New buttons on Etsy.

And new buttons at Polka Dot Creations.

And lots of fog out the window.

It’s been a day of catching up. I only got half of the orders out today (*sigh*) but the rest will definitely be done by tomorrow. Some batches just take longer than others. This particular one was about twice the size as usual, with a large percentage of international orders. Shipping globally is more time-consuming than shipping locally.

Of course, the kicker is that once I get these out tomorrow, it will already be time to get the next batch ready to go, if I don’t want to fall behind again. And I don’t.

Ah, it’s almost time for the school bus to get here and another evening to begin. Off I go to await my firstborn’s arrival home.

Whoa, almost forgot my little bit for 30 Days of Thankfulness…  Today I am thankful not to be a deer.  The hunt is on this week at the Great Swamp, and I woke up to the sound of shots being fired.  Just heard another one a few seconds ago, too.  So, I’m glad I’m not a deer and that nobody is stalking me with a rifle at the moment.

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We’re huntin’ wabbits!

Actually, not rabbits. We were looking for a raccoon. We’d seen him sitting in the driveway, watching us walk down the path towards him on our way to the garage. As we got closer carrying our bags of garbage and recycling, he toddled off towards the back yard. I put the bags in the cans in the garage, ran inside to get my camera, gave Eamonn a little direction regarding appropriate behavior around wild raccoons, and set off to see if we could snap a picture of the big guy.

We couldn’t. Never did find him again. But I got this lovely shot of the back of Eamonn’s head, and his nibble-worthy little neck, as we made our way back to the front door.

It’s been a busy day so far of observing a flock of migrating blackbirds, dropping Aidan off at school, locating a napkin basket, finally changing a hard-to-reach light bulb, cleaning the kitchen, raccoon hunting, cleaning the living room, picking items to be shipped, sitting in on one of Aidan’s classes for American Education Week, sharing lunch with Mom & Eamonn, and picking the rest of the items to be shipped. Were it not for the school-related distraction in the middle of the day, I’d probably have gotten at least the Priority Mail packages on their way today. Unfortunately, though, I’ve missed the mail pickup at this point. Which is why I have time to be blogging right now. If there still existed a chance of getting these packages in the mail today, I’d be hunkering down, stuffing envelopes and boxes with wild abandon. I get a momentary reprieve, but I guess I know how I’ll be spending my night!

Today I am thankful that I have a mother who is willing and able to come over and watch Stuart Little with Eamonn when I have “no younger siblings allowed” events to attend for Aidan. Thanks, Mom

[Edited to add: I forgot to mention what I did here last night.  I enabled gravatars in the comments.  If you don’t have one, you are represented by a big pink dot.  If you don’t want to be a dot, get yourself a gravatar.  They’ll work on any site that uses them.]

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So the lawn guys were here today cleaning up two weeks-worth of leaves. They did a great job on the lawn, the sidewalk and the driveway. And speaking of the driveway, guess where most of the driveway leaves got blown? Yeah, oh so conveniently onto the car. And up against the garage door. Neil was so amused he snapped a few pictures.

Amusingly enough, the head of the lawn guys lives next door, and when he looked out the window and saw what our car looked like, he came over and fixed it. And probably had a “discussion” with one of his employees. Heh.

I’ve got a bunch of new magazines in stock and covers to scan, but there’s a child sleeping in the same room as the scanner tonight - I had to separate the two little chatterboxes, or they’d never go to sleep. Guess I’ll just flip through the magazines and make note of the polymer clay articles for now and scan the covers another day.

Tomorrow is going to be dominated by Halloween-related activities. Man, I wish I liked this holiday. At least I have a snazzy new skirt to wear. I think maybe I need a fun skirt like this for every holiday…

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’cause I’m kinda in the mood for a weekend. A crafty weekend. I know I left the “Evolution of a Color Scheme” posts hanging, but there is more to come. The next installment is already written, and I hope to get my hands on the clay for some color mixing within the next few days. With luck, I’ll wrap up the series within a week or so.  And I really hope the color scheme doesn’t tank.  That would kind of stink after all of the buildup, now wouldn’t it??

