PokeFan

Remember a while back, I made a brightly colored bracelet for a twitter friend to match her brightly colored nails. You remember right? Anyway, She is quite the fiber lover herself always knitting or crocheting some brightly colored bit or bob and the before my bracelet even got to her she was making something very special for my daughter. You see, not only does the woman love her fiber, but she is also a pokemon fan...a big one. Well, my 5 year old daughter is as well. I go as far as to say a bit obsessed really, so when she spied a pokeball hat my twitter friend was making on my computer she began to chant 'want'. After I shared my daughter reaction a second hat was selflessly made and sent to her. It arrived yesterday and her reaction was priceless.
That is pure joy right there, plain and simple. So thank you so much Patience aka @millarca of the twitter. It IS much loved...in fact her little sister has a fledgling interest in the pokemon and had to try on the hat for a moment as well. I think this piece is going to get a lot of wear.

The children did spend a good chunk of the afternoon with their Grandparents, so I got to clean and vacuum and finish up the choker I was working on. So today, I'm seriously back on the masks. I feel the time before Halloween slipping away and I can't sell the things if I haven't got any made to sell. So that and setting up the Wunderkammer are on the to do list today. Oh, and bills and more cleaning...wow, I really DO lead a charmed life.

A Little Complaint

I try to avoid talking about those topics...you know, the big ones that cause all the drama. I find that along with bringing out the loonies on either side of the debate, you can offend people you actually like, but simply disagree with. So I'm just going to complain without mentioning particulars. I am starting to lose patience with people lately. The alarmist reactions to even simple things seem to be gaining ground. Why is everyone going off their rockers with the crazy? It appears that otherwise functioning adults are losing the ability to tell fact from fiction. Is the Internet and its viral nature to blame here? People seem to be believe everything the read regardless of what basic logic should be telling them. I know I'm being very vague here and it is intentional, besides it is happening in so many different topics that being specific is not really necessary. I think that if you spend any time online or watching television you have probably been exposed to the behavior and I imagine that you might be sick of it as well. I think I feel better now.

Outside all the loony business, I think we're on track to have the Wunderkammer giveaway the week of the 10th. I'll be contacting all the folks who offered up prizes in the next couple of days with further details and get the posts ready to go up. Oddly enough, I'm finding it hard to mess with the formula I've set up over there. I've been so consistent, I'm worried about shaking things up with contest posts. Of course it should be a good thing, but I still feel weird about it.

I got the lost package necklace remade and in the mail yesterday as well. While I'm still annoyed at the package getting lost, these sort of events allow you to really show what your customer service is made of. It affords me the opportunity to do the right thing and even be appreciated for my efforts. Even though I've now got a couple of extra weeks until my house move, I won't be making anything new. This is partly because I have already packaged away all my photo props and I don't feel like unpacking them. I plan on continuing to make up masks since I keep hearing about Halloween already. I know, it's 101 outside and people are talking about fall holidays, but it would be wise to prepare. I've begun babbling now, so I'm going to stop writing now. Until tomorrow.

Two Steps Back

Well, I can't say I'm really surprised, but yesterday was full of little setbacks. First as I spent afternoon nap time packing, I received a convo about a package that had not arrived. It was a piece mailed over a month ago and of course the delivery confirmation shows it as delivered just two days after I mailed it. It was a custom colored piece, so I tend to believe the customer and they have been given the option of me remaking the piece or a refund. I know that it's not my fault, but I always feel guilty when this happens. Lucky for me it has only happened a handful of times. Even though I haven't heard back yet, I went ahead and worked on remaking the piece anyway.

Turns out that I needed to stop packing anyway. We got a call later that evening from our real estate agent. Apparently the 2nd bank on the seller home, the same one that held us up for so long in the beginning hasn't gotten their paperwork done, so we need to file an extension until mid August with the first bank to give them more time. We'll be filling out that paperwork tonight, so fabulous right? It's not all bad really, at least we'll have a set date now and more time to sort out our house. We have until the 19th to get out of our rental, so hopefully there will still be a little cross over for comfort. This does also mean that I can do some supply ordering and keep the store open longer. It also means that I might be able to set the Wunderkammer redesign date, though I still need to talk to my design elf. Yes, I know that also means that my husband was right, but that, right there, is the only time I'm saying so.

