21st Century Complete Guide to Mars Exploration: Mars Exploration Rovers 2003-2004 ¿ NASA Spirit and Opportunity Rovers (MER) and the Mars Express Beagle 2 Mission (Three CD-ROM Set)

21st Century Complete Guide to Mars Exploration: Mars Exploration Rovers 2003-2004 ¿ NASA Spirit and Opportunity Rovers (MER) and the Mars Express Beagle 2 Mission (Three CD-ROM Set)
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Opportunity Vs. Spirit

21st Century Complete Guide to Mars Exploration: Mars Exploration Rovers 2003-2004 ¿ NASA Spirit and Opportunity Rovers (MER) and the Mars Express Beagle 2 Mission (Three CD-ROM Set)
World Spaceflight News
Manufacturer: Progressive Management
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: CD-ROM
ASIN: 159248509X

Book Description

This comprehensive set of three CD-ROMs provides a thorough guide to the mission of the twin NASA Mars Exploration Rovers, Spirit and Opportunity, launched in 2003 for an early 2004 landing on the Red Planet. In addition to MER-A and MER-B, there is coverage of the Mars Express mission, including the Beagle 2 lander. This historic program is documented in NASA reports and mission images - there are over 385 images and 30 video clips reproduced here. Every aspect of the program is covered:

* Preflight Tests, Launch and Cruise Phase * Landing Site maps and detailed photographs * Mission Objectives, Science Objectives * Entry, Descent, and Landing System * Science Instruments (Pancam, MINI-TES, Spectrometer, APXS, Magnets, Rock Abrasion Tool RAT, Microscopic Imager) * Spacecraft Description * Mission Timeline * Communications with Earth * MER Project Team Members

This CD-ROM set has over 11,000 pages reproduced using Adobe Acrobat PDF software - allowing direct viewing on Windows and Macintosh systems, and Reader software is included. Advanced search and indexing features are built into our reproduction, providing a complete full-text index. This enables the user to search all the files on the disk at one time for words or phrases using just one search command! The Acrobat cataloging technology adds enormous value and uncommon functionality to this impressive collection of government documents and material. There is no other reference that is as fast, convenient, comprehensive, and portable!

NASA's twin robot geologists, the Mars Exploration Rovers, launched toward Mars in 2003 in search of answers about the history of water on Mars. The Mars Exploration Rover mission is part of NASA's Mars Exploration Program, a long-term effort of robotic exploration of the red planet. The program seeks to take advantage of each launch opportunity to go to Mars, which comes around every 26 months as the planets move around the Sun. Launched on June 10 and July 7, 2003, the rovers will land on sites on Mars in January 2004. Primary among the mission's scientific goals is to search for and characterize a wide range of rocks and soils that hold clues to past water activity on Mars. The spacecraft will be targeted to sites that appear to have been affected by liquid water in the past. After the airbag-protected landing craft settle onto the surface and open, the rovers will roll out to take panoramic images. These will give scientists the information they need to select promising geological targets that will tell part of the story of water in Mars' past. Then, the rovers will drive to those locations to perform on-site scientific investigations over the course of their 90-day mission.

Our CD-ROMs are privately-compiled collections of official public domain U.S. government files and documents - they are not produced by the federal government. They are designed to provide a convenient user-friendly reference work, utilizing the benefits of the Acrobat format to uniformly present thousands of pages that can be rapidly reviewed, searched, or printed without untold hours of tedious searching and downloading. Vast archives of important public domain government information that might otherwise remain inaccessible are available for instant review no matter where you are. This book-on-a-disc set makes a great reference work and educational tool.

