Gift

Nothing throws a day like a morning meeting. I tried to start schooling early enough to mitigate the effect, but it was to no avail. Once we were home and I tried to start classes again I was met with grumpy kid. Grumpy kid always turns me into ogre mom and the rest of her classes were a mighty chore which put me in a mood.

When I sat down to get back to tatting my mood shifted from annoyed to slightly depressed over the state of my etsy shop. Yes, again. It's November and I should be busy, but I'm not. I expressed that sentiment and I tried to think of some way to be proactive about it. All I could come up with was to make these and offer one as a free gift with the next three orders I got. I used the only hand dyed threads I had on hand. To be honest I also made them to keep my hands moving and the pretty colors have a calming effect as they swirl into the design. The two on the left are from Jess and the purple one is from Yarnplayer. Unfortunately the effort did not have an effect, at least not yet. All three roses are waiting to be gifted.

So that leaves me with no real tatting tasks unless I want to get back to the art project. I could of course tackle more cleaning, but I'd rather be tatting and filling orders and busily remaking sold things. I'd rather get my own holiday shopping knocked out, but with the slow sales that's unadvised as well. I think I'm due for the Universe to bring some joy. I'm going to attempt some positive thinking and I'm going to make things to focus my energy and I'm going to avoid cleaning too much because that just makes me tired. So here's to a surprisingly good day ahead...I hope.

Eureka

I don't know if I got the kick in the pants that I needed, but I did manage to get some things done yesterday. In fact right after breakfast I looked over at the bracelet from yesterday and had a eureka moment. I realized exactly what it was missing, cohesiveness. The original was simply the motif joined to two more modified versions of the same. It has so many picots that the join was perfectly solid and sturdy, but it still felt pieced together as an afterthought. So all I did was add some chains between the sections, effectively creating a border that hopefully makes the piece look more finished.

After that was complete it was more errands with the family, this time in preparation for next week. We have four family members staying with us for various time frames over the next week. The first set arrives on Sunday and the rest on Wednesday. They'll all be here through the end of the week. Now you see why I've been cleaning things I'd rather avoid. Speaking of which you'll be happy to know I found a solution to the toilet cleaning, let the much stronger husband use the pumice stone. Though this method did come with taunting afterwards about that being much easier than I let on. Still worth it. Of course I still had plenty left to do myself. I cleaned one room worth of carpets yesterday, but I still have a few more rooms I'd like to at least vacuum. I think I might save the bulk of that for the weekend though, just so that it can't be undone before the guests arrive.

Today we have another teacher meeting, this time for the oldest child. It's early this morning which means school will likely run long so I'm not going to plan any tatting. I'm sure I'll get round to some, but sometimes its best to focus on the tasks at hand and not think past them too far. The worst part about this time of the year is that just when you've finished one task, event, dinner, there is another one just waiting for you. It's a seemingly endless string of stuff to do with very little time to breathe.So we just take big breaths when we can and get to work.

The Weekend

You know that there was something wrong with your weekend when you sit down to write about it and you can't remember accomplishing much of anything. I know I managed to remake a couple of things for the shop...oh, and I made this jewelry set for my niece whose 10th birthday was Saturday. I used Ocean Teal for it, but yet again my camera fails to capture the actual shade and instead it looks just blue. I'm fairly certain that the set will be abused or lost, but what kind of jewelry making Aunt would I be if I didn't attempt to provide the girls in my life with such things.

So, much of Saturday was errand running and a birthday party. Well that and some more cleaning. We have hard water issues around here and that coupled with my desire to not clean certain things like toilets resulted in those nasty rings that can only be removed with pumice. I tell you this only because after that cleaning my hands, specifically my thumbs were ridiculously sore. They were so sore in fact that when I sat down to do a little tatting, they objected, loudly. They're still sore this morning and my tatting speed has slowed to accommodate this. I will of course be more proactive with cleaning from now on to avoid this in the future, but who knew cleaning would affect my ability to tat.

