For the last maybe 3 years, I have only purchased my purses at thrift stores. Kinda a nose-thumbing at fashion, and our spendy society. Plus, I love the thrill of the thrifty hunt!
Unfortunately, each purse seems to have gotten bigger and bigger, until I felt like I was walking sideways and always have neck pain. So I decided to get small! I've been looking for a small purse for the last few weeks (I thrift probably on average of 1.5 times a week), and one issue has been what to do about the wallet? I've been 'in progress' on a cool duct tape wallet, but I don't want to wait on that because I'm paused at a couple design dilemmas and who knows when I'll get those worked out. So I decided that a little purse with wallet area built right in would work great. For now. We have to be flexible about these things.
Last Saturday, the ArtistExtreeme (my younger son) and I had a little outing while most of the rest of the house was still asleep. Coffee shop, thrift stores, foreign food store (with Kinder Eggs!), it was a great morning. And I found this adorable little purse. Mostly adorable. I love denim, so that's a bonus. And it does have the wallet area, but not really a lot of other room. It had an area that must have been for make-up that I had to overhaul, and I wanted to take off any/all brand name.
The felted flower patch was one priority before I would carry it, as there was a metal logo stuck on right there that was not coming off without ruining the pocket that it's on. More hacks &/or decorations will follow, as now I'm considering the tiny purse a tiny portable canvas and a great way to continue working on my felt embroidering.
But I got the flower patch done yesterday, just in time to load it up last night. I'm off this morning for the last minute purchases that always accompany a vacation, and we leave this afternoon!
Nothing like baptism by fire! We'll see how the purse fares on the vacation. Of course, I will still be carrying a tote bag also most of the weekend, because I need my sketch pad for the Artist's Jam, and my coffee cup, and my camera, and a tin with more felt for the next project, and whatever I pick up at the convention. Oh, and dice! I'm sure I'll be carrying lots of dice!
9/24/07
Game Week!
You know when you're waiting for something, like a birthday or holiday, and it seems like it's forever until it gets here, and then you blink, and it's here? That's how I'm feeling right now. Next weekend is NukeCon, the game convention that we're all going to. I'm so excited to go, and now in planning mode, making sure I do everything this week in preperation. I'm also a little disappointed because I really wanted to have my Etsy shop up and ready before the convention, in case I had any opportunities to pass out business cards. There are just a few more things I have to figure out before I can get the shop going. I have enough things made to start it, but all-of-a-sudden it's the week before, and I need to pack, and make a couple things specifically for the convention, and I will not have time to take photos and officially set up the shop. And I've decided I'm not going to beat myself up about it. What good would that do? I will still make business cards, just with the blog addresses, and when (NOT if) I get the Etsy shop going, I'll post on both, so that will cover it.
Because part of what I already have made is holiday related, I don't want to let this go too long, so my new goal, my updated goal, is to work through all my questions and ponderings on how I want to do my Etsy shop, and get it up and running sometime in October.
Because part of what I already have made is holiday related, I don't want to let this go too long, so my new goal, my updated goal, is to work through all my questions and ponderings on how I want to do my Etsy shop, and get it up and running sometime in October.
9/22/07
Silhouette
Several years ago, I took a parents class at my church. We got together on Saturday mornings, in the cool fall like now. I don't actually remember a lot of the specifics of the class itself, I think we talked about creating rituals with our kids, for one, and we did a few creative projects in class that we would be able to do with our kids.
One of the things that we learned about ourselves in this class, was that we really enjoyed getting together as a group. We were maybe 10 women, and one man, with kids all right around the same age, who all really felt inspired by and connected to each other. When the weekly class ended, we didn't want it to stop. We came up with a plan to continue meeting, on a monthly basis, to explore more creative ideas, and share ideas with each other, we'd each take turns leading.
That part, the getting together after the official class was done, that's the part that stands out in my mind the most. We made plaster casts of our faces, learned some yoga, wove, and danced. We enjoyed our time together. The group shrank every week, unfortunately, the spirit was willing, but the families were busy.
