A new year, new life changes

Life has been crazy once again.  I spend a great deal of time with my youngest grand baby and in mid December I decided I have to move.  Don't get me wrong, I love where I have been living for the last 6 months but the fact is I cannot afford it.  Matter of fact I have finally realized I can not afford to live anywhere on the amount of disability income I get each month.  So, after a good amount of thought I gave my landlord notice that I had to move.  I am going to once again try to share a home with my daughter and see if we can help each other get on our feet.  My dog Alex has been staying with my daughter for almost 2 weeks now anyway.  The night after Christmas we had to rush my mom to the hospital, she had a rather serious case of pneumonia.  My mom is a stubborn woman, does not like to bother people, does not want anyone to have to take care of my dad who cannot be alone, an amputee with very poor health, so she tends to suffer in silence until there is a really major problem.  I am so very thankful my brother and I decided we have to check up on her because if we had not we may very well have lost her within 24 hours.  So instead of being at home packing I have been babysitting my dad so my mom would stay put. 

I am working like a crazy woman to get this move done this weekend.  Monday ends my vacation from school so I want to be ready to sit and apply myself to my schoolwork.  I also have been doing a lot of thinking about my Etsy shop.  The sad fact is if I could improve sales just a little bit, I would have that extra bit of money to make ends meet.  So I started doing some research.  Here is what I came up with:  My sequined ornaments sell twice as often as my beadwork.  That tells me I have to concentrate more on my ornament work.  My beadwork?  Well I have a certain loyal following that purchases my amulet bags, thank goodness for that because I would never be able to give up making them.  But that said I have to start making a lot more other things than the amulet bags and I think it is time to start putting the time into doing some of the more funky beadwork I enjoy that also commandeers a bit higher price point. 

I was also recently was contacted by a friend.  Her fiancé owns a woodworking business, does kitchen cabinets and that type of thing.  They are in the process of building a new workshop and adding a gift shop besides.  She has asked to carry a line of my jewelry.  It would be on consignment but she is a person I trust completely, she has sold work for me before on consignment and has never let me down.

So I do have a full plate setting in front of me just waiting for me to take advantage and work for it.  This is exactly what I shall do because it is time for my life to change and I only I can make it happen.

Happy 2014 to everyone!

Welcome November

The season change is getting a bit obvious, it is starting to get really chilly outside,  We actually spent a few days last week raking, I have just enough trees to give me a yard full of leaves and pine needles.  Yesterday morning it was snowing.  It did not stick around but Yes it was snowing. 
So I have decided I am going to use this as an excuse to slow down and take care of me for a while.  I will keep up with my schoolwork and create beadwork when I can sit and enjoy doing it.  I will spend a lot of my free time with my grand baby because now I can have her come stay at my house more often than I have to go to hers.  Now I just need to find a playpen so I have a safe place to put her when she is sleeping.  She is right at that point where she is going to start really rolling on her own with no warning ;o)

I ended up with 8 custom orders for Amulet bags which means forget getting new items in my shop before Christmas.  First order was for a large bag, large enough to hold credit cards.  that is finished and mailed.  I have 2 that are required to have metal feathers, they are almost done but running into a problem,  the feathers I have bought in the past, well I just can't find them, I have found larger ones but not the size I use.  But I will find something.  One the next order I have one bag finished, one almost finished and 3 more to start!
I will not stress, I will not stress, I will not stress.  This is the winter I stay tucked in the house and work at my own pace, even in my jammies if I don't feel like getting dressed and enjoy being home doing what I wish without stressing about what I cannot do anymore. 

Tomorrow is Veterans Day, coming from a family who has many members past and present, close and distant, of the armed services, it is natural for me to remember what this holiday is about.  Remember to say thank you if you happen to come across someone tomorrow who is in service.  If you or someone in your life is in any of our armed services, I thank you and honor you for what you do for us.

