{*Hello Sinus*}

*Thanks everyone for your sewing machine thoughts*!

It's not doing so hot, I brought it by the sewing/vac place that is local, basically something is hanging up the bobbin. It works ok when I stitch normal straight stitches, but not so much going through layers decoratively >:( When I go home for Christmas I'll being it by a Pfaff dealer and see what sort of magic they can work.

Instead of moping around all day, I got to work on coffee cup cozies! I've been wanting to make these little guys for a while now!!! I got out some of my favorite winter themed fabrics and went to town! They have a layer of batting on the inside. I made the cutest valentine themed one! Gah! I can't wait to show you tomorrow!!!! Mr. McPorkchop has promised me a starbucks trip in the morning, I'm claiming it a business trip so I can grab a venti sized cup so I can add an extra snap to these so they are adjustable! They'll be in the shop tomorrow night! Yay!!! I already have about ten done! But I'll gladly take custom orders on these if you know of a fabric I have that you'd like a cozy in!!! Oh! And some of them are backed with washable wool, some are backed in cotton and some twill! Yay for options!!!

AND! I got LUSH TODAYYYYY!!! I got it as a gift from a special someone, but I know that fabricworm has some! In fact, after I update on Saturday, I might buy the wood grain print, wouldn't that be a beautiful skirt?! I ended up getting the deer print *of course* and the paint chart! So so so so cute! They are going to make fantastic pads!!!

Unfortunately my icky throat from yesterday has turned into a sinus infection! Booo!!!! But I'm actually pretty jazzed, its been since September that I've had one! That's a big deal for me! I have extremely bad allergies and get sinus infections pretty often, I think this might be a record! Tonight I'm going to steam my face with some essential oils and a sinus tincture that I made. It helps * a lot*. But today was nice, I just worked on cozies and drew with a hot face cloth on my head..haha!!! 

Tomorrows winter shop update is going to be pretty big, I have over 20 pads, some wipe sets, the cup cozies, some tree ornaments...its going to be *fun*!!!!

And Saturday...ready for Saturday..

It's a decorated truck parade and my house?

It's on the route!!!

Mr. Mr Porkchop and I discovered this last year! One evening we kept hearing sirens and loudness and flashing lights, so we went across the street...low and behold...

A lighted truck parade!!! We watched big logging trucks, tractor trailers, all sorts of trucks that are just decorated with lights! It's hilarious!

If you live in Eureka, CA, I'll be outside, with my coffee. Watching the trucks dressed as reindeer!

OH! Before I forget!

You know Tania right? Well she's making Maine Morning Mitts too!!!! Have you seen her stuff? She's *fantastic!* I have two of her little mini bird paintings, one lives on my thermostat and one that I wear as a necklace! Yay!!!

Have a fantastic Thursday!!!!!! I'll be back tomorrow with some photos of some neat projects I've been working on!!!! 

{*Oh Boo!*}

I woke up this morning with a sore throat and a wonky sewing machine. I've been drinking this awful yogi tea for throats, its grooooooossssssssssssss!!!! It feels all odd in my throat. I'm going to see if Mr. McPorkchop will pick me up something else. Haha! I'm going to switch over to peppermint here in a few!

Sewing machine is majorly wonky. I'm very grumpy about it. I brought it to the shop and basically got no where >:(

But instead of being grumpy about not sewing, I'll share with you what I have sewn!

At least I was productive up until today!!!! It makes me feel good to look over at a big pretty stack of pads and wipes!!! These pads will go on sale at 5PM PST on Friday at my seasonal shop, MapleMade!!!

Phew! I'm off to snooze and have more tea!

Have a fantastic Wednesday!!!

{*Noooooo!!!!!!*}

Wow!

Imagine me, sewing along, having a grand old day, then going for an amazing walk with Mr. McPorkchop.

Then imagine me sitting down to keep sewing and suddenly, my sewing machine acting strange.

Now I clean my machine, rethread, change needle, keep going, everything is ok for 5 minutes, then...the needle isn't holding tension. At all. The top thread is completely slack!!!! I've adjusted the tension knob multiple times...nothing :( I'm kinda scared to mess with the bobbin >:(

I'm sort of at a loss of what to do right now! It's just odd that it will work ok for a few minutes, then get wonky!!!

I'm going to bring it to the machine place tomorrow, hopefully they'll have a quick fix. I've already had to push back my update once! I don't want to do it twice!!!! OF course, right before Christmas when I *just* got a new set of Christmas fat quarters and I'm dying to sew!!!

NOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

{*Best Day*}

{my new friend...a gift from Mr. McPorkchop, I'm wearing him as a brooch}

Today was one of those days where I just woke up feeling *good*!!!!

First, a *huge* thank you to everyone who purchased pads from me last night! There's still two cute little ones in stock!!! As orders were coming in, I was packaging them up and getting them ready for the post office today! One extremely sweet customer bought both sets of large wipes and I couldn't decide how to package them and my friend Sarah  (look at her ornaments! amazing!) suggested larger sized brown grocery bags! I had one left from a Trader Joe's visit that I hadn't recycled yet, so cute! It worked out really well! For my shop, I wrap my pads in little brown sandwich sacks and tie them with pastry twine, so ecofriendly!!!

Porkchop & I slept in a little bit, only till about 9 am. We had grand plans of buying and flocking a small Christmas tree. This is a very big deal around here for a multitude of reasons!!!!

We made a little space for the tree, in front of my craft shelf and next to our bikes. I had an old snowman Martha Stewart pillow case that I cut and put on the floor as our tree landing.

We found the perfect tree! It's small, only about 4 feet, its a fraiser fir! We wanted flocking, but couldn't find any :( But I'm ok with no flocking, everytime I touch the tree it releases the most amazing smell ever!!! This is the second real tree I've ever had before in my life!!!!

Haha!! Isn't it cute and wonky?!?! We've put little multicolored lights on it and I've started making decorations for it!!! I love it *so* much!!! We danced and decorated it together, so this is our "before" shot, hopefully Monday I'll finish the decorations for it and show you what we've created!

