Archive for April, 2008

The other day I took all that extra energy and went out in the woods to play with my camera a bit. You can see more photos at my Flickr! I picked up this Gunne Sax dress at the Goodwill on Friday when I was out with Susan… I have a feeling it will get a lot of use over the coming months. Spring has inspired me!

This evening I spent some time under the deck, sorting through my garden stuff so I’ll be ready to plant flower pots in a few weeks. Yes, She of the Black Thumb will attempt to grow flowers this summer. I managed to do it a few years ago without many problems, and this year I have lots more space to work with.

I’ve been so caught up in other things this week that I almost didn’t realize that between my two shops, I made my 100th sale today! Yay!

Busy weekend! A three-day weekend, even! Hurrah for Patriot’s Day! Note the ample use of exclamation points! (And you thought I was exaggerating?)

Three-day breaks are wonderful, although I’ve reached the point where I’ve done almost everything on my to-do list (save for cleaning, but eh, it’s cleaning) and I have a whole day left to kill. We have no Netflix, I’m between custom orders, and I didn’t arrange for any photo shoots this weekend (d’oh) so I’m kinda floating and trying to figure out what I want to do next. The strange free-ness of time! I’m not used to it! Someone, quick! Give her a stopwatch and a schedule before she hyperventilates!

I hung out with Susan on Friday night for more thrifty good-ness and Mexican food. Have I mentioned how nice it is to have friends? Friends who you can even go out with and talk and stuff? I know it seems I’ve been living under a rock when I say that, but occasionally us rock-people have epiphanies of the obvious sort, and I’m particularly enjoying this one.

On Saturday the weather was so nice that T & I decided to take a day trip to the Ellsworth area for some sun and tasty food at Jordan’s snack bar. They had fresh crab (!) so I got a crab roll that was delicious. It was so tasty that I couldn’t stop thinking about it for the rest of the night (seriously–I went to bed drooling), so the next day we went grocery shopping and I splurged* on some fresh Maine crab meat. Then I got really brave and tried my hand at homemade crabcakes. The verdict: Tasty! Even better: Mr. Tim does not eat seafood, so they were allll mine! Muwahahahaha!

* Does the word “splurge” conjure up gross mental images for anyone else? Because whenever I hear it, or see it written, I think about puke.  And in current context, that’s just unbelievably wrong.

It’s SPRING! Spring spring spring spring SPRING! I am manic, what with the 70-degree temperatures and the green grass and the buds on the trees and and and !!!!!

It feels so good to be alive right now, I can’t even tell you. A co-worker mentioned the nice weather to me the other day in passing, just making polite conversation, and I was all, “Oh, I KNOW!?! Isn’t it wonderful?!? I’m so ecstatic!!! I love it so much!! I want to roll in the grass and frolic through the fields and hug a tree!! Let’s go!”

They backed away a little, understandably so.

I’ll be abusing my adjectives and exclamation points until at least June, when I finally settle into this beautiful lovely gorgeous magnificent superbly spectacular weather! You’ve been warned!

On a different note, as you may remember, T & I gave up our cable a while back, because we weren’t really using it. We decided to switch to a larger plan on Netflix and get our media fix there. However, there’s a slight problem… see, Tim has something like 60 movies in our queue, and I have a grand total of, uh, 2. That’s right, 2 movies that I actually want to see vs. 60 that I don’t because they’re really bad sci-fi. This is not good, people. I need your help!

What’s good in movies these days? I like documentaries (mostly for present-day subjects, not so much historical), indie films, creepy horror (not gory horror), good science fiction (note the part about “good”), comedies, etc. I’m not so much into action movies, but if it’s a must-see, throw it on the pile. I’m trying to avoid a whole summer of really bad B-movies, and given our track record with movies, I definitely need outside intervention to do so.

I finally have a chance to catch up with my favorite blogs and get down to business! The business of blog-writin’, that is.

I’ve been working on a lot of projects lately, and each one requires me to shift gears a little. Programming, design, photography… all distinctly different processes that have me feeling like a Jack (Jaqueline?) of all trades; but it’s a very competent feeling. That’s good to have when one is swamped with work!

The photo to the right is part of the recent product photography I’ve done for Allison Strine Designs. Allison is an incredibly talented artist–I adore her work, and was honored when she accepted my bid. I’ve had a lot of fun working with her and I’ve enjoyed working with her products, so much so that I had to keep a pendant and a magnet for my very own.

Last weekend’s EtsyMaineTeam meet-up was wonderful! It was great to put faces to names, to network a bit, and learn more about what the artists in our state are doing. I had the pleasure of meeting our team leaders, Becky and Jennifer, as well as Ms. Jamie, whom I’ve known online for years but had never met in person. She came with her crafty family to boot! She and her husband and sister just opened Sweetland Retreat, an artists’ bed & breakfast in Manchester, Maine.

I also did some trading while I was there. I made out like a bandit, and my prints were well-received. I will have pictures of my new treasures soon. You can also look forward to reading my posts every Friday on the new EtsyMaineTeam blog! Double the me, double the fun, right? I thought so!

Tim’s birthday was on the 8th (happy 26th, hon!) and then I got a surge of custom orders, so I’ve been absent from blog-land for the last few days, and I don’t think it’s going to slow up any time soon! I was lucky enough to be featured in yet another edition of Etsy Finds (thanks, Anda!) and have since found my sales at Calobee Doodles a little overwhelming. But overwhelming in a good way!

Speaking of Etsy, I’m quite excited about the upcoming EtsyMaineTeam meet-up this weekend in Augusta! The last meeting was snowed out and rescheduled to a time when I couldn’t make it, so I’m eager to catch up and meet everyone.

Now, we interrupt your regularly scheduled programming for a dose of girl-talk, of the “OMG SHOES SQUEE” variety. Please forgive me in advance:

On Tuesday evening we took a trip to Target, where I found not one but two pairs of cute shoes. This is amazing, because I haven’t bought a pair of shoes in a retail store in years (save for the occasional $5 flip-flops, and my annual trip to the Saucony outlet for new sneaks on-the-cheap) because they never fit. My feet are very short and wide and tall–a shape that pretty much rules out anything that has a pointed toe, or even the slightest hint of a pointed toe… in other words, anything that isn’t designed to be worn by a duck. In fact, every pair of dress shoes I’ve ever owned (that would be 2 pairs, mind you) in my adult life came out of a “special” mail-order catalog for people with ridonkulously weird feet.

That’s right, folks, my feet are “special.” And now you know why I spend 99.9% of my time in sneakers.

But my new shoes? They’re cute. And when I say cute, I mean, adorably perfect in every. single. way. They’re comfortable and stylish, dressy enough for the office but casual enough for weekend wear. I bought two pairs–one in the ribbon style, one in black–because I’ll probably never find any shoes so perfect ever again. In fact, I recommended them on ThisNext long before I’d seen them in person, so it must be fate! The shoe gods are smiling upon me.