Cynthia's Two Year Blogoversary Hop

Cynthia asked Alicia, Bobbie, Janet, Therese, and me to join her in her Blogoversary celebration and today is Party Day!!!  She sent us all these gorgeous faces to work with.  We got some other items...some made it to the final project, some provided me with unmentionable language.  More on that in a moment.


Happy Two Years of Blogging Strong, Cynthia!  I can honestly say, meeting you has changed my life...in the best of ways. Thanks for asking me to be a part of this event.  You know how I feel about you...and it is not just for your beads...I'd love ya if you were beadless ;-)



The package arrived in the mail...in it was the focal face bead, sky blue frosted AB seed beads, white oval beads of unknown origin (i am leaning toward an agate of some type, though they could be bone), and white reclaimed sari ribbon from Darn Good Yarn.  The focal was made by Jana of Happy Fish.
I hatched a plan early on...like immediately!
As soon as I saw the face, I laughed as I said out loud to no one not even the dog, "Sleeping Indian."  Back in my Colorado Daze, it seems as though every town in the Rockies overlooked a range the locals called "Sleeping Indian."  There must have been dozens.  I took it as a joke after a while.  But they were all serious when they said the name of the range.  This guy...he had to be a Sleeping Indian Mountain Range...from Buena Vista or Creede or Durango or Gunnison or Frisco or Twin Lakes.  Take your pick!  I am sure there are a few dozen in New Mexico and Wyoming that I saw along the way.
So I had a loose plan...he needed to be a mountain range.  The blue beads needed to represent water and sky, the white beads-snow, the white sari-clouds.  Then the language began.  I tried every method I knew (even incorporating wire, if you can believe that!  me...wire!!!) to make that damn sari look like clouds.  I gave up.  So then the white beads became the clouds.  But the way I did it was so tailored.  What in the Rockies is tailored?!  It is nature for goodness sake!  Then there was the issue of the Sleeping Guy himself.  He would lay down but he just didn't look right.  Cut.  Cut.  Cut.
I put it down for weeks.
 I decided that ALL the Sleeping Indian Ranges in the Rocky Mountain region were conspiring against me.  Having majored in Anthropology and American Indian Studies in college, I knew when to reign it in---when to stop poking fun at something I guess I didn't really understand after all.  And I didn't understand how so many towns could have the same name range.  But I wasn't a local so how could I understand.  I was only passing through for 7 years.
And then my mind opened up.  And this came to be.  I smoothed his back by draping these red beads under him (courtesy of Liz from Bead Contagion.  Thanks Liz! They saved the day in yet another project!) and gave him movement and fringe with the original blue and white beads.  Still snow and rain and sky and clouds and water...and the color red...just not so much.  I still had no idea of how to support him, which made me pause for another week or so.  In the end, I decided he should be a pin.  Keep the focus on Jana's artistry, with my simple additions.  To say this was a challenge is an understatement.  But like all good things, this was one worth seeing through to the end.  Thanks Cynthia...for absolutely everything.

I cannot wait to see what the rest of the Ladies created!

Janet Bocciardi          Honey from the Bee

Bobby Rafferty          Beadsong

Therese Frank           Therese's Treasures

Alicia Marinache        All the Pretty Things

Cynthia Machata        Antiquity Travelers