Just wanted to share :)

I just wanted to share some new items that I have ready to list. I have listed a few on Artfire tonight but have many more to go. Here are some of my favorites! Have a wonderful night!!

I really need to figure out how I got this last picture to look so great. No clue and I can't get the others to look like it...Hmmmm?

I Have Been Interviewed!

We have been interviewed on Sick and Wierd! You have to check out Bonnie's interview. It was so organized and easy to answer. We love how it came out. Please be sure to take a moment and stop by Sick and Wierd and learn a little more about my wonderful Mother, Sandy, and her jewelry making. Thank you Bonnie! It came out great!!!

Wednesday Afternoon Fun...

So it is Wednesday, Hump day! Let's try to wake up those minds a little.

Last week I put a few brain teasers and it seemed as though a few of you had a good time with them so I thought I would try to find some more :) I found these brain teasers that I thought were fun. You have to check out the color one! I find it to be kind of freaky but cool! Maybe I should put one of two of these up on Mondays to wake us all up instead...

Hope you enjoy!!

Can you find the baby in this picture?
Stare at the centre dot and the colours eventually disappear. Spooky!

How many black circles can you see?

1. The baby is outlined using the tree and land.

2. Is just too cool!!

3. There are no black dots. All the dots are white. If you stare at one dot they will all be white!

I found these on Brain Bashers !

Enjoy the rest of the week!!

Another Artfire Perk

For those of you that don't know or are not on Artfire, Artfire just released a new checkout program called "Rapid Cart". You can now purchase items from someones blog or website without signing up for Artfire and it is supposed to be quick and easy.

If you look to the right you will see my new Artfire store Mini with Rapid Cart ----->.

This is so great! Of coarse there may be some bugs that may need to be worked out but that is OK! Artfire is on the right track and trying to make it easier to sell and to buy.

Now, if you are cruising blogs or see a mini with this checkout on a website and see something that you want...just go ahead and purchase that item or items in a quick and easy way.

It is very exciting but remember there may be some patience required with this checkout being brand new. With the way Artfire is, if there are bugs, they will be working on it until it gets fixed and it is right!

Great job Artfire!!!!

Now I think I have to try it :)

What a Week!!

This past week the kids were off from school for February vacation and what happens, Everyone is sick! I don't know about you but it seems as though almost every person I run into has sick kids! I really can't complain since this is the first time all year that the boys are sick. So now everyone is on the mend and I am hopefully at the end of it, I can back to getting the house put back together and back to work!

The good news is...I made my first sale on Artfire!!

How exciting :) I love the feeling of a first sale and it is even better when you have a wonderful customer.

I sold these wine glass charms. They are not much but I loved them and hopefully Linda will too.

Hopefully all of you and your families are healthy!

Hopefully mine will be back to normal real soon.

Fugliest Banner Contest

A few days ago, Picardcreative started a post in the Artfire forums that she was shopping on Artfire and decided she wanted to buy something for someone else. How cool is that!!!So she started "The Fugliest Banner Contest". Well, I had to join in. My banner was just nasty!! My brother, who is an IT major and works for Microsoft, made me a banner and it was just bright, ugly and pitiful (as you can see above). I thought he would do something nice for me, but I was just happy I had something up. Anyway, There was 2 of us who stood up and said we had ugly banners and 1 had none!! Well, the good news is, we all won. Picardcreative said she would purchase the 1st and 2nd place banners and SoyScentual said she would make the 3rd place banner for free!



So now that we won, we got to deal with this amazing woman, Dawn, at LifesMomentsCaptured. You can find her on Artfire and Etsy. Come to find out, Dawn, generously offered her services to us. Way too cool also!!! She is such a sweet and patient person. I told her a round about way I wanted the banner to look and she tried many times until I saw exactly what I wanted. She says I didn't drive her nuts but I drive myself nuts so I can only imagine what I did to her...LOL. It was such a wonderful experience working with her and getting to know her.
Here is the new banner and avatar that she made for my mother and I at our Artfire store! Aren't they wonderful. She hit the nail right on the head with these. We liked them so much that we are now purchasing business cards from Dawn!

For you those don't know about the name Baci's Creations. This is the name of my mothers store on Artfire and Baci means grandmother in Polish. My mother is a Baci of 3 grandsons and a beautiful granddaughter!!


You really need to check out all the great work in all of these wonderful and generous stores. Now I would like to come up with something to do that is as nice as Picardcreative did...I would like to spread the love too! I just need to come up with an idea...this could take a while. I would love some suggestions if anyone has some. Pass them along. I would love to hear them!!