So today's agenda is supply orders, mask tatting, Wunderkammer planning and no packing...see not so bad.

Mail Call

Guess what I got in the mail yesterday? Go ahead, I'll wait...yes, I got my new corset. I immediately laced the sucker on and proceeded to gasp for air for the next two hours. I do remember that this was the exact sensation I experienced two months ago when I started with my larger corset. I couldn't even make it through the whole day at first. Of course after I had had enough I put my old one back on and it was as if I was wearing a t shirt. That corset will now be the sleep corset and the new one for days. The new one is still a good fit, so I've not doubt that in a months time it too be perfectly comfortable, so yay!

One note, if you like this one and plan on getting it, the flower design is a raised velvet and on one side the grain goes up and the other down. So if you look at it for a top of bottom angle, one side is darker than the other. I kind of like it like that, but thought it would be good to know.

My husband is giving me a hard time about my assumptions regarding our house move. You see, I am working on the idea that we will in fact close this weekend and start to move. He, however, is under the assumption that Murphy will win out and he's not even thinking about moving until the next weekend. I suppose it doesn't really matter, but I feel all floopy without a definite date to work with here. So many things can't be done until I know for sure what's going on. I'm running out of supplies that need ordering, but it's pointless to order them until I know which address I'll be at next week. I know, I know...just breath, it'll be over soon enough. I've put a closing warning on the etsy storefront, but I think I may revise it a bit to indicate more uncertainty. I suppose I'll calm down a bit and try to just roll with it.

Weekend

Ah, the weekend. A time to relax, enjoy family time, or if you're us pack, fend off the cuteness of a stray kitten and go to the fair, leaving you exhausted and sore. We're still under the impression that our house purchase will close at the end of this week, so we're packing as if that's a possibility. All the boxes and empty furniture is providing the children with really bad ideas for play time. I have also begun the unsavory job of really cleaning things like the walls and floors, in short I'm feeling a bit like Cinderella over here.

Oh yes, the kitten. We have a nasty habit of having small kitten arrive at our place of residence and cute us into letting them in the house. We have however already acquired 4 cats, which is plenty enough to feed and clean up after. This weekend we were visited several times by a cute little white and mottled boy kitten with a shoelace tied loosely around its neck as a collar. We assume that someone has claimed him, but he just keeps coming back and sleeping n our porch. We really can't let him in, but if he continues we might take him to the in-laws who have large group of outside cats that they care for. What's one more when there are already a dozen getting food and water right?

Then onto the county fair. It was a fairly sad display this year with all the exhibits smaller and even though it was cooler this year than it has been, even the animals looked like they were phoning it in. This didn't matter at all to the kids of course, who ate up all the bee displays and petting the three goats and two cows that made up the sad petting zoo experience. Let's face it, we are not really County Fair kind of people, so we're going for them. Before you ask, no I don't enter my tatting the fair. I used to enter my art before I became a Mommy, but haven't in years. There is no tatting or lace category and though I could enter it in 'other', who would I be competing against except myself and that's no fun. Last year they did have a woman doing tatting demonstrations for a couple of hours and I stopped by. She actually knew who I was from my Belle Armoire piece, which was nice, but this was the first time I had met another tatter from anywhere around here so there you go.

If I get the indication that we are closing this week, the etsy store will go into vacation mode for the duration of the move, which may be up to two weeks. I'm just trying to give everyone fair warning just in case you might want of need something in the near future, get it now. I will definitely be taking down or altering all custom orders to a month wait, to give me enough time to pack, move and unpack without worrying about getting them done. I think that's all I need to share this morning...yep, that's it.