This is so funny

I had to share this I really think that it is so funny. A friend of mine showed this video over the weekend and I think that it is too funny.

A Great Read

I have been meaning to write this for a while now. If you are a fan of mysteries then this book is for you. It is a plus that it revolves around a weekly knitting circle who come together to help in a time of sadness, and fear.

Death By Cashmere, A Seaside Knitters Mystery
by Sally Goldenbaum.
ISBN 9780451224712

From the first page to the last I found myself unable to put this book down. Picture a beautiful seaside town, where everyone knows you and your business, where there are people that have lived there all their lives mixed with newcomers this is Sea Harbor, MA. Each of the characters are very well rounded, and well written, they each have such a depth to them that you really connect with them, and feel like you know them. With each page I began to feel like I was being drawn into the world of Sea Harbor, MA. I could almost see the details of the locations as they are described. Each and every chapter of this book with keep you wanting more. The conclusion to this story is so well written that when you read the answer to the mystery you really begin to see the clues that were written into each chapter but I did not put them together. I really would recommend this to anyone looking for a very good read. There is a lace knitting pattern in the back that I am really wanting to try it is for a scarf and it really sounds like it would be a great beginner's lace project.

Here is an excerpt from the publisher's website:
This brand-new mystery series spins a yarn about knitters and murder in a quaint seaside village.
Not long after Isabel “Izzy” Chambers opens up a knitting shop in the sleepy fishing town of Sea Harbor, Massachusetts, a diverse group of women begins congregating each week to form the Seaside Knitters.Izzy raises some eyebrows when she rents the apartment above her shop to Angie Archer, whose reputation for loose behavior and a quick temper has made her unpopular with many locals. But could any of them have wanted her dead? Angie’s body is discovered drowned in the harbor, her long red hair tangled like seaweed in a lobster trap.An official investigation rules the death an accident. There are speculations of too many whiskey sours, a slippery wharf, a dark night… But Izzy and the Seaside Knitters smell something fishy. When several strange incidents occur above the shop, the women decide to take matters into their own hands. But before long, their small-town sense of security is frayed, and the threat of more violence hangs over this tightly knit community.

I would really like to read other books by Sally Goldenbaum, and I will let you know how they turn out.

I haven't forgot about you all

This is a picture from a beautiful organic farm in Vermont, that I took on our road trip.

I have been so busy over the past month that I have not had the time or energy to post. I have been back in school since July 14th, and the girls started back on Aug. 1st. I have been crafting. I have made a baby blanket, a sample scarf for a kit that I am making up. I made a quick lap blanket for the house, and 7 balloon valances for the school that the girls go to. I have also been working on finding a job. I feel that I have not been keeping this up a well as I should be anymore. I will come back and post when I can. The last time I said that I was taking a break I ended up posting like crazy for a while. I thank you for reading. I really plan on posting as often as possible.

I have been going nuts over at YouTube lately. I am able to watch it on my phone and I have found a few that I would like to share.

Road Trip Day 2

We have really covered alot of ground today. Our day started out in Steven City, Virgina, and we are now in upstate New York. We have been through West Virgina, Maryland, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and finally New York. We are in the Adirondacks right now and I have very spotty service on both my phone and air card, so I am unable to post pictures right now because I know I will lose signal in the middle of an upload. It has rained on us off and on ever since Albany, and we are still at least 45 min until Plattsburgh, NY. I will be glad when we get there. we will stay the night there and then take the ferry over the Vermont in the morning. The girls are very excited about going in the truck on a boat. They do not understand how we are going to get the truck on the boat. I have tried to explain it but I still do not think that they really understand.



On the crafting side of things, I have made a couple of beaded crocheted chains and a cape for Shae's Barbie doll. She kept asking me to make her something and I figured that I could make her something that she could play with.



We will be going to Vermont, New Hampshire , Conneticut and New York City tomorrow. I really want to take the girls to see the city and I think we might try to go to Ground Zero, I really think we should make the effort to visit the this if we can. I really want to go to Purl Soho and pick up some new yarns.



Oh My goodness the views are wonderful up here but the light is so bad that my pictures won't turn out good. I really wish that is was clear so that I could show off these beautiful scenes.

Road Trip and no Cell signal

I am on the first day of a few day road trip and I do not have any pictures yet, :-( so sorry. I really need to get back to my old blogging self. I have no cell phone service here in VA but I am able to use my air card for my laptop, I know it doesn't make sense. They say that it is something about the type of towers that they have here is messes up out of state cellphone. ARGHH....
Well I may have no pictures but I do have a couple of links to recommend. So here they are in no particular order.

This one is an Etsy crafter that I found through her ad in Ready Made and my girls really think that her creatures are cute. She is Debbi von Zyl, and she makes one-of-a-kind hand-knitted toys/creatures. Here link is here.

