Bethjoy.com

While on our California trip we entered a store that sold the most beautiful pictures. They were embroidered with silk threads on silk cloth on the effect was absolutely stunning. Some of the pictures, like their prices, were huge. Far surpassing the beauties of oil paintings the pictures seemed to capture light and hold it captive so that as you moved a shine greeted the eye where ever it looked.

After oohing and awing over the multi-thousand dollar pictures I thought it would be wonderful to have one so I walked over to the \”inexpensive\” section and looked at the $150.00 pictures where were probably about seven inches square. And I looked at them. They were pictures of just a simple flower. And I thought, \”I could do that.\” And yesterday, I proved it!

True, this is nothing so gorgeous as the pictures we saw there but considering the fact that the design I used was from a dollar coloring book and used to be a color by number design. Considering the fact that I was just using embroidery thread I already had. Considering the fact that instead of spending the year it would take an artist to do one of those gorgeous embroidered pictures and I only spent one afternoon. Considering that I had almost no clue of what I was doing and had no instruction book whatsoever and was just operating with the TLAR method (That Looks About Right). Considering the fact that I only figured out what I was doing about halfway into the project… I think I did okay. Any way, it didn\’t cost me $150.00 and I’ll enjoy it just as much if not more so I\’m very happy about that.

There it is! My “Yellow Rose Not From Texas”. Pretty isn’t it? I’ve already started on another picture from the same coloring book.

I thought I was very clever the way I solved one problem that arose during the making of the rose. I was trying to trace the design from the coloring book onto the fabric. If you have ever tried tracing you will know that the thicker and harder to see through the paper, the harder it is trace. Most fabrics are challenging to see through. The blue fabric I chose was no exception. After a great deal of time spent trying to see through it I suddenly remembered a behind the scenes video I’d seen on a disney DVD. It was of the animators drawing there cartoons on a lighted panel so that the drawing below could be seen plainly through onto the page above it. Not having a lighted surface to draw on I improvised. I had a desk lamp that was \”flexible\” and after putting the fabric on top of that which I was to trace and holding it to the light and being pleasantly greeted by an excellantly rendered image of a rose, I began to seek some flat surface that would allow light through. Tracing on a round light bulb did not seem like a good idea. So I found a plastic lid to a small xtorage pin and the lid let enough through for me to trace so sitting on the bed with the lamp on it\’s side and kind of in my lap, balancing a lid on my knees I isolated the coloring book page and began the delicate process of tracing. I’m terrible at drawing but fortuantely I\’m not too bad at tracing so the task was completed without too many mistakes. I thought I was very clever with the way I solved the tracing issues:)

Also, I pulled out my camera for the first time in about a year. That is a good sign of things to come!!! I think I may try taking pictures of things I make now so that even after I give them away I\’ll know what it was I made:)

I have just spent nine days in California. Or it was really more like seven days in california with two days of flying to and back from it but the total trip length was nine days.

The first stop was the home of my good friend Sarah Massatt where I proceeded to make a movie with her, her brothers, and one of my brothers. I enjoy saying “I went out to California and made a movie”. Actually I now can say I’ve made three movies in California as this was the third VonFange/Massatt Movie collaboration and it was quite fun. I played the role of Zanara, Lady of Fire. It was a different role for me because she wasn’t a princess and was actually a villainess of sorts. The whole movie was unusual in that it had no real hero or good guys in it and was some what of a tragedy. But it was quite funny with many comic misfortunes falling upon the heads of the evil king who was the main character.

After a pleasant visit at the Massatts we traveled North to the real purpose of our trip, the 2007 Von Fange Family reuinion. We have a family reunion once every two years so it is quite special. Although everyone had backed for hot, sunny california, the whether was cold and cloudy. Yes, it even happens in California by the sea. I wore the same pair of long pants all three days and gazed wistfully at my beautiful new sandles and capri sets I’d purchased. The final day I just caved in and wore my sandels so I could show off their pretty new stylishness. They have the special “Wedge” heel which is quite fun and stylish.