So while we were listening and dancing to Christmas music on pandora I made up some bacon wrapped filet mingons! YUM!!! I made an amazing sauce of melted blue cheese and crimini mushrooms! My BFF Aric came over for dinner and we decided to walk down to Arts Alive here in Eureka, CA. It's a really neat night once a month where art shows open and everyone drinks wine and walks around and looks at art! I've had a solo show up in a local boutique called Ali Rose in Old Town for about a year now, I did a series watercolors depicting designer goods that totally goes hand and hand with the upscale clothing they sell, I framed them in these gorgeous gilded silver frames as well... Aric suggested we go walk down and see how the show was doing,  I was laughing because I didn't think anything new had happened, assuming that the owner would have called me. Low and behold earlier in the week someone from San Francisco had bought my Marc Jacobs Stam painting!!!! AWESOME!!! I am *so excited*!!!! The owner asked if I'd paint more paintings, unfortunately the frames were extremely expensive, but I'm thinking about maybe painting a few more :)

 We visited a few shows, I get nervous in crowded, tight spaces, so we wandered up to Starbucks, were Mr. McPorkchop treated me to an iced peppermint mocha and we sat outside and took photos and just chatted. One thing I adore about our house is its in walking distance to so much. The fog was starting to get thick, so we walked back home and played some wii!

That's my favorite store front we walked by!!! Isn't it festive and amazing?!!?

Okok! I'm off to work on more ornaments and work on a new little side project! Thanks again for everyone who's been stopping by and reading lately :):)
xoxo

{*Maine Morning Mitts

Hi everyone!!!

Still can't publish comments :( Geez!!!

Today is a busy, but slow day. I'm really, really, really feeling under the weather today, boo!!! I'm updating my shop @5pm PST today! It's going to be a very, very, very small update this time around, but the pads are so pretty, in addition to the pads I'll have two larger sized 8x8 inch cloth wipes and a wet bag! Yay!!!

I'm going to definitely take it easy today! Last night Mr. McPorkchop & I were able to find a small Christmas tree stand, so tomorrow depending on how I feel, we will be getting a tiny tree! YAY!!! I'm planning on making all the ornaments myself this week, as that is a good couch project! I might even work on some pads for MapleMade!!! Who knows! The weekend is filled with possibilies that are hinging on my stupid stomach!

BUT!!! Thats not what today is about!

Today is about:

Maine Morning Mitts

aka my most favorite knitting pattern ever. EVER!

I've been knitting these like they've been going out of style! I'm working on my 3rd and 4th pairs right now!!!! I never make things twice, so this is kinda a big deal around here!

I made a pair for Mr. McPorkchop!

  

There he is! Being a great hand model! Hahaha!!!

The only thing I've changed is I'm knitting these on size 6 needles, it makes them more snug and warm and cozy, plus we both have narrow hands and wrists! His pair is knit from Brown Sheep Worsted, I can't find the tag, but you can see it stripes! His pair starts two inches below his wrist bone and end before his knuckles!

Here's a photo of my pair!

(I painting my nails with gold glitter. Yup. That's how festive I am!)

Don't you just want to squish your face in that ribbing?! It's SO plush and cozy!!!! These are knit from malabrigo, velvet grapes is the color. Malabrigo is my all time favorite yarn. Seriously. I cleaned off my yarn shelf a few days ago and I'm debating de-stashing a bunch of my yarn that I'm not using so I can buy more malabrigo because I know I'll knit with it!!! I stupidly bought a bunch of lace weight malabrigo for a cardigan, but I can't even begin to knit with such a fine yarn! I'm not patient enough!

ANYWAYS! BACK TO MITTS!

(Pardon the lint, they were in my purse ;))

Mine are longer and go further up my hands because I'll admit it, I hate turning on the heat and sometimes I wear these while sewing. Yup. I'm crazy!!!

So the nice thing about cleaning my yarn stash?

I found some malabrigo, my last skein, that I bought last Valentines Day!!!! I about DIED when I found it, so I caked it and guess what I cast on for?!

MORE MITTS!!!!

These are going to be longer and I'm calling them my Valentines Day Mitts, because I *love* Valentines Day, I love all the pink and red and lace and silliness of the whole event its a great burst of color during a blah winter!!! I'm also liking the pink because they'll be nice when I'm snowshoeing next month since I'm boring in head to toe black snow gear!!! I also have another pair on the needles, but those are a Christmas gift, so I can't show you them!

Aren't they GREAT?!?! Look at those little wonky stitches!!! Every time I look at them I just *grin*! Don't you love projects like that?!?!

Ok, I feel like I need to make a list of things to convince you further:

1. You need to knit these because they are fast and would make amazing Christmas gifts! You can change them to suit your reciepient, like Porkchop wanted his shorter, I like mine longer, etc!
2. They can be changed completely with your yarn choice, Porkchops came out manly and guy like, but mine are girly and fun, the pattern suggests Noro, which would look amazing as well! This is a good pattern to showcase different yarns!
3. You'll wear them more than you think. At first I wasn't sold on the fingerless glove idea, but since these are ribbed, they stay in place nicely and are perfect for going out and about because you still have free fingers!!! I like that I can wear them in stores and still grab my car keys and hand the cashier money, because with mittens...thats just ackward. Haha :)
4. The pattern is super well written. It's really really easy and anyone who can knit, purl and work simple increase and decreases could easily tackle these. At the top of the pattern theres even explinations of the decrease/increase methods!
5. These work really well on short double pointed needles, making them great for car knitting and small couch knitting while cuddling, so you don't have to worry about poking out someones eye with your needle! Sometimes I poke myself (and Porkchop) with the longer ones, but since theres only 12,12 & 9 stitches on each needle, this is a good pattern to try the short needles with!

