Athena Creates

Vanilla

2011-12-23T20:54:00.004-05:00

Finally got around to finishing my vanilla project...started in February! I was procrastinating because I didn't want to spend a fortune on the little amber bottles. Fortunatelty, I recently found a local container warehouse with great prices. I bought 2 cases of 4 oz amber bottles...but I really only needed 1 case because the bottle actually held more then 4 oz.

The one bad thing about the super cheap container warehouse was that the bottles were dusty. I washed them in scalding hot soapy water and let them dry for a day to make sure all the water drops were evaporated.

Look at all that yummy vanilla! Super steeped since I wait 10 months! 6 months would have been fine. I had to strain out the vanilla bean pods and use a coffee filter to get all the vanilla seeds strained out. There were so many that it looked like coffee grounds!

Hubby helped me fill the bottle because even with a funnel..I was making a mess, wasting precious vanilla. The kids thought the vanilla smelled yummy when we were filling the bottles. It did smell wonderful!

Next step will be for me to design labels. I have some leftover waterproof labels that I think would be almost perfect but they are a bit smaller then I'd like. I have non waterproof labels that are the right size but I think they would get yucky looking if any vanilla dripped down. I'll sleep on it and decided tomorrow.

This was a fun project. I can't wait to gift some of the bottles to neighbors and friends.

Woosh, there it...was!

2011-12-23T18:51:00.003-05:00

My last blog entry was written at the opening of the 2011 season for the Riverside Arts Market. And the last market of the season was this past Saturday 12/17/11. What can I say? The months absolutely flew by. I had too much to do and not enough time to get it done!

How did my year go? Terrific would sum it up!

Two booths worked out nicely although I am thinking about scaling back next year. Business has been growing and it's becoming increasingly tough for me to be so fractured. It's just to the point where I need to narrow it down and basically decide what I want to be when I grow up. ;) The problem is that I love aspects of everything. Tie Dyeing for RAM, offering workshops in my studio, private sewing lessons...and of course, the Bird-E Towel 'factory.'

In the previous blog, I pined after a cargo trailer so that I could stop filling my van with RAM stuff (and thus getting my dining room back because THAT's where those van seats where living.) I did end up getting it which was an amazing help. I did a TON of RAMs this year. Even through the tough summer months when the heat was awful. It was worth it though! My fantastic customers kept coming back for more.

One sad event of the year was when my excellent employee moved on to full-time work elsewhere. I'm back to the me, myself & I show and it's not quite as good as having a team. After the ups and downs of normal small business stuff, I don't feel that I'm quite ready to bring someone else on board. It often feels that I bring money in right before the next big expense. Case in point, I just spent the equivalent of ALL of my December arts market income securing fabric to make Bird-E Towels over the next few months. That's 1200 yards of fabric and it wasn't cheap. When it's just me, I don't mind diverting my paycheck so that I can get an advantage on supplies. Obviously can't do that when someone else is on board. Anyhow, moot point because NOW is the wrong time to even think about this. No arts market income for 2.5 months = lean business months. Time to recuperate and come up with an action plan for the new year.

I ended the RAM season on a massively high point. Best sales EVER in the 3 years I've been doing this.

Rough Goals for next year - still working on them

Bird-E Towels
- increase Bird-E Towel Sales. Bird-E Towels are more family friendly as far as production goes. I can make and ship around our schedule.
- Take on a few wholesale accounts and see how it goes. Couldn't do this last year with spotty fabric supply. Every time I turned around, my supplier would tell me he was out.

Sewing Lessons & Workshops
- I will continue doing these on a sporadic, as requested, basis. I LOVE doing these but they are slightly more difficult to manage with our ever increasing busy schedules. I look at these as recharging events. They help fulfill the inner teacher in me.

RAM
- Oh RAM, how I love you...but I need a bit more balance in my life and working nearly every Saturday was really tough this year. I'm going to load up on the front and back end of RAM dates for 2012. If I can, I'm going to give myself a break over the summer.

Facebook
- I'm kind of embarrassed that my facebook fan base hasn't grown tremendously. I really need to figure out how to get those numbers to rise on a regular basis. I think I have a fear that I'll be pushy if I do contests tied to 'sharing' like other fan pages do. I am not a pushy sales person. I am thankful that I haven't needed to be!

I love how my business has grown in 2011. I love that the different pieces have worked together in harmony...mostly. I do work really hard and spend virtually all of my 'free' time on this endeavor. I can imagine big things for Athena Creates. Huge! I just need to keep growing, learning and working really hard so that I can make it happen.

Oh how I missed you, RAM!

2011-03-09T08:31:00.008-05:00

March 5, 2010, was the grand opening for the 2011 season at the Riverside Arts Market after the winter hiatus. I can't even tell you how nervous and excited I was in the past couple months. Would I be approved? Would I be able to book my desired location? My friend and I were checking the reservation website daily and we'd text each other any news. All the worrying was for naught. We were both approved and we were able to book a booth next to each other. Phew!

So there were 2 big developments for my business as it relates to RAM. 1) is that I expanded to 2 booths! Over the course of time that I have been in business, I would do what most other small business owners do....take my profits and reinvest in more products. Before I knew it, I was having a hard time staying within my 12x12 space! It wasn't too bad because I usually got an end spot and I didn't have to leave a space between my booth and the next on the end. Well, on the last day of RAM last year, there was a new booth created on the end...and I felt claustrophobic in my booth with everything moved in!

Having 2 booths meant that I needed to do a mock up of my booth with my gridwalls and tables. I was able to use a larger table and all 3 brass clothing rack that I had acquired for a song on craigslist last year. I LOVE my brass racks because they are rock solid stable even when strong winds come through.

My helper and I spent all day Friday, Mar 4, setting up my booth in my driveway. We had to pull all my stock out of storage bins and put them back on hangers. I fiddled with the layout many times until I found the best configuration that allowed for people to walk through and see everything. I made signs. My helper priced everything that previously wasn't priced. It was a full day...and then we had to pack it all back up and load it into my 15 passenger van with all but 1 bench removed. I hope business will allow me to buy a cargo trailer soon.

This photo just shows half the booth.

I hardly slept that Friday night. I was up at 4 a.m. and ready to go! I forced myself to wait until just before 7 for the very short drive to the market. I had most of the booth set up by the time my helper arrived at 9. It really went together VERY smoothly since we had done all the prep work the day before.

The second exciting new was that I was able to invest in some mannequins for my booth! Last year, I discovered that whatever I had on my half mannequins would sell quickly. Something could be on a hanger week after week with no interest but the minute I put it on a half mannequin, it would sell and the new owner would exclaim how cute it was! LOL

Mannequin #1 is this adorable little girl, sitting. I liked her because I figured she could be buckled into our van and kept 'safe' from the shifting stuff in the back. We've had a lot of fun with her! My kids think she's a life sized doll and they would put hats & shoes on her...ALL my kids, even the boys. hehe

The reaction at the market was very interesting! I noticed that several people were a little freaked out...but for the most part people really liked her! Kids loved her and would have to touch her as they passed by! That cute dress that she's wearing is super special. I didn't start with white clothing that I purchased...I actually sewed the dresses with a high quality interlock knit and then I tie dyed it in a 3 part process to get the lovely purple Shibori burst on the side.

Mannequin #2 is a super tall, thin lady with sculpted hair like the girl. Sorry....I didn't realize that I didn't get a photo of her. You can kind of see her head in the back of this photo.

The wind was REALLY strong at times in the morning. I have never had a problem with my shorter gridwalls swaying but I felt the need to really keep an eye on them when the wind was really strong on Saturday. I moved the cascade racks down a few notches and I made sure all 4 legs were on the bricks and that made a big difference. I'm toying with the idea of getting a new tent to have something else to stabilize them. Plus it would be nice to have some sort of shelter when the torrential rains come through sideways. My booth is under the bridge and very protected from normal rain but there is a chance of getting a bit wet when it comes in sideways.

Anyhow, I am so excited that we are back in the swing of things at RAM! It's a lot of hard work but we all have a lovely time....chatting with other vendors who have become friends, chatting with customers, enjoying the music and entertainment. Such a nice way to spend a Saturday!

This last photo is how RAM looks at the end of the day. Everything packed up and ready to load up.

Homemade Vanilla

2011-02-13T09:40:00.005-05:00

Our family goes through quite a bit of vanilla. We usually buy it it large 16 oz bottles from Sam's club and with our large family, it doesn't last as long as you'd think it would. I recently stumbled across directions for making homemade vanilla and I knew I had to try it.

I used the directions from this blog: heavenlyhomemakers.com

I bought 2 half pounds of vanilla from amazon

For some strange reason, it was cheaper to buy 2 half pounds then it was to buy a whole pound!

With shipping, I paid $51.95 for my 2 half pounds. I only needed 3/4 a pound for the vanilla so 3/4 of that total = $38.97 The quality of the vanilla is amazing. Plump and moist, not dried out twigs. With my 1/4 pound, I will be making vanilla sugar and whatever else I can think of that requires whole vanilla beans...like my favorite dessert recipe...creme brulee!

I didn't want to go buy a gallon sized jar nor did I want to recycle a pickle jar because I know from experience that it takes a long time for the pickle smell to go away! Not wanting pickle flavored vanilla, I opted to use quart sized canning jars that we already had on hand. Dividing the 3/4 pound among 5 jars, I end up with 16 beans per jar. Per the directions, I split the beans but I also had to cut them in half to get them to fit in the jar. Once filled, each jar had about an oz over the 24 oz line. So, if you wanted to make 1 jar instead of a gallon's worth, you could use 16 whole vanilla beans and just add enough vodka to pass the 24 oz mark.

Hubby purchased the vodka from Sam's Club at a cost of $11.99 per 1.75 litre bottle = $23.98 + tax = 25.66. We didn't shop around so I'm not sure how this compares to a liqueur store or walmart as suggested by the original blog.

Vanilla beans + vodka = 64.63 for 1 gallon (128 oz) of premium homemade vanilla.

That brings the cost to approx 50 cents an ounce but NOT including the little amber bottles that I would have to buy to gift the vanilla. Now I just have to wait 6 months before I can try it!!

Ultimately, this little project does not save me money over warehouse pricing BUT I am positive that the quality will be much better. Is does beat grocery store vanilla prices and it's WAY cheaper then the cost of premium vanilla. And I think it makes a really neat gift especially when transferred to those cute bottles with pretty homemade labels. Oh and we definately will be gifting some. Vanilla stays good forever but I would rather share then have our own lifetime supply! :D

9 months later...

2010-12-05T11:53:00.003-05:00

Woah...I was a little surprised to see how long it has been since my last blog entry. The truth is...I have been busy, extremely busy with my business and with my family. It does not even seem possible that 2010 is drawing to an end. It really feels like it should be September!

We have had some big changes here since my last blog. My oldest child entered high school, my oldest son entered middle school (in 5th grade! That's unusual here but he attends a new charter school that starts with 5th.) We successfully fought to have my twin son moved to his appropriate grade level after he was withheld the previous year. And...he is doing GREAT...as we expected. :) And my baby girl attends a preschool 4 days a week, mainly so that I can have some uninterrupted hours to get work done. In case you lost count, that's 5 kids in 4 different schools. Somehow we manage but I think it contributes to my insanely fast moving life!

Business has been great! I hired my first employee over the summer. Her name is Candace and I feel incredibly blessed to have her. She helps me be more productive. It's a good thing! I have to say that to this day, I am still amazed that I am now a bona fide employer. It's a little scary to have someone rely on me for income...but because of her part, I am able to keep business rolling in. For that, I am thankful. It also feels really good to be a part of a business that is constantly growing (albeit in tiny steps) in this market.

My arts market sales have consistently been great and I have reinvested back in more product. When I think about what I started with....compared to what I have now in product and in fixtures like my gridwalls.....it's a LOT. :)

I'm looking forward to another year of growth in 2011! I'm hoping I can provide my employee with full time hours, pay myself with a little more consistency (instead of reinvesting as much as I have been.) And I'd love to bring on another part time employee next summer.

Also on my wishlist:
Industrial 2 or 3 compartment sink to be installed for tie dye operations
Used top loading washing machine for tie dyeing
2nd Industrial serger

OK, I guess that'll have to do. Lots of stuff on my to-do list today...laundry, embroidering, soup making, order filling, product listing, etc, etc, etc!

Screen Printing

2010-03-30T19:18:00.005-04:00

Not too long ago, I was shopping for kraft bags for my arts market customers. The box of 500 bags that I bought last year are already gone...plus they were really a tad too big. I bought them because they were actually cheaper then the next smallest size. Go figure. Anyhow, this time I splurged on green bags because my Bird-E Towels are an eco-friendly green product. I also wanted to have my business name printed on them. I quickly ruled that out because of the cost! They were pretty pricey per bag and there was a set up fee that was pretty high.

In the past, I have tried a variety of ways to get my name on my bags...stickers that weren't super secure because I have the re-positionable kind, I also used a stamp but it didn't stand out. I stumbled across a screen printing website...and I was instantly interested. Not just for my little bag project but for the other possibilities.

I bought a hobby kit from www.silkscreeningsupplies.com and I am glad I did. I made a few mistakes in the process & I had to email their customer support. They replied very quickly and gave me a ton of helpful advice. I'm afraid that if I had just bought the supplies elsewhere that I would have been ready to throw the towel after my first disastrous attempt.

The basic steps are:clean you silk screen, let it dry

apply emulsion to screen in a light safe room & let it dry
make your design negative on the computer & print it on transparency film
tape your transparency onto your screen & 'burn' the design by exposing the whole screen to uv rays
rinse the screen with a water sprayer/hose. The parts that were covered by your negative will rinse away.
let your screen dry again
then you are finally ready to actually get the ink out and print! But don't get too excited yet. There is still a learning curve.

I thought I followed all the steps but I couldn't get the ink through parts of the design. Customer service helped me realize that my screen was actually under exposed. I spent an entire morning trying to get the old emulsion off. Looked so easy on the video...oh yeah, they used a pressure washer. Our pressure washer was stolen last year. I was never able to get it wall off even after all that effort. I wrote on the sides of the screen so that I would know which areas to avoid when I burned my new design.

Oh and somehow I ended up buying a new Epson printer and a pressure washer to help me with future screen printing projects. chaching!

So it has been quite a process but it was fun learning something new. :)

Meet Shorty

2010-01-09T20:37:00.004-05:00

Our oldest child is our 13 yo niece, my brother's daughter. We've had her since she was 2 and we just count her as one of our own. Her mom & extended family is very much involved and we have a great relationship with them all. Not only were we blessed with Mia...but with all the family that we get to claim because of her. :D

Mia's cousin Lindsay needed to make room in her house so she asked Mia is she wanted one of her chinchillas. I have to say that when I agreed...I didn't really know much about chinchillas. I looked them up online and the pics I saw were just of the chinchillas...nothing to judge their size by. I thought they might be a little bigger then a rat.

Meet Shorty. He's huge! About as big as a rabbit. I exclaimed with delight when I saw him...and I'm not one to get excited about rodents. He is just too freakin cute. His fur is so soft. I'm in love with him already.

And then I saw his cage...it's like the biggest, nicest cage I have ever seen. Seriously, it's really nice, well-made & heavy! The rumour is that Shorty has been quite spoiled. I can tell based on all his nice toys! I hope he loves it here.

FRAM - buying local

2010-01-09T12:10:00.005-05:00

I like the idea of buying local but if I'm being honest, we still do most of our shopping at our favorite warehouse club..mainly because of cost. When feeding a crew of 7, cost is a consideration. But, it is my new goal to buy local when we can. Today, I braved the freezing cold temps to hit FRAM, the Farmer's portion of the Riverside Arts Market in Jacksonville, Florida. (The artist's portion of the Arts Market is currently on winter hiatus until spring.)

The biggest plus to just having the farmer's there was that I was able to drive directly onto market grounds. With the vast majority of booths spots vacated, there was PLENTY of parking. It was rather convenient.

I think there were 10 vendors there, mostly produce tables but there was a coffee seller and someone selling granola.

I bought a little from most of the veggie vendors present. I avoided the largest one because they seemed a little more 'Florida' local vs Jacksonville or our surrounding areas. And, I don't know...their stuff seemed a little too perfect...more like grocery store produce. I wanted stuff that looked like it was local, fresh from the ground with dirt.

I was especially drawn to this little table from Down to Earth Farm. Somehow I ended up on their email list and I have enjoyed their upbeat attitude. Their latest email included info on how they are trying to save their crops from the freezing weather. So of course I wanted to purchase from them. Their stuff looked really exotic to me. As a child, my veggie consumption consisted of iceburg lettuce, carrots, cucumbers, canned green beans and canned corn. No, I am not kidding. As an adult, I am much more adventurous but I wasn't quite sure what to make of the unfamiliar veggies in front of me.... cone shaped cabbage, rutabaga, kohlrabi, beets and whatever else was there. OK, I've heard of rutabaga & beets but I didn't know what I would do with them. I opted for a $4 bag of prewashed mixed greens & a $2 cone shaped cabbage since I do know what to do with those at least.

I purchased from other vendors, too....green beans, tomatoes, cucumbers, cilantro, peppers. All in all, I spent $13 and bought a LOT of veggies. When my hands were full, a FRAM volunteer offered me a free canvas tote bag for my goodies. Nice! I came home, thawed my frozen hands, arranged my produce and took a pic for my 365 day project. My kids immediately wanted cucumbers. I made myself a salad with the mixed greens...it was delicious, absolutely wonderful. Not bitter at all like so many mixed salads can be.

So what are my plans with all these veggies... I plan on making salsa with the tomatoes & hopefully canning some. The green beans...oh the green beans...I can almost taste how yummy they will be using the Pioneer Woman's fresh green bean recipe. mmmmm mmmmmm

FRAM is open from 9 a.m. - noon on Saturdays. I'm pretty sure I'll be there as often as possible. It feels good to buy local. And maybe next time, I'll buy a rutabaga. Well....maybe. ;)

Pressure Canning Session #4

2010-01-04T17:14:00.005-05:00

Pork Stew

8# Pork tenderloin - 15.80
5# whole carrots - 2.74
Onions - .75

$19.29 to fill my smaller stockpot which I think is 2 gallons Not sure about the cost per serving as some of it cooked down before I started canning. Plus, it was dinner for 6. I'll come back and edit the numbers when I'm done canning and get a better idea of what it produced.

Update: 21 pints plus I am guessing we consumed 2 quarts for dinner so that would have been 25 pt = approx .77 a pint (or 1.54 a qt.) Oh and I added a bag of frozen corn to the remaining stew in the pot so half of my jars will have corn...just to change things up a bit.

Like the beef roast, I cut the pork into 1-1.5" pieces. I'm trying to eat healthier so I cut off as much fat as possible. (Heck, I do this anyway. Cooking meat with big globs of fat just grosses me out.) This time I browned it on my big griddle to get the caramelized edges vs the oven method of quick browning that we did before. Into the stock pot went the pork alongwith 6 chopped onions and the 5 pounds of carrots that my children peeled & chopped for me last night. I really would have liked even more carrots! I covered everything in the pot with water, added salt & pepper + some chicken base for extra flavor. Oh and I put quite a bit of garlic in, too! I love onions and garlic.

I started making the stew around lunch time but I waited until the kids were home from school before I started the actual canning process. (I could have started the canning earlier but I didn't feel like I could leave it on the stove while I did school pick-ups just in case anything held me up.)

Came home, got my jars ready, heated up the water in the pressure canner and got a load started. I did pints instead of quarts because I specifically want to have easy lunch meals for me. So often when I head to pick the kids up, I realize that I haven't eaten lunch and I stop and pick up fast food or I eat some highly carby food that I don't even enjoy...like cheeze-its.

Not sure what I'm doing wrong but my canner says it can hold 10 pints but I was only able to get 8 in there. I tried stacking them but that didn't work either.

Gotta cut this one short or I'll be late to an appointment!

I had some of the stew for dinner and it was....fantastic. Very yummy. The pork just flaked apart. The kids, minus one picky 9 yo, all loved it as did the hubby.

Pressure Canning Session #3

2009-12-31T11:24:00.003-05:00

I made a double batch of 15 bean soup, following the recipe on the back of the bag. It was the perfect amount for 7 quarts, the capacity of my pressure canner. I used a meaty hambone that we froze from our last ham, not too long ago.

Ham bone 0
Hurst Soup Beans (x2) - 4.78
2 cans crushed tomatoes - 2.98
Onions - .50
Lemon Juice - .25
Chili Powder - .05
Garlic - .10

8.66/7 = $1.24 per quart

I should note that we had to go buy MORE canning jars and they can be pricey! 12.59 for a case (12 jars) of the quarts and 11.49 for the pints. I decided to go with the wide mouth style which are a bit more money then the regular ones. The wide mouth ones are easier to fill and clean. I have been searching for cheaper sources and even put a request on craigslist but haven't found any yet. I've heard thrift stores and yard sales are good places to look for them...but I haven't been doing much thrifting lately...too busy! At some point, we can stop buying them because we will just be emptying the ones we have and reusing them over and over. Gotta buy new lids each time though!

Nice lazy day. (not really lazy but it felt like it)

2009-12-29T22:11:00.002-05:00

Today has just been a fantastic day! First, I was still glowing after finding out that my Bird-E Towels were featured (again) at apartmenttherapy.com 'best of 2009' etsy finds. Hurray! It explained why my sales and convos picked up markedly.

Then I got 2 wholesale requests. I don't really do wholesale. It just doesn't make sense for me at this time. With 5 kids, my business time is limited and my retail sales are already keeping me quite busy. I did finally nail down my bulk discount rate though and I submitted details to my 2 requestees. If they are still interested, great. If not, that's OK, too. Maybe sometime down the road I can start considering wholesale a little more seriously...like when I have some help!

What else happened? Oh yeah...I was contacted by our local paper. :D They wondered if I was interested in doing a video piece of me making something crafty & eco-friendly. Yes! The video would run on the paper's website and the article would be in the weekend paper...with my name, business name and links. Coolio! Now I just need to lose 50 pounds in a week. Any good crash diets out there???

There were a couple other smaller things that happened that just made me feel good about my business today. All these things on ONE day. :D

OK, what else? Did I actually get out to my studio today?? Well, technically, yes, but I didn't actually get any work done.

Instead, I played with my kids, talked to my hubby, worked on my bulk pricing, replied to convos and emails, cleaned house a bit, did a load on laundry and made 6 gallons of Weight Watcher's Taco bean soup. Oh and I played a little Farkle on facebook. (Watch out Tamee, I got my eye on first place!) ;)

Now back to the soup. We love this soup. It's easy and very versatile. Serve it like soup just as it is. Serve it like chili with shredded cheese on top. Or a hearty tortilla chip dip. It's also great on baked potatoes. It fills you up and it's a good 'diet' food, too. Well, as long as you go easy on the shredded cheese and chips.

There are a ton of different variations of it but the main 2 ingredients that make this version good are taco seasoning and dry ranch mix.

My recipe is approx 6 times a normal person's recipe. hehe I like to make a LOT at a time. And 6 times is the right multiplication for the cans of tomatoes, sauce and corn that is sold at sam's.

So this time, I'm excited about now having a pressure canner because it will actually save me time. I used to have to wait a long time for the soup to cool before I could freeze it. Then you had to wait a long time for it to thaw before it was ready to serve. woohoo!

Although now that I'm on day 2 of using this pressure canner, I'm thinking one of the bigger models would have suited my cooking style better. I can only can 7 quarts at a time in my canner. Oh well...

So here were the ingredients in my 6 gallons of soup...

ground beef 6 pounds	6	2.34	14.04
onions	1	$ 0.97	$ 0.97
2 # dried black beans	1	2.69	2.69
2# pinto beans	1	2.25	2.25
4# Light red kidney beans	2	2.87	5.74
tomato sauce 6# 10 oz	1	2.18	2.18
corn 6# 10 oz	1	3.48	3.48
crushed tomatoes 6# 10 oz	1	2.68	2.68
chopped green chili - tiny cans	2	1.35	2.7
taco seasoning	1	$ 0.66	$0.66
ranch dressing mix	1	4.59	$4.59
			$41.98

6 gallons = 24 quart

$1.75 per quart

I think 1 quart would actually be a meal for our whole family especially if served with a side and bread. Nice!

Although I really must admit that I don't really do this to save money. Not really. I'm just lazy and don't like cooking all that much. I love putting effort in at one time, having something to show for it and then get a chance to slack later. And there is that benefit of me choosing what goes into it. I like that part, too. It's nice that my hubby really appreciates my kind of cooking. Heck, I guess he just appreciates any kind of cooking that he doesn't have to do.

Pressure Canning

2009-12-28T19:50:00.007-05:00

I love to make soups. I love to make BIG batches of soup. Work hard for a little bit and end up with many, many meals for the effort. Hello! What's not to love? In the past, I would make 2, 3 or 6 gallons of soup at a time and then I would freeze the leftovers in individual and family serving sizes. Sometimes I would use freezer bags and sometimes I would use plastic freezer containers depending on what I had available. I would rarely reuse the freezer bags but I would use the containers over and over until they pitted on the sides or perhaps if I lost a lid.