The visit was very fun. I heard a lot about my grandfather who died before I was born and about how creative he was. He could just take miscellaneous spare parts stored in the garage and build an air conditioner that would cool said garage. He could make wonderful things and deeply loved his children, His sister came to the family reunion and told many stories about him which were very interesting to hear. Once there was a bicycle race in town but he didn’t have a bycicle, so he built one! And he won the race!

While at the family reunion we went to see a large aquarium that had many spectacular varieties of sea life in it. There was one fish, I think it was the sun fish, that just didn’t look real! It was so strange and weirdly shaped it looked like something out of a cartoon. And a mature adult one of those, I was told, could be ten feet long… I wouldn’t particularly want to meet one. I also got to see a tuna fish. When I think of tuna fish I think of small cans and sandwhiches and since the pictures on the small cans show small fish I naturally assumed that the tuna fish was a small fish…It is not a small fish! I’ve now seen several in person and the smallest of them would make a whole lot of little cans of tuna fish!!!

After much memory sharing, visiting, and sightseeing my immediate family and I drove to Yosemite to see the big trees and other things in the park. We drove through many beautiful mountainous ways and beautiful valleys as we went into the park. I regret to state that I was either asleep or playing my Gameboy Advance through most of it which was how I handled just about all of my California traveling time. I did think most of what I saw was very impressive though.

I enjoyed the gift shop. Many beautiful and interesting objects were there, like a hat that looked it had a raccoon perched on top and a very pretty purple pencil case… and I didn’t buy anthing there. It was astounding, my entire personal spending on the trip was less than four dollars, most of which was spent on gifts for other people. Pretty much all I got for myself was a $0.51 squashed penny of the big trees at Yosemite.

Oh the trees! They were indeed magnificent and very, very, very big. Coming back here the trees look quite a bit smaller in comparison. THe main thing about this was that we actually hiked about four miles amongst the trees. To anyone who knows me they will know that this was a really, really big thing for me to do. Especially since I did it with very little “I’m tired and ready to go back now”. Pretty much I only did that three times. The first was mild when we reached the agreed on stopping and turning around point and it was desired to go on, and I was the one who said it was okay with me to go on. The second was a lot further on when I was getting tired and a saw a way to the return path and didn’t think that the trail was leading where it actually did. THe third time was a ways later when it really was time to be heading back and I had no interest in going further and seeing the clothespin tree as the loving couple was quite enough for me and I would have been perfectly content to just have seen the grizzly giant which was the first landmark tree we had seen.

After Yosemite it was time to drive back to the Los Angelous area to get to the air port we were flying out from. And we encountered traffic in LA… After spending an hour to go about two miles we have decided that the traffic at home is actually very nice and fast moving and not so bad really.

At long last we returned home and I am quite happy to be here. I hadn’t used the internet since I’d left so naturally I was very eager to rush to the websites I’d been missing and find out what had been going on in my absence. Now I just neeed to unpack and do a myriad of other far more important things than what I’ve been doing… So this is enough posting for now.

In breaking news, I\’ve now been in a state of unwellness for one month. The state of unwellness is not very serious though but as it gives me an excuse for excessive video game usage and movie watching I haven\’t been in too much of a hurry to get well for some odd reason…

In other news, despite being ill, I made my own version of Princess Leia\’s Bespin outfit which has a very interesting cape. I\’m hoping soon to sew a really neat outfit of black and orange which I can wear for villainess roles, should I wish to play any. As in most of my movies I play all of the roles I generally end up playing both the heroine and the antagonest so I thought it would be neat to have a suitable outfit for that purpose.

I\’ve done almost no writing lately but I\’m hoping to change that. In the past few days I actually have done some writing primarily because it is time to write the script for the third Massatt/Von Fange movie collaboration. As is usual Joshua Massatt has written the plot and I am adapting it for the screen. I still have a lot of work to do on the script but it promises to be very funny, especially the council scene were the refreshments have been sprinkled with a substance that makes everybody think they are speaking normally while they are actually saying completely silly things.