I just want to say that my whole experience on Etsy, Artfire and with blogging have been wonderful. I have met some wonderful people and made some new amazing friends! If I never sell anything else on either site or write another post here, I will be grateful for the people I have met and can now call friends!
I also want to send a very special thank you out to everyone who took part in this. It is really nice to know that people are still nice out there in this strange world. Thank you to everyone!!!!

Can You Do This?

Just for fun. Can you figure this out?

1. Whats wrong here

AAA

BBB

CCC

DDD

EEE

FFF

GGG

HHH

III

JJJ

KKK

LLL

MMM

NNN

OOO

PPP

QQQ

RRR

SSS

TTT

UUU

VVV

WWW

XXX

YYY

ZZZ

Did you know that 80% of UCSD students could not find the error above?

2. This isn't really a game but it is still cool! fi yuo cna raed tihs, yuo hvae a sgtrane mnid too Cna yuo raed tihs? Olny 55 plepoe out of 100 can. i cdnuolt blveiee taht I cluod aulaclty uesdnatnrd waht I was rdanieg. The phaonmneal pweor of the hmuan mnid, aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it dseno't mtaetr in waht oerdr the ltteres in a wrod are, the olny iproamtnt tihng is taht the frsit and lsat ltteer be in the rghit pclae. The rset can be a taotl mses and you can sitll raed it whotuit a pboerlm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe. Azanmig huh? yaeh and I awlyas tghuhot slpeling was ipmorantt! if you can raed tihs forwrad it

I couldn't believe it when I could read it! The human brain is amazing! Now I am going to see if my DH and son can do it.

Where you able to read it?

The answer to #1 is there is only something wrong in the title! "Whats" is supposed to be "what's". The letters are there to throw you off and there is nothing wrong with the letters. Pretty stupid but still kind of fun!!

Do you like giveaways?

Then I have 3 great giveaways that I would like to share with you! You may have found them already and have entered or maybe I can introduce you to a few more great giveaways. It is like one stop shopping for giveaways....Have fun!!

A absolutely gorgeous giveaway is taking place at Lilbitof with a wonderful Leaf Pendant. You have to check it out...just beautiful!

A brand new giveaway can be found at Tootie's Tidbits. She is giving away promo clothes pin magnets...they are so cute!

If you don't know of this blog which always has such wonderful giveaways then get over to One World Organic Clothing for her great giveaway (which ends today..sorry a little late with this) from Boysenberrylane , way to cute wrist wraps! You can always click on my side bar on Jen's button to check on her giveaways.

There are so many giveaways out there right now there is no way I could list them all! These will just get you started. So if you have a favorite blog giveaway or know of someone who has a giveaway and would like me to add it to the list please feel free to let me know.

A Friday Find

I had just gone onto Artfire and I saw some of these items on the front page. I fell in love at first sight. I found these items at a shop called byapryl.

They are all made to order. You have to check out her shop. She also has some jewelry that is being sold at a discounted price.

Click on the pictures and it will bring you to the descriptions.

I chose this Amethyst one since it is February
I love this Emerald one since it is perfect for my birthday

If I ever make it to 50 yrs...you bet you will see this on my cake.

She also says that she can make them into a family tree and you get to choose the color stones. Hmmmm, gives me an idea! My mother would LOVE one of these for Mothers Day! So would I...Hint, hint Honey!!

I just had to share. Hope you enjoy.
Have a great weekend!!!

Bob Bull Saved From Slaughter

This is the story of Bob Bull, my husbands race horse.

I am telling this story with the facts that I have. We have most of the information but some of the time line has holes that we cannot fill and will not without the facts.

Bob Bull is a 4 yr old Thoroughbred race horse who originally made his debut with Tom Schell of McSchell Racing Inc when he was 2 yrs old. He was born in March of 2005 and hit the track when he was 2. This is the age when Thoroughbreds start racing.

Tom ran him in a claiming race in the 2007-2008 racing season and Bob was claimed by another trainer. Bob raced 4 races in 2008 under this new trainer and then ended up in Pennsylvania. We are not sure how or why he was in Pennsylvania but anyway, he was eventually found in a field starving. He was then brought to a slaughter house to be slaughtered. Yes, it is true, people from all over the world eat horse meat!