Sunday brought more errands as the temperature around these parts dropped dramatically in the last few days and it became apparent that the children were in need of warmer clothing. The youngest sports an impressive wardrobe of hand me down shirts, but pants are needed because her sister is a knee destroyer and the oldest needs everything having grown quite a lot. Shopping like this, while necessary, makes me painfully aware of the slowness of the shop. Aside from the the one off pieces, I've sold about as much as I would in February when no one is shopping and I still have my own holiday shopping to tackle. Sorry to whine, but the stress level is rising and this is, after all, my place to vent. I did sit down to make this out of the motif I shared before. I don't know if I'm going to bother listing it though. It doesn't seem quite right yet. Or maybe it's just good old self doubt settling in. Aren't the holidays the funnest emotional roller coaster?

There's no school today and the husband is off work, but there are no real plans for the day. I still have a couple of pieces waiting to be remade and maybe I'll work on whatever is bothering me about this bracelet. Or maybe I'll try and make another one off piece in the hopes of drawing more attention to the shop. There's also still cleaning that needs doing. Of course it's just as likely that I'll let my general malaise drag me down into a lazy ball and nothing will be done. Here's hoping for a kick in the pants.

Another Gone

Well I have good news to report about the green necklace I showed you yesterday. Like the red piece, it was picked up quite quickly yesterday and will be heading to a good home this morning. It really is one fabulous feeling when something finds an owner so quickly. These are the moments that recharge my drive and remind me, after bouts of silence and slow sales, that there are people out there who do appreciate the work that I do. In fact these are the moments when I feel like a real artist as opposed to most days when I feel a little like an overworked thread slave or ignored cog in the household machine. I much prefer the ego boosting days.

Other than that though, we had a teacher meeting with assessments for the youngest at the book store. So I stalled until that because I knew as soon as we were home I was going to tackle some more bathroom cleaning. I love having three bathrooms except when I need to clean them. The worst one is the kids of course, not because they're horribly messy except for the toothpaste, but because I never go in there which means it's neglected until I clean everything in the house. I still have the kitchen to tackle and the floors in the rooms that will serve as guest rooms and I can feel time slipping away. Hopefully I'll get the bulk of that done this weekend.

Back to tatting though, I remade one piece yesterday afternoon and I got an order for a custom necklace from one of my favorite customers that I will be working on today. Of course I do have lots of favorite customers which is also a much needed ego boost. If I get caught up on those things this weekend I'm going to try to get back to the art project so I can try out my something more ideas before they slip right out of my brain. Man, is this time of year exhausting.

Green

Well I'm slightly disappointed to report that the purple piece I listed yesterday has not in fact flown off to a new home yet. Of course this does mean that you get to see a much better picture of it today. In fact I was so bummed that I didn't get a repeat of the red pieces success I almost didn't bother making the green one that I said I was going to make, but the idea was already in my head and it would be silent until I cracked open that bag of metal bits and dug around for treasure.

We are definitely at the end of these, or very close to it for now. While I still have more stones and the setting in both copper and brass, I have very few matching bits in either metal left and these only work if I have some of those. There is a chance that next time I do a supply order that I just pick some up so I can actually repeat a piece like these, but aside from the fluke of many sales the other day the shop is still too slow to justify me actually spending any money. Anyway, I did this piece in Lizbeth Evergreen. I had to use two different sizes on both this one and the purple piece. This one was was extra annoying because the round beads I used are the mountain jade too and that stone is incredibly soft. I snapped like three in half just trying to make links out of them. The ones I used are survivors though, so they are strong.

So today I have schooling and then a teacher meeting for the youngest that I didn't learn about until yesterday afternoon. I still have a few pieces that need to be made for the shop and I need to get this green piece listed as well. I'm attempting to be way more social online than usual as well in an attempt to get more attention for the shop and if I get any downtime there are still rooms left to deep clean and the art project still waiting for that something missing to be discovered. I guess what I'm saying is that I have plenty to do and I really have no idea what part or parts of it that I will actually get round to doing. Man, I'm tired just thinking about it and next week should be even worse with time slipping away.