One week, when I think we had only three of us show up, we made silhouettes of ourselves. We commented that it was perfect that there were three of us, one to hold the light, one to trace the shadow, one to sit and be traced. I think the plan all along was to make a collage out of our silhouette, but that morning all we had time to do was the tracing, and my posterboard with pencil sketch outline stood in the back of my closet for a while. I pulled it out a few months later to color in the outline, another year later painted the background. All the time collecting possible pictures. A couple years ago, I collaged on the pictures that you see in this photo, complete with 'art car' painted lavendar and covered in seashells, these pictures being the dreams or goals or ideas that were in my head at that time. I hung it up then, and I have added a few things since then, sometimes just jotting a note as I walk by. So many things have changed since I hung it up, and many more have changed since the origional day of group silhouetting, but I am still me, and the 'things inside my head' haven't changed too much in all that time.
9/18/07
Ten on Tuesday
10 Things You Do When You Have Nothing Else to
9/16/07
Halloween Crafts
Speaking of Halloween ideas, we picked up the special Halloween edition of Make magazine, it's chock-full of awesome ideas. And they have more Halloween coolness on their site, too. Including some very interesting contests, costume, food, decorations, and even a contest for just linking to them.
I thought I'd find some Halloween photos to share, it's all about the creativity. I guess most of my photos from when the guys were little aren't digital, I'll have to find and scan some of those.
Here are our pumpkins from a few years ago. Mine is the eyeball, not my best work (I did a Pikachu pumpkin one year that was awesome). The ExtreemArtist did the center one, complete with not only toothpicks, but a knife and corkscrew imbedded in the 'head'.
These photos are a few years old, when they weren't 'too old' for going out trick-or-treating, but old enough to do their make-up mostly by themselves. That's the fun part, anyway.
I thought I'd find some Halloween photos to share, it's all about the creativity. I guess most of my photos from when the guys were little aren't digital, I'll have to find and scan some of those.
Here are our pumpkins from a few years ago. Mine is the eyeball, not my best work (I did a Pikachu pumpkin one year that was awesome). The ExtreemArtist did the center one, complete with not only toothpicks, but a knife and corkscrew imbedded in the 'head'.
These photos are a few years old, when they weren't 'too old' for going out trick-or-treating, but old enough to do their make-up mostly by themselves. That's the fun part, anyway.
9/13/07
Wists
No, that's not baby talk. It's a new site for making a wishlist, or weblist, thus the name. I found it a few weeks ago, and I thought this would be handy, being able to list things from any website, not just things you would like from one specific site. It's great for birthday wishlists, and as I played around adding things, I discovered that some people aren't just adding things they would like to purchase, but tutorials of things they would like to make! Like a pdf of a quilt pattern, sock instructions, or halloween ideas.
I personally have added a tutorial for an awesome Knifty Knitted bag from Canadian Crafter to my Wist, I've been keeping it bookmarked for that day when I actually try it. And I've found a few tutorials that I had to book mark after browsing other people's Wists, too.
Check it out!
I personally have added a tutorial for an awesome Knifty Knitted bag from Canadian Crafter to my Wist, I've been keeping it bookmarked for that day when I actually try it. And I've found a few tutorials that I had to book mark after browsing other people's Wists, too.
Check it out!
9/11/07
Ten On Tuesday
10 Cities You Could Live In
9/9/07
Stats-N-Comments
Searches that brought you here
In addition to "seAshell crafts" which I usually get hits from due to my name (hmm, maybe I should do more shell crafts...), you also got here by searching: "Googly Eye Crafts", "sewing instructions for cell phone pouches", and "felt barrettes". Check out these felt barette kits I found through Cafe Mom on the Etsy group.
When I checked my stats on Friday, to get to work on this post, I found bunches of hits coming from a sewing forum. Wow! I must have been linked on one of their threads! I signed up, but am awaiting approval, so I don't know what was said about me, I hope it was good. If you're visiting from the sewing forum, Welcome!!
