Happy 1st Birthday, Sweet Pea!

It's been a year already...

I can't believe my baby is one...

Hope you have a wonderful day, sweet baby girl!! I LOVE YOU!

Just Listed in My Shop!

How adorable is this shiny, purple octopus!?! I just LOVE him! He is listed in the SHOP today!

Getting Some Things Done!

Finally! I feel like I have gotten a few things done the past couple days. First- I want to wish my big sis a very HAPPY BIRTHDAY!! Sunday was her '36' B-day and the kids and I went home to Akron to visit and had an awesome cookout with the family! It was a a lot of fun & Shel, I hope you had a wonderful day!

Then, my mom and brother came home with us, and after the kids went to bed, my mom helped me finish up my swap pendants for Heather's Jewels of the Sea swap. I love how they turned out! Love those colors so much. Happy to get those in the mail, finally!! Here are the ATC's I made to put the pendants on:

Here are the finished pendants. I didn't add too much more to them- mainly just the pearls.

And here is the final piece:

Renee thought I should try to make an octopus, like my mermaids and seahorses and my mom and I whipped this up last night, too. I LOVE it!! I am going to send this one to Heather for her hostess gift for the pendant swap, I hope she likes it!


I can't wait to make some more of these, hopefully tomorrow! They are so sparkly and pretty in the light. And they are pretty good size, too! About 9"x9", so lots of light shines through.


Lastly, at our craft group gathering this past weekend, we made framed collage art. I have been feeling pretty, let's say...challenged- as an 'artist' lately. Haven't had much time to do anything creative, but I haven't really felt like it, either. So, I made this collage. Very simple. Maybe it was just what I needed to get my creative juices flowing.




Well, that's all for now, it's time for bed! Have a great Wednesday!! ~Lisa

$46 and Thunderstorms...

That's what I got at the craft show on Saturday, $46 and all this rain. It was beautiful weather in the morning, from about 8-11am and then around 11 it started raining & thundering. There was only an hour the whole afternoon I sat at the show that it didn't rain. I did skip out early, unfortunatly, my table cloth was soaking wet on the ends from the tent drippings and starting closing in on getting all my things wet. I managed to sell 4 things with practically no one in attendance but a bunch of kids running in the rain. There were about 20 tables that sat empty that no one even showed up for, too- so I am glad that I wasn't one of them.

I do have lots of stained glass flowers that I am going to list in the SHOP, and maybe some of the charms and the cake boxes. I am not listing the pendants for reasons that I explained HERE, but if there is family or friends that want one, just let me know, I have a picture I can email of them all so you can pick what you want. Here are some pictures of the flowers. I have to have Scott cut some wood for bases before I list them online, they are top heavy from the glass. He'll do it soon, I am sure. He's so good about helping me with things like that!

I'll leave you with pictures of what my studio looked like after this past week trying to prepare for the show I was only at for 3 hours to sell 4 things...

Even the FLOOR is overflowing with things that need a home!

Such randomness, I know...

This is the square foot of space I had open to do any type of work in for the past few weeks.

Good thing I have all that space on my sewing table to sew! Do you see my sewing machine, I promise, it's there somewhere!!

That's all for now- i MUST go retain some order in this room. ~Lisa

I Really Need To Focus...

I was really hoping that I would have a bunch of craft updates and tons of great pictures to post, but...nope. I do have some things I have created in the past week, just a few. I haven't gotten any stained glass projects from my 'to do' list done yet for the craft show. For some reason, I can't get motivated to do them. Hopefully I get over that really soon. Scott is leaving in a few days and I will probably get some done then. I find that I would rather be downstairs in the living room hanging out with him after the kids go to bed, but if he is gone, I am usually in my studio til all hours of the night. So, here's hoping for that. The craft show I am doing is Saturday. YIKES! I kind of hope it rains. Is that bad?

So, Renee had a bridal shower to go to the other day for one of her dear childhood friends and decided that she was going to make a gift cake. She has made a few in the past that turned out so, so cute! You can see the one she made Maggie here. Very cute, indeed! I made some gift cakes in the past and searched high & low for some pictures {had to get out the old back-up hard drive!} and this was the only one I could find. It was for my very good friend, Dani Jo's baby shower a couple years ago. Each layer was filled with little gifts!! So fun to make & she loved it!

So, that got me thinking that I had a bunch of those little paper mache boxes laying around {because, who doesn't, right??} and that it would be a good use of table space to use up at the craft show to make little tiny cakes. I guess you could put gift cards or jewelry in them. They turned out ok.

I also made a money tree like my other ones with a Graduation theme. I figured maybe someone at the craft show might be on their way to a graduation party & may still need a gift! And again, looking to fill that table space!