I got a call right before supper that made me think I am probably going to be invited to a baby shower soon, so while the pizza was in the oven, I cut out the fabric for three coordinating bibs, like the ones I made before. I’ve been wanting to make more, because they are a lot of fun, but I haven’t really had a good reason to do it. I used the pattern & instructions from Bend the Rules Sewing. Love that book. I need to see if there are any restrictions written in the book about selling the things you make from the patterns. It would be cool if I could whip up a stack of bibs, give some away, and sell others in my Etsy shop.

I made this yesterday, after I posted about the pillowcase skirt & table runner. [as an aside, it cracks me up how many of you are wondering now if you can fit into a pillowcase!] I’m not sure what I think of it. It’s my “fly by the seat of my pants, use whatever scraps I have left from napkin-making and add a matching clay button, fall apron”   I’d have been happier with a pocket that wasn’t stripey, but my leftovers in that collection are running low.

It looks like all I’ve done for two days is sew, but that’s really not true - I am just a fast worker.  In fact, if you read the crafter profiles in Bend The Rules Sewing, I am a classic Speed Demon if ever there was one! The bibs and the apron each took me less than an hour to do, and I stitched away at the dining room table after supper, while the kids played and did homework nearby.  As much as I would love to have a studio or craft room of my own, I think I’d miss a lot if I hid away in there any time I wanted to do a project.  It’s nice to be a part of the family life while I indulge my muse.

After tucking the boys in tonight I packed a huge batch of orders, most of them for the very excellent Millefiori Story.  I still have to charge the credit cards and print the postage, but I’m saving that for tomorrow.  I really preferred the idea of showing you my matching bib set to spending half an hour with the touch-tone phone punching in credit card numbers.  Yawn.

Speaking of yawning, it’s 11:25 pm and my dear husband wants to know if I’m going to “blog myself into oblivion” before crawling up to bed.  Guess that’s my cue to log off, eh?

One day closer to the weekend!

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As you may know, I’ve been up to my eyeballs in so much stuff this week, but I needed some moments of brainless activity to help keep me sane.  Sewing a series of straight lines is brainless enough for me, so I worked on my non-seasonal everyday napkins.  I did a few every day this week and finished up the last of them this morning.  I really like them - they go nicely with the navy blue and white color scheme in my kitchen.  These are all patterns from Susan Branch’s Martha’s Vineyard Watercolor collection.  I already had the navy blue fireworks and the white/navy toile patterns, which I had made 4 napkins and an apron out of a while back, but I wanted more (in quantity and in variety).  I’m so happy with the way they came out!

I’m less happy with the success rate of my brainless activity at keeping me sane…  I spaced-out on two commitments today.  It’s bad enough to forget one thing, but two?  At 1:30 today I remembered Aidan was supposed to go to a birthday party from 12:00-2:00.  He missed it.  And at 2:30 today, as I was driving to the store to buy orange thread for my next napkin project, I remembered I had committed to making pumpkin bread for the MOMS Club bake sale at our town’s street fair this weekend.  The bread was to be dropped off at 4:00 today.  Needless to say I blew it there, too.

I am feeling so overwhelmed this weekend with things that I have to do and things that I want to do, and things that I don’t really have to do, but feel like I should do.  Normally, I am the queen of lists, but I haven’t written any of this down.   Maybe that’s why I feel so much like I am juggling - and why I keep dropping the ball.

It’s already 11:00 and I still have three important things to accomplish business-wise before I hit the sack.  It’s Saturday Night, for crying out loud.   I should be sitting on the couch with my sweetie watching almost-unwatchable comedy together and maybe sharing some pumpkin biscotti (a treat I haven’t made but really wish I did today).  I should not be answering email, processing orders, or planning what to bring to tomorrow’s guild meeting.

Executive decision time:

• I’ll process the orders that are necessary for tomorrow’s meeting.
• I’ll just bring an armload of Judy Belcher’s new DVD with me to the meeting and not worry about any other titles.
• Answering email can wait until tomorrow.

There.  Thanks for being here while I brain-dumped.  I feel a little better now.   I’d feel a lot better if I had a pumpkin biscotti to munch on, though

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My creepy, larger-than-life podcasting pose, at that. No, I haven’t started a podcast. I love to listen to them, but I can’t imagine my place being at the helm of one. So what’s with the headset, then? This was me two weeks ago, when I was chatting with Ilysa Bierer and Kira Slye of Polymer Clay Productions. It was an honor to be interviewed, and if you are reading this, Ilysa & Kira, I thank you! (And I promise to get that headset back to you as soon as I can find three minutes to dig up a box!)