Anyhow, at some point in the past year, I become aware that you could can soups and meats if you had a pressure canner. It just never dawned on me that you could do this at home. I did hear that you could pay to do your own canning at the county extension office but they had rules and it wasn't cheap to do. You had to use an approved recipe AND you had to cook it there before canning. To make it worthwhile, you'd almost need an army of people to process a large amount of food quickly.

So I started doing research and found that serious canners recommend the All-American brand of canners. For Christmas, my darling hubby surprised me with the 21 1/2 qt model. yippee! (He would have gotten a larger one but we have limited space on our range because of the built in microwave.)

I read the instruction manual...and it scared me!! So many warnings about serious injuries that could occur every step of the way if you screw something up. yikes! I panicked and tried to find a canning friend to walk me through it. Hubby went online and found some fantastic canning videos on youtube. That helped allay my fears and I was ready.

Hubby picked up 2 cases of canning jars and extra lids for me... $30 (ouch!)

First recipe...beef stew.

We had a 6# beef roast in the freezer from a previous sams' club trip so we decided to use that. Cost $15.03

Then I was going to break down the other costs but I seem to have lost some of the receipts! Well, OK...whatever 3 qts of cubed red potatoes ($2.50), 3 cups of diced onion ($1), 3 cups of diced celery & 8 cups of carrots costs...add that in. (I don't count the seasoning because we buy that in bulk at sams' for cheap.) I'm thinking it was probably around $23 for everything.

So this is what the stew looked like when we threw it together before canning. Browned cubed beef, veggies, beef base and seasonings. If I were making this for immediate use or for freezing, I would have thickened it with flour but that's a big no-no with canning.

Then it was time to start canning! I filled my quart sized pre-washed & pre-warmed canning jars with stew but left 1 inch headspace like my directions stated. I wiped the rims with a clean damp cloth and then put the lid & rings on.

The jars were very hot so I was thankful that my hubby bought me the canning accessory kit which included a jar lifter. The jars were then loaded into the canner which already had hot water in the bottom. (We accidently put a little too much water in. Whoops!) I will say that the directions in the manual were very confusing! You had to look at this page and then refer back to that page and then look at yet another page. I guess because there are so many options with canning. It would have been easier to a beginner like me if all the directions were complete in one place...even if it would have made the instruction manual a lot thicker.

Once I had 5 of the jars in, I realized that I forgot to swoop the insides of the jars to get the air bubbles out. Whoops! We pulled them back out and redid them. I was careful to rewipe the edges before we rescrewed the lids back on.

That's my hubby's hand, not mine, if you are wondering why it looks so masculine. ;)

We got all 7 jars in, screwed the lid on the pressure canner and started the process.

We first had to wait for it to steam for 7 minutes. It looked like this.

Exciting huh? Then we put the little regulator on, using the 10 pound setting since that's what our recipe called for. Then it was 90 minutes of process time at 10 pounds with the jiggling of the regulator. It looked like this...

The pressure canner is done but it hasn't cooled down enough for me to open it. They warned you heavily not to try to rush this part so I won't! Although I can't wait to open it and make sure all the jars sealed the right way. I know we ended up with a bit more then 8 qts worth of hearty beef stew made without preservatives with ingredients that I was in control of for around $2.75 per quart. (It could be made more economical with less meat more veggies.) And the best part....it won't use up freezer space! And it will be much quicker to reheat.

All in all, this wasn't too bad at all. Tomorrow we will turn these ingredients into WW Taco Bean Soup and 15 bean soup.

My take on having a cash register at a show...

2009-12-20T10:39:00.008-05:00

My Arts/Craft Show Background

I am not a highly seasoned arts/craft show vendor but I have quickly learned the ropes. I currently only do one 'show,' the newly built Riverside Arts Market (aka RAM) that is less then 2 miles from my home in Jacksonville, Florida. RAM opened in April of this year. I missed the first few weeks but I started at the end of April. I don't do RAM every week...just not possible...but I have done enough of them to learn a few things about handling sales at shows.

In order to sell at RAM, I had to get legal. Not too scary, actually. I went downtown to the Tax Collector's office to get a peddlers business license. It was not too pricey and the process was easy. I has also filed my DBA online..I don't think that part was required for RAM but I wanted to be covered to use my Athena Creates name. I also had to get set up to accept sales tax for the state of Florida. That was done online and it was free. (All of this was later changed when I became a corporation in August of this year but this gives you an idea of how I started.)

In reading the sales tax info, I learned that if you sell something, you are required to provide a receipt with the sales tax broken out separately. As a buyer, I can say that most vendors don't do this. And in the beginning, I didn't either but I had that nagging feeling that I was a (gasp) lawbreaker! I tried to hand write receipts but it was time consuming and cumbersome. You want to be fast so that the customer behind the one you are 'ringing up' doesn't put the item down and walk away.

The majority of the booths have access to electricity and they charge a reasonable $5 if you choose to use it. I had noticed a few vendors with cash registers and it peaked my interest. So I started looking at them and reading reviews. There are some inexpensive ones out there, some that run on battery power. The reviews on those were OK, not great. The complaints were that it took a long time for the receipts to print. I eventually discovered that I could get some really nice features by buying a slightly pricier model.

The One I Bought:

I chose the Sharp XE-A203. I opted to buy new but I did scout craigslist for a used one first. There were a few out there but I was concerned they wouldn't have the manual or all the keys and whatnot. This model had a display facing the customer. It also let me highly customize the data. I could program departments for the different products I sold. I could also set up different cashiers (for when my hubby or oldest dd came to help) and I could even put a logo or my own text on the receipt.

First things first, setting up the register was not as easy as you would think..even with a manual. The software would not work on my desktop PC which has Vista. Not sure if that was the problem or not. I did not end up calling customer service...I just tried loading it on my laptop and it worked fine there. I was able to set up departments and to get my logo in. Eventually, I removed the logo and just opted to add 6 lines of data that I thought would be helpful to my customers. When I was playing around entering fake sales, I found that sales tax was not being figured correctly when I offered a discount on an item. It was taxing the total before the discount. The manual was useless in trying to figure out how to fix it. I put a call in to Sharp's customer service and they were able to help me in a friendly manner.

I had a vision of a customer bringing an item to me, I'd press a button and it would ring up the item without me entering the dollar amount...so I set my departments up like that but I left a few miscellaneous open for dollar entry...which was a good thing.

I made tags for my products with the price and a tiny department number under it. Unfortunately, not all my items got tagged. I brought the stuff with me to finished tagging but the market opened before I had finished.

Here's how my first live experience went...

Customer brought up an item. I realized then that left my master programming list at home. The customer's item just happened to be one without a tag and none of the similar items had a tag. In my panic, I just couldn't remember what button to use. I started mashing buttons with the intent to figure out the right one with the intent that I would void that receipt. It worked but I was sweating bullets for the 40 seconds that it took me to figure it out. I've had a few transactions like that because I didn't have my cheat sheet handy. And yesterday I left my register keys in the van and my hubby had to come to my rescue. I'm sure that wouldn't happen to anyone else though! ;)

After that, things went much smoother. All in all, the first day was a success and I LOVED being able to hand my customers an accurate receipt. I also found it helpful to have the register figure the change for me. Yes, I know how to count change but it would slow me down a teeny bit especially at the end of the day when my energy would be waning (and lack of sleep from preparing product the night before didn't help!)

At the end of the day, figuring out my sales info was so much easier especially since I broke my departments down based on specific product. I could easily see that my adult long sleeved shirts were selling like hotcakes. I had a feeling that my girls' tie dyed dresses weren't selling well..but when I looked at my register report at the end of the day...they were selling! My faulty impression was based on the fact that many people came and admired but not as many bought. In the madness of the day, I seriously forgot about items that did sell. The summary took my faulty memory out of the equation. You could obviously do an inventory before and after the show to get the same data...or you could keep a detailed log as items sold but I never found the time to do it manually.

At the beginning of the day, I use the RA button to log how much money I am starting with and it adds that to my cash sales and tells me what my final tally should be. And during the day, I can QUICKLY figure out what my sales were thus far.

Here's a fake example of my summary report. It's called a X1 report.

It makes my life easy! I can see exactly what my sales were and how much money I should have in my register.

Pros

It is WAY quicker then writing a receipt and manually figuring things out with a calculator.
It's lightweight and easy to transport.
It doesn't take up that much room, maybe a slightly larger footprint as a regular sized cash box.
I can put my info on the receipt: my store name, my name, my etsy website & the dates I am scheduled to be at the market.
I can easily apply a discount, either to a single item or to the whole total. Sometimes I put the slow movers on sale for 10-20% off. Or I can offer a vendor discount if someone asks.
I can price my items exactly at the price I want without having to round up or down. And without trying to build the sales tax in there to get to a whole dollar amount.
The back-end accounting is so much easier! I can easily see what I need to submit to the state for sales tax.
The data of items sold is invaluable...without me manually tracking it, I mean.
My customers get a detailed receipt of items they have purchased.
It lends a feeling of professionalism.
The cash is not visible. I always wonder about the booths that keep their cash boxes right out in the open where the 'shoppers' can get right next to it. Maybe they don't keep much cash in there but I also think that it would be an easy target is the seller was distracted.

Cons

The cost of buying one.
There is a learning curve & in my case since I have never run a register before, I was starting at ground zero.
You have to be organized about it. Either have *everything* labeled or have a cheat sheet taped to the register or just use a few basic entry departments where you key in the dollar amount. And make sure you have the keys!
Requires electricity that you may have to pay extra for.
You have to learn a new routine when ringing a sale up.

Precautions
I will say that my register is VERY lightweight. Much more lightweight then I expected. I turn my machine off after each sale because I once had a little girl reach over and mash buttons. It popped the drawer open! Luckily I was right there but it took me a bit of time to void what she had rung up. If I have to leave my booth, I do empty the register of the bills just to be safe. I still wear my vendor apron to keep things on hand like my pen, keys so I just tuck the money in there. I also choose to put the back of my tent up and I block access to the register with my table slanted so that I can walk to the front of my booth to help a customer without worrying so much that someone would walk away with the whole register. I think these are the same precautions that you would take with a cash box though.

Summary
For me, having a cash register has been the right decision, a good investment for *my* business. I've done enough shows without it, my products are selling & I need to streamline the processes where I can. I don't do a bunch a different shows where electricity may not be available. I might sign up for 1-2 smaller venues during the RAM hiatus (now until March) but I can go back to my cash apron for those if I can't get electricity. And my product offering will be much smaller so it will be easier to keep track of things manually.

I would not recommend one to a newbie who has never done a show before. Doing shows is not for everyone. Make sure you like it and that it's profitable before you invest a ton of money! And maybe a cash register is not for someone who does 2-3 shows a year. And it's probably not necessary for someone who sells one item at one set price. I offer probably 50 different items at different price points.

My Last Day at the Riveside Arts Market for 2009

2009-12-06T08:13:00.008-05:00

December 5th (yesterday) was my last scheduled appearance at the Riverside Arts Market (RAM) for the 2009 season. There are 2 more RAM dates but I did not get signed up in time for spots with electricity, a must for me now since the purchase of my cash register. I am on a waiting list so there is a chance that I might get in. Still haven't quite decided if I will say yes if I get that call. It is December. We have a birthday coming up for our twins..oh and that thing called Christmas. I suppose it would be a good idea to have presents under the tree...and I don't think my kids would appreciate Bird-E Towels and the rest of my tie dye stock. Ingrates that they are.

I loved my location. It was not an end spot but that was OK. I was down closer to the food vendors and there seemed to be more foot traffic. My sales were higher then last week but not as high as they were 3 & 4 weeks ago. Being close to the food was also good...I was able to eat. Yay for eating! Another wonderful feature of the location was the proximity to the restrooms. I bring my valuables with me and not have to wait for my hubby to come watch my booth...which wasn't an option yesterday anyway because my dear hubby flew to Texas yesterday for a business trip. (Pray for me...patience and whatever...because I have never done this on my own for a week before. Uh - 5 kids really do take 2 parents, I think.)

Carla, my custom order bride, (that sounds like I ordered her - LOL - no, she was the bride who ordered a ton of Bird-E Towels for her reception a couple months ago) came by with her new hubby. It was so cool to see them. I have thought about her over the months and kept thinking I should contact her to see how the wedding went. She said she's going to send me photos from the wedding..yay!

I also met quite a few other customers. Several other vendors came by and purchased from me. I'd be willing to bet that more then 50% of my sales were to other vendors. One vendor who had a booth behind me bought t-shirts for her entire family for Christmas. I didn't have a boyish long sleeved shirt in size 4 that she really wanted and it was a struggle to find something that worked. We ended up going with a short sleeved one. (Reminder to self to order more long sleeved 4T shirts.)

Dawn, a friend of mine through Etsy and now in 'real' life, had a booth a couple spots down. She has beautiful glass pendants and other cool stuff like slumped bottle cheese boards and neat paper weights and glass dishes. Every time I walked by, her booth was loaded with people! (Hope you had a great day, Dawn!) Her etsy store is FirstLightGlass. Dawn had her children (+ a friend) with her for a portion of the day and I loved watching them skip around. It was especially cool since they were sporting their new tie-dyed t-shirts. It was like moving advertising. ;)

I also finally sold a shirt to Copper Head Dan. He's the one who requested long sleeved shirts back in the summer. He gave me a free copper sand dollar so that I would remember and darned if I just hadn't seen him since then. And the long sleeved shirts have definitely been a hit so thank you, Dan! I was initially scared of the price of the long sleeved blanks (compared to short sleeved ones) so I'm not sure I would have taken the plunge. Dan picked up a orange and blue shirt...to root on the gators.

The day started out so nasty and cold. Rainy, gray skies and just blah...and then the sun came out and it ended up being a lovely day. Yay! There were MANY booth cancellations...28 to be exact. I have to say that I was SO very tempted to cancel, too. With hubby catching a flight, we had to make arrangements for someone to watch the kids and then I needed help breaking down my booth. And then the prospect of standing in the icy cold rain just didn't add to the appeal. I'm glad I stuck it out though! It ended up being a lovely day...and my brother and his girlfriend came to the rescue for the babysitting and booth breakdown.

This is my brother, Levi, here. He is my baby brother, born when I was 9 years old. He was supposed to be Kelly and it took me a long time to forgive my mom for ruining the lovely all-occasion card I made for him with KELLY plastered on the front. I had gotten one of those little brass things that you punch through paper and it lets you attach 2 pieces of cardstock together. I had cut a little window in the card and attached a wheel of cardstock that said 'birthday,' 'Merry Christmas' and other holidays . So it was a whole year of card giving that was ruined when they came home with Levi and not Kelly!

He looks a little scruffy but he is a really nice guy and he always helps me out when I ask. And he's super smart with computers so he helps me when my computer crashes. I'm thankful to have him around. He was helping me break down my grid walls here.

Coming up soon...my take on having a cash register (vs not having a cash register) at a show.

11/28 Riverside Arts Market - Spidery!

2009-11-29T11:22:00.009-05:00

My supply of shirts was dwindling down so I tie dyed the remainder on Friday, after Thanksgiving. It took me a super long day to get these done. I always underestimate how long it takes to just do stuff! I had planned on sewing more Bird-E Towels for the market but there was no time.

Here are some shirts, soaking in a solution to bring them to the right PH level so that the dye that I use will be permanent.

With the super cold temps, I had to bring my operation inside and then keep the kids away from the tempting bottles. This was set up on top of my dining room table. I used pieces of cardboard to soak the small spills. Tie dyeing is messy!

I keep grates over bins like this to contain the dripping. And I'm now mixing dye by the gallon or half-gallon...thus the milk jugs (which were thoroughly cleaned obviously.) I like to recyle and reuse with my business. I use reuse plastic bags over and over and over again...even though it takes precious time to clean them out after each use. The same with the rubber bands that I use.

So yesterday was my second to last schedule appearance at RAM. It was cold, brutally cold for this gal who does not have proper winter clothing. My hands especially did not like the cold. It was hard to get them to cooperate with me at times. My feet, however, where quite toasty in my hand knit wool/cotton socks...ones that I knit myself a couple years ago!

I changed the layout a bit, like I always do depending on where I am and what is around me. I really prefer spots with one end open.

For the most part, it was a long slow day. Traffic was down compared to the previous 2 weeks. Sales were about half of my average. Not complaining really, these things happen and I am very thankful for the customers who did stop by and find things to purchase. I have high hopes that next week will close the year for me with a bang. You know, so that I can actually pay myself instead of just accumilating supplies. ;) Not that I don't get immense pleasure from opening 200 yard rolls of fabric, dyes and t-shirt blanks. Oh, I like that just fine!

This week's RAM theme for me was spiders...partly because of this beauty..

This is the Christmas spider that I bought from my booth neighbor, Samantha. I had never heard of Christmas spiders but I was entranced by them! She included a little piece of paper with a brief version of the story but I found a longer version here... http://www.santalady.com/xmasgame/stories/spider.html Kids were really drawn to the spiders so I know my kids will love having this on our tree. And Samantha has an etsy store! alaart.etsy.com Her stuff is gorgeous and she's really nice, too. She does have some spiders in her store now... http://www.etsy.com/search_results_shop.php?search_type=user_shop_ttt_id_5585745&search_query=spider

When my hubby comes to help me break down my booth, our children are sometimes with him and they help. When my middle dd was undoing velcro from my tent, she found this little spider.

I can't believe that the Riverside Arts Market is so close to wrapping up for the year. It has been such a great thing for Riverside, heck...for Jacksonville and the surrounding areas, too. But, considering that I am and have been a Riverside resident for nearly 20 years, I feel what I consider to be a deeper appreciation. This is my neighborhood and my small business is thriving, in part due to RAM. And the other kudos go to etsy.com for sure!

Muses' Corner

2009-11-17T13:34:00.002-05:00

I have crossed another milestone with my business. My product is now in a brick & morter store in Jacksonville, Florida. The store is Muses' Corner and it's in the Avondale area, 3562 St. Johns Avenue.

http://musescorner.com/Welcome_To_Muse_s_Corner.html

I set up one spiral rack with some of my tie dyed stuff. I also left a small qty of my Bird-E Towels.

That's it for now. After my Arts Market days are over, I may send more stuff over.

Riverside Arts Market 11/14/09

2009-11-15T04:09:00.004-05:00

My hiatus is over! I guess it's been 3 months since my last date at the Riverside Arts Market. It's so much work to get ready...especially the first one after a break. I have been working very, very hard to have product available. My booth looked like a rainbow exploded over everything....lots & lots of tie dye and a tall stack of my popular eco-friendly Bird-E Towels.

The morning was very chaotic. I bought a cash register to help me keep track of sales and to help speed up the process of providing a receipt for my customers. I spent time programming keys for departments. I printed price labels with dept numbers on them so that I just had to push a button to get the right item. The only problem was that I ran out of time to get the stickers on every item. No problem...I would have time to do that at the market. haha I left the stickers at home AND I left the lovely master list I had created. So my first customers had to wait while I figured out which keys were right...and somehow in the process, I rang up a $10,000 order and I couldn't figure out how to void it. argh! My cash was a bit off at the end of the day....by $10,000. hehe It was actually very nice to have all the good data from the register so I don't regret the purchase. Next week will go easier, I'm sure!

Another new thing was that I now accept credit cards through propay. What an awesome thing! More then 50% of my sales were credit cards. And it was very easy to do. Well, my knucklebuster was a fail but it was easy to rub the card impression with a receipt so it worked out.

Exciting events of the day:

Having a woman driving a segway crashed into my booth. She was so apologetic and a bit embarrassed, I think. It slid my grid walls over a bit and knocked off some shelves. Product (and the lady, I might add) were all fine after a bit of dusting off.
When I was talking to an old friend, I had a kid push cash register buttons and the drawer popped open! I was able to fix it. Lesson learned! Lock the drawer every time. That was too easy. I thought it was in a somewhat secure location but I never imagined a child would be tempted and would actually touch it. Thank goodness it wasn't a thief.

I'm suddenly feeling very sleepy so I better end this. I was going to head out to my studio...but I just decided to head back to bed for a little bit longer. {{yawn}} I've been working so hard lately that sleep has not been a priority.

Here's one photo from the day. I love how my booth looks! It's such an improvement over my first days. I can really get a LOT of product up on those hooks. Yay! I have more photos up on my facebook fan page. Become a fan here to see them. Thanks!

Oh and I had a very good day, sales wise. I felt like the day was a bit slow but when I sat down and totaled everything, I found that I must have mentally been counting the cash because my guess was close to the cash amount. By the time I added in the credit cards receipts...it was a good final number!

A Paperless Birthday Celebration

2009-10-26T18:47:00.015-04:00

Sometimes I feel a bit guilty when I find myself doing un earth-friendly things...just because it never dawned on me that there was an alternative. I fully admit that when I created Bird-E Towels for my family, it was more based on a desire to stop spending money on paper towels as a way to stretch our household budget a little further. And I LIKE the earth-friendly aspect but that was not my primary motivation at the time. Since then, I have changed many of our un earth-friendly habits and it feels fantastic.

We now use and LOVE our stainless steel Klean Kanteen water bottles. My 4 smaller children have the smallest sized bottle which we pack in lunch boxes as an alternative to juice boxes. And we have a complete set of the 27 oz bottles, one for each family member that we keep refilled in the fridge. Easy to grab when we are going somewhere. No more bottles of plastic tasting water here and NO trash to worry about!

When making purchases, I now think twice before I purchase stuff with plastic or with big bulky plastic packaging that will just end up in a landfill. I haven't totally avoided it but at least I'm thinking about it and making decisions that make me feel like we are making a tiny bit of difference. One small example that comes to mind is that I am buying bars of soap from a local seller at our arts' market. Virtually zero packaging compared to the squirt pumps that I would buy and toss after one use. And it lasts longer, too, so it ends up being a better value.

So last night I was at Target, shopping for birthday gifts for my baby girl and I stopped by the gift wrap. My first thought was 'Why is this stuff so expensive??' My second thought was.....'Why do I HAVE to wrap her presents in paper that will be thrown away?' Well, there is something nice about seeing a stack of prettily wrapped packages so I knew that unwrapped gifts wasn't the answer.

Enter lightbulb moment:

Aha, I have lots and lots of pretty fabrics. Couldn't I just wrap her presents in fabric and tie it up with a ribbon??? And that's exactly what I did. I didn't even serge or sew the edges. Chances are that I will use this particular fabrics for something else so no need to worry about raw edges. I just fold it so that so raw edges were showing. I'm sure that someone else could do the folding more justice but this is kind of in line with how I wrapped presents with traditional paper...just get her done.

I am pleased with the results!! I'm sure that this would not be the most cost effective thing for a non-seamstress. But maybe there are other reusable things that could be used to wrap presents to avoid paper. A pillowcase comes to mind. Or a fancy apron could possible be folded and tied around a gift using the straps. A reusable grocery tote, a kitchen towel for smaller gifts....just all sorts of options that could be part of the gift and not produce any trash. Heck yeah!

Now I interrupt the talk about paperless gift-giving and will share some photos about my baby girl's 3rd birthday. I love this little girl with all my heart and can't imagine what life would have been like without her. She was our rainbow baby and she helped heal our hearts from the loss of her big brother, Nolan, whom she never had a chance to meet. We are pretty darn sure that she's the last kiddo so she will probably always be referred to as the baby...even though I'm pretty sure 3 is the official cut-off for calling your child a baby among other adults.

Happy 3rd Birthday, Lily! You are such a joy to us....smart, funny, adorable!

Make a wish!

SOFT!

Um, OK - clothes!

Now we're talking...toys!

This isn't hard to open and none of that annoying paper ripping sound.

Who are these kids and why couldn't I be an only child??

So this little paperless experiment was a great success! Not sure I can pull it off for Christmas but I know birthdays will be a cinch. No more trashy paper!!

As I approach the gift-giving season with my business, my mind will definitely be on providing complete gifts that will not require excess disposable gift wrapping for my customers. So, keep an eye out for Bird-E Towel sets 'all wrapped up' in drawstring gift bags. A few are already listed in my store and they have been quite popular already. I enjoy making stuff that has a bit more color then my best selling product so it's all good. :)

Halloween Inspired Creature

2009-10-14T12:03:00.003-04:00

I really love bright colors and bold color combinations...like purple and orange. I came across a box of felt in my studio last night and I felt the need to create. My toddler 'helped' me. This guy is soft and squishy and my youngest daughter thinks he's her best friend. He has big bug eyes that I made using non equal size imperfectly round 'circles' that sewed in yoyo fashion to create the eyeballs. I added hand painted eyes that I purchased from etsy a while back.

And he looks just as good upside down as he does right side up.

I didn't really have a purpose in mind when I made him but I have a feeling this fella is going to stay here.

Supplies!

2009-10-13T01:02:00.003-04:00

I love getting stuff in the mail. One great thing about running a business is that I get to spend money and get packages in the mail. Like a double dose of retail therapy! Today, USPS brought me 2 things....another roll of fabric and a box from the Atlanta Thread Company. I love the Atlanta Thread Company!! They ship so fast. I have gotten package in less then 24 hours from order to my doorstep. The had a special promotion this month where you would get a free pair of ginghers scissors with a $75 purchase...so I did just that. I picked the pinking shears since I already own every other size of ginghers with a few duplicates in there, too. I also picked up needles for my industrial serger, 12,000 yard cones of thread and some new maxi-lock cones to add to my collection. Plus a lint roller, fray check and seam stabilizer.

