Sale!!

I am having a sale in my etsy shop, check it out! 25% off any order over 100.00, lots of earrings pairs, owls and goddesses!!

SATEAM blog!

I wrote a small article for the SATEAM blog, check it out! It was a lot of fun and I appreciate them putting it up for me.

Indy update .. again

Indy is perkier tonight than he's been for a while. The swelling in his neck is slowly going down, but he's rubbed it raw. I am hoping we don't get the heat wave they are predicting, the heat knocks the stuffing out of him!

Roddy (husband) was at Courtenay and Coombs rodeo's this weekend. Turns out Eazy bucked him off while trying to gather cows ..... giggle I keep telling Roddy his horse is a bubble boy, he is good at his job but ask him to do something different and well ...... that's what happens.

Indy Updated

For those of you asking about how Indy is doing he's still a very sick guy. He re lapsed Friday night and we've changed his meds yet again. The heat is really making it hard for him to stay comfortable. Today I'll have a sprinkler set up for him to try and keep him cool. Healing thoughts are much appreciated.

Bead of the Day!

My new blackbird was chosen as Bead of the Day on the Fire Diva's blog! I love making smaller beads and the birds are a challenge, it's hard to get the right amount of detail into them without overwhelming the bead. I do love making them though!

Thanks Lara Lutrick for picking my blackbird as bead of the day!

Indy update

For all of those asking how Indy is doing, he's ok. Thanks for all the healing thoughts, he's a tough guy who was very sick. He's through 1/2 his penicillin and may have to go on another 5 days of it. He'll be a pin cushion if we have to do that! Out on the back field eatting grass he's pretty happy. He cant have any dust, stress or riding for a while.

My Dream Home

My dream home, consists of a log house on the back corner of our property. It would over look a pond, the spot is currently a bit of a slew but some day we'll dig it out to be a proper pond. There would be a little dock with a studio on it. No buildings for as far as the eye can see.

On to Stettler

We headed up to Stettler for five days. We needed to let me horse's health improve so we could head home. We did some work on our indoor arena, and fixed some fencing. Trees had blown down on the fences over the winter. I'd forgotten how nice it is out there!

Stampede Art Show

We spent one whole evening wandering around the Stampede Art Show. You could spend and entire day there. Lots of talented artists! The room itself is pretty spectacular, lots of fountains and sitting areas. They had people done up like bronze sculptures, they'd sit very still for a while, then move! It startled more than one person.

Squirrels!

While hoofing it into Calgary on day two (we were late for the start) I had to stop and take this picture. A brown and black squirrel came running out of the bush and sat on the road. I love squirrels so I had to stop and grab a quick picture.

Back to Canada

Now, back to the proper order of the trip!

I flew into Calgary to meet Roddy for Cochrane rodeo and Calgary Stampede. Cochrane was a three day rodeo that was very nice. It was great to stay put for four days, all though my horses did get sick we had a great time.

We parked at Davey Shields place for a couple days and he had adorable donkeys!

The river picture is as you walk into the competitors entrance at Calgary, it's really a pretty spot.

HOT AIR balloons

I forgot my pictures of our hot air balloon ride! At the end of our Cappadocia stay Andrea decided hot air balloons were a must. I however and afraid of heights. But, being the good friend I am I decided to give it a go.

It was AMAZING! One of those great life moments, I was proud of myself for even getting in the balloon, and the view was stunning. Thanks Andrea for encouraging me to do it!

The long trip back home .......

I apologize for not getting any pictures of the LONG trip back home. It took 6 flights to get back to Canada. I flew to Calgary to meet Roddy (my husband) for a week there.

I learnt to never let someone you don't know very well book your travel plans. We could have made it back to the US with one transfer easily. Our flights were long and crowded. I was very happy to back once I hit the Calgary airport!

Boot Camp continued

After hiking down the canyon and seeing the little caves, with more fresco's and wandering the trails we headed back up. Yikes! It was hot and it was much harder going up than coming down. At the top we got ice cream, the only thing we figured was safe to eat as it was in a wrapper! Then the long drive back, which became a lot longer than we though as it wound through another small valley. We took a different route home, very pretty and different terrain. We almost wondered if we were lost at one point, the scenery looked so different.