Customer Reviews:

Opportunity Vs. Spirit.......2004-01-28

Photographers and brothers Cornell and Robert Capa have often been considered as a salient study in contrasts. Perhaps their shared skill behind the camera could be attributed to some genetically endowed gift. Robert gained fame as the man who hauled his Leica equipment to battle zones from the Spanish Civil War up through the start of the conflict in Vietnam, giving war its "human face." Cornell quietly established an impressive career that would one day earn him notice as his brother's near-equal but opposite, as the "Photographer of Peace."
Living in the expansive shadow of his brother the war hero, Cornell pointed his lens in the opposite direction, opened the shutter wide and produced a classic meditation on symmetry and light through his image of an afternoon at Moscow's Bolshoi Ballet School; of narcissism at the dawn of the Age of Television in the 1959 photo, "Jack Paar Watches Himself on TV"; and of everyday people at play, whether it was the early morning cold baths at Winchester College or couples out on a Friday night at Harlem's Savoy Ballroom.
While combat photojournalists such as Robert Capa and Gerda Taro might have snagged the lion's share of magazine covers in the day - What with their work's shocking urgency and the tales of daring-do that accompanied them - there was a subtle balancing act at work. For every image of brutality provided from battle fronts around the globe, photographers such as Cornell Capa, and his contemporaries Henri Cartier-Bresson and Grace Robertson, offered gentle reminders of the beauty and joy found in humanity, be they a candid shot a young delivery boy haughtily marching across Paris' Rue Mouffetard with bottles of wine tucked under each arm, or a series of pictures chronicling the slightly tipsy patrons of London's Battersea women's pub on an outing to an amusement park, giddily holding down dresses on windy roller coasters and starting impromptu conga lines.
In the early oughts of the 21st century, with images of mechanized carnage, bloodshed and war pouring out of every media orifice available, it's of no surprise that public interest should drift out to the cosmos and clutch desperately onto the prosaic, still images being captured on Mars, depicting gently bowed landscapes and baby skin-smooth rocks. But while such escapism into the wonders of the fourth planet out might provide temporary relief from the eye-strain of horrific imagery found here on earth, all is not in equilibrium amongst the photography community on the Red Planet.
It's fitting that in our modern age the two brightest stars of the photo world should be robotic. However, while one of them is a true visionary producing images worthy of oversized, hard-bound coffee table books, the other is a free-riding loafer whose work possess, at best, flash-in-the-pan cleverness, but often lapses into tired gimmicks which seem designed to compensate for a lack of artistic ability and a minimal respect for the medium or subject.
NASA refers to its two Mars rovers, Opportunity and Spirit, as twins, bringing comparisons of the Capa brothers to mind. Instead of two photographers in possession of comparable skills showing us different sides of the same world, however, we have a contrast in talent. Opportunity is a master of its craft, displaying the full knowledge of the rules of its art form, even in its cunning ability to occasionally bend those rules, often with wondrous results. Spirit, meanwhile, muddles in vapid self-consciousness, usually abandoned in the trenches of undergraduate programs at small, Northwest liberal arts colleges. Spirit's use of obscure angles, extreme close-ups and a grotesque use of color saturation are pedestrian, and it indulges itself in an unearned, over-the-top indignant artistic temperament, pettily shutting down and refusing to work as its colleague and sibling, Opportunity, lands on the planet.
As these two up-and-coming photographers launch their careers among the Martian dunes, let us examine their work thus far, and observe the strikingly opposing trajectories of these two media darlings. One will be remembered. The other will diminish into a trivia question for game shows.
On January 4, Spirit launched its career with a crude mosaic baring the self-congratulatory title, "First Look at Spirit on Mars." Seemingly happy with the lack of competition on the planet's dust-blown terrain, Mars' premier landscape photographer falls into producing a pretentious set of self-portraits that are hardly on par with the Catherine Opie "alter-ego" series Spirit so obviously seeks to emulate in its own works dubbed "First Look at Spirit at Landing Site," "View from Above Spirit on Mars," and the obtuse "View in Front of Spirit." Oh, it's always about you, isn't it Spirit? These images are not unlike the juvenile attempts of pretenders who insist on being called artists because they produced grainy photographs of their own feet that were displayed in some trendy coffee house in their hometown for a week.