Here are a bunch of alphabet charms waiting to be cut, foiled & soldered. I have 2x2 bevels that I am going to put them in. Hopefully I won't run out of unleaded solder, cause there isn't anywhere around that sells it and it's too late to order some now! Oh, Lisa...way to think ahead.

I did manage to squeeze in one stained glass flower. I don't really like it. I can't believe that I am putting it on my blog, because I usually don't show anyone the things I make that I don't like. I am definitely going to tear it apart & redo it. I have it all in my head how I want it to look & this is not what I was imagining. The next one I will love. Maybe I'll be motivated to do that...maybe tomorrow...maybe.

OH- and one last thing... a little sneak peek of my charms for the Jewels of the Sea swap!! At least I know that these will be ready on time! They aren't done, there are a bunch more things I want to add, but it appears I am running out of room. We'll see what else I can squeeze on there before it's a big gawdy mess!

That's all for now, hope you have a great Tuesday! ~Lisa

I Saw Red...

Over at the lovely Sadie Olive's Blog, she is hosting an "I Saw Red" challenge. I was invited to join in the fun, so here goes! I am going to post all my pics today, here and on Flickr, rather than a few at a time, because if you have read this blog before, then you know I am a BS {blog slacker} and would probably miss the deadline if I just didn't do it all now!

As I was thinking about what to post here, I quickly realized that while I don't dislike the color red, there is a major lack of it in my house! Other than the kids toys, there isn't much red around. Except...for Jake's room. His room is decorated in all things firefighter, and most everything he inherited from his Pappy, Scott's dad. His Pappy passed away almost 2 years ago now and was a retired firefighter with the Altoona Fire Department. Along with being a loving grandfather, a fantastic father and father-in-law, a trinket master and an all around great guy & jack-of-all-trades, Jim was always very proud of his fire fighter service. Jake was just 10 months old when his Pappy passed away, but talks about him all the time like he lives next door! I think he understands that he can't see him anymore, but still talks about him and to him all the time. He told me the other day that he wanted to be a fireman when he grew up, like Pappy. I think that's sweet. So, here are some RED pictures, all fireman related, all in Jake's bedroom!

Here is a banner I made for his windows. Very cute, vintage feel fabric!

Now, what future firefighter can go without a firetruck bed?

And this is a big sticker from his friend Mario, they both love that curious little monkey!

This was Pappy's kite. He took it with us every year to our family vacation to the beach!

This is a painting that Jake did last year at the Children's Museum. He said it's a dinosaur.

This is a puppet {that looks kind of like Pappy} from Aunt Renee and a hose nozzle and fire helmet, courtesy of the Altoona Fire Department!

Here is a photo I made for Jake of him & his Pappy. He was so happy & proud to take us on a tour of the station! It reads "A Grandfather is someone with silver in his hair...and gold in his heart".

This is a very special wooden fire truck that Pappy's brother, Fred, made for Jake. It sits on this shelf along with boots, Pappy's Captain hat and an old fire alarm.

Well, that about wraps up the red I have in my home. But, I think that what we do have is very special and beautiful. Thanks for the opportunity to play in the challenge!

Blog Slacker

Yep, that's me! I have been a blog slacker the past week, but with good reason {for me, a good reason}. I had a busy week with work last week and then I had my long honeymoon weekend trip to the Dominican Republic! It was actually the first vacation that Scott and I have taken just by ourselves. Crazy, huh? In his defense, we have been on a camping trip before we had kids, but he got sick & we headed home after one night. And while we have been on many family vacations, this one was alone! But, it was very nice, we had a wonderful relaxing weekend in Punta Cana. The weather was overcast, but still warm. The resort was just beautiful! We will go again. We will take the kids, because- I missed them terribly! It would be a pretty child friendly place to go, so a family vacation will be in the works in the future.

I have to get caught up on work this week and then concentrate on that craft show a little bit. I feel like I should have more done than I do. Scott is going on a fishing trip Father's Day weekend with his good friend, so I will have the kids during the craft show/festival...ugh. I am working on talking my mom & dad and brother into coming over that weekend to help out & have a cookout! We'll see. I also host a craft group for the neighborhood once a month and I went ahead and scheduled that for the same weekend. What is wrong with me? I wish I could back out of the craft show and re-schedule craft group and head home to my parents for that weekend, but I just can't do that! What would I do with all these resin necklace pendants if I didn't do this show!?!? Ok, that is enough rambling/complaining for now. I still have to go unpack!

Hopefully my next post will be filled with finished creations for the craft show and Etsy shop! OH- and I joined in my first swap! I am kind of nervous, but very excited for the challenge. It's Heather's {Speckled Egg} Summer Swap, Jewels of the Sea. Vintage, sea inspired necklace pendants. Right up my alley! Glad this has a deadline, that makes me get up & DO IT! I'll be sure to post updates.

That's all for now- I'll leave you with a few beautiful vacation pictures!