They boys had requested a weekend at a hotel. We couldn’t swing that, so we asked them to make a list of their favorite memories from previous hotel visits and worked at checking them off.

Hot chocolate. Check.

Staying up late on Saturday night to play games. Check.

And check.

Finding a shore town to do a little shopping for jellybeans and other trinkets. Check.

Walking on a boardwalk. Check.

Unexpectedly getting to play on the beach. Check.

And getting to see things we don’t see every day. Check.

Check.

And Check.

I think we did pretty well. And I suspect the happy boys, who are upstairs giggling in their beds when they should be sleeping, would agree.

There are more game night and beach photos on flickr.  And a peek at my newest skirt, if you are so inclined.   It was a nice time today and last night.  I hope you all had pleasant weekends as well!

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The boys and I are on our own today. When I asked them what they wanted to do, the answer was “go to Panera.” Really? Really. Sure you don’t want to go to the bagel place (read: Mommy is addicted to their fat free tuna on a very light everything bagel, please get bagels, please, please, pretty please)? Nope. Ok, then. So we went to Panera for lunch. I tried a Sierra Turkey Sandwich (well, half of one, really. I’m saving the other half for supper) which wasn’t as good as the now-defunct Tuscan Chicken Sandwich, but it’ll do.

From there we walked to Path Mark, a supermarket I don’t particularly care for, which is redeemed only by the DVD vending machine they have. For $1 you can rent a movie until noon the next day, which I think is a bargain and very handy for those weekends when all of the Netflix are in transit and you’re dying for a little mindless entertainment.

After we safely had our movie in-hand, we walked over to Starbucks for a Decaf Tall Pumpkin Spice Latte for me and a couple of big cookies for the boys.  (Aidan lost his second tooth while eating his cookie.) This is going to be a very fattening day, I can tell. At least the boys ran around and burned off some energy when we got home. I promptly plopped myself down in a chair with my latte and my laptop. And my camera. But not the good camera - Neil’s got that with him, darnit.

Lots of pretties on flickr this week, eh? I can see the seasonal “warmth” creeping into my selections at this point. All that’s missing is images of crock pots and comfort food.  These colors make me want to curl up next to the fireplace with a quilt on my lap, some choral music on the DVD player, and a good mystery in hand.  Not quite chilly enough for that yet.  And that’s ok, I can wait.  Today’s weather really has been perfect.  It’s 60 degrees and sunny right now.

I started a project this morning that I hope to finish sometime today.   I’m making lounge pants!  I’ve got Eamonn’s done, and the pattern cut out for Aidan’s.  I want to make myself a pair, too, and if there is still material left, Neil is getting one.  We’ll all be sickeningly cute in our matching Halloween pants, I’m sure, but it’s not like we’ll be leaving the house in them. Well,  the guys won’t, but I might.  Heh.

How about you?  Having a pleasant Saturday?

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I sent of my contribution to the Sweet & Sinister Swap yesterday and got this box in return. It was stuffed to the gills with neat things - things that I enjoyed opening and looking at, and decorating my house with. Handmade things. The aesthetic is so different than that of the box I sent in, that I really hope my partner likes it. I didn’t get to make as many things as I had hoped to, and I’m afraid my contribution looks a little skimpy in comparison to what I received. What is that they say? Less is more?

Ginny, if you’re reading this, thank you so much - I love everything!  And I hope you enjoy what I sent you.

We went on a class trip this morning.  Pumpkin picking and a hay ride.  Somebody got a little dirty…  I’d love to chat all about it, and tell you about my trip to Super Suppers last night, but I need a nap.  I haven’t been sleeping well the last two nights, and I may doze off right here right now.    All I need to do is find something to occupy the Little Cherub. Right now he’s leaning his chin on my arm trying out different ways to say the word “pickle” and that just won’t do

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Having a great time. Wish you were here. Today we learned to construct Japanese inro pendants, and to decorate them with image transfers, stamps, pigment inks and the ever-important gold leaf. This is my pendant in-progress. It still needs the domed top to be added, and it could use some sanding/buffing. I’m impressed with how this is coming along, given my lack of experience with these techniques.