The next one for today is a really good food magazine called, Clean Eating. I just discovered this one and after only one issue I am hooked. The recipes are great and are very healthy and the way they are presented even a picky eater will try it. Here is the link.

Let me know what you think about these 2 and I will try to post more soon. I am going to take a few pictures of the beautiful views of the Virgina countryside and post them in the hotel tonight.

My Newest Obsession

. . . Ribbon Covered Clothespins. Here are a few pictures of the ones that I made yesterday.

These are covered with vintage ribbons that I have collected over the years. I seend to have gotten so carried away making them that I have so many now I put a few in my etsy shop.

Facebook and more

I am so addicted to Facebook that I have neglected my poor little blog. I really have not gotten much crafting done this week, and this time change is not good for my system. I did happen on a great find today at Goodwill. I really have need an electric pencil sharpener. I found one that looked just like one that I used in school. I love it. It is very heavy duty and it works great. Now all of my pigmacolor pencils look great and are really drawing me (no pun intented) to them. I will have to get to work on some new ATCs. I have a few that I need to post that I would love to swap.

Layouts of the Day

These are for a 4x6 scrapbook for my mother for to take on her vacation at the end of the month. I love the way that these turned she loved them. I printed them at wal-mart today and they were ready in an hour online. Let me know what you think. I made these with a free kit. I will have to find the link and I will post it as soon as I can.

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Featured Site

I would like to start featuring sites once per week. The first featured site is The Shabby Princess.

This site has all you need to get started Digital Scrapbooking, with great how-to's and freebies. The Dinner Party kit is one of the great freebies that are avaliable on this site.

The shoppe is filled with beautiful papers, embelishments, fonts, and kits.

You can also find great premade blog headers and buttons. All you have to do is add your blog title, and you have a great header.

Even if the digital scrapbook medium is not for you this is great for digital collage and other types of art because you can print these images out with your home printer and use them for any traditional crafting.

A New Slideshow

Merry Christmas To All

I think I might be too busy to post over the next few days.

So, here goes, MERRY CHRISTMAS I hope that you all have a good one. I have included a few of our new ornaments that we have aquired over the past few weeks.

The Star is from Khols and the Strawberry is from Bloomingdale's

The Snowman bell is from Kohl's and the Good Night Moon is from Bloomingdale's. the Gingerbread Man is one that Anastasia made in Kindergarten last year.

Here is one of my most recent cards. I used the Making Memories Distressing kit and a Marvy 1' circle punch and one blue snap. I set the snap with the fisker's eyelet setter and punch. I also used an ink'ed phrase stamp for the happy birthday.

A Cool How-To

I really love this how to at this site and all the other ones that are on there also. This picture from there also. I just thought I would give a little inspiration for today.

Inspirations of the Day

I love this idea. printable wrapping paper. I found this on Blueprint magazine's website. I thought I would share this very unique find. I really have gotten inspired lately to do more paper crafting. Here is a very cool blog by Tim Holtz, he is a mixed media, stamping artist. I used my weekly Michael's coupon for the Making Memories Distressing Kit. I love how it works but I think I might have to practice a little bit more before I show off anything. The bone folder that came with the kit is great I like hw crisp my folds look. I am working on a new scrapbook layout for Anastasia's scrapbook. I hope to have it done tonight. I

had to stop to watch my favorite show, NCIS. It was supposed to be a brand new one but, it is a rerun. I guess that I will get more done on my scrapbook than I thought.

I really am loving being out of school this week. I really needed the break, an essay each week has been a little hard in the sleep department. Going to bed at 12am and getting up at 6am to take the girls to school and hope that I would get to work that day (I am a substitute teacher at their school) then not getting home until 3 in the afternoon. When I got home I would have to cook dinner, do laundry and get the kids in bed by 7:30, and then start my school day over again.

I also got to watch Carol Duvall's Holiday Workshop today, and I loved the idea of the folded paper tree. Here is the link for this I hope that you find it as interesting and easy as I have.

School Is Over For The Year

I finished my classes on Saturday and the girls on Friday. I have been going crazy this weekend making a few things and letting the girls make collages. I bought myself a new cabinet to store my craft stuff that we use in the house so I don't have to carry things back and forth from the studio. It is a Making Memories Embelishment Cabinet, Michael's had then on sale for 30% off and I just had to have it. It has been great. I have things for paper crafting, stamping, scrapbooking, and beading all in one cabinet. It has made keeping things organized and easy to get to. Look at all the storage space. I love the ribbon rods, I thought I had more ribbon than this, I will have to look through a few more drawers. I have the jars filled with floss, buttons, beads, paper scaps, paint daubers.

Here is one of the scrapbook pages that I made last night. This one is Shae's first trip to Stone Mt. in 2003.

