Cherry Blossoms...

A couple of days before the rains came, we saw a whole lot of cherry blossoms on the trees, a promise that spring is right around the corner...they looked sweet...after the rain, my car was covered with little pink petals... I love cherry blossoms...check out these cool tiles I found on etsy from artist Marieanne Cavaciuti

Hope you are having a Cherry Blossom Day...

Have a great weekend...Life is good...

Jelveh

Peace

Forgot to show Bead Soup Beads...

I have been so busy these past two weeks, we had several birthdays, a trip to Reno to see Bill Maher, mom having knee surgery...well you know as they say life happens...so I got this very yummy bead soup from Jeanette Blix weeks ago but failed to show a picture of them, I just love the ceramic beads, all that sterling & the gorgeous goddess focal & amazing oval shape clasp...I have been working on some ideas, but I decided to go with something totally different than my sketch shows...so you have to wait and see the results on March 3rd when the blog hop is on...

Thanks for stopping by...life is good

Jelveh

Peace

Great Corina Class & Beads...

Hi all, hope you had a great week so far...this past week was rather busy for us at Graceful Studios...Grace, Frank &  I hosted Corina Tettinger & 11 lovely students for Corina's 3 day Floral Class...needless to say it was an amazing success, Corina is still the queen of glass beads...Grace is the best she cooked & hosted the best party ever & I ran around making sure the studio ran well during it all...Frank made tools on demand, it was very very fun for every one...the students did so well, I have never seen so many great beads made one after the other in a class...just awesome...below are some photos of the class...

These are some of Corina's sample beads for her Floral Class...can you say yummmy?

everyone making yummy beads...

some of the yummy beads from the first day...wow just look at all the roses...

Corina doing what she does best...great teacher & artist...

And here are some of the yummy beads made on the 3rd day...

I have more photos of this great class, including group photos, but they are in Grace's camera, so I will save them for another time...on Monday Grace held an excellent Social where folks who were not able to take the class came by the studio to meet with Corina & see the yummy beads that were made...one of the people who showed up is one of my all time favorite bead artists and people in our industry, Toni Lutman of Wildwood Art Glass, below is a photo of some of her yummy work, she will be teaching a one day class at our studio sometime in Aug 2010, contact me for more information on this class...

and in other news the winner of last week's red opal bead pair is Sandy of California, girl send me your address...for this week I have the yummy focal bead above, enter to win it by making a comment on this post...

NEW BEADS from me...I will have new beads listed in my etsy shop by Friday noon California time....

Thanks for stopping by...Life is good...I have mostly rested the last couple of days...

Jelveh

Peace

Home & Happy New Year...

Hi all, we are home & yes it is Persian New Year or rather NoRooz in Farsi which means New Day...fitting really since we are starting a new chapter in our lives...so its a great day to come home...Persians everywhere, (save for me, I am too jet lagged, so the photo above is from 2005) get together, celebrate, eat & are merry for about 2 weeks starting on March 20/21 the first day of spring...the tradition is all about re-birth & re-newel...and it dates back 2568 years...

What you see us sitting in front of is a table set with the Seven C's or 7 items the names of which start with the letter C in Farsi/Persian...here is a break down of what they are and why...

Sabzeh: Where you germinate seeds in a plate or container so it sprouts in to a small lawn at it wore in a plate, often from lentils or wheat, its all about rebirth & renewal

Senjed: The fruit of a Lotus tree, it is very dry and somewhat sweet, it smells good too, & some thing it makes people fall in love, so it’s all about affection & love...

Sib: A large red Apple which stands for health & beauty, kind of like the Apple of life...

Samanu: Never eat this one, ok many do, but I think it tasted well BAD, it’s a pudding of some kind made from Wheat Pudding…anything to do with wheat is a representative of fertility, all about being fruitful if you get my drift...

Serkeh: Good old white Vinegar. This stands for age, wisdom & patience. All of us could use some of that...

Somagh: Ground up dry Sumac berries. This one is all about the Spice of Life & something to with the color of sunrise, although I don’t think so, Persians traditionally sprinkle this on many of their foods, I love it on rice specially...

Seer: Last but not least Garlic. This one is for its medicinal property & a sign of good health stinky as it may be, it’s good for you...

Other items on the table are Fish & Mirror for life & reflection, perspective if you will, money/coin for good fortune, candle to wish for light in your life, Hyacinth for life, and the Good Book, which can be a Bible, The Torah, The Koran, or any other book of faith that the person believes in, since the celebration is not religious based, in our house it is a book of poems by Hafiz, a celebrated & famous Persian poet...at the end of two weeks of celebrating, eating good food, visiting family, wearing new clothes, even giving brand new bills of cash as gifts, we all go on a picnic by a body of water, bring the Wheat that we grew in the plates with us & give it back to the earth as a circular symbol of life...

we are resting, life is good, thanks for stopping by...have a great new Spring & new year...

Jelveh

Peace