Today was a bit frustrating as I spent the morning working on financial stuff and my numbers weren't adding up. It took me way too long to figure out the problem was related to e-check transactions in paypal. The payment was reported in one time period but didn't clear until the next. The accounting stuff....is not easy for me. I think I'm actually pretty good at math and that's not the problem. it's just keeping track of all these bits of information and assigning account numbers and transferring things and doing journal entries, blah blah blah. I would really like to just stick my head in the sand and ignore it. (I wish that was really an option!)

Well, I better cut this off and get to sleep so that I can wake up at a reasonable hour.

Where are you?

2009-10-11T00:41:00.005-04:00

My mom and her husband, (not referred to as my stepdad, he's just her husband, Tom) just arrived for a super quick visit before their 'fabulous' vacation in Florida including a cruise to the Bahamas. She signed up through one of those crazy cheap web offers and I'm not sure she hasn't been scammed in some way. If they get on the cruise and someone asks them for more money, ha, ain't gonna happen. And they won't be doing any of that expected tipping either.

So right before she got here, I called to see where she was. I'm heading towards the beach. 'Uh, why?' was my reply. I was trying to figure out if she had an overwhelming desire to see the beach at midnight. Ya never know with her. 'I couldn't find your street.' {{banghead}} So instead of calling me, she just randomly decides to head towards the beach which is 30 minutes from my house.

'Mom, where exactly are you?'

'I see a McDonalds.' (There are 114 McDonalds in Jacksonville.)

'Uh, need more information. What street are you on?'

'There's a Chick-Fil-A.' (There are 18 Chick-Fil-As in Jacksonville.)

'Mom, please tell me what street you are on so I can get you back towards our house.' The unspoken part is 'SO THAT I CAN GET MY TIRED BODY IN BED AND NOT HAVE TO WAIT FOR YOU.'

I then had to hand the phone to my amazing husband. He knows thing. He can walk you through directions over the phone and give you things to look for on the way. Not that *I* have ever needed his services. OK, ya got me. I call him all the time when I get lost...in my own city. But hey, this is a big city not some podunk little town.

Back to my mom....it took her longer then we expected and I called her again. 'There's a Walgreens.'

'What street, Mom????' How many Walgreens are there in this city?? 56

We got her here.

I told her not to leave any valuables in her truck or in the back because we've had some thefts. My oldest dd had a slumber party last night and someone stole one of her friend's bikes from our yard. It was locked to our camper. They just clipped the bike lock. Anyhow, so my mom decided that they needed to bring in the grill and their cooler. Yes, they brought a full sized grill on their vacation. My dh wasn't too keen on that idea of bringing the grill in so he came up with an alternative plan of having them back in so that the back of their truck wasn't wide open for the sticky finger 'shoppers' that come through in the middle of the night.

Now it's 1:00 a.m. and i really need to go to bed but I wanted to post my most recent creation, the Bug Bucket Bag. Bug bucket bug, big buck bag, bucket. You try saying it 3 times fast!

Isn't it cute??? I hand-dyed a vintage linen napkin and turned it into a fabulous bucket bag. It's in my etsy store if you want to read more details. I'm too tired to type it all out again.

Night all!

Wednesday

2009-10-07T23:38:00.004-04:00

I find is absolutely fascinating to feedjit statistics to see who has visited by blog. Of course, I don't really know who stumbles across my blog..just basic information like city/state or country. Sometimes I get a little extra bit of information based on which blog post is hit first. I've gotten quite a bit of traffic from the etsy bulletin boards, particularly one post about studios. I linked my studio more then a week ago yet I still get at least a few visits a day from that. Just fascinating stuff.

As far as my business goes, I struggle daily with decisions that will affect the future of my company. I grapple with the biggest question of all...how big do I want to take this? Is it OK to apply pressure to myself to get orders out the door at the cost of perhaps slightly neglecting my stay at home mom duties? I don't know the answer. I do get the feeling that my husband get annoyed at my small 'failures' i.e. not having any plan for dinner when he gets home, not keeping up with laundry, etc. Don't get me wrong, I'm still doing laundry (perhaps on an emergency basis) and the kitchen gets cleaned multiple times a day...and we are all eating. It's just hard to get excited about cooking and cleaning...when it all just has to be done the next day.

I am excited about my business. It gives me something...that I just can't quite put into words just yet. Or maybe it's just that I'm exhausted. {{yawn}}

I am proud of how quickly things have progressed with my business but I do have times where self-doubt tries to take root in a corner of my mind like what if more then a day goes between orders. I wonder how I'm going to make all the right decisions without making any monumental mistakes along the way.

I was able to pay myself another small payroll check today. I bought groceries with a portion of it and that felt great.

Must go to bed. I can't write a blog post without posting a pic so here goes..

This is something my 6 yo son created with some of the groceries I bought. Can you tell what it is????

It's a robot! Of course. Now you see it, right? ;) It's also the makings for chili. There was a once a month chili recipe on my favorite recipe website that used tomato soup instead of sauce and I'm going to do that one tomorrow. It's a sweet chili that most kids like.

Riverside Arts Market 10/3/09

2009-10-03T15:18:00.004-04:00

My haul from the Riverside Arts market today...

I have to say that there are REALLY nice vendors at the Riverside Arts Market. I think I spent about $17 for all the above stuff. The pumpkins were free gifts with my son's $3 purchase of blackberries. That's what he wanted to spend his money on. And when the vendor knew he was spending his own money, he loaded Ethan up with 2 bowls of the delightful berries. And he made each of the kids take a mini pumpkin. See, nice people. And this is not the first time that we have been gifted like that at the Riverside Arts Market.

When I have been a vendor at the Riverside Arts Market, it has not been uncommon for people to give a small token of their work. Copperhead Mike (I think that's his name) gave me a hammered copper sand dollar...to remind me that he wants me to make him a long sleeved tie dye shirt when I do my next batch. Vendor have given my children fresh fruits and veggies, too. And if I thought long enough, I bet I could come up with half a dozen other examples, too.

I love participating in the Riverside Arts Market as an 'artist' and I love going as a Riverside neighbor. And it's not really about the stuff that's for sale. While at the market today, I chatted with quite a few vendors that I have become acquainted with. It's nice to walk through and have that personal recognition. I also ran into a store owner who really wants my product in her store. That was a good contact for my business! Not 100% sure that I'm going to do it but I am certainly considering it.

Another really cool thing is the Children's Creativity Corner. I had my 3 youngest children with me today and they got to make slime to take home. What a thrill that was for them. (haha, my slime farts. Mine does, too...haha) They also had a beautiful corn snake and the children were allowed to touch it. And that my friends was FREE entertainment. woohoo!

I have been on a bit of a Riverside Arts' Market hiatus, as a seller, I mean, but I'm thinking I'll be signing up for a spot sometime within the next 2-3 weeks.

Where Did September Go?

2009-10-03T12:13:00.009-04:00

Poof, there went a whole month. Must do better about blogging! I think I got sucked into facebook and keeping my Athena Creates fanpage updated.

I have been feeling rather energized lately. With school back in session, I have had time to keep up with my etsy orders and I've had some time to create new stuff.

I had a lovely local customer, Carla, request a large quantity of Bird-E Towels for her wedding reception and I was able to oblige. She was my second (or third?) bride who wanted my eco-friendly alternative at her reception. She was rather excited about how large her stash of Bird-E Towels would grow once the reception was over. So cool! Once the initial order was done, she commissioned me to sew napkins and a tablecloth using fabric her friend had dyed. Absolutely gorgeous!

I couldn't bear to toss the scraps so I made 2 little drawstring giftbags for Carla. My wedding gift to her. She hasn't picked her order up yet but I hope she likes them. :)

I also made an adorable chinese inspired upcycled dress. Cute, cute, cute! (if I do say so myself) It started as a thrift store find, a like new chinese shirt. I cut the bottom off and added a gathered skirt using some of my precious stash of linen. It ended up a tiny bit shorter then I had intended (why can't I measure first and then sew? LOL) Anyhow, when my little one modeled it, it reminded me of the short dresses we wore in the 70s when I was growing up and I decided it was very cute. I think this would also look fabulous with a pair of jeans on the tot.

I used bits of the print to create a few more items for my etsy store, too. I love using up scraps of fabric!

Bird-E Towels (tm)

2009-08-26T08:46:00.005-04:00

Lots of changes have been happening at Athena Creates! I'll have to summarize.

I am now president of a newly formed corporation, Riverserge, Inc DBA Athena Creates. yah! I have a brand new name for my eco-friendly paper towel replacement product.... Bird-E Towels (tm) (I can't figure out how to get the tm with a circle symbol in here. hmph! ) Hurray! This means that I have a name that is unique to my product. I can build my customer following on my product and not worry so much about the copycats.

And speaking of copycats, I have now had to deal with a few sellers who lifted my photos and/or my exact words to plop on their copycat product. It makes me sick to my stomach to know that others would do that. There are others that are copying the idea and you can tell they modified my words just enough to fly under the radar. And they are copying my pricing structure which is annoying. It all makes me a wee bit upset, but not nearly as bad as the photo and word lifters. It is outright theft. I'm trying so hard to not let it upset me. I am learning about copyright, trademarks and patents. And I am taking steps to protect my work.

Mainly, I try to remember that I am an important part of the equation here, too. And that comes in the form of my enthusiasm, my belief in the product, my high level of workmanship and my customer service. My business is still growing but at a pace that I can keep up with.

Other exciting news...I have a new logo for my Bird-E Towels! I love it! So the significance is that Bird-E Towels are an eco-friendly paper towel replacement. Paper towels come from trees. Birds live in the trees that are harvested for paper towels. Using an owl is a nod to my business namesake, the Greek goddess Athena. She is often depicted with an owl...and of course, she would want to save trees for her feathered friends!

My logo was created by Morningstar Artistry on etsy. I really liked some of her logo samples and I'm happy with the final product that we ended up with. She was really easy to work with and I think her prices were quite reasonable.

4 out of my 5 kids are back in school as of Monday. One more week before my wildly curious and adorable toddler will start pre-school and that's when the party starts in my sewing studio! LOL I'll have 3 days a week to focus on my business without distractions from the children. Hurray! I miss my kids but it is increasingly hard to set business goals and meet them with a constant stream of interruptions. My 8th grader is loving school so far. And my 3 elementary aged kids each hit the teacher jackpot. They each got fantabulous teachers!! Makes it easier to send them to school, knowing that they are having a pleasant day.

I have to take the little one to her school orientation so I'll cut this off now. Thanks for reading!

Vacation!

2009-06-27T19:31:00.018-04:00

We drove up to Massanutten, Virginia for a mini-vacation and our annual reunion with hubby's 3 sisters and their families. We rented a huge 7 bedroom house. The set up here is actually perfect. The kids can go outside and I don't have to freak out...well, if you forget about the gigantic black bear that was sighted down the road. So other then THAT, and the fact that we are the side of of a mountain, it feels safe. hehe

The car ride went OK. Started with Lily screaming and ended with her screaming. Ear plugs for everyone just might be a purchase for the trip home.

We have had a really nice time. I can't believe I contemplated missing this to work on orders. What was I thinking?? I do need this. I love my dh's family, his sisters and my nieces/nephews. They are all so good to my kids. It's just easy. Everyone gets along.

I brought my tie dye stuff and a bunch of blanks that I had ordered and we had a day of tie dyeing. I did the prep work and the clean up and the everyone did their own shirt. Not knowing everyone's sizes, I ordered extras and I intend to offer those for sale, at the Riverside Arts Market or perhaps my etsy store. I love tie dyeing! It's so satisfying, hard work but satisfying.

The shirts curing in plastic bags.
A few of the family shirts.
These are the extras!

Gotta go! They are returning from the water park and it's dinner time!

working, working, working

2009-06-24T02:22:00.003-04:00

Sometimes, a picture says it all. These will be going out this morning, a battle against time. We leave for vacation tomorrow morning and not one thing is packed. These, however, will begin their journey across the North American continent and to Australia, too.

My studio

2009-06-22T21:04:00.003-04:00

I spent some time this afternoon cleaning my studio and rearranging things to better fit the industrial serger. This is what I ended up with.

It makes me so much happier to work in a clean space! My cutting table is right behind me as I took the picture. It has bits of fabric still on the floor so I didn't take a picture. Just pretend the whole workspace is neat and clean and I won't show pics of the kitchen or bathroom. They aren't terrible, terrible but they aren't organized either.

And here is my latest tool, a used electric rotary cutter. It cuts like butter. Fairly easy to use and it saves my body a ton of wear and tear. That doesn't even address how quickly I was going through rotary blades! This thing has a self-sharpener. I am scared though because there is no safety mechanism and no off switch. So, I will have to be UBER cautious if I'm using it and the kids come to visit me.

I spent the past 3 days prepping fabric, cutting and organizing my work space. Now I am ready to crank out some orders. :) I am thankfukl that my orders slowed down. It was getting to be overwhelming especially since we have our vacation coming up in a few days. Now I feel like I can relax on vacation and tackle undone things when we get back.

2009-06-20T04:10:00.002-04:00

Unpaper towels created 6/19. (A few aaditional ones didn't make it in the pic. They will be heading to their new homes tomorrow. I usually switch the ribbon colors around but tonight I did them all the same. It's now 4:00 a.m. and I'm heading to bed.

(wo)man vs the Machine

2009-06-19T11:35:00.004-04:00

So, I want to tell you that I just adore my new industrial serger. I want to tell you that my 16 years of home serger use gave me a huge advantage and that I would sit down and know exactly what to do. I expected there to be nice knobs for adjusting the differential feed and stitch length. And that between my knowledge and the instruction manual, that we would be well on our way to a harmonious relationship.

Are you laughing yet? If you know anything about an industrial serger, I bet you are.

I bought my wonder new piece of machinery 2nd hand which means that I don't get the benefit of picking the phone up and calling my dealer everytime something goes wrong. That is a pretty big deal. But, the savings of buying (barely) used vs brand new was too great to pass up. So I have to muddle through this myself.

Yesterday, I achieved some level of success with actually using the machine and serging up my unpaper towels. I had previously been afraid that I could never manipulate the small fabric fast enough. After lots of trial and error, I started getting the hang of it. I slowed down at the corners and I appreciated the speed on the sides. That was an area on my home serger that I felt like I could braid my hair waiting for the serger to work down the 4 sides. (Not really but it felt like that.)

The industrial serger is FAST, way faster then I really need. I can only imagine going full blast if I were making curtains. I did run some fabric through at full speed and I ended up biting a hunk of the middle of the fabric into the seam. Whoops! I just couldn't arrange the fabric quick enough.

I had lots of mess-ups but I think I am almost at a point where I can let my home serger take a mini-vacation with the service shop.

Notable facts about an industrial serger.

There is no presser bar lever. I have 2 pedals, the left is the speed, the right lifts the presser foot. I have adapted fairly well and it's actually a nice change. I'm not as good controlling the speed with my left foot but it's not really an option to use my right foot on that pedal because it would be an akward twist of my body to access the serger.

The machine uses oil and a LOT of it. It took half a quart to fill it. When I serge fast, you can see oil bubbling up to the top of the machine under a little plastic bubble. It's kind of weird and cool.

It's a PAIN is the arse to thread. About 10 times harder then a home machine and tweezers are definately needed even when threading the needles. I can thread my home serger without tweezer if need be. It's probably a bit quicker with tweezers but half the time I don't know where they are, usually buried under fabric. I will HAVE to keep track of my tweezers...or maybe buy a few extra to keep floating around.

It's a teeny bit noisy. Is has a separate motor that is attached under the table. Oh, and yes...has to be attached to a table so it's not portable.

The instruction book is pretty useless. It's written in 4-5 languages and each section is lacking. The diagram for threading it is not clear enough and not big enough for me to be 100% sure. There is plenty of room for error!

Adjusting the stitch length and differential feed involves opening the machine up and pushing buttons that don't look like buttons or twisting knobs that don't look like they want to be unscrewed. Not exactly abundantly clear even when looking at the instuctions.

But, it IS faster. And I'm starting to warm up to it. It will help me be more productive. But, I expect that it will give me plenty of headaches until we become more accustomed to each other.

June Sales Stats (so far)
162 unique customers, mostly new but a few repeat buyers in there, too (thank you!)
221 sets of unbleached unpaper towels sold (5 packs and bakers' dozens) That's approx 2700 individual UPTs!!
3 'deluxe' sets of hand dyed unpaper towels
12 sets of flannel cloths
1 apron
96 packages shipped
71 to be shipped (to date)

Holy moly! Never, I and mean NEVER would I have dreamed that I would post stats like that. This month's sales mean that I was able to pay CASH for the industrial serger, CASH (OK, the debit kind) for all the other supplies that I need to run my business - like shipping supplies (polymailers, labels, tissue paper,) a large order from dharma for dyes and blanks, 16 spools of serger thread, 400 yards of fabric, an industrial iron and a new cutting tool. And if I weren't saving to become incorporated, I could pay the household back for the purchases that started my business. And one of these days, in the near future, I might even be able to pay myself for the bazillion hours a week I am pouring into this business. And that money will be mainly earmarked for debt and hopefully a bit of renovating of my studio.

Hurray! Dave Ramsey would be proud, I think. It feels WONDERFUL to be able to offer such a great product to my customers and to reap benefit that will directly impact the lives of our family.

I have reached a level of success that I didn't know was possible

2009-06-17T09:33:00.004-04:00

My business....it's good. Don't get me wrong, it is a LOT of hard work. My neck, collarbone and arms are SORE from handling 6+ yards of fabric at a time. The part of the process that makes me sore is hanging 6-12 yards of wet fabric on the line. It's hard work but the pay-off is that I don't have to iron the fabric before I cut out my unpaper squares. I'm sure a bigger operation wouldn't go through the steps of pre-washing, drying and then hanging wet fabric on the line. I do it because it makes the end product better. I have tried taking short cuts in the interest of saving time...and the results were not desirable.

Anyhow, I am not getting a whole lot of sleep. I am constantly working or doing research or ordering supplies. Every ounce of extra energy is going towards this business. And I'm excited. I believe in my product and I am tickled with the amazing feedback that is rolling in.

I bought a slightly used industrial serger from a couple last night. They had plans to make some sort of dog products but they put the project on hold and decided to outsource the work. They knew a little bit about how to operate the serger but not the level of expertise that I would have gotten if I had purchased from a dealer. At 50% of the retail price, my husband and I will muddle though it. And yes, I said my husband. This serger is way beyond me at this point in time! It's like man equipment, for sure! It's seriously fast. Like faster then my hands can manipulate a 10" square piece of fabric. I am hoping that with practice, I will get better! It's not fully set up in my studio just yet so I can't start that process just yet.

I have also ordered an electric rotary cutter and I'll be looking into an industrial iron. My beloved Rowenta just isn't cutting it anymore.

I have approx 100 orders to fill. My short-term goal is to do 18 orders a day. That will catch me up, exceed my customer's expectations on shipping and place me in a good place next week when we leave for a 5 day vacation/mini-reunion with my husband's 3 sisters and their families. We are heading to Virginia, driving...not taking the camper.

I took a couple hours last night to finish up loose ends. I owed 2 packages that I owed to gals from an online bb. One was for photo magnet buttons and some unpaper towels. The other was for 2 toddler outfits. I have one more photo magnet button order to do and then I can 100% focus on my etsy orders. Here are the 2 outfits that I made. My ultimate goal was QUICK yet cute projects and these went together super fast. And I think they are adorable. And I'm pretty sure they would fit Lily so I'm a little sad they aren't staying here! LOL

Now I'm going to get a bit religious and delve into a very sad subject. Read at your own risk.

Today is the 4th anniversary of the unexpected death of our youngest son, Nolan James. It is not a day of celebration, like his birthday, but a day of mourning. A day to reflect on what we lost and the horrifying details of June 17th, 2005. I miss him and still feel an unmeasurable sense of loss and sadness. I just know that he would have been a very special 4 year old if he had been allowed to stay here with our family.

I have spent the past 4 years holding God at arms' length. Actually, I think I tried to throw him right out of my life with the sheer magnitude of my anger geared towards him. I obviously couldn't budge him. He was still there, watching me. I told myself that he did it with indifference because he obviously didn't care about ME since he allowed my precious son to die. That wasn't the God I knew.

I feel like God is making it clear that he does care about me and that he is guiding me towards success with my business. I can't really claim any credit for it. There are so many people that work hard, make a product and then struggle to find the right audience for it. I am no different. It is things that are outside of my control that has driven traffic to my store. I'm not a marketing expert. I don't know the right words to say to close a deal. I've just put myself on the line, like so many others.

I guess that all I'm trying to say is that this success makes me feel like God is trying to reach out to me and offer a proverbial olive branch. That he does care and that he is calling me to do this work. So I will work. And maybe I will try to start forgiving him. Maybe.

Woah!

2009-06-12T09:54:00.008-04:00

I can't believe it's been 2 and a half weeks since my last entry. All I can say is that I have been busy!

My oldest child, a niece we have been raising since she was 2, went to visit her mom in SC. My oldest son, Greyson, turned 9 on the 8th. Poor kid...we had to reschedule his party due to the fact our toddler was really sick. So this was our little salvaged party at home. Real party coming up soon.

Greyson was the first baby born to me, 2nd in our home. He is a super easy, delightful kid. He also has a quiet sense of humor. I'm so glad I get the pleasure of being his mom.

These cookies came from RosewoodHill. She replied to my alchemy request on Etsy and she made 2 WONDERFUL cookies for the birthday boy. Also got him a Jedi robe from CustomKids

And, my business? BUSY! I found out I was featured on a website.

http://www.ohdeedoh.com/ohdeedoh/scavenger/etsy-find-unpaper-towels-087167

I sold more then 40 sets of my unpaper towels is a very short time frame. I am in complete shock and awe. I would write more but I have a heck of a lot of orders to process!

Oh one more thing...

I'll be in the July Spotted Box. I stayed up until 3:00 a.m. to get my samples prepared. I wanted to get this out of the way so that I can work on my unpaper towel orders. Phew! I just need to work on my ads and then I'll be all set.

And 2 lucky Spotted Box buyers will get a FREE package of unpaper towels!! Who will win?

Can you see how I SEWED these closed?? :D That was fun! I have had these small manilla envelopes forever and they don't work well for my shipping needs so I cut them in half, stuffed them and sewed them closed.
I recently made some girly burp cloths for a friend. She bought one set and I put a set up on my etsy store. After a sea of off-white unpaper towels, this little project tickled me...pink. heheOK, I really have to go. since I started this, my toddler used her little potty and tried to clean it out in our bathroom sink. Sound goods but not really! She also scratched the heck out of her big brother. And my middle daughter helped herself to Coke for breakfast. Aye aye aye!

Dresses!

2009-05-25T21:37:00.008-04:00

I finally did some sewing for my girls. Remember that vintage fabric a couple posts down? It turned into little girl dresses. I made one for my 6 year old dd and another for my 2 year old. I also made another toddler sized one for my friend's dd, the one who gave me the fabric. I think the dresses turned out great. Kendall's is a little gappy under the arms. Lily kept untying her dress. Aye aye aye!

Hey look, I wrote a blog post that wasn't book length!

Sunday Night

2009-05-25T08:57:00.017-04:00

A friend wanted to see the silk scarves that I dyed a couple days ago so here they are. I love how they turned out! There are 3 scarves, not 5.

I wasn't very productive in my studio last night. The little girls needed baths so I took them out to the studio with me. Discovered we have a leak. When the tub drains, no leak. When water goes down the overflow part, we have a leak into the garage. I'm guessing the leak is in that part of the tub. It's probably rusted out or something.

After the girls were bathed and bundled up, I tried to get some photos for etsy. As I said, I didn't get much done! The girls needed one thing or another the whole time we were out there. Lily kept wanting to put stuff in my photo tent. Like her bear! I did get a few good pics of the pink unpaper towels I made sometime last week.

I also had another little 'friend' who wanted to hang out in the tent. It's hard to gauge size based on this pic but let me assure you he was HUGE. bleck!

Bear with me while I work on my blog layout. I'm having a hard time finding a layout that works well for me. My previous one had so much wasted space on the sides. This one isn't working for me either. It's such a pain to get the pics where I want them!

New things

2009-05-24T18:52:00.006-04:00

We had a half sleep over last night. Sophie, one of my twins' friends, came over for a sleepover. We ended up calling her mom around 11 p.m. Oh well, maybe next time. (Kendall was upset that it wasn't a full sleep over.)

Sophie's mom is really super sweet. She loves shopping at thrift stores and she always brings me treasures from her searches. Once it was an awesome knitting book. Yesterday it was an incredibly cool piece of vintage fabric. I love it and there's a lot of it, 4 yards I think! It's screaming wrap skirt to me. Or maybe aprons. Or both! It has a nice weight to it.

Our neighbor Lisa is fostering 4 baby kittens whose mama was run over on Park Street a while back. There are 4 of them and she keeps hinting that they need a home. She keeps them on her front porch and my children love to go visit them. This little fella is my favorite one! We have borrowed him (with her permission) a couple times and I have a strong feeling that he's ours. Isn't he sweet???

