Another completed project!!!

A few weeks ago, I went to a fiber store in another town. The kind I could just spend hours in. The kind that has all the lovely, expensive yarns and wools and silks. The kind where you walk around in a daze, touching, and ooo-ing and aah-ing.

I picked up a hank of Rayon Boucle' by Fiesta. I put it down again, saying to myself, "There is no way I am paying that!"

I picked it up.

I put it down.

Suffice to say, I did that multiple times. Finally, I walked out. So overwhelmed by all the possibilities that I bought nothing!

But that beautiful sapphire skein of rayon haunted me the rest of the afternoon. And thus I begged my hubby to swing back by the shop before we left town!

Here is what I made. Photos do not do it justice. Everyone who has seen it is amazed. I can't take credit. It is not a hard pattern, but this fiber is gorgeous! My teenage daughter keeps trying to sneak off with it!

And a close up of the fiber:

I did it! I did it! Hooray!!

Ack! Do I sound like Dora the Explorer???

I just wanted to announce that after a few weeks of self-induced exhile, I am back! I am happy to report that I actually have something to show for my time of absence from cyber-world. Presenting...

Blue Moon Artistry
...which is the new name of my business. You can find it at www.bluemoonartistry.com. Taa-daaa!

"Big deal," you may be saying. Well, for me it is! I am no idiot, but when it comes to site building, I confess great ignorance! Because I could not find a template I liked, I started with a blank page and built my own web-site from scratch. I learned some HTML so that I could have a shopping cart. I created several new pairs of hair sticks and earrings to build up some stock. I have also been working hard on some knitted items that will be added soon! Everything had to be photographed and described. Photos had to be cropped, resized, inserted. Yadda, yadda, yadda. Every one of those steps was a new skill that I had to learn (except for the actual crafting of items...that,I already knew!)

As best I can tell, everything on the site is working fine now. I have even had a few orders! Please, if you will, take a few minutes and look around www.bluemoonartistry.com and let me know what you think! Criticism is welcome too. I can take it as long as it isn't mean spirited!

Where is she???

Yes, I am still here. However, I have been hunkered down, desperately trying to get my website up and running for my little business. I will let you all know when it is ready to be unveiled. Until then, let's just say my esteem for web designers has grown by leaps and bounds and leave it at that!

Happy Birthday to...ME! (thoughts on turning 40)

Today is the dreaded day. The one everybody warns you about. Yep, it's the big 4-0! (Imagine, if you will, creepy music in the background and a piercing scream.)

All I want to know is this: How in the world did I get to be old??

Well, actually, I don't really think 40 is old. In fact 40 is quite young. I am in the prime of my life!

(Hey! I can hear you chuckling and saying to yourself, "She's in denial!")

But so many people seem to think that I am now ancient, over the hill, etc. Sure do wish we lived in a society that had more respect for the old and less obsession with the young and beautiful. It is really sad to see the extremes that people go to, especially women, to try to look younger than they are. They spend incredible amounts of money on cosmetics, color their hair, and have surgeons cut them up in desperate attempts to hang on to their youthful appearance.

Even I am brainwashed by this type of thinking. I can not tell you how very gratified I feel when someone says to me, "You don't look old enough to have 7 children!" I guess that deep down inside, I am just as vain as the next woman. I want others to see me as young and attractive.

But you know, the more I think about it, the more I think that there is a balance that God has built into the human race. Be really honest. How many of you would like to go back to being as stupid as you were when you were 18? Not me!! So you see, earlier on in life we get youth and outward beauty. As those begin to fade we gain (hopefully) wisdom and depth as a person (i.e. more inner beauty). The outer beauty fades as the inner beauty increases. It is only fair and just.

So I hope and pray that as this outer shell ages one more year, the inner me, the real me, will grow and mature and become a wiser, better person. Perhaps a stranger may look at me and see "old," but hopefully, those who know me will see "beautiful."

Breaking up is HARD to do!

Feel sorry for me. I have had a tough weekend!

Have you ever heard the saying, "Never go into business with friends or family"? Well, I guess that proverbs, adages, and old sayings become proverbs, adages and old sayings because there is some nugget of wisdom or truth contained in them.

My good friend and I both enjoy making hair sticks. So, we thought "Wouldn't it be great fun to start a small business together and sell our creations?" This weekend, I came to the conclusion that I was not having fun. (And to be quite honest, I don't think she was either!) Our relationship was morphing from a pleasant friendship full of banter and laughter to a business partnership in which we both drove the other half nuts! It was not her fault. It was not my fault.

I also realized that I was spending waaaaaay too much time thinking about the business, worrying about the business, trying to market the business, yada, yada, yada... I am a wife. I am a mother. I am a friend. I want to be a good wife. A good mother. A good friend.

It was not an easy decision to make. In fact, I walked around with a tornado in my gut for a day or two before finally doing what had to be done. It is hard to walk away from a project that you have spent countless hours and lots of hard work to develop. But it was the right thing to do. I know that it will take a LOT of stress off her back and mine.

So, on Saturday, I gracefully bowed out. I will keep the things I made, she will keep the things she made, the stuff we bought together we will split. She will keep the website since she was the one managing it anyway, and hopefully, I will still be able to place my creations in a local boutique that has been carrying our stuff.

We can go back to just being friends and having fun again.

Once the decision was made, I felt so relieved.

Then I began to think about all that I now have to do...

Essentially, I am back to square one. I have to decide exactly what it is I am going to do. I have to come up with a name. I have to get a web site. I have lost the customers and exposure that we worked hard to develop on the web. I have to develop a "look." I have to work on making more stuff...

Funny, for some strange reason, that tornado in my gut came right back!

On second thought, maybe you should feel sorry for my hubby and kids!

In praise of finished projects!

I know that I agonize over all the projects I have started and then sadly neglected. However, I do manage to finish a good many as well!

Check this out. It is my first ever knitted sweater made out of Lopi wool. I will confess that I worked for hours and hours and hours on it, got it done from the waistline all the way up to the shoulders and then proceeded to "frog" it and start all over again!

For those of you not in knitting/crocheting circles, "frogging" is what you do when you are not happy with how something it working out. It means to take hold of the yarn and unravel the work you have done. In other words, you rip it, rip it, rip it.