I am now officially bead-crazy. I owe lots of photos of finished beaded objects, plus the latest felted pouch (still not felted). I made a ton of stitch markers, and they are quite pretty if I do say so myself. I enjoyed the effort of learning to work the pliers just so to twist the wires just so, the combinations of colors and themes, it was great fun. I watched "Philadelphia" while making a ton of stitch markers. No more plastic things that get lost on the needle for moi. I beaded my butt off for the past three days, I can truly say I'm hooked. And making things like stitch markers is so cheap and easy, anyone could do it. I'm very pleased with the finished products, and ready to move onto more complicated beading projects.

Tomorrow it's back to the real world.

On the subject of the real world - I live in it. I wish everybody did. The KR political discussions are driving me batty, mostly because the Bush positions are represented by women who have at best a toe (one of them) in the adult working world (and she's my son's age). The rest live in what is to me a Never-Never-Land where women think it's safe and secure and so lovely to be stay at home mommies, submissive wives, like the Bible tells them to, and they can do this forever and worry about being working adults later. And they have no clue that this administration is snickering at them behind their backs and coldly using them to score votes, and gives not the tiniest rat's ass about them.

Please note, this isn't a slam on being a stay at home mom - it's a slam on being so unrealistic that you assume this is a secure future. If you do it, enjoy it, but do it with a backup plan, and not "I'll become a knitting designer" or a ballerina or an astronaut, "after the kids grow up" unless you are already designing or dancing or in the space program and taking an LOA for raising kids. Some members of my gender make me absolutely crazy when they don't see the thin ice beneath their feet.

There is thin ice beneath their husbands' feet too, but under theirs it's even thinner, his thin ice minus their zero contribution to the family financial security and well-being creates even thinner ice, and they just don't GET this and I want to scream. Okay, thank you for letting me vent that. It's just my life experience talking. Two international corporate jobs between us when my husband got sick and the ice was still quite thin. After a few years of Bushworld, it's even thinner. Women need to think about themselves, and have a "what if" plan. It's not disloyal to their marriage, it's reality.