Just a little information before we continue on. All race horses have tattoos on their inner lip that identifies them with the Jockey Club, this is where all names of race horses are registered. If your horse has a tattoo, then you can track their pedigree, race records, past owners, sales history etc. It is just like Carfax (in a way). Tattoos are made up of a letter and numbers. They start with a letter (every year is assigned a letter) followed by the year in which the horse was born and then followed by the last 5 digits of their Jockey Club registration number.

A wonderful organization called Racefund dedicates everything to finding home for race horses and helps provide funds to help race horses in retirement. They also go regularly to the slaughter houses looking for horses to save since a lot of race horses end up at the slaughter houses due to injury or retirement, Sad! On a day that Racefund was at the slaughter house, they found Bob Bull in a "Kill Box". The kill box is a box that is just big enough to fit the horse in it. The horse is not able to turn around or move much in this box. In a slaughter house this is the last place that a horse, or any animal will see. The kill box lives up to its name so I am not going to go into further detail. Usually once an animal gets into the Kill Box they will never walk out on their own.

Racefund found Bob, found his tattoo and traced him back to Tom, who was one of his past trainers! Thank God for tattoos!! Tom was then contacted by Racefund and the rest is history.

Bob Bull has spent some time in Ocala FL resting, putting on weight and getting ready for his trip back to Miami FL. He was reunited with Tom a few weeks ago at Calder Race Track in Miami FL. He has starting his training to get ready for his first run in April!

This story just amazed me! You always hear of cats and dogs being thrown away like they were nothing...did you ever think a horse? Bob is one lucky horse and has a very kind and caring owner. My husband could not ask for a better person or horse to be partnered with. We have so many animals that we saved and Bob just fits into our family!

I know people don't like to read super long posts so I have tried to keep it short and I will be filling you in more on Bob Bull and his race history and personality. I will also be filling you in a little more on how Tom got into racing and how he cares about all his animals.

If you you are thinking of donating money to a great organization, please consider Racefund.org! You can find there site on the right hand side of my page to make a donation!

If anyone has any other information on this story or has anything they would like to add please feel free to contact me through my profile email. Thank you

Moon Over Connecticut

We finally had a BEAUTIFUL day today and we spent almost the whole day outside. My thermometer read 52 this afternoon. I felt like I should have been in short sleeves and shorts. OK, so not that warm. The girls were out today flying around the yard and playing in the lilac trees. They were so happy! Most of the snow melted today and we can see a lot of grass. We haven't seen grass in what seems like months. I know that this is just a tease and it will only be in the 30's again by mid week. I will take what I can get!! :)

So what's a better way to end a beautiful day? A beautiful night. The moon is shinning and I have my new camera to play with. I really have to learn how to use this thing! So, I went out and enjoyed the night for a bit, a little chilly and you can see the melted snow on the driveway starting to cystalize, but still nice.

These are some of the pictures I got.

I love this one!
This one is a screw up but I liked how it turned out.

This one is sooo cool. That is a cloud coming over the moon.

I don't think they turned out to shabby. Now I need to figure out how to get my camera back to everyday settings :0

Hope you all enjoyed the warm weather for a bit!

Have a great week!!

Summertime Finds for the Garden

I spent some of the day today dreaming that it was warm out. It was -6 this morning. I have been thinking that the crocuses will be popping up in about a month and soon after that all the trees will be budding. Then I said to myself, "I have to get more stuff for my gardens!" So I thought I would cruise Artfire today to see what they have available and man did I find some wonderful things that I would like to share.This is a stained glass butterfly garden stake that I found at Glassfancy. This shop has so many wonderful stained glass items. I LOVE stained glass. She has yard items, suncatchers and more! Very cute shop! You should check out the Strawberries n Cream butterfly..Tough choice between these two. I thought this one would stand out more in between my 2 rose bushes.

When I make a few bucks I am getting this sign! It would go perfectly on my chicken coop. My girls would have a blessing and stay safe every night from raccoons. I found this at Tolemountain. She has some wonderful signs. Some of the signs are wreaths with animals..very cute! You really need to check out the sheep birdhouse on the first page..it is just adorable!

I thought this was the cutest thing I have ever seen! Do you know what it is? It's a fairy door!! You have to check out the other photos. It looks like it is a door that leads right inside a tree or wood planter. I fell in love with this! These fairy doors come in a few different styles. These can be found at nothinbutwood on Artfire.

I am always looking for new pots. My husband would kill me if I got another one! But isn't this just wonderful! It has such style and I love how all the different colors were used and put into all different types of patterns. It would look great on my deck! This and other pots and mosaics can be found at broken4art. This shop also has mosaic pendants!

