New Crafting Fun, or Devistatingly Enjoyable addiction...?

Free time is not common in my life. I have to budget family time, and my Etsy store, with domestic chores and cooking to boot! So when the opportunity to do an ATC (Artist Trading Card) exchange with some friends from Ravelry came up, you know I had to pass.

But I didn't.

Nope! I decided that I deserved some "out of the box" time and dove in instead. I had never even heard of ATCs before this exchange and am super glad they have entered my creative life! They are an incredible outlet for stagnating creativity and act almost like a cure for the writer's block of the crafting world. With each card being such a small canvas, they are a perfect mix of limited time investment with awesomely powerful results. For those who are not familiar with these little beauties, this is a brief description I snatched from Wikipedia:

"Artist trading cards (or ATCs) are miniature works of art about the same size as modern baseball cards...Cards are produced in various media, including dry media (pencils, pens, markers, etc.), wet media (watercolor, acrylic paints, etc.), paper media (in the form of collage, papercuts, found objects, etc.) or even metals or cloth. The cards are usually traded or exchanged."

These little babies are a great way to play with different techniques and play in new artistic arenas. Have you ever seen something and said "oh I wish I knew how to do that" or "this would look so much better if the artist had only done ______"? Well, this is the perfect outlet for that type of creative energy/frustration. Ok, now that we are all "in the know", I'll tell you a little about my ATC experiences thus far.

In the Ravelry group "Good Things Together", we often host group crochet-a-longs, knit-a-longs, and just general craft-a-longs. One of the most recent happenings has been the ATC swap I mentioned. Since I was new to this whole arena, I drew inspiration from some of the other group member examples and played around with a few before diving into my swap obligations. A general theme flowing through the group was a collage/decoupage approach, so I grabbed up some scrapbook paper and embellishments and jumped on the boat!

*MOD PODGE IS DA BOMB!*
No, I am not being paid to advertise, and I'm not looking for endorsements, but this stuff totally rocks! I've never used it before this swap, but I have already incorporated it into other projects as well-- new craft staple for me!!! It's like shiny varnish and heavy duty glue all in one with no lumpy, clumpy, gooey issues to deal with. I don't think I could have achieved such nice results without it. My very first ATC actually ended up being an ACEO (Art Card Editions and Originals)-- the main difference being that this one is not intended for trade purposes. The timing of all this just happened to coincide with the very first Everyday Peacocks give away, so I decided to incorporate my "ATC" into the packaging of this special prize. (Originally I was going to include a matching case, but it did not turn out the way I wanted and therefore became another jewelry box for my daughter.)

The process was fairly straight forward:

• Paint card with pale watercolors (and sprinkle with salt before drying)
• Create pattern from sketch
• Cut out paper pieces
• Mod Podge design onto card
• Draw doodles wherever my pen wanted to go
• And add rhinestone details.

Once the outside was ready, I printed my Silver Jewelry Care sheet and finished up the inside information part of the card. All together-- not including drying times-- this took about 2-3 hours of hard creative labor. Below is the result of my efforts:

I really quite liked how this one turned out, and how nicely it incorporated into my jewelry packaging, so I decided to make a quick set of customer appreciation ATCs to send out with the first internet orders I received for Everyday Peacocks! The series is titled "Famous Firsts" and has six cards:

For these, I followed the same process, only I used tissue paper instead of scrapbook paper to get that translucent effect. And with that, my warm-up cards were done! Time to dive into the deep end and create some true crafty works of art for my group swap...

TO BE CONTINUED (but here is a juicy preview...)

Twelve years

It's been twelve years today since my daughter was born. I know it's cliche to say that time flies, but I honestly don't now where the years went! I can still remember her as the cheesy little cut-up always grinning and charming her way out of trouble when she was a toddler. And that sassy little six year old girl still grinning and charming her way out of trouble. I guess old habits die hard cause six years later she's still grinning and charming her way outta trouble... or trying to anyway...

I think this journey with her has been very bittersweet. I've been a working mom (outside of the home) for the vast majority of her life. And the times I was at home I was either a very focused University student, or mothering a very demanding baby boy. I've been so proud watching her grow and become her own person-- but I'm very sad it's been mostly from the sidelines.

