the time has come...

i decided i am done. after much going over the pros and cons, i have decided to stop working at the salon altering bridal dresses. i had been thinking of stopping for some time, but after a particularly rough week, and trying times with a couple of "bridezillas", and some other deciding factors coming into play, i decided it was time. i have also been steadily increasing in calls for my own things, both in general alterations and bellydance costuming, so it seemed silly to put off my business for someone else's. i will miss the girls i work with, they are a lovely group of girls. i will not, however, miss dealing with the brides. i am looking forward to a new freedom to play in my garden and cook more, and also paint some rooms in my house that have neede my attention for some time now! actually, i have quite a list going, of projects that i want to do but needed time!

"latin spice" performance at priya's indian restaurant for OLA

monday night, we performed our new choreography with our newest costume for the first time. it was at an indian restaurant for the ottoman trading company's women's club, "ottoman's womens auxiliary", or OLA. it was lots of fun, and went pretty well i think, but of course there were a couple of fist time rough spots. we will be performing this routine at a couple more places, and then at medfest (the mediterranean fantasy festival) in july.

these shots are some a friend of our's took and graciously sent on to me. i was very happy with how the costumes turned out...the skirts flew so nicely!

i will post a sidebar, eventually, with some of our "latin spice" performance dates and locations. i will also be putting up some favorites again like before. i am still trying to work out what kind of direction to take the blog in. i am thinking it may be similar to before, kind of eclectic, but less focused on bridal stuff. i will still put up pictures of a particularly spectacular dress of course! i will probably just keep people guessing!

i am in the process of re-vamping this poor, much neglected blog. i changed the background, and it made all the sidebars go away, but i was needing to get into them and change things anyway. there were some links that no longer worked, and some that i had not looked at for a very long time too, so i don't know if those were there as well!

i am deep into the wedding season again, and if that were not enough, i have been working on my own things, and also helping out my friend at her turkish shop in country willage. here are some quick shots i took in the shop...

it has been fun, and interesting. i went last month to a big bellydance festival in portland oregon, to help vend for the shop, but i forgot my camera, so i do not have any pictures of it! it was great fun, and i came home with a giant bag of fabrics to make into dance costumes!

i almost forgot...the last post i mentioned we had gone to "paradise". we went to hawaii! it was so beautiful, it seemed exactly like what you would imagine paradise to be like! here are a couple of pictures of "paradise".

hi everyone, i am still around! i realised i haven't posted anything for nearly two months! lots of stuff has been going on...i went to 'paradise' for a week, i will post more about that later, and some more photos. i am going to start working in my friend dena's turkish shop, ottoman trading company, that will be interesting! and of course, i am still dancing, and then, there are 'the dresses'! speaking of which, there is one calling to me right now. i have not been taking pictures of them lately, since it has been dreary out and they don't photograph well in the dank darkness of the work studio these days. ok, i am off to work!

joy to the world!

no, not the christmas one, the one from "three dog night"! you know...

jerimiah was a bullfrog, and a good friend of mine, i never understood a single word he said but i helped him drink his wine. and he always had a mighty fine wine!

anyway, i have been listening to my "three dog night" cd in my car lately, and it always makes me think of when i was a kid. i loved the song "shambala" too. at the time some of the songs came out, i was just starting to listen to this kind of 'grownup' music, and they were some of my favorites. the joy to the world song always makes me remember a great childhood memory of the best slumber party i ever went to. we stayed up all night, telling ghost stories, and then we watched this movie, "the innocents". and it scared us all to death! there were some of the girls who left the room, and refused to watch the rest of it because they were too frightened. i found it and watched it years later, and wondered why it scared us so badly, but i still like it! here is a youtube of some scenes from the movie.



it had a kind of spooky song that was the theme song for the movie too. after we watched the movie, we went swimming in the pool in the families backyard. someone stood out in the middle of the pool, and then someone yelled, "it's the lady in the lake!" and we all ran back into the house, and wouldn't swim anymore that night! i guess we finally fell asleep, and then when we woke up, the mom had made us little homemade doughnuts! yum!

that is one of the amazing things about music, and movies too, huh? they can bring a flood of memories back, sometimes they are good ones...sometimes not so good. these both brought back good stuff!

i got psyched..or is it "sike!"