Over the subsequent days and weeks, Spirit has the exclusive luxury of being the sole camera jockey to capture the mystique of its surroundings. But the photographer seems to be adrift and unable to tackle the subject. Spirit is intimidated by Mars and cowers into the comfortable realm of moderate technical proficiency. Unable to offer up a single image that says "this, ladies and gentlemen of Earth, is the real Mars," Spirit offers us 3-D stereo images to distract us from poor composition. Saturated colors and strange cropping techniques are employed to counter the lack of clarity and purpose that runs though Spirit's work. It's as though Spirit believes it can make up for its artistic shortcomings in the darkroom. While finding perspectives and angles that offer a wink and a nod to Chris Simpson's "Sun and Sand II" and "Atacama Desert," Spirit's work contains no stamp truly of its own.
It has often been opined that the United States should send a poet into space. While those who parrot this quip are really pleading for something more elegant than Neil Armstrong's clumsy, over-rehearsed "one small step for man" one-liner, that call might have finally been answered, at least in the visual arts, with the arrival of Opportunity on the Martian photography scene.
In Daisaku Ikeda's poetic homage to Cornell and Robert Capa, "Eternal Voyagers toward the Light of Peace," he writes, "A photograph is a consciousness painting, the instant's art that opens on the unbound vistas of the inner life." That was inspired in equal measure by the works of both brothers. It would be difficult to imagine such praise divided half and half between the twin shutterbugs of Mars. When Opportunity landed Jan. 24, selecting the road "less traveled by," on the opposite side of the planet from its sibling, Spirit went into a snit, shutting down and refusing to submit any more of its work. Almost immediately, Spirit apologists at NASA rushed to the premadonna's defense, saying "we should expect we will not be restoring functionality to Spirit for a significant amount of time - many days, perhaps two weeks - even in the best of circumstances," and "we believe, based on everything we know now, we can sustain the current state of the spacecraft from a health standpoint for an indefinite amount of time." Yeah, right. These cover stories as transparent as Spirit's deplorable aping of Robert Glenn Ketchum's work for its own "They of the Great Rocks" series.
As Spirit wallows in self pity, Opportunity astounds from the get-go with a run of crisp black and white offerings. Consider one of its first images, "Meridiani Planium in View." So sharp and barren, the photo's composition also pays subtle homage to the "Rule of Three." On the left, the rover's mast is seen in its stowed position, but unlike Spirit's blatant self-promotion by centering itself in the image, Opportunity uses part of it's own body as a gentle lead for the eye, guiding it back toward the photograph's center. And while its close-up work (specifically with "Meridiani Soil" I and II) shows a playful agility at balancing darkness and light to reveal pattern, it is when Opportunity shows us its breadth by taking "First Look Behind Opportunity," using only available lighting and its hazard-identification camera, that we are truly amazed. Utilizing the fisheye lens in the way it was intended, Opportunity renders what could have been a banal landscape, if captured by a lesser, with the intimacy and erotic electricity of Christian Coigny's high-contrast black and white "Le Reveil" nude. Playing with light and shadow, Opportunity titillates more with what it obscures than through what it reveals.
And while Opportunity displays informed talent with its use of muted colors to show the stark reality and melancholy of vast Martian vistas and the solitary nobility of the simple, reddish-brown, wind-eroded stone, it is the magnificent "First Panoramic Look at Meridiani Planum, Mars" that will become Opportunity's signature work. With the sharpness, depth of field and the utter sense of contentedness it portrays, This 360-degree vista would not suffer in a gallery hanging among contemporaries, even next to the likes of Ansel Adems' "Mt. McKinley, Clouds."
NASA has sent two rovers to the Red Planet. Spirit arrived first, and overcome with fear and anxiety about the task at hand, turned in on itself, announcing "I am on Mars." Opportunity came second, allowed the alien environs to take the lead, let itself be consumed by the landscape, and through the timeless images it beams home it proclaims, "Mars is on me!"