The main reason I've chosen to pursue a homemade business is to allow me more time with my children. The irony is that instead of spending more time with them, I am getting to spend more time telling them why I can't spend more time with them! (Does this sound familiar to anyone?) The reality is that I am physically more available to my family, but it somehow comes with a higher stress level as I mentally juggle around my agenda to make sure everything gets done-- home, family, and business related-- while also constantly reevaluating current priorities. Telling my child "not today, Mommy has work to do" always weighs especially heavy on my heart.

So where does this magical balance lie? Or is it as fictional as the TV family of the 1950s, living only in the dream world of the overwhelmed housewife? We can find many success stories and read many blog posts about the joy of staying home with the kids while running a Cottage Business, but Internet is just another form of mass media where the lines of truth often become quite blurred.

I'm not giving up, though! Call, me a hopeless romantic, or an optimistic fool, but I just can't believe dreams don't come true. At times working at home has been incredibly successful for me-- in that I get my work done for the day and then have some great quality time with my children. But as the children get older, their demands and expectations change. The toddler boy has hit a phase of "give me what I want now, or else", and the pre-teen girl has hit a phase of " you BETTER give me what I want now, or else". I can't even begin to tell you how challenging and frustrating this is, as a mother. But as a business owner, it's devistating. I keep reminding myself that this too shall pass and make a real effort to go with the flow... I'll let you know how this works out once I know myself! I catch an occasional glimpse of daylight at the end of the tunnel, and I swear the road is getting shorter. Now I just have to be patient and believe that everything I'm working towards will be worth the blood, sweat, and tears!

A Crafty Plan: The Sample Knit Saga (cont.)

I'm so glad the weather has changed bringing Southern Quebec warm sunshiny afternoons. I'm NOT as thrilled that this has been seriously cutting into my knitting time. Let me explain...

From the time my youngest son gets up in the morning, till long after dark at night, he wants to be outside-- pitches fits to be outside-- and actually has a daily meltdown at nap time due to the mandatory four walls looming in his near future. I absolutely LOVE his enthusiasm for nature and exercise! I absolutely HATE that all my project bags have ridiculously short straps-- just long enough to let my armpit get a great view of what's inside. For those unaware, this means it's quite difficult to knit while carrying it around. So when the weather is nice, I am chasing around a toddler outside-- who, by the way, doesn't actually want to play with me, I'm just a good audience. Without a project bag to carry with me, I'm losing out on some Super-Primo knitting time!!! With new CashSilk draping seductively from my needles, this just won't do!

I think my solution is quite brilliant really, not to toot my own horn or anything. Ok...maybe brilliant is pushing it a little. We'll go with Inspired. The idea started with me needing a way to carry my yarn bowl around with me--since I don't want to muck up this beautiful yarn. (By the way, the yarn bowl in question is not actually a yarn bowl...another yarny issue I should deal with in the near future.) I needed a big bag, with a wide mouth, and a long strap. You know, a lot like those messenger bag type purses that were in style years ago...like the one that's been hanging in my hall closet for the last five or six years collecting dust.

Talk about a light bulb going off! I think I could've lit up half the state of Texas with that realization! So off I rushed to said bag hanging exactly where I left it so many years ago. Now, for those who don't know me, this by itself is a feat-- things in our house have a particularly irritating way of sprouting legs and walking off. Giddy as a schoolgirl, I snatched up my new-old project bag and rushed off to try it out!

It turns out that I could not have bought a better solution (with the exception of a couple of Velcro strips which will be removed shortly.) I have my wide mouth pouch, which is just deep enough, plus two smaller pouches on the front-- one for my row counts and project notes, the other for my stitch markers and other notions. And to top it all off, there is a large messenger style flap that covers everything when I am not knitting. I think my favorite feature so far is the little side pouch (intended for pencils) where I keep a tiny crochet hook for M1 or dropped stitches. It has been incredibly handy!

So now I say "Bring on the sun... Bring on the sandbox...Bring on the toddler chase! I am armed and ready!" Knitting time has returned. Now,let's see just how long this lace panel is going to take me...