Crazy week. New stuff. Venting (a bit). And still going strong.

Okay, I'd like to take the first section of this post for my wee bit o' venting. Brought to you today by our sponsor: the crappy week, new and improved version, as in the crappy week just before I had a show that weekend.

Honestly, it's hard to pin everything down. I'm sure that as a survival technique, my mind has blocked out a good deal of it. But here's a snapshot:

-I canceled a class this week because I was informed at 2:05pm on the day of the class (I have to be there at 6:00) that I had 2 students signed up, but it was curriculum night that night at my son's school, so... I'm supposed to get 48 hours of notice. I know I annoyed people by doing this, but for real. I have too much stuff going on to drop everything because someone else didn't call me in time. (And classes are supposed to automatically be canceled if there are less than 3 students, but I just won't get into it... this is the 3rd time in 2 weeks I've done this. I'm sure they assume I'm crapping out since I'm quitting after October, but it's always been this: not getting enough notice and there also not being enough students. It's too many hours of work to do a class so that I can get like $15.00 in three weeks.) Anyway, this was a hard decision. I don't like saying no. But I've vowed to be more assertive. So there you go.

-My 3 year old, Elliott, my sweetheart and my joy, a blessing to my life... Really, he's a treasure. Okay. *sigh* My 3 year old, Elliott, picked THIS week to have a huge regression in his using of the potty. Every single day this week he has had an accident. I thought yesterday was the topper when he started in the living room and went all the way to the bathroom tracking pee-pee footprints behind him. But today might have been better. I don't have to share the details, but he might have been trying to make a new lake in the bathroom. I'm not sure.

-Our weight room got flooded from this weird and freaky micro-burst storm we had a couple of days ago. It apparently loosened shingles on our roof because we got two huge leaks, too. On the surface, this wouldn't appear to effect me too much (can't remember the last time I used weights), but it did because this is also the place I store all of my jewelry displays and organza pouches and ring boxes and bags and all of that stuff that I use to make my shows successful. I mean, I hate to be obvious. But, yeah... this is all stuff I NEEDED to be easily accessible this weekend. Now it's all shoved willy-nilly into the garage and part of tonight will be pulling it all out and sorting through it all to find the stuff I need.

-Today was the worst day of the whole week (if you can believe it), started off by getting some horrible news that should be good, I suppose, but the potential bad of it is so much that I was really mad when I heard it. I got, for lack of a better word, yelled at for nearly a half hour about a disagreement that a certain person can't let go of, but that I would happily never talk about again. It's just one of those trying to convince me of their opinion things that doesn't work because I simply don't care and I know what I think and I'm done. After this is when Elliott tried to make the lake in the bathroom. (See above.) And then, because I was momentarily distracted upon leaving the house and taking the kids to my grandma's (she's watching them so I can finish all of this show stuff), I locked myself out of my house and, bonus, my car, and my grandma came and picked up the kids while I waited outside for my husband to drive in from his work, 22 miles away, to let me back in. Did I mention I live in Mesa, Arizona? It's not that pleasant outside today.

So maybe that was more than a bit of venting. But it's been kind of building up for a long time today. And I don't do it that often. So... I actually feel a bit better.

Just for fun, here is my table as it sits now after nearly 3 days of constant use:


It's a card table I have set up right by my couch so that I can do my torch stuff while we're all watching TV. I'm excited to get it out of my living room tomorrow.

Here's the pile of stuff I pulled out of the tumbler today. This is what it looks like before I separate it all out. I had accidentally gotten rice in the tumbler at some point this week, which I saw when I pulled the stuff out. I thought that was kind of funny. It's some really clean rice, I guess. ^_~


Those huge purple beads are SO cool. They're vintage glass beads I got from an older lady at the church I used to go to. She knew I made jewelry, so she handed me this bag of old, gorgeous purple beads that apparently fell of a necklace that snapped. I offered to restring them, but she didn't care. I've had them for years and never used them, and I finally decided to make something with two of them.


Here's the whole setup so far. It really doesn't look like a lot. I've still got to price everything and find my displays. I won't have a lot of room, and most of my thing this weekend is my demo of how I make my buttons, which reminds me that I have to cut a lot of blanks tonight, but I think it's still a pretty good supply.

That's my ugly desk, too. The icky background of a lot of my photos. It's really sturdy, though, and can take a lot of abuse. Just like me. ^_~

Overall, I feel pretty good. Maybe partly because my sweet hubby ran off to McD's to get me a McFlurry after he drove home and let me in. He just took the rest of the day off. Even though we're obviously not interacting right now, just having him around is so nice. I always feel more at ease when he's near me.

So tomorrow is going to be good. Still a lot of work to do, but in the end, it will have been fun. I always look back and feel glad about my accomplishments. I make amazing stuff. And even though most of this doesn't have anything to do with knitting, it's exciting to be selling in an area where people really can respect the time and skill it takes to make things. And I'm starting a new pair of socks tonight. Wewt, wewt!