Monday Check In

So this is week two of being back on full time.  I never thought I would hate Mondays as much as I do right now.  But I'll get use to getting up early on Monday's and working full 40 hour weeks again.  Not that I wasn't putting in more then 40 hours before, but now I have to be in the lab.  It's not quite the same as working from home.  But I enjoy it, so that's good.

This weekend was fairly productive.  The inlaws were over to help us finish up building our deck.  You can read about that here, here, here, and here.  It was also my MIL's birthday, so we had birthday pie and then went out for a nice dinner at a local Loas restaurant.  Yummy!!

I didn't do much deck building, I was busy getting ready for the two shows I have next month (they are three days apart).  I have been going through my jewelry and making sets.

I have a few items that were already sets, like this necklace and earrings

Or this cuff and beaded hoops.

But I had a lot of beaded triangle earrings and necklaces that didn't match.  So I came up with a quick but cool solution.  I made little pendents for the earrings.  Like these.

The pendents work up really fast and are oh so cute.  I seriously can make 2-3 of these an hour.  That's awesome.  I have a few more ideas that I'm working on and I hope they go over well at the shows.  And yes, I will be adding a ribbon or leather necklace to them, I just haven't gotten that far yet.

I'm also looking into getting some battery powered lights for shows.  I've been thinking about it for years, but never have.  LED lights have become so cheap, I think I need some.  My plan is to buy a few different kinds and see which ones I think work the best.  And since I'm doing a complete overhaul for next year, it's the perfect time to add some lighting.  Do any of you have any suggestions?  What do you guys love/hate?  I will take any suggestions.

So that was what I worked on this weekend.  And now we have a beautiful deck that I can bead on, YAY!  What did everyone else do this past weekend?