Comments that you left here
September Thoughts
artgirlATL: Good to have someone else working on starting an Etsy shop, let me know how your pursuit goes! And on the layout, Thanks, I love it too, but no, I did not create it. I know where my strengths lie, and when to ask for help, and web design is not something that I have mastered. My lovely layout is thanks to the wonderful Zoe at Chic & Sassy Designs! (and speaking of the Chic & Sassy one)
Zoe: You might not think you're 'crafty' but you are definately creative! Go for it with painting your post! Maybe ask the paint salesman what kind of paint to use.
First Painting
Annonymous/Bryan: I've gotten more compliments on your first painting than on some of the things I've made! Honestly, you did a great job, honey! (And maybe I need to paint more?)
Zoe & SugarDaddy: Thank you on behalf of my guy for the nice compliments. I'm trying to get it hung up, or get him to hang it, but it's still sitting on the desk!
Bracelet Kit
Moral Compass: Thanks! And no, I didn't steal flowers for her birthday (this year, anyway!)
Wire We Creative?
Sir Jorge: Thank you, I love all the colors that wires come in! They are so inspiring. Stay tuned for more wire projects...
In addition to "seAshell crafts" which I usually get hits from due to my name (hmm, maybe I should do more shell crafts...), you also got here by searching: "Googly Eye Crafts", "sewing instructions for cell phone pouches", and "felt barrettes". Check out these felt barette kits I found through Cafe Mom on the Etsy group.
When I checked my stats on Friday, to get to work on this post, I found bunches of hits coming from a sewing forum. Wow! I must have been linked on one of their threads! I signed up, but am awaiting approval, so I don't know what was said about me, I hope it was good. If you're visiting from the sewing forum, Welcome!!
Comments that you left here
September Thoughts
artgirlATL: Good to have someone else working on starting an Etsy shop, let me know how your pursuit goes! And on the layout, Thanks, I love it too, but no, I did not create it. I know where my strengths lie, and when to ask for help, and web design is not something that I have mastered. My lovely layout is thanks to the wonderful Zoe at Chic & Sassy Designs! (and speaking of the Chic & Sassy one)
Zoe: You might not think you're 'crafty' but you are definately creative! Go for it with painting your post! Maybe ask the paint salesman what kind of paint to use.
First Painting
Annonymous/Bryan: I've gotten more compliments on your first painting than on some of the things I've made! Honestly, you did a great job, honey! (And maybe I need to paint more?)
Zoe & SugarDaddy: Thank you on behalf of my guy for the nice compliments. I'm trying to get it hung up, or get him to hang it, but it's still sitting on the desk!
Bracelet Kit
Moral Compass: Thanks! And no, I didn't steal flowers for her birthday (this year, anyway!)
Wire We Creative?
Sir Jorge: Thank you, I love all the colors that wires come in! They are so inspiring. Stay tuned for more wire projects...
Stats-N-Comments: The Intro
Feedback. We all love it!
We appreciate it, but we don't all handle it the same way. E-mail responces to each commentor? Comment on their comment? I have decided to borrow a great idea that I see on one of my daily-read blogs, My So-Called Strife. He does a Friday Feedback post, to answer comments. I love this idea, and have been considering doing this for a while now, despite the fact that I have way fewer comments than he does.
Another bloggish thing that I have always found interesting is how people get here. It's interesting to check your stats and find a strange search or to discover you've been linked somewhere. On my old blog I kept getting search hits from people misspelling 'Dahrma' (as in the tv show 'Dharma and Greg'), because I misspelt it that same way.
So I have decided to add a little feature here to share some of my interesting searches, and answer some comments.
And off we go...
We appreciate it, but we don't all handle it the same way. E-mail responces to each commentor? Comment on their comment? I have decided to borrow a great idea that I see on one of my daily-read blogs, My So-Called Strife. He does a Friday Feedback post, to answer comments. I love this idea, and have been considering doing this for a while now, despite the fact that I have way fewer comments than he does.