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The New Complete Beagle

Manufacturer: Howell Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000GSA344

Average customer rating:

The New Complete Beagle
Henry J. Colombo
Manufacturer: Howell Book House Inc.
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000OYL4WA

Average customer rating:

The New Complete Beagle
Henry, Holcombe, A.d., Madden Lew, Payne, Owen, Wing, Morgan Colombo
Manufacturer: Howell, Book House Inc
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000MNJOAC

Average customer rating:

The New Complete Beagle,

Manufacturer: Howell Book House
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

General | Animal Care & Pets | Home & Garden | Subjects | Books

General | Veterinary Medicine | Medicine | Subjects | Books

Animal Husbandry | Agricultural Sciences | Science | Subjects | Books
ASIN: 0876050240

Creative Metal Clay Jewelry: Techniques, Projects, Inspiration
Average customer rating:

Creative Metal Clay Jewelry Review

Excellent book to inspire you to work with this magical material.

Best for Beginners, in my humble opinion

I'm not that impressed with the projects

Great Clear Photos

Creative Metal Clay Jewelry: Techniques, Projects, Inspiration
CeCe Wire
Manufacturer: Lark Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

Decorative Arts | Design & Decorative Arts | Arts & Photography | Subjects | Books
General | Crafts & Hobbies | Home & Garden | Subjects | Books
Jewelry | Crafts & Hobbies | Home & Garden | Subjects | Books
Metal Work | Crafts & Hobbies | Home & Garden | Subjects | Books
Similar Items:

The Art of Metal Clay (with DVD): Techniques for Creating Jewelry and Decorative Objects

Metal Clay Jewelry

Metal Clay Magic: Making Silver Jewelry the Easy Way

New Directions in Metal Clay: 25 Creative Jewelry Projects

Working with Precious Metal Clay (Jewelry Crafts) (Jewelry Crafts)

ASIN: 1579903010

Book Description

The fabulous techniques, found here with instructions, lavish photos, and projects open up endless creative possibilities. Combine the clay with lampworked and fused dichroic glass or enamel. Make exquisite jewelry, sculpture, and carvings. Try a new liquid gold for coating silver objects. Among the glittering, gorgeous projects: an African Mask Pin, Groovy Flower Earrings and Ring; and Puzzle Piece Bracelet.

Customer Reviews:

Creative Metal Clay Jewelry Review.......2007-08-31

An excellant book that is a great resource for new users and old hands of PMC. The inspiration I personally got from the book is awesome and has sent my creativity into a high.

The book is well written and illustrated perfectly.

Excellent book to inspire you to work with this magical material........2007-01-08

CeCe Wire has a winner here, projects that will guide you from initial forays with this material through to more advanced techniques, such as ring making and sulptural pieces. A good solid Introduction on tools and equipment. The instructions combine both lovely photos and sketches which are easy to follow, even projects that are a photo of the completed piece and written instructions only are achievable. Whilst some of the finished projects may not suit all tastes ( what book does!!), it is the idea and technique that is useful, it can be adapted to a design of your own making. One of my favourites is the Twig and Leaf Condiment Spoon, I have made a set of these and the awe factor from my guests is wonderful when they are used. Nice to go outside just jewelry. I recommend three books to my Silver Clay students, this is one of them, with Sherri Haab and Tim McCreight being the other two. Well worth adding to your bookshelf.

Best for Beginners, in my humble opinion.......2006-07-20

I first borrowed this book from the library, and now I have finally been able to order it. I have used two other books on this subject, but I think CeCe Wire's book is best suited for me. I am a beginner with this material, however, I want my finished projects to have a certain streamlined sophistication, and I feel that of all of the books I have read on this subject, this book suits my needs and goals best. Ms. Wire has a wonderful grasp on the technical aspects of working with metal clay. Her projects are great for beginners, well illustrated and explained, but the final results are professional and stylish. One does not need to invest in many additional tools or materials in order to finish her projects. I also find that her projects and gallery of finished pieces provide a great springboard to encourage the reader to envision and create their own great jewelry pieces. There is a non-jewelry piece in here, but that does not bother me at all. It encourages the reader to consider other uses for metal clay, and who says jewelry must only be worn on the body? Why not create decorative objects as "jewelry" for the home? If you do not have a kiln, do not worry. I fire my pieces on my gas stove or with a small butane torch purchased from my local home improvement store. Also, I hear that bead and jewelry stores that have PMC or Art Clay Silver classes or paint-your-own-ceramics studios are often willing to fire your pieces for a reasonable fee. So give this book a try, I hope you will be as pleased as I am!