Finding Balance

How do we find balance when we are trying to juggle to many things?  I have been pondering this all weekend.  How do I find balance? My schoolwork, my beadwork, my housework, my grandchildren...It just seems that I am alway's trying to do a bit more than I can and something along the line suffers.  I have to admit these day's it is usually my beadwork.  It seems like my school work is taking many more hours a day than I ever imagined an online class could.  It seems like I just finish babysitting my newest grandbaby and then I am doing it again.  I am not complaining, I love the time I spend with her, my other two grandkids no longer need me that way but I cannot do much else when I have her, she does not sleep, she is very alert almost all day and needs to be interacted with.  So now I sit and wonder how to keep up with new shop listings on Etsy when I don't seem to find the time to make anything.  I listed the amulet above today, it has been sitting in my "done" box for weeks and I haven't done another since.  Right now I have three custom orders for amulet bags, each one is started, but I am not making progress.  I did my schoolwork this morning.  Then I babysat until 9:00 tonight.  Instead of sitting down to pick up my beading needle I sat down at the computer and went into my classroom to do......more schoolwork!... So now it is 11:00 at night and my eyes are telling me I can do nothing more than climb into bed.  Seems like a very typical day so how do I find that balance that gives me the time to do my schoolwork, be with my family and find the time for my creative needs? This is going to require a bit more thought, maybe I'll sleep on it.

A reason to laugh

It seems like I have not had much in my life as of late to make me laugh.  But this week we stood on my porch and watched an event that had me laughing so hard I had tears running down my face.  The farm next door has a number of pastures and they move different sets of cows around occasionally. Apparently this week it was moving day for the cows that have been across the street to the pasture next to my house.  Well, it did not go really smoothly.  The cows decided they weren't in the mood and decided to go in all directions causing bedlam to break loose.  The cows were running back and forth across the road, Have you ever seen a huge cow run?  There were three farmhands with big sticks running around to try to herd the cows in the direction they wanted.  That did not work out so well.  The farmhands ran right and the cows ran left.  Then the farmhands ran in a circle to the left and the cows ran backwards to the right.  There were cars stopped on both sides of the road because some of the larger, older cows decided to stroll up and down the road.  Three of the youngsters managed to get up into my driveway.  I literally stood on my porch staring down at three young bulls, they were just babies when I moved in here.  Here comes a farmhand on a tractor chasing them and they ran in three different directions.  They sure gave him a run for his money.  All the cows got eventually rounded up into the pasture next to me so we had a happy ending but it sure was fun watching this comedy while it unraveled.  Hope those farmhands got a pay raise!

Thoughts

Life just does not seem to settle down.  Every time I think things will slow down so I can catch my breath and figure out how to catch up, another something or other comes up.  I am just not getting any time to myself other than when I just do not feel well enough to do what is normal.  So I sat once more thinking what I can do for my shop to try to get through the holiday season.  Just cannot accomplish what I wanted and am now resigning myself to the fact that things aren't going to change much.  So I decided if nothing else I would concentrate on my mini amulet bags that I created for my "Love for Tori" line.  And then I would put them all up for a very special price of $10.00 through the holiday season which will fly by us just as it alway's does.

For anyone who may have not been reading my blog for a long time this particular line of mini bags are named for my grand daughter, Tori.  Tori is 17 and she totally owns my heart.  She also struggles with more illness than any 17 year old should have to.  She has a number of problems starting with a type of mono that never goes away.  It lives dormant in her blood stream and flares up when it feels like it. At least once a year and she is bedridden for ages, it has darn near killed her 3 times. 
Then a few years ago we went through the thyroid cancer scare, which is when I created these mini bags, not big enough for much but the perfect size to write a wish on a bit of paper, roll it up and tuck in your bag so it is alway's close by.  A bit over a year ago we finally got a positive result that Tori has both Rhuemetoid Arthritis and Psoriatic Arthritis, a gift from her father.  So at 17 she lives with the pain of a 70 year old.  This child is such a brave soul and I love her dearly.  I joke with her that we make a great pair with all our illness and fighting to have a normal life when I am rich I am going to go buy us matching lazy boys for the living room. 

Why I am going into all this is a mystery, just deciding to do some more of these bags for my shop just gets me thinking about how much we have gone through over the last 10 years.  I forget what tough people we are. 

