Fall Clothing Show Tomorrow!

I'm in the final stages of prep for The Clothing Show, so this will not be a long post. For any of my readers in Toronto, please come by Booth #513 if you can and take advantage of some great deals. Hint: Print the above image from this post out and you can save 20% off my New Fall tees.

I was thrilled to see another of my items on the front page of etsy the other day. What a great looking treasury for Fall too! Well, wish me luck at the Show! I'll let you know how it goes after the weekend.

First Day of Autumn

This morning I was treated to a nice surprise when this made it to the front page. I love it when that happens!

Last week, this sweet gal wrote some very kind things about me and my shop.
Thanks, Kristen. You are a sweetheart!

Today is also the first day of my favourite season so I'm looking forward to the cooler days. No more need for a/c, lots of excuses for hot chocolate and less sweat exuded from my body (hopefully). Of course, I've yet to step outside. The day was devoted to making a ton of buttons for my various retailers and also the upcoming Clothing Show. Most of my stock is together, I just need to make signage for the booth and price it all. I will have some great deals on the Summer tees and older items, plus will unveil some new Fall stuff. If I have time, I'll post some pics of what to expect in the next few days.

The change of seasons also means all the Fall lineup of shows are starting up again. Tonight is Heroes, one of Matt's favourites. Tomorrow is House, I believe. Next week, there's Grey's Anatomy, my fave... So much to watch and so little time! Yes, we are tv junkies, but hey, it beats being addicted to other vices.

Edit: I forgot that the Season Premiere of House was on last week. Duh! And I meant Thursday instead of next week for Grey's Anatomy. Geez, where's my brain?

A Clean Slate & A Blank Canvas

I didn't get around to blogging yesterday and really should be silkscreening some things right now, but if I don't do this now, I probably won't get around to it at all this week. After wanting to repaint our upper level for several months now, Matt and I finally did just that last Friday. His colour of choice was a dark greenish-grey to mimic a chalkboard and my colour of choice was white, hence the title of this post.

This is what that same wall looked like before we started painting:


Thank goodness the dark wall is just a temporary thing for Matt's next film project. (It will be painted white to match my workspace after he's done shooting.) I had previously told him that he wasn't allowed to film any more movies in our home. Since I work from home and need to be able to move around and make noise at any given point, filming a movie in the same environment can prove to be difficult. But in marriage, you learn to compromise. And so while Matt got his wish to film part of his next project here, I also got my wish (below):

In all his years of riding a bike, Matt has never worn a helmet. Until now!

Something new that I'm trying these days is having my desk up against the wall. If you're familiar at all with feng shui, then you know this isn't the best position in which to have your desk. Not only do you have something in front of you, blocking chi, but your back is left vulnerable. But for practical reasons - facing the other way meant I'd have to use a huge and unsightly extension cord - I set it up like this for now. Plus, all the cables and cords are kind of eyesore so at least this way they are less visible.


The main reason I wanted white walls is because I thought they'd make for better product shots. A good amount of natural light and decent photography skills don't hurt either, but I thought the wall colour before just didn't go anything for my items.


At least now I have a blank white wall to work with. My workspace is still a work-in-progress as there are a number of other things I want to get from here to complete it. I'm loving my new Judy dress form and red Lerberg rack though.


Those are all the photos for now. To see more from our fun day, you can go here. Sorry, Tara, no other after shots yet :)

Makeover Madness

I don't get my hair cut at salons very often. Not because I've had any traumatic experiences... until yesterday, that is. See my hair in the photo above? Notice how long it looks? It's nearly down to the middle of my back.

Well, Matt was in need of a haircut, and my hair was badly in need of a trim to get rid of the split ends. I asked for two inches off. THAT'S TWO INCHES PEOPLE! What ended up happening? My hair was basically massacred.

Before I knew it, hair was flying and a LOT more than two inches was lopped off my head.

The hair stylist said I had such pretty hair...
--- SNIP SNIP ---

The hair stylist said I had a lot of hair...
--- SNIP SNIP ---

Why didn't I say anything?

Well, it's a bit intimidating to tell someone holding a pair or scissors and a razor in their hands to stop. Plus, I was trusting her to listen to what I told her at the beginning. I specifically said "only two inches". Obviously her idea of two inches is more like 2 + 2 + 2 = 2.

