Tuesday, August 31, 2010

Really? It's been a week???

Wow, where has the time gone. I can't believe it's been a week since I posted! I'd love to say I've been cranking out all sorts of craft projects but in truth I just got one started. I am working on a collage piece on a canvas. I've not done that before. It's fun.
I am also signing on for another craft fair. This one is called Mom's Market and is sponsored by the Arlington Early Childhood PTA. It will be held on Saturday, October 9. Once I get some more info I will get it out to you. Plus... If you are interested in participating shoot me a message and I will pass it on to the correct people.
If you know of any craft events going on please feel free to share them!

As for now I will appease you with pictures of cute kids...

Tuesday, August 24, 2010

Hey Crafty Tuesday... It's been a while

One of the things that is keeping me from posting is crafting. YAY! I have filled a couple special orders and am working on another. I'm also trying to build backstock for an up coming craft fair at Martin High School here in Arlington, TX in October. I am so excited to be making some extra money selling my stuff.
I recently received an order from a lady whose daughter received one of my boxes as a gift. It was so exciting to find that she liked what I did so much that she wanted to order more for some one else. I fell like Sally Field: "You like me, you really like me!"
Now all I have to do is get some pictures taken and get some stuff on Etsy and hope that works out for me. I have been doing Artfire but I really want to try to join up with the local etsy group. I am trying to be all about creating and networking right now. With the future of the book business heading digital I may need something to fall back on. My looks can only carry me for so long!

Here are a couple of special order frames I've done recently:


This is a frame a friend ordered for her adult daughter who is being given a cello and lessons for her birthday. I was really happy with this frame and I am making more along the same lines.


This frame is for a friend who has a cyclist boyfriend. I really like working with the bike parts but am running low. I have an idea for some other cycling frames. My husband is also a cyclist so there are often pieces parts floating around.

What have YOU been working on?

Thursday, August 19, 2010

Thursday 13: 13 Favorite Television Shows

First, let me apologize to all who stopped by last week and didn't get a return visit from me. It's been a crazy few days.

This is a list of 13 of my favorite television shows. They aren't in any particular order and I'm sure that I have had WAY more than 13 favorites in my lifetime.

1) Psych
2) Monk
3) Law and Order (all of them)
4) Project Runway
5) Bewitched
6) How to Look Good Naked (The BBC one with Gok Wan)
7) Andy Griffith
8) All in the Family
9) King of the Hill
10) NCIS
11) Let's Make a Deal
12) The Match Game
13) Love Boat

What are your favorites?

Check out other people's lists at Thursday 13.

Wednesday, August 18, 2010

Art Envy



As I expand my circle of artst fartsy people I find that I start to have 'Art Envy'. I look at what everyone is doing. How much they're selling. The accolades they're getting and, although I am excited for them, I get a little jealous. I have little tantrums in my head. I want to sell more stuff. I want to win awards. I want people to seek me out.
This leads me to run out and look at all of the 'run your own craft business books'. I delve in and learn how to market. How to run my own craft show. What licenses I need. I try to figure out what I am doing wrong.
I get SOOOOO wrapped up in this I stop working. I stop making things. Hmmm, could this be what I am doing wrong? How am I supposed to sell things if I don't have anything to sell? How can I win awards if I don't enter contests? How can people know to seek me out if I'm not out there to be sought out?
It's time I stop feeling sorry for myself. It's time I pull myself up by my boot straps and get out there. It's time I get out the glue and the paper and start creating. If you don't hear from me for a while I may have glued myself to something. Watch for me. I am going to set up an etsy sight soon. I am going to bombard you with pictures of stuff that I'm doing. I am going to remind you over and over that I make custom items. If I don't... please free to call me out.
Off to glue I go...

Thursday, August 12, 2010

Thursday 13: Pet Peeves

Here are thirteen of my pet peeves in no particular order...