I'm not that impressed with the projects.......2005-03-09

I just received this book today and I leafed through it and put it down. Normally with a book of this type (art instruction, projects etc) I'll just get lost in it and read it from cover to cover. I bought this book based on the reviews here and also that Ms. Wire is the head cheese at the PMC Guild, but if I had seen this book first in the store I probably wouldn't have purchased it. The jewelry projects are not my style at all, and the layout and photography isn't that exciting either.

A better book about PMC is The Art of Metal Clay by Sherri Haab. I love the projects in there and the pictures are totally inspirational.

Great Clear Photos.......2004-08-31

This book has wonderful photographs that are clear enough to see the details of the jewelry and steps involved in creating them. I highly recommend this book.

spacedust
pmcer.com

Creative Clay Jewelry: Extraordinary, Colorful, Fun Designs To Make From Polymer Clay

Average customer rating:

ONE OF THE MORE HELPFUL BOOKS ON THIS SUBJECT OUT THERE.
Good book to teach canes and give examples
5stars for us beginners
I love this book
Colorful projects ranging from basic to challenging

Creative Clay Jewelry: Extraordinary, Colorful, Fun Designs To Make From Polymer Clay
Leslie Dierks
Manufacturer: Sterling
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | Instructional & How-To | Arts & Photography | Subjects | Books

Decorative Arts | Design & Decorative Arts | Arts & Photography | Subjects | Books

General | Crafts & Hobbies | Home & Garden | Subjects | Books

Jewelry | Crafts & Hobbies | Home & Garden | Subjects | Books

Pottery & Ceramics | Crafts & Hobbies | Home & Garden | Subjects | Books
Similar Items:

The New Clay: Techniques and Approaches to Jewelry Making
The Art of Polymer Clay: Designs and Techniques for Creating Jewelry, Pottery, and Decorative Artwork (paperback reissue, Updated)
The Polymer Clay Techniques Book
Polymer Clay Jewelry
Creative Techniques For Polymer Clay Jewelry

ASIN: 0937274747

Book Description

“The instructions are easy to follow, plus the practice requires little in the way of expensive tools....There’s considerable artistry to the 48 projects....Great for rainy days.”—Booklist. “Combines basic information on jewelry-making, specific techniques...for working with polymer clay, and instructions for 48 projects....Highly recommended for public libraries.”—Library Journal.

Customer Reviews:

ONE OF THE MORE HELPFUL BOOKS ON THIS SUBJECT OUT THERE........2007-09-15

I found this work to be most helpful. It provides step by step instructions and is great for the beginner. The book is full of designs for use with Polymer Clay and is quite detailed. The photography is great and quite clear. The text is full of helpful hints and tips as to techniques that are easy to follow. I also enjoyed the great ideas for projects I gleaned from this work. One of the strong areas of this book, unlike some others I have in my collection, is that the author does not assume that you already know something and goes ahead and explains even simple steps. The only weakness I found was that some of the information is just a bit dated as so much progress has been made in this field over the past two or three years. This is not a big problem though as there certainly is no "bad" information. This is a good one to add to your collection as it is nice to have on hand to answer questions as you are working. It is also a very handy book to have if you happen to be teaching a course in working with Polymer clays. The instructions here can be worked into a lesson plan quite nicely. Highly recommend.

Good book to teach canes and give examples.......2005-12-16

The author shows how to make canes and that is pretty much all that is in this book. Not much if you are looking for other techniques.

5stars for us beginners.......2005-06-14

Im new at polymer clay and this book is just perfect.Ive loaned it out but kept track of it so no one forgets to bring it back too..I really couldnt have learned so much about canning and the craft of beads in polymer clay without this book..ITs a must add to your clay library.Mrs.C.

I love this book.......2002-10-14

This book got me into making jewelry. It has everything from the very simple, to complex canework. I've taken many of the examples in this book and made them into my own design. I would definitly recomend this book for anyone, if your just starting out or you already know what your doing.

