Sleep Tight

My "baby" Charlotte is often a big help to me. She loves me every day, smiles when I need it, snuggles when I'm sick or cold, and helps me eat leftovers.

Now she's found a way to help me with my wool too.  That's a good girl! :-)

As said by Ernest Hemingway, "I love to sleep. My life has the tendency to fall apart when I'm awake, you know."

Losing My Head

I went to a craft show this morning in a neighboring town.

To participate.

Got there early to set up.

It was cold.

I was early.

It's tomorrow.  :-)

Giving Thanks

I have so much to give thanks for.

Unfortunately, I forget about many of those things on a daily basis.

May I be guided to remember my many blessings and be thankful for them each and every day.

Great illustration borrowed from businesspundit.com.

Six Days

Six days.

Hard to believe.

I've gone six days without caffeine.

I've over-indulged in Diet Pepsi for way too many years.

Since my bout with the flu, I haven't had a Diet Pepsi.

I'm doing surprisingly ok (after working through headaches this past weekend). But this is kind of how the inside of my mind feels...

Nasty Thing Update

For those of you who have been sitting on pins and needles...

(Of course, I know no one actually was!)

One mouse down.

I know.

More to go.

Celebrating Creativity Show

I'm honored to be a part of the Celebrating Creativity Sale at The SPACE this weekend.

Unfortunately, I've been down and out with a nasty flu bug since Wednesday night and have not been able to attend the show at all. Friday night was the opening with special music playing in the early evening. I'm so disappointed  that I wasn't able to be there - how fun and festive it must have been!

Fortunately, one of my friends (thanks Jody K!) stopped in The SPACE on Friday and took some fun snapshots for me. So I'd like to share some with you as well.

IF they ask me to participate again next year, I'm going to stay clear of all flu bugs for weeks before!!

Wool Owl Ornaments

I made some new wool owl ornaments this week.

I had to take them outside for a quick photo shoot in the wee-little-chilly-hours of the morning. I hung them up on my frigid clothesline - which begged to get put away weeks ago (it's retractable) but I refused to give in to the thought that winter was really, for darn sure, coming. The owls shivered. Aren't they supposed to be able to handle the cold better than that?

Things You Don't Want To See

Mice. I really hate them. I see no need why God created them. They just scare us and bug the heck out of us.

I've been seeing "signs" of mice the last couple weeks in my house. You know what I'm talking about. "Signs."

I thought the most reasonable thing to do would just put a nice tempting peanut-butter-dolloped trap on my kitchen counter. It's been there for about two weeks. Peanut butter intact. No mice. "Signs" still appearing.

Last night I decided to take a slightly different approach and place the baited trap carefully in one of my drawers - fully expecting that I would take the lead in this darn game.

Here's what I found this morning. I think he landed on Boardwalk and I've been sent to jail without passing Go.

Celebrate Creativity 2010

I am very proud and excited to be a part of an annual "Celebrate Creativity" art show at The SPACE in New Richmond, Wisconsin. It will be held this coming weekend.

I've never participated in a show like this, so I really wasn't sure what or how much I should try to be prepared with. With all the other commitments I have had this fall, I basically ended up with "what I could" - meaning I worked to get things ready for the show but, as usual, was wishing I had time to prepare more items.

When delivering all my goodies last Friday, I saw several posters/signs they had prepared and placed in a variety of areas that made me feel like I had really missed the boat and should have had a lot more product prepared than I had. (Insert small panic attack here.)

However, I was very relieved when I shared my concerns with the sweet gal at The Space and she assured me that I had prepared just the right amount of things.

So...ready or not, here we go! Wish me luck!

Etsy Sets New Records

The following is a pretty exciting announcement from Etsy regarding it's sales for the month of October.

As the seasons change, Etsy sets new records and continues to foster the handmade way of life! The stats:

• $29.9 million of goods were sold by our community in October, 12.4% higher than September's $26.6 million.
• That represents 1,677,986 items sold for the month, 14.5% higher than September's 1,466,039.
• 2,452,359 new items were listed in the month, 11.6% higher than September's 2,196,970.
• 322,466 new members joined the Etsy community in the month, up 41,928, or 14% from September.
• 842,291,766 page views were recorded on the site in October.