I worked on a second box using my canes from the Country color scheme during the times when the main box was baking. This, too, is a work in progress, but I don’t think it’s as impressive as the first inro.

I bought one of Donna’s pendants - I love it! It’s got my favorite green in the world, and it’s got polka dots. What more can a girl ask for? (My son the ham, must get into every picture and make a weird face.)

This class has been great - I love the pace, and I love how, with Donna’s instructions, I can do something completely new to me and it will feel like second nature - as if I’ve been doing it forever.

After-class, the family and I walked next door from our hotel to Chili’s for supper.  The rest of the evening involved, drinking tea & hot chocolate with the boys in the hotel lobby while Neil got a little break, and all four of us playing a rousing game of Rummikub before tucking in the boys and kissing their sweet little faces goodnight.

If this is a post card, I must be writing really tiny…

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Well, would you look at that?  It’s Friday already!   I’m not sure how that happened, but it did, and as a result, I have traded in my trusty spot on the family room couch for a soft, fluffy bed in the Hampton Inn.  We drove south tonight, my family and I, so that tomorrow I may broaden my artistic horizons in a Donna Kato workshop, while the children learn all about the hotel-provided Cartoon Network, and the husband takes advantage of the complementary Internet access.  I don’t usually have an entourage when I take a class, but I hemmed and hawed about coming here in the first place - I wasn’t sure if I wanted to spend Saturday alone in a hotel room, but I also wasn’t sure I would be up for the 2 hour trip home tomorrow night only to come right back to Philadelphia Sunday morning.  And so, Neil, who is either incredibly sweet or incredibly crazy said “we’ll come with you, hang out in the hotel all day, and keep you company when you’re not in class.”  Awwww.

Now, I’ve said it before, the boys’ idea of a good vacation is getting to sit in a hotel room watching cable tv (which we don’t subscribe to at home).  So, presuming they don’t get a burst of monkey energy at any time during the day, this is going to be pure heaven for them.  And if they do get the urge to climb the walls?  Well, let’s just say I’ll come back Saturday night to one very frazzled husband who I will owe big time.  I may have to break down and actually give him that backrub he’s always asking for

So, as I sit in this dark room, Neil to my left with his fingers clicking away on his own keyboard, the boys in their bed to my right, snoring quietly, I am thinking about my flickr favorites for the week.  And I am also thinking that I should have stopped dipping into the goldfish once my 7UP was gone because now I am really thirsty.  Perhaps I’ll seek out the hotel soda machine shortly, but for now, I must tell you that I need a pair of those polka dot shoes (second image in the mosaic).  They are so much like the pair of shoes that started it all.  Before blogging, I hadn’t thought about those old shoes in ages, but now I’m thinking I either need to find a pair somewhere, or make myself another pair…  Ooh!  Ohh!  I’m getting ideas now… instead of fabric markers (which, let’s face it, look like you just colored your own shoes) I can apply fabric dots somehow - that would be neat-looking!  I could cut out dots from several coordinating fabrics.  The Freshcut shoes!  Or the Lotus shoes!  Or the Aviary shoes!  Now I’m inspired.  I just have to figure out the best way to apply the dots… food for thought.

I probably won’t be around here tomorrow or Sunday.  Tomorrow night I might like to actually spend some time with the people who dragged themselves down here to be with me, and Sunday night I may just want to flop down somewhere and be entertained by Farscape and Stargate:SG1 reruns before dragging myself to bed.  Have a great weekend!

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The best way to see the city is from afar, in my opinion. I grew up in an area of New Jersey where, if traffic and the intervening river were not an issue, I could have gotten to New York city in 15 minutes or so.  Still, traffic and the intervening river usually are an issue, so we rarely ventured in.

