Thanks

So tired...I suppose I'm not the only one though. We had a lovely, but loud gathering of family. There was, as you might expect, food, laughter and perhaps a tad too much hard cider. It was actually a smaller gathering than usual, just a few family members short this go around. The best part of that was how much easier the cleanup went. No, it's not all done yet, there's at least one more load of dishes waiting to be done this morning, but it was still easier. This is a picture of the oldest child waiting to be allowed to eat the yams...her love for them is strong.

I didn't pick up my needle and thread once during the day, but here's the custom bits I made the day before that need to be shipped out today. That will also be one of the two times I plan to leave the house today. There is absolutely no way that I am going out to shop today.

Speaking of shopping though, one last time, here's all the info for my etsy shop sale. Ending on the 1st, get 25% off any purchase of $40 or more with the code 'Holiday2013' or get 10% any purchase with the code 'Holiday10'. Again this is only good until the 1st. Please do shop from the safety of your home or share the coupons with others who might be so inclined. This will be my only sale code for the holiday season.

Clean

As I feared, I have nothing really interesting to share with you today. Instead you get to hear all about my day of cleaning house. Yep, that's all I've got, take it or leave it. There was copious amounts of laundry as I cleaned all the afghans on the furniture. Yes, I have afghans I made on all my chairs. Then there was the dishes followed by hours of cleaning floors. I took it upon myself to try and get all the cat fur out of the rugs. Not the carpet mind you, but those nice dense, mostly black patterned Indian looking rugs. I figure out that the upholstery tool scrapes it up...one small section at a time. It took forever, but the white cat fur that made the rugs mostly gray has been removed...for the most part.

I pause here to complain that I am sore all over this morning. Apparently using this cleaning method on two room sized rugs and a hall runner takes it's toll on ones body.

After all that I did take a break to work on a couple of custom orders, but I didn't stop for pictures. Then I was back to cleaning counters in the kitchen and there are quite a lot of those. Late in the evening my brother popped over to stay for a few days over the holiday and much of the family will be over later today to eat. I imagine that I won't get to tatting today at all since after we eat, I clean and clean some more. I will be massively sore tomorrow I imagine.

I thought I'd leave you with this video I saw yesterday of 25 little know facts about Thanksgiving. Some of it I knew, some just amused me. It was either this or cats with wigs, so here you go.

Chaos

You would not believe how chaotic it got around here with three extra kids on vacation. I suppose you would if you either have that many kids or were at any time tasked with babysitting them. The point is, I am very lucky to have gotten anything done at all. Schooling required extra concentration as the other kids were already here and playing while I forced mine to learn for one last day before their vacation. As soon as I let them stop, the volume of the household rose.

Since I knew I wouldn't be getting anything new and interesting done, I went for mindless and repetitive. That way I could still pay attention to the chaos in case intervention was required. So I made another split ring necklace. This one with the last of the middle sized green glass beads and some older hand dyed thread again.  Basically, I'm trying to use up what I have on hand, rather than spend money on new supplies to make things. I still haven't ordered any more findings for the pieces that need them on hand. I'm waiting patiently for things to continue to pick up before I spend a cent on anything not vital.

Today has been earmarked for cleaning, so I'm not certain that I'll get around to any tatting, though it definitely makes my day nicer to spend at least a little time with the thread so I might carve out a little time. Thank you to everyone that has shared my sale information around. I really do appreciate the support. Now I'm off to household duties, reminiscing about those childhood days when vacation meant doing nothing at all.

A Bit Better

I had a fairly busy day yesterday, though I'm not certain that the coupon code sale had anything to do with it. I just managed to keep adding tasks to my own queue. There was schooling and laundry and dishes. Laundry is getting particularly annoying as winter creeps up and there are so many more clothes in there. It seems doing it now lasts the whole of the day.

During schooling, I sold a few patterns and a dream catcher. So right after, I had plenty to do. I listed the new purple split ring necklaces. Both are in the same listing since they do look remarkably similar. After that I worked on making up another dream catcher while becoming a bit of a pest online with the sale announcements. I made up the graphic at the bottom of the page to post around in an effort to be eye catching.

I was also handling a shipping request issue. I had a potential International customer that was looking into expedited shipping. I assumed it was far too expensive, but after some back and forth, I was off on an errand to the post office to fetch the right boxes to ship their order. People occasionally surprise me. Then I got a call from my sister with a request to watch her kids today. This of course means that today will be chaos and I will likely get little done. I did start another split ring and bead necklace yesterday that I can mindlessly work on if given any time. This one is in light greens.

So I leave you today with this large sale image that includes the active coupon codes and links to the shop. Please do share the sale with anyone who might be interested and since I didn't put the etsy shop address on there it's: http://totusmel.etsy.com

SALE Time

Much of the weekend was planned out for us. There was the Doctor Who thing on Saturday that me and the oldest daughter just couldn't miss. That was followed by dinner out of town for my father-in-law's 75th birthday. Sunday was errands in the morning, but by the afternoon, I had a little free time to get tatting.

While I was out in the morning, I promised my nieces that I would make them earrings. The youngest has a Christmas recital and needed earrings to match. Since she's wearing black and white, that's what she requested. Then I offered her sister some as well. I'm always afraid I'm forcing my pieces on relatives as I rarely get an enthusiastic response to them. It's as if they think because I made them myself, it might as well be plastic and yarn hot glued together at camp or something, but I digress.The blue and white ones didn't photograph well, they're actually an ocean teal that she asked for. When I shared these online, someone suggested they'd make a nice broach. It occurred to me that I do have a baggie of pin backs, so no supplies need to be bought to try which means I might give it go later.

After the earrings, I decided to use up some glass beads I had bagged up and made another, metal free, split ring necklace. I actually had just enough beads to make two similar ones. The beads are all a slight bit different so they have that nice random feel and I used some hand dyed thread I've had around for some time. I have some beads in green and I think some blues as well, so if I've nothing else to do, I might get some more variations of this made as well.

The shop still hasn't picked up and honestly, I'm really starting to really stress out about it. The only thing I can think of to do is keep making things. I'm just not good at aggressive marketing, probably because I find it annoying myself. I think I'm going to go ahead and offer up a coupon for the week as well because I can't shop unless other people do. So, for one week only, get 25% off any purchase of $40 or more with the code 'Holiday2013'. The code will expire on the 1st, so use it or lose it. It also occurs to me that many of you tat yourselves, so you might appreciate a coupon good for smaller purchases like patterns, so for that you can have 10% any purchase with the code 'Holiday10'. Again it's only good until the 1st. Please do shop or share the coupons with others who might be so inclined. I really appreciate it!