If you’re interested in listening to the interview, you can check it out here.

You know how you always can come up with better ways to say things after a conversation is over? Well, maybe you don’t, but I am intimately familiar with that feeling. After playing the podcast and hearing myself speak, I realized that I didn’t say too much to embarrass myself, which is a really nice realization to have But I do think that maybe I trivialized my book store a bit. It really is a lot more than just a way to “pay for my clay so I can play.” Like many polymer clay enthusiasts, I have a serious affliction when it comes to new books, videos, and anything that gives me the opportunity to see what people are making. It’s an exciting feeling to see the UPS truck pulling in the driveway when I know some new book is on the way. I’ve been known to squeal and jump up and down in the living room, which may not be dignified behavior, but who cares?! Besides my obvious love for the products I sell, I really enjoy the connections I’ve made in the community as a result of having this business. Given how much I love seeing new books & videos come in, is it any surprise that I get excited to share them? I know I have complained long and hard about packing orders around here, but if there is one bright spot, one shining beacon of enjoyableness in that task, it is that I know I am sending a little package of inspiration someone’s way.

I was asked what my business plans are for the future, and my feeling is that I will continue for as long as

• I have an interest in polymer clay and a need to create things with it
• The business can sustain itself financially (we could never survive on this, but so far it’s not costing us anything)
• I can run the business without negatively impacting my family life
• I am happy running it

So there’s my little addendum to the interview. Other than that, I am happy to let it stand as-is. Neil commented to me (in jest. I think…) that I made it sound like I neglect our children in the course of being crafty and having a business. Anyone who reads this blog knows, though, that once in a while I do dust the little darlings off, take them out and play with them No, if anything is getting neglected, it is the kitchen. And maybe the husband.

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Words of wisdom from Judy Belcher: “Even crap is beautiful tessellated.”  I love it.  Along with the rest of this new DVD.  Millefiori Story showed up yesterday and over the past two days I have watched the whole thing, from checkerboards to quilts to faces.  There are over two hours worth of caning techniques, starting with basic stripes, jellyrolls, and checkerboards and moving effortlessly into mica shift, extruded canes, and a discussion of the ubiquitous and essential Skinner Blend.  The second half of the DVD builds on previous concepts to create leaves & fruit, kaleidoscopic (tessellated) canes, clay quilts, and face canes.  Despite the fact that I’ve been caning for over a decade, I still had a few a-ha! moments watching Judy do her thing.  That’s the beauty of DVDs over books, I think.  Sometimes there are things to learn simply by seeing how an artist cranks clay through her pasta machine.  Everyone moves somewhat differently, and it’s the seemingly unimportant movements that define an artist’s technique and can help you refine your own.

There are nine millefiori lessons, and each lesson culminates in a project.  Jewelry, a clock, salt & pepper shakers, and a night light are among the offerings.  There is an extensive gallery (so extensive that I had to take a potty break in the middle ).  Image after image of Judy’s beautiful work is displayed, and each piece refers back to one of the projects on the DVD.  If you see something you like, you can go from the gallery directly to the relevant project and see how it’s made.  All PageSage DVDs have this feature, and I think it’s fantastic.  Actually, I love everything about PageSage DVDs.  They are professional, well-made, and take full advantage of the DVD format.

Millefiori is one of the most popular applications in polymer clay, and yet it has been hard for me to recommend learning tools when I am asked.  There are several caning videos out there, many of them very good, but aside from the excellent-but-10-years-old Millefiori Basics, they all focus on one particular type of cane.  This DVD is more than two hours full of techniques that will satisfy beginners and experienced caners alike.  I will not hesitate to recommend this DVD to anyone who asks.  In fact, at the risk of dooming myself to an extra several days of packing-and-shipping, I am going to be so bold as to say you really need to get this DVD now, if you have any interest in millefiori at all.

Or, you could wait - a little bird with the initials JB has offered to send me a signed copy that I was thinking would make a lovely little blog giveaway for one of you loyal readers… You’ll have to stay tuned for more on that.