Garage Sale Score for my Business!

2009-05-23T16:18:00.009-04:00

I headed up to the Riverside Avenue Christian Church yard sale today and found a few things for the kids, like they need anything! LOL There was this activity table thing that was brand new...air hockey, paddle ball, checkers, chess, etc, etc, etc for $35. Also picked up some movies and a few books. Ethan bought a spider man web shooting thing that lasted 5 minutes by the time he came home. Oh and I picked up one of those marble game building things for $3.

But the score for my business was a serger! Yes, I already have a serger but I have been living in fear that something bad was going to happen to it. It's been acting finnicky but I can't stop serging long enough to take it in for service. I have my heart set on an industrial serger ($1200!) but I'm not quite there yet. I do have some money from recent sales, thank goodness, but I'm hesitant to spend all or most of it just yet.

So this beauty was marked "$50 - never been used." That peaked my interest so I opened the box and pulled it out. This action seemed to draw attention to what I was doing. Ladies, potential competition, were eyeing me. I knew the minute I walked away from the box, that someone would swoop in and take it! But still, $50 for an old musty serger? I couldn't quite bring myself to spend that much so I put everything back. At this point, I saw that there was ANOTHER price written on a different flap that had been hidden when the box was closed. $20 Heck yeah!

I took the box up to the 'cashier' and asked which price was valid. He told me that the old price was probably from when the owner tried to sell it at a yard sale. Their price was $20. So I paid for my purchases and headed home happily, hoping the thing would work.

The machine was immaculate. I rethreaded it. It threads slightly differently then my 2 previous sergers but I figured it out. The first stitching was less then desirable but after adjusting the tensions, it eventiually produced beautiful results, better then my current serger, I think. The negatives? It's considerably SLOWER which is not a good thing. It also doesn't have a thread cutter and it doesn't have as many options for changing thread length and stitch differrential. But, for $20???? Oh yeah, I'm happy, very happy!

Now I can take my main machine in for a spa vacation at the repair store and still be productive while it's gone.

I have been busy making unpaper towels and filling orders. Here's what they look like before I serge them. At one point I'm going to sit down and figure out exactly how many I've sold between etsy and the Riverside Arts Market. It's um... a lot! And my body feels it. Making these little cloths uses muscles that I never knew I had before. My collarbone hurts! I'm pretty sure it's from the repetitive cutting because that's when I feel it.

I received a box of yummy flannel for flannel cloths. 44 yards, I think. I think this will be my last flannel purchase...at least for a while. My flannel cloths just don't move as quickly as the unpaper towels. I think I would be wiser to have more of my best seller on hand.

Good News

2009-05-22T13:22:00.010-04:00

I feel like one good thing after another has been happening for my little business. I have a simple product that people are buying and loving as much as I love them. The sales are pouring in and I am having a blast preparing packages and getting those orders out the door as quickly as possible. As a matter of fact, you can see how productive I've been. See this empty roll? That was full of 200 yards of birdseye fabric 3 weeks ago!! I pulled the last batch off today and I'm prewashing that fabric now. I predict that the unpaper towels that I make with this batch will be sold out before my new roll arrives next Wednesday! What an amazing and wonderful thing! (Although the thought of selling out makes me a bit nauseous because I like to ship my orders the same day and there might be a wee bit of a delay for orders placed early next week.)

A blogger asked if she could feature me so I am working on answering her questions. She also suggested that I include a photo of my work area so I thought I'd share it here, too. (The other areas are too messy right now!) Here is my beloved cutting table. My amazing husband made me this table with a large piece of wood that he found in our attic when we bought our house 15 years ago. The initial base was looking icky so he just remade it for me recently with new unfinished cabinets. I love it! The cabinets still need to be finished but I can't stop using the table long enough to let him do it. I was going to store fabric in the cabinets...except that my children LOVE to hide in there with a flashlight so it looks like they will remain empty except for a pillow and a couple blankets. If I ever lose a kid, remind me to look there first.

My current fears and concerns are not having ANY unpaper towel stock built up for my next appearance at the Riverside Arts Market, Saturday, May 30th. I just keep selling them via my Etsy store so quickly! My new roll of birdseye arrives May 27th and I'll need to burn the midnight oil to make as many as I can between Wednesday and Saturday morning. Yikes!

We have had monsoon weather here. Day 6 of dreary rainy days. I really rely on the sunshine and breeze when I make my unpaper towels. Hanging fabric on the line means I don't have to iron before I cut the fabric out. So...I was forced to hang 2 lines in my garage. Not as delightful as seeing my fabric blowing in the breeze but it meant that I could continue whipping out unpaper towels.

And all these gray skies were kind of bringing me down so I had to make my own brightness...in the form of hand made and hand dyed kitchen towels. My 2 youngest girls and I stood out in the drizzly rain and tie dyed. It was fun! I want to do it again already. Here are our little packages that rested overnight. The results are stunning! I'm saving these for the Riverside Arts Market. Aren't they just awesome???

Sick kids

2009-05-20T14:14:00.002-04:00

I finally got some new stuff listed on etsy. I've had some requests for color unpaper towels so I tried to oblige. And before I could get the last set photographed, my camera battery died. And where might my charger be??? The last time I saw it was in the stairwell hallway. In it's place was a bug/rodent-scaring-away-ultrasonic-electronic thingy we got from MIL. My 6 year daughter plugged it in a couple days ago. I've looked in many a nook and cranny and can't find the charger. It must have found my FIRST battery charger and they ran away and eloped, I'm guessing.

So now battery charger number 3 is on it's way to me. (Hey, the alternative was to clean the whole house from top to bottom, moving furniture and whatnot and hoping it showed up.)

Today is day number 4 of torrential rainfall. I'm thankful for the cool down in temperature but I am not happy with the cold wetness. It also messed with my productivity. I eventually broke down and strung 2 makeshift clotheslines inside the garage. Doesn't dry the fabric as well as sunshine but it better then using the clothes dryer and then having to iron all the way down the edges of my fabric.

My 6 year old son stayed home from school yesterday with a tummy bug. And he was kind enough to pass it to his younger sister so she's the sickie today. We had 2 baths and 3 outfit changes before noon. She started crying that her tummy hurt and I picked her up...just as the doobell rang repeatedly. It was the mailman. He had packages for me! I always love getting packages! Just as he was handing me over the boxes, he said 'Oh, she's not feeling well.' I thought, 'Wow, he's perseptive, especially for a guy.' Then I casually look down and see that my toddler is puking scrambled eggs all over the rug and door thresh hold, about 8 inches away from his feet. Oh my! I tossed my boxes inside and started stripping her for bath number 3. And for some unknown reason, I just started laughing. Not because she's sick, no that's not funny at all.

The funny part was that I have spent the day trying to get her happy and situated so that I could go sew. I have a customer waiting on a custom set and quite a few unpaper towel orders from late last night and early today that need to go out the door ASAP. And life just told me that I am not in control and I just need to stop worrying about orders for a bit and just hold my baby girl until she feels better.

Business is booming

2009-05-17T08:13:00.013-04:00

Yahoo! It is so exciting to be part of a new business that is doing well. I'm at a point that I HAVE to figure out how to be more efficient so my mind in constantly evaluating the processes I follow to conduct business. One thing has become clear is that I must invest in a commercial serger. My little home serger is just too slow. It has served me well over the years but now I need speed! My husband gets excited about machinery so he's been doing some research for me. I'll need to wait a bit before I can actually purchase since I'm running this business on cash, not credit. So far, just about every dime has been reinvested.

Yesterday was another day at the Riverside Arts Market in Jacksonville, under the shade of the Fuller Warren bridge. The weather is starting to heat up but it wasn't unbearable. I rearranged my booth and had MUCH greater traffic and sales. I had my 2 4 foot tables at the front of the booth and one 4 foot table down the side. After I rearranged things, the honey people next to me, experienced show participaters, agreed that it's better to have everything up front instead of doing a U shape or L. Some people are hesitant to actually enter booths. And based on how many people actually stopped to talk to me, see my products and buy, I now have to agree! I sold out of my plain white unpaper towels by 12:30! Holy cow, it was amazing! And one lady bought $51 worth of kitchen towels and unpaper towels. That's my highest single order at a show. Keep in mind that the majority of my stuff is $1 so getting to $51 is quite a job! I also noticed a huge difference in sales and interest in my hand dyed kitchen towels. In my previous 2 market days, I sold a small number of them...most likely because they were in the back of my booth. Yesterday, I sold quite a few!

I was so excited this week to have a banner with my business name. Last week a passerby told me I needed a banner on the front of my tent to explain who I was. I had previously ordered a freebie banner but it didn't arrive until this week. I proudly put it on the front of my tent when I set up yesterday. Halfway through the day, my excitement was squashed when the jeweler's husband came over and told me it was really bad! More specifically, the location was bad. He pointed out that half my product was hidden. Doh! He was right! I moved it to the back of my tent and it opened up the view. Now I need to actually buy a new one that will go all the way across the top front of the tent. Boy, I just keep learning new stuff every week.

I took a custom order from a super nice lady in avondale. She wants 10 of my birdseye kitchen towels, half plain and half dyed a soft minty green or a pale sky blue. I'm working on the blue right now. I'll dye both colors and let her pick her favorites. Now that I'm looking at the color, i think this one might be a bit too dark so as soon as this batch is done, I'll dilute the solution a bit and try for a lighter color.

Also in the works is black & blue and a lovely fushia. My roll of fabric is getting smaller and smaller so I must order another roll ASAP.

My friend Jennifer from my MOPs group came by and sat with me for a while...and she had her adorable 4 week old son with her. Oh my goodness, I got to hold him and admire him. I can't remember the last time I held a tiny baby...at least a year ago, I think. I didn't forget how though. ;) Alicia came by, too, and so did a friend of Diana M. (Diana is my local friend who seems to know everyone in Jacksonville. And if she doesn't know them, she undoubtedly knows someone who knows them!) Tonya B from church stopped by. Congrats on the kids getting into the school you wanted!

The one person I didn't see??? My dh's co-worker Danny who in the past has the uncanny ability of showing up when my booth would be empty. Maybe I was busy with a customer when he walked by this time and I missed him? hehe

Thanks to being on the front page of etsy yesterday morning, my recent online sales have skyrocketed, too! Everyone wants my plain white unpaper towels. I'll be working on getting those orders out today...delivering them to the Kings Road post office later tonight so they will have a headstart on their journey to their new homes across the United States and Canada. The photo on the left is of my prewashed fabric, waiting to be cut into squares and serged up. I do prewash and dry the fabric in my dryer to encourage shrinking BEFORE I cut but I have found that using my clothesline as soon as the fabric comes out of the dryer allows me to skip a time consuming step in the process.....ironing! And seeing yards of fabric billowing in the wind just gives me an unexplainable sense of joy.
It was also nice to see some of my North Florida Etsy friends... like Dawn from First Glass Light (http://www.etsy.com/shop.php?user_id=5824585) and her family. She was there as a participant and not a vendor this time. I love her glasswork! Oops - i just checked out her store and found a paper weight that I want. It could help prevent my unpaper towels from threatening to blow away at a future RAM. And Kelly from Happy Shack Designs (http://www.etsy.com/shop.php?user_id=5510421) stopped by, too. In addition to running two etsy stores, taking care of a family, teaching and participating in RAM, she also runs our team website http://etsyteamnfcr.blogspot.com/ And I thought I was busy!

So, these are exciting times here at Athena Creates.

I also became the proud owner of this...

http://unpapertowels.com

I quickly added some basic info and I will be tweaking it...as soon as I have fulfilled all my outstanding orders. My goal is for it to be an informational website with a link to my online store.

Baffled, bewildered and downright thankful

2009-05-12T16:20:00.003-04:00

My little business is growing my by leaps and bounds. It started one week ago when I listed my first set of unbleached unpaper towels on Etsy. Since then my sales have exploded. I can't believe how much need there was for such a simple idea....a paper towel replacement that feels and acts more like a paper towel then anything else out there. I created my version of the unpaper towel based on personal need. I wanted to stop buying paper towels. We were spending over $30 a month on paper towels!

My first few attempts were sort failures because the suggested fabrics (flannel, woven prints, etc) ) didn't really work like a paper towel, they sort of pushed the water around. When I came across my stash of diaper-making fabric, an idea was born and I made a whole stash of unpaper from birdseye fabric last summer. It was only then, that my dh gave me permission to stop buying paper towels. Success!

And I have been slowly building my business over the past 9-10 months. Sales were coming but at the rate of 1-2 or maybe 3 in a week. In the past week, between Etsy and the Art's Market, I have sold over 70 sets of either my unpaper towels or my flannel cloths!!!

I am thrilled and a bit giddy. I'm already reinvesting back into my company so that I can be more efficient. My husband built me a 3x6 foot cutting table and set it on top of 3 new cabinets. I also purchased a new huge self healing cutting mat that covers the entire surface! Other couple weeks of great sales and I'll be looking for an industrial serger!

Rachel German Moyer

2009-05-11T04:47:00.004-04:00

I met Rachel when she came to visit the Beta Sigma Phi sorority group that I was a member of. Beta Sigma Phi is a non-academic sorority with chapters all over the world. It was really a way for women to get together and do stuff that women love doing...the main thing was talking and laughing! We also did fundraisers and were were involved in charity activities.

The main thing that I remember about Rachel back then was her contagious smile. She was always super friendly and always more concerned about everyone around her then she was about her self. And I remember her talking about her girls and her husband Dave. All nice things, of course! She loved her daughters Danielle and Hannah so much and always included them in conversation.

Rachel and I connected in some way that I just don't think I could ever adequately explain. We talked about our families and our plans for the future. She shared her intense desire for a third child and I shared my history of infertility and treatments that we had gone through to add to our family. It was around this time, that my husband and I conceived twins via invitro fertilization. We were ecstatic to know that we were going to have twins. And Rachel shared that joy with me...in spite of her own personal longing for a new little baby of her own.

Being pregnant with twins was about the time that I became a really bad sorority sister, missing meetings and events and not being able to follow through with my duties. I loved being a part of the group. I loved the ladies that were in my chapter...but I just didn't have the time/energy to be a part of such an organized group with officers and group minutes and required fund raising events. Our chapter was also experiencing growing pains so it just seemed like time to focus on my family vs my social life.

Rachel and I continued to stay in contact even though we were no longer in sorority. I used to volunteer at the Yates YMCA and I encouraged her to apply for the part time job they had. She got the job and ended up loving it. And over the years of my on-again, off-again membership there I would always stop to see if Rachel was in.

I found out I was pregnant again in the fall of 2004. It was completely unexpected since we didn't actually visit the Florida Institute for Reproductive Medicine for conception like we had for our twins. Rachel again shared my joy. And it wasn't too much longer that she found out that she was pregnant, too! At this point, we didn't get a chance to spend much time with each other but we stayed in touch to compare our pregnancy joys and woes.

I gave birth to Nolan James, on May 6, 2005. Rachel gave birth to her baby, Sophia, somewhere around that same time but I'm not sure of the exact date.

When Nolan was 6 weeks old, he died. He was a perfectly healthy baby who was a perfect addition to our family and he just stopped breathing on the night of June 17th, 2005, another tiny victim of SIDS. That was the day that my world crashed around me and I ceased to exist. No, I was still here but there was nothing about me that was the same. EVERY SINGLE THING in my life changed because I changed, even the minutest thing ran through my new 'Nolan' filter and the world was no longer the happy, safe place I knew. I learned that I was not protected from tragedy. I suddenly started to hate the God that I had known and loved since I was a child. My God, a god of fairness and mercy and a prayer answerer, would have listened to my prayers and the prayers of the strangers in the emergency room that night and he would have saved my son. He choose not to do anything...and that made me angry, very angry for a long time.

I think I used to be a lot more like Rachel in my years before Nolan's death. I always had a smile and I was definitely a glass is half full kind of gal. After his death, I lost friends. I know that many people don't know what to say when someone loses a loved one...so they sort of withdraw and don't say anything. Or they are afraid that you will cry when you talk to them. The funny thing is that crying is actually the best thing. It releases those intense feelings and then leaves you sort of empty so that you can continue living.

Rachel was not afraid to reach out to me. I will never forget how she came to visit me during the darkest time of my life, in the weeks immediately after Nolan's death. She brought us lunch, Chinese food, and she also had newborn Sophia with her. We talked and cried and cried some more. Somehow, just opening her heart and crying with me allowed her to take some of my pain. At some point, she asked me if I wanted to hold Sophia. I mean, who would do that? Put a newborn baby in a grieving mother's arms? But somehow, with Rachel and with Sophia, it *was* OK. Sophia was so teeny tiny compared to my chunk. And she had a ton of dark hair, unlike my almost bald blondie. She was just beautiful and I rejoiced in her...in spite of my own sadness and longing.

And then life just continued. I was learning how to survive me new cruel reality. We eventually had another baby, Lily.

On June 15th, 2007, I took my children to Chick-Fil-A. It was just 2 days away from the second anniversary of Nolan's death so he was on my mind. A lady was there with 5-6 kids herself. I saw a lady with a t-shirt that had pink footprints so I immediately assumed it was another loss mom and I got up the nerve to ask her about her shirt. It turns out that it was something related to being a sign language interpreter. While this conversation was taking place, one of the girls looked at me and asked me if I was her mom's friend. It was Hannah, one of Rachel's daughters! I told her I was and I immediately asked how her mom was doing. Hannah looked at me, frozen with indecision. I could tell that she was trying to figure out what to tell me. She looked away and mumbled something about her mom being at the doctor.

I called Rachel immediately and found out that she was at the hospital, getting a chemo treatment for breast cancer. I felt the air sucked out of me. She told me that her cancer was spread to several locations and was considered to be between a 3 and a 4. I recall these details because I wrote about our encounter in my journal.

I am so sad that Rachel spent the last 2 years of her life fighting cancer and that she didn't make it. Yet again, it makes me angry that God didn't swoop in and intervene. I love Rachel and although I am sad about the loss of my good friend, I am heartbroken over the separation of Rachel and her daughters. They need her. It's unfair for them to continue life without the mother who loved them so much.

I have regret that I didn't get to do much to help Rachel during her battle. I was busy raising my 5 children and she was busy raising her girls...and fighting the blasted cancer. We visited a few times and we talked to each other on the phone from time to time. I was deeply honored when I got to watch Sophia while Rachel went to a couple doctor appointments recently. But again it was not enough.

Rachel died on Wednesday, May 6th, on Nolan's birthday. What a strange coincidence. I can't help but think there is some connection. In my mind, it's Rachel's way of telling me that she will be looking after Nolan once she gets to heaven. I don't know exactly what heaven will be like but I do get a tiny bit of peace at the thought of Rachel sitting in a grand rocking chair and holding my youngest son and giving him the blessing of her great smile and her loving manner.

Riverside Arts Market

2009-05-10T11:25:00.008-04:00

I love, love, love the news Arts Market that just opened in MY neighborhood in Jacksonville, Florida. I have always loved living in Riverside and the RAM (Riverside Arts Market, of course) makes it even more enjoyable.

I have participated nearly every week since it opened, mostly as a shopper. Yesterday was my 2nd time as an artist, although I find it kind of hard to call myself an artist. I think of artists as the painting/drawing/sculpting kind and not so much the sewing kind.

This week, my booth was under the shadow of the Fuller Warren bridge and what a huge difference it made! It was almost cool with the soft wind blowing through. My first week I was under full sun, the wind was crazy and the sun zapped every ounce of energy out of me!! So yesterday was really lovely. Although I think my location might have made a difference with the wind. I heard from a friend that a heavy wooden pottery display fell over and smashed all the artist's hard work. How heartbreaking!

Here was my booth set up. It worked out better then last time. Having the tent helps to define the space. I also like that my tent is GREEN for eco-friendly, green living. That's my focus! Sewing products that make a better impact on earth then disposable paper products.

Kudos to wonderfully helpful husband, Glenn, in helping me prepare for RAM. He made my heavy duty tent weights with 4" PVC and cement. He also set up my tent and tables in my booth without my help. (Someone had to stay home and watch the kids. Our oldest child would have normally watched the younger ones for a few minutes but she was at a lock-in at church.)

He also came and relieved me for a few minutes at lunch time and he left me a helper, my 6 year old daughter, Kendall. It's nice being able to leave my booth so that I can actually buy lunch and walk around a bit. I love seeing what have available! My lunch was a pulled pork sandwich from the barbecue place. As a matter of fact, I buy the exact same thing every time. LOL It's really good! I don't particularly like their fries (too seasoned for me) but my kids deemed them great so there wasn't any waste.

My purchases this week were from my neighbor, a bottle of local orange blossum honey. Kendall loved it and tried to refill her little honey sample straw with my honey. I also bought a ball of soap from SunDog Soaps, a whopping $1.50 purchase! Kendall bought from them last time and I love that soap. It's gritty and smells so good. He had some new soaps out this week, too. And yet again, I meant to buy strawberries but I forgot!

There was plenty of goofing around going on, too. Kendall had a little fun with my clothespins. And one of the jewelry vendors had her hubby with her as a helper and I can just tell he's a trouble maker so keep your eyes out for him if you make it to RAM. ;) He was sufficiently shocked when I told him about how many children we have. I'm not sure what his wife's name or company name is but their booth looks very professional with black display stands and lights illuminating her lovely jewelry.

Another funny thing that keeps happening is that one of my husband's co-workers, Danny, kept walking by when I had no customers in my booth. It happened the first week, too, and then several times yesterday. He'd look over and smile as if to say "you aren't selling much, huh?" I did! LOL I'm quite pleased with my sales for the day. Anyhow, I now have a personal mission to have customers in my booth for the next chance encounter with him at a future RAM.

Thank you to my friend Teri (and her friend Kathy) for stopping by to see me. We used to be the Kerri and Teri team when we started in the same department on the same day at BCBS many, many years ago. People always mixed our names up after that. Anyhow, Teri is one of my favorite, bubbly people and i was glad to see her. So that's another reason why I love being a part of RAM....to see people I haven't seen in years. And it's good to see the friends I do see on a regular basis, too! (Hi Lisa and Lisa's mom who's name I can never remember.)

So if you are in Jacksonville, please stop by my booth next week. (I won't be at RAM every week so that I can have some Saturday fun with my family from time to time.) If you tell me that you read this blog, I'll let you pick any one of my single flannel cloths as a free gift!!! (Ssh - don't let Danny know you're getting a freebie. This is part of my grand plan of having customers around.)

One of the most amazing things I participated in creating...

2009-05-06T11:30:00.007-04:00

Four years ago today, I gave birth to our 5th child, a sweet little boy we named Nolan James. That was such a joyous day! Isn't he amazing? I love that little boy with all my heart, as I do will all of my children.

The below pic is what our family looked like when the children met their new baby brother. 2 year old Ethan had better things to do but you can see his head in the corner of the picture.

I feel great happiness and crushing sadness when I look at that photo. The first thing that strikes me is that Lily, our 6th child isn't in the picture. Of course not, she wasn't born until 17 months later. I know that. But here's the part that hurts...we have Lily here now and she can be in all our current family photos but Nolan never will. He's gone. A part of my family, my heart, is missing and it will never be whole again. There will always be something not quite right.

I try not to think about the sadness on his birthday. I really try to think about what an amazing gift we received 4 years ago. Our time with him was way too short but that doesn't mean it wasn't worth the time that we did have. It is worth the blinding pain that continues. And his birthday IS worth celebrating even if it means that we celebrate from Greenlawn cemetery instead of our home or Chuck E Cheese.

Happy Birthday, Sweet Bebe Nolan! We adore you. We remember you today...and everyday.

We will put his cross (one that dh made with his name and birth/death dates) in our yard and tie a couple balloons to it. And when the kids get home from school, we will head to the cemetery for a balloon release.

Thank you to all my friends who remembered what today is and those who sent us messages and called. It's nice to know that other people think of Nolan, too.

Not Me Monday

2009-05-04T13:58:00.003-04:00

This is my first "Not Me" Monday.

I did not notice my toddler running around outside (in our privacy fenced backyard) naked a couple days ago and I certainly did not overlook it in hopes that dh, who was closer to the toddler, would notice her first and get her dressed. I didn't do that because she was dressed when I saw her. ;)

I did not pack my kids lunchboxes with junk one day because the 'good' lunchbox food was gone and we were out of bread to boot! I mean, who would run out of bread??

That's all I can think of at the moment. I'm sure I'll have many more "Not me" moments for future Mondays.

Wicked

2009-05-04T10:40:00.003-04:00

Months and months ago, a friend ours sent an email that Wicked was coming to Jacksonville and that she was able to reserve prime tickets to one of the performances and it was at a discounted rate. We signed up and I have been impatiently waiting for the big night. Last night was the show and Glenn and I got to go on an amazing (and quite rare) date. My brother and his girlfriend watched the kids for us.

We had dinner with friends at Moss Fire Grill, one of my favorite local places in Jacksonville. We really should eat there more often considering how close it is to our house! The food is always yummy and last night was no exception. I even had a couple margaritas with dinner.