Pictures of me, at boot camp!

Ilhara Valley (otherwise known as boot camp day!)

After the underground city we decide to drive to Ilhara Valley. What a drive it was It was a good two hours across fields and around a large mountain, but seeing the valley was well worth the drive. We took little to eat with us as we'd had no problems up till now finding decent restaurants to eat in. THIS was another trip entirely! We found no places to eat on the way down, so we snacked on our nuts and ate all our dried fruit. Once we got to Ilhara we realized we'd not be eatting their either, this was the first and only place we'd seen one of the icky toilets everyone had been warning us about. But not to worry we had our arsenal of handy wipes! Since the toilet was so icky we decided eatting there was a bad idea, so we grabbed our waters and headed down the canyon.

Underground city

The next day we went to the underground city and a beautiful valley FAR FAR away! The underground city was very interesting, we got a guide which was good because we'd have missed a lot of it on our own. Andrea ventured off through a lot of the tunnels, I stayed put in the larger rooms!

Mare and Foals

After the thunder storm left, and the sun came back out we saw a really lovely sight. Out of the caves came wandering a mare and two foals. They are the horses from a dude string that takes out trail rides.

Look close you can see them in these pictures.

One of my favorite photos

This is one of my favorite photos of the trip.

Valleys

The next day we took a drive around, we wanted to see several of the small valleys and some of the villages.

Later in the evening a thunder storm rolled in, it made for some pretty cool photos.

Fresco's

There are 100's of tiny churches in the rock caves, most for the 11th century. There were fresco's everywhere. Most of them are still very preserved and clear. Some of the faces were damaged in one of the religious upheavals, sorry I can't remember when it happened. It was a very humbling experience to be in something so old, with so much history.

The "interesting" rock

This rock we found interesting ........... for obvious reasons!

Cappadocia and the caves!

Cappadocia is a region in Turkey known for it's caves. There are caves everywhere, and these fairy towers that are just the coolest shapes and colors. Here's several photos of different rock formations from that area.

ON the Fire Diva's blog today!

I got a feature on the Fire Diva's blog today!! Thanks Eileen! Check it out!

Cappadocia

Then we flew to Cappadocia, what a stunning area! The original hotel was discusting! ICK ICK ICK! Filthy dirty, so we decided to go to a hotel Ozen had recommended called Serinn House, it was amazing! It was a cave hotel but more like our own little spa!

When we arrived Fundik met us at the gate, she's the owners little dog. Her name means Chestnut in Turkish. She was very sweet, I think she sense we were stressed and cuddle up to both of us while we called our husbands to tell them about out detour to a different hotel.

The bridge!

There are two huge bridges in Istanbul, and most people know I am afraid oh heights. We drove over the bridge one day with Pinar and Ilkner and it wasn't too bad. When we went out to dinner with Pinar and her husband this night we saw that they have lights on the bridge. They change color ever 3 min or so, it was very pretty and some how made the bridge slightly less scarey!

Random Pretties

We saw this really cool wooden door along the wall of what looked like another palace. We couldn't figure out how to get in it! A beautiful butterfly along a wall. Pretties everywhere!

Blue Mosque

The next day we spent wandering around Istanbul. We went to the Blue Mosque, Topkapi Palace and peeked in some shops. I loved the garden in Topkapi Palace, it was cool and very pretty. The guards at the gate with guns were a bit scarey though!

Hand Carvings

Pinar took us to a factory where they do hand carving on glass. A gentleman that I believe said he'd been doing it for 40 years did a quick demo for us. His work was lovely! They were happy to do a sand blasting demo for us too.

After this Pinar took us for lunch and then to the Grand Bazaar, it was a busy day!

Old Glass Furnace

The Glass Furnace has a old furnace similar to the first ones ever used for bead making. In it these beads were made!

The Dock!

As we wandered around the Glass Furnace we found the dock! You can cross the river on a tiny little rope ferry and on the other side you can ride horses!!!

Starting from the right of the photo myself, Ilkner, Andrea and Pinar. They were so nice to show us around all day!