I remember walking to my bus stop at 7:15am when I was in high school. I had to travel up one steep hill and down the other side. In the winter, I often got to see the sun rise over the city when I reached the crest of the hill. Breathtaking view.

These days, I have no real desire to get inside those borders and experience the feel of the city up close. But this vantage point? This I can appreciate.

The last time we were driving up Route 3 on the way to visit my parents, I pointed out the front window of the van and told the boys they could see the Empire State Building when we reached the top of  the hill. They were duly impressed, and as such I made sure the rest of the trip was on the roads with the best views. This sudden interest in skyscrapers is what prompted our little adventure this afternoon. My mom took me, the boys, and my sister’s boys to a park in Weehawken which, for those of you not familiar with North Jersey, is right across the Hudson River from New York City. Aaron Burr and Alexander Hamilton had their famous duel in the spot where the park - not coincidentally called Hamilton Park - now stands. I’m sure their view 203 years ago was quite different from ours today.

Summer is winding down. Just another week to go before we have a new routine to look forward to. It’s probably time to start getting ourselves used to going to bed early and getting up early as well. I’m going to miss staying in my pajamas until 10:00…

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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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Yesterday was the last day of my vacation. The plan today was to spend most of my waking hours wading through email and processing orders, but when I woke up this morning to the sounds of the Bicker Brothers in the other room, I knew it was not to be.

On those days when the little people are fighting before they’re even out of bed, there’s very little escaping an argumentative tone between them for the rest of the day. It is not the type of day when I can retreat into my laptop while they happily entertain themselves. No, days like this require diversions.

Big diversions. How about a trip to the planetarium? Nope. Closed on Mondays. Maybe a train ride? Nope. Our train line is running buses this week due to electrical work on the tracks. Hmmm. Grandma’s house?

And maybe a trip to the Bergen County Zoo with Grandma? We could see monkeys, bobcats and alligators, and maybe even snap a picture of a grumpy bald eagle. And after we’ve watched the prairie dogs artfully arrange their holes, and after we’ve been meowed-at by the mountain lions, we could end our trip with a ride on the carousel.

And then another ride, just for fun. Yes, I think that would improve the day’s outlook very much.

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Yeah, I have my fair share of guilt at times, and so it is G in the Encyclopedia of Me.  Guilt when I have other plans the same time as a family party; guilt when I have too much business to do and can’t spend quality time with the kids or the husband; guilt when I have artsy things on my mind and am in such a frenzy of creativity that I don’t really want to spend quality time with them…  And guilt when all of my other endeavors cause me to have no time for keeping house.  While I know that in the grand scheme of things housework is really less important than time on the floor playing Uno, it’s still a necessary evil.  And when things get as out-of-control clutter-wise as they have in recent years, it impacts those other more important moments.  There have been times when there really was no place good to sit down and play Uno.  And the kids haven’t been able to have a friend over in more than a year!  And either have I, for that matter.  I feel really guilty about that.  And I go through decluttering phases and get parts of the house cleaned up, but I just can’t seem to see it through enough to get everything presentable at once.

Well, I’m doing something about that this week and next while I’m taking time off from my business.  My vacation actually started Tuesday afternoon.  The kids and I had a Burger King lunch, and then went out on the town for some errand-running, which included a stop at the pet store for some quality time sweet-talking the kittens, marveling at the colors of some of the more exotic fish, and wondering what kind of new friend we would bring home with us if we were going to do that kind of thing (which we weren’t).

Yesterday morning, I caught up on the laundry and then the boys and I went swimming at Grandma’s house with their cousins.  A fun time was had, and I came home somewhat pinker than when I got there.   We also went out for ice cream (Daddy’s idea) last night after a trip to the liquor store because (in Neil’s words), “Mommy needs a drink.”