And here's my list why you should love malabrigo yarn too:
(I'm pushy today, haha)

1. It's SOFT!
2. It's fun to watch it change colors with you knit!
3. Some people think it pills too much, but I like its fuzzyness and so far nothing I've knit with it has pilled too much!
4. The plushness of it! It creates such cozy things!
5. THE COLORS!!! Ok! I know, twice in one list, but whatever, I LOVE THE COLORS!!!

See! That's how much I love it! I even fashioned a terrible little string heart, so you can fall in love with it too..hahaa!!!!

I hope everyone has a fantastic Friday!!!
xoxo

{*Let's Eat!*}

Sometimes I crave certain tastes so so so much that if I don't cook them that very instant, I'm going to fall over and never be able to get up again!

Ok. Maybe that's a little extreme.

Maybe.

But lately I've been craving farfalle, broccoli, criminis, pesto, pinole nuts and freshly grated parmesan cheese SO MUCH! So last night I whipped together a little something-something for dinner, knowing I'd have enough left for lunch today! Awesome!

Then after eating that, of course, carbs were heavy on my brain...so I started searching through google reader...

Do you use google reader? We should be google reader friends, I'm frenchtoastcakeATgmailDOTcom

ANYWAYS!

My new favorite thing is to subscribe to cooking blogs and then around dinner time, I type in a word or two in the search feature in google reader, so last night I did "chocolate" and "cookies" and all sorts of neat things will pop up!

And guess what popped up?

Smitten Kitchens Chocolate Toffee Cookies!

Mr. McPorkchop & I ran out to the store at 9 pm and I had these babies in the oven and I was in heaven around 11 pm!

These are *phenom*!!! I ended up refridgerating half of the dough overnight and woke up early this morning to bake more! I dusted the tops of them with coarse kosher salt, OMNOMNOM!!!! Waking up early in the morning and baking cookies is truly amazing!

It was my first experience using a double boiler to melt chocolate, I cheated and used a metal bowl and a dutch oven, but it worked beautifully. Thankfully, my mom is an insanely amazing chef and gave me a pep talk before I tried it, mainly it was filled with "DON'T GET WATER IN THE CHOCOLATE OR IT'LL SEIZE!"

I read a lot of the reviews on the epicurious website, some people felt it spread too much or had problems with it being too liquid-y, I think you *really* need to follow the directions, especially the part of mixing the sugar and eggs until they are thick and chilling it for at least 45 minutes! Mine spread, but not too badly, they are perfectly crisp and chewy all at once, plus salty and sweet, my all time favorite combo!

Unfortunately that late at night I couldn't find any soy lecithin free toffee, so I'm limiting myself to one cookie a day, which let me tell you, is hard ;)

I hope your having a fantastic Thursday, I'm trying my darndest to get a ton of sewing done today, however, its going slow, so my update tomorrow may be a very small one :)

Have an awesome day!

xox

{*Trims & Trinkets*}

*~Happy Wednesday~*

I got up bright and early...well kinda...here in Eureka its never really *bright*! I worked out with wii fit, did my favorite boxing and beat my previous score! I love wii fit! Then I took a super hot shower and sat down to sew with some Trader Joe's gingerbread coffee only to realize...

I HATE SEWING WHEN THERE IS A MESS AROUND ME!

I just can't focus! So I started cleaning and picking things up when I remembered that my mom had given me an awesome gift for Thanksgiving...this neat little pumpkin shaped creuset! I have an entire set of creusets, I'm extremely blessed in that aspect, but unfortunately, I've destroyed my kitchen cabinets with their weight, but thats a different story for a different time ;) So anyways! I grabbed all my ribbon and trim thats just been floating around my work space and rolled it up and stuck it in this little pumpkin! I love it! It's the brightest, warmest, most cheerful color and now its perched happily on my desk!

I'm worried that I'm starting to get a cold, so I think I'm going to take it easy this afternoon, I did serge 15 9.5 inch cores this morning, serged 5 more wetbags, just finished up another pad, I want to take it easy, but realistically I never take it easy, haha!!!

So here's my question for you friends!!! How do you store you yarns and trims? I think I might clear off  a shelf and wind all my yarn into cakes, clean out my magazines, etc and would love to hear some ideas!!!!

Have an *amazing* Wednesday!!

{*Home*}

Phew!!!! I went an entire WEEK without internet, blogging, email, etc.

AND IT WAS AMAZINGGGGGG!!!! I found myself getting a *ton* done! Granted, I was on vacation, so it was small things, two pairs of Maine Morning Mitts, a little needle book, some embroidery, lots of sketches and a business card holder! Yay!!!

Filckr is being kinda dumb right now, so I can't update :( BOO!!!

BUT! Instead! I'll share a ton of photos!

I met a bunny!!! My best friend Jenny owns him! His name is Buster! I want a bunny SO badly!!!

I've been knitting Maine Morning Mitts like it's been going out of STYLE! I love love love them! These are Lambs Pride Worsted! I bought two skeins at Websters in Ashland Oregon! While I was there, I got to talk to one of the women who works there and apparently its a really, really popular pattern and they'd just taught a class using it! Awesome!!!! Those brown ones are for Mr. McPorkchop, at some point this week I'll take a photo of them on. I also made a pair for myself in Malabrigo. I'm planning on making Mr. McPorkchop's dad a pair in Cascade for Christmas! Oh and can I also talk about how much I adore *short* double points?! They make knitting in the car so much easier!!!

 

Mr.McPorkchops family deep fried a turkey! I only had a tiny piece, as it was fried in a blend of oils including soy & peanut and I'm *lucky* (sarcasm) enough to be allergic to BOTH. We deep fried it in his families gorgeous orchard, I think they are all olive trees! It was a fun holiday! The next day we drove to Reno and visited Cabela's and some little shops in Grass Valley!

The weather was *GORGEOUS* during vacation! It was warm and cozy every day! I loved it!!! It was a little chilly in Ashland though! Isn't that orchard so pretty? His families home is stunning!