The $29.9 million of goods sold by the community represents a 55% increase from 2009's total. At the same time, items sold were up 41%. All the October stats represent new Etsy records!

I have to say that I am pretty darn proud to be a part of that community! Cheers to Etsy!

Re-Recycled Wool

Is it considered re-recycling if I have already used recycled felted wool sweaters to create new items and then donate them to someone else as a new item?

Ok, I know that doesn't really make sense - but I just thought that re-recycling sounded like a fun thing. So I guess to really re-recycle, someone would have to take one of my recycled scarves apart and make it into something totally new - like maybe a wool billfold (do people call them billfolds anymore, or are they wallets?).

Well, anyway...just wanted to share a pillow and scarf that I am able to donate to one of our patient-aid employee-donation campaigns where I work. They will go up for online bidding next week. I hope they are able to make a little money for the campaign.  (I don't like the coloring of these photos either [like some others that I posted recently]. Daylight savings time has made a mess out of my prime-daytime-natural-light-outdoor-photo-time!)

Making Recycled Pin Cushions

Well, as promised, here are some Big Honkin' Pin Cushions...

These are a few of the pin cushions I made with thrift store/tag sale wooden salad bowls. Incredibly, t hey were only a dime a piece and look like they were never even used!

I was hoping to post these on my Etsy site, but I've decided that I will bring them to the sale that I will be doing this weekend at The SPACE in New Richmond, Wisconsin.

Whattcha think? Do you have enough pins to fill them? Uhhh....without a doubt, I do.

Truly Good Consignment Wool Sales

WOOL UPDATE:

I received my first check from the shop in Minnesota that I supplied with some of my wool items earlier this fall. When you venture out into a new area/location with items, you never are quite sure how they will be received. So I was happy to see that I sold five of my items already and it's not even prime holiday shopping time yet! And, the shop owner has asked me to drop off more items anytime!  (ALWAYS great to hear!) :-)

Generally, when sales are made, it can really help you determine what type of items are most popular and where to focus more energy and time for future goods. However, this time, I sold a scarf, a pillow, a set of coasters, and two different types of pin cushions. Basically, one of each of the items that I supplied her with. The good news is that they were all well received!  The tough news is that there's not one or two things to focus on for replenishing items. Well heck, I guess all-in-all it's just darn good news!

Peace Please

I need just a little extra peace today. I'm feeling over-whelmed, under-loved, over-worked, under-needed, over-indulged, and under-organized.

Ahhhh..... I think I'll be alright now.

Big Honkin' Plans

I got these wooden salad bowls at couple recent thrift store visits.

As with most things I get my hands on, the salad bowls have a whole new life ahead of them.

I've created an itinerary for the bowls. It goes something like this:

• See bowls.
• Buy bowls.
• Take bowls home.
• Prime and spray paint bowls. (What? Of course!)
• Stack bowls and place on back porch cupboard for at least two weeks. (No sense rushing things.)
• Use some fun recycled wool sweaters and turn them into some big honkin' pin cushions. (Big Honkin' Pin Cushion photos to be posted soon.)
• Post for-sale on Etsy page for some big honkin' bucks.

Pillow Talk

I was working on some pillows last night and decided to go circle crazy.

The first pillow was simply different circle pieces (ok, there were also come squares that I threw in there to shake it up a bit) machine sewn in a decorative-oh-my-gosh-have-you-gone-sewing-nuts-kind-of-way.

The second pillow was in the Alabama Chanin fashion (similar to what I did previously with the recycled t-shirt fabric) but I've never tried it with wool. It was kind of fun and I'm thinking that maybe I'll try one with different sized circles next!

(Sorry - I had bad lighting for these photos, so the color is muted and dark - but I decided to just use them anyway!)

Birds, Birds, and More Birds

I made about a dozen birds this weekend. I really like making these little buggers, although they are a bit time consuming.

When it was photo-op-time yesterday afternoon, the sun was just right to make some of these shots extra fun with the light and shadows.