouses, tunics, dresses (in different categories), skirts, and accessories. Any clothing article can be customized. They also have items in different colors that you can choose from. Sizes range from 0-26W. But anything can be customized according to your measurements. shipping in just 3 days. They also have a no-questions-asked refund policy.



So if you want something to fit just right, just for you. Check them out, customization has never been so affordable.
(I received a tunic and pin from eShakti for review purposes)

An Arm and a Leg vs. Peace of Mind. Catfish, Shrimp and Bleeding Hearts.

Back sometime in the 80's a friend of mine was laying on his bed, underneath a skylight watching TV. Some high winds blew in, not unusual in Virginia Beach, and toppled a tree in the next yard.
The whole tree fell on my friends house and a huge branch came right through the skylight and speared the bed right next to him.
Aside from needing a clean pair of pants and a good stiff drink, my friend was fine. Nerves were rattled for a few days, but he was fine.

To this day, I have a huge fear of high winds when I am near trees. So when we built this house we were going to build it further back on the property. What is now our house started out as a garage. It was going to be a nice big garage. One room.
But sometimes the best laid plans change.
What we started building as a garage became over time our house. We keep adding onto it and it ended up on one side right under a couple of trees that started to lean...and lean...and lean.
Until I found myself a nervous wreck everytime the winds would blow.
So this is what happened around here this past week...
He took the first one down little by little using the bucket truck.


TIMBER !! This one he pulled down using cable and the truck as a pulley.


Right where he wanted it to land..YAY !!

Tree Service for 2 Trees- 450.00
Trees Down in Yard- lots of clean up work
No More Frazzled Nerves- Priceless

________________________________

A Few Pics...

Bleeding Hearts


Lunaria or Honesty or Silver Dollar Plant...This is why it's called silver dollar Plant.....when dried...

Tarragon...I like to plant herbs in cinder blocks at the ends of my garden beds...

Broccoli in the greenhouse....
An apple tree I am growing from an apple I ate last year...
__________________

I made some catfish and shrimp the other night.
My new breading mix;
Crushed potato chips
Panko bread crumbs
Bayou Blend Seasoning or Seafood seasoning
egg
1/2 c. water
1 lb. fish fillets, I use catfish
1/2 lb. shrimp, peeled and butterflied.

2 cups peanut oil.

Heat oil in wok or frying pan.

I just eyeball how much. About half and half on the chips and bread crumbs.
About a tsp. of seasoning. Mix together.

Put egg and water in large bowl and stir. Put fish fillets in egg mixture and coat letting excess drip off.
Roll in crumb mixture.

Place in hot oil and fry until golden about 3-4 minutes per side.
Do same with shrimp, but fry about 1-2 minutes.

Drain well.