Update

Okay, so no pix tonight....my bad.  It's been a long day.  Hope everyone had or wished a member of the military a Happy Veteran's Day!  And yesterday was the 235th birthday of the Marine Corps, Semper Fi!

Now that that's out of the way, time to get down to business.  I bought a TON of stuff today at Michael's (20% coupon!) and already made a Chrstmasy-looking red bracelet with green dangles, and a dyed howlite necklace on leather cord.  It's my first time using leather cord, so that was a bit of an interesting experience! 

I got down to this one bit of howlite and the cord just stopped partway through.  Rather disconcerting.  So I finally peered through the hole and discovered it was uneven.  So I went downstairs to see if my dad had a drill tip small enough to straighten the hole out.  He did, looked at the stone and said it looked straight to him.  But he gave it to my brother, since his eyes are younger and therefore better.  So I followed my brother, threatening him that if he broke it, he was buying me a whole new strand.  He looked at the bead and proclaimed it to be "not straight."  I said something along the lines of, "I'll alert the media!"  Case in point, he did straighten the hole--without breaking anything--and now I owe him a chocolate milkshake.  The necklace is complete, and all is slightly better with the world.  Now I just need to get my act together with my shop!