If you’ve pre-ordered a copy, I will be shipping it out over the course of the next week.  I have more preorders for this title than ever before, so they will be going out in waves.  I’ll see if I can recruit a little help to speed up the process - as a clayhead myself, I know you get antsy waiting for your fix of new instructional materials

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Normally, that is not a phrase used to describe me, but it has been a busy day and will continue to be a busy night. Today I…

Went to the farm for apples, a cute little pumpkin and zinnias. I peppered my house with little containers full of flowers.  I took my picture for Self Portrait Thursday.

I de-fingerprinted some woodwork, straightened up the visible areas of the house, put on my apron, and made an apple crisp to share with my afternoon guests (mother, grandmother, aunt).

Eamonn and I entertained said guests with Netflix coupons and Where’s Waldo books. Perhaps my family is easily amused?

I ran errands, waited for buses, and got mail.

Tonight I get back to the order processing I started last night. It’s been much slower-going than it should be. Must. get. through. email! Am I, perhaps, in slow motion this week? I have 1589 unread feeds in my Google Reader, so it would seem that I am not wasting time in my traditional way… and yet, time is clearly passing me by.  Thursday. Already.  Wow.

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What a drag of a day it’s been. I spent most of it packing orders and they’re still sitting here! Normally it doesn’t take this long to get this many orders through my system, but today I had a few doozies that just didn’t go the normal route. One took me about an hour to deal with. Ugh. I’m glad I decided to do my packing on the floor in the family room today, because it allowed me to hang out with the little people. I caught a few episodes of Arthur that I haven’t seen before. I like that show. And Curious George. I love George. Seriously!

Anyway, I just have postage to print tomorrow morning and then off they go! Whoooosh!

Now on to more inspiring things. Like magazines…

The latest volume of Belle Armoire Jewelry is here, and wow, is it full of inspiration! There are no fewer than ten projects related to either polymer or metal clay. I love Patty Barnes‘ idea of making photo transfers from her grandmother’s china pattern and turning them into jewelry - genius! I’m really big on using old family photos in my work, but I love Patty’s idea because it’s more subtle. And sometimes, let’s face it, it’s just weird to wear somebody’s face on your person, no matter how much you might like them

I’m looking forward to spending more time with this magazine. Oh! and there’s more good news - starting in the Spring of 2008, Belle Armoire Jewelry will become a quarterly publication. That’s nifty: more great articles to read, and more opportunity to submit your own articles, if you’re so inclined.

Speaking of inspiring things to look at…

Fabric, footwear and clay, are all united by color. Isn’t it pretty? If you haven’t checked out the pool yet, you’ll want to go have a look. In addition to these, there are another 100 or so artsy aqua photos to get your creative juices flowing. And don’t forget - the last day to submit your artwork to the Polka Dot Creations Color Challenge for August is tomorrow, Saturday, August 25th! Sometime after that, I will choose my favorite nine entries (which will not be easy, I can tell already) and of those nine, a winner will be chosen randomly. Good luck!

And now for this week’s Flickr Favorites… I went a little crazy with them - I guess I was just inspired by a lot of things! Several old cars and a plethora of food this time around. Why so much food? Must have something to do with my effort to cut back on the snacking this week Click on this image and take a look at some of these great photos up close.

So glad the weekend is here - this week has been frustrating weather-wise and business-wise and housekeeping-wise, and I’m really looking forward to shaking the funk I’ve developed and having a nice, creative weekend!

Lisa

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I wish I had something creative to share, like images of the beads from Dan Cormier’s class (back in JUNE!) that I’ve been planning to sand, but haven’t. Or the half-finished necklaces that I made to go with Alexander Henry’s Birdseed fabric, which can’t be completed until my jump rings get here from Fire Mountain Gems. Or the other two quilt tops I haven’t yet put together. Or an actual quilted piece. Or, heck, it might be nice to tell you all about the new issue of Belle Armoire Jewelry that arrived here yesterday and whose cover I have yet to scan.

But the truth of the matter is that I spent the morning food shopping and the afternoon staring at a computer screen while my kids watched The Santa Clause [yes, they know it’s August]. We had a brief walk outside when I started to feel like we hadn’t had any fresh air in days. It has been raining for almost a week. And when it’s not raining, it looks like it will at any moment. It’s starting to bug me.

