Too Hot

I think I mentioned that it was getting to hot yesterday. What I think I didn't mention was the reason the heat was getting to me. Well, our air conditioning has broken. I know many people live in climates where this would not be a problem, but I live where yesterday was over 105 degrees. I managed to keep the house under 90, but barely. We did tell our property management about the problem,but we also told them we were putting in our 30 day notice, so I'm just crossing my fingers that they don't ignore the problem. Sure we're out of here in a few weeks, but it's not likely to be cooling down outside for quite sometime. To add a little extra fun to the hot, my husband is now out of town for a few days for a training. Yep and he's in the bay area where it is always cool, but I'm not bitter, not at all.

Yesterday I snagged prize number three for the Wunderkammer giveaway. Part of me feels kind of weird planning so far in advance and yes a few weeks is far for me. I'm used to doing these sort of things on the fly with little advance planning. I'm finding that contrary to what logic might dictate the extra time is not making me plan better. If anything it's letting me come up with then summarily reject additional giveaway scenarios that are really quite lame. This is certainly a case of going with your first instinct as the best bet.

I know that I also said I wasn't going to be able to come up with any new designs for a while either, but during the construction of my custom project I came up with a ring. It wasn't much of a stretch from the hat band to a ring. I just decreased the circumference a bit and it made itself. It's quite a comfy thing and I've already listed one in what I suppose is a small size since I have particularly skinny fingers. When I asked after pricing on twitter, it was suggested that I might do a ring and pendant set, so I decided that a pendant based on the same basic pattern design would be interesting. I haven't gotten great pictures of that piece yet, but it too is made with the slightly smaller thread, size 20 and is based on the same motif as my Spine barefoot sandals and the throat corset. I made it smaller and turned the top edge into a clover as well. I might get it listed later today. Of course I might not as the heat is sucking the life out of me.

Look What I Made

I had the worst nights sleep last night. Seriously awful. It has gotten ridiculously hot here and on top of that my brain won't shut the hell up. You see Saturday we met with our real estate agent to sign a few papers, but she had unexpectedly received the escrow papers so we got to look over and sign those as well. This is our first house buying experience and though I've done a metric ton of research on this stuff, it's never real until it's actually happening. Causing a particularly high level of stress were the pages denoting the tax disclosures. I know that they will be reevaluated with the new, much lower sale price, but they still gave me...pause. All those things we were going to buy for the new house listed out in our heads are now right out until all this business works itself out. So, yeah...didn't sleep so well.

Before all that happened though, an interesting tatting project fell into my lap. A friend of mine, met through the Internet, Diana. You might know her as paynesgrey , asked for a few pieces to add to her current doll project. Now, I've been asked to make some odd things in lace, some easy some impossible, but these rank high up on the things I never thought I'd try to make. First a hat band and matching garter...so easy. I made them both in a Celtic fashion to make them not only look a little more complex, but also to give them a little extra strength. Yeah, that wasn't the odd part. The odd part was a little whip. Honestly I would not have known where to start with this piece, but she had made a design out where it would be made in three parts and folded over with the whip portion braided.

I went a little further with the design and matching the other pieces weaved the handle together in a triangle. The actual whip was a simple crochet chain braided together thicker toward the handle. I was pretty proud of how quickly the pieces came together. Though I am notoriously design lazy. I mean, the first prototype of a piece is almost always the end product. I rarely take the time to refine and adjust a design. If it looks like it'll work the first go round, it is done. Anyway, I'm certain you have questions as to what sort of doll might need these accouterments, but for now I shall keep you in he dark. Hopefully I'll be able to reveal it as she does.

Done and Done

Is there a name for that gesture where you mime slapping dirt off your hands to indicate that you've completed a task? Well, that's what I did this morning as I finished packing up the last of my recent bout of custom orders. All done. Whew. Hmmm...now what?

I've notice that this summer in particular has been moving in a feast or famine pattern. I go a long stretch with no sales nor attention and then without warning they are heaped on for a short period only to fade to nothing just as quickly. This is not a comfortable pattern for me, though I am getting used to it. You see, now that these are in the mail I can expect to go with sales for up to a week. Then if the pattern holds I should get at least two custom orders in a row effectively swamping me for days. I think I would much prefer a nice steady one day on one day off sort of pattern, but we don't get to choose now, do we?

