Holy Cow...on Friday July 20th while sitting in the studio talking to JP on the phone a huge lightning bolt hit so close to my house that I actually thought it had hit the house!! The noise from it was deafening and I hung up the phone and immediately searched the house for the smell of smoke or fire!

I discovered my cable was out so called Brighthouse right away...they said there were no other reports of outage from my area so they would send a tech out tomorrow between 1-2pm.

It was really weird to be with out computer and tv...so I worked in studio and caught up on some art and worked in my journal.

The tech arrived right on time and just as he rang the doorbell another huge storm came complete with driving rain, howling winds, and of course lots of lightning. He braved the bad weather, however, donned a rain suit and umbrella and fixed the cable.

We then discovered that the lightning had fried basically ALL of my Tv's, two phones and answer machine, computer, dvd players, refrigerator in garage, and washing machine!!!!

I was totally freaked out and overwhelmed -- what no computer????? I could live with out TV but not to have my computer was simply too much to bear.

Called my son, Scott, and we decided the fastest thing to do was simply to go buy another computer rather than have him try to build one for me. So that afternoon I met him at Circuit City and I got a HP Pavilion computer,VTech Answer Machine with speaker phone on handset, and a UPS Battery Backup unit.

I had packed the fried computer in the car so Scott to both machines to his house, added a DVD drive, and copied the files from the zapped computer to the new one.

Don't know what I would do with out my wonderful computer wizard son-- he has saved me so many times!!!

I picked up the new computer on Sunday...got it all set up and it worked great with the exception that Microsoft Vista is NOT compatible with my external backup drive- -Acronis software--- which I am not at all happy about as I discovered I have to buy the new version which is another $50.00..... total bummer.

This has been a total nerve wracking experience and one I sure don't want to experience again .... The whole thing is really weird as I did have surge protectors hooked up to some of the equipment and they still got fried. Scott told me that they basically don't work that well and he is the one who suggested that I go on and buy a UPS backup.

Now comes the time consuming job of installing all the software- ugh ugh -- not looking forward to that for sure!!

Wow....another dream became a reality on July 10th! My work was actually purchased
by a new store in downtown Cocoa Village called What You Love To Do.



A friend had emailed me to tell me of the store and suggested that I contact them in regard to my work so I called but got an answer machine. It was several days before Kathryn,the owner,called me back and we set up the appointment.

She really liked all of the handmade paper wall hangings and took them all immediately. She also took several Spirit Masks and Spirit Men!!!






"Disconnected" actually hanging on wall in shop!!!!






Kathyrn with my friend Thea who bought a really cool metal dragon wall hanging!



I am so thrilled to have this dream actually come true!! I am anxious to approach
Creative Energy,a metaphysical store, here in downtown Melbourne. I am getting my Gratitude Bowls ready to show her along with some other new items...

A new adventure for sure!!!

Well it is finally 99.9% completed!! The studio is now in working order minus some final tweaking that needs to be done! I have worked like a dog for weeks sorting, organizing, labeling, and throwing tons of stuff away. Its wonderful to be able to actual create again and below are some pictures of the latest project that I have been working on the last couple days.

I love doing assembledge and this project evolved using a broken cork tile that I painted with acrylic paints, burned soda cans, copper tape, rusted ball chain, screws, and a can lid, wire and a handmade paper casted face....

It is called Disconnected







This is a handmade paper bowl-- painted with acrylic and water colors... sticks, and wire.It's name is Shasha which when I looked it up on the net means protector and helper of mankind.
How cool is that?



I am making gratitude bowls now and will post some pictures of them when I get a few completed...

oh here is another handmade paper pic



Going out to lunch with my son today so need to get busy around here-- more later!

Labels: assembledge, handmade paper