Autumn leaves are fallin!

Yes, Autumn leaves are falling along with the snow and ice. We haven't had much of a fall this year, the summer was cool and now all this snow and ice. I had to travel on ice and snow packed roads to get to Ellen's Saturday for our show in Alliance, NE. last Saurday, and then from her house we had to some snow and ice spots on to Alliance. So much for Global Warming! Our show turned out well, we were sure wondering but everything went well. We have a lot of shows yet before Christmas and it makes one wonder if we are going to have this kind of weather from now on. One thing about it, it puts one in the Christmas mood to do some shopping. A couple weeks ago Lar, I, and Troy went to our son's in Salida, Colorado to the Doug Kaess Memorial Roping to watch our 11 year old grandson, Jhett, rope (he did well!) and you wouldn't have believed how beautiful the Aspens and other foliage in the mountains were, it was absolutely breath taking. I was telling my 16 year old, granddaughter , Mercedes, about it and she it was my artistic eye, I hope everyone has one because to see all of those autumn colors merging together was awesome. We had a great time there, got to see a lot of old friends that we rodeoed with.

It is pumpkin time and to prove it, I received the above photo from Ellen's daughter, Kristi, of Ellen's Granddaughter, Anna Kay. What a darling 'little punkin' she is. Anna Kay is 4 1/2 months old and everyone's 'Lil Punkin'.

It will soon be goblin and ghost time with all the kiddies Trick or Treating. What fun! Anyway, Happy Fall Y'all. Pray for our country and our troops and that everthing will turn out the way God intended!

In The Good Old Summertime

Busy, yes, that is how you would decribe this summer. June was and is our (Jewelry by Sonell's)busy month. We start off the first week-end by setting up at the Nebraska's Cattlemens' Ball and this year it was in Doniphan. It had rained and the mud was high but we managed and had a very successful day. We met a lot of our old friends and as always made new ones. It was good to see everyone and although the weather was wet it didn't dampen ours or anyone else's spirit.

Then in the middle of June we set up at the Miss Rodeo Nebraska's brunch where we always

meet many of the Queen's from all over the United States. They are always so perky and fun.

Such beautiful girls with such futures ahead. And of course Ellen and I always have to pick who we think might win, and it looks like Nebraska has another very capable Queen in the waiting.

We got to see Miss Amy Amack, the currant Miss Rodeo Nebraska, who is always a delight to see. We got to see her at the Cattleman's Ball also.

The Nebraska High School Rodeo Finals always takes up the third week in June and again

Ellen and I were on the road to set up there. This time instead of rain it was unseasonalbly and unreasonalbly hot but everyone suffered through it. Again it was a reunion of old friends and

meeting new ones. Again we got to see Amy. These pictures above are of our booth there.

In July, haying began, so between running for parts and cooking for them, and working in a very successful jewelry in-home show, I was kept quite busy. Ellen was gone to Washington D.C. for her annual DAR Convention, she was gone a week so it was quite hectic for her also. Her DAR keeps her time used up in the summer and then in October she will go back to Washington.

My birthday is the last of July and 3 of my old friends took me tanking on the Loup River. It is so much fun and such a serene trip. This year we took the 5 hour trip down that took 6 hours as we were always getting stuck in trees where the currant would take us. If you have never done this, you must. We are going to get Ellen to go one of these days. Imagine sitting in a horse tank and letting the currant take you down a river, it is great.

That about tells it for our summer so far, except I and my family plan on going to Estes Park, Co.the middle of the month to watch my grandchildren compete in the CJRA Rodeo Finals, sure hope it don't rain.

Oh, I almost forgot to mention that Ellen has a new granddaughter and what a sweetie. Congrats. Ellen.

Branding Time in Nebraska

Granddaughter, Mercedes coming in with a calf
for the branders.

After branding dinner, time is spent visiting and

catching up on the events of the day.

Son, Troy and friend, Cody, waiting for the

the brander and vaccinator.

Grandson Jhett, dragging one in to the fire.

Corey, a little roper draggin one in.

And then it is over for another year, it is a lot of work but a lot of fun. A time

for neighbors to get together and one of the last social events in cattle country.

Nebraska's Springtime in April

How does the song go? When it's 'Springtime in the Rockies'? Well, this is springtime in Nebraska! I can hardly wait to work in my yard but first I have to find it. I have been thinking about ordering my vegetable seed for my garden. Should I be in a hurry, I don't think so. The wind blew and we worried about the safety of the livestock but most fared pretty well.

It did get up to 60 yesterday so a lot of the snow melted and it is supposed to get that warm again today but tomorrow more rain and snow is predicted. We won't complain as we all need

the moisture and hopefully we won't have to hide Easter Eggs in the snow.

Sonja

Home Again!

Photo of myself, Ellen and Kalene taken by Tate Taylor whom we
met at the Horse Expo and who always had his camera handy.

Ellen's daughter-in-law, Kalene at our booth in Denver,

was such a great help as we put her to work arranging our booth

and just being our right hand woman.

Picture of our booth at the Denver Horse Expo.

We had a great time at the Horse Expo, meeting so many new and nice people. It is always so

much fun making new friends. We met Siri Stevens and her daughter Laci, editor of the 'Rodeo

News' magazine and who we will be doing some advertising with in the future. I had already

felt like I knew her as we subscribe to the magazine, it carries all the rodeo news in Colorado

and surrounding states. Beings my grandchildren and son rodeo there I can hardly wait for

each issue to see the news and see if people we know out there are in it. Also the Nebr. rodeo

news. The people are so friendly and it always seems like they know who we know.

What a small world! Thanks to all we met and all that helped us in any way. We apreciate each and everyone of you.

We are off again!

