I made this!

Get ready for way too many pictures of the process, but I'm PROUD!! I took the class from a man here in my little town. He's an amazing artist and holds these classes occasionally. I was really excited to get a spot! He has a studio in his house-- and it was only about 5 minutes from me.

I started by picking a pattern. I went with an art deco piece-- I wanted to use lots of color, so it was perfect. After tracing the pattern on a light box, I started cutting the glass. NOT EASY!! haha.

after I cut everything, I used this grinder to make the size and shape more precise. This was surprisingly fun.

after cutting & grinding, I wrapped each piece with copper tape. It had to be exactly even on both sides-- a little bit tedious!

 The following Saturday, we met again to finish up. I learned how to use a soldering iron! 

I soldered everything together-- this was the hardest part, by far! 

here's my teacher, Don, helping another student.

  

 after the soldering, came the cleaning:

then the polishing:

 and it was finished!! All in all, about 10 hours of work-- but it was really a lot of fun!!

  here it is in the sun. It's definitely not perfect but I love it!

Oh Snow You Didn't

It's a snow day here--- we've got some cuh-razy weather right now--blizzard-like conditions?! That just doesn't happen in NWA. The furbabies don't know what to think! These were taken about an hour ago-- it's really coming down now:

(I stole the title from someone's hilarious twitter hashtag.)

My Newest Obsession

I.Am.Obsessed. 

Mike and I each got a Kindle for Christmas and I cannot believe how much I've been using mine!

It's teeny tiny, so light and the battery lasts forever. 

I always thought I'd prefer books-- the smell, the way it feels in your hands... but I'm a convert. I've been reading so much more now that I have the Kindle-- I've finished three books since Christmas! I'm going to attempt to sew a cute cover for mine... I've got my fingers crossed that it doesn't look like a 2nd grader's craft project. ;-)

*edited to add a list of the books I've read*

1.  Eat, Pray, Love
2. Decoded
3. Little Kids, Big City

Currently reading-- Water For Elephants & Cosmopolis!

Party like it's 2011

We decided to avoid all the going out drama--- the driving, the over priced drinks, etc and threw a small NYE party at our house. IT WAS SO FUN!! A few friends from Tulsa came up and got to meet some of our local peeps for copious amounts of food, cigars, booze and Rock Band playing:

 some pics of setting up--- we got a chocolate fountain as a wedding gift and used it for the first time ever-- so good!!

 Mike dancing before the guests even arrived. ;-)

 Amy & Mike were opening the champagne bottles and pointing them down the hall-- makes for a bizarre couple of pictures!

 This is the 3rd NYE that Amy & I have spent together-- so much fun! 

Winter Wonderland Date Night

On Saturday Mike and I went to the Winter Wonderland Lighting of the Square event in Bentonville. It was so much fun! It was also the grand opening of the new ice skating rink-- (we decided to watch this time, not skate)  plus lots of music, vendors and Christmas lights. 

Such a great day.

 Mike being a dork as usual :)

  

 After checking out the rink, we headed to dinner at our favorite Thai place right off the Square. We still had some time to kill before the lighting so we headed over to a new frozen yogurt place-- which also happens to have two vegan sorbets! It might not sound like much, but any place to get a vegan dessert in our area is a big deal! This picture of Mike cracks me up:

I got a mixture of the mango and the valencia orange... so freaking good!

Okay, back to the Square! Can you tell we live in Arkansas?? 

 one of my favorite restaurants is shown in this pic--- Table Mesa. Fantastic Mexican food!

 The first W@l-Mart-- it's a museum and it's currently being remodeled. 

  no town square is complete without a courthouse:

 the sun finally went down and it was time for some Christmas lights!