Colorful projects ranging from basic to challenging.......2000-07-21

Creative Clay Jewelry is one of the many books that attempt to cover polymer clay work from the very basics to quite advanced. While other books are probably more successful at that (Sue Heaser's Polymer Clay Techniques Book, for example), Creative Clay Jewelry has some good projects and solid information, and would be quite useful to the beginning to intermediate clayer.

It's unfortunate that there's no real indication of level of difficulty in the projects; they don't follow any logical progression. Some of the early projects use very basic techniques only - jelly rolls, marbling - which could probably be discussed in the introduction section. However, just a few projects in, there's a geometric pattern that would be quite difficult and frustrating to do as your third or fourth PC project. I'd advise careful consideration when selecting a project from this book.

Dierks does provide a much more detailed ingredient list, including things like findings and clay amounts, which other books tend to skip. She even specifies particular brands and colors, but it isn't necessary to adhere to them.

On a more personal note, I got less use out of this book than most of my PC books, simply because the projects were very bright, busy, and colorful - and that's very far from my style. But for those who love the casual, cheerful look that polymer clay can provide, this book might well be great.

Creative Techniques For Polymer Clay Jewelry
Average customer rating:

Not bad

This is the book I've been looking for!

Great PC jewelry book. Love it.

Well-organized basic book

Great book when used with other PC information

Creative Techniques For Polymer Clay Jewelry
Nanetta Bananto
Manufacturer: North Light Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

Decorating | Crafts & Hobbies | Home & Garden | Subjects | Books
Dough | Crafts & Hobbies | Home & Garden | Subjects | Books
General | Crafts & Hobbies | Home & Garden | Subjects | Books
Jewelry | Crafts & Hobbies | Home & Garden | Subjects | Books
Similar Items:

Polymer Clay Surface Design Recipes: 100 Mixed-Media Techniques Plus Project Ideas

Polymer Clay Jewelry

Polymer Clay Creative Traditions: Techniques and Projects Inspired by the Fine and Decorative Arts

Making Polymer Clay Beads: Step-by-Step Techniques for Creating Beautiful Ornamental Beads

Faux Surfaces in Polymer Clay: 30 Techniques & Projects That Imitate Stones, Metals, Wood & More

ASIN: 1581806515

Book Description

Polymer clay jewelry is hot! A growing number of crafters are eager to learn the art form, while longtime enthusiasts are always looking for new, fun projects. Creative Techniques for Polymer Clay Jewelry will appeal to both groups with:

-An extensive overview of polymer clay and jewelry-making basics, including tools and materials, blending and finishing -A section devoted to making simple and complex canes such as the leaf cane, rose cane and star cane -20 step-by-step jewelry projects, each including suggestions for variations so readers can tailor the projects to their own taste

Customer Reviews:

Not bad.......2007-05-13

Some interesting concepts. Seemed a bit too project orientated for me personally but learned a few things and interesting to see her process.

This is the book I've been looking for!.......2007-02-14

If you wonder how polymer artists create all those incredible, minute details and delicate shading read this book. Ms. Bananto's designs may or may not be to your taste, but (hey, we're all different) the secret of HOW she achieves them is relevant for anyone who wants to develop such skills. Basics and general information are well written too. Good work, lady.

Great PC jewelry book. Love it........2007-02-13

Basics were covered well and her basic canework instructions (18 canes) were perfectly photograhed and explained. Considering I'm the visual, put things together by the diagram alone kind of person, I'm picky about photo demonstrations in clay books. There never seems to be enough. I think I could make up every cane solely instructed by photos in this book.

The projects include typical sliced beads, rolled beads, image transfers, a really cool fidget pendant and much more. She also includes the jewelry making steps as well as the clay making.

I especially enjoyed the color palette section (inspirational fabric samples) and the color palettes supplied at each project. That's a tip I will use regularly.

Well-organized basic book.......2006-05-26

Iam rather new to polymer clay but have a bachelor of fine arts degree and have done many arts and crafts, most recently being a stitchery designer for consumer craft magazines. I also have a Master's in Education in art and have taught in the public schools. Having said all that, let me tell you why I found this book above the average, even books by other polymer clay masters. First, this book is very well-organized. It gives basic cane making techniques and then puts those specific lessons to use in the projects shown in later chapters. I found the projects to be gorgeous for the most part, and the artist uses fibers, beads and other media with the clay. The projects make direct use of what is explained in earlier chapters.