During dinner, I realized I left our tickets at home so we swung by the house to get them before heading to the Times-Union Performing Arts Center to watch the show.

The place was PACKED! And no wonder, the show was spectacular! The music, the acting and the stage design were all perfect. I really felt mesmerized the entire time. And today I'm left with a slight longing to watch it again! That's not likely anytime soon so I'll have to be happy with listening to the amazing soundtrack on my MP3 player. {{sigh}} And as soon as I'm finished with my current audiobook, Voyager by Diana Gabaldon....you can bet I'll be adding Wicked to my must read list.

Latest Happenings

2009-05-03T10:59:00.010-04:00

Our house is off the market!! It is no longer available. And I am ecstatic. I want to stay here after all. I have such a feeling of peace about it. The kids are pretty excited, too. DH put my clothesline back up yesterday! No more worrying about how things look from a potential buyer's standpoint!!! I am relieved and thankful that we will continue to live here. It doesn't have everything on our wish list but it is a lovely house to raise our children in. Hip Hip Hurray!

And speaking of markets, this one being the arts market....I know I promised pics of my booth. It didn't happen. Well, my helper, 6 year old Kendall, did get a few random shots which I've included. The only thing I can say is that I was incredibly busy from the moment I got there until my dh came to help me pack up at the end of the day. And my brilliant idea from the below blog? Not so brilliant when it has wheels and the entire market is slightly sloped. Add some wind gusts and I had no choice but to position it at the back of my booth against a curb. And that meant that I sold virtually nothing from it. Well, a few things but not much! The things that sold were the items that were prominently displayed at the front of my booth, my unpaper towels. And the plain ones sold out within a couple hours! My display board was great for drawing people in but it kept getting blown over.

I did better then I expected! I know that some of the artists around me were not too pleased at the end of the day so I am assuming they didn't sell much. I'm guessing they probably had higher priced items. Even better then my sales were the custom orders that came in. One has the potential of being HUGE. yeah! And in general, I enjoyed the day, meeting people and chatting. It was a lot of fun! The sun beating down on me was not fun! I took my earnings and ordered a craft canopy from ebay. So I'll be shaded next time. Phew!

I made a decision NOT to do the market every Saturday so that we can have some family time. So, this weekend was off - I'll be back next.

This last picture was as I was packing up to leave and dh and the other children came to 'help.' (That really means they tried to run out into the market area and get run over by cars/trucks as other vendors were driving through the market to go home!)

Want to see what 200 yards of birdseye fabric looks like??

It's heavy! This is my almost 9 year old son TRYING to lift it. I think it would squash him if it happened to fall over on him!

My amazing dh designed and made a wall mounted fabric rolling system for me. It works beautifully and was very inexpensive! Sorry for the lousy photo, one of the kids secretly switched my camera to manual focus and it took me too long to figure it out!

And the last tidbit that I want to share is a postcard that I made for an art show in St Petersburg, FL. I used scraps from my recent tie dyeing session and I crazy quilted them together. It's not perfect...the card is not perfectly rectangular and that bothers me a wee bit. But, it's what happened when I work on a project at midnight. And it's 'art' so it's ok, right???

If you want to enter your own postcard, check out this website...

http://www.artpoolrules.com/

(Click on the 3rd banner to see the details about the PSPS09 art show.)

And a big thank you to Jennifer from iwunder.etsy.com for telling me about it. Jenn makes LOVELY crocheted flowers that can be used as a brooch or as a decoration for a handbag or whatever you can dream of. I bought several to embellish my lovely traveling scarf. (And yes, I know how to crochet but I couldn't resist Jenn's lovely flowers!)

Building a better booth

2009-04-24T13:27:00.006-04:00

I've done a couple craft shows over the years and my set-up has always been amateurish. I want to kick things up a bit with my booth at the Riverside Arts Market. And since it's close and ongoing, it's something I can participate in on a semi-regular basis.

I'm working on a budget and I don't have a tent. If I do well enough, I'll buy one soon. But for now, I have to pray for no rain! I'm been walking through our house and scouring the storage unit for things to use in my booth. I have several categories of items and I want them to be displayed nicely. I have no desire to go out and buy new furniture or tables. I want to use stuff that we already have so that I won't have to find a place to store such items.

It didn't take me long to claim our front door catch-all storage cube unit. I bought it from a neighbor's garage sale last year and it's proven to be invaluable in organizing shoes and backpacks, etc. I figured I would use baskets and use it for my flannel cloths and unpaper towels.

My next dilemma was I needed something magnetic that was high enough to catch someone's eye...to display my photo magnets. DH and I kind of went around and around on this one. I had a vision. He had a different vision. He was going to build something for me so I was trying to let go of my vision and trust his judgment. And then I had a brainstorm moment...we could attach steel sheeting to the hidden sides of the storage cube instead of creating a new standing display. We layed it flat and then used gorilla glue to attach it. The stuff shown on top is to weigh it down to form the bond. After it dried, I applied silver duct tape along the edges so that it wouldn't be sharp in case a customer had a weird encounter with it. LOL So now it's safe.

I'm pretty excited about it! It was super cheap and after RAM, I can roll this thing back into the house and put our stuff back on it.

I also claimed a kids' storage bin thing to use as a rack to hang my hand dyed towels from. It's the white thing with bars in the above pic, being used to weigh down the steel.

Tomorrow I'll get pics up of the completed booth at RAM. :)

The next exciting thing of the day is my new color laser printer arrived! Our last 2 color printers were a HP and they are practically disposable. Never will I spend another dime on a HP printer. This one is a Brother HL-4040CDN. It's massive!! And heavy! But thanks to my amazon prime membership, I got it delivered over night for a whopping $3.99! I'm excited about it being laser, too. Those prints will hold up better and won't melt away if they happen to get wet unlike what happens to inkjet copies. The most annoying thing was how my home printed business cards smudged. Not a problem now.

Fricken Frackin Vandalism!

2009-04-21T19:36:00.003-04:00

Mia's band teacher called me this afternoon. Her flute, the one we JUST bought was vandalized at school today. Someone removed it from the supposedly locked cabinet and thrashed it around breaking keys off and denting it to smithereens. Nice. Hello middle school! ugg!

Mia is not totally without fault. When we bought the flute, we told her that she needed to bring it to and from school every day. On Friday when she came home without the flute, she told me her 'teacher' insisted she leave it there and that it would be locked up. I questioned her on it because how in the world could she practice at home??? OK, so I figured that maybe the band teacher got tired of students forgetting their instruments and that's why they had this rule. She said they practice for 1.5 hours at school and that her grade was based on participation.

Well, the true story is that her 'teacher' was another girl who plays flute and it teaching Mia. She is the one who told her it was safe to leave it at school. And that most of the students leave theirs. That might be true but the band teacher told me that the students should bring their instruments home every day. On day one, I asked Mia to clarify her flute responsibility with the teacher and she failed to do that.

So it appears that Mia bent the truth a bit to suit her desire...which was to blindly follow the advise of another student even if it was in disagreement with our request.

I am annoyed that we basically kissed $100 goodbye and have nothing to show for it. I am annoyed that Mia did not trust us, the parents, because we told her that leaving it at school was a bad idea!

I am pleased with the response from the band teacher. He said Mia was a delight and that he was glad to have her in his class. He said that he would try to have the instrument repaired when the repairman comes through next week. (I guess the school owns some instruments and has a repairman that comes by regularly.) I don't really have much hope based on Mia's description of the damage. Anyhow, he said he would take responsibility since he did not tell Mia about the risk.

Anyhow, dh and I talked about it and we are not punishing Mia. The natural consequence is that we are not going to buy another flute. Heck, we pulled money out of our emergency fund to pay for the first one...which was used a whopping 3 times in class.

Big Changes Around Here

2009-04-21T06:32:00.007-04:00

Over the past week, we have been transitioning the children back into public school. (Yes, three quarters into the school year.) There were lots of factors that went into the decision and it was not something that we entered into lightly. One of the factors is that I just can't kick start my new business while caring for and homeschooling 5 children. Well, maybe if I locked myself into the office and let them fend for themselves for 6 hours a day. ;) Trying to do business research and making phone call inquiries while I was constantly interrupted by children who thought I MUST know *right* then that my toddler lobbed a potato at their head? haha Another factor is that my personal motivation to be a homeschooling family has been waning in recent months. I have found myself craving time without my delightfully inquisitive and generally wonderful children.

Our 12 year old daughter has been championing for a chance to attend our local middle school for a couple months. This was prompted once she refound an old friend Emily, a neighborhood girl that goes to the same school and apparently loves it. So Mia started school last week. And luck was on our side when Mia was placed in ALL of Emily's classes. Mia has been ecstatic about school and her report has been all glowing...although I would be remiss if I failed to mention how moody she has been outside of school.

One of Mia's new classes is band and she needed a instrument. She picked the flute. I had a slightly hilarious interaction with a music store employee where I learned that a new flute would cost $895. {yikes!} I was thinking it would be under $100! That was a bit eye opening. My darling husband came to the rescue and found a used flute on craigslist for $100.

My oldest son, Greyson, started 3rd grade at the local elementary school last week. He went there for K - most of 2nd grade so he knows the drill. Turns out that he was assigned an amazing male teacher, Mr. H. So far, so good. And Greyson is in the same class as a few old friends, like Max, Mia's cousin whom we all claim, too. I think that helps. He has enjoyed his time at school so far, especially lunch and recess. There is some confusion with the school about how they will pass him at the end of the year, since Greyson didn't take the required standardized testing.

My twins were placed in separate kindy classes yesterday. There are 2 classes. One has the super sweet, very patient Mrs. H who has 2 of my twin's preschool friends. We decided that even though we know Kendall would have a great time in this class, that it really would be a better fit for Ethan who is struggling with reading and with following directions in general. (Really I wish both kids could be in Mrs. H's class.) I also figured that Kendall would fit in anywhere and would still do OK in the other class.

Both the twins were really excited about starting school but their excitement was a bit tempered when they came home. They didn't realize that the day would be so long. And Kendall was distraught when she found out that tattle-tellers get in trouble. (She didn't but she witnessed another tattle-teller getting reprimanded.) Ethan said his day was a little good and a little bad. Kendall reported that her day was good but later, at bedtime, she was a little teary and she told me that she wanted to be homeschooled again. That made me tear up because I fully expected her to LOVE school. Maybe it would have been different if she had been in Mrs. H's class with her 2 little friends. I am a little miffed that Ethan and Kendall didn't get to play outside together during recess like I had been told they would. Turns out that the 2 kindy classes aren't as synched as I had been told. ugg

With all the kids in school, it left me at home with our 2 year old. The day went remarkably smooth. I was able to do some deep cleaning and Lily helped. I didn't have to stop to feed lunch to 5 kids. I didn't have to remind kids not to step on the wet kitchen floor. I was able to take pictures of new product for my etsy store. I was also able to register my fictictional name AND apply for a tax id number, things that required me to read and comprehend a lot of fine print to ensure I was setting it up correctly. And dinner was in the oven when the hubby came home. A good day.

The evening did get chaotic with homework and reading logs to be completed. And 2 of the older children sporadically fell alseep before bedtime. This will be the trade-off, I suppose.

On the creative front, this is what I have been working on...

This represents a good portion of what started as 20 yards of birdseye fabric. I hand dyed the fabric with professional grade fiber reactive dye using a low water immersion technique. Then I permanetly set the color, washed, dried and ironed the fabric. Then I cut it to size and serged the edges forming unique and funky towels. They can be kitchen towels, hung from the oven door and used for drying hands or dishes. Or they can be hand towels. These will be available this Saturday at the Riverside Arts Market.

The 'I hate cancer' post because I can't think of a better title

2009-04-15T15:06:00.004-04:00

There's been something really sad that's been going on around here lately. The feeling is heavy. A good friend of mine is losing her battle to breast cancer. She's my age and right on the cusp of middle age, which is still too darn young to even be dealing with a deadly cancer. I hate it. I feel awkward and uncomfortable at times because I don't know what I can do to help and I worry about the words I use. Are death and dyeing taboo words when talking to someone who is very close to death? And part of me wants to back away and protect myself... which is really silly because this is not about ME.

The latest news is that the cancer is growing quickly and it's in the lining of her lungs. It's a struggle for her to breath. She has been to the hospital several times in recent weeks to have the fluid drained and I think they may have even inserted some sort of ports. I'm not very good at remembering medical details and some of my information is secondhand so I'm not sure if it's 100% accurate. A friend told me that doctors said our friend could have 2 weeks or 2 months, it's unknown but it almost certainly points to the fact that there will be an end. Our friend is tired of fighting. She's tired of chemo and doctor appointments. She's tired of hospitalizations and just being separated from her family especially when the cancer is still growing.

I finally had a moment of quiet in the house and I picked up the phone and called her. I was surprised when she picked up the phone herself. She sounded very weak but she was there. We talked. I told her that I heard the news wasn't good. I cried. She cried. We both cried. I told her that I was just very sad that the cancer was winning and that I couldn't bear the thought of her not being around. I think that this is worse then our loss when Nolan died. Or maybe I just think that because I've had almost 4 years to deal with Nolan's death. My friend has 3 daughters that still need her. It's unfair that she is likely going to be robbed of the joy of watching them grow up. She told me that she's not scared to die but that she worries about her girls and whether her husband can handle being a single parent. Kids need their mom. It's fundamental.

I have more to say on this subject but I will have to save it for another time. I made plans to visit my friend early next week.

But yeah, I hate cancer. My friend's battle reminds me of my cousin Jared's fight with pancreatic cancer. He fought the battle valiantly and won...until the damn cancer came back and claimed his life. He was 32 when he died with 3 children and a wife. So unfair.

Semi Official

2009-04-15T07:50:00.002-04:00

I went to my SCORE group counseling session yesterday...only it was just me, my 12 year old dd and then Bill and Bob, two retired businessmen. Bob was the talker. Bill was in training to be a SCORE counsellor and he pretty much said nothing to me the entire time. The meeting was semi-helpful. They weren't able to answer all of my questions so the referred me to a ton of different websites. I think it would have been more helpful to match me with someone who has a business offering lessons of some sort, like a piano teacher. It was still very exciting to talk to someone else about my plans!

From there we walked over to the Tax Collector's office to get a business license. At this point, I'm just set up as a sole proprietorship and my license is a peddler's license. This will allow me to sell at the arts market. It does not cover phase 2 of my business. That gets a bit more complicated. And I still haven't decided on a name so that piece will be put on hold until I decide. I'm not super creative with business naming and I really don't enjoy this aspect of starting a business. Should the name be a cool name or a name the states the nature of the business? Should it be narrow or broad in scope? etc, etc, etc.

My creative endeavor last night was dyeing 20 yards of fabric in 5-6 different colorways. As I've mentioned before, I LOVE dyeing fabric. It's very satisfying to me. I did have one uh oh moment in that I accidently muddied one of the solutions so the bright orange and pink has turned into something else. I think it will still be OK, just not as bright as I was aiming for. And that's the thing, it's hard for me to get repeatable results because I love just mixing and adding dye and praying for a magnificent surprise.

There is other exciting news going on here. My oldest child is going back to public school starting today. And the other children may be following soon. We are still ironing out the details with the younger children. Two of them can't wait to start and one is not looking forward to it at all. I'm excited at the thought of having time to devote to my business and household stuff. There just is not enough time in the day to get everything done...especially when children undue the work before I move to the next room. There will be some trade offs but I think that those will be minimal considering how late it is in the school year.

A New Business

2009-04-14T08:32:00.002-04:00

Last night dh and I attended a free small business orientation held at our local chamber of commerce. There were several organizations who sponsor it - SCORE, Jacksonville Women's Business Center and quite a few more. There were probably 30 people aspiring or existing small business owners in attendance. The meeting was not 100% geared to what my plans are but it was still very helpful. The annoying part was all the talk about getting financing to start your business. They focused on writing a good business plan including financials so that the bank would want to loan the money. They mentioned the importance of having good personal credit and how banks (obviously) look at it when determining risk. The SBA guarentees a portion of the loan, blah, blah, blah. I will be starting my new business with a small amount of cash that we can divert to it.

And my business will need to be profitable pretty darn quickly. I will have to watch expenses like a hawk. If it doesn't add to the bottom line, then I will have to say no.

I am so very excited about starting! I have always wanted to do this and now I will.

What will I be doing? Stayed tuned. I'll make an announcement very soon. I'm ironing out the details of naming my business first.

I will be attending a group counseling session with my local SCORE office today. Right after that, I'm applying for a business (occupational) license. Today!

Dear Paas

2009-04-11T23:01:00.004-04:00

I just wanted to write to let you know about our recent experience with your Marble Magic craft activity egg decorating kit. First of all, good job of sucking me in. I thought the Marble Magic must have been worth double the price of the plain ole egg decorating kit. So maybe you don't have kids or maybe you didn't actually test this product with kids. No fear, I'll share my review.

I found your directions to be less then clear. We wanted to do the marble technique so my eyes jumped right to that bold section. It told me to 'Add 3 Tablespoons of oil to the color baths.' OK, back up and make color baths, which I did. Then I added the 3 TBL of oil to each color per your directions. That's 3 TBL x 12 colors. What a waste! And the results were less then spectacular since the oil coated the eggs as we dipped them..in spite of our rigorous stirring.

So now AFTER the fact, I understand that I should have dyed all the eggs and then selected a few colors for the marbling. But as I read back through your written instructions, no where did it tell me that.

And if the waste wasn't enough, I ended up with super greasy eggs that dripped pools of oil as they 'dried.' I had to remove each egg and wipe the excess grease off and then clean the greasy mess left on the counter.

Bad idea for a product with less then clear instructions. Next year, I'm going with the .99 box.

Recycle Upcycle Repurpose

2009-04-08T09:22:00.004-04:00

I'm not a stranger to transforming things. I have taken things that I have liked and turned them into other items - like cutting into a doomed shirt to pilfer the fabric to make sleeves for a dress and stuff like that or cutting up a flannel receiving blanket and turning it into baby wipes. What I didn't realize is that there is a movement sweeping the country of other people doing the same thing...and then selling their wares touting the environmentally friendly nature of the item. Turning something destined for the city dump into something usable, extending the life expectancy of the item. I really like the idea of that.

About a week ago I was folding laundry and I pulled one of my favorite dresses for my youngest dd out of the dryer. I was sad when I noticed a rip in the skirt. It was such a pretty dress and the cotton fabric had an almost silky smoothness that I have never really encountered on new bolts of fabric at the fabric store. It reminded me of my favorite dish drying towels that I inherited from my dh's family. (We believe they came from his maternal grandmother.) They were such a joyous find to me! The towels are long rectangles, serged with red thread and they about 1/3 the width of a standard flour sack towel and much thinner. I love those towels. Thin so they dry quickly and absorbent. I always keep one on my oven door handle.

And that's when I came up with the idea of transforming that dress into a fancy hand towel. And I've gone a little crazy with it since then. I imagine my dressy towels hanging in fancy schmancy guest bathrooms or in girly girl bathrooms. They make me smile when I make them and again when I see them displayed. Each one has been a unique work of art, taking time to figure out how to work the fabric in my hands, making the best use of it. Figuring out the bodice, the straps that must come undoen so that it can be attached to a towel bar - sometimes using spagetti straps that I sew and turn and sometimes using buttons, serging the hems and gathering the waist, and then attaching the bodice, making sure that I've topstitched appropriate seams for durability and so that it holds its shape after washing. And then I hold each one up and think ' That looks like a cute little doll dress' and then I know I was successful.

So now when I go through my kids' clothes, looking for cast-offs, I will have a new pile - items to be repurposed or upcycled. And perhaps I will look a little harder at the throw away items and see if there is anything else I can salvage like buttons. Or maybe I can cut a few quilt squares out of the ripped up jeans.

Woah Nelly!

2009-04-05T16:50:00.004-04:00

Boy, have I been lax. Seriously lax in updating my blog. So the truth is that we put our house on the market, last October. 180 days later, it's still on the market. We got one low ball offer and lots of interested people...but no one is acting. Our realtor said that the last couple that came through REALLY likes it but they are working on getting their financing together. I'm not holding my breathe.

I hate having my house on the market. It's a boatload of work and it's very intrusive. Please tell me how you would get 5 children out of the house and run through and make sure that all the toilets are flushed and that no one stuck a used band-aid to the edge of the sink. Gross, I know but it's my life and it doesn't bode well for last-minute showings. I just can't do it.

Anyhow, to prepare the house for the market, I packed up a massive amount of crafty stuff...my spinning wheel, yarn, fabric, etc, etc, etc.

It's only been in the past couple weeks that I felt like I was going to explode if I couldn't do something creative. So I have been making beautiful, unique items for my etsy store. I went from nearly nothing to almost 100 items in two weeks. In all fairness, most of those items were already made! I just had to take inventory, take photos and get them listed.

My latest obsession is making hand towels in the form of dresses! Check out my store for pics and details.

Oh and I heard of a cool yarn giveaway so I wanted to include the link here so that I can be entered. I'm too far away to attend the festival. Boohoo! The giveaway yarn is from Three Irish Girls. I own one lonely skein which is being turned into my Forest Canopy shawl. The colors are so wonderful. I'm almost done with it! My first lace project and my first shawl!

Child's Play

2008-09-16T18:08:00.005-04:00

Wheee!! Today was a fun day for me. I needed to dye some fabric to make unpaper towels and before I knew it, I was getting rather crazy! It took some hussling on my part to be able to do all the steps involved in the process while watching 6 kiddos, my 5 plus my niece. Phew - a hard day's work but it was awesome to be able to create and to see the results.

The formula for today's creative fun was 4 vintage linen tablecloths and a bunch of napkins (that I had intended on selling a while back,) 5 different colors of fiber reactive dye, swimming pool chemicals and water = pure gorgeousness. This one turned out soooo fabulous. I think I'm keeping it!

I had to use the kids' swingset to set this one up the way I wanted. The color is still setting so I won't know the results until tomorrow! I can't wait.

I also did a bunch of other ones that aren't pictured because they are in various stages of completion. I'll post more pics tomorrow!

New Friends!

2008-09-08T20:50:00.003-04:00

I found there was a group of Esty sellers right in my area. I was accepted into their group. yeah! And the funny part....I know one of the new ladies who just joined the group! It's a small world.

http://etsyteamnfcr.blogspot.com/

Malabrigo, Baby!

2008-09-08T16:07:00.002-04:00

Today was a good mail day. :D

10 skeins of natural malabrigo
2 skeins of geranio
10 skeins of oceanos which is so freakin pretty it makes me cry!

Yep, 22 skeins of yarn. Mmmm.malabrigo no less. And I have no idea where to begin. The blue was sorta supposed to be for a sweater for dh. But now that I have it...I was something for myself! Maybe he can get gloves and a scarf?? Right?

I bought the natural to dye...but I'm not feeling like that right now. I may sell it to help me raise money for my next obsession!

The Dark Side of a Crafty Business

2008-09-07T10:09:00.002-04:00

I love to sew. I love to create. I love to make something and show it to everyone in sight, children included, and say 'Look what I made!!!' And when they gush and tell me how fabulous it is, that just makes me feel all warm and toasty inside.

So that's where my passion is...in the creating part. And selling? That's fun, too. Seeing that someone purchased something from my Etsy store, or from eBay or a 'For Sale or Trade' bulletin board or even from real life friend...all good stuff. But the part that I don't like is taking photos and actually getting my items in a place where people can actually see them...so that they can buy. I struggle with background choices and lighting. I can tell you that you will never, ever see my items photographed on a dirty carpet or with a cluttered room in the background. (Hey, not that there's not plenty of cluttered here...you just won't see it!) Every once in a while, I take a picture and I think, 'That's it! Perfect.' But mostly I just say...'Oh hell, I'll never get these listed if I retake the photos yet again. So my main goal is to get stuff listed...and quickly.

So last night, I spent in excess of 5 hours taking photos, inventory-ing my lunch napkin stock after I sold a bunch outside of my store and listing my latest round of products from my sew-a-thon. More then 5 hours! And that was kid-free time because they were in bed. If I had tried to do it during the day, it would have been a 10+ hour job. And somewhere in the back of my mind is this nagging suspicion that if I were a serious businesswoman, then my prices would be high enough to cover all the non-creating time which they definitely don't. I think I'm OK with it at this point because I am mainly motivated to move the fabric that has been taking up space in my studio. And I get the pleasure of changing pace and creating something totally different depending on which piece of fabric I am touching and what it says to me. I like that. It's what being creative means to me.

So today I have 53 items in my store. I thought I was all done until I found my box of knitting project bags. Oops! I gotta get those up today.

I'm a woman on a mission...I want to buy something completely frivolous and unnecessary...and I want it NOW. ;)

How a $1 deal turns into a $1000 want

2008-09-03T09:31:00.004-04:00

This is going to be quick because we are heading to a playdate in mere minutes!

I had to go to Jo-ann's on Labor Day...looking for the perfect fairy princess flannel for a customer. On the way there, I passed signs that our favorite thrift store was having a big 50% off everything in the store. Lucky for me, I just had my middle daughter with me and she's a good shopping sport. We got there 15 minutes before they closed. I tore through the store looking for size 14 (girls) jeans for my oldest and for size 6 or 7 jeans for my oldest son. I would have also looked for jeans for my middle daughter but we ran out of time. Somewhere along the way, my dd spotted a box.....a box incasing some sort of plastic junk, I was sure.

