Good Reads

I have just discovered this wonderful writer named Tana French and have read one of her books and am half way through the second one. I don't want to do anything but read - I so love to find a book like that. I'm reading her first book now entitled "In The Woods" which is about three children missing in a dark woods and only one is found - traumatized and standing in blood filled shoes. Twenty yeas later this child is now a detective and has to investigate a child murdered in that same woods. Old memories surface and a cold case is reopened. This book won the prestigious Edgar Award for best mystery. Her second book is "The Likeness" which
involves a detective from "In the Woods" going undercover and assuming the identity of a murdered girl who is her "double" and who has used an alias the detective has previously used. This book has won numerous awards as best thriller and novel of the year. If you like really well written mysteries that have excellent plots and great character development, you will want to read these books. I can't wait for her to publish another one.

Invictus

I just recently saw the movie "Invictus" and have been thinking about it alot. I can not fathom how Mandela survived all those years in prison. He says one way he kept his sanity was focusing on the poem "Invictus". The last two lines of the poem keep running through my mind :
I am the master of my fate:
I am the captain of my soul.
Rick DiBiasio in his blog "The Affluent Artist" writes a really interesting article entitled: "Hope, Mandela and You". If you can, check it out at
http://affluentartist.com/

I would like to introduce myself and welcome you to my blog. I am a fused glass artist who lives in south Florida with my husband and our cairn terrier "Zoe". I have a grown son and daughter, four granddaughters, one grandson, two granddogs and a soon-to-be grandcat. I am a retired social worker and worked for a number of years in the mental health field. In the early 1990's I retired to the mountains in Colorado and decided to try and find a creative outlet for myself. I started painting gourds and making gourd and fiber masks. I did this for appx. 10 years and did shows and worked with various western and southwest galleries. We then decided to move back east to be closer to our families. I continued to work with the gourds and with a gallery in Key West for another three years until I realized that I was really needing a change. A friend had decided to take a fused glass class at the local high school and invited me to go with her. I did and that was the beginning of a new venture. I continued to take classes in glass fusing and thought I would focus on making mirrors. I bought a large kiln and the challenge began. I made two very large wall mirrors that had to be made in sections and then assembled. One hangs in my home and one in my daughter's. I decided that was going to be too much and I needed to think smaller. I then began making smaller mirrors which I sell though a local gallery and then got interested in making jewelry. I purchased a smaller kiln and one that didn't intimidate me quite so much and I now focus on making jewelry and smaller items. I have two online shops - one on Etsy and one on Artfire - where I sell my jewelry and small home decor items.
In addition to working in my studio, I love gardening and being outdoors. Fortunately for me, our climate here allows me to do both. I also like to read and belong to a fun Book Club. I volunteer with the local Humane Society working with the Boys & Girls Club, visiting nursing homes, and attending special events with my certified therapy dog. I have done the pet therapy work for 8 years.

I live within a couple of hours of my daughter's home so I spend alot of time with two of my granddaughters and my grandson. Unfortunately my son and his family live in Maryland so we only see them two or three times a year.

I look forward to getting to know many of you better and hope you will continue to check out this blog and my shops. I am new to blogging so you will have to bear with me while I fumble and stumple through trying to figure out how to add things, arrange things, delete things, etc. Another challenge awaits me......

Very hot and sunny here in south Florida this weekend and we are still in the throes of a bad drought. Rainy season doesn't start until June so we still have a few weeks of brown lawns and serious watering restrictions to go.
This afternoon I am off to help with the annual Environmental Studies Center's annual fund raiser - "Fishnic on the St. Lucie". I will be working in the arts & crafts section with the kids helping them to paint a mural and also to paint coconuts which they can take home. The Center provides kids of all ages the opportunity to learn more about our environment and our need to care for it well. There will be live music, lots of activities for both adults and kids, a fish dinner, cash bar, exhibits and lots of family fun. Monies raised from this event along with public shcool funds will help pay for a teacher for the Center .

Well this will no doubt be a challenge for both me and anyone else who decides to follow this blog. I am not very computer literate and this is my first effort at blogging. That being said, here goes.......
I am a fused glass artist and am trying to figure out how to design and set up my blog like many of the other artists do in my CGGE team on etsy. If you aren't familiar with this group, check us out at: http://www.cgge.org/.
My passions in life other than my family are fused glass, gardening and pet therapy work with my cairn terrier "Zoe".