Zoo pics

Some of my favorite pics from the zoo. It was lots of fun. And FYI stingrays are squishy feeling.

Moving Forward.

So this beautiful little girl is what life is all about. Today we are taking a family day. I am closing the store and Glenn took a day of vacation and we are off to the Milwaukee Zoo! It will be lots of fun and I understand we will get to pet sting rays. I am super duper excited about that! It will be a good day.

It has been getting really busy in the store lately and I have been busy making things and taking care of the Chairs for Charity and Sputnikfest stuff so my posts may be a little sporadic but don't worry I will still try to post at least a picture or a small update at least every other day. I just really need to move forward right now and get down to business. I am really contemplating a small change in the direction of the store. I was walking yesterday and noticed Worldly Treasures is going out of business so maybe I can get a small quality selection of beads and have more beading classes and such. I do have the earring bar to kind of test out the interest and so far it has been great. Haven't really made a lot of earrings but it gets dialogue started about maybe carrying beads and most are interested. So we will see. I really like to teach and inspire others so I think a few more supplies seems only natural.

I am a total blogging slacker.

Sorry I have been kind of busy lately and needed to try and stay away from my computer so I can actually get something done! It is so easy to slack when I can chat. I opened an earring bar in the store. With the winter coming up I need to make room in the store for a couple of tables for art nights so I thought why not put out some beads and supplies and let people play...for $8 you can make a cool pair of earrings.







The Farmer's Market was on Saturday as it is every Saturday and Tuesday May - October. I love the market! We try to go every Saturday. This cute little family sells right near the playground area and they are the sweetest little kids. I happened to have my camera out when I saw the little one looking at me and snapped this great picture. They sell those incredible bouquets for only $5! We bought some really yummy cheese, apples, and a few eggrolls. Usually we go to breakfast at Newey's a local Thai restaurant but it has mysteriously closed with no real warning.

Yesterday we went to Green Bay to Artstreet. I love that art fair. They have a lot of the performing arts going on all over and a lot of art demos as well. It has been going on for over 20 years now and is really a with it event. There are food vendors with all different ethnic foods it is very hard to decide. A few of my friends had booths and said it was a great show. On our way out we watched a mime. Ok mimes are creepy in themselves but this mime was doing little audience participation bits. He played chess with this man in the picture which is fun but he came up to me and motioned for me to join him in taking a shower. I politely declined taking a shower with him.

MMMMMMM....gelato

Ok I am not a world traveler by any means.... I have been to Mexico once but stayed in a resort which hardly qualifies as experiencing the culture...... so when my friend David at Stumpjack told me he was getting gelato soon I didn't know what it was. Well I went there this morning and let me tell you gelato is flippin fantastic! Oh my it was the yummiest creamiest dreamiest thing I honestly ever tasted (I had pistachio). I love ice cream but I am afraid I will never eat another Dairy Queen cone without thinking if only this was gelato....so get to Stumpjack next week and get some.

For some reason I can't link on the word Stumpjack so just go to my links and find Stumpjack Coffee for more information.

BOO.

I'm doing a Halloween ATC swap with my Wisconsin etsy team members and here are my cards. They were fun to make. Much better day today...I think the key is being creative!

Two silly things to brighten my day.

So I went to the zoo today after dropping Molly off at daycare. I needed to go away and think about a few things and it seemed like a nice secluded place to do that. I was right. No one else was there but me and all the critters. This rooster thought the back of this deer looked like a cozy place to cock a doodle doo. I took this picture and was then chased away by some angry geese. I have a lot on my plate right now and made the decision to not run for president of our downtown association in the upcoming election. It sounds like I am being a big head but no one else really wants the job so some are expecting me to do it. I have been kinda sick the last few weeks...hives, achy, panic attacks, and just overall grouchiness due to stress and this was the thing I didn't love doing so I needed to just let it go. The group needs a whole lot of work and I am just not willing to give part of me to make that happen anymore. I have been involved in the group for about 2 years now and have not seen much change and I just don't see it happening in the future. With Sputnikfest and the Art and About group I love the things we are doing and it is improving the downtown so I think my energy will just be much better spent with those things. It really sucks but I want to feel better and reduce this stress.