And today I am finally in a position to tackle the kitchen.  It took me an hour and a half to subdue the beast, but I did.  There are still dishes in the sink, but once the dishwasher is done running, I’ll move them over and be truly done.  One room down, 8 to go

Actually, I am working towards a greater goal than mere cleanliness.  I have a social agenda.  I don’t need to finish all 8 of those other rooms, but if I manage to do 4 of them I will consider myself to be in great shape for the social event of the summer: A+E’s 3rd Annual Water Party Extravaganza!  Or AE3AWP for short   Most of the invitations went out this morning, so there is no turning back!  Basically, we’ve invited a few neighborhood friends to play in the back yard in our kiddie pool.  It’s really more fun than it sounds, LOL!  The kids tend to stay on the grassy spot in the yard, while the moms hang out on the patio, and this year I decided we moms should have an activity, too.  So, I’m setting up some buckets of dye on the patio and we’re going to get artsy with some clothes.  It should be fun!  In the meantime, the kids and I have to plan a snacky summer menu, party favors, decorations, etc.  I’m looking forward to the prep as much as the party itself.

While G is for Guilt, I should clarify that I don’t spend my days caught in the throes of it.  It’s there, and it makes itself painfully known from time to time, but it doesn’t own me.  What kind of life would that be? And when guilt does take over, after it’s done making me feel bad, It does inspire me to improve, which is a Good Thing.

Now we have an afternoon of fun ahead of us - playdate in the park with E’s “favorite friend” that he hasn’t seen since school ended in June.  (Note to self: Why don’t I do this park thing more often?  No clean house required…)

Lisa

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Yep, it’s definitely summer. We spent yesterday afternoon swimming at my parents’ house with my sister & my nephews, and today we picked berries in our yard. We didn’t have a gigantic harvest - maybe 2 cups - but it’s a nice haul, when you consider we only lucked into these plants and didn’t have to do anything to take care of them. They grow wild along the perimeter of our property. I’d like to know exactly what kind of berries these are - Neil thinks they may be blackberries, but they’re smaller and bright red. It’s possible they’d turn black if we left them on the vine longer, but leaving them on the vine would be like issuing an open invitation to the local wildlife to come and feast. These berries are always gone within hours of turning red. We were lucky to beat the animals to as many as we did. What am I going to do with this fruit? I think I’m going to try a blackberry cake. Last year I made jam, and it didn’t come out that great, so I’m going a different route.

I did get a chance for a little craftivity today. I made a hat I’ve been wanting to make! Unfortunately, the crown and the brim are both crazy tall. I think there is a problem with the pattern, since others in the Simple Sewing Flickr group have expressed similar sentiments. Luckily, I have a work-around: if I yank the hat way down onto my head and turn the brim up, it’s actually pretty neat! Yeah, I think I might be able to leave the house in it like this

Earlier this weekend, son #1 and I spent his “special night” outside. We filled up the kiddie pool to dunk our feet in, and lit a whole bunch of tea light candles around the patio. While we sat out there and chatted, a few baby owls flew into the yard and had a conversation with each other on our swing set.

Ah, summer

Lisa

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Here’s a recent family portrait, courtesy of The Simpsons Movie. I wasted far too much time on that site this morning. Neil designed his own avatar, and I did mine & the kids, although the boys did pick out their own outfits (if you couldn’t guess…) Thanks a lot, Neil, for sending me that and ruining my productivity - I just managed to get shipments out the door in time for the postal pickup by the skin of my teeth today!

We’re on Day Three of Readercon. Well, let’s make that, Neil is on Day Three of Readercon. The rest of us are on Day Three of Weekend Without Daddy. Whenever this happens, I try to come up with a few interesting things to do to help break up the weekend, give us something to look forward to, and help insure that I am not tearing my hair out and looking longingly at the front door by 5pm Usually our agenda involves a movie, and this time around we saw Ratatouille. It was very enjoyable. And just when you think they can’t do much more to improve animation, you see a rat being washed away by a raging river. Wow.

