whirlwind weekend, and i worked too

We had a fun weekend with Rick's sister Vicki, and her lovely daughter Brianna. I'll tell you more in a sec, but first, a quick note on an idea that's too good to ignore...

A friend sent it to me, and I checked a little further, to find that this brilliant little plan is spreading like wildfire on the mesa. Simply put, if you'd like to send a clear message to Sarah Palin and her little pals, make a donation of any size to Planned Parenthood in her name. Oh I just love this. Clear details are here on The Huffington Post. Count me in, Sarah.

And now, back to our regularly scheduled programming...

Yes, a fun weekend with family. We don't get a lot of visitors. It's too hard to get here, which is one of the reasons we're moving... some day. When we do manage to get someone here for a few days, we whirl them around town, doing all the fun things we can find, hoping they'll come back someday. Most don't. Maybe it's us...

Brianna spent some time with me in the studio, and of course came away with a bag of Beady Loot. At some point I glanced over from the torch and asked if she'd ever gotten her ears pierced. Her dad was opposed to the idea, but here we were, in Taos, with no Dad in sight. One thing led to another, and before long, Mom was calling Dad, and an expedition set off for the local tattoo shop. There is a distinct difference between having your ears pierced at Claire's in the mall, and at Talisman Tattoo in Taos. They don't use that nice little piercing gun. They use a looped hemostat and a needle. This is body piercing. If you're going to go for a ritual rite of passage, this is the way to do it. And even better, she got hoops instead of posts. Far superior, in my opinion.



Next day we decided to check out the Taos Trade Fair at the 200 year old Martinez Hacienda. Cool place. Loads of wild west history. We wandered through the rooms and exhibits, saw Aztec Dancers and axe throwers, sampled biscochitos from a wood fired kiva (warning to vegetarians - these are usually made with lard.), and chatted with our friend John Le Bleu. He's a Mountain Man in his everyday life, so he was really in his element here. What a guy. He even posed with my doll, Lily. Long story, the doll story. If you haven't heard it yet, it will wait for another time. For now, how sweet of John to stoop to such silliness for me. We bought one of his lovely wooden crosses, with hand stamped copper conchos and rivets. It's now hanging by our front door, a blessing to those who head out into the Four Directions, and a nice reminder of a fun bit of Time Travel on a beautiful fall day.



While we were off having fun, Lauren was home sorting through all her stuff. She has much. Too much. And it was beginning to take on a life of its own, filling her room and spilling out into the shed. She got inspired to drag it all out to the front of the house and sort through every last box, weeding out years worth of crap, and preserving precious mementos. She even found my old collection of dolls, or what's left of it. A few Madame Alexanders, the Lady Doll in her shredded pink off-the-shoulder dress, and Shirley Temple. She's great, and still has her hairnet! I can't imagine why I never took that off of her. So unlike me. It really looked like Lauren was having a yard sale out there. I'm surprised the neighbors didn't pull into the driveway and start picking through boxes with her. The good news is, she got rid of a lot, and put the rest of it away in a tidy manner. Well, most of it anyway. There's still the issue of storage in her room. Tiny room, tiny closet. I think she's yearning for a bigger job in the bigger world, so she can have a bigger life of her own. I feel her pain!



We got up at Ridiculous O'Clock this morning, to see Vicki and Brianna off. Guess I get a good jump on the day this way. Next stop, as soon as the sun is high enough, is to take bead pictures and post some new beauties in the BeadShop. See you there later!