diggers

February 1st, 2008

I am very excited to announce that my shop is up and running!  The little diggers have been in bits and pieces all week, but I finally sat down with all the parts today.  And as my daughter built tower after tower after tower with her blocks, I sewed button joint after button joint right next to her.  Setting up an etsy shop was a little intimidating at first, not because of the site itself–it’s fantastic–but because I had to sit down and describe myself and what I make.  And make people want to buy it.  I have no idea how to do this, so I went with boring ol’ descriptions of the first three then when I got to the pink digger I laid it on thick.  I was only going to make three to start with anyway, but then I saw this little bit of hot! pink! vintage! linen in my scrap bag I cut into it without thinking twice.  Because how fantastic would it be if a cute indie rock boy out there gave his cute indie rock girlfriend my pink digger for valentine’s day.   I guess that’s an odd daydream to have, but I think that’s what mothers of small children do: daydream.  Most of what we say could be recorded and just played back over and over again all day, “Stop. stop. sit down. sit down. don’t play with your food. don’t rub your toast on your head. don’t put playdough in your brother’s ears.” I always wondered why I had to say, “MOM!” so many times before she heard me.  Now I don’t hear my daughter until the third or fourth mom.  So (to get out of this tangent) I’ve been day dreaming about this little shop all week and now here it is!  yay.

new home

January 29th, 2008

If you are here you already know, but I’ll tell you anyway, I have a new website!  My husband set it up for me as an early birthday present (thank you dear).  It looks just the same, I know, but there will be changes in the future.  Nothing huge, as my style sheet knowledge is not huge, but at least I can make it more my own.  It’s funny how a blog like this can start to feel like another home–granted one that is always clean and quiet and where things magically get done.  The picture above is of my real home.  I found this little tabletop kitchen at a thrift store near my mom’s house.  It was very lovingly designed and handmade by someone and I snatched it up for 5 bucks.  We don’t have enough space for the full on, pimped out kitchens kids have nowadays, but my kids love it.

breakfast

January 27th, 2008

The weekend went by too fast, but at least the breakfasts were nice.

sardines

January 25th, 2008

Turns out that when you have a blog you start doing bizarre things like taking pictures of the sardines you bought.  But then again, you never know when you will be inspired.  And it might be in the canned fish isle in your slightly depressing grocery store at 10 o’clock at night.  I was thinking I might try to make my mobile out of paper and this little sardine box may even play a role, but I may chicken out and just sew something instead.  Speaking of mobiles, Leah from leahglass.blogspot.com has kindly offered to help all those out who may have questions about mobile construction–I haven’t got to the construction part yet, but I’m a little nervous thinking about it.  You can email her directly or go the discussions in the mobile swap group on flickr and ask questions there.  Leah is an artist who makes lovely mobiles out of glass.  If you are involved in the mobile swap she is offering a two for one deal on the mobiles in her etsy shop.  Just type in “mobile swap participant” in the notes to seller box.  So go take a look.  And I’d love to see what others are inspired by these days–post a picture on your blog or just leave a comment.

thank you!

January 23rd, 2008

I’ve finally come out of my extended couch hibernation and started sewing last night.   Sewing things for the shop to boot!  You can see pieces of a couple different diggers above.  I was really excited about making a patchwork digger, but it has proved to be a royal pain in the ass, so it may stay in pieces for a while.  Thank you for all your motivating comments on the last post!  It really did the trick (the cupcakes my husband brought home didn’t hurt either). And thank you for all your comments in general.  It amazes me that people take time out of their busy day just to say nice things about what I have made.  You have made me work harder and make nicer things than I thought I could–hell I probably would still be on the couch if it wasn’t for you.  I used to only get one or two comments and would reply to each, but now that more people are reading this little blog it’s a bit too much.  So from now on I’ll try to answer all your questions in the comment section, okay?  If you leave your blog address, I’ll be sure to visit, because I can’t get over how huge and varied this crafty community is!  Okay that’s enough, I always hated reading these kind of posts before I had a blog (but I didn’t know how grateful I would be because of a few kind words).  So THANK YOU! now tell me what you’re working on.