Perhaps the most exciting thing to happen lately.. Well, not the most exciting (that would probably be my throwing up, twice, last month or maybe buying my latest video game) but the most unusual thing to happen lately was that last week my parents took in for a check up, and (large gulp) for a blood test. Mother was concerned I might be anemic (Most, if not all, mothers would be concerned if their daughter was unwell for a month). We entered the building, filled out large quantities of paperwork(well, actually just two pages) and waited for a while. Then I was called and shown to a small room(Mom came with me) while the nurse asked a few questions. Mother said that we were there for a blood test for me. The nurse nodded and promptly picked up an apparatus from the table and walked towards me. One end of it was a largish kind of box with gages on it and the other end of it was long pointy, and larger than I liked, object.

Mom says I jumped back several inches when this approached me. I doubt this since I was already seated firmly in my seat but I definitely shrank back suddenly and quickly thinking \”Oh no this is it!\”. However, to the nurses great amusement, this was not the device to test my blood. The long and thin piece was supposed to go in my mouth under my tongue and it\’s purpose was merely to take my temperature. I relaxed, slightly.

A little later the doctor came, Mom had chosen a pleasant female doctor for me to see, and when she asked my about my past medical history it was limited to my having fallen, cut my head, and had three stitches when I was five. And that was the last time I\’d been examined by a medical professional so it was no wonder I cringed at the sight of the thermometer thingy.

Several questions were asked and we spent some time talking about my symptoms and possible things that could be wrong with me. She then used her stethoscope to listen to me in a few places and then it was off to… to extract some blood.

Um… I was nervous. I wasn\’t terrified but I certainly wasn\’t calm. I was told it wouldn\’t hurt… I was told you just looked the other way and thought about something else. I was led to the laboratory where the nurse was waiting. She gave me an object to squeeze so my veins would show. I explained about being very nervous though I was sure there was nothing to be nervous about. Mom was still with me, I was glad about that.

The nurse examined my left elbow on the side where the elbow isn\’t. or I mean where I bend at…. Oh never mind. Where ever it was she examined it and dabbed it with antiseptic and then began taking out some equipment and I began looking the other way and thinking about my Gameboy advance and the twenty dollars I\’d put in my purse to buy myself a reward for standing the ordeal I was going through. In retrospect I probably should have been thinking about a Bible verse or praying as that would have been more Christain like… I\’ll try to remember that for next time.

My tolerance for pain, on a scale to one to ten, would probably be 0.2. Which is why a very minor illness like what I\’ve had could effectually hold me for a month in a state of unwellness. The nurse told me the blood sucker thing(she did not describe it thusly) would just a pinch a little bit. And I\’m sure it did only pinch just a little bit, but I felt more than just a little bit. I looked the other way and held still. Though accidently, forgetting myself, I briefly looked over to my left and and instantly looked back to my right as I suddenly remembered why I wasn\’t supposed to look at my left. Still, it was soon over and nothing had been dreadful and all was in fact quite easy and so forth though I was still in a state of shock and though everything had been quite easy I was still tense and in a state of after shock and… I had briefly seen the container of my blood sample and it was a lot larger than I thought it would be. Besides, the blood hadn\’t been tested yet so I still didn\’t know whether I was anemic or whether there was some large problem wrong with me or whether I\’d have to do more tests or… Anyway the nice thing about being nervous is that the nurse gave me a fun circus band aid. Andrew who had come in for a shot only got a plain ordinary boring band aid.

My resounding battle cry after this event was \”Shopping!!!\” but when the time for shopping came I actually didn\’t buy anything… For one thing, they didn\’t have the game I wanted. And for another thing frugality was coming back to me and I didn\’t really think I ought to spend twenty dollars for a game since I had just purchased $50.00 worth of games that month. Of course, I called it \”Pain Medication\” at the time of purchase. And both the games I got where very effective as such.

