Check out my Treasury!!!

Hey everyone, I got chosen for a Treasury on Etsy by Etsy Texas Crafters of which I am a member! Thanks Liz... I really love the color green. You can see my work as well as 11 of the best that Texas has to offer at http://www.etsy.com/treasury_list.php?room_id=10193.

New stock coming up, stay posted!

Too Much Computer Time

I've been spending so much time on my computer trying to learn the business of running a business I haven't been paying much attention to my business! I have been accepted to the EtsyDallas show Jingle Bash which will be my first show. I will have to get busy making lots and lots of jewelry to take with me. Plus figure out how to take credit cards, get packaging supplies.... on and on. I hope I make enough money in the show just to pay for getting there! Whew! But I have some great ideas for new pieces and I have also been working on getting better pictures of my jewelry. I have a new display thanks to my daughter. As soon as I finish painting it I'll dress it up and show it off!

I will be blogging more regularly now and I'll give everyone sneak peaks of my new creations. I have some great new cabs to wrap and a couple of new wrapping techniques so stay tuned!

My daughter and grandsons were here for Labor Day weekend. We had lovely weather and my daughter and I did some shopping. We checked out a really great shop in Dallas called The Rock Barrel. They have great stuff. A really good place for tools also. If you are like me I prefer to see the tools and hold them in my hand before making a decision. This place was great and the people running it are very helpful. The do have online ordering if you are not in the Dallas area.

Well, back to the workbench to create some more spectacular jewelry items!

I've been busy!

I have been a busy girl the past few days. I have learned how to do Bubble Share, you can see it above the post, signed up for LinkReferral, got advice on my blog from there, and signed up for Blogflux where I can get stats on how many people visit my site, where they are, what my ranking on Google is and lots of other stuff that I can't quite figure out yet!

I'm also designing a line for Christmas. I'm thinking of doing a show in Dallas called Jingle Bash. I'm a member of the Etsy Dallas team and they are doing it.
Isn't that the cutest picture? I love it.It is an indoor show and I will have lots of people to help me with the set up. I'm really looking forward to it and am working like a mad woman to get enough stock made up. Wish me luck and for those of you who are in this area, come by and see me!

IT'S HOT!!!!

Ok, I know that North Texas isn't the hottest place on earth, but its darn close! Here in the DFW (Dallas/Ft Worth) area we have been above 100° (106° predicted today) for about 2 weeks. Now, this isn't that unusual for here this time of year. The part that is new and unusual is how I cope with it. Even though I was born in the north (Indiana) I moved with my family to the south (Louisiana) when I was 16. Now at 48 I have lived in the south much longer than I lived in the north but I still think of myself as a Yankee! I've been told I sound like a combination of both and since my husband is English and we have been married for 10 years my accent is even more muddled. Anyway, back to my point. I've been here for a long time but its in the past few years I have noticed that the heat of summer is harder to take. So, for the past week or so I have been feeling very tired, sluggish and having trouble sleeping. Although we have central air we are watching the electric bill so we are keeping the thermostat between 78° and 80°. Even the pool is HOT! Its like bathwater! I'm really feeling the heat so to speak this past week. That is my excuse for not blogging every day or two as I intended.

I have been working on some new jewelry and hope to get some pictures uploaded and items added to my Etsy shop. I've been struggling with the lighting, sunlight too much or not enough and flash not right either, so before I post more pictures I want to work on it. I plan to get that done today. Again, its back to the heat thing. Its supposed to be below 100° the middle of the week so we are putting off mowing the yard until then. Hopefully I can get my craft work caught up.

This probably sounds like a bunch of whining but it makes me feel better to whine online for a bit! LOL....

Stay tuned for the next blog which will be what I have found out about local craft venues.

Topic of the day: Gardening-Vegetables

I love to garden. I really do. I have fond memories of "helping" in the garden when I was a little girl. It takes a bit of adjustment to garden in North Texas, but I seem to be getting the hang of it this year. So, in addition to blogging, making jewelry, and searching the web for a job I've been spending a lot of time in the garden. I have both flower beds as well as vegetable beds. Because this part of Texas has a lot of clay we decided to make raised beds for vegetables. We built 3 4'x4' beds that are 12" deep. Then we got good quality soil to put in them. I have to admit the first 2 seasons I was somewhat less than successful, but I learned a bit each time. This year has been the best yet. We have harvested Brussels sprouts in the spring, potatoes, tomatoes, corn, peppers,squash and zucchini. We also put in a strawberry bed a last spring and this past spring we harvested TONS of strawberries. You know the container you buy them in at the store? The one that is labeled 1 lb? We filled about 20 of those! (yes, I save containers, plastic bottles, milk jugs,,,, etc) I even save the cell packs that flowers come in at the nursery to use later. A couple of Christmases ago my husband, Anthony, bought me a small greenhouse. It is about 2.5 feet wide and 2 feet deep, and has a plastic cover that fits over it with a zipper door in the front. It is fantastic. I started tomato seeds, pepper seeds, and multiple varieties of perennial flower seeds this spring. They have done really well. I ordered tomato seeds in both regular and cherry types but the variety is specifically designed to be grown in the south, in the heat. They have done really well. Right now they are putting on blooms again for a new round. Anthony and I have indulged in BLTs for the past 3 weeks with all the tomatoes we have picked. BTW,,, its really good to add avocado to your BLT. mmmmmm, yummy! I have yellow bell pepper plants with about 9 peppers on them, okra about to bloom, and squash and zucchini coming. I also planted pole beans and the plants have completely covered the bamboo poles! I have cucumbers coming up as well as cantaloupe and garlic. I just pulled the corn up and tied them into bundles to dry out to use for our fall decorations. The corn we got was good but didn't produce very many ears. I may try a different variety next year and space them out more. I was really pleased with the potatoes. We planted 2 kinds, Reddale, which have red skins, and Russet. I put in 1 lb of seed potatoes and harvested 17 lbs of Reddale and 15 lbs of Russet. The have tasted really good.

All in all the garden is looking much better this year. Tomorrow I will tell you all about the flower beds.