Hi all,
Ellen and I are packing up again, we are going to Denver to the Horse Expo and of course where we go, so does our jewelry. We have a booth there March 13-14-15th.
We are looking forward to meeting more new people and making more new friendships. Ellen's daughter-in-law, Kalene, is going with us, yeah! She will be a great help and she is so good at creating an eye-catching arrangement of our jewelry. We are lucky as both of our daughter-in-laws are good at this. If there is anything in our store that anyone has been looking at and thinking about, you might want to get it as we are taking it all with us. Hopefully, we will have new photo's to post when we get home and stories to tell.
Until then,
Sonja and Ellen

'Our Cowboys'

We've told you that part of the background of our jewelry making
is rodeo, so we thought maybe it would be fun to share some
photo's with you..

Sonja's husband Larry, heeling
a steer at a rodeo in Nebraska.


Ellen's husband Tom, heading a steer at a team roping in Nebraska.


They both have had their share of roping championships in this event and Larry also in the calfroping event.

And it goes on and on with our kids roping and tying goats and now grandkids.
What a fun life we have had traveling and rodeoing in most of the surrounding states and all the wonderful friends we have made all over the country. We do a lot of reminiscing as we travel to our jewelry shows up and down the road and meeting our old friends to talk over fun times.

We're back and ready to go again!

Pictures of our booth at the Cattleman's Classic. We met so many nice people there in Kearney, Nebr showing their cattle. We saw a lot of old friends and sold some jewelry.
If you were wondering where some of the pieces that we had in our etsy store dissappeared to, we sold them at the Classic.

Thank you, Mary Clifton, for all your help and support and to all who helped us in any way while we were there. And of course, a big thank-you to our customers!
Sonja and Ellen

Valentines Day Blog Party

Romancing the Blog Party !!


Welcome to our blog - Jewelry by Sonell.

This is our first blog party and our first Giveaway too!

There are over 54+ participants so far participating today
who will be offering you wonderful Valentines. Some with free downloads or random drawings to win some goodies, as well as sharing their blogs
with us, so I hope you will join us and visit as many blogs as you can.

Here is what you do.... CLICK HERE to visit the party host, Flatwoods FolkArt, and on her left column is a LIST of party blogs to go visit and leave comments.

But first.... You can start with US!! Here is the Jewelry piece we are offering today!!


This giveaway is open to all! You can enter by just leaving a comment on this post only in the comments area (click the little comments button below). If you don't have a blog, add your email addy so that I can reach you! The random drawing will be midnight tonight...February 14th and we will e-mail the winner.
Good luck! We can't wait to visit all of the awesome blogs that are participating.

Happy Valentines Day Everyone!!
Sonja and Ellen

Nebraska Cattlemens Classic

Got up this morning to rain, rain, rain and we were expecting to get up to ice and snow. The temp was 42 at 6:30 A.M. This will be so good for the hills.

Well, Ellen and I have been real busy getting ready to be gone to the Cattlemen's
Classic in Kearney, NE. all next week. We will have a jewelry booth there and we are looking forward to it. Besides getting jewelry ready to go, packing for 6 days and getting food ready to be left here for the guys. They're not much on batching, but will get along,I am sure. This will be our longest to be gone, we always do the Nebraska High School Rodeo Finals in June and that usually makes us away from home 4 days.
It is always so exciting to meet new people and have them see our jewelry. Then when we get home from that we have several in-home shows scheduled and a bead show to attend. I will have things to report I am sure when we get back.
Thanks to everyone for the support that our blog has gotten and also our etsy store.

Carnelian and Turquoise Necklace

WOW! Are we excited, we were notified that we had sold our first piece of jewelry out of our Etsy store and we were so excited.

We are in our fourth year of this venture and have sold a LOT of jewelry,but this really thrills us. When we decided to try going online after so much urging from our customers, we really didn't know how it might go. You see, we do in home shows kind of like Tupperware and special events and had thought about this for some time. With our son's and Connie's help, we dove in.

WE love a challenge and do custom work, if it is doable. You might all enjoy this little story. A few years ago, I was waiting at Walmart for my husband who was at the cattle sale in North Platte. I struck up a conversation with a little lady who was also waiting for someone and she admired the necklace I had on and asked where I had gotten it. I preceded to tell her about our jewelry and she asked if we did custom work. Of course I told her yes, IF it could be done. WELL, a few days ago she called me and said she had some stones and would like earrings and a pendant made out of them. Yesterday, I received them in the mail and that is just what they are, stones. They are pretty, but no way can they be set on silver. I will have to return them and I'm sure she will be dissappointed, but that is better than cobbling something up than she wouldn't wear.

Well, the sun is out here today after 5 days of snowing off and on and accumlating 11-12" of snow. We will all be ready for spring.
Thanks again, Connie and Thank-You Kathy for our 1st Etsy Sale!
Sonja

Hi,
We woke up to a real snowy day here in the sandhills of Nebraska. At least 4-5" of the white
stuff on the ground. It was snowing when we went to bed last night but we thought it would soon end. Yeah right! It sure covered the grass so if it doesn't melt soon the guys will have
to start feeding hay to the cattle.
Ellen and I have been so pleased with the response that we have gotten since we started our
blog and etsy store. I don't know if I mentioned it before or not but we do custom jewelry orders also. We love a challenge and are always open to new ideas. Youcan always get ahold of us by email if you need to. My e-mail address is strenary@wildblue.net and Ellen's is
ekwhite@neb-sandhills.net.
Keep warm everyone!

We are two women from the sandhills of Nebraska, setting up our first blog and are excited to bring our beautiful western and southwestern 'One of a Kind' jewelry to you. We will be adding some pictures as we go and also on etsy. com.
Sonja and Ellen