remember that? when we were kids, someone told you something, and gets you to believe one thing, and then they went, "sike! fooled you!" well, i think that's what my garden did! i was out talking to my neighbor this past week, and we were looking at our yards discussing the dismal nature they were in after all the winter snows (mine sooo much more than her's! her house is usually the one pictured in the some of the snow pictures i have posted in the past, since she is right across the street, and her yard is always so tidy) but we were happily noticing some of the plants budding out, both thinking 'spring cannot be far behind'! my lilac bush has tiny leaves on it, and my roses are covered with little buds starting to come out. the hydrangea i thought was surely dead, also has leaves coming out. and then, it came...

more snow. well, i can't complain so much...i have seen pictures of other places like saskatchewan and ontario that has snow over the height of the roof! amazing! how do people do it when there is so much snow!?! we get this little bit, and i can't even get the car out of the driveway! lol! a mustang is definately not a snow vehicle! i am thinking when the spring comes, i will be able to start with a fresh canvas, so to speak, since many of the things in my yard don't appear to have made it. but maybe, spring will come and they will pop up and go, "sike! here i am!"

i can hope! i think gardeners are ever the optomists, always knowing that spring brings fresh hope.

tuesday nights are the best!

has anyone else been watching this show, "fringe"? i LOVE this show! it is like a freaky x-files, which i also loved at the beginning seasons, before it became totally about conspiracies. i like the interesting characters, but especially walter bishop, the scientific genius that spent several years in a mental institution until this government group decided it required his special brand of services. his son, peter is necessary to the plot, because without his permission, walter would not have been allowed out, and peter is required to "babysit" his father while he is out of the institution. but they have been estranged for a long time, and peter has a shady background also, so their relationship is odd, but they work together very well. and we often find out that peter's father ofter used him in his 'experiments' when he was a child! then, there are of course the government agents that are investigating the weird phenomenon, and sometimes the good guys are not always the good guys they seem to be! except for agent olivia dunham, she is always a 'good guy'! and tough...you know i love those tough girls! and charlie...i think charlie will always be a good guy, at least i want him to be, i like charlie.

the characters are only some of the interesting parts of the show...there is weird stuff happening all the time, and that is what the government group investigates, the weird stuff. i am totally hooked on this show, but it is a little too weird for my family. they don't do the sci-fi much anyway, they want 'believable'. sometimes reality isn't very believable, and you don't want it to be real anyway! one really good thing is, during 'fringe', the commercials are shown for only 60 or 90 seconds! how cool is that?!

Johnny Quest original opener

i used to LOVE this show as a kid! we recently got a new dish for the television and there is a network that plays classic cartoons, and jonny quest is on it. my girls just roll their eyes at me. i liked herculoids and space ghost too...they do have herculoids but not space ghost.

for the love of bread

i love bread...i REALLY love bread! every time i try to lose weight, that is the last thing i will give up. giving up bread is just a no go for me! i love tortillas, here are some that i made, and i have been making these since i was a kid, so i make pretty good tortillas. no store-bought tortillas for this girl! (o.k., so in an emergency i would eat a store-bought tortilla...hee, hee!)



and i love beignets...these are just fine to make out of the box. the cafe du monde ones are just as fabulous as the ones that need to sit overnight!

i think you an guess how i feel about scones...mmm. pink sugar sprinkled ones,

almond scones and date-nut scones,

and pumpkin scones.

here is an amish friendship bread cupcake/muffin that i make sometimes...i eat these till i am sick! i usually put choclate chips and coconut into them, that's why i am not sure whether to define them as a cupcake or muffin!

and then, there is the best of all...pan dulce! heavenly. i don't ever make this myself though, and i don't know of anyone in my family, not even my grama, that has ever tried to.

not only does bread taste really good, it is fun (and theraputic!) to make. there were times that i was really worked up about something and needed to make dinner, and made tortillas to go with it...by the time they were done cooking, after all the kneading and rolling, and turning, i was all mellowed out and happy again! then, you get to EAT your therapy!

i actually have a bread machine, one of those monsters that sit on the counter and eat up a ton of space, and i have used it a few times, but it's really not the same. there isn't the same satisfaction of the bread machine bread for me. sure it tastes o.k...it tastes like fresh home-baked bread, but it is such a boxy, brick-shaped loaf of bread, and i don't think i have the settings right, since it still comes out a little darker than i like. and there is zero therapy factor with the bread machine...no pummeling the big blob of dough into submission, that's the part that gets all the aggression out!