Ashland was simply amazing!!! We stayed at the Mt. Ashland Inn and it was just fantastic! It's a few miles down the road from the ski resort, so I'm hoping during Christmas they'll get some snow and we'll snowshoe the Pacific Crest Trail! The inn was simply gorgeous! They had a fanastic pup named Powder who loves to bring people on walks and chew sticks, I took so many cute photos of him! We had the most amazing hot tub in our room, it felt so nice to take a long soak and look out over the mountains!

We had a laughable experience at Callahan's, the food wasn't bad at all, although they gave me the wrong dessert..to go :(, but unfortunately the service was bad and our fellow diners were extremely rude, it wouldn't have been so bad but there was someone walking around, chatting up the customers and when she got to our table, apparently because we are "young", we got an extremely rude brush off, which was kinda a let down because the lodge looked *beautiful* and like a place that we'd love to spend a few nights at! Oh well! Mt. Ashland Inn it is! The inns owners were so lovely and kind, they had this great book about how the inn was built and all sorts of magazine clippings about it, it was neat seeing how the inn had been built and grown!

I also visited Prize, I wanted to take a few snapshots to show you how beautifully curated the shop is, but they don't allow photos, so instead, I'll share with you a cardinal ornament I bought!

Isn't it *cute!!!* I love it!

 I got to visit Green Tangerines!!! I ended up going the day before Thanksgiving on a total whim and accidently left my camera at home, but if you are ever, EVER in the area (Rocklin, CA) you gotta stop by! It's another shop thats well curated. I have a love/hate relationship with supply stores, sometimes they are so poorly set up that you just become overwhelmed and uninspired, but NOT this place! Everything was laid out *perfectly*, each little nook had cordinating papers, trinkets and trims, it was just amazing! I somehow managed to stay on budget in there, but believe me, it was difficult! They even had the coolest huge rooms for classes, I'm hoping during Christmas I'll be able to take a class! I normally don't gush about stores, but this place totally had me jazzed! Everyone who works there seemed really really friendly and extremely helpful. I love good customer service more than anything! One more thing that made me happy? They are across the street from Sportsman's Wearhouse, for Mr. McPorkchop & his dad were able to do guy stuff, while I spent time walking around being inspired, awesome! We finished off that afternoon with a trip to Lucille's BBQ which was really really good! I need to take some photos of the book I'm working on too!

So now I've been busily working for the past two days, getting back into my schedule! I'm going to be updating Etsy on Friday, I've also destashed a set of Christmas fabric and I still even have one pad in stock! I need to run out tonight for more printer ink and gocco bulbs.

I'm super far behind on etsy convos, googlereader, blogs, commenting, emails, everything, so bear with me :) I hope everyone had a simply *amazing* vacation!!! Hopefully I'll have more stuff to show you later on in the week :):):)

Have a fantastic Tuesday!
xoxo

{Oh!}

Phew! I've been curled up on my couch, under my favorite plaid blanket since 7 pm writing etsy listings and getting the shop ready for tomorrows update! For some reason listings take me FOREVER to write!!! I'm just slow and usually 99% of my listings still have some awkward typo or mistake, haha, it adds to the charm right? ;)

Can I tell you guys how much all your comments have meant to me?! I've tried to "publish" them and can't figure it out, I want to reply to them, is it "blogingly acceptable" to reply via email? Is it dorky that I want to hug every single one of you? Probably! Don't answer that!

 I keep getting the same question over and over and it cracks me up, so here goes:

• Who is Mr. McPorkchop and why is he called that?!!
• He's my beloved fiance and we aren't sure how he got the name, only that my BFF Jenny calls him that and its stuck! Haha!!! I love love love it! Mr. McPorkchops real name is Eric, but Porkchop for short! He refers to me as Mrs. McPorkchop, but I yell "HEY MISTER! WE ARENT MARRIED YET! SO IT'S MS.!!!! See? We are awkward!

I can't believe is almost FRIDAY!!! Tomorrow I'm dying my hair to cover the grey (tmi!) and Saturday I'm getting my eyebrows waxed (tmix2)! How exciting, hahaha! We are going to spend the weekend cleaning and packing for our trip! I can'ttt waiiiitttttt!!!!!!!!!

So the other night I was out to dinner with Porkchop & my BFF Aric and the next thing I knew, I was going on and on and on about ROGER! ROGER THIS! ROGER THAT! OH WELL ROGER.....!

...ROGER IS A FREAKING FICTIONAL CHARACTER! On a TV SHOW! He's ANIMATED! Why on earth was I quoting him so much!? I really have no idea, it might be that we both are chubby, clumsy and adore pecan sandies.

Realistcally, I have no idea why I like him so much, I think it might have to do with his body shape and how his animators have him moving around the screen. Either way, he's on one of the best/worst tv shows, American Dad! I feel like right now is a good time to point out that t.v. wise, I'm clueless, I rarely watch tv, as Mr. McPorkchop & I only use ours for wii and I'd rather read. I've always chosen reading over tv, but lately I've discovered the joys of tv watching online and Mr.McPorkchop really likes this show, so one evening he was watching it and I GOT SUCKED IN!!! *Notice that I feel rather uncomfortable that with all the shows out there, this one sucked me in...go figure*

ANYWAYS! Geez! Enough back story!

I LIKE ROGER! A LOT! I also like learning new things, so with the help of this fantastic website I taught myself how to EMBROIDER!!!! EEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!

And when you combine the two things...you get...

ROGER EMBROIDERED!!!! Hahahaha!!!! Ignore the little blue lines, its fabric marker that has yet to disappear! I FREAKING LOVE LOVE LOVE HIM!!!!

He's stitched on an organic linen/cotton blend and I used DMC floss and totally the wrong needle, so I have a charming bruised index finger, but it is *so* worth it! I think I'm going to google how to frame embroideries and hang him in my kitchen. Seriously, look at his feet! HILARIOUS!!!

I'm now deciding that everyone in my life is getting something embroidered and framed for Christmas because thats fun and amazing all at once!

Want to see something else thats fun and amazing? MAC Cosmetics and Hello Kitty are teaming up and releasing a collection! I'm pretty jazzed about that!

