Weekend Recap

Well, we had a pretty busy weekend around here. We hosted a birthday gathering for the oldest child and that of course meant cleaning and preparing food and then cleaning again. I was also quite fortunate to get another order in my etsy shop just after I wrote on Friday. This was for another pair of barefoot sandals, but a much more complex design. I worked on remaking the pair off an on throughout the weekend. Luckily due to the postal holiday I had a couple of extra days to use the existing pair as a template to get the new pair made.

On Sunday we headed out to Monterey Bay Aquarium for the day. It was the last bit of birthday celebrations and it was quite lovely out there. The weather here inland is already too hot, but the coast was a cool 60º. We also met up with my brother who lives near there and had some family time and catching up.

We had a few errands to run on our day off yesterday, but I also got another order in my shop. This time it was for a simple cuff bracelet. I happily went to work remaking that as well. I got both pieces remade by the end of the day yesterday and we're just starting our third to last week of homeschooling. There are a few more projects and tests to worry about as well as other family events coming up, more birthdays and a graduation. So I'm still pretty busy, but since some of that busy is tatting, I made time to write. I'm not sure what I'll get done this week yet, but I'm feeling a little more focused already.

I'm Back

Hello everyone, which is probably just a small handful of people at this point I'm guessing. Clearly I've been taking a bit of a break on the blogging. I've also been taking a bit of a break with basically everything craft related. Sales in my etsy shop have had me wondering lately if I ought to just throw in the towel with the whole endeavor. I'm not quite ready to let go yet though. I do still quite enjoy creating and that's still the best outlet for it.





Over the past couple of weeks, I've spent a lot of time on family stuff, birthdays, moving, divorces, none of those things are mine by the way. I spent a weekend cross stitching a clearance sampler kit while watching Netflix with the family. I've also spent some time with the slowly growing Armenian lace doily/tablecloth, though I haven't taken a picture of it in a while. I probably spent the most time reading actually. Well that and contemplating the idea of writing something myself. I'm not certain I have the skill set for that though.

It's also the home stretch of the homeschooling year. We have just a few weeks left and that means a lot of projects and state testing to deal with. So I guess that I just took the time off from being an artisan to focus on all these other things for a while. I did just finally get an order in my etsy shop yesterday that got me tatting again and that is likely what brought me back here as well. I finally have something tatting related to share, though to be honest it's just a pair of barefoot sandals you've seen countless times before.

So I'm hoping that I can get back into the habit of creating and blogging again soon, though I somehow doubt I'll be as consistent as I used to be. I just need to find a bit more motivation somewhere to really get back into everything. Here's hoping that it actually exists. Regardless, life is fine and I'm still making things, always making things.

One Off

I meant to write yesterday morning to show you this necklace that I made, but I got distracted by my sister-in-law going into labor. Her and my brother live quite a distance away, so we were relying on text updates and I guess that had much of my focus. The baby wasn't born until this morning by the way...it was clearly a marathon experience for them.

Back to the lace though, I added some tatting on either side of the metal ring and then finished it off with crochet chains and a macrame slide clasp. I also meant to get it listed in my shop yesterday, but the aforementioned distraction was a pretty all encompassing. I'm hoping that I can focus today among all the cleaning I have to do before this weekend. We're hosting Mother's Day at our house and since I don't want to have to clean on Sunday myself, I've got to get it done today. So here's to a productive day and a busy weekend.

Hen and Chicks

Two days of tatting in a row, yay!I got an order early in the morning after a strange conversation thread with a different potential customer. The conversation was odd not only for the inclusion of text-speak, which I personally think should stay solely in texts, but also because I opted to answer honestly regarding whether or not a choker would slip down. I just couldn't see guaranteeing that seeing as tugging on it would definitely do that. Anyway, I think I scared that one off, but I got another order for this bracelet.

This one is my take on the hen and chicks pattern. All the chains are Victorian sets and I made it double sided. I finished remaking one for the shop  while I was also finishing reading Utopia. The bracelet is in the mail to its new owner this morning. I might try to get back to the ring from yesterday later today, but I'm not sure. Whenever I do I'm sure I'll write again.

Weekend Update

I had a nice weekend for the most part. It was Free Comic Book Day and the newest Marvel movie hit the theaters, so that's what my family spent time doing. There was a little cleaning, some planning for the future with the extended family, and bread baking.

Sunday evening I had the hankering to tat up something. I didn't have any new ideas, so I just grabbed a small ring and tatted around it. I'll probably add a little more to it today and turn it into a necklace for my shop. I'm starting to think that maybe I should spend a little time just making one-off pieces like this just to keep my tatting skills from fading away. Hopefully I can stay motivated enough to actually photograph and list them when they're made, oh and that they actually sell. That would be great. Here's hoping.

A Little Work

I actually got some tatting in yesterday. I received a custom order request overnight and my lovely customer was quite responsive in the morning and we got the details worked out quickly. I did have to wait until after schooling to get to work, but it's a nice small piece so it was made up pretty quickly.

Now before you comment on the colors you should know that I can never get blues to show up in pictures the same shade as they actually appear. These are both Lizbeth colors and the blue is dark ocean teal. It's definitely darker and a bit greener than it appears here. Luckily I can use the swatch pictures from Handy Hands to show customers because I fear that they would be put out by the color in person if they were expecting it just like this. The green is pretty close to accurate though it's not the order, just the piece I was using to remember the pattern.

So that's it for now. I am still working on the giant doily and there are some pet rat issues we're dealing with, so it's been a long week already. It's been hot all week and I'm hoping for some nice uneventful time soon.