1) People who can't admit when they are wrong.
2) Smoking in the car with your kids in it.
3) Smoking around kids in general.
4) Kids not being restrained properly in a motor vehicle. I will dial 9-1-1 instantly if I'm in the passenger seat.
5) Drinking and driving.
6) Talking on the cell phone when you are being waited on.
7) Swearing in public. (this one bugs me much more now that I have kids)
8) People who mock others when those 'others' are within ear shot. It's not nice regardless but to do it when some one may hear you and get hurt really irks me.
9) Being asked questions when I'm on the phone.
10) The fact that ice cream makes me gain weight instead of lose it.
11) The fact that diet soda makes you crave sweets. What's that all about? Oh Diet Pepsi... Why have you forsaken me?
12) People who can take things OFF of a shelf but not return them to said shelf.
13) People who leave their kids unattended in the bookstore because they assume it's safe. ( I could come up with several pet peeve lists just from working retail... Hmmm... I guess I'l file that away for later.)


Don't forget to check out other Thursday 13 posts here http://thursday-13.com/

Wednesday, August 11, 2010

Growing Up is Hard to Do

A few weeks back a friend asked me and a few others to share our stories about growing up on a blog that has been created to show kids that they are not alone.

I grew up a poor black child... Oh wait... That's not my story... Here is MY story.

I grew up in a stable Catholic family. I am the oldest of five. My parents are STILL married, to each other, after 41 years. We didn't have a lot of money but we never lacked anything.
I was a 'Drama Geek' in high school. I wore Chucks when people thought of them as clown shoes. I wore big clunky boots. I had parts of my head shaved. I was no where near cool enough to be a leading role in the 'punk/skate rat/new wave' scene where I grew up and I was a little to geeky and weird for the Student Council crowd. I had friends in all the circles but I tended to be closest to the most troubled kids.
I would wander around and find shoes and make sure no one left parties with anyone we didn't know if they'd been drinking. I'd hold hair back while my friends puked. I'd sit at parties and listen to the police scanner to make sure no one was headed our way. I had a friend who got mad at me for knowing more people at the mall than she did. I also had a friend who stopped talking to me because another friend had invited me some where and I hadn't asked if she could come along. I had friends who would run away and come to my house.
I lost friends to drugs. When I got older I had a friend following The Grateful Dead. I would get late night phone calls from her. She would be places like the hospital because half of her veins had collapsed from shooting up so much. Or she would share stories about how she had lost all of her clothes and wandered around all of the camps looking for a grilled cheese sandwich.
I lost friends to suicide. One of my closest friends in high school I had met while she was in the hospital with another friend after HIS first attempted suicide. She came to our school a few months later and we clicked. I would get notes passed to me about how she had been sitting out back with a gun but her step-dad had found her. She would tell me she wasn't taking her medication. She wanted my undivided attention. I wanted to give it.
All of this started to have it's toll on me. I worried. I enabled. Luckily I had parents who were wise and understanding. When a friend came to my house 'unexpectedly' from Chicago my parents called his parents and found out he had run away. They smoothed things over with his folks and talked to them about accepting my friend for who he was. They talked to my school about getting me counseling when a friend from another school killed himself.
I had stable friends as well. Friends who wanted to make something of themselves. Friends who let me be who I wanted to be. Friends who didn't expect me to drop everything for them if I was having a better time than they were.
I know that there are some of you out there. You aren't the troubled one but your friends are. You are the mom. The care-taker. The punching bag. You don't have to be. It's hard to learn that you can't save the world. It's also hard not too lose yourself while trying to save everyone. You know who the soul suckers in your life are. You don't have to abandon them completely. You just have to be able to step back and take a breath and do something for yourself. Listen to music. Write. Make some art. Hang out with people that you feel you can breathe around.
Keep your heart open and loving but be as open and loving with yourself as you are with others. If you have some one who is continually making you feel like crap maybe they need to go. I'm not trying to sound like a preachy adult. I am some one who has been there. I am forty years old and still trying to learn this lesson.

Monday, August 2, 2010

The Worm Hat

My kids tend to be 'creative types' so I'm not sure why I was surprised when my husband took the kids off for balloon animals and my daughter came back with this...


I know what you're thinking but get your minds out of the gutter. It's a worm hat. My husband asked her three times and each time she said 'worm hat'. I'm just not sure that the guy had to make it from a flesh colored balloon.