And now I am putting off printing the paperwork that will direct my order-packing tonight. When I started posting, I was alone in this room, listening to my new Crowded House CD, feeling peaceful. Since then, both kids have come in here, and now one of them is playing a computer game and the other is acting out a scene from some show he made up. They’re competing with my music. And my peaceful feeling for that matter. Too many things happening at once in here! And I suppose that’s my cue to stop trying to write and start the brainless activity of printing and packing

Lisa

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In the Encyclopedia of Me, D is for Dr. Pepper - the only Doctor I’d willingly visit every day…  And that’s really all I need to say about that, isn’t it?  Mmmmmm.

I have been a walking ball of stress all day.  I slept poorly last night, which I’m sure didn’t help, and when I got up this morning, the one task I really needed to finish all day just seemed daunting.  As any regular reader here knows, I hurt myself a week ago and couldn’t pack/ship orders.  I’m fine now, perfectly capable of getting the orders done, but it took so long that I ended up with twice the number of packages that I am usually able to do in one sitting.  And I needed to get them done before mail pickup at 11:30-ish.  Yeah.  Right.

I didn’t make it.  I got all of the Priority Mail packages done by around 2:00 and the boys and I dragged them to the post office ourselves, so at least those are out.  When we got home, we took a little Pepper Milk break (son #1’s invention - half milk, half Dr. Pepper - the boys love it, but I like my Dr. Pepper unadulterated, thankyouverymuch), followed by a Roll Around on the Bed Tickling and Giggling break,  and then son #1 decided to help me get the rest of the orders packed up.  What a good kid.  All of the First Class and Media Mail envelopes are stuffed now, and all that remains is for me to charge credit cards and print/apply postage.  Whew.  I feel relieved.  I’m going to feel even more relieved when I place that last label on that last package and drag it to the front door, though

Anyway, I am feeling somewhat better now.  In part, because the packing nightmare is nearly over, partly because it was fun taking 10 minutes to kid around with the kids, and partly because I got a little treasure in the mail today.

I have been admiring block party press‘ jewelry ever since I first noticed it on flickr.  In an earlier post, I alluded to a project I was having trouble completing.  When I saw the possibilities pendant, I knew exactly what I wanted.  I asked if she could make a few changes, and do it with an olive green background with a soft pink flower, and as you can see, she did!  Aren’t these beautiful?  I ordered the large bead, but she also sent me all of these extra goodies.  So sweet.  I can’t wait to finish my project and post a picture of it.  You’ve really got to check out her etsy shop - everything is even nicer in person, and I thought it was pretty great in the photos already

Neil’s working late tonight, and the kids are downstairs right now watching FarScape.  I think I’m going to join them and have a little sci-fi snuggle time on the couch before I have to make supper.  Looks like D is also for Decompression

Lisa

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</p> 1 ) Project Book:The CF Sculpture Series Cats Big and Small 2 ) Magazine:PolymerCAFE Summer 2007 3 ) Book:The Art of Polymer Clay Creative Surface Effects 4 ) Project Book: Creative Canes 5 ) Project Book: Tiny Babies Bestsellers for previous months (Bestsellers prior to May, 2007) Want to be notified instantly when this list changes? Click here to see how… *Sales figures for this calculation are based on items shipped.

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Is the universe trying to tell me something? Am I only supposed to get one batch of shipments out the door each week??

There’s been a cycle recently, and it goes like this:

1. Send out a batch of orders
2. Spend a week getting caught up in summer fun and crafty activities
3. Realize a week has gone by, panic, and get a HUGE batch of orders out the door
4. Become conscientious: immediately get ready to send out the next small batch that came in while I was working on the last batc, and vow to be a better businesswoman for the rest of the summer
5. BAM! Get smacked in the head with some affliction that makes it impossible to make good on #4

I’m seeing the pattern now. #5 is a punishment for #2. This time it’s my back. I have a really sore back, between my shoulder blades, but over to the right a bit. Movement is a problem. I could barely step into my shorts this morning, and putting deodorant under my left arm proved to be a challenge as well (note to Neil: when you get home tonight, try not to be downwind of my left side, since I plan to take the kids outside today and sweating is likely).There’s no way I can lug books up the stairs like this. I’ll have to just print out the paperwork so I’m ready to go as soon as my body wants to cooperate. I’m really starting to feel like I’m not “allowed” to do more than one shipping run per week this summer. Hey, I’m cool with fewer boring packing/shipping sessions, but letting the orders build up not only makes each shipping run really big and heavy, it kind of annoys the customers who have to wait.