I've already begun taking advantage of the recent downturn to remake many of the pieces lost to the feast, but with the daily packing regimen, it is going to be a slow process. I've all but abandoned the idea of any new designs at least until after the move and the Wunderkammer relaunch. Though honestly the relaunch shouldn't take too much effort really. I've received two giveaway offers and though I am hoping for a few more, I can always make up the deficit with a couple of my own pieces. We're suppose to meet with our real estate agent this weekend and that might result in a better sense of the time line we're looking at. Then I'll know more accurately when the relaunch should occur and I'll let everyone know.

Goals

It's that time of the year again. The time when I start to get antsy and decide to come up with a set of goals. The goals I've chosen this time are a mixed bag of slightly possible and absolutely ridiculous, as is my way. The set this time includes receiving 5000 heart in my etsy shop and my 1000th sale by years end. Then there's the ridiculous one. In the past I've set this goal to revive tatting as the newest craft craze and while I admit to doing my part to expose more people to the art, it remains an illusive one. Another ridiculous goal was the writing of a tatting book. This one is hampered by being the stay at home mother of two small children...yeah it's not happening any time soon. This time I've aimed for the starts, I want at least one celebrity sale that results in a tatted jewelry sighting on said celebrity. This doesn't even need to be a sale, I'll give away the tatting to get the sighting, though I've no idea where to start to make this one a reality. Which is why it sits comfortably in the ridiculous goal spot.

More house updates for you this morning too. The house was appraised yesterday and came it at what we needed it to, so that's moving smoothly. Packing however is going to be the death of me. The dust is a killer...I know I could wear a mask, but I don't and I not certain it would really help anyway since the dust I disturb floats around the house all day and night now. Also my desire to keep everything is fighting dramatically with my desire to throw away tons of stuff so I don't have to move it. Of course I also suffer from an advanced form of the pack rat syndrome. I believe everything will eventually be used and to throw it away now would mean that need simply presents itself sooner. That's the way it works...right?

I opted for a simply call for donations on the Wunderkammer's sidebar. I'm hoping to get in a healthy handful, so I can run the same sort of giveaway I did here. You know, more entries more prizes and all that. It was really successful at getting new traffic and though the levels I reached during the giveaway were not maintainable, I did see a sustained increase in traffic, so here's hoping I can do the same thing for the Wunderkammer. I've already gotten a couple of responses so I am hopeful...for now anyway.

Updates

Well, it seems like everyone who has already left for the darkside had plenty to say justifying their decision and those out here with me are all just fighting the pull. I shall discuss it no further until it has me firmly in its maw, so moving on. We were finally informed yesterday that we are in escrow and the house we're buying is officially off the market. We don't actually know when this happened because our real estate agent and mortgage guy seem to be running with the ball. What they don't realize is we're those people who want an update on every little mundane detail, there is never enough information for me. No I don't really want to supervise the whole event in an active sense, but I do want a play by play and I'm not getting one.

In the world of tatting, I'm slowly catching up. I have just one pending order I'm working one. Of course that order contains two masks, so it's not likely to be finished for another few days. I haven't gotten any new orders since I got back and while I would normally begin to worry, I'm relieved that I have the extra time to catch up. In fact this run on custom pieces has gotten me thinking forward to the holidays. Yes, I know they are months away, but if the summer sales are any indication and I hope they are, I'm going to be a bit swamped. So from this point forth, every little bit of down time I am afforded will go to creating stock of my most popular items starting with a crap load of masks for Halloween. Though making this statement will probably jinx me to very few sales of them, oh well.

Anything else...oh yeah, the Wunderkammer redesign is humming along and has an eta of the first week of August. To go along with the new skin, I want to have a giveaway, which I think I've mentioned. Problem is, how to ask for donations from the featured artisans without coming off all spammy. I know many of them make very expensive items and those are right out, but perhaps discounts. Then I was thinking of offering an ad to those who wanted to donate an item, but I want to make sure that the prizes are, well...appropriate for the Wunderkammer audience. I suppose I could just post a call for donations on the site, but would that look tacky? Aargh, I'm just thinking out loud now and I have so many other things to think about, so I'm gonna stop it now. You know where to leave opinions should you have them.