Ok! Geez! It's getting late and I'm getting up at 6 to sew more! I hope you are having a fantastic Thursday night!!! Thanks again for all your comments!!!!

I freaking LOVE TODAY!!!!!!

I've done a ton of stuff and had a gingersnap latte to go with it! PERFECT! It's also slightly overcast and cozy in here, although I need wool socks and I'm too cozy to get up and get them!

Can I just tell you how much I love Purl Soho? There was a tiny mistake in my order, I emailed them, they got RIGHT back to me, are shipping me the correct fabric and let me keep the incorrect fabric! Freaking AWESOME! It totally doesn't surprise me that they are as popular as they are! Once I get good customer service, I'm a customer for LIFE! I can't handle spending money at places that could care less if I buy from them or not!

OK! SO! You'll notice I added some stuff to my sidebar, some cloth menstrual pad photos and my new art kit photos! Want to see what I made today?

I made a pouch for my Polaroid Pogo!!!!! I freaking LOVE LOVE LOVE IT!!!! It's the neatest little printer EVER, so of course, it needed a pouch!

 

So this is my second attempt at anything with BATTING! I used warm and natural and it went well. Except I decided to get all FANCY. I took off my presser foot, lowered my feed dogs and used some odd feature on my Pfaff that claims to keep tension when you free motion quilt, although I somehow forgot that I actually have a quilting foot, but whatever.

I made circles. I have a thing for circles. I love love them! I also love this fabric! Both fabrics are from Cicada Studio which I super love, I had originally bought a lot of her fabrics with the intention of making pads, only to realize the fabrics aren't suitable for projects that require frequent laundering, oops, so needless to say, not pad fabric, but either way  the fox fabric has my name on it!!!! Super, SUPER, SUPERRR cute stuff from her etsy shop!!!!

ANYWAYS! So I quilted little circles to the fabrics, then simply serged them together using chain chomp! I'm going to put a snap on it when Mr. McPorkchop gets home! And that cute loop? Yeah!! I love love love it, its from Retrosaria!!!! I got a bunch of ribbon yesterday in the mail, so I'll leave you with a photo of that prettyness!

 

{*Monday Again?!*}

Seriously? It's Monday? November 17th? Are you sure?

l guess thats what happens when suddenly your on your own schedule! Suddenly days fly by with lightening speed!

So many fantastic and exciting things have happened and I want to share them all but I have no idea where to begin!

FIRST! A big huge hug and a huge thank you to Karen! Karen is the amazing writer who interviewed me a few days ago, she's seriously fantastic! She has completely inspired me to start embroidering again in fact! I even went and bought this little pattern!

ANYWAYS! Back to Karen! She has an amazing blog, called memyselfandkai and she posted a super great interview with me! I was debating copying and pasting it here, but I really want you guys to meet her! She's great! Seriously sweet, sweet person!!!

The odd thing about being on your own schedule is time. I'm always running out of it. No matter how much time I have, its never, ever enough. This weekend I made 14 pads and I still worry its not enough! I got 22!!! new fabrics from Purl this afternoon, which made me so so so happy! I spent an hour serging all of them so when I wash them tomorrow they won't unravel. I just want you all to come over so I can show you them and so you can hear the plans I have for them!

I've also kinda gotten into scrapbooking. I'm kinda meh about that term, I really love paper and building things, so maybe they are more books I've built, rather than scrapbooks, for example, I'm INSANELY inspired by this post, maybe I just have an old ladies idea of scrapbooking? EITHER WAY! I bought a bunch of the new life at the pole papers and I seriously want to poke my eyes out and die from the cute AND!! scrapbooking stuff (at least for me) is very budget friendly, hello $1 for paper, I can spend $10 and get a ton of great stuff and not feel guilty!!! SWEETTTTTT!!!! Granted, I don't have the paper yet, they are being shipped to Mr.McPorkchops dads becauseeeee

NEXT MONDAY WE ARE GOING ON VACATIONNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNN!!!!!!!

HOLY MOLY!!!! I got an early Christmas gift from Mr. McPorkchop, its called a Polaroid PoGo! It prints via bluetooth, which is super neat and makes the CUTEST prints EVER! EVER!!!! So I'm leaving my laptop home, my sewing machine home and instead I'm arming myself with my moleskine, my favorite pens my camera and a whole slew of paper and embroidery thread for the week! We are staying a freaking LODGE in the middle of a MOUNTAIN that is kinda sorta part of the CUTEST TOWN EVER!

We are spending the night in Ashland Oregon, its going to be AMAZING! We've booked a room at the Mt. Ashland Inn! I'm planning on hitting up Prize and Web sters!!! Yarn & TRINKETS!!! EEE!!!! Can anyone suggest a great place to eat in Ashland? I don't know how to publish and reply back to comments yet, but I'd appreciate any suggestions on places to eat :):):)

The idea of having a week off is incredible to me. I'm thinking by the time I get home I'll be itching to sew! That means this week I'm going to bust my buttom to get the shop fully stocked for Friday!

Oh! You know what else I'm looking forward too? Wednesday! Because I'm determined to get a hand made pine cone!!!! Seriously!!! I also like how firm she is with her site, its direct and to the point, I'd be willing to bet she doesn't get grumpy messages from people!!!! >:)

OH! Ok! LIST!
I've:
discovered and bought my first glue gun
of course I bought GLITTER GLUE STICKS
cleaned out my makeup stash and had enough money to make a double payment on my credit card
discovered the greatest $8 tank tops at Target
read Martha Stewarts Christmas issue from front to back. 6 times. easily.
lusted after these but refuse to break my budget over them!
been making plans to visit Green Tangerines

okok! Off to make my nightly list of things to accomplish tomorrow!

Have a great Tuesday!

{*~Good Evening~*}

holy smokes! I can't believe its already Wednesday! Where on earth is time flying too???? I'm leaving for Ashland & Thanksgiving in 11 DAYS!!!! EEE!!! I can't WAIT!!!! I hope it snows, hahaha.