Another thing that will break up our weekend some is the NJ Polymer Clay Guild meeting tomorrow. My parents have graciously volunteered to come and hang out with the boys for a while so I can go to the workshop. I’ve got Donna Kato books to deliver, dontchaknow The theme for the meeting is “Faux Techniques” and if I have a chance tonight I’m going to put together a little collection of books & videos with that theme and bring them with me.

I plan on feeding my parents after I get back. It’s been a while since I have had dinner guests, and it certainly hasn’t happened since I started my latest domestic streak. So, here’s what I plan to have on the menu:

• Hamburgers (pan fried, since our grill is busted)
• Homemade hamburger rolls (pictured - aren’t they HUGE?! I adore this recipe from Beth Hensperger’s Bread Lover’s Bread Machine Cookbook. I always stick them in the freezer right after they cool, and then use them one at a time, as I need them. I haven’t had them in a few years, and my mouth is watering just thinking about them now…)
• Potatoes, onions & peppers (all from the Farmer’s Market, and prepared in the same manner as last time)
• Sweet Corn on the cob

I’ll, of course, have to set the table with my new napkins, and I’d like to also make some strawberry smoothies. And that leads me to…

I didn’t get a chance to post last night - a raging headache will keep one off of the computer, generally - and so I missed out on Color Week’s last day, which was blue/purple. So, I’ll do it today. How about some frosty blue mugs full of strawberry heaven?

Enjoy the rest of your weekend!

Lisa

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I made another little project today. This is another version of this tote from Lotta Jansdotter’s Simple Sewing. I like the first tote, but it’s a bit flimsy. I decided to try adding a lining, but of course, I didn’t bother to do any research on how to do that. I just flew by the seat of my pants. It actually came out pretty good! I just see, now that I’m done with it, that there is a better way to make a lining, and that if I’d done it the right way, there’d be no visible seam allowances inside the bag. Ah well, live and learn. I still like it, even if there was a more elegant solution, and the edges don’t quite meet up evenly at the top It’s going to look nice with my most recent wraparound skirt.

My tote made its shopping debut about 15 minutes after I finished the last stitch, when the boys and I took a short trip to a local Farmer’s Market. I absolutely love the idea of a farmer’s market. All of that freshly-grown food, waiting to be brought home and turned into wholesome meals and snacks? Wonderful! I only wish I actually liked fruits and vegetables

I’m only sort-of kidding. We did manage to bring home a few bags of things that made us happy. First was cherries. And I don’t know where I read this brilliant idea, (and I must have read it somewhere because it seems too clever for me to have made up on my own) but I took two nesting glass bowls, filled the space between them with water, and put the bowls in the freezer. Later when I took it out, I had an “ice bowl” that I was able to set out on the table, full of cherries. The cherries were able to stay out for a few hours and still be nice and cold. Yum!

We also came home with baby potatoes, a green bell pepper and an onion (all of which I chopped up and fried in a small amount of olive oil), a little container of sweet pickles that Son #2 taste-tested at the market and proclaimed purchase-worthy, and a basket of strawberries that I turned into jam tonight. Did you know some bread machines have a jam cycle? Mine does, and I’ve made all kinds of delicious jams in summers past. Strawberry is my favorite, though.

Tomorrow, as long as I’ve got the bread machine out, I’m making a Banana Sandwich Loaf. It’s like white bread with a bit of a banana zing to it. It makes a great peanut butter sandwich, particularly when I spread a little homemade strawberry jam in there, too - I feel positively domestic when I make a sandwich like that!

Now if only I could figure out why, with all of this wholesome goodness in the house, I’ve been scarfing down pretzels and Kissables during my computer time tonight, I’d be in good shape…

Lisa

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Son #2 and I were heading off to Trader Joe’s today, and we traveled through the Great Swamp to get there.  We were only about a mile or two from home when I saw a beautiful blue heron standing in the water on the side of the road.  I went back home for my camera, but he was gone by the time I returned.  Another mile or so down the road, I came across this guy to the left.