so, with all the bread love, i have another great blog to share...a bread blog! it is called for the knead for bread. cute huh!? i go over to that blog, and just get hungry! then i want to bake bread! go have a look too, and see if you don't get hungry! i think that i want to try the crackle bread, and the corn jalapeno lava bread too. they both sound very delicious. i think i made myself hungry now just writing this!

trying to tear myself away from the t.v. and go do something as boring as work, after watching our new President inaugurated. so exciting! what a great day for our nation, to start a fresh new year with this man in the white house.

i have been feeling like i don't have much of interest to say, so not many posts in 2009 so far. i have been working on some of my turkish scarf skirts like in a previous post, the last of 2008, but i also have gone back to jewelry-making again...i just love it so much! both the making and the jewelry. i made a few earrings, and was going to post pictures, and then post them in my etsy shop, but the camera batteries died...i will get more today and post those soon.

all it took to have the jewelry bug bite again, was "cleaning out" my bead closet. yeah, i neither cleaned it out, nor did i find what i was looking for, the thing that started the cleaning out process! but one pair of the earrings went as a gift to the lady that held the event this past weekend that we danced at, the spice box theatre. she really liked them, and was actually happy to find out that i made them! she said it makes them more special...that is nice to know! it was a fun time, too, dancing at this venue! i was a little apprehensive, as it was changed from the original spot where it was when we first booked it. it was now at a night club, on a raised stage, but it turned out to be quite less intimidating that i had thought! there was lighting on the stage that made it difficult to see the audience, so i could pretend they we not there! i could just pretend we were dancing in my little space downstairs where we practice, and always do pretty well! i haven't seen video of the performance yet, but hopefully it looks as good as we felt that night.

then after, we went to a place to have a late night bite, and it had 24 hour breakfast. we will definately be going back there, since the food was pretty good, and they had huge portions, always a neccessary thing for hubby. the place was called the hurricane cafe in seattle. anyway, we both liked it enough to decide to try it again, which does not ususally happen...that is just waaaay too long a story to get into!

creature features

when i was a kid, there was a show on that i just loved...creature features. it came on a local channel, channel 2 in oakland, california, and it showed all sorts of monster movies and sci-fi and b-movies. it was probably one of my very favorite shows ever. this man was the host, bob wilkins. he was a quiet guy that didn't seem to go with the monster movies and other things that were on the show, but yet oddly he did. well, he unfortunately passed away this week. i have a bob wilkins link in the sidebar that you can look at a fan blog about him, "bob wilkins, the man behind the cigar" and you can also go here, bob wilkins official website to find out more about him. he will be missed.

i was working on some of these little skirt things (at far left) for my friend's shop, ottoman trading company, and while i was downloading photos, i realized this year i have sewn soooo many things! and i now own an abundance of costumes, some not yet worn even. my favorite is still my first one, shown at the top on the right.

can you believe that tomorrow is already new year's eve? i really can't, and i am excited by the prospect of going to a big party at ottoman too! it will be so much fun, and there are some wonderful dancers scheduled to dance...i feel very humbled to be dancing in the same venue too! i have my costume all clean, and packed, and ready to go, and tomorrow i plan to go help set up. (i went there yesterday and was pretty amazed at the amount of snow piled at the sides of the parking lots!) then, hopefully, i will get a few moments to practice before, but we practiced a few times in the last couple of days and felt good about it...i think we will do well.

man, i hate snow. it snowed AGAIN today. snow sucks! here it is falling again...my sister said i should do a rain dance. i will try anything at this point!

and then here is more white. (i promise to cease and desist with whining about the snow, or as we have been not so affectionately referring to it in our house, the bleeping snow...insert expletive of your choice.) i started in on some more wedding dresses again, although they have been hanging in my work studio for a while now. they are for 'next year'...next year is in less than a week now!

this one is a reem acra, it has lots of pretty beadwork on the top. it needed the shoulder straps shortened, and the hemlines all taken up. i have been working on general alterations and belly dance things for so long, it felt nice to rip into a big white dress again!