I'm currently taking a sick day. I've already slept on the couch for a good 15 minutes. And read half a book. And chatted with my post man. And mailed off packages. And responded to etsy convos.

Ahh, etsy convos. Etsy convos both bring joy and sadness into my days, hahaha! Some are fantastic like "I love your pads, you are great!", others are normal "Do you take custom orders" (no!), others are QUITE rude "Please stop making buttons and focus on more pads to make buying less stressful please" (what do I even SAY to that). I'm not really sure what it is about people, I think sometimes we are online so much that we become detached from the fact that there is actually a living! breathing! person on the other side of our message and we should be polite and kind to each other!

I did get TWO!!! requests for buttons today, YEAH! How fun is THAT? I totally wasn't even expecting it!!!

Button making is so so so fun to me, its very relaxing and stress reducing all at once, its quick and your thumbs hurt afterwards, but its GREAT!:
cutting fabric in a circle: relaxing
pushing fabric in the button mold: stress reducing
popping the finished button out: relaxing AND joyous!!!!

Last night, after coming home from watching the Elk shake rain off themselves, turn into fluff balls and rub off their velvet, I sank into the couch with some AMAZING alpaca from Mr. McPorkchop! I'm working on something called a Fidget which has been perfect, its interesting enough to keep me entertained, was fast enough to keep me satisfied (just needs four more rows and its ready to be blocked) and is cute enough that I'll wear it constantly, plus of course, it was gift yarn from Mr. McPorkchop. I'm already trying to decide what sort of buttons I'll put on it! And I'm trying to determine the best way to block this, I don't think I've ever blocked alpaca before!.

This morning started really really productive, wipe sets were cut out with my NEW rotary blade (seriously, change your blades! often!), cores were serged and drawings were being finalized for spoonflower and I decided, ok! I'm done! I have cramps! I'm taking a day off. And crashed. On the floor. Then realized I was laying next to a pin and thought the couch would be a better idea. So I grabbed my favorite blankets and heating pad and relaxed. I also had a craving for a hamburger, but that wish might be fullfilled this evening at Lost Coast Brewery

I got some fantastic mail today, lots of magazines, catalogs and a POUND OF CEDAR CHIPS!!!! So then I dragged my butt off the couch and into the kitchen where I became a bit of a scentologist and began the workings of my next project, which will hopefully be in the shop by next Sunday! Bwuahaha! I love secrets!!!!

Ok, so does anyone else wish you could just get Etsy gift certificates for Christmas? I swear, I keep adding more and more stuff I love to my hearts! I think I might just send an email to my mom and porkchop and say HERE! I LOVE THIS PRINT! AND THIS TRINKET! Thats all I want. Porkchop & I are making each other gifts this year and I'm working on something for my mom and fabric that I bought for a gift for Porkchops dad came today...geez. I need to get gift making!!! I am currently lusting after some gorgeous Japanese fabrics that were just posted Retrosaria. I'd love to buy them, but I *just* bought ribbon from her last week and it feels silly to order again when that hasn't arrived yet, haha! But that fabric...gorgeous!!!

Suddenly I'm falling asleep at the computer!

Have a fantastic Wednesday!!!

Yay for Buttons

Yay for buttons!!!! I've had the worst cramps all day, but of course, I can't sit still and take a day off, its just not in my nature! So I wrote out more etsy listings and sat down to cover buttons! Who doesn't love a cute covered button? There's still some in my shop! Earlier I realized I set the shipping up wrong, but now its ok :)

While people were shopping, I went out to pizza with Mr. McPorkchop, Aric & Ash, it was fantastic! We finished the night with a little Starbucks and wii! I ended up packaging all my US orders, but I don't know if we have mail service tomorrow? Either way, orders are all set and ready to be mailed! I love packaging, its my favorite part of the job, I recently got metallic pastry twine that I wrap the packages with, as well as some deco tape, awesome! I love getting pretty packages in the mail and I assume others do as well!

This week is going to be SO hectic but rewarding! Tomorrow is laundry day! I got my new sugar snap fabric in the mail and I used up almost all my washed organic fleece so I need to pre-shrink all that. Usually laundry day is also car drive with Mr. McPorkchop, so that should be fun! Then I'm going to come home and start serging! I'm going to serge 7, 10, 11 and 12 inch cores for pads! I'll also start cutting a new 8x8 inch wipe size! CAN'T WAIT! I'm SO excited for that! Hopefully I'll get my pound of cedar in the mail this week so I can start working on that project! As much as I LOVE sewing pads, sometimes I need little small projects to work on at the same time so I can stay happy and creative! 

I got a bunch of new magazines in the mail today, plus a new one from Borders! One of my goals on a day off is to go through all my magazines and make an inspiration book! I think the only ones I won't cut up will be Martha and Domino. I think I might share my favorite parts of the new magazines this week! Mr. McPorkchop also bought me a new book, I like a certain author who writes romance novels, but also writes under a pen name some romance-y crime novels, its total smut and terrible, but completely entertains me for a few hours, I keep trying to pace myself, other wise I'll read it all in one sitting!

Ok! It's late-ish! I need to get up early early early!!!!

Have a fantastic evening and I hope you had a nice Monday!!!

Phew!

This has been a whirl wind weekend! One of those times when you feel like you've accomplished everything. and nothing. ALL AT ONCE!

I ended up making 45 cloth multipurpose wipes. 45! 6x6 inch squares! Of SO MANY amazing fabrics! They'll be available on Etsy tomorrow night at 5 PM PST. I had originally wanted to update tonight, but I'm simply beat!