Another bloggish thing that I have always found interesting is how people get here. It's interesting to check your stats and find a strange search or to discover you've been linked somewhere. On my old blog I kept getting search hits from people misspelling 'Dahrma' (as in the tv show 'Dharma and Greg'), because I misspelt it that same way.
So I have decided to add a little feature here to share some of my interesting searches, and answer some comments.
And off we go...
9/6/07
Welcome Collage
The first of a set of functional collages. Created at work, for work. I've been interested in exploring collage recently, and actually have been working on this piece, and the rest that go with it for several weeks, on the breaks at work that I just can't stomach working on the 'thing for etsy' anymore. I love picking through magazines with the sole purpose of cutting them up! My guy gets EW (among other mags, but this one is easily disposable), and he gets me House Beautiful, so most of the images I've come up with so far. I love finding color, texture, and patterns. And cutting out the letters makes me feel like I'm sending a ransom note!
The background image, if you can't quite tell is a couch that was in two pieces because it was at the binding. I liked the idea of the couch was welcoming, but didn't quite match up, to show an off-beat kind of welcome.
The background image, if you can't quite tell is a couch that was in two pieces because it was at the binding. I liked the idea of the couch was welcoming, but didn't quite match up, to show an off-beat kind of welcome.
9/3/07
September Thoughts
So I've been thinking about a 'something' a day creative experiment. I've heard of folks doing a sketch a day or a self-portrait a day (drawing or photograph), or a watercolor a day for a week or a month. I'd need to coordinate it with my Thing of the day post also, but I could do a week's worth, and then post them the following week (I've really wanted to get ahead on my Things anyway).
So I glanced at the calendar, and noticed that September has four nicely rounded work weeks, I could do one topic for the whole month, or each of those nice little weeks. But! WAIT A SECOND!! This is SEPTEMBER! And my goal was to have my Etsy shop open by the last weekend of September. That means I have to get busy!
Here's where I'm at right now:
I wanted to have three different catagories of things to start with, each in various colors. I had decided that one of those three could be my holiday earrings, it is getting close to that time, and they do sell in person, so they would probably sell on Etsy. Plus I have several pairs finished, so that will reduce the stress of what I have to finish. Number two is what I've been making a bunch of, until I get sick of making them, and I am sooo almost at that sick of point! These are cute, I think people will laugh and hopefully like them, as long as I can come up with a reasonable price. The third item is just an idea and a few supplies at this point. I'm not even sure exactly how to put them together yet. And this third thing is why my goal is the end of September, because we are going to a gaming convention that weekend, and I want to have buisness cards to hand out, as I intend to be wearing/using this third thing as promotion and testing.
With the realization of only having a few weeks to meet my goal, I am getting nervous, am losing a little confidence, and am full of questions. Do I need to set up a seperate bank account to use on Etsy? How do I figure out what to price things at? And OMG, I need to figure out shipping, assuming anything actually sells.
So this month I will be on an information hunt, while I'm finishing the first things to go into the store. I've found some good info already, Cafe Mom (I'm seeshellsmrf there, come say 'hi') has an Etsy forum, which pointed me to this EtsyWiki, and a good article on pricing stuff. And looking for more. And maybe October can be a sketch a day month.
So I glanced at the calendar, and noticed that September has four nicely rounded work weeks, I could do one topic for the whole month, or each of those nice little weeks. But! WAIT A SECOND!! This is SEPTEMBER! And my goal was to have my Etsy shop open by the last weekend of September. That means I have to get busy!