But back to the test. Today Mom got a telephone message to call the doctors office about my blood test. As it came on our business line and my brother works there his wife Erin came in to tell Mom about the message. She also mentioned that if things are normal they usually just send you a letter instead of a phone call. I think mother was a little worried. I intentionally was thinking about the Massatt Movie Script I was in the process of writing. Mom quickly dialed the number but everyone was out to lunch.

However, when she called back later and got some one we found out my test results. It was along the line of: No diabeties, No kidney problems, no anemia… In short, I was fine. From my blood sample I had no major problems. Mom was very happy and I was happy so thus ended my adventure with the doctors office, at least for now.

In further news I have recently discovered the world of Pokemon. I\’ve been aware of its existence for years though it had not affected me at all and I had never been interested in it. But that changed when I purchased Pokemon Leaf Green for my game boy advance. It\’s a really fun game that I have used extensively in the fifteen days since I got it. The past few days I haven\’t used it much since I\”m trying to do things other than play games all day but it certainly took me on a time warp through over sixty hours of game time. Its a very fun game:) I especially like the Rapidash I caught and I\’ve caught over 100 pokemon so far!!! I\’ve more or less won the game though there still are things to do, like leveling up my Pokemon:)

In other news I did a very interesting mathematical problem. I was reading The Total Money Makeover Book by Dave Ramsey and noticed his example on a fifteen year home mortgage, comparing it with a 30 year mortgage. The 15 year mortgage was for $110,000.00 and the payment was roughly $1,000.00 a month with yearly interest of 7%. So I wondered what would happen if $1,000.00 a month was saved in CD\’s at 5% compounded annually in a bank for fifteen years. And do you know what I got? $283,889.93 at the end of fifteen years. That is a difference of $173,889.93 between that and $1,000.00 a month for a mortgage. Amazing what happens when your money works for you instead of paying someone else. And something else interesting, Even if you only saved $500.00 a month in the CD\’s at the end of fifteen years you\’d still have more than $110,000. It would be $141,944.96. $30,000 more at only half the monthly payment… You can probably guess which method I\’m using for home purchasing!!!

Of course, all of that doesn\’t include inflation or house values going up but I still think one could buy a fairly nice little home with that money. Now all I have to do is find a husband with a good job, who is good at saving his money and most importantly is a good Christain and… Well, I am saving money now but I\’d rather have him do most of it:)

In even further recent breaking news… The Jacuzzi of the house next door that my parents bought six years ago has just been put into working order. I have recently started going up there a lot and today Mom bought me a little friend to have up there with me, a killer whale named Shamu. He is 50something inches long and from the dollar store. I was impressed that such a large inflatable pool toy could purchased at the dollar store. Shamu is quite nice and fun to play with. I\’ve also gotten two new very pretty swimsuits! One is pink and the other is a mixture of colors. The are both the same pattern/type as far as shape goes and have pretty skirts. I like being modest so I like swimsuits with skirts. Finding a swimsuit with a skirt is easy compared to finding one with a high enough neckline for me so I fortunately already had a nice plum colored T-shirt to wear underneath my swimsuit for suitable modesty. A Jacuzzi can be fun. I call it the pool though, just to make it sound larger. My Dad and brother Andrew spent a lot of time and effort to clean it out(six years without cleaning or a cover…) and it is a testimony to the success of their effort that I would actually even think about getting in it considering how green was the bottom before.

We cooked out there tonight and had hot dogs and hamburgers. My Dad also got a new grill. I anticipate many more evenings together with my family up there with the new grill, Jacuzzi, and patio furniture.

Hmm, that just might wrap things up. I think I\’ve written a nice long post and hopefully I\’ll write them more often(no promises though) so I don\’t have a ton of news to post when I finally do post. Have a nice day!