Sunday, February 17, 2013

we have a winner

Katie from minivan diva has won some lovely fabric fat quarters!

Let us know what you end up doing with them:)  {personally, i love to just serge or fold the edges and viola! cloth napkins}

happy sunday everyone!  hope it is restful!

Sunday, February 10, 2013

new fabrics and a giveaway

new fabrics now available in my fabric shop:




Psychedelia Gold




King's Road Lemon





Brit Boutique Radiant





Girl About Town Rose





Go-Go London Powdery

all of these are from a brand new collection by Pat Bravo for Art Gallery Fabrics, Carnaby Street.  

Carnaby Street is just awesome because it id delightfully 1960's London.  says Pat about the line "Flower power! Femininity! Fashion! Peace and Love! These were the mottos of the "Swinging London" movement in the 1960’s. Groovy blooms, strong geometrics and liberty-esque florals are the signature of this fun and colorful line."

very fun for spring!  i can't wait to sew up some loveliness in these for my girly, myself, and perhaps you?  stay tuned for some new products:)

anyone want some free fat quarters to play around with?  leave a comment on what your favorite fabric is and what you would like to see made with it.  i will randomly pick a winner from the comments and ship off some '60's London fabric love to you for free!!

Thursday, November 1, 2012

hurricane Sandy stole my show


(christy, me, kelly)

can i even tell you how much work it is for us to get ready for a 2-3 day show??

and then...hurricane.

people "weather panic" here on maryland's eastern shore.  seriously.

2 inches of snow calls for EVERYTHING being closed, snow plows, salt on the road, etc.

well, the locals definitely did not disappoint this weekend.  only a few die-hard shoppers decided to brave the perfect fall weather on saturday and shop.

saturday night, more than half of the vendors packed it up and headed for home (out of towners who were scared that the bridges off of the peninsula would be closed due to sandy)



(wallets that are amazingly getting even better!  they now hold so much more:)


we show up on sunday to a craft show ghost town, and the poor non profit organization who puts this shopping event on (mostly grandmotherly ladies) have been stressed to the max.  i went over to offer them some encouragement...

and they tell me that in addition to the show basically falling apart and them loosing their fundraising opportunity they had to evict a naked man from the bathrooms this morning! 

lovely.  so that's why the sheriff was out there...

anyway, the show closed early on sunday when the rain started...killed our sales.  boo.

i am like a super busy homeschooling mother of 3!!!  this is really the ONLY big show i do a year.  yuck.



(cute wristlets that did not have a chance to sell)

so...obviously we are jumping into an even bigger show this coming weekend to try to recoup our time/investment!

duh.

yeah.  i really don't know what i am thinking here...i just signed up 2 days before set up (which is tomorrow, pray for me!)

but then again, if not for the hurricane, we would never DREAM of trying this show we slipped into last minute.  who knows?  perhaps it will be an even bigger success for us than the one we normally do!


(onesie dresses that i actually did sell most of...wish i had these when my girly was a babe)

how was your weekend?

Wednesday, October 17, 2012

surgery, vacations, and craft shows

hi everyone!

first of all, thank you.  for praying for our family and my son and his surgery and recovery.

everything went great for him...fantastic outcome with his surgery, he gets a whole year in between this time (yay!)  we are all so excited to have an entire year uninterrupted by surgery!

we have decided to kick it off with a vacation:)

our family will be heading south on saturday to spend a while in a gargantuan beach house in the outer banks, north carolina.  perfect.  i can sit on the deck and watch my guys surf fish:)  we will get to spend some time with my husbands parents and perhaps his sisters too.

this is super significant for us because we haven't taken a vacation or even any time off as a family except for surgery in over 6 years!!

in other news...

i am also in the midst of preparing for my largest craft show event that i do all year.

and, oh yeah--it starts the day after we get home from north carolina!

i am up to my eyeballs in awesome ideas for items i want to make and don't have time to.  so i'll do what i can and leave the rest!

i am also trying my hardest to grade, record, and get our next set of homeschooling lesson plans done before i leave...




so even though i may look like i could be reading something relaxing and enjoyable here, i am really just being a teacher...

and as much as it pains me to say, i promise to take pictures of the vacation and the show to share with you lovely folks.  i seriously just need to get over my phobia of the camera already!


Friday, August 31, 2012

in a weird place

yesterday our family packed it up and headed back to Johns Hopkins for my little man's next pre-op appointment.

more x-rays, {and i have a secret fear that he may literally glow by the time he is done with x-rays}
more blood work
more testing

i don't know how he feels about facing all of this....again.
is it common place to him?  is he afraid?

i'm not sure.

i'm also not sure how i feel about all of this.  it's strange.  it's weird to go to an appointment with a surgeon and talk about putting your child under for hours, opening him up and adding metal bars, tweaking and adjusting as if he were a car...at some point i felt like i was discussing an "upgrade" of some sort that could be special ordered.  only...i'm not.  this is my youngest son, and his body, and his life.  and the composure!  i have found some very odd detached space in myself where i live in the facade of calm expressions and politely answer questions and give little nods outwardly.  where i can endure the talk of what is to come without getting light-headed or panicky.  like i need to box up my boy's mommy and put her away for a few hours behind closed doors so that she can't melt down.  whew!  really, really strange.