It contained this beauty...

The box was marked $1.99 (and would be half off that) but it was all sealed up by the thrift store folks so we had no idea what it contained or if it even worked. I ended up getting a huge bag full of clothes and the button maker for $25.

At Jo-ann's, we looked for a button refill pack...that they amazingly had but in a different brand. It looked to be the right size so I bought it ($7.99, I think) and hoped for the best.

We got home and have been having a blast with our little button maker. And not just my daughters. We did one of a yoda's eyeball from the Happy Meal box for my middle son and some pirates of the caribbean images for my oldest son. It's not perfect and some of the buttons don't turn out right for some reason or another.

So, I looked online for refill packs...and ended up immersed in a whole new world of button makers. I found a killer deal on a 2.25" button maker and I bought it and then I bought button refills for another site but in the process, I found they had button makers that did fabric covered buttons! And professional button makers and cirle cutting tools and, and, and.....to the tune of over $1000 in wants. {{sigh}} Not going to happen but a girl can dream, right?

So $1 at the thrift store, $7.99 at Jo-ann's and then approx $55 on the larger button maker and 100 refills. LOL

Knitting, I've been knitting...and sewing!

2008-08-31T10:33:00.006-04:00

Saturday was a mommy day and was sooo needed. The highlight of the event was going to a gathering of Jacksonville knitters from Ravelry. I can't even tell you how refreshing it is to hang out with other crafty women (and a couple men!)

I made some knitting project bags to offer to the group before I listed them on my store. I started with the pattern that I bought, the Wired Up Designs 'Knit and Go Girl Project Bag,' but then I started doing my own thing and creating totally different bags, one of which was a green asymetrical pouch that i can't show because I sold it. It was pretty darn cute!

Here are some of them. There was another batch that was being washed and I didn't get pics of those. I had fun sewing the bags...and using my stash fabric. The more I sew, the more I realize that my current stash does not suit me anymore. I am getting to the fabric that I have had for years and haven't had inspiration to use. I'm going to have to think harder or get rid of it. I have been thinking about the amount of fabric that I have used. I am fairly certain that I have sewn in excess of 10 yards a week for the past 6 weeks. Over 60 yards!! And I still have a lot left. The balance has now swung to where my stash now has more knits that are fairly new vs wovens that I have had forever.

The other exciting news is that I finished a knitting project!!! Wool pants (for cloth diapering) that I had intended for Lily. They actually fall right below the knee so I would call them pedal pushers. I made these blindly without consulting my knitting guru friends. And my stripes are less-then-perfect where they meet. And there were a LOT of loose ends to weave in. The off white is peace fleece and the stripes are from 1 skein of Noro. The crochet extraordinaire guy next to me suggested that I would have been happier if I had knit them flat and joined the seams. DOH! I guess I could have done the main part, stitched the seams and then picked up stitches on the sides to do the legs flat...and then joined them.

It felt quite wonderful to come home with a completed project! I started these pants at a hockey game in February. The one where my children knocked over 2 or 3 cokes and my baby girl was a thrashing wild child because she wanted to run around and not be confined to our seating area. I ended up taking her to the van and letting dh and the other children watch the game in peace. And I got to knit...while she was safely buckled in her seat. So over the months, I have worked on these. They went quickly until I got to the legs. For some reason, the legs gave my hands arthritic pain so I could only handle 2-3 rows at a time. I couldn't just carry the Noro down each leg because I wanted the legs to match. So I had to do a bit on each leg and work my way down. It was a lot of work....which is why the are knee pants instead of full length pants!!

The main think I had to do yesterday was weaving in all those ends and then make the i-cord. This was my first i-cord and it was fun...for the first 3 inches. Then I wanted to poke my eyes out with my knitting needles because I swear it took me 2 hours to get it long enough. Now if only my baby girl didn't hate them. {{sigh}} yep - too itchy for her.

Bad, bad mommy

2008-08-21T13:38:00.005-04:00

Herein lies my most embarassing moment in my history of being a mommy. Today I took a gamble...and I lost.

I went to Jo-ann's to buy some specific flannel for a customer. Nevermind that tropical storm Fay is knocking on our door. I made my decision based on the fact that she weakened overnight and was still offshore, still pretty far away and Jo-ann's was indeed still open. I opted to avoid taking the bridge to my normal Jo-ann's and I drove the other direction so that if by chance, the weather started churning, I wouldn't be stuck somewhere because the closed the bridges down.

People were on the roads, businesses were open. Everything was fine. I made it to Jo-ann's with no problems.

Not only did I buy the one print I wanted, I got several other really cute ones. I also noticed the husqvarna lady was not busy. Aha, maybe I could do that embroidery machine demo and be entered into the contest for the free $9000 embroidery machine just like the HUGE dislay sign promised! I asked her how long it took...only a few minutes. :) I only had my 2 youngest girls with me so it seemed like the stars where lined up right. I decided to get my fabric cut and then head back her way for the demo. And that's when I noticed that my toddler pooped. And it stunk. Bad. I decided to purchase the fabric and then buy it quickly before heading to the van to change her because of course I didn't bring a diaper bag in.

So far, so good. I made my purchase. The cashier was not happy to be working and mentioned how money hungry the corporate offices were for making them work when a hurricane was on the way. And they had only made $750 so far. I told her I was glad they were opened and I bumped that number up a bit more with my purchase.

And then the sky fell down. The rain was pouring and our van was not close by. We happened to be close to the restrooms so I decided to get her out of the nasty diaper. She could go 5 minutes without a diaper, right? At home, she has just recently started potty training and for the past 2 days, she has been telling me when she had to 'beep' and 'boop.' Then my 5 year old noticed they had one of the diaper dispensing machines right there! Woohoo! Only it turned into a boohoo because it took my money but was empty.

I stood at the entrance to Jo-ann's again and it was still pouring. Hey, I had the sling with me! I decided that I would put Lily in the sling and that she could surely last 5 minutes until I saw the demo and could get my named entered. Right? That sounded better then getting soaking wet and doing the demo in the cold air conditioned building.

And that was my mistake.

She didn't want to be in the sling. The lady was showing me that awesome machine and Lily was flinging herself around trying to get out. I tried to calm her down by crouching down and letting her out of the sling. All the while, pulling her dress down so that she didn't show her hoo ha to the other customers. I told the lady that this was a bad time and that we needed to go but she reassured me that it was OK or something to that effect. So close to the finish. So close!

As promised, the demo was quick. As the lady was wrapping things up, I asked about the contest. She said 'Oh that's over!'

And that was the moment that I noticed that my Lily peed on the floor...by the lady's foot. Oh let the earth open up and swallow me whole!! It was suddenly apparently clear that I made the most idiotic decision ever. Who in their right mind would do that? I had no choice but to tell her because her shoe was perilously close to the offending puddle. I cleaned up the mess but I KNOW the lady was just waiting for me to leave so she could tell the whole horrifying story to her co-worker and any customers that she encounters today and well...for the rest of her life! "I remember that time that that toddler almost peed on my shoe at work." Yeah, people just don't forget that kind of thing.

I'm going to flog myself now. Oh thank goodness I didn't go to my regular Jo-ann's. I think I might live through this after all.

Sewing to Solve Problems

2008-08-18T14:44:00.005-04:00

We have 5 kids in the house. I'm mom to 6 kids and I don't ever not include our son Nolan who died but sometimes his position in our family isn't relevant to certain topics...like this one. But, I can't just say we have 5 kids...so I have to include that little 'in the house' phrase so that I know I'm not excluding him from my overall count of children. It's not so much that I mind what other people think about how I include him...it has everything to do with how it makes me feel if I don't.

So, back to those 5 kids. They each have a toothbrush and we have had the worst time with keeping things separated. I have labeled them and the mark wears off. In the past, I have scoured the web for toothbrush solutions for large families. The cute little toothbrush holders are usually meant to hold 4 small toothbrushes, not 5 jumbo rotating ones that we sometimes get. One of the main things that I just kept coming back to is that there wasn't a good place for the kids to store their toothbrushes when they weren't in use. And, we only have one teeny tiny corner self in that bathroom so I really wanted a wall mountable toothbrush holder.

This was close...

I almost ordered the test tubes but decided to keep looking.

Last night, I was cleaning my sewing studio and I had one of those lightbulb moments. I started pulling out stash fabric and created this...

It involved embroidery, fusible vinyl and clear vinyl fabric. I also inserted a piece of template plastic inside to give it stability. The final product should be waterproof. I'm a little concerned about how the vinyl pockets will handle day to day wear and tear. I consider this one to be my prototype and I can make a new one, in the future, if needed. I'm pleased with the end result. Not what I initially pictured but this one will work nicely!

Why I call them my little monkeys

2008-08-17T11:50:00.008-04:00

Because they are!!

I can't believe it's even possible for a little boy to climb up a column like this but he does. We also have wide columns (even taller!) inside the fellowship hall of our church and I've caught my boys up near the ceiling on those things, too.

Kendall doesn't quite have the same dexterity so she stays lower to the ground...right where I want her. I'm always worried someone is going to fall and crack their head open. So, no, I don't 'allow' this. I did have to get a couple pictures before I forbid it.

I do remember scaling doorways when I was a kid. And my kids do that now, too.

DH bought the kids new socks last night, short black sport socks. I'm not totally sold on them...seems kind of wrong to not be white. It just reminds me of an old man wearing black socks with sandals. DH thinks they are awesome because they won't stain like white socks do. My kids were THRILLED with their new, soft socks. Greyson invented (his word) a new game called 'Sock Sliding.' He and Kendall were running and sliding on our hard wood floors. Kendall wiped out a couple times. I told them they need to stop because I didn't have any clean clothes to wear to the ER. LOL

So, that brings me to today's monumental task....laundry! Ugg.

I Love Thee, Thread

2008-08-17T00:52:00.006-04:00

Today was not a fun sewing day. For the most part, it was a yucky house cleaning day. I did make quite a bit of progress in the dining room. That's where we homeschool and where the kids color, draw and cut things up. Imagine bits of paper under the table and broken crayons and beads under the mule chest. And don't forget to imagine the letter A in sticker form stuck to the wall...because that's what one of my munchkins did when I wasn't watching. So it's a crafting room in addition to being a dining room. And it's a dumping ground. I sorted papers and found that we missed the deadline for our cell phone rebate. (bang head on wall!)

While I was cleaning, I made my 8 year old son come in and work on a math 'game' that we have. He sulked and moaned about it and we had a little talk about priorities...meaning I was going to take away screen priviledges so he'd have plenty of time for math! He had a hard time with multiplication so I brought out some M&Ms and we grouped them so he could see the math problem. It seemed to help and he buckled down and got the work done. When he was done, I gave a different one to my 11 year old and she did it pretty quickly.

So, that was most of the day...cleaning sorting and a bit of homeschooling. DH cleaned out our van....like a 4 hour cleaning job!! It was bad, very bad, and it was loaded with MIL's stuff that has been weighing down the back of our van for a couple weeks. He finally went through it and cleared out our van. It looks new again. :D Once we all got cleaned up, dh took us out to dinner...but first we had to stop at Joann's.

I love thread almost as much as I love fabric. A couple months ago, my handy dh hung pegboard in my sewing studio for my serger, wooly nylon & jean stitch thread. It gives me great pleasure to look at it...so organized and inviting! This picture was before I completely filled the board...so all those empty hooks are full, too.

Jo-ann's is having a 50% off sale on all their thread so I had to stock up on missing colors. I have a new thread addiction....maxi lock swirls, the varigated stuff that I use in my loopers of my serger. It's just so pretty...but who in their right mind would pay $10 a cone??? Even at 50% off, it's a whopping $5 but I just had to add 2 new colors to my collection. Today I got the loveliest orange swirl and a green swirl, too. I also stocked up on Wooly Nylon, another thread addiction. Although my love affair with wooly nylon is waning a bit....since I discovered how easily it MELTS when you iron something with a WN edge. Whoops!

Here's today's booty...

Does it look like $75.44 to you? That's 2 yards of lilac flannel, 2 yards of the lovely brown and rust flannel and a remnant of felt for Mia, in addition to the thread. More then I expected it to be when the cashier rang it up. Cha ching...it adds up fast.

The good news is that I don't think I need anymore serger thread...unless a nice soft green comes along. LOL I am lacking in regular sewing machine thread colors but that will have to wait until another 50% off sale.

After our Jo-ann's run, dh took us all out to eat at The Cheesecake Factory. He hates that place but he went because I like it and it was close to Jo-ann's. It's asking a lot of the kids for them to sit and behave for the LONG wait there but they did pretty good, not perfect but not too bad if you overlooked a few minor infractions.

Internet Addiction!

2008-08-14T12:39:00.003-04:00

Last night a wind storm came through. It didn’t sound too bad from where I was but when I came back to the house, after working in my studio, I did notice that our Rubbermaid garbage shed was blown askew. Earlier in the day, my 3 middles wanted me to let them play with the hose so they volunteered to clean the whole thing…and they did a darn good job, using soap and washcloths in addition to the hose. Anyhow, it was all opened up after their cleaning job so I’m sure that contributed to its little flight in the backyard.

So, although our personal experience from the storm was less then blogworthy, there was another side effect……insanely slow internet service! Like slower then 1993 on dial-up. Yet, I’m so addicted to the net that I kept trying to see if it had been fixed. Nope. I even cleaned the office while waiting for pages to load ever so slowly. And I realized that I just can’t do jack without my internet service.

Here’s my high-level to-do list…

1) List (on Etsy) the new unpaper towels that I have finished over the past couple days. I was able to get all my pictures edited so this should be a relatively quick job.
2) Prepare my packages for mailing…not without paypal shipping.
3) List MIL’s old square dance outfits either on Etsy or eBay. I think most of them are over 20 years old which would meet Etsy vintage definition but there are a couple newer pieces that I’m not sure of. I’m having a hard time with the thought of selling those lovely petticoats…which is why I haven’t listed them already.
4) Download the 2nd part of my latest audiobook. This was the thing that was the most maddening to me. I’ve become accustomed to cleaning and working with listening to an audiobook. It fulfills my inner desire to multi-task during every possible moment. So, the internet being down wouldn’t have been toooo bad if I hadn’t just finished part 1 of ‘The Disappeared” and I was really getting into the story. Next time, I will download all parts at the same time.
5) List the rest of my scrapbook stuff and the remaining MIL stuff in my dining room on eBay.
6) Reply to a couple emails that I’ve been putting off.

I thought about baking something but then I would have had to pull out a cookbook and pick a random recipe without user reviews and feedback! LOL

I then thought I should see if I could find an online notice about the outage….not unless I wanted to wait 15 minutes in between each page loading! 15 minutes for google to pop up, 15 minutes for the search results, etc.

It was just maddening and further proof that yes, I am addicted to the world wide web. I rely on it for just about everything…from ordering pizza to checking our account balances.

So, you can see that I posted here. Internet is marginally better…maybe similar to my first days online…browsing bulletin boards on Prodigy on my boyfriend’s (now my dh) new home computer!

Hopefully I’ll be able to get my listings up. I’ve created a basket full of pretty unpaper towels and more are in various stages of completion. On the homefront, I’ve got homemade cinnamon rolls in the works this morning, too, and plans to tackle the massive mountain of clean clothes. . I’ve been busy washing fabric, dyeing fabric and rewashing it so our regular laundry got neglected. {{sigh}} Why did I do that to myself?? It’s so much easier to just fold it as each load completes hot from the dryer so they aren’t too wrinkled. That won’t be the case here. We will have wrinkles a plenty! And I hate ironing…unless it’s fabric or one of my creations.

Here's just a couple photos of what I've been up to lately.

Locked Out!

2008-08-13T11:49:00.003-04:00

I headed out to my sewing studio around 9:30 last night. I had a stack of flannel unpaper towels that needed to be serged and I had some already completed ones that I need to take pics of. My oldest child joined me for a while. She played on my laptop while I worked and listened to my newest audiobook, The Disappeared...a free one I got from audible.com..it's got aliens and is set in the future, not my normal type of book. I'm not digging the narrator so it's going to be a slow 'read.'

So I was busy working and taking photos, ironing, carefully folding and then packaging up my newly listed sets. Around 1:30 a.m., my camera battery died so I decided to call it a night. I headed to the house...only to discover that I was locked out! I did have my keys when I went out to my studio. When my oldest child left, she took my keys! Thus, I was locked out.

I banged on the door a little, hoping my dh would be in the office where he could hear it. No answer so I knew he was already in bed. I debated whether I should wake the whole family up by ringing the doorbell and I initially decided not to.

I came back out to my studio and decided to just spend the night out there. I had a sleeping bag stashed in a closet and a pile of fleece fabric as a pallet and a another yard of fleece as my pillow. It wasn't too comfy so I went to the house and rang the doorbell once. No one answered the door so I resigned myself to an uncomfortable night on the floor.

My dh came looking for me around 6:15 a.m. with our toddler in his arms. I'm guessing she woke up first looking for mama. We settled into my bed and I was able to get a glorious 3.5 hour nap so I don't feel too bad.

Today's agenda is to get more photos taken, to finish up my stacks of already cut unpaper towels and to list more on my Etsy store. My first Etsy bill is due already...$12. I'm not rolling in the dough but my 8 sales covered that and then allowed me to make a couple small Etsy purchases. Not bad for using up my stash fabric!

Today I am dyeing more fabric. I really enjoy this part of creating. The results can be so unpredictable. Yesterday I had a perfect brown and my fabric was fully saturated. By the time I used my mordant and then rinsed and rewashed it, I had an amazing mottled multi-colored fabric but not brown in the least. I think this is where my lack of following the formulas exactly comes into play. I'm not heartbroken at all though...even if I didn't get the results I was aiming for.

While I was mixing up a batch of scarlet, my 5 year old daughter climbed onto the table to help me. In the process, she knocked the bucket over spilling red dye everyehere. I grabbed my white dishtowel and sopped it up trying to catch it before it dripped onto our dining room carpet. I saved the carpetbut my hands are now a lovely bright red! My oldest said she was going to call me murderer until it fades away. It does look a bit gruesome!

School's In Session

2008-08-12T17:05:00.004-04:00

We have been winding down our summer vacation and I've been trying to wrap my mind around homeschooling 4 kids. It just seems like a monumental task. One 7th grader, one 3rd grader and my 2 newest students...my kindergartners. All while keeping my toddler out of trouble!

Today was one of those days that made me realize that will will get by just fine. We had a rare pajama day. The kids usually get dressed as soon as they get up today was an exception. But it doesn't really matter because we didn't have to go anywhere today.

I pulled my fiber reactive dyes out so that I could mix some brown to use on more flannel for cloth napkins. My 11 year old came over to help. Before I knew it, she had formulated a hands on lesson on primary colors for the younger kids. And she carried it out. I didn't prompt her or ask her. She just wanted to do it and after a bit of cajoling, the other kids wanted to participate. And they enjoyed it. And they learned a little bit, too.

A confession

2008-07-24T20:32:00.002-04:00

This is really hard for me to admit but I feel compelled to confess a deep dark secret. There was a time, many years ago that my sewing adventures involved sewing vests from pre-printed panels. :'( I know, I know. It's just horrible! There's just no defense for it even though this was 14-15 years ago. My co-workers even paid me to sew vests for them and their family members. It was insane. There were Christmas vests and Halloween vests, Back to School vests and even a Noah's Ark vest.

This next sewing project relates to those awful, awful vests. I still have scraps of fabric in my stash from those vests, mostly the coordinating fabrics used for lining. Tonight's feature was created using the navy lining from the Noah's Ark vest that is long. long gone. As in probably in a landfill gone!

Navy background, animal print twirl skirt with brown grosgrain ribbon trim and attached korker ribbon 'bow' made from ribbon that I made. Well, I didn't make the ribbon but I wrapped it around dowels and baked it and then I heat sealed the ends.

I must say I think it turned out great! I think it's about a size 18 months, possibly 2T and I think it's destined to be sold. I'm feeling a desire to open my own cart. :-X

Sewing Fool

2008-07-22T21:59:00.004-04:00

I have been a sewing fool lately and it just feels so good. My serger, coverstitch and sewing machines have been burning rubber. I'm motivated to actually process my 500 yards (this is a guess I have no idea how accurate it is!) of stash fabric. Today's project was unpaper towels.

The loops of the 'basket' hang over the paper towel rack...which is now empty.

There was a time not too long ago that we used more then a roll of paper towels every day. And this was a roll of Bounty, not cheapo paper towels so it was a BIG roll. The main thing was that we used a paper towel EVERY time we washed our hands. Change a diaper, wash hands, use a paper towel to dry. Rinse or wash a dish, use a paper towel to dry hands. Clean the bathroom? Use 10 paper towels. Get the picture? A lot of paper going in the garbage!

We had dish towels but we really used them for the lowest jobs...cleaning messes on the floor or big spills on the table. I think we all had a germ phobia about what that towel might have been used for. Paper just seemed cleaner.

It wasn't until after I started using cloth diapers that I started thinking about the waste of it. So I made an effort to use dishtowels for my own use. I hung a hook up high for my own dishtowel that wouldn't get used to wipe a little snotty nose and then rehung. (Who am I kidding, my kids just leave it on the floor after they use it!)

My dh has been a bit resistant about giving up paper. 1) he's a germaphobe and 2) dish towels are nothing like paper towels. Neither is flannel. It's too thick or something and just doesn't seem very absorbant to me. I made flannel dinner napkins a while back. The kids and I use them but not dh.

Anyhow, it wasn't until we inherited dh's grandmother's thin dish clothes that dh started to like using cloth. The only problem is that they are kind of big. They are very thin, similar to birdseye so I ran with that thought. Just today, I made over 40 unpaper towels that are smallish - 10 x 8 inches. I'm pretty excited! For the first time ever, we did not buy a case of paper towels when we went to Sam's. For each roll of paper towels that we don't use, that's $1 saved! This should save us almost $30 a month!! Sad, but true.

Sometimes things go horribly wrong

2008-07-17T19:14:00.003-04:00

You reach a point where you think maybe just a little more this or a little more that and before you know it, you have something like this.....

;D ;D ;D

I can't draw worth a darn. I know it. I tried hand embroidering the face TWICE before I gave it to my 11 year old for her to try. And no, she didn't make that mess that you see above, I did! My final attempt was with the fabric markers. I just couldn't get the lips to look right and they kept growing. Then I tried a darker color to see if I could get more defined. :'(

I had to resew the whole doll, redo the hair, etc. And I was racing against the clock. I barely made it.

Here's the one that is on it's way to the birthday girl (in S Carolina so I can't hand deliver it.)

And of course NOW I notice how dusty my window sill is. :P

Along with the doll, went an outfit for the birthday girl....

Yep - leftover frog fabric from the quilt. I went out there this morning with plans to sew with 3 cute coordinating prints that I bought from Jo-ann's recently but that went out the window when I saw that the frog fabric matched the Old Navy 'blank' that I had on hand.

Oh....I guess I forgot to blog about the quilt...

I'm on a sewing roll lately. Kendall and Lily inherited a full size bed from MIL a couple months ago...well, actually we bought it from her. Anyhow, it came with....um....bedding that is...ummm....nevermind. ;) It just wasn't girly and pretty.

So, I have been scouring the stores for the perfect set. I like quilts and not puffy comforters with characters...not that we haven't had that type of bedding. Anyhow the stuff I like seemed to be the pricey stuff. But I just couldn't stomach paying $100-$200 or more.

Cleaning out my studio helped me find motivation. After lunch on Sunday, I refound a stack of coordinating frog fabric that I had bought on clearance for $1 a yard. I didn't think there was quite enough and I wanted something to pull together the fabrics so I also pulled out a faux minkee fabric (very plush and super soft) that I had bought on clearance online for $1.95 a yard. And I started cutting 8" squares and then I figured out placement.

I was able to get 98% of it done on Sunday before I went to bed. I finished the binding in about an hour today. It's 100% done on machine. I used most of the frog prints and only have enough left to piece together shams which worked out perfectly. The quilt, however, is NOT perfect. Some of the edges don't line up because the minkee was REALLY stretchy. Oops! I think that done is better then perfect though. I'm pleased that I saved money, used what I had and created something that makes my girls happy. (And it also makes my thrifty dh happy, too!)

I feel like I had a choice here and I did the right thing. I could have easily bought something that would have been 'perfect' in that the corners would have been lined up and they would perfectly coordinate with the sheets etc. But this was something that I made with my girls in mind. It also has the frog theme which is obviously an important symbol in our family.

Without further ado, here it is...

Finally...sewing time!

2008-07-13T09:37:00.002-04:00

My past couple weeks have been consumed with estate stuff and ebay. I really haven't had any crafting time other then the midnight knit in at mny LYS and then a bit of car knitting here and there. Yesterday I forced myself out to my sewing studio. Before I could sew, I had to do some major cleaning up. There must have been more then 100 yards of fabric on the floor that used to be stacked on the bottom of a hanging rack that I borrowed for the yard sale. Luckily, my eBay selling spree opened up some closet space so I was able to find a better place for my large cuts of knits. I have an insane amount of thermal knits in cool prints that is destined to become PJs for the kids...some day before they outgrow pirates (boys) and butterflies (girls.) My kids love Hanna Andersson zipper pjs but they only go up to size 100 so I can hopefully recreate them in their sizes with some of the knits I have stashed. (which reminds me that I need to find a cheap source for long sippers.)

