Art Star Recap

Sorry I'm a week behind.  This week that has disappeared since the Art Star Craft Bazaar has been filled with a birthday, a birthday party, a school field trip, and some general family recovery time.

The show was fabulous.  

A bit windy, but clear blue skies and perfect temperatures.

Unfortunately, the lighting wasn't great inside my tent...

Now, back to work.  Keep your fingers crossed for some sunshine so I can get some photos for a shop update!

Packing Up: Art Star This Weekend!

Tonight I'm packing up for the Art Star Craft Bazaar at Penn's Landing this weekend.

Dresses, Bibs, Baby Blankets, Lunchbox Napkins, and a whole rack of Clearance items.

Sunshine, Live Music, and an amazing array of vendors.

I can't wait!  Stop by Booth #4 and say Hi if you make it out.

Up by the food and the Chestnut St. Entrance.

Guaranteed to be a fabulous time.

Now, I'm back to ironing and tagging and folding and packing.

Thanks!

Belated May Day

O's nursery school had it's May Day celebration on Tuesday.

Complete with handmade flower crowns, lots of little kids in white, and a maypole festooned with ribbons.

I realized as the kids were circling that each ribbon had a popsicle stick attached to the end of it.  Brilliant in helping them hold on and keeping the ribbon from slipping out of their hands.  Even cooler, at the end of the celebration, each child was told to 'plant' their ribbon.  They stuck the popsicle sticks into the ground all around the pole, leaving the ribbons splayed out and anchored.

Beautiful.

Gratitude

Today I am thankful for:

A Red Cast

And that he landed on his arm instead of his head.

Fifteen Minute Increments

The Dad, who works from home, finished up yesterday and came down to play with the kids.  I asked for 15 minutes to run up and sew a little bit.  "I could never get a project done the way you work." he told me.  "What?  I usually work in 15 minute increments."  "Exactly."

When I began really sewing (I think I just hit eieio's 2 year anniversary!), E was in nursery school and O was home with me.  It was rare to have more than 15 minutes at a time in my studio so I learned how to make it work.  Now, O is in nursery school and E is in Kindergarten and I have one full 'Studio Day' per week where they are in school until mid-afternoon and I have no other obligations.

Besides that, I still tend to work in these little spurts.  I use my evenings for fabric selection, ironing, and cutting - the parts of the process that seem to take the most amount of time. If the pieces are all prepped, I'll do some sewing, too.  I've learned, though, that I should turn off my machine at 9.  Otherwise, I get a little glassy-eyed and am more prone to make a mistake.

Last weekend, The Dad took the kids up to his parents' for overnight.  They were gone for more than 24 hours!  And I got to just sit in my studio and sew.  When they returned home Sunday at 5, I realized I hadn't even unlocked the front door and left the house since the night before!  Not necessarily very healthy, but oh so productive...

Moving Forward

To be honest, I've been feeling a little paralyzed around here lately.  I apologize for the choppy entries of late.  For me, feeling overwhelmed does very little to spur on productivity.  I just. kind of. stall. out.  And that's what's happened.

But, thing are starting to move.  For the first time in almost 7 years, I am getting up at 5:30 am and working out with my husband.  And actually really enjoying it.  The trade off is that I'm going to bed at 9:30 so I don't turn into mean, growly mama bear around 3pm.  After multiple (failed) tries to figure out how to fit a regular workout into my day (and consistently making my health and fitness one of my lowest priorities), I bit the bullet and went back to the beginning.

Before I had kids, The Dad and I had a very regular morning routine.  We woke up at 5:30, rolled out of bed and went to the Y, worked out, came home and showered, and headed to work.  Once E was born, that just wasn't an option and The Dad went without me.  Then when O came along, it got even harder to figure out where to fit exercise in.

I am happy to see it become part of my daily routine again.  We actually work out at home - on a great enclosed porch far enough away from the kids that we don't wake them up but close enough that we can hear them if they need us.

I didn't mean to ramble on about exercise and my new routine, but I do believe that the way out of a rut is to just do it - and in this case, it means just writing.  So, the next few posts might be random but they are my way of getting un-stuck.  So follow along if you'd like, and thanks for hanging in their with me.

By the way, the photo above (which has absolutely nothing to do with the post) is my new mannequin.  Frustrated with poor photos of my work, we've added her to the family to help out.  E dressed her this afternoon.  Earlier today she looked like this:

Cheers!

A Little Pink: Summer Song by Riley Blake

As I neared the end of my load of dresses for Art Star, I realized that I was missing some pink.  Lots of teal/blue and cream with graphics, but not a whole lot of that girly color some folks (like my almost 6 year old) are drawn too.  So, off to the fabric store I went.  Really, my life is tough...

A little Summer Song by the new(er) Riley Blake Designs.

Beautiful colors, great quality.  Just what I was looking for.

Now back to the ironing board.

Literally!

While I've Been Gone

Besides spending most of my free time gearing up for the Art Star Craft Bazaar, we've been doing some other fun things around here, too:

Building a makeshift Teepee

Celebrating Easter

And O's 4th Birthday

The prep for Art Star (and life) is starting to feel a little more under control now (60 dresses almost finished!), so I'm back.  Thanks for continuing to check in!

I Remember Being Forced To Play Outside

Yesterday, with a weather forecast calling for four days of rain, I told my children that they had to play outside.

At 1:00 (it was a half-day at school), I brought them out.  I sat on the front steps, the door to the porch open and the door into the house closed.  And, with visiting playmates and each other, they played outside.  For four hours...

The fort.  The logs.  A sled.  Collecting bark.  A warship.  A rescue helicopter.  A ladder hanging from a tree branch.

Four hours.

And I remembered, as a child in a small town, living down a dirt road in 'the woods', how my aunt would gather my mother and their friends to sit and drink coffee and smoke cigarettes and play scrabble.  They would usher the kids outside and actually lock the front screened door.  We were forced to play outside.

There was the injustice of the one little girl who was allowed in with her mom, there was a bit of whining through the screen, but much more than that, there were hours of creative play among the trees and in the dirt. 

I'm sure we bickered, but the adults rarely interfered intervened.  I remember those hours outside much more than I remember any time playing with toys inside.

I realized yesterday that you don't have to live in a small town, down a dirt road, in the woods for kids to have this experience.  Though I didn't lock them out yesterday, I did challenge them.  And they rose to the occasion.  I look forward to many more days of this as Spring continues to reveal itself.

Ahhh...

Spring is Coming

O stepped out the door on Monday and exclaimed "Look!  There is grass!".  And really, there it was again.  A small patch of grass amid the slowly disappearing mountains of snow.  And all of a sudden, it is a bit easier to find color around here.  Aaaahhh...