Now this is one of the coolest things I have seen in a long time! You have to check this shop out! this is a fire pit at johntunger. He uses recycled material and hand cuts these wonderful pieces of art. A bit pricey for me but man if I had some money and a pool....

You have to check out all the styles and look at the pictures by the pool...so awesome!

Well, these were just a few of the wonderful things I found for my backyard at Artfire.

They all made me feel good today since it is soooo freakin cold! Only another month and a half and we should be smelling spring, maybe sooner, I hope!

Have a great night!

Types of Races/Bob Bull Update

I have recently posted some horse racing terms that you may see in upcoming posts on Bob Bull. Now I would like to shine some light on some different types of races that are run by these magnificent animals.

• Allowance Race: A race which has eligibility conditions to determine the horses that may enter and is not a claimer.


• Claiming Race: A race in which any horse may be purchased at a predetermined price.


• Handicap Race: A race in which weights have been assigned by the racing secretary after evaluating entrant's past races.


• Maiden Race: A race for horses which have never won a race.


• Stakes Race: Highest class of race, reserved for the best horses. Owners have to pay an entry fee or "stake" for these races.


• Derby: Stakes race for three year olds.

In horse racing they will run on one of two surfaces, dirt or turf. If it happens to rain the day of a race you will hear terms like sloppy or soft or yielding and you may see a lot of horses scratched from the race. Some horses can't run in the mud or wet surfaces, they are too slow and of coarse safety becomes an issue. If it is a beautiful dry day you will hear terms like Fast (dirt) or Firm (turf).

Bob Bull update:

Bob has adjusted just fine into his new (old) home and has starting training to run in April. He has put on weight and is around 1000 lbs. Tom says he seems to be very happy he is home and is still pretty "goofy". I will explain more of this in the next few days. I am currently working on Bob Bulls and Toms wonderful story of how Bob ended up back running with Tom.

I will be posting this story in the next few days. Please stay tuned. It is a wonderful story! Unfortunately it will be minus pictures but we are working on that right now. It's a little hard when we are 1500 miles away from each other :) but the pictures are coming!

Proud Moment

Last week Thomas starting asking me how to "make letters". He has been able to say the letters in his name for a while now, so I new it was only time but I'm thinking "you are nuts, your not even 4 yet". Well he kept asking me so I wrote the letters out in his name nice and big and showed him how to trace them. He started tracing and then lost interest and that is the last I heard of it....until today.

He was drawing and then he says "Mommy is my name right" So I go over and was expecting to see a bunch of squiggly lines and this is what I found

How cool is that! What a proud and sad moment all in one. Proud because he is growing and learning and sad because he is growing and learning.

Super Bowl, 4 Foot Sub, Wings..Oh My

For the past 16 yrs my father has ordered a huge sub for the Super Bowl. When I was in high school he used to order a 6 ft sub and now that we are grown and all moved out of the house he has downsized to a 4 ft!

As kids, we used to invite all of our friends over and have wings, pepperoni bread, chips and dip and so much more. The biggest hit was the Sub!

To this day my father still gets the sub and now my kids now enjoy their grandfathers tradition.

This is the massive sub that we always get every Super Bowl

It always has Turkey, Roast Beef and Ham.

I know this doesn't look that good but this is a bowl of hot wings that I made. My husband and Jessi LOVE hot wings.
This is the sauce that we found in AZ on our honeymoon almost 8 yrs ago. We can't get hot wing sauce like this up here in CT. So, Thanks to Jen..My husband is a very happy man this Super Bowl Sunday. We had tried soooo many different kinds of hot sauce that we can find here and nothing ever stood up to this sauce according to Mark. Jen...You made Marks Super Bowl!!! Thanks again!

Jen sent us 3 different kinds of sauce,Jalapeno hot sauce, Chipolte-Habanero hot sauce and Habanero. Can you tell which one I used? Well...It's the Habanero! It was sooo hot that Mark had 3 wings and Jessi just about made it through 1!! As you can see by her face it was HOT! They say that is the hottest of them all. After about 15 minutes she was soaking her lips in a cold drink.

I personally can't stand hot things. I can't see how you can enjoy your food when your lips and tongue are numb...this picture proves my point.
So now that we are all stuffed and in the mist of watching the Super Bowl, I have to clean up! I don't watch the game I just like to watch the commercials.

Enjoy the rest of the night!!