To Progress or Not To Progress

On Friday, I thought it was Monday. Today I feel like it's Sunday. I don't know what's going on other than that I've been very busy. I've delivered the first 3 Hawaiian shirts I've been working on. I made 4 new zipper pouches for this past week's markets and now have two left that I can list in my shop.

I made this new little messenger bag last week and added it to the shop last night. I've been thinking about a small messenger for a while. I'll adjust the measurements slightly before I make it again. It was fun to finally use some of this great fabric. Yes, it will be a pattern at some point.


My hands are still feeling pretty bad, but I'm trying to take lots of breaks to prevent as much pain as possible. I can barely crochet at all now so new monkeys will be few and far between for a while. This makes me really sad...really. But my wrists start to hurt as soon as I pick up the hook. I think that's my body telling me something so I've decided to listen as much as possible. Not being a person who can sit still, this is proving very difficult.

I heart Circa Ceramics and My Husband

I've been admiring the work of Circa Ceramics as long as I've been a member of Etsy. So, when I had to come up with gifts for the male side of my wedding party, I finally got a chance to make a purchase!

I have to tell you how impressed I was with Nancy & Andy. They were so helpful and willing when I said I needed a sailboat on one of my cups, something they didn't have available. At the last minute I added a cow and a California Highway Patrol car. No problem. I was just so pleased and when the box came in plenty of time I was really excited. They even put a special message on the bottom of each cup from Nick & I. These cups made great gifts and I was jealous of our friends who would be receiving them. (I got one for Nick too, that's his with the mini.)

Well, there's more. Nancy & Andy offered to make a cup especially for me as a wedding gift and even let me choose the design & color. Naturally I chose a sewing machine on a light green cup.

Apparently my wonderful new husband had the same idea. He signed up on Etsy, contacted Circa Ceramics and asked if they'd make me a cup with a sewing machine! Can you believe that? They told him they'd already promised one to me and offered to put a message on it from Nick. How nice is that? Well, I wasn't expecting that at all when I opened my cup this week.


Now we have his & hers Circa Ceramics cups and mine even has a super secret and lovable message from Nick. It's great to know there are still nice people out there, eh? And great ceramics too.

p.s. Nancy & Andy also enclosed a very nice card made by the lovely littlepretty

The Aftermath

This weekend, though we had friends in town (more on that later), Nick and I managed to get a few things done. We had a very large and broken TV sitting behind the couch (for a year) - that's been recycled. There were two large piles for the Goodwill - delivered to the donation bin. The last big project on my list started here:

Yes, it all started with my recent wedding. Gifts started rolling in back in February or March, sometimes every day! There weren't many at the wedding, most were delivered. This left me with quite a lot of box recycling and worst of all - MASSES of packing peanuts. It took weeks to get them consolidated into 3 gigantic boxes. Those boxes have been sitting in the living room since before the wedding. Well, the solution came to me via a customer. She came by to pick up her order and suggested giving those peanuts to a shipping store. I just about lost my mind with excitement, and it's exactly what I did.

I called my local Mailboxes Etc. & asked the dude (he was a total "dude") on the phone if I could donate packing peanuts and he replied, "yep". So now that's done too. My living room is now twice the size and I can sleep at night knowing I didn't throw away 8 tons of polystyrene. Sweet!

Other places that might help keep packing materials out of the landfill:
-The UPS Store
-PostNet
-FedEx/Kinko's
-More info on recycling polystyrene packing material - including the bulky stuff.

Your Opinion Please

I'm working on some more sewing patterns to add to the shop and I need your help. Which one should I finish first?

The handy dandy shopper tote with interior pocket?

Or 5 variations of the ever-popular tissue cozy?

Tell me which one to complete first. I'll be working on these this weekend, though I've got some top secret plans already. More on that later. Right now I have to get ready for another trip to the city to meet up with Christina! How cool is that?

Well, it's unanimous, the Shopper Tote wins! I'm working on the pattern now. It's coming along very slowly as I can spend very little time on the computer at the moment.

Update #2 - The Shopper Tote is now available in my shop!