After the floor and my work surfaces where mostly clear, I finished Greyson's birthday shirt that I cut out on his birthday a month ago. It's a pale yellow blousy kind of collared shirt with elastic on the sleeves. He loves it and actually wore it to sleep in last night. I didn't get a picture.

My next project was turning one yard of ugly fabric into something cool. The fabric was sent to me as part of a swap on another BB. The fabric I got was an icky feeling taffeta type fabric with a strange border print running down the middle. It told me it wanted to be doll dresses...mainly because I couldn't imagine a real child wanting this fabric against the skin.

I turned it into doll dresses and I am quite pleased with the results.

There was a 3rd dress but it got melted on the bottom of my iron. Whoops! I guess it got a little too hot. Now I have a yucky iron and I haven't been able to find the hot iron cleaner locally. It's been out at my normal shopping places. (I've been looking for it to clean up my old steam press for ebay.) I have almost ordered it from ebay at least 3 different times but I just can't bear to spend $6+ on shipping for a $4 item.

More Estate Stuff & Some Homemade Goodness

2008-07-04T11:53:00.002-04:00

We have been going through more storage unit stuff. There was some cool finds in the box of linens. A few really bright and colorful printed tablecloths from the 50s or 60s? I'm not sure how old they are. There were some hand embroidered ones and a couple fine damask linen ones. And most had matching napkins. We just don't use tablecloths so I have no use for them so they will go to eBay. I might have to keep one though...the blue and white one with cherry? blossoms.

I washed them yesterday and hung them on the line. I normally get a kick out of hanging stuff on the line but this was even exploded from that. I am 100% positive that using a clothesline works as a natural antidepressant. Especially when it's vintage linens at are dry by the time you work you way to the last one.

Another cool find.....

Vintage dishtowels that I am keeping!! Mine, mine, mine!!!

I'm massively excited about them! There are a ton of the ones with red thread 'serging' on the edges. At first I wondered if they were diaper flats but they are really long and skinny. I guess they could be. They do look like birdseye. I really think they are the 'paper towels' of the past based on the number of them. I also have 7 incredibly awesome days of the week dishtowels. These ones are a bit thicker then the red edged ones and feel like flour sack material. (I got 3 flour sacks, too!) Each day has a cool 50s? lady doing a specific chore for that day. Wednesday is knitting!

My dh is not as non-paper product friendly as I am. He is a germaphobe and he doesn't like anything that contributes extra laundry. But...he thinks these are cool and maybe he'll use them because we think they were his grandma's. They are times that I think our grandparents did things the right way and I think this is one of them. Here is my new stash of unpaper towels!

In between sorting, I found time to make 2 batches of homemade yogurt. I was experimenting and the first one didn't ever set so I did a repeat the next day with slightly better results. My first mistake was trying to add my berries to the yogurt at the front end. The second day, I had the temp in my roaster pan too high and I think I killed some of the active yogurt cultures. I was ready to give up on that batch, too. I accidently left the roaster on all night and when I went to dump it, I had yogurt! I have been assured by a yogurt 'expert' that I won't kill the family with it. On the contrary, the yogurt I made can be eaten by someone with lactose intolerance because of the extra 'cooking' time.

I also made a batch of homemade granola using this recipe.

http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Megans-Granola/Detail.aspx

As far as eBay goes, I now have 51 auctions up. Two auctions sold already. If everything sold sold with the bids, it would be almost $70. I have a ton of watchers in the wings so I think that number will go up, up, up.

I have a ton more to list. Yesterday's load included some fine china, correlle and a neat pyrex dish. I also have 4 square dance petticoats and square costumes to list. Kendall has had a lot of fun with the petticoats even though they are for a full size woman! The elastic could be cinched for a child though. I think we might have to keep one for dress-up.

No crafting blues

2008-06-16T23:46:00.002-04:00

I've got the no crafting blues in a bad way. Things have been chaotic with MIL's move. DH has spent virtually every non-working moment at her house since we got back from vacation. that means I have been a single parent. The 4 oldest kids are fine but my baby girl is high maintenance! I have come to really rely on the break I get when dh is home. I don't even see an end in sight because we finally realized that time is not on our side and dh rented a storage unit today. That means that we get the pleasure of paying $100 a month until we can deal with each and every box. I think I mentioned how slow MIL is at looking through stuff. DH is even worse! We went over there to pack yesterday and he kept bringing me stuff from his childhood to look at. He would look through every page of the photo albums and then show me and tell me about every relative. I love a walk down memory lane but not when it means that we don't have time to sort stuff...and then have to pay for a storage unit. I'm a quick processor. I've always been able to make quick decisions and the slow decision-making people drive me a little batty.

So...no lovely sewing pictures to share. I've been sorting through boxes. No knitting progress either. I've just got a big mess of a house that needs to be reaaranged and cleaned in prep for the new stuff we have inherited from MIL. wah wah wah I think I'm going to explode.

At the very least, I *will* be going to my LYS knit in this weekend. The thought of that just might tide me over a few more days...until I can get a 'hit' of creativeness.

A Birthday Gift for a Special Boy

2008-06-09T13:20:00.001-04:00

My oldest son's 8th birthday was yesterday and this was my gift to him...a pirates of the carribean costume. We are calling it a pirate costume but it really looks more like a captain. Anyhow, he LOVES it! The pattern was Simplicity 3844. I am shocked that the sizing worked out so well. I expected it to be huge since the smallest size was 7 and my son wears a 6...and I usually have a problem with the big 3 running way to big to start with. This pattern size seemed right on...at least for the size 7.

I made the boots (covers over regular shoes,) pants and the jacket. The first picture is minus the black pants because they weren't finished until later in the day. I need to finish the shirt, too.

Details

Boots - I used leftover red vinyl from my cube seat project. A brown leathery looking vinyl would probably be even better but these are fine.

Jacket - I used stretch velveteen from my stash that came from Joann's clearance section last year. I love the feel of this fabric and I had planned on matching sister jumpers but that didn't happen. I did have to buy $17 worth of buttons - 8 larger ones and I used 12 smaller ones instead of the 15 it called for. I didn't do the ones on the back. 1) to save a couple bucks and 2) because I messed up on the back flap. The directions were not clear to me and I sewed, ripped, sewed and ripped several times. By the time I figured it out, the damage had been done and my final result is a bit squinched up which bugs the heck out of me. If I had more fabric, I'd remake the back. I also had problems with the sleeves. The sleeves are oddly shapped with an upper and lower sleeve and cuffs that have a rounded edge. Of course, I have sewn sleeves on a hundred times so I didn't mark the dots...I just did the pyramids...and I sewed the sleeves on backwards. Then I sewed the trim on the wrong side of one of the cuffs. I really, really think the pattern markings were poorly done anyway. These sleeves had a definate right sleeve and left sleeve and they should have had the cuffs done after the sleeves were attached to the body. There were just too many variables to get wrong. I suppose it didn't help that I was working on this at 3:00 in the morning. The final sleeves are still not 100% right since the buttons should end up right over the top of the sleeve vs towards the front like they are. Oh well!

Pants - black fabric from my stash.

Shirt - I have cut a shirt out of a pale yellow top sheet that my MIL gave us...that I had no use for. (She gave mismatched sheets and pillows and I can't stand when things don't match.) The thing that appealed to me about using a sheet was that it was well used and thus super, duper soft. I placed the pattern pieces so that the sleeve edges were on the top edge of the sheet...so I won't have to hem them. I did the shirt hem edges on the bottom edge...allowing for the hem and moving the pattern off the edge a bit. I hope i can sew it today. I watching a friend's dd in addition to my crew so I might not be able to.

And just for fun, his 'cake' was homemade cinnamon rolls based on his request.

The Red Tent

While working on this project, I started listening to a new audiobook...The Red Tent. I am really liking this story and all the details about sheep, wool, spinning and weaving are pretty neat.

Home Again

2008-06-05T11:12:00.002-04:00

It was a long, long car trip home but we made it. We attempted to stay at a Walmart but I just wasn't feeling safe so dh found us a campground close by that allowed us to get a good night's sleep before the final leg of our trip.

I don't know if I mentioned it before but we allowed my brother to stay in our house when we were gone. He is in between houses again so I'm sure he appreciated it. It also made it nice that we didn't have to take Mia's rats to her friend's house...because the mom wasn't too crazy about the idea. So, coming home after my brother was here was kind of funny. He had asked me if there were any things he could do while we were gone. I told him he could finish stripping the wallpaper in the kitchen. DH said he could do yardwork. Neither of those things were done. He did organize our DVDs and CDs in our cases...which means that my blockbuster dvds are not where I left them. And at 29 years of age he had no idea that it was a bad idea to put a half-used jar of spagetti sauce back in the pantry. He did that twice actually. And I found an opened bottle of barbeque sauce, too. He must get food poisoning on a regular basis.

As far as knitting, I started Greyson's Wonderful Wallaby on the final leg of our trip. I got a good start on it but didn't get as far as I would have thought.

So we got home Tuesday and the camper is mostly unpacked. DH cleaned out the van and he filled a LARGE trashcan with trash from under and around the kids' seats. I had kept our area fairly tidy and I did clean up the back area several times over the course of the trip so I was shocked at how much crap there was. My kids are just slobs! They would just drop stuff on the ground with no thought.

The next phase of our lives will be consumed with MIL moving into an assisted living apartment. She sold her house and the closing date is June 20th. She gets her keys today. DH is the only kid in town so he will be the primary mover. One of his sisters will be coming June 10th and she's bringing her son, Nathan the college grad, so they will be able to help a lot. And we will pay my brother for his moving help, too. I'm a bit bummed because this move means that I will basically not have dh's assistance at all over the next month. He will go to his mother's house (across town) every day after work and on weekends. She's moving from a large 4 bedroom house into a tiny 1 bedroom...and she can't make decisions quickly about what to keep and what can go.

Winding down

2008-06-02T08:17:00.003-04:00

Our mega vacation is winding down now. Sometime this morning, we will start our journey home. We will need to stop one place along the way and we should be pulling into our driveway tomorrow afternoon. The kids, especially Ethan, are more then ready for the comforts of home. I'm looking forward to it, too. I grossly underestimated how much 'free time' I would have for my creative activities during our vacation. Yes, I got lots of knitting in during our driving days and even during our sitting around and visiting times but I'm really anxious to develop more consistancy with my spinning and I think 10-15 minutes a day at home is what's going to help. Our days here have been 'go, go, go!' and I think I'll have a bit of on of down time at home for spinning. I have a ton of yummy fiber to work with.

I finished Mia's first sock last night. Instead of casting on the 2nd one today, I'm going to cast on Greyson's wonderful wallaby. Mia's 2nd sock can be my take-along project once we are back home. Greyson's wallaby will be a larger project and it would be great to have a big dent made in the progress.

Well, my time is up. I gotta help dh pack us up. It'll be a long driving day for us today.

Graduation #2

2008-06-01T09:05:00.002-04:00

We have been in Indiana for the past 2 nights. Friday night, we went to my nephew's grad party. Saturday we had lunch at my all-time-favorite pizza place...Pizza King. They don't have them in Florida and nothing is quite as good as Pizza King. I like to get barbeque sauce and pepperoni. Yum yum!

We drove up to Muncie to visit with my grandma who is in a rehab place after her back surgery. I brought her a couple gowns, socks and chapstick. She was really appreciative and that made me feel good. Then we drove out to aunt's house in Eaton We visited for a little while and then we went to the cemetery to visit my cousin's gravesite. We talked about Nolan and Jared and we both got teary. My mom met us there. My aunt had previous plans for dinner at Red Lobster so they went that way. They had invited us but I didn't think the kids were up to it (plus I needed to spend time with my mom and I didn't want to complicate my aun's dinner plans) so we made plans to go to Chuck E Cheese with the kids. Mia actually LOVES Red Lobster and we never take her so I asked my aunt if she minded letting Mia tag along. She didn't and it actually worked out very well because my aunt's 12 year old step-granddaughter was with them. Mia and she had a fabulous time.

The other kids had a blast at CEC, of course. I think my mom has wanted a reason to go there so she had fun, too. My aunt dropped Mia off at CEC as we were leaving and we drove back to my SIL's house.

In the midst of all these activities, I got to spin and ply Nate! I did the bulk of the spinning in the morning. When we got back, it was late but I wanted to finish so I plugged on. Greyson was awake when I was dealing with a tangled mess from a yarn cake plying attempt. He actually peddled for me while I stood WAY back, untangling the 2 plies and then feeding it onto the bobbin. Nate, as yarn, looks great! I still have thick and thin spots so I have no idea what I'll knit with it.

I've also come a long way on sock #1 for Mia. I'm 4-5 rows away from the first toe decrease.

Today is the actual graduation so things will be busy. I'm sure I'll get some sock knitting in but that might be the only thing I get done. Tomorrow, we start our long trek home.

Chicago

2008-05-29T23:20:00.003-04:00

We took a train from Michigan City, Indiana, into Chicago. We decided on the Aquarium although the Field Museum was very tempting. I quickly determined that it was $25 cheaper for us to buy a family membership then it was for us to buy regular tickets. So, we can go back as many times as we want over the next year. hee hee hee Before we went in, we met another loss family from Chicago. The kids all ran around and played on these rolling hills in front of the city and the lake. It was a beautiful view.

The aquarium was really nice. The kids all seemed to like it. The sea otters, beluga wales, penguins and komodo dragon were all favorites. Mia was acting mopey because she knew Chicago had an American Girl Place and that was one thing we didn't do in NYC that we had initially planned. DH and I decided to try to get there, if we could. It involved a few free trolley rides but we made it there. We let the girls picked out one item each. (So much for watching the budget!) Kendall picked a mini Julie just like her doll. Mia picked out an asian outfit.

We then got to take a regular bus to Millenium station to catch our train home. It was a great, busy day. Chicago was rather cool. I wish we had more time here. I would have liked it if I could have coordinated a few online friend visits since we were so close to others. I'm too tired to get the camera to upload photos. Maybe tomorrow.

What Day is it?

2008-05-28T23:00:00.007-04:00

I think it's Wednesday. Time marches by quickly and there just isn't must lounging time here on vacation. There is an insane amount of work to be done for us camper dwelling folks.

Loads of laundry done: At least 15. Seriously. We've been gone for 11 days and we've done more then 15 loads. That's not really including bedding either..unless you count a few items here and there based on need.

When I last wrote, I hinted about diamonds. The kids and I went prospecting and sluicing in Herkimer, New York. Dh stayed at the camper with Lily and the rest of us walked across the way to the Herkimer Diamond Mine. I paid $42 admittance for the 4 big kids and I to get hammers and entrance to the 'mines' which were really 2 big piles of rocks.

It was hot. We smashed away but didn't really get anything good although we saw lot of possibilities. I think we needed better tools to be able to free the tiny 'diamonds' (quartz) from their stony homes. A chisel would have been very helpful. We tried anyway. And it was pretty fun. Kendall mosied up to people and told them she hadn't found a single thing. One man, a professional prospector working from a hole in the ground, told her she needed to look harder. Later, the man's lady friend gave Kendall a diamond which I thought was very nice but I had a little talk with Kendall about not fishing for gifts from people.

Since it was so hot, the hottest day of our entire trip, we didn't stay as long as I would have liked. On our way out, I bought a $10 bag of dirt and we sluiced using their water thingy outside. We found lots of great gems!

The rest of the day was spent getting cleaned up and then the kids tried swimming again. Somehow, the temp plummetted and it was too cold for swimming so they shivered at the edge. I dove in and it was...refreshing...bone chilling cold.

I can't remember if this was the day I took my wheel to the playground. I am seriously sad that I just haven't had hardly any time to spin. We have been moving too much for that. I did get to predraft all of 'Nate' so I am hoping I can spin him soon...maybe when we park at my SIL's house this weekend.

Tuesday was a long road day. In our initial planning, we planned on stopping at Niagara Falls but we nixed those plans after we got a late start and a falls diversion would have put us behind schedule. As we approached, I asked dh how far off our path was it? 16 miles. We both decided to heck with the schedule and we stopped anyway. It was a whirlwind stop. We were in and out in about an hour. We didn't get to see everything but we can say that we went and we saw the falls. Lily was especially impressed. Mia hated it. She was freaked out by the panhandler who approached us in the parking lot. He was really agressive and it ticked my dh off.

I finished my 2nd monkey sock just as we arrived at Niagara Falls...ends woven in and everything!

We stayed at a Flying J last night...don't ask me where. Tonight we are back to a regular campground. We arrived here, got set up and I watched the kids on the playground while working on my next sock project...socks for Mia with yarn purchased in NYC. They will be short socks so I hope they go quickly. I'm not following a pattern on these ones. This playground has lots and lots of DIRT under the equipment. Kendall rolled around it in wearing her wonderful wallaby....the only 'jacket' she has so it meant another laundry round for me. And we had somehow already accumulated 2 full loads anyway.

I met a longtime online friend, Rachel, at the Hanna Andersson outlet here. I was in heaven walking among all the cute clothes. Oh my how I love HA clothes on my girls. On the way there, Mia proclaimed that she hates it along with Gymboree but that didn't stop her from finding 2 things that she liked from the racks. I could have bought a ton more but I exercised great restraint which dh would probably disagree with. Rachel has 2 daughters and they seemed to hit it off with my kids, especially Kendall and her oldest dd.

Now we have tentatively planned a quick day trip to Chicago tomorrow. I think we will check out one of the museums there.

Graduation #1

2008-05-26T07:32:00.002-04:00

We met our family at the college campus Saturday morning. It was dh's oldest sister, her dh, their son Nathan - the graduate, and MIL who flew up for the event. We walked around campus a bit and then had lunch at a buffet there. MIL can no longer walk down stairs in general and the buffet was upstairs so we had to scramble to make a seating area so that she could avoid the stairs. That was a fun arrangement...when having to get food & drinks downstairs for kids. After lunch we walked around some more...it is a lovely place.

We came back to the campground where our crazy kids went swimming in the freezing cold pool. DH and I watched them and I tried to sneak a little sock knitting in. Somewhere between there and our camper, I lost a dpn...a size 3.0 US 3 dpn not your tandard 3.25 US 3. So almost halfway through sock number 2 and I lost a vital tool that can't be found at any of the local craft stores or even LYSs. Grrr!

Dinner was at the Hotel Utica in a meeting room. It was a catered event held in honor of a network of 11 friends, including Nathan. Our kids were fairly well behaved but I was not entirely comfortable there. It seemed liked a lot of the people were monied and we were just plain old camper traveling folks. Kendall, however, was the belle of the ball and she charmed quite a few people with her contagious smile and fancy dress twirling. Ethan kept 'stealing' the fancy graduation toothpicks near the appetizers. He had a stack of 20 of them when I finally caught on and he was quite convinced he was keeping them. Mia felt uncomfortable and after dinner I let her walk around the lobby with Lily.

Sunday was the big day. We arrived on campus an hour early and still had to park very far away. Lily lasted 30 minutes before I had to take her out. Eventually all my kids joined me outside where lots of other children and toddlers were playing. I pulled out my sock and was able to knit a bit while they played. (I had swapped a 3.25 us 3 for the missing dpn because at this point I just want to be done with the damn sock.) On the way to lunch, I discovered that dpn #2 was missing. I had an entire afternoon on a beautiful campus with lots of waiting time and no way to knit. I retraced my steps but didn't find it. The college hosted a catered picnic for all attendees so we participated in that. Once the crowds cleared out, I retraced my steps again and found my dpn stuck in the grassy area close to where the kids were playing earlier. It truly was like finding a needle in a haystack because my dpn matched the little tree triggy things that were all over the grass. I was thrilled to be able to knit again! And yeah, I guess I should give magic loop another try.

We met Nathan's girlfriend and her parents. For whatever reason, I was a bit surprised when I met her....a very beautiful Korean girl named Kate. We have known about Kate since Nathan's freshman year so I have had 3+ years to envison her as someone completely different. She was incredibly nice and tried to convince Nate, as she called him, to take them to a playground across campus. We hitched a ride on a golf cart back to our van while dh pushed Lily in the stroller.

DH and I discovered that we have burned through an insane amount of money and we aren't even halfway through our trip. Yikes! I think we got a little free with the spending since we are on vacation and all. From this point on, we need to buckle down and watch our spending. The main thing we can do is actually eat from our camper vs eating out.

The kids, minus Kendall, went swimming again. Well, if you call standing in the water up to your knees and shivering 'swimming.' We cooked tilapia on our griddle/grill and had cesar salad, apple slices and oreas on our picnic table outside the camper. Afterwards, we took the dishes down to the campground's outdoor dishwashing sink. Once chores were down, we all took a bike ride around the campground and we ended up on a rocky beach along a river. This was seriously one if the best moments of our entire vacation. We let the kids take their shoes off and walk around in the frigid water. Kendall fell on her bottom but she wasn't too upset. Mia tried to get to one of the huge rocks but she just couldn't do it. Lily sat on the edge and tossed little rocks in. I took my shoes off and joined the kids, too. We all did a kind of river rock dance, walking on the rocks, slowly and step by step, and trying not to step on sharp ones. It was dark by the time we biked back. Our neighbor's fire was still going and the kids were hungry so we let them roast hotdogs. It was a lovely way to end our evening.

It's now the start of day 9 and we have plans to add 'diamonds' to our family wealth today. More on that later.

Day 6-7

2008-05-24T06:59:00.002-04:00

Day 6 and 7

As usual, it took us hours to pack up camp and get back on the road again. The bikes had to be attached to the roof rack, our outdoor table folded up and brought inside, the camper slide cranked in, the 2 tent bed ends disassembled and folded up, the outdoor carpet swept off and folded, etc, etc, etc. The coolest thing was listening to the kids play outside in that field while we packed up. There were no arguments...only a few squeals from Lily who wanted out of her secure (safe) spot in the stroller. We let her run around a bit, too, but we mostly needed to make sure she didn't run down the road while the big kids were preoccupied.

It was lunch time by the time we headed out. We are getting low on groceries so we were going to do a quick fast food run...which always starts a big argument of who likes what. McDonald's is almost always the popular consensus except that I am getting sick of Micky D's. Greyson doesn't like the chicken at Wendy's or Burger King. No one likes the fries at BK for that matter so it's usually out anyway. And so on and so on and so on. We used our handy GPS to locate a McDonald's on our path. It led us to a freakin food court in a huge outlet mall. That just wasn't working for us so we picked the next one a mile away. That ended up being a distribution center with lots of golden arches on semi-trucks. We gave up and got back on the highway. We then decided to try a service exit which boasted of a Roy Rogers. DH and I made the executive decision to go there. Mia & I went in to get the food since there was no drive through.

There was a hold up on chicken and there were 20 or so people behind us. There were 4 peeps, including us, waiting for chicken. Someone from the back got the great idea to let the non-chicken waiting people go ahead to grab there food from the cafe line style warming slots. Which meant that by the time we got our chicken, the mashed potatoes that Mia wanted were gone and so were the fries. Of course, I didn't think about that when they were all walking by. It took an INSANE amount of time for us to get our food. And the food we grabbed earlier was cold by the time we checked out. We ate in the van. It was seriously the most disgusting meal I have ever purchased for my family.

I was in the mood for knitting so I worked on my 2nd monkey sock. Right after one stop, when we were moving, my dpn from my monkey sock flew out of my hand and disappeared to the right of me. I emptied both compartments and it wasn't there. I HAD to be able to knit so I unbuckled and dove down into the foot area where I finally was able to find it in the step area of the door. I was able to knit to the heel flap. I was hoping to be done with this sock already so it's getting old! Plus I'm majorly ticked off at a knot I encountered. I cut the knot out and left the ends to be tied but the new area was in a different color and it's patterning in a different way which irks me. I'm ready to move on to another project.

Our new campground is awesome. There are tons of children here and we are close to the playground. Our neighbors are 2 elderly couples who have taken a liking to the kids. They had a fire going last night and they gave our kids sticks and marshmellows for roasting. I didn't reealize that it was Memorial Day weekend which explains all the campers here. The camp also has lots of activities planned..like the flashlight candy hunt last night. We aren't actually going to be here a whole lot over the next few days since we will be doing nephew graduation stuff.

I did 5 loads of laundry when we got here. It would have been 2, maybe 3, loads in our front loader. I think this was 3 days worth of laundry. It it wasn't so darn cold and wet we could go a week between laundry but our severely limited clothing options forced the camp laundrymat trip.

If I can, I'm going to set my wheel up outside in a few minutes. I really need a shower first but I can't bear to go to the showers in this 40 degree weather...with no heat in the showers. Yes, they have hot water but the air is just too cold. I can't really shower here because we don't have a full hook-up site...just water and electric.

