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We've moved

This morning we crossed the foggy Golden Gate Bridge and made our way to Sonoma County.




A scenic vista on the way:






Our new hotel room!







The balcony is so pleasant.




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Gary Danko

We had an amazing meal at Gary Danko for our anniversary. We started with the Osetra caviar.




I had the seared Ahi Tuna.




Robert had the crispy egg.




We both had the Salmon Medallion.




I had the seared filet of beef.




Robert had the Stuffed Squab.




The cheese selection.




First dessert:




Second and third desserts:




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I need one of these little cars.



We took a bus tour yesterday.

























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We started out on the cable car. This is Lombard Street, the famous crooked street.



A view of Alcatraz.



Us in front of Alcatraz.



The Aquarium of the Bay.









View from dinner.



I see the Golden Gate Bridge peeking through the fog.



San Francisco from the water.



Alcatraz.


















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We're riding the cable cars today.



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San Francisco

Hermès is down this street. This is the view from our hotel room. Today we're going to Fisherman's Wharf and to Alioto's for dungeness crab and then to Alcatraz for the night tour.
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My glass bead adventure blog is here.

I haven't been able to get on the torch since the Gathering because my best friend from High School came to visit for a few days. I showed her how to make a bead and wanted her to try, but she was not eager to. So we had a nice time together but it didn't leave me any time for my artistic endeavors.

So our houseguest has moved on and now it's time to sit down at the torch in a serious way. My bench this morning looked like the above, so I cleaned it and now it looks like the pictures below. I needed a clean start. I even swept the floor and Robert helped me by vacuuming.

I only made a few beads, but that's OK. I warmed up by testing out one of the new Double Helix test batches I got at the Gathering. It was a quick one to sell out there, so when I got home I ordered more online. It looks amazing in the sample beads. I hope my beads come out as well.

Then after lunch I took on an off-mandrel project, which was the subject of Libby's class I took at the Gathering. The class gave me a lot more confidence with working off mandrel. I didn't feel rushed. I felt OK! It is a daisy - an off-mandrel flower with a Boston Terrier in the middle. Yellow background in the middle and white petals. I'm going to send it to my friend Cari, who has a Boston named Daisy.

Back from the Gathering

   

This is me at the torch, unlit. Whenever I go to the Gathering, I get very inspired by other people and the work that they do. Not the resulting beads themselves, but the process people go through and how much they work to achieve their end result. I really admire glass beadmakers who are artists, rather than just craftspeople. I tend to think of myself as the latter, but I aspire to be the former. I think the key difference for me is the time spent at the torch and also taking time to think about my beads and where I would like them to take me.

After every Gathering Amy and I swear we will take more time to make beads. Usually we try to get together, but this time we're going to be more realistic and each torch separately, but post to a common blog. We'll be setting up a WordPress blog where we can both post and comment on each other's work. So look for a link to that in the near future.

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Yesterday we took our bikes down to Ayer to the end of the rail trail we usually ride and rode the last four miles of it. So we have ridden the whole trail only not all at once. There are a few underpasses we go through, and each is painted with a mural. Really neat:


We rode through a pond area and saw some wildlife.










On the way home we saw skydivers coming down to earth.


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