I made a really neat thing today, I'm honestly not even sure what to call it! Scrapbook? Assemblage? Art? Trinket? Ode to a Season? I've been really really into scrapbook stuff, not actually scrapbooking, but just the supplies and reading scrapbooking blogs. I've been making a little 4x6 card everyday documenting the year, some of them I post to flickr, some are too personal and I don't. Well today I used some coupons at Michaels and got some FANTASTIC Martha Stewart Christmas stuff!!!! AND! It was 30% off! AWESOME!!!! So then I started realizing I have all this awesome stuff, but was feeling really limited by a 4x6 space, sooooo then I remebered that I had an Ampersand Gessobord that I had watercolored on and wasn't jazzed about it and a new creation was born. You'll have to wait until tomorrow to see it! I got to use some Mr. Campy wood grained paper, some glitter card stock, a deer sticker..its truly...erm..unique.

I did have a small incident this evening however that has left me a little grumpy. I've designed a winter themed card, all is going well, I can feel my micron slowly dying, but I plug on, happy as a clam, drawing snow circles (I don't do flakes) and snow diamonds (because snow sparkles!) and I put in on my little blue gocco, expose the screen, coat the screen with the very last of my white ink and...no image. Well, wait, thats a lie, I think I got one tiny little snow bubble. Apparently gocco REALLY likes carbon and if you don't give it 100% of your carbon-y best, nope. No pretty image. Now I'm out of bulbs and ink! BOO! Thankfully theres a shop downtown that sells both and might be my next bike ride. Next door is a boutique that I have some paintings hanging in and I should maybe pop in and say HELLO!

I spent the evening last night cleaning up my sewing nook. I hung some tinsel, some fake snowflakes, some garland, I'm getting all jazzed up for winter. However, I'm a giant cheap skate and I've been romping around the house in smartwool leggings, my favorite reindeer red and white j.crew socks from like 3 winters ago, flannel pants, two tank tops, a teeshirt and a long sleeved teeshirt. I just can't justify turning on the heat. Mr. McPorkchop and I live in a house...kinda, its basically a studio but a stand alone structure, two rooms, our bathroom and shower are actually IN our bedroom, and then a front room, the front room is fantastic, its alllll windows, BUT, the building was built in 1920 and still has some of the original windows and the HEATER. OH boy. It's directly in front of the front door! So even when its on, you never feel it!!! So instead, I layer. I'm a fan of layering. ANYWAYS! So I'm re-organizing my sewing nook, I realized I have over 200 spools of thread. I have two thread racks that are filled and an entire drawer filled with backups. I think I own every color gutermann makes! I'm like a kid in a candy store when thread goes on sale at JoAnns! I just got a new sewing machine, which I love and its why I started to clean up, I only have like, 12 bobbins for it and I realized I accidently threw one away in a tangled thread mess, so cleaning simply had to happen in order for progress to be made. Bobbins for my machine can't be thrown away, my last machine the bobbins were $0.15, my new machine? $1.15 each. BOO! They are fancy Pfaff only and are blue and apparently speak to the machine in some language of weirdness to let me know BOBBIN IS GOING LOW! BEEP! BOBBIN IS GOING LOW! Mr. McPorkchop and I are going on vacation in a few weeks and spending a night in Ashland, OR and thankfully, in Medford theres a Pfaff dealer, so I'm stocking up on bobbins!

I'm rambling! It's time to curl up on the couch with a new book, my heating pad and my Mr. McPorkchop! I can't figure out how to post comments you've left or reply to them, so...erm... thanks everyone for your comments!!!!

Have a nice Sunday night!!!

P.S. I almost forgot! Are there any Nintendo fans out there? I named my serger this weekend!!! His name is now Chain Chomp!!!!! Bwuahahahahahahahaah!!!

TGIF!!!

Phew! What an insanely long long long day! I got so much accomplished, but now I'm BEAT!

• Got up @ 6am
• Attempted to decorate the kitchen for winter, only to almost fall off a chair because the swag I was hanging was wayyyyyy too heavy, I'll be switching it out for tinsel.
• Moved over to sewing nook and added snowflake garland!
• Packaged up international orders
• Balanced checkbook (boo to budgets!!! BOO!!!!)
• Made 90 lists, ok, maybe not 90. I'm a list maker. I have an entire moleskine dedicated to daily lists.
• Replied back to Etsy convos, starred things on googlereader, made a list of emails that I need to reply to tomorrow morning.
• Worked on more cloth wipes! These are SO addictive to make! Tomorrow I'm buying a new size quilting square so I can go one size larger! YEEEHAW!
• Had to return my keys to school and take my stuff out of printmaking. I really really wish school could have worked out for me, but its totally the wrong time in my life and I've been in school for 8 years now. I'm just done and want to spend time just being me and building stuff! I have been dreading this day all week, so of course, my stomach was flaring.
• Had lunch with Porkchop & my two BFFS, Lizzie & Aric. Seriously, just one afternoon with them, eating lunch and listening to Van Halen @APD makes everything better
• Went to the post office, mailed out intl. orders, bought...NUTCRACKER STAMPS! AMAZING!
• Did laundry!
• Came home and worked on more wipes
• Answered more Etsy convos
• Bought a lb of cedar chips off Etsy, plus some Sugar Snap!!! I can't WAIT to make pads from that!
• I got all jazzed to go to JoAnns tonight, my friend Christin gave me an awesome email coupon and I was planning on buying thread, linen and rotary blades. I got all the way there and realized the sale doesn't start until tomorrow! EEP! So I'll ride my bike there in the am before all the crazies get there. I've learned riding my bike is helping with my budget, I can only cram so much stuff in my basket ;)

Now I'm cutting more wipes. I feel bad but I'm not going to be updating very many pads on Sunday. Right now its painful to sit very long, so wipes are kinda faster and easier to fix if I make a mistake. Have you ever tried to seam rip fancy machine embroidery out? Let me tell you, its NOT fun!!!!

After I cut more tonight I might gocco my Christmas cards! I don't know why but I'm so intimidated by making cards and putting that part of myself out there. With pads, its easy, if no one buys them, its ok, but thankfully I've been really really lucky to be successful, but if prints/cards/paintings don't sell, I feel like it would hurt me more since I've spent the last 8 years sucked into the art world. But then again, I did drop out of school to have the freedom to create whatever makes me happy, so I just need to gather a little more courage and bite the bullet, even if others don't like them, I'm sure I'll be jazzed by them!