After taking that picture I was set to get back on the road, but Son #2 said “let’s take some more pictures of animals!”  I  considered my morning’s agenda and almost said “no.”  But then it struck me - what’s the point of being a stay-at-home-mom, if I don’t break my own schedule once in a while and do something spontaneous, fun, and educational with the little ones?  So, we drove back to the Great Swamp’s entrance, and took a few pictures of the water creatures we could find: mostly frogs and snakes.

This was a fun diversion for a cloudy almost-summer morning.  I started thinking when we got back in the car, that I hope we can have a lot of little field trips like this throughout the course of the summer, once Son #1 gets out of school.  It’s very easy for a family full of computer geeks to whittle away all of our downtime basking in the blue glow of the monitor.  And while there will certainly be ample opportunity for each of us to be alone in that way, I really want to make an effort to plan some together time that takes us out of the house an into someplace interesting.   Exploring the swamp is a great, local, spur-of-the-moment activity to keep in mind.  I think it will be the first suggestion I put in my little jar of “Summer Adventures.”  I don’t have a jar like that yet, actually, but I plan to make one now.

Lisa

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So the Other Half takes the Sons over to his parents’ house this afternoon and comes back with a power washer but without the boys. Now, I love my children dearly, but the prospect of an evening without the duties of parenthood looming kind of makes me giddy

Other Half asks me what I’d like to do tonight, and I reply, “I’d love to go shopping.” Shopping used to be a great date night for us before the Sons came along. We’d go out to eat and then wander over to the CD store or the book store and drop $100 on new music or reading materials. Ah, those were the days, when we were both making a nice income and could afford that kind of recreation. Now a trip to the book store is largely financed by gift cards that we receive for birthdays and other holidays. We keep these cards tucked away and trot them out when we need a fix. Still, it’s not the same as it used to be. We sometimes spent a couple of *hours* at the book store - I’d find a pile of crafty titles or cookbooks that looked appealing, find one of those big soft comfy chairs and settle in to choose which titles would come home with me and which were staying put. These days, we are accompanied by little people who don’t have a few hours worth of patience for watching Mom leisurely flip through magazines. And Son #2 has a penchant for curiosity in the least convenient of places. He feels he is entitled to touch anything he wants to, and touch he will! There’s nothing relaxing about a book store trip with that one. So, it’s really no surprise that I would instantly think of book shopping when faced with the prospect of a child-free evening.

So we grab a quick bite to eat at home and head out to the book store in search of crafty books. Since I already have every polymer clay book known to mankind sitting on the shelves of my own book store, I am really more in the mood to look at books pertaining to *other* crafts. Particularly, I’ve had learning to sew on my mind a lot lately. And I mean a LOT. Now, on the way to the book store is a Sears. I happen to recall that someone on some board somewhere had said something about the basic Kenmore sewing machine being a great, reliable-yet-simple machine for a beginner. I talk the Other Half into a quick detour “just to look.” Turns out they have a model that I like, and it’s on sale. After a quick conversation during which the Other Half expresses concern over our lack of space and I promise to finish cleaning the dining room and throw/give away enough unused craft supplies to create a spot for the machine before I ever open the box, I buy myself my first sewing machine. Woo hoo!

At the book store I flip leisurely through 4 sewing books and buy two, and then we’re home again. And here I sit, in a room I usually don’t frequent at this time of night for fear of waking sleeping children. I’m sure I will miss the Sons at some point tomorrow, but for now this is kind of nice. I am pretty sure that even if I didn’t miss them tomorrow, the Other Half would make sure we had them here, if for no other reason that to keep us home - night time shopping can get very expensive when you have the freedom to do it right!

Now, I need to go peruse my new books for a little while and pick my first project. Don’t worry - I won’t be abandoning my clay for fabric. An important criteria for my first project is that it must be something that will look good with a polymer clay button on it

Lisa

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Hello! It’s been a long time since I’ve posted anything here other than bestseller lists. I have been busy with one thing or another for months, but I have a few minutes tonight to post an update, so I thought I’d take advantage of it. So, what have I been up to lately?

