So I’ll have to say that a lot has been going on because usually I can’t stand still and keep things moving along. lol. For Dana Arts I keep myself busy. I always have and will continue to do so. I’m a small business that is just me and my determination, passion and love for what I do that will keep it going no matter what. I have to admit that the past 5 or 6 months have been more than slow as far as sales go, but I continue to try and find ways to come up with new ideas, improve the website, or as of lately planing to do more video about what I’m up to. I have a few pendants that I think are really cool that will come out for the next few months as my newest featured items that you can usually see when they come out from the banner at the top of the webpage. I try and come up with ideas of what I think is cool. There have been times when a customer had an idea that we worked together on and are now available for sale. If you’d ever are inspired just let me know. I can do custom unique pieces just for you or we can work it out to put it into my line of jewelry. My shop is a bit cluttered right now. I have a 12’x12’ shed that I work out of right now. It has all my equipment for jewelry, gardening tools, and wood working tools. Oh an a lot of vw bug parts all over the place mixed in with everything.

So the shop has been real messy lately as I have been working more on my vw bug engine than jewelry. Ever since the fire I’ve been slowly trying to get parts and now cleanup to get this thing running again. So far I’ve managed to pull the engine from the car. (my first time ever doing so). Now I’ve been tearing it apart. I’ve managed to paint a few tins and am currently working on cleaning up other tins for painting. Next I’ll clean up the engine bay and then re wire the car. After that I plan to assemble the engine and put it back in. I want to test it to see if I can get it running again. If it does then I can work on the seats, windows, and the rest of the car to make it usable again. I just want to know if it can run before I spend the time fixing up the rest. The sad thing is that I am not going to be able to restore the whole car as it should be. I can’t replace the pans right now that have holes in them. I can’t do a lot of things that should be done since the car is stripped down to nothing. I don’t have the money to put into it, so I just want it running and drive able again. This way I can enjoy it once again even thought it won’t be perfect. It’s just a joy to drive my 67 VW bug. My first car. It’s a big fun project that I will share more about down the road.

The garden is doing well. After the last frost I pulled out all the tomato plants and basil. Right now I have onion, yarrow, mint, carrots, a few types of lettuce, bak choi, thyme, cilantro and a few other small plants and herbs. It’s starting to warm up a bit and I have planted a few carrots, celery, squash and more. It may not be the right time for some of these, but I will replant if nothing shows up. Already we have tons of tomatoes popping up from the old tomatoes. Same thing with the basil. It’s like a weed. I plan to keep the garden area a bit more clean this year. We’ll see how it goes. My henna plant may have died in the frost because it got frosted when my cover blew off it. Hopefully it survives. I could go on and on, but that’s just a small update on the garden.

Garden Area in the back and the fire ring up close to us.

The Garden House. It has begun. Yes the day we have been waiting for for almost 2 years now. The pad was built a few weeks ago and then it rained for a week. Now that it’s dry again the footing was just poured Friday the 16th of February 2024. I look forward to seeing the next steps and progress of the build. To get to this point felt like it would never happen. I did have to change the plans and lower the pitch of the roof from a 9:12 to a 6:12 because it just plainly cost too much. I also had to modify the foundation a bit to save some money. We are happy that our builder is our next door neighbor. He is amazing and so helpful. I would love to post about this whole journey someday. It’s a blessing that I’d love to share with everyone, but for today I’m just keeping it simple and letting you know that it has begun. Within six months we should be in our new home.

Live is full of ups and downs. I know that nothing lasts and I’m sure hard times and good times come and go. I just know that if we keep God close to us we will be able to get though anything, appreciate life and see the light as we progress through life. Our outlook on life will be different and we will have greater peace within our life and that energy will show. I will keep everyone updated now and then on mainly the house, garden and of course Dana Arts. Take care and I’ll talk with you again soon.

So when I was 16 I got this 1967 light blue VW bug as my first car. I loved this car. I even took my drivers test in it to get my license. Through the years I have created so many memories with this little car. As I got older and moved to Arizona I brought it with me. I got married and still drove this car everyday to work. After about 20 years of driving it I had to get the engine rebuilt, but could not at the moment. It sat in my garage for about 8 years. I finally had got the engine rebuilt and it was great. Now my son was old enough to drive. I taught him how to drive it and he drove it to work and to school half the week. I always thought that would be cool to have my first car be my son’s first car. Well now my daughter is learning to drive and should be getting her license this week. I started teaching her how to drive the bug. She did very well for the little time she drove it. Well the way life works is when it rains it pours. We have our main car in for repair. My car needs repair so I had to drive the Bug to work this week. We’ll on my way I was just getting off the freeway and I was only about five minutes from work. On the off ramp I heard a loud POP sound. I looked back quickly and saw the deck lid bounce up and then a large amount of white smoke started to come out of the engine. I pulled over and the smoke turned black and then flames were overpowering the engine. The person behind me stopped and called the emergency for me. I am thankful for her because I was too sad to think of who to call. Not in the right state of mind. Another person pulled over and had a fire extinguisher. We tried to put it out and could not. The fire would keep going and restart. So we watched it burn. While we waited for the fire engine to arrive the fire moved to the inside of the car. So very sad to see so many memories fade away. It kinda also reminds me of Paradise and all the memories that I had growing up there. All just memories now. I’m safe and that is what matters most. I had the car for 33 years. It’s just sad to see it go. I think I will try and sell it all as is and if there are no takers I will just strip it for parts and sell them off. Not sure what else I could do. It would cost too much to rebuild. Maybe someone else can put their heart and soul into it. It was an awesome car. So sad to see it go.

10/28/22

After a lot of thought I feel like I just can’t let go after 33 years and it being my first car. I want to rebuild this. My envision is to keep some of the battle wounds and keep the bunt body if I can and seal it like that. I hope to find time over the years to buy parts to slowly rebuild it. I guess this is a good time to redo the pans that have holes in them. I have a lot to learn. I need to learn to weld and how to rebuild a car. If anyone would like to donate to the cause I’d sincerely appreciate it. Hopefully my kids and I will be able to drive it again someday.

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