Whereas some early polymer clay books showed very weak projects such as light switch covers or other tacky decorations, this book actually shows items I would be proud to make and wear. They have a high level of craftsmanship. What I particularly like is how the author names different color combinations of clay and shows how to use them in projects to great effect. Many artists who are self-taught have a lot of trouble with color and their choices sometimes make a reader wonder, "What were they thinking??" This author chooses a color palette for each project from among about ten or twelve shown in the front of the book and uses one of those palettes in each project. So the projects are created out of techniques shown in earlier chapters and also out of a specific palette. The end of the book has outlines of handy shapes for the projects shown, and even a page of clip art one can photocopy to make transfers. I read about fifteen polymer clay books so far and this is one of the better ones. It is not real wordy with baking tips and all, but it gives the basics. The book design is visually exciting, nicely laid out and colorful too.

Great book when used with other PC information.......2006-05-04

I recently began using polymer clay specifically to make jewelry and beads, and I loved the projects in this book. NOT because I'll be copying her patterns and colors and graphics on my own jewelry as is. I personally don't like some of the transfers Nanetta uses. But the directions are easy enough to understand that you can add your own graphics or use different colors or patterns for your own projects. Also, I picked up several other polymer clay books recently. I find that each book builds upon ideas that I've learned in other books. So this book shouldn't be viewed as an encyclopedia. It does offer some great creative sparks for a beginner like me.

Customer Reviews:

Very good environmental and energy references book.......2000-04-22

This book contains very good tips for a landscape that can assist the environment in order to improve energy saving. Also has a very complete list of plants and it's classification according to the weather and soil requirements. It helps to understrand how landscape can contribute to the environmental control, modifying noise, wind, sunlight, and temperature.

Homeowner's guide to landscaping that saves energy dollars

Average customer rating:

Homeowner's guide to landscaping that saves energy dollars
Ruth S Foster
Manufacturer: McKay
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Unknown Binding

General | Gardening & Horticulture | Home & Garden | Subjects | Books
ASIN: 0679508635

Grown-Up Marriage: What We Know, Wish We Had Known, and Still Need to Know About Being Married
Average customer rating:

A Marital Must Read

Great book.

May have saved my marriage!

Wow! Insightful book on married life

Terrific insights into relationships

Grown-Up Marriage: What We Know, Wish We Had Known, and Still Need to Know About Being Married
Judith Viorst
Manufacturer: Free Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

Marriage | Relationships | Health, Mind & Body | Subjects | Books
General | Psychology & Counseling | Health, Mind & Body | Subjects | Books
General | Parenting & Families | Subjects | Books
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How Did I Get to Be 40 & Other Atrocities

Accessories:

Braun IRT 4020 ThermoScan Ear Thermometer

ASIN: 0743210816

Amazon.com

In Grown-Up Marriage, bestselling author Judith Viorst uses her abundant gifts to consider how marriage pulls, cajoles, and commands us to grow up. By viewing marriage "as a problem we have to solve again and again," Viorst offers a fresh view of both the mirages of marriage and how readers can adjust their expectations to create an enduring state of the union. Complacency, warns Viorst, is the bind that unties. "If we imagine that marriage is where we can burp, bitch, snicker and snipe day after day without paying a price, we are wrong." She crafts a smart synthesis of decades of psychological research, case studies, and examples drawn from popular culture. Viorst rounds up the usual suspects--the routines that kill marriage, the outlaw in-laws, the mommy-daddy trap--and the unusual ones, including marital sibling rivalry and why second marriages often fail. Each subject is illuminated with nuanced, mirthful details about creating a mature marriage. Her insights are sometimes diluted with too many expert quotes or her own poetry. Still, her shrewd observations will make this book required reading before your next anniversary. --Barbara Mackoff

Book Description

Although marriage is for grown-ups, very few of us are grown up when we marry. Here, the bestselling author of Suddenly Sixty and Necessary Losses presents her life-affirming perspective on the joys, heartaches, difficulties, and possibilities of a grown-up marriage -- and no, that's not an oxymoron!