Well, from a polymer clay standpoint, I haven’t done a whole lot, except that I’m getting more and more involved with the local guilds. I’m lucky enough to live within a reasonable driving distance of three polymer clay guilds (New Jersey, Northern New Jersey, and Philadelphia), so I’ve been taking advantage of it. I’ve been involved in polymer clay for 10 years, been active in one online pc group or another for much of that time, and been a member of local guilds, but I’m only just now actively participating. The kids are not so little anymore and it’s easier for me to take off for a few hours on a Sunday afternoon, or for a weekend workshop. It also helps that my husband is practically handing me my pasta machine and pushing me out the door I tend to have bouts of Mommy Guilt, not sure I should be ditching my family for a whole day or two days in some cases, but he knows it’s Good For Me and that I’ll enjoy myself, and he always convinces me to do it. Besides, I think they have a good time spending a weekend in their pajamas watching japanese monster movies!

So, in mid-January I attended a 72-hour clay-a-thon hosted by the South Jersey Polyholics (an offshoot of the Philadelphia guild) and it was a real blast! I’d never done anything quite like it. We took over a hotel near Atlantic City and clayed to our hearts’ content ’til all hours of the night. Fun! I got a chance to try out a couple of techniques I had floating around my head for a while. Here are a few samples:

Aside from that, I haven’t really done anything clay-related lately. I do have to make a batch of Birthday Magnets for my son this weekend. He’ll be 6 next Sunday and I always make magnets as party favors (see this article I wrote after his second birthday: http://www.pcpolyzine.com/0204april/favors.html)

On a personal note, I have been keeping really busy around the house. I have had some serious Housekeeping Issues developing over the last few years. The clutter in my home has been taking over little by little to the point where it was suffocating me. But trying to crawl out from underneath it was completely overwhelming. I finally reached rock bottom and created a website to help inspire me to clean up. My thought was that sharing my embarassing living conditions would motivate me to change them. I don’t know if it’s working, but *something* is, and I’ve been on a real roll for three weeks. I’ve lugged bags and bags of junk out of the house. I’ve filled the trunk of my car twice with piles of things to be donated to the local thrift shop and I’ve filled up 10 garbage cans with things nobody would want. And there’s still plenty more where that came from. How have I lived with all of this cr@p for so long?? I really hope I don’t burn out on this task, but I’m actually enjoying taking care of my house right now. It’s been a long time since I had a sense of pride about it. For the longest time it’s just been an embarassment and I’ve been living in fear of drop-in company. I’m still not done, there’s a lot left to go, but I’m not embarassed anymore. Some days I feel like calling up everyone I know and saying, “hey come over and look in my closets- there’s no longer an avalanche when I open the door!” Our “laundry room” is just a small corner of our unfinished basement, and there’s nothing at all pretty about it, but today I scrubbed clean the sink (eliminating about 8 years of accumulated laundry soap scum) and hung up a fun picture on the wall - the ugly patched-up cinderblock wall. If you had told me a month ago that I’d be taking pride in that crummy little section of the house I’d have thought you were nuts.

Anyway, I’m finally in a really good place with the house. I’m seeing improvements every day, I’m enjoying the routines that are helping me keep the clutter under control and I’m feeling happier than I have in ages - it really spills over into so many other areas when you’re not drowning in junk… Ok, I’ve gone on enough about that! If you want more, you can check out my website: http://www.clarkesworld.com/cleanup

I’ve got some orders to process tonight, and then I’m either going to put away some more of the books & videos that arrived this week (and it’s a LOT - I was running out of so many things, and I went and restocked all at once - now I’m buried in books!) or I’m going to put my feet up crack open a Dr. Pepper, and find something mindless to watch on tv for a while! That last option sounds really good, actually. I may add some pretzels and cheese dip to the mix…

Have a great weekend, everybody!

Lisa

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