So my morning has been pretty sucky but a good friend Jan came and brightened my day with a bag of useless little figures. Anyone who knows me knows how much I love misc. little bags of silliness...why? I don't know I just do. Look at them aren't they adorable. I especially love the little naked babies. Someday I will use them in a shadowbox or other fun project but for now I will just hoard them. I did get a few fun things from St Vinnie's this morning as well. I was not happy walking in though..their front door window was smashed to bits ... someone broke in last night. I live on the same block so I don't like to see that. It is increasingly becoming a little ghetto here. I wish we could figure out a way to keep these sassy kids occupied so they wouldn't commit all these senseless crimes. But like I said earlier I am already overwhelmed.
Hopefully today will get better soon.

So we have a new chair powerhouse contributor. Her name is Gail Riebe and these are chairs 3,4,and 5. She decidedly is the queen of chairs for charity. The thing about her chairs is that they are all so unique and different but very well thought out and executed so beautifully.

Funny story... if you notice the little magazine rack in the backround of the pictures. I put that out months ago because I didn't want it anymore so I thought someone would steal it right away...I mean they stole our dog poop bin from the backyard a few weeks ago and they don't want the cool rack? What gives?

Sometimes all it takes to make me happy is.....

a really really really yummy sandwich. Oh it was perfect...artisan potato scallion bread, aged provolone, turkey, red leaf lettuce from the farmers market, and a little swipe of mayo. YUMMMMMMMIE. I was sad when it was gone but I am really full so I guess it's good it's gone because I think I would have ate way more than I should have.

Oh and today is mine and Glenn's 10 year anniversary...I love him so.

Sooooooooooooooooo Busy!!!!!

So I am using my husbands computer for this post so sorry..no pictures. I couldn't really post any pictures that would really have anything interesting about today anyway. I did a whole lotta running around today trying to sell a really good idea for a fundraiser for our downtown association. We are going to make a i heart manitowoc button sell it for $3 and then if you wear your button for Oktoberfest on October 6 you can get a good deal or maybe even something for free at participating businesses. I think it's fun...buy a cool pin that you will be proud to wear and get a deal...what more could you ask for? So after I talked to a few businesses about that I came back and got ready for the Sputnikfest meeting. It was a good meeting. We talked about lots of the legal stuff which wasn't fun but necessary. We talked about a lot of really great fun stuff to so it far outweighed the icky legal stuff. I do have a lot to do tomorrow though! Hopefully I will have time to blog but if not I will be back in full blogging mode in a few days!

Flowers, a plaid dress and birds.

I got some pretty flowers from my BFF Kate.

Found a plaid vintage dress in my size! That doesn't happen too often cuz I'm chubby.

And found a book with some cool birds I can't wait to make some ATC's (artist trading cards) with.

The chairs are out!

So the girls...Kate, Heather, Annette, and Jo came and picked up and delivered the chairs to their temporary homes throughout town. Oh it is so exciting to have them out and about. You can see them at...First National Bank, Chamber of Commerce, Splash, M&I Bank, St Francis of Assisi Parish office, US Bank, Rahr West, The Visitor Center, Maverix, The Mad Hatter, Grape Grain and Bean, Dr Freuds, City Hall, Full Circle Studio, The Dolan Gallery, Stumpjack and of course Persimmons. We hope to get more and more chairs and will keep an updated list as we do. We really have some great chairs to raise lots of money for the arts in this beautiful community!

I am going to do something I thought I never would.

I am going to list a card on etsy. Now I have been calling them ATC's (artist trading cards) because that is what I want to do with them...trade them. However I am having the hardest time finding people to trade with me without having to do a themed swap. Lots of people have them listed on etsy as ACEO (artist card edition originals?) and sell them so I guess I am going to try to do the same. So watch my etsy shop. Price will be minimal...$3.

Of course if anyone reads this and wants to trade cards I am still up for that!

A fun little sale today.

Well I say little but not really. I went to the sale of a family of childhood friends of both mine and my sister's. They are auction lovers and recently decided to just get rid of stuff so they had a huge sale today and tomorrow. It was a lot of fun. Here's what I got....

A little desk

a kid's chair

a kid's coat hanger made with old blocks

a retro little stool

5 old cookbooks

25 vintage patterns

over 20 pieces of vintage linens...tablecloths,fabric,doillies,hankies etc.....

and an old mixing measure thingy

And how much do you think I spent? Well I can tell you it was way under $50...that's all I'm sayin!

