Ebb and Flow Necklace

I first got into beaded jewelry through chainmail jewelry (which I got into through chainmail armor making, but that's a different story). It started with adding beads onto the chain to add color or focal points for the particular piece. After a little while, I started repairing jewelry (including beaded necklaces and bracelets) for my mother and her friends. From there, it was a pretty natural step to start making my own.

This necklace was inspired by a similar design on ArtBeads.com, located here. ArtBeads is an amazing source of jewelry-making supplies. If I'm looking for something particular and can't find it locally, I order it from them. I also find inspiration just by looking through their catalog. They also offer free shipping! Honestly, how can you beat that?

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Now playing: Arctic Monkeys - Balaclava
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Deep Dish Pecan Pie

At work, we designate one day a month to celebrate everyone's birthday that falls during that month. Well, one of the guys in our group had a birthday this past week, but was out of town for the party, so I thought I'd bake something. He had mentioned liking pecans before, and I had been wanting to try this recipe anyway, so I thought I'd take the opportunity to try it.

Now, I'd never made a pecan pie before. Well, I'd never even had pecan pie before. So this was all completely new to me. Although, after being horrified at the ingredient list, I came to the conclusion that anything with that much corn syrup in it would have to taste okay.


The pie filling looked pretty gross. You know when you're at a lake or something, and there's a bunch of sticks floating near the shore, and you suddenly change your mind about wanting to go for a swim? That's what the filling reminded me of. So I covered it with pecan halves. I tried to make it look like pictures of pecan pie that I've seen in the past.

Matt from MattBites is a professional. I mean, literally a professional food photographer. I'm a huge fan of his work. But I still have no idea how he got such a clean cut on his pie. It's really amazing, and makes mine look terrible. However, looks don't affect taste, and this tasted awesome. Of course, I didn't really have anything to compare it to, but the guys at work and my parents all thought it was good. Also, I have no idea if whipped cream is a proper topping for pecan pie, but that and some cinnamon was awfully tasty.



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Now playing: Joss Whedon - Firefly - Main Theme
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