A Perfect Storm

2008-05-23T06:54:00.003-04:00

Day 5

We took our time getting ready for our second trip into the city. At the first station, dh realized he left his phone in the van. He decided not to get it because it was raining and because we didn't need it at all the previous day. He also rationalized that he had his work Blackberry that could be used for calls in an emergency. Once in NYC, we took the subway directly to the Museum of Natural History. We stopped outside and had hotdogs from a street vendor before we went inside. Somewhere around the 3rd floor, the kids started whining and they just wanted to go to Central Park for cotton candy and playground time. We had to see the dinos though so we trugged on. The museum was very cool. I read some of the information out to the children but who knows what they may have learned. Naturally, the boys gravitated to all the weapon displays. Mia loved all the little house displays and she was in heaven in the Asian area. I worked on my monkey sock there and throughout NYC.

We walked to another LYS, Knitty City. At first, it was a bit uncomfortable because of the smallness of the store and the wideness of our stroller. DH moved it to the side and he waited while I walked around. No one greeted me or asked me if I needed help and for some reason, I was a little bothered by that. There appeared to be a class going on in the back of the room and it made me feel like I was intruding. I walked around, touched lots of fiber and yet again I have a knack for finding and drooling over the $60 a skein stuff. I was prepared to leave when Kendall spotted the same yarn I used for her Wonderful Wallaby...Cascade Sierra Quatro. OMG - how I love that yarn. It's a Pima Cotton and Wool blend. So soft to the touch, almost silky, and it knits up beautufully. Plus it's machine washable. At this point, I needed help figuring out how much to buy to be able to do Wonderful Wallaby sweatshirts for Mia, Greyson and Ethan so I found an employee and they happened to sell that pattern so they brought me one to look at. And the girl was very nice, I might add. I bought 16 skeins of Sierra in 3 colors! Red for Ethan, dark blue for Greyson and 2 greens for Mia. They didn't have 7 skeins of any color for Mia so we picked 3 varigated green and 4 solid light green. I came so close to not spending a dime and yet I ended up spending $150, my biggest yarn purchase ever!

We walked to Central Park, looking for a playground...that we didn't find until it was too late. We went right when we should have gone left. We walked and walked and walked. We stopped and let the kids play on a huge rocky area. I knit some more, dh replied to a work email on his crackberry, I mean blackberry, and he was wearing sleeping Lily in a sling.

One thing I noticed was the huge number of nannies pushing strollers in this part of town. It was like we had fallen in step with nannies and their charges heading to a nanny convention. And I think there was even one male nanny pushing a stroller. He definately did not look like a dad. I know a few people who have nannies back home but it was nothing like what we saw. Now, if we had been smart, we would have turned left to join the convention which I am sure was at the playground to the left pathway vs the path we took. I think it was a happy mistake though. I did notice that moms/nannies? hover right next to their children on the playground. DH and I can't do that with 5 kids so we would have looked negligent. {gasp} The rock formation thing was enjoyable to us and the kids so it was a win/win situation.

We took the Subway back towards Penn station where dh inadvertantly gipped the system by only scanning our pass once before we were let through the gate with our stroller. P.S. the stroller was a life-saver! Since we had the sling, the stroller became available for Kendall or Ethan as their legs 'ran out of gas.' Greyson even took a quick turn in there. The moms of NYC have evolved and have strollers better then ours. They all seemed to have these cool looking ones with bigger wheels, yet with a small footprint, and the child was raised higher and could be faced in or outwards. We saw a few of these $500 strollers at BRU when we made a quick trip to BRU restroom.

The 7:07 train to Secaucus was somewhat full so dh stayed in the handcapped area while the kids and I moved forward (or was it backwards) to find seats. A very nice gentleman offered to move so that Mia and I could sit together. I had Lily in the sling. The 3 middles sat diagonally from me. If the one butthead sitting scross from them would have switched with us, then we all could have been together.

They announced that Secaucus was near and I got our stuff ready...and waited until we were supposed to get off. There was no activity by our area and I was facing the back. Then we started moving and realization hit...we missed our stop! I took a quick inventory and immediately realized that dh had my backpack which had my money. I had 5 kids, 4 bags, no stroller, no money and no cell phone. (My cell phone died, totally died at the beginning of our vacation.) And our navigator had gotten off the train in Secaucus. He had his blackberry but I had no idea of what that number was. The kids started asking questions. I assured them that we would be fine...that we would get off at the next station and then go back to our stop. I was a wee bit concerned that dh would realize we didn't have money and that he would hop on the next train to find us. Ultimately I decided that he would stay put because we still had to ride to Harriman and that train left from Secaucus, where he was. As we got off the train, I had a moment of panic that our stop might not be a 'real' full station with an information desk. We were in luck...and we headed down the stairs to find someone to tell our sob story to.

'My husband and I got separated and we need to get back to Secaucus. Is there a train heading back that way?' 'Yes, of course' she replied as she looked the schedule. 'OK, great,' I replied. 'My next dilemma is that all of my money is with my husband in Secaucus so I can't buy any tickets.' She immediately came out of her glass information booth and she walked us to the track that we needed. We had to walk down a broken escalator. She even helped me keep my wanderer, Ethan, in line with the group. And then she waited with us until our train arrived a few minutes later. She told our story to the conductor and he let us on the train without tickets. And voila...we were on our way. But we had no idea where Daddy was and if he had gone looking for us. The kids spotted him first and they ran full throttle towards him. We had to go into the customer service office to get the stroller and our belongings. "Hello Kerri' they greeted me. "We know all about you.' They were trying earnestly to locate me on the trains by sending out calls to all the possible stops. I have to say that the employees were all very nice!

We made it to our track, which was empty of any commuters, we looked across to the next track and saw a stopped train heading down our line. DH insisted that was the one we wanted so we rushed up the yet-again broken escalator and down the other side where we *just* missed it. DH looked at his watch and said 'Wait, that was too early.' We headed back to the other track, where commuters were now arriving and we were able to get on the right train. Just another little bit of excitement! I was secretly glad that dh led us on this one because it took the heat off me for my little diversion.

I think the kids will love sharing this little 'story' (of our missed stop) with anyone who will lend an ear. We all made it back to our camper safely where everyone fell asleep fairly quickly. They are all still sleeping, those lazy bums. ;) My body feels like I ran a marathon and I'm hobbling around today.

Next stop - Hamilton College, New York.

One final thing before I forget...we were definately an oddity in NYC. During our entire trip, I saw 2 other families with 3 kids. The vast majority was one child with a fair sprinkling of 2s. We were the largest family for sure. OK, I'm sure other large families were probably in the city but we did not see them and we certainly got lots and lots of comments. The kids were all ready to move to NYC. I think it would be pretty hard to do a Sam's trip on the subway. Yeah, that would be horrific. Nevermind. We never could afford to live here anyway. It has been a wonderful place to visit though.

New York, Baby!

2008-05-23T05:21:00.006-04:00

Day 4

Our campground...Black Bear in Florida, New York. After 3 days in the van, we were looking forward to letting the kids loose to burn of some of their never-ending supply of energy. And guess what? It was raining..and freezing cold, too. So we all danced around each other while dh set up the camper and I made a lunch of soup and sandwiches. Eventually, when the rain lightened to a mist, we let the kids run around in the small field next to us. They were very cold so I made some hot cocoa for them. When the rain stopped completely, I brought out M'lady and I started spinning my second batch of kool-aid dyed roving (bought at Knit-Witz.) This stuff is reds and pinks from 3 varieties of Kool-aid and very pretty. I really enjoyed spinning while watching my children outside playing princess (Kendall and later Lily) and sword fighting princes (Greyson & Ethan.) Mia was the director. She even got Ethan and Kendall to fake kiss for a scene. I didn't get too far on my spinning, maybe 1/4 a bobbin. I don't remember if I got much knitting done...maybe a couple pattern repeats on Monkey Sock #2 (or #3 depending on if you count the doomed one.)

We hung around the camper all afternoon. Everyone got much needed showers so we would be clean for our jaunt into the Big Apple on Wednesday.

NYC - Day 5

We parked our van in Harriman, NY, and we took the train into Secaucus. From there we transferred to NYC Penn station. The kids, especially Ethan, were thrilled to be on trains. I can't even describe how thrilled I was to be walking around in NYC! So many sights looked familiar from movies and whatnot. It was just cool. We used our GPS to find the big Toys R Us and it looked like a local yarn store, Yarn Connection, was on the way there. We had to drag the stroller up to the 2nd floor of a residential building. The store was tucked away in a tiny room that had very tall ceilings. I felt claustrophobic with the towering walls of yarn. I picked a ball of tofutsies sock yarn and we headed out.

GPS let us down with her outdated information because we arrived at TRU to discover it had been converted to a Babies R Us. We decided to have lunch and we ate at Good Burger...and it was very good...but ended up costing us $69 and that was with some sharing among children.

We took the subway to TRU. We rode the Ferris Wheel ($4 each.) Dh and I waffled about whether to let the kids pick out a small toy. We decided to let them...and that was a BIG mistake. It was just too over-whelming...too many choices and we, the parents, had limited them to $10 and something small that they could hold. I think we spent 2 hours in there including the Ferris Wheel ride. I was ready to get out. I mean, the store was nice but it was still loaded with the same toys that could be bought at our TRU or online. Here's what the kid's picked...

Mia - cheap Barbie Doll and a clothing pack. She really went over the $10 limit by a couple bucks. I'm not even sure why she picked Barbie considering her age and the fact that she doesn't really play with Barbie's anymore.

Greyson - Star Wars figurine with light sabor

Kendall - a little Bratz Baby that pees after you give her water from a bottle and 2 bonus pets that pee into a litter box with sand. I obviously didn't look at that package closely before buying!

Ethan - The best choice among the toys - a 2 pack of Speed Racer cars.

Lily - I picked out a little stuffed giraffe for her.

We headed towards the Empire State building. I was surprised at the security check point. I guess this was one of the things that changed after 9/11. I understand why they need to do it but it was really a pain to unload all the bags and keep the children together. Mia ended up getting pushed aside by several non-english speaking tourists because they crowded the metal detector as it was her turn and someone set it off. We were herded through ropes and we took 2 elevators to finally get up there. We did get an express pass up the last elevator, thanks to Lily screaming. They escorted us right out of the line. LOL Thanks, baby Girl!

It was WINDY and cold. I was not digging the continuous blast of freezing air. DH's hat blew off and he had to chase after it. We looked around a bit from all 4 sides and then I headed inside with all the children. Lily was still very fussy so I thought I would sit down and discreetly nurse her. Wrong. No sitting allowed. After a long day of walking...and no place to sit, I was done with the Empire State Building.

We had dinner at McDonald's close to Penn Station. Thank goodness for fast food prices! Greyson's tiny light sabor got stuck under a bench and dh had to lift the bench so he could retrieve it.

Then we took our trains back to Harriman and dh drove us back to our camper. I think it was 9:30 and all 5 children were fast asleep. A fun-filled exhausting day!

Day 3

2008-05-20T20:15:00.002-04:00

It’s now the beginning of day 3 of our grand adventure although I likely won‘t be able to post this until tonight. We started in Florida and have passed through Georgia, South Carolina (where we met T’s mom to drop off Sophie,) North Carolina (where we camped at a Flying J truck stop instead of walmart,) Virginia, West Virginia, Maryland, Pennslyvania .

That first night, we just couldn’t make it another 1.5 hours to get to the WalMart Super Center that was on our path. We might actually have to forgo walmart camping because we have are using an entire tank of water each day. When 6 people have to stop and pee at least every hour to hour and a half…we end up using our entire supply of fresh water in the tank in less then 24 hours. That’s water for flushing and washing hands. I guess that also includes water for washing a few dishes/pans, too. The flying J has water, propane, fuel and even a dump station. We will try to conserve water a bit more on our driving days but I doubt we could go 2 days unless we resort to public restrooms. {{gasp!}}

Speaking of restrooms….we seem to have started a tradition where the first person in the camper bathroom at each stop…well, they stink it up for everyone else. Most of us hold our breath and just deal with it but our sweet Kendall has a very sensitive nose and she starts gagging. Poor thing! Yeah - it’s not pleasant. Got to keep it real before I encourage any large family road trips!

I have been knitting so much that my hands are feeling arthritic…especially now, first thing in the morning. On a VERY happy note, I finished one of my Monkey socks…with Jitterbug Kingfisher. And it fits!! I cast on number 2 immediately but had to stop when I dropped a dpn into the door jam of the van. I later recovered it but it as then too dark for me to resume knitting. I also discovered that my yarn ball winder fits perfectly on the grab handle of our van. I actually had the nerve to frog my first too-tight monkey sock and then I wound it onto the ball winder so that I could keep the skein continuous. I have just kept it there because I rather like knitting off it.

Speaking of my beautiful completed Monkey sock. I tried it on and took a few pictures. Not even 30 seconds later, we discovered that Lily filled her diaper. We spotted a sign for a farmer’s market so DH pulled off so that I could change her and then afterwards we would pick up some fruit from the market. I layed a towel down on the bench seat of the van and I unbuckled her. I stood at the end of the seat, pulled her pants off and was treated to a small ‘thump’ on my monkey sock foot. Yes, a nice plop of yellow cabbage poop flew out of her pant leg and of all places onto my prized hand knitted sock! I got her cleaned up and then I got myself cleaned up. By this point I was feeling gross so I took a quick sponge bath in the tiny camper bathroom and I washed my hair by leaning into the tiny shower and using the shower sprayer. No one else has showered or anything. We are holding out until we get to our campground.

After the poop knitastrophy, we picked out our goodies and then headed to a local playground to fix lunch and to let the kids play. It was a great playground and a class of daycare kids was there so my kids had new friends to play with.

One thing that I hadn’t planned on…it’s freakin cold up here!! I packed a minimal amount of cold-weather clothing…pants and long sleeved shirts for the kids. It had to be in the lower 40s last night. We are going to be in trouble if it ends up like this every day. Thank goodness dh had 2 hoodies because I took one of his. Lily is wearing Pjs today because it was the only thing that covered her arms and legs. Brrr! I guess I would have expected this a month ago…but not late May.

Can't leave home without it

2008-05-18T08:24:00.004-04:00

We are heading out in a couple hours and I think I spent more time packing my wheel, fiber, yarn, knitting needles and pattern books then I did packing everything else. It's going to be a monster trip with loads and loads of driving time. Whee! DH does most of the driving so I'll be able to knit...and maybe even predraft fiber for my early morning spinning sessions while the kids are still sleeping in the camper.

We won't be staying at a campground tonight. Yep...we are going to try Wal-Mart camping. When dh told me about it, I thought he's been smoking crack or something. I like to save money and all but this sounded extreme! I did a bit of internet research...to prove him wrong...and I even posted a poll on my parenting BB and people had seen and even done this before. I still thought he was nuts but with the rapidly increasing cost of fuel...I changed my mind. Our gas budget for this trip will be well over $1000!! Tonight is a good night for trying the walmart thing because we are driving as much as we can and then we will be leaving early tomorrow for day 2 of driving.

First destination? New York City!! Well, we aren't camping in NYC. We are camping as close as we can get and then we will take the train into the city. I'm beyond excited. The kids are also excited. My oldest was excited but now she's panicking about the crowds. She's convinced we are going to get separated. I'm a wee bit concerned but I think we can handle it.

I hope to have internet access along the way so I can post my fibery progress.

Oh oh! I can't forget about the spin-in yesterday. Our local yarn store, Knit-Witz, had a spin-in. My dh was gracious enough to 'allow' me to attend even though we were no where near ready for our trip. I had a great time. My spinning is getting better!! The green yarn is blue faced leiceister wool that I dyed with kool-aid, spun on my ladybug and then plied. I love it! The gals kept calling it BRIGHT. LOL I don't really think it's all that bright...more sherberty then neon.

Chris from Sugarbee Studios brought lots of fiber porn for us to touch and buy. I picked out a One Night Stand fiber batt named Nate. Man, he's hot and has awesome baby blues. I thought I was going to pick Collin but Nate stole my heart. I can't wait to spin him up! I also picked up a bag of her squishy raspberries & cream roving with merino/corri/wool & silk. And she brought me the 'It's All About the O' sock yarn that I bought from her etsy website site last week. I'm in fiber heaven. Now I just need to take my time and get better at spinning so that I can spin and then knit something with this yummy stuff.

A New Hobby...Spinning...Hazardous to your Hair

2008-05-13T07:48:00.008-04:00

When the gals at our local yarn store would bring out their spinning wheels...I said no thank you. The last thing I wanted was another pricey hobby. The wheels alone start at a couple hundred bucks and go well over $1000. Then you need something to spin...fiber....squishy glorious fiber in a rainbow of colors. I started changing my mind at Sheep and Wool Days at Middleton Place when I saw the ladies (and one guy) spinning. Hmmm - that looks like fun.

But still...no thank you. I already had enough hobbies and as my husband pointed out I hadn't gained any new hours in each day.

And then I saw this...

It looked sturdy, the red wheel was cute and the surprise was that somewhere on the wheel would be my own enamaled ladybug...no 2 would be on the exact same spot...or so they say. The reviews were also pretty darn good. A great wheel for a beginner but that it would grow with me, too, as my skills improved.

I was sold...but my dh needed a little work. My friend let me borrow her spinning wheel, a Fidelis, so that I could learn to spin...and so that dh could see that I was serious. It worked. He let me order my wheel.

"M'lady" arrived a couple days ago. I was a little intimidated by it. I had practiced a little on the Fidelis...but it hadn't clicked. My initial results were similar....a twisty curly q mess. But it was fun!

Then a local yarn celebrity came to my rescue. Chris from Sugarbee Studios http://www.etsy.com/shop.php?user_id=55462 came to my house and watched me spin. Well, we spent a lot more time talking then spinning! It was such a fabulous morning. Her kids are very close in age to my 2 oldest kids and our kids just seemed to hit it off. I think everyone had a great time. And I got a little help with my technique. Turns out that I was pinching and pulling vs letting the fiber pull apart. I really think I'm on the verge of a spinning break-through.

Having Chris here really was like having a celebrity in my house. Her yarn and fiber is fabulous. I've been a part of many conversations at my LYS about her 'Politically Correct' line. Sock yarn with names like 'It's All About the O,' and 'Fiber Floozy.' Last time I was at the store, I took home a one night stand...George. Poor George. I ruined him. He was no good for me anyway. I should have practiced on some plain old roving before I jumped to fancy batts. Now my goal is to get better at spinning so that I can take home another one night stand...like Collin or Michael. I also like Serge but that's Chris's husband's name and I couldn't do that to a friend.

It was just a fabulous day all around! While Chris was still here, the post man brought me a box crammed full of yummy blue faced leiceister wool...and a spindle, too. I also got 8 ounces of pink corriedale. I am now swimming in fiber! Later in the day, I learned that I won a lotto for a free embroidered cloth diaper from the creator of the Fatty Cakes diaper pattern. Then a knitting bag pattern I having been coveting went on sale. And to top my fabulous day...my MIL finally got an offer on her house. Wheee!!!

The yarn on the right is what I worked on when Chris was here. It's a mess but it's mine!

As I was finishing the last bit of this, I had to fix a little over-twisted problem. I leaned back from my wheel, held the yarn over my head and let it unravel. Only is grabbed my hair instead!! And it wouldn't let go!! Ouch!! I was able to separate it from my head and I then figured out how to ply the yarn. a bit later, my 11 year old came over and grabbed at my hair. Owww - again! She pulled out a few strands of my hair and a lovely poof of wool. LOL Thank goodness I didn't go anywhere like that.

Neglected

2008-05-09T09:55:00.004-04:00

My poor blog. I had high hopes and then I abandoned it. I have been creating...just not doing a good job of capturing and recording.

Some of my recently finished items:

My oldest child wanted a birthday present for her best friend. We gave her 2 American Girl dresses that I had sewn a while back with the intent of selling. These were ultra fancy dresses. While my dn was rushing around trying to prepare the package, I was kettle dying yarn for a swap. DN lamented that we had no appropriate wrapping paper or gift bags. I had an ah-ha moment and threw a playsilk into the dye pot which was nearly exhausted. It produced a beautiful light lavendery-burgundy with veins of slightly deeper colors. Once it was rinsed and dried, we wrapped it around the box and it made a stunning gift.

Drats - can't finish this now.

$10 Baby Gift

2007-12-30T18:31:00.000-05:00

I had plans to do some serious decluttering today...until I remembered that I had volunteered to make dinner for a new mom in my MOPS group. Well, I had remembered the dinner part but then I decided I wanted to sew something for the baby so my grand cleaning plans were set aside.

I snooped on the Babies R Us website to find her registry to get an idea of her tastes. Black furniture, white sheets, changing table pad and she noted that the nursery was simple with tiffany blue accents. What the heck color was tiffany blue?? She also seemed to like brown and blue baby outfits. I did a web search and found a teal color that was called tiffany blue so armed with that knowledge, I headed to my sewing room.

I thought I might make a simple quilt with white and 'tiffany blue' squares. And I would also use my embroidery machine to add the new baby's name. Only I didn't have anything close to tiffany blue. Well there was one floral print that I nixed. I did pick a few fabrics and I brought them to the washing machine because I wasn't sure if they had been prewashed.

While that was running, I sorted through a bin of ebayable stuff because I knew I had some tiny baby boy clothes in there. I found a NWT brown fleece gymbo outfit that I bought on clearance a couple years ago. I'm sure I paid less then $10 for even thought the tag said it retailed for $28. I had planned on gifting it or eBaying it but hadn't done anything until today. It was perfect for the new baby.

I then changed my sewing plans completely. I went to my fleece bin and found 2 remnants of a boyish stripe that sorta coordinated. I paid approx $1 each. Both pieces were long and skinny so I had to improvise with the simple block pattern. I didn't have blanket binding and I didn't want to add the thickness of a folded hem so I just serged the edges...which I'm not entirely comfortable with. It looks a little unfinished to me but I didn't have time to do anything different. I had thought about making it 2 sided but I really didn't want to add the thickness. I wanted a super soft blanket without heaviness that could be draped over the baby and the mom's lap to keep them both warm as she nursed him.

I had a bit of fleece left so I decided to use it to make a a little hat. I had a pattern but it only made one size which was gigantic. I chopped it up a lot and tried again. The resulting hat was teeny. Surely it would be too small.

Once the blanket and the hat were done, I threw them in the washer with my new thermal knits and I washed everything with Baby All and I started dinner. I always make mac & cheese with shredded cheddar but I wanted to try it with velveeta. I found a recipe online and it made a ton of cheese 'soup' instead of a creamy sauce. I used half of the soupy mixture and cooked more pasta for the rest of it. I had planned on making double of everything but I ended up making 4 times the mac & cheese. LOL Once it was almost done, I turned the broiler on for a few to lightly brown it and I forgot it. My first pan had a couple dark brown bubbles. Whoops! To salvage it, I scraped off the top, put everything in a bakeable gladware container. I then threw some regular sharp cheddar cheese on top and baked it a few. The main course was slices of pre-cooked ham, heated up. And I made a batch of chocolate chip oatmeal cookies. I should have added a veggie or salad but I didn't have time to make another trip to the grocery.

I packed up the meal for the new family and I also packed a duplicate one for my brother and I delivered the food. As luck would have it, the new mom lives exactly 2 blocks from my brother's house. I didn't discover that until I was driving away from her block trying to figure out which way to go to get to his house and boom there his street was. That was kind of a weird thing. I also brought him the laundry that he had abandoned at our house 2-3 weeks ago. I washed it for him and dh folded everything and found an empty bin for the clean clothes. I should also mention that I had to wash everything TWICE because my brother is a smoker and his stuff still smelled awful after the first wash. I doused the clothes with odo-ban and washed again on the longest cycle with the hottest water and with the pre-wash and extra rinse added. I should have let my kids smell the clothes as a way to show them one reason why smoking is not a great idea. Who wants to walk around stinking all the time?

The mom called the house before I had even come home and she told my dh that my macaroni was the best macaroni that she had EVER had. LOL Should I tell her that I had burnt it?

Pay it Forward

2007-12-28T22:56:00.000-05:00

Something really nice happened to me today. I found out that I was selected as the grand prize winner of a drawing for 8 skeins of wonderful malabrigo yarn and a knitting book. If you know anything about knitting, malabrigo yarn is something to be coveted. Finding out that I won just gave me a warm, fuzzy feeling. There is no way that I would spend so much money on yarn and I have no idea what I'll do with it but I can tell you that 8 skeins is enough to do a big project and that makes me happy. I also adore the colorway - velvety grapes.

Part of the deal of winning is that I have to write what charitable deed I plan on doing. I guess I could send a donation somewhere. That's easy. I could even do it in Nolan's name, something that would given me a bit of happiness.But, I keep coming back to the idea that if I did a donation, my good deed would pretty much end. What could I possibly do that would be meaningful and would continue the ripples of good deeds? That's where you come in. I thought that maybe I could ask my friends here (and on my other blog) to do a good deed. It doesn't have to be big and it doesn't have to cost money. Just do something nice for someone else that you might not have done. (No dangerous good willing or picking up hitch hikers though! ) If you want to tell me about it and you want to send me your address, I will mail you one of the infamous FROG wristbands that were ordered after Nolan's death. I also plan on doing a few good deeds, too.

I'll come back later (likely tomorrow) and post a picture of the FROG wristbands and will also explain the significance of them.