Harley

Harley the bald eagle was set free today at the Carpenter St. Croix Valley Nature Center in Hastings. He has been recovering for the past 6 months from a broken wing and lead poisoning. He was found by Harley-Davidson motorcyclist Brian Baladez. The bird appeared injured and unable to fly. Brian captured the bird in his leather jacket and used a bungee cord to secure it to the saddle bags of his motorcycle and drove it 50 miles to the Duluth Zoo. Harley was later taken to the Raptor Center at the University of Mn. (click pictures for larger view)


Harley is wearing a helmet to limit his visual stimulation to help keep him calm.



The eagle is being handed over to his rescuer, he is getting instructions on how to hold and release Harley the magnificent bird!
Flying towards the St. Croix river. Harley has a GPS transmitter to help learn more about eagle behavior.
http://www.theraptorcenternews.blogspot.com/

A glimpse into the making of my fused glass suncatcher

First I start by cutting a piece of amber colored glass to size. This particular piece is 1.5" x 2.5". It is put into my kiln and fired to 1500° F . The kiln needs to heat up very slowly, taking at least three hours to get to 1500°. Once the kiln reaches the desired temp, I crack open the lid to cool the kiln to 1000°. This allows the glass to stop "cooking" and start the cooling stage. Once the temp reaches 1000° you must leave the lid closed! No peeking ;) The glass sits in the kiln overnight slowly cooling down (annealing). If the glass is heated or cooled too quickly the glass could crack.



You will notice the fired glass on the right has become more translucent and the edges are rounded. This makes for a great base to decorate.




I used a purple dichroic glass which is reflective and shiny. The dichroic glass will be used for the petals. A thin round stringer is used for the stem, the center of the flower is a yellow dichroic piece.


The pieces of glass are arranged on the already fused glass base into the design of a flower. A small amount of fusing glue or white glue can be used to hold the pieces in place.



When the glue is thoroughly dry it is placed in the kiln to be fired again. This time the glass is fired to 1400° for a tack fuse leaving the flower design a little raised and not completely melted into the base piece.


The finished fused piece! The dichroic reflects an orange in this photo and in other lights it appears purple. To hang the suncatcher I drill two holes in the top with a diamond tipped drill bit, attach jump rings and a chain!



An example of a suncatcher with a chain, ready for your window!

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Chocolate Chip Cookies

Tonight I made a huge batch of chocolate chip cookies!! Halfway into it my poor electric mixer started to smoke -just a little- :O It was trying so hard to mix and I couldn't figure out why it was going so s l o w . . . I realized I had put double the recommended amount of chocolate chips!! Oooops. Well they turned out great and I expect there to be none left come Christmas night.







Mmmmm, the babies loved the cookies, look at all the chocolate !! :)

NKOTB at Mall of America

So I go to the Mall of America at 4 a.m. Friday morning (August 8 2008) to wait in line for a wristband. The wristband allows you to get autographs from The New Kids on the Block after their 5:30 performance. Yes, 5:30....p.m.!!! 13.5 hours of waiting..o.k a little longer than that because the band was delayed, but it was worth it ! Check out these shots I got of the Fab 5 :)

Cindy and I with our limited edition laminate that the boys will be signing. We also pre-ordered The New Kids on the Block CD "The Block" through Best Buy. It was the stores grand opening and the fab boy band was there to help in the celebration WoooHooo ;)

Tic-Tac-Toe. Five mic stands in a row ! !

Where's Waldo? There we are !! See the yellow arrow ? ? This area was limited to wristband wearers only

After waiting and waiting and waiting . .The hotties hit the stage! Joe, Jordan, Donnie and Danny..Jon is further to the right and obviously didn't make it into this shot !

It's Jon! Singing his heart out to all the adoring screaming fans ;)










O.K. ~ I have a favorite out of the bunch. Here he is. Joey McIntyre ♥

Yummy Danny, nice muscles ! !

I'm pretty sure that Jordan is imagining that he is kissing me :O

LOL







HEY!! Who took a picture of Donnies butt with my camera? Oh . . .I did !









Here we have Danny, Donnie -yup, he's lookin at me- and Joey. Have you had enough pictures? I didn't think so !








Danny. Again. With his muscles. Ready to sign autographs.

Jonathon looking up at the thousands of fans on levels 2, 3 and 4

* * * * * * * * * * My signed laminate !! * * * * * * * * *

I'd like to say HELLOOO to all the friendly fans Cindy and I met and chatted with!
Hi Hi

Million Inch Chain

We did it !! Cindy (pink) & I cut 8.5 inches off our hair to donate to Pantenes Million Inch Chain. They collect pony tails to make free real-hair wigs to women in need. For more information please click this link http://www.beautifullengths.com/en_US/about.jsp