Featuring interviews with married women and men, the findings of couples therapists, the truths offered by literature and movies, and a bemused exploration of her own marriage, Judith Viorst illuminates the issues couples struggle with from "I do" through "till death do us part." Examining marital rivalry, marital manners, marital sex (extramarital, too), marital fighting and apologies, what kids do for (and to) marriage, and the boredom and bliss of everyday married life, Viorst leaves no marital stone unturned. From the early years when we wonder "Who is this person?" and "What am I doing here?" to the realities of divorce, remarriage, and growing older (and old) together, Viorst offers insights and advice with honesty, humanity, and humor -- all the while recognizing how tough it is to be married and, when it works, how very precious it can be.

Customer Reviews:

A Marital Must Read .......2005-07-29

This book should be compulsory reading for any couple contemplating marriage. In a sometimes gut-wrenching analysis of modern marriage, Viorst spells out the fallacies of our society's view on marital bliss in a way that will challenge and, on occasion, shock you with its ability to reflect your own romantic relationship.

One of the most provocative chapters is, "The First Shocks of Marriage." This chapter outlines the expectations we bring into marriage and the feelings of betrayal that result when those expectations are invariably, and sometimes brutally, crushed. As a divorced, middle-aged woman with many female friends who maintain a 'revolving door' of romantic relationships, the concept of feeling emotionally betrayed is one that will speak to every woman...and should be understood by every man. Viorst cites the common female viewpoint that "marriage should be nothing less than love, adoration, companionship, physical intimacy, emotional availability, respect, humor and tolerance." And the male viewpoint Viorst cites is one that expects a wife to "respect his need for autonomy and give him plenty of room to do his own thing." Yet, if anything, the reality of marriage teaches us that we often won't get all, or even some, of what we expected.

One lesson every individual who reads this book should learn, and learn, and learn yet once again, is that marriage is work...Work...WORK. This book, like no other I have read, made me question whether I'm up to it. :-) It also made me realize that, when it does work, when both halves of the couple (not either/or) are willing to work diligently at keeping the dream alive, the reward is priceless.

Great book........2005-06-27

I've been married one year, have just read this book and I loved it. The book promotes standing by your partner. My parents were divorced, and according to this book it puts me at a greater risk of getting divorced. With that in mind, I'll work as hard as I can on taking good care of my marriage.

May have saved my marriage!.......2004-07-10

This is a terrific book for anyone at any stage in marriage - I read it as I was on the brink of divorce, I read most of it and had suggested to my husband that he read a chapter of it. Things have turned around and we are on the road to repair and re-comittment it seems, this book may have saved us.

Judith has wit and charm and sensibility combined to talk about various aspects of marriage, about everyday marriage - and how to improve it, about how various factors can affect marriage at various stages. Thumbs, fingers and toes are all up for Judiths book!

Wow! Insightful book on married life.......2003-12-16

Judith Viorst has articulated some profound insights on married life- why do we choose to get married, why do marriages fail, why do we stay married. She addresses some of the problems marriages today face- infidelity, "sibling rivalry", yet the book is a surprisingly uplifting celebration of married life and the value of sticking it out through the tough times.

Terrific insights into relationships.......2003-04-06

I wish this book had been written a year ago when my own "starter marriage" was falling apart. There were so many instances in the book where I could point to a passage and say, "Yep! That's us." "That's totally what happened to us too!" etc. It might have saved my marriage. But I'm glad to have read this book later rather than never. With an impressive understanding of human nature, Viorst touches upon the many delicate interrelational factors that causes strain in people's marriages as well as second (and third) marriages, and why seemingly happy couples divorce while destructive, unhappy couples stay together. This is a worthwhile, mandatory read for every couple who plans to get married or is already married or might be thinking of divorce. Do your loved ones a favor and give this book to a future bride or bridegroom as a wedding gift. It's one of the best relationship tune-ups you'll read.

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