It's coming faster than we think

     Tomorrow is October 1st and I absolutely hate the fact that I am sitting here thinking about the upcoming holiday's.  My whole life I grumbled when I walked into a store and saw Christmas decorations before Halloween got here but as an online shop owner now, I get it.  I get it, I get it.  Each year I tell myself I am going to buckle down get rid of distractions and get great, holiday worthy, items made, posted and promoted in my shop in plenty of time for the holiday's because I know I can't wait until December 5th to start.

    Yet here I sit on September 30th, with so many things going on in my life I wonder to myself, when am I going to get the time to create enough?  This has to be the year I get a head start and make gorgeous, creative, beautiful items for one and all and sell them all so I can in turn buy gorgeous, creative, beautiful items to give to my family for gifts.  But when will I find time?  It just is not going to happen.  No matter how much I make up my mind life will always interfere with the best layed plans.  Some one will need me, my school work will get heavy, I will have an episode that stops me from creating.  It will always be something so all I can do is just move forward as best as I can just like I always do.  I will have new items posted, I will work on my ornaments but I will not be performing any miracles.  First and fore most I will concentrate on the ribbon ornaments for my friend for a few weeks.  Then we will delve into the holiday creation in the free minutes of my life.
Just the real life facts in the every day life of Debsparkles.  ;o)

Empowerment

A strong word.  A person can be empowered in many ways.  Today I am brainstorming way's to empower someone and I am going to appeal to your heart.  I have a friend, well I am not sure that is the best description, she is someone who has more than once been a part of my extended family. a best friend to my own daughter, someone we love.  She is in need of help.  Often we all are in need of some help but remember the old saying "no matter how tough it gets someone else has it tougher"
This is definitely one of those moments for me.  I am going to tell her story but I will not name her, she will just be called her because as much as I want to share what she is going through and what I wish to do, I must also protect her privacy.  If you and I are close and have the same group of close friends then you are already aware of who we are trying to help.

She married her high school sweetheart.  Sad and strange as it may be her childhood sweetheart, decorated service man husband quickly plunged her into a life of abuse.  But like most of us woman, she tried to work at things, she loved him and could fix him.  This is a thought I know so very well having spent 5 years married to an abusive alcoholic.  I loved him and I could fix him.  Yeah sure.

She gave birth to two gorgeous kids and the abuse became steadily worse and worse until the day she realized because she is a strong person that she needed to get out of the situation.  She tried living in the same state so the kids had contact with dad but that still left her vulnerable to the physical and emotional abuse.  Recently she came home so she had the support of family and friends  and after a recent court hearing on custody, had to return her children to dads state or face kidnapping charges. 
Any mom can understand the pain of leaving your kids with the man who has beat you over and over.  But she will fight and continue fighting for her children til the very end. 
I truly, truly have to wonder, what kind of a Judge facing a pile of police reports proving a man has beaten his wife over and over, blatantly hands those children over to the abuser without thought to not only their safety but to the woman who has given birth, loved and raised these children and subjected herself to more abuse to keep them safe?  I cannot for the life of me understand it. 

So now to start getting to the point of this post.  As a mom who's kids are her life she has no choice to travel between states for court appearances to fight for her family.  She has friends and family ready to support her emotionally, mentally, physically but the fact is this will cost money.  Lots of money.  Money to travel, pay lawyers, eat and have a place to stay.  The one power not in her reach is ready cash. 

What can I do?  There has to be something, that is the person I am.  Those that know me personally or have been reading my blog know I am dirt poor and never will be able to hand someone money.  But there is always a way and what I do have is my ability to turn my pile of beads into something of value.  So I am in the progress of beading awareness ribbon ornaments.  The samples I have been working on are done in purple because that is the color for domestic violence but I think I will be making them in as many colors as I can.  The only money I take from the sales will be what I spend in shipping.  The rest will go to my friend.  Anything I can do will empower her just a bit more than yesterday.
The ornaments will be listed for sale in my Etsy shop but I will also take custom orders in any color or amount.  If you are interested please contact me through my gmail and I can give you more information.   deb913@gmail.com

So as I make and list more ornaments they will pop up on my pictures or give send me an email if you can help.  Thank you and if nothing else say a prayer for my friend to keep her strong while she gets through this fight to bring her babies home.