…but i still managed to make a goddess. This is one of my daily 365 Project photos – so far i’m just loving this creativity resolution. I struggle with photography but taking a picture everyday really forces me to think about the subject, framing, etc. Hopefully by the end of the year there will be an obvious improvement…
Got this 2010 summary of my blog stats in my inbox this morning and my first reaction was: “Really??” And here I’ve been mentally beating myself up all year for not blogging more (2010 was a record low number of postings for me)… But, i’m bright enough to know that these stats aren’t due to my efforts but to you folks – my lovely readers – who visit both this blog and my Etsy store regularly even though there’s been nothing much happening in either of those places during the last year.
Sooo… first, if there’s anything you’d like to see more of on this blog, then please let me know in the comments and second, allow me take this time to say:
Finally, here’s that summary of the 2010 stats email I received from the WordPress folks:
The stats helper monkeys at WordPress.com mulled over how this blog did in 2010, and here’s a high level summary of its overall blog health:
The Blog-Health-o-Meter™ reads This blog is on fire!.
A Boeing 747-400 passenger jet can hold 416 passengers. This blog was viewed about 10,000 times in 2010. That’s about 24 full 747s.
In 2010, there were 6 new posts, growing the total archive of this blog to 125 posts. There were 14 pictures uploaded, taking up a total of 3mb. That’s about a picture per month.
The busiest day of the year was January 7th with 218 views. The most popular post that day was My Glass Beads.
The top referring sites in 2010 were europeanbling.com, facebook.com, ottawaglassbeadartists.com, artistsincanada.com, and lampworketc.com.
Some visitors came searching, mostly for goddess beads, sheba makeda, annealing glass beads, lampworking supplies canada, and annealing beads.
These are the posts and pages that got the most views in 2010.
My Glass Beads October 2007
5 comments
Lampwork Supply Sources for Canadians November 2007
2 comments
Glass Class 101: Annealing & Glass Beads January 2008
10 comments
Tales from the Torch: More pregnant goddesses July 2008
14 comments
My Studio October 2007
8 comments
batch of encased glass stringers pic run through the iphone Percolator app
Hope you all had a wonderful holiday season and are raring to go for 2011!
I’ve been pretty absent from this blog this past year… 2010 was a year of extremes for me: when things were good they were wonderful but when they were bad they really well and truly sucked. All of which apparently left my muse in such a state of confusion, she completely abandoned me which meant I had so little creative energy, I barely torched at all in 2010. And what little I did make I wasn’t terribly excited about – at least not enough to put out the effort required to photograph, blog and list everything. Artistically speaking, 2010 can be summed up for me as a great big old… “meh”.
If you’ve been following me on Facebook then you have some idea of what i’ve been up to – it so much easier to do a quick update there vs. here… Anyhoo, I’m back as my muse seems to have somewhat rejoined my world plus I’ve decided to torch regularly regardless to work through whatever creative block I’ve been experiencing… I found not torching left a big empty hole inside me that just couldn’t be filled with anything else.
Finally, this blog is due for a major overhaul. I think a new theme, some updated pages and pictures of my latest beads would do a world of good.
(Coming soon…)
It’s Michael Jackson’s funeral today and while normally i don’t pay a whole lot of attention to celebrities, this particular celebrity death is hitting me hard – a harsh combination of sorrow shadowed by guilt. 
Since the news, I’ve found myself teary-eyed and nostalgic – there isn’t a period in my life from childhood to my 20s to which an MJ song, dance move or TV appearance can’t be associated.
And i’m not the only one: in the first days, everywhere i went strangers would randomly stop to talk about how sad we all were about Michael Jackson’s sudden death. 
Family members and friends from around the world contacted me to share the news or reminisce about which moments of their lives will be forever associated with which Michael Jackson song…
If you only know the MJ of the last 20 or so years – that ghostly, surgically sculpted figure with bizarre habits and a constant subject of questionable accusations and behaviours – then you might be confused at the worldwide outpouring of grief. 
If most of these people are like me though they’re likely grieving for the other “before” Michael – the young pop star genius Michael who won every award available and completely transformed videos and the pop music scene. The one who’s every song we can identify with some significant moment in our lives since childhood – the one who we’ve always wished could have found the inner peace necessary to live a more normal and happy life – THIS Michael:
I SO wish things could have turned out differently for him. I wish he was still making music. I wish he hadn’t ruined his career. I wish he hadn’t ruined his face. I wish he was still just being fantastically talented and musically brilliant in the way only Michael Jackson (and no one else) could be.
I wish i could still listen to his music without that momentary flash of doubt and distaste. And I wish i could still feel the pure and innocent fan worship that kept this picture happily posted in my highschool locker: 
xoxo R.I.P. Michael xoxo
Do you remember this cartoon from the 70s? For some strange reason, i woke up yesterday morning with this song going over and over again in my head. That was so completely and utterly random, i of course had to go look it up online and then watch all the Youtube videos followed by several heavily nostalgic sighing moments…
I used to love this cartoon when i was little – it was so beautifully simple: every time Simon encountered a problem, he went into his room and drew a solution and his world went right back to being ok. I kind of feel like that now with my beads – no matter how stressed i am at my day job or with whatever else may be going on in my life, if i can make the time to slip into my studio for a few hours all my tension just slips away…
If this cartoon was about me it would be called : Evelyn in the Land of Lampworking and my opening song would be:
“Well you know my name is Evelyn, and my dream to be an artist came true. So i make beads, make beads, make beads and send them all over the world to live with you…”
(yes, i know it’s incredibly corny but i’m recovering from the flu and utter exhaustion post-show so allow me the luxury of this momentary bit of self-indulgence…)
Evelyn Duberry - Glass Artist 