Supply list:

Black Dye Ink Pad

Blue Eyelet Snaps

Forest Green Cardstock

Round Journaling Stamp

Flourish Stamp

Tree Stamp

1 inch round paper punch

Green Crinkle print paper

All Night Media Typerwiter Key Letter Stamp Set

Dark Blue Ink Dauber (used to distress the edges of paper)

Anastasia's first year in school.

Supply List:

1 inch round paper punch

Paper Flowers K & Company

Large Brads K & Company

Fabric Stickers

Making Memories Heart Brads

K & Company Chipboard accents

Plum Ink Dauber

Scallop Scissors

Round Journaling Stamp

Striped Pattern paper

Pink Cardstock

Amy Butler Mat Stack

I also got an early christmas present. I bought my self a new camera. It is a Sony Cyber-Shot DSC-S700. Circuit City had it on sale for $20 lower than wal-mart and they gave a 1G memory stich with purchase. Yipee, my last one fell in the atrium waterfountain at the Georgia Aquarium, this summer.

Here is the list of books and magazines that I have used to get some ideas for my paper crafting.

Vintage Paper Crafts

The Decorated Page

The Encyclopedia of Scrapbooking Tool & Techniques

This weeks update

We have been really busy this week. We made two countdown calendars, one for each of the girls.

Anastasia's is a bottle cap tree with round tags for the covers and I left the strings because I thought it would help her pull the tags off each day.

Shae's is made out of origami water cups that were glued to a piece of poster board.

Each of these took less than one and a half hours and they offer a fun change of pace.

I really can't believe that these pictures are so dark, but I don't get home until late and it is still dark when I leave so I have to deal with afternoon light and the dreaded flash.

Zentangle

Ok I saw this on another blog the other day and I had to try my hand at one. Once I got started I realized that I used to make these alot when I was in school. I really like the way that this one turned out. Here is a link to the Zentangle Gallery.

Books For Sale

All books listed are Brand New and I have multiple copies of some of the books. I was doing fairs and teaching fiber arts in my studio and I would like to offer a few things here. Shipping is included in the price, and I accept check or money order, only. Thanks in advance for looking.

Beader's Companion $19.95 regular price My Price $17.95

Crocheter's Companion $19.95 regular price My Price $17.95Getting Started Crochet $16.95 regular price My Price $14.95

Wrap Style $21.95 regular price My Price $19.95
Domino Knitting $16.95 regular price My Price $14.95

Felted Knits $21.95 regular price My Price $19.95


Getting Started Knitting $16.95 regular price My Price $14.95

Knit Fix $19.95 regular price My Price $17.95

Handy Book of Patterns $24.95 regular price My Price $22.95

Handy Book of Sweater Patterns $24.95 regular price My Price $22.95

I will also be posting some back issues of Interweave Crochet and Knits as soon as I can take an inventory of how many I have of each issue. I also have a full selection of yarns that I will be posting also. I have not been having classes for a while and I really need to get the studio redone where I can use the space to create and not just for a store.

REMEMBER shipping is INCLUDED in all of the prices. I will also give a discount if you purchase more than one item. Here is the scale.

Buy one book at regular price, get the second one for 20% off of equal or lesser value.

Buy 3 books and get 10% off of each book.

Buy 4 books and get 15% off of each book.

Just e-mail me if there is any title that you would be interested in. Thanks in advance.

What a busy month

October is the busiest month for birthdays in out family. My niece starts the month off on the 5th (she turned 20 this year), then it is me next on the 21st (29 here this year), My cousin's daughter on the 25th (8 this year), My oldest daughter on the 26th ( she turned 7), and my mom and her twin sister today ( I will not mention how old the are here).

I worked all last week at the school and by the time I get off, help the girls with there homework, get dinner on the table, the bathed and ready for bed I barely have time to take a breath. Planning a birthday party for my little girl I felt like I just pulled if off. We had finger food and over 30 people here and oh my. She did have fun though. I got her an MP3 player because she had been wanting my I-Pod and I did not feel like I should let her have it because her little sister would have a fit.



For my birthday my mother gave me money and so I decided that I would buy something that I really needed and that I would remember after the day and so I bought a new bedding set that I have been looking at for sometime now. I purchased it at Linens N Things and they have it on sale now so here is the link.

I hope that I can make more time for making some of the things that are on my christmas gift list.

If you would please pray for me, I am going through somethings that I don't feel that I can go into here but it is very personal and important to me. Thanks in advance for your prayers.

Things that I find Inspiring

I just thought that I would give you a little taste of what has inspired me today.

These are ribbon belts that I found via Martha Stewart.com Photo Jewelry also via Martha Stewart.com Strawberry Pincushions from Martha Stewart.com

and last but not least Yarn Gift Wrapping also from Martha Stewart.com

Kumihimo Video

Here is a great Kumihimo Video that I found through you-tube.