and the difference for my son is plain.  the first surgery he had no idea what lay ahead for him.  we were able to talk about it with him often to try to "prepare" him.  this time he knows.  we aren't discussing it much.  i'm afraid that i'd just be reminding him of what is waiting for him.  it may feel like that heavy sense of dread when you know a punishment is coming your way (i.e.: wait til your father gets home...) but right now he is just in the dreadful waiting part.  things are becoming more real as we prepare now...our family is officially on "quarantine" as we try out best to keep all family members in perfect health leading up to his surgery.  mommy is forgetful and her brain isn't holding water.  mommy is forgetful and her brain isn't holding water. we are discussing what to bring, where we will stay the night before, how to best keep him occupied right up to the minute!

* aside--folks, we are not video game people at all.  therefore, our children (against their wishes) are not video game kids.  BUT.  we bought our boy a 3DS just for the waiting.  there is nothing like sitting with your child for hours in the pre-op area in a thin blue hospital gown with teddy bears on it and thick, non-slip socks and watching the anxiety and emotions play across him.  THIS is why we bought that handheld video game.  and it's the best money we ever spent:)

will you pray with me?

against complications and infection?
for doctor skill and wisdom? (my boy has a rare condition and this is sort of experimental treatment)
for peace? (for us parents, for him, for my other 2 children we will be leaving at home)
for a good outcome?


as for me, i am praying that i would be a faithful steward of what God has entrusted to me.  He has seen fit to  trust me with this child, with this experience, with some heart-wrenching, with trials of many kinds.  Oh, that i may be counted faithful in all of these things and that our little lives and experiences would bring Jesus glory and that His goodness would shine through our lives.

Thursday, August 23, 2012

happy fabric day !

this is exactly what my dear sweet friend (who lives across the street) wished me today!

today was the day i was greatly anticipating a huge (for me!) fabric delivery from the big brown truck.  120 yards of beautiful prints!

in the past, i have anxiously looked out the window every 10 minutes all. day. long. waiting for him to pull up in front of my house and deliver fresh new bolts of uncut pristine fabric just waiting to be rolled around in  neatly stacked in my studio;)  only several times the truck didn't come by until after dinner, or worse still--one time the lovely fabric made it all the way to my hometown and the ups personnel scanned the wrong barcode and sent it back to south carolina (where it came from) instead of putting it on the truck that would have stopped at my house.  very disappointing.  indeed.

today i was determined NOT to be so anxious and act like my children on christmas eve.  after all, anything could happen and it may not even arrive today.

the kids and i had a lovely day!  after lunch, i settled down on the sofa with my 3 yr. old littlie to read a few books and with quite a herculean effort managed to stay awake til the last sentence!  {nothing can make me sleepier than reading to my kids after lunch...it calls for either an espresso or a nap, pronto!} my snuggly little girl and i decided to just cuddle and close our eyes for a second...

and then my 10 yr. old screams mommy! your fabric is here! the ups man is bringing up a huge box!

naturally i was immediately refreshed and hopped up so quickly that i almost deposited my little girl right on the floor!

i am impressed, mr. brown truck delivery guy!  thank you for being so early on a fabric day:)

i called my friend to come take a look at the yards of new textile lovliness, and she commented on each one and wished me a happy fabric day! although, she did wonder if i had projects in mind for some of these prints...??

nope.  i buy what i like and think about what to make with it after it arrives and lastly consider if it is anyone else's taste and would even sell in my fabric shop:)  a little backwards, i know, but there it is.

and now....the fabrics....

sinister swarm in flour {these are moths!}

sundials in happy


cell structure in americana


migratory lace in seaweed


field study coordinate in saffron {so cool with the arrows}


mind's eye in tambourine


fine feathered in whisper {really, how lovely is this?}


specimen in struck {huge and awesome print!}


now i just have to discipline myself to finish all of the work on my plate (4 custom orders this week) before i cut into this!  that kind of stinks, but it does make for excellent work motivation:)

Monday, August 13, 2012

Thoughts

things on my mind...

i need to finish choosing homeschool curriculum for the boys as they move into 5th and 3rd

i can't wait to order new fabric for my shop!

i really want to babysit for my sister {who has a 5 yr. old wild boy and 10 wk old twin girls}, i'm certain she needs a date

i have an ottoman i re-inherited from my mother and i really want to sew a new cover for it.

i need to pray and be prayed for...our son is undergoing more invasive surgery in less than a month

i want to gather up good stuff to deliver to the children at johns hopkins

my summer bible study i've been hosting only has 2 more sessions left and i want to plan the next one

my dear friends husband has suffered a major heart attack and is waiting to hear if he could be a candidate for a transplant.

i was too unmotivated today {lazy} and now tomorrow's plate is full, full, full

perhaps the reason my one of my favorite hymns is "I Need Thee Every Hour" is because it is so true.