On another topic, I have a giveaway I want to post about later today or tomorrow, so stay tuned. Here’s a hint: think floral.

Lisa

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I have been forgetting for the last few weeks to show you this! It’s apparently been making the rounds on the blog circuit, so you may already have seen it, and if you have, you have my permission to skip ahead to the next paragraph Neil took this picture at Readercon, of his colleague Mary’s computer. I wish I had seen it in person. She used stickers to create the look of a vintage typewriter. I love it! Now I’m looking at my own vanilla Dell Inspiron 600m and wondering what I can do to jazz it up. It never occurred to me to do anything to it before, but shouldn’t artsy people have artsy machines? It makes perfect sense to me… See Mary’s blog for more details on how this was accomplished.

Speaking of computers… I did a little geeking out in the last few days and made some enhancements to Polka Dot Creations. First up, a routine that will allow you to see what un-shipped orders you still have on file. It is available from the home page, or you can go directly to it here.

Secondly, I separated the book store into a system of “book shelves.” You can continue to shop the way you always have, or you can shop by shelf. For instance, if you interest today is in jump-starting your creativity, you might not want to wade through all of the polymer clay books to find something useful. Go directly to the Creativity shelf. I haven’t gotten too nuts with this - every book/video/etc. sits on only one shelf, which I choose based on the primary focus of the item. You can see a list of shelves here. My main reason for doing this is to allow me to stock things from time to time that don’t really have their basis in polymer clay. If I want to feature the occasional cookbook, I want to do it without getting in the way of the people who only use their ovens for curing their clay projects I found a way to order some of those books I was referring to recently, but I am hesitating. I don’t want to dilute the polymer clay focus of Polka Dot Creations. I think the changes I made today will be helpful towards that goal.

Oh, I was just about to sign off, but I’ve suddenly remembered the project I was working on last night! (That’s one chesty angle I managed to photograph myself at . Geez.) I wanted to make myself a tank top, but everything I’ve heard about commercial patterns is that you need to make modifications to them if you’re more than a B-cup. I don’t think I have enough expertise to attempt to modify a pattern I barely understand anyway, but I do think I’m just enough mathematically-inclined that I could build something from scratch that would accomodate my, uh, larger-than-B-cups. So, I did. And generally-speaking, I am pleased. I won’t be wearing it out in public for a few reasons, but for a first try, I’m really surprised at how well it turned out. So, what’s wrong with it?

For one thing, the pleats I put in the bust area are in a bad place. I need to move them more towards the sides. Also, the neckline and sleeve holes are not right. They look and feel odd. I need to copy the neckline of something I like. Additionally, I’d like the length to have another 2 inches or so. And lastly, I had intended for this to be all one fabric, but I didn’t have enough of anything. So, I used two coordinating patterns, and added a stripe in the front to help tie them together. I’m going to attempt this again, after I go fabric shopping, and I’m going to try to address all of these problems. Wish me luck!

I hope everyone had a great weekend! What’s on your personal to-do list for this week? Mine includes lighting a fire under my butt to actually get some real housework done. And I’d kind of like a hair cut, too

Lisa

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…and no one is home to hear it fall, does it still make a sound? I don’t actually know. All I can say is that

1. I’m glad it didn’t fall two days earlier when we were under it picking berries, and
2. I’m glad I decided to skip berry-picking last night and run out to buy the ever-important Pop Tarts and red thread (not to be used together).

We came home last night from our shopping trip to find that this tree had fallen in the back yard and then rolled down the hill as far as it could go. More pictures here, if you are interested.

Now, I have to say I am completely underwhelmed by the response to my Lisa Pavelka DVD giveaway. Did I make it sound really bad? I didn’t mean to. I suppose calling it a “glorified infomercial” does imply negative feelings. Poor choice of words, perhaps. I only meant to say that the low price tag can be explained by the product placement. The projects themselves are still pretty interesting, and a value for the money. Being that I am so generous of spirit (or, actually, because the guys who are going to do the drawing for me aren’t home at the moment ) I’m going to give you a little extra time to drop by that post, say hello, and get your name in the running.