Margaritas anyone?

So I really think part of the reason I am such a procrastinator is that I know I can be. A customer came in with a plain set of margarita glasses and a pitcher and asked if I could paint them to match the paper plates she had by next Friday. I said sure and decided that rather than wait I would do them right away and just 45 minutes later I had them all done. I really like how they turned out. I am quick.

Chairs are on their way out!

So we had our Art and About meeting last night in my busy Heather's beautiful backyard. It was a little gathering but as always lots of fun. We mostly talked about the upcoming chair auction and things we need to do. A group of people are coming to pick up the chairs I have in my windows which is 29...and putting them in locations all around town next Monday. So we have almost 50 chairs now and lots of people working on them yet so hopefully we can reach our goal of 100 chairs. It is just so fun to see all the different chairs come in and all the creativity it takes to come up with these fantastic ideas. This beer cap stool was made by my mom and sister and the panda stool is the work of my very talented auntie Annie.

So here is what I have to do now.

It's the grossly overflowing 3 boxes of fabric I need to now price to put out. If you think it looks like fun come help me.

Really getting rid of stuff.

So since this morning I really went through this wall of shelves and got rid of the stupidest stuff. I realized that I really do have a little more than the average collage artist probably does. Now that all my scissors are together, all my pencils are in the same bin, and my little bits of ephemera are now in just a few containers rather than 10,000 little ones I don't wanna work and mess it up!!!! I think cleanliness is very very very overrated.

Lots of cleaning still more to do.

So when I look at this on film I don't see much of a difference after about 6 hours of butt busting cleaning but 2 garbage bags later and a few cuts and bruises I can now see my floor.

I really really want to have one of those organization shows come and help me organize and paint put in a new floor. I really won't keep it organized but I just want the paint job and new floor and don't want to do it myself. I am still going to work on this today. Organizing my bins and going through all the stuff on the shelves. I did purge most of my fabric and it is in a heap in the store until I figure out how in the world I am going to put it out. I found some cool fabric hiding out on those

shelves. I also found my stamp carving tool that I have been looking for for so long it has made me crazy!

So in case you can't figure it out the top pic is before bottom after.

The big purge.

I am on a wicked purging spree today in the studio...will post pics later!!! Hope everyone had a great weekend.

Funky shoes.

So I dropped off Molly this morning and decided it was a beautiful morning why not drive to Stumpjack for an iced mocha? The lake was stunning today...so so blue. As I got closer I remembered it was Maxwell Street Days in Two Rivers. Not a real big deal to me seeing as I really don't shop at real stores too often. So I sat and talked with David for a bit drank my coffee and a peach smoothie that he whipped up for me on the house. I then decided to just walk up and down the street a ways to see what was out there when I saw these funky shoes at Schroeder's. They were on sale for $30...regular $65 so I thought that was enough of a bargain to buy them. I have a problem with my walking shoes that I owned before these..they gave me major blisters and for those of you who know me you know shoes are not my favorite thing to wear in the first place. I very rarely have them on at all. So these are perfect...lots of openness and super comfy. I stopped back to show David and he sent me for a pair for Kim. We will have to go for a walk together some night with our matching shoes. He thanked me for running to get them with a mocha. Needless to say I am coffeed out right now. But it was nice. Okay now I have to get to work. I have some ladies coming on Monday to get some science themed pendants and I can't let them down. Have a great weekend everyone!

The pics of the loot.

Some of the good stuff from my trip yesterday. Love that little chick pitcher. It is real hot again so I am just looking for some motivation to make some stuff.

Hookie hookie hookie.

I totally played hookie today. It has been so freaking hot I just couldn't bear sitting in my 700 degree store for 8 hours. So mom dad Molly and I went to Plymouth and Sheboygan thrift shopping. Oh my did I score the great finds. I spent a total of about $150 but man did I get a lot of stuff. That Plymouth Vinnie's ROCKS! I got a really cute little bird cream pitcher there that was my favorite purchase of the day. Some of the other stand out buys are of course tons of old books and magazines, a Barbie prom game, and a potty chair for Molly. Yep it's about that time...oh joy. Anyhow I am melting so I am going to shower now. I will post pictures tomorrow of all my good loot. PS..sorry if you tried to shop today...I really needed a day off.