I also sat down for an hour today and sketched out an idea for a tattoo that I'd like on my forearm. I think once I have my forearm done I'll have a full sleeve, but then again, I'm not sure how to handle the elbow area, so maybe my arm will be really big tattoos and not a sleeve..haha!!! It's going to be sewing/knitting/painting/creating related and I'm going to get the Shooter Jennings lyric "It Ain't Easy" in beautiful old script. I adore Shooter and met him this summer, which was magical and hilarious! It's kinda my motto in life right now, it ain't easy, but we all get by somehow. It also is an amazing song about his dad and it's really helped me cope with losing my dad.

Ok! off to finish cutting and ironing! Have a fantastic Friday!!!!

2-3 pm kills me!

Around 2-3 pm each day I start to feel so so so sleepy. I could just fall right over and nap this very second! I'm honestly not sure why, hormones? case of the sleepies? not resting well at night? pushing myself too hard? Who knows! But around 5-6, I perk back up, ready to build more stuff!

It's hard being your own boss, on one hand there's this great freedom, I could go for a bike ride whatever I'd like, but on the other hand, I need to be able to you know..eat, haha. So it's this balance that I'm still trying to work out, when its ok to take it easy and when its ok to push myself. I realize some days that I don't even eat any food until around 5:30-6! That's not good! So today I made myself a giant salad, spinach chicken, cranberries, feta, walnuts, dried pumpkin seeds, spinach and organic baby micro greens, all with larrupin sauce, YUM! I expected I'd have energy, but nope, its the same 2-3 pm slump!

HOWEVER! I recently gave up caffeine. I get anxious and nervous really easy and sometimes after I have a soda, I can't calm down, so out with caffeine, BUT! BACK ON TRACK! If I wanted caffeine again, I'll admit it, I adore starbucks and I'd be using the starbucks gold card to get treats! It's so so so tempting, theres an amazing starbucks here in Eureka, its in biking distance from my house, it has a charming fireplace and its just so cozy. Most people here don't do anything corporate, so its nice to go to an empty starbucks with a book and just read and relax...with a peppermint mocha. I just adore peppermint mochas and rumor has it, the new red cups are out. I just adore the red cups too. Sucker for packaging? Yup! Thats me! Right here! ::waves hands wildly:: Not ashamed of it!

This is my second week of being my own boss and not being a student. It's been a pretty neat week, I'm going to start making cloth wipes. It's amazing how someone who loves great packaging can also be interested in eco friendly goods, I know its a wonky idea, but it works for me, so I'm going with it. The cloth wipes are fantastic, during the summer I had a nasty sinus infection and was going through massive amounts of tissues (tmi? yes!) so I sat down at my serger and made some halloween/autumn/seasonal nose wipes, one side 100% cotton, one side hemp fleece, which is so so soft. Fast forward to now! I'm making them on the serger, but turning and top stiching them for more durability and using organic 100% cotton fleece for the backing and a little piece of organic cotton ric rac so they could be hung! I love that they can be used in a lot of areas, in the kitchen instead of paper napkins or paper towels, to wash dishes, in the shower as a face cloth, at the gym to wipe off yucky machines, they just are fantastic! I'm going to be updating my etsy shop with some sets on Sunday night. The fabric in the photo is an unreleased collection by Moda called "Arcadia", I believe it comes out in 2009, its SO beautiful!

I've been quite addicted to google reader lately, its truly fantastic! I can save posts, share posts with notes to friends, its just an awesome service!

Want to see some stuff I've recently fallen in love with?
Red & Grey & Cross Stitching! This blog is BEAUTIFUL!
Knowing that even Martha stays up late working on projects! Martha makes honey!!!
Poppytalks Greeting Card Post! This made me want to finally ride my bike to Old Town, buy some white gocco ink and make my "Let It Snow" greeting cards!
This incredible toadstool tutorial! I want to make a whole set of these for my mom for Christmas, she lovessss toadstools!

Do you know what else I love? BONES! This tv show makes me so so so happy! I just think its fantastic! Porkchop & I own a fancy pants flat screen small HDTV, but we only use it for wii, so instead I stalk Fox's website waiting for the new episodes to go online, dorky? yes. But it makes me happy!

Branches

I find inspiration all over the place. I think thats why I could never ever live in a big city, I'd just die of a sensory overload!

When I start to feel overloaded, I gather up my moleskine, my camera, Mr. McPorkchop & I'm off to roads less traveled. Sometimes we have a route planned, sometimes we don't, but it always involves exploring Northern California, Southern Oregon and sometimes even Nevada. I need those days of just sitting in the truck, spacing out and looking at things, occasionally jumping out to take a photo of something or save a snakes life, you know, the usush. The nice thing about being with a country boy is that he totally understands my need to photograph and collect things, we spent all day on Saturday driving through the woods, collecting sticks, fir needles, pine needles and moss for a new project I'm working on.

I recently made the decision to drop out of college and focus on following my heart, I've had a really really hard two years and currently have stomach ulcers and a whole slew of health stuff and I realized, I'm 26, I shouldn't have ANY OF THIS. It has been amazing and scary all at once. Learning to budget money is tough, but being able to work at my on my own projects, at my own speed, is so so so worth it. Thankfully, cross my fingers, I run a successful home business, so it's not as if I'm just off in the world without anything to hold on to, but its fantastic to watch that grow and grow!

I've really really been enjoying the freedom to paint, whenever and whatever, I totally adore watercolor and its such a fast medium to play around with and I've been playing around with print gocco as well..I also just got some felt in the mail today, so so so exciting!!!!

ok! I'm hoping if I keep writing I'll have something better to say, in my other blog I'm much more eloquent, but I'm having a hard time with this one...

Testing?! TESTING! IS THIS THING ON!?

Hello! HELLO!

Here I am!

I'm trying blogging again. It might be fun or I might be dreadful at it. Either way, the time is right and atmosphere is prime!!!

How are you?