I’ve got one more thing on my mind today. Book recommendations. As a small, independent bookseller, I struggle with presenting my recommendations for books I don’t sell. I’ve been so enthusiastic lately about some of the sewing books I’m reading, and a couple of cookbooks that are long-time favorites, and I want to provide links for you to learn about them and maybe pick up a copy for yourself. BUT. Where do I link to? Amazon is the logical choice, but frankly, they are my biggest competition in the polymer clay book world. Do I really want to send you over there? Not particularly. But at the same time, I’d be lying if I said I didn’t buy my non-clay books from them fairly frequently. So, it’s a dilemma. I don’t want to send any business to the evil empire, but I really want to provide links. Ideally, I’d make friends with another small, independent bookseller who carries these titles, but that hasn’t happened. I have toyed with the idea of selling these few favorite titles myself, but there are a couple of things holding me back:

1. I don’t have an established relationship with the publishers, and generally you don’t get much of a discount anyway buying a small handful of copies of a single title.
2. I wouldn’t want to confuse my customers by sticking cookbooks in among the clay books in my store.

I’ve got two possible ways to get around #2, but #1 is a sticky point. If anybody can recommend a good small book store that sells sewing and cooking titles, let me know. If they have my favorite books, I’ll link to them until I get it all figured out.

[edited to add: I found a way, and the books are now available at Polka Dot Creations]

Lisa

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Originally published at Polka Dot Creations. Please leave any comments there.

My UPS guy has been busy lately. Look what’s newly-arrived…

I wish I could spend all day tomorrow curled up on the couch popping bon-bons and losing myself in these new items, but I promised myself I would get another batch of orders out the door. Man, I wish everyone could come shopping in my basement and save me the trouble of shoving things in boxes.

I’m bleary-eyed and must drag myself into bed. But first… it has been brought to my attention that apparently I am favoring one child over another in terms of blog shots. (Yes, Neil, their father, went through all fifty of my entries and counted how many pictures of each son I have posted). So, in the interest of fairness (and because I kind of like the darn kid) I present son #1.

And now, despite the fact that I feel like chatting with you all about berries and fabric, I am off to bed!   I’ll save those things for tomorrow and try to  get my brain to rest as much as my body wants to

Lisa

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Originally published at Polka Dot Creations. Please leave any comments there.

Packing and shipping is just one tedious task after another…

1. Picking the items, 2. Packing the orders, 3. Charging credit cards, 4. Weighing the packages, 5. Printing shipping labels, 6. Affixing the labels, 7. Packing the mailbag, 8. Requesting a pickup, 9. Ready to be picked up!

Today’s load (which was somewhat larger than usual) took me nearly 3 hours, not including the time it took to get all of the shipping paperwork together (which I did last night), do the “Yay! I’m done and I made it in time for the mail pickup!” dance (which I did as soon as I dragged that insanely-heavy mail bag outside), and do the post-shipping processes including sending out shipping notices (which I’ll do later tonight).

I really dislike the whole shipping process, and if I could I would offload it to someone else. The best I’ve been able to do is hire son #1 for package weighing / label affixing duties and son #2 for mail bag loading duty. Frankly, that’s got more to do with giving them a sense of accomplishment and an understanding of working for your money than it does being a help to me. I usually end up re-packing son #2’s mail bag when he’s not looking, and son #1’s jobs, while well done, are anything but speedy

I can’t help but think, as I stuff yet another copy of Cats Big & Small into yet another #3 rigid envelope how much more satisfying it would be to be doing something creative instead… For the time being I have found some compromise - crafty podcasts. This morning I listened to Alison Lee chat with Celie Fago on CraftCast, and SisterDiane talk to Jeffrey Yamaguchi of 52 Projects on CraftyPod while I worked. I downloaded a whole pile of conversations from CraftCast, CraftSanity, and CraftyPod recently so that I could have something interesting going on while I work, and I still have plenty to get through. By the time I’m done, I’m sure there will be a nice new crop to download, and there are probably a few other good podcasts I haven’t even looked at yet

And now I have to go somehow pull dinner out of my, er, I mean, go prepare something nice to feed my family

Hope everyone has a nice weekend - I am sure mine will be a lot nicer, now that I don’t have all of those shipments hanging over my head!! Maybe I’ll get a chance to do something artsy that I can post about…

Lisa

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Originally published at Polka Dot Creations. Please leave any comments there.