Here's where I'm at right now:
I wanted to have three different catagories of things to start with, each in various colors. I had decided that one of those three could be my holiday earrings, it is getting close to that time, and they do sell in person, so they would probably sell on Etsy. Plus I have several pairs finished, so that will reduce the stress of what I have to finish. Number two is what I've been making a bunch of, until I get sick of making them, and I am sooo almost at that sick of point! These are cute, I think people will laugh and hopefully like them, as long as I can come up with a reasonable price. The third item is just an idea and a few supplies at this point. I'm not even sure exactly how to put them together yet. And this third thing is why my goal is the end of September, because we are going to a gaming convention that weekend, and I want to have buisness cards to hand out, as I intend to be wearing/using this third thing as promotion and testing.
With the realization of only having a few weeks to meet my goal, I am getting nervous, am losing a little confidence, and am full of questions. Do I need to set up a seperate bank account to use on Etsy? How do I figure out what to price things at? And OMG, I need to figure out shipping, assuming anything actually sells.
So this month I will be on an information hunt, while I'm finishing the first things to go into the store. I've found some good info already, Cafe Mom (I'm seeshellsmrf there, come say 'hi') has an Etsy forum, which pointed me to this EtsyWiki, and a good article on pricing stuff. And looking for more. And maybe October can be a sketch a day month.
9/2/07
Links
Here are the two newest crafty blogs to be added to my list of Must Reads:
MelleBug and Me and For The Love of Crafts. Go check them out.
By the way, do you use Bloglines? One of the things that I really love about Bloglines as an RSS reader, is that you can bookmark specific posts, which I do so much with my list of artsy/craftsy blogs. Right now, I have almost 200 individual posts bookmarked!
MelleBug and Me and For The Love of Crafts. Go check them out.
By the way, do you use Bloglines? One of the things that I really love about Bloglines as an RSS reader, is that you can bookmark specific posts, which I do so much with my list of artsy/craftsy blogs. Right now, I have almost 200 individual posts bookmarked!
9/1/07
Meatloaf Cake
Thursday was my guy's birthday. When it comes to birthdays, I enjoy planning and surprising people, so I had been thinking about this cake for quite a while. I used my 'famous' meatloaf recipe, and the frosting is mashed potatoes. I've seen some much fancier ones, with carrot curls or grape tomatoes, but I wanted it to appear to be a real cake and watch the surprise when he figured it out. When he saw the cake he was puzzled, since I said I was bringing 'supper' (and he can't eat regular cake for supper, since he's diabetic). And then he figured it out! He was very excited, which was very evident when he brought the cake out to share with his coworkers.
I was under a little time crunch, I needed to get it to him either at 4:30 or 5:30, and the kids got home at 4-something, and I had two phone calls at the same time, and felt just a little stress. I really wanted to get it to him at 4:30, so I was letting the stress rise. But then I told myself to just relax, 5:30 was fine, I should slow down and do a good job and enjoy myself! And it worked. I really enjoyed finishing it, and without the stress build up, I did get it done in time to take it early.
On my way home, stress completely gone now, car ride went well (Thanks again Z!), and everyone was excited to see the cake, and I'm thinking "only 365 days 'till his next birthday, what am I going to do to top that?" But I forgot about leap year. So I checked the date, sure enough, next year his birthday will be on Saturday! In fact, if he keeps the same schedule, he won't have to work on his birthday again unitl 2011!! I think I can come up a great work supper by then.
I was under a little time crunch, I needed to get it to him either at 4:30 or 5:30, and the kids got home at 4-something, and I had two phone calls at the same time, and felt just a little stress. I really wanted to get it to him at 4:30, so I was letting the stress rise. But then I told myself to just relax, 5:30 was fine, I should slow down and do a good job and enjoy myself! And it worked. I really enjoyed finishing it, and without the stress build up, I did get it done in time to take it early.
On my way home, stress completely gone now, car ride went well (Thanks again Z!), and everyone was excited to see the cake, and I'm thinking "only 365 days 'till his next birthday, what am I going to do to top that?" But I forgot about leap year. So I checked the date, sure enough, next year his birthday will be on Saturday! In fact, if he keeps the same schedule, he won't have to work on his birthday again unitl 2011!! I think I can come up a great work supper by then.
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