Yes, it's just hair. It's not the end of the world. And thankfully it will grow back before it is the end of the world (hopefully). But seriously, by the time I walked out of the salon, my hair looked like "The Rachel" - you know, Jennifer Aniston's famous Friends hairdo - only not nearly as glamorous. Not to mention the fact that I was never crazy about that do.


So now my hair barely pulls back into a ponytail, that's how short it is. And the hair that makes it into that ponytail is about 1/3 of what was there before. I have yet to take a photo of the mess and I'm not sure I want to.

Needless to say, I won't be going back to that salon for my next haircut.

More makeover madness photos to come tomorrow though. This time of the home reno kind.

Can you "handle" this?

I've been on a blog hiatus lately but only because I've been working real hard. A new design is here, finally! And yes, I've hopped on the moustache bandwagon, but only because it looks so cute and funny on this kitty. I'll be listing tees and totes with "moustache kitty" in my shop later this month.

Other new designs are in the works, along similar "dress-up" lines. With Halloween around the corner, I've been inspired by that theme of donning costumes. Stay tuned.

As well, the Clothing Show is just weeks away, so I'm preparing for my second time there. A lot of summer stock will be marked down and I will have some new items too. It may be my only show for the rest of the year, since a lot of the deadlines for Christmas shows seemed to have already passed. Please come check it out. Same spot as the Spring show. Booth 513. September 26-28.

Bubblemint!

I was admiring this beautiful treasury (wink wink) the other day and was thinking how lovely it would be to see on the front page and voila! It happened this morning. Sweet! And I have to thank Stacey and Christine for letting me know that it was on the front page, as well as Margaret for including me in the treasury.

I took the cats in for their annual checkups this morning and both got a clean bill of health. It was a bit tough juggling two cat carriers on my own, but can you imagine looking after 500 cats? Check out this link I discovered today. What an amazing woman! I think for the upcoming Christmas season, I will be donating a portion of my etsy sales to The Cat House.

Home... where the heart is.

I'm back home now... after going "home" to my parents' for a week. Funny, how I used to consider Saskatoon my home, but now I don't think I could ever live there again permanently. I told my sister that if Matt and I moved there, I think we'd just get fat. Saskatoon's not really a walking city like Toronto. Even biking seems kind of foreign there, as I didn't see very many people pedaling around. Plus, the way the sun beats down on you, you seem safer in a car. Though the skies are clear and blue there, as opposed to the smoky haze we noticed from the plane, as soon as we were over Toronto. If we didn't put on weight from being sloths, we'd surely gain some from all the food my mom fed us. Appropriately, we saw Wall-E while we were there.



And since it'd been more than 2 years since my previous visit, some things surprised me. Like the size of the trees in their front and back yard. HUGE! They never reached up to my bedroom on the second floor when I lived there, but now they soar above it. And the birds there seem plentiful. I heard and spotted a blue jay several times there and I swear they weren't around before. Or else I was too caught up in my teen angst to have noticed.

Then there was how dry it was. Almost every night I woke up having to go to the bathroom because my body wasn't sweating out the fluids. Even though temperatures were in their 30's most of the time we were there, it didn't feel as unbearable.

Still, there were some things that haven't changed. Most noticeably, all the brown in the house! If I work up the nerve, I will nominate my parents' place for a home decorating show as it is badly in need of some updating. Everything in their house is brown or beige. Well, almost. Their bedroom is an exception but baby blue curtains are not that hip either.

Our big project for a few days was to paint the exterior trim on the windows and garage door. Matt had wanted to repaint their deck too but my dad said it needed to be fixed first... by the time we left, it was in pieces as it required more fixing that my dad originally thought. Sorry, Dad :)


Other than that, we spent a lot of time eating like I said, watching Olympics and playing an array of board games including PayDay, Monopoly, Clue, The Game of Life, Sorry and Scrabble. I didn't do an ounce of my own work or catch up on my reading like I had planned on doing. In fact that stuff didn't leave my bag while I was there. Typical.


I also brought my camera but never took any photos (which accounts for the drawings and Internet image). I certainly took my vacation to heart this time. Which means I've got to get my butt back to work. The Fall Clothing Show is coming up next month so new tees are in the works. And some new things will be added to the shop in the next little while.