Vacation Day

...but not really. So I'm taking a vacation day at work. Today is one of those days where my boss is the busy one. Which means anything I need to get done will be pre-empted by his need for copies, stapling, sorting etc. It's bad for my 'to do' list but good for me because all I can do is sit here and wait for him to give me little chores. SO...today I'm on vacation. and THIS

...is what I'm doing. That's right, I'm watching scary movies found at Emol. The movies are free but there are commercials. Yes, commercials!! Come on over...and bring some popcorn!

The Red Hot weekend

Yes, this weekend was a fiery one. It was warm yes, but mainly I refer to the Houston Fire Fest put on by our Fire Dept. There were demonstrations, moonwalks, food, music, trainrides and several vendors. Sadly, Mr. McD was working this weekend so it was me, Little Man and Princess Buttercup. They made sure to wear the FD shirts Mr. McD got for them. Of course, Princess Buttercup just HAD to wear her 'fireman' boots to top off her look. Little Man was mostly 'checking out the babes'...and hiding out in a sea of tough guys!
I've been working like crazy on bags for an upcoming craft show. No, no sneak peek, but I can tell you, they're pretty much like Princess Buttercup's first bag...the giant one. Except these aren't so giant. Yes, I've made some adjustments.
There's a great messenger bag tutorial over at Craftser. I like this one because I always want folks to explain stuff to me like I'm four years old. Pics n everything. Go see. I'll soon post a few pics of the bags I have going.

In the meantime, I give you a hint at what my next post will be about ...

Yay for stamps!...now, what?

So I'm stoked about my own customized clear acryclic stamps I got from Anna Mae over at Village Impressions. They take your images, your logo, your text, whatever and create clear stamps from them for an unbelieveable, obscenely low price. I ordered a half sheet (8.5 by 5.5) and filled it up with different logo styles, some thank you's, an address stamp and more. It cost me the same as ordering only 2 custom clear stamps elsewhere. check it out!

So I made myself a few simple 'starter' calling cards to hand out. I need to get a little more creative. Maybe I'll ask some of my favorite bloggers for ideas. Especially Shelly over at Lily Eden and Cathe at Just something I Made. They always have such neat little ideas! But for now it's these simple candy color cards. how fun! Thanks Anna Mae!

Yesterday was picture day for Princess Buttercup. I (gulp) let her dress herself. She went to school looking like Stevie Nicks and Rainbow Brite had a baby. She was so excited about her outfit until we were walking to school. She said, 'I hope I'm wearing the right clothes'. Asked her if she was wearing what she wanted to wear. She said 'yes'. I asked her if she liked her outfit. She said 'yes'. 'Then you're wearing the right clothes' Am I right or what? She also showed me the picture of her with The Queen Mother on Grandparents' Day. As of yesterday, the Queen Mother is calling every clerk in the school to make sure she gets! that! picture!

Mr. McD has been up to his own handcrafted goodness. I came home to find THIS on the stove top:
Yes, Mr. McD will again brew his very own beer to drink...well, actually, he's not a very big drinker so guess who will be downing most of the home brew. Yeah. He also added his own brand of furnishing to our bedroom... Adds that 'college dorm room' touch to my pretty drapes in the background. Isn't it romantic?

Back to normal...mostly

Well a month has gone by since the hurricane and we're back to normal...mostly. We got our lights back on Sunday, the 29th (of Sept). We haven't filled the fridge back up but we may go shopping this evening.

I thought I'd bring you some pics from our little neck of the woods. Not of damage or destruction but of the little clan in 'survival mode'. First of all there was of course...clean up. Little man started off (or was firmly coerced into starting off) by picking up fallen branches in the front yard.


Mr. McD is seen here also picking up some of the ba-jillion branches that fell ALL OVER the place

Princess Buttercup was so kind as to sweep up the deck which was, unfortunately cover by some super slickery (slick + slippery) stuff that made me fall and BADLY sprain my wrist (but we'll save that for another cloudy day).

The Queen Mother did mostly cooking, cleaning and helping out in every way she could (especially after my wrist thing but we won't talk about it right now) here she is helping Little Man pick up even more branches and debris!

The hurricane did have one victim at our house (besides me of course, when I fell and sprained my wrist, but we'll talk about that much later)...it was Mr. McD who struggled with the dang generator for days. He did finally break down and get a new one. But not before this happened....see if you can spot him working on the generator:

Of course it wasn't all bad...Princess Buttercup knows how to make the best of a bad situation. Once clean-up was over and she realized that tv, radio, internet and other electrical goodies were temporarily suspended, she decided to take the lemons and make lemonade. She took a blanket, her drink, an umbrella, a couple of stuffed animals and her phone (read: old flip phone she uses to call Hannah Montana) out onto the front stoop and relaxed ...not unlike a celebrity, poolside. Don't know if I should be tickled or scared....you decide.

Keep on Keeping on!

Well, for those of you who have been in a coma for 28 days; We have been dealing with the aftermath of Hurricane Ike and everybody is a zombie now....just kidding about the zombie part.

So everbody who can read (or hear) knows that on September 13 about 2 am, Hurricane Ike blew through our little neck of the woods. Galveston Tx is uninhabitable and many of the surrounding parts have been completely closed off. About half of Houston is STILL without power as I write this. The kids haven't been to school since Thursday, September 11. Still, most folks are trying to keep their spirits up.

We had, Praise God, no damage to our house. We had one tree break in half and it fell between our house and our neighbor's house without hitting either one. Whew!! In the meantime, we do have running water and gas. We can bathe, cook, wash dishes. The upside to no power is that we spend quality time together. The kids did something OTHER than watch tv. They made friends with our elderly neighbors; they read real, actual books; they made the most of the daylight hours and played outside as much as they could. Now they're at their dad's house. Lights and cable will drown out the silence they enjoyed for a few days. But hopefully not too soon.

Brand New Bag

So i just HAD to rectify the bag situation. This weekend, I altered Princess Buttercup's book bag. I shortened the straps, took in the bottom gusstes and bit. We'll see how it fits her now. But I didn't stop there. I went ahead and made another bag. I couldn't resist, seeing how cute the first one was (despite the misproportions) check it out...



and two more of the details...





not bad for being the second bag i make like this!

Birthday Boy and GIANT BAG

This Labor Day was my wonderful hubby's birthday. He's 35 again! yay! The Queen Mother and Sister Kewpie came over. The idea was to craft like mad-women all day; we actually worked on making him a big and hearty Birthday dinner comprised of a huge pile of meat. It went over quite well! it pleased and flattered him which of course, sent him straight into "shy & quiet" mode. Happy Birthday my Hunk of Burnin Love! and many thanks the Queen Mother and Sister Kewpie for they're graciousness!

So while my little princess was at her dad's I made her the cutest little bag. It's messenger style, very pretty prints on oil cloth. I put pretty little embellishments on it. I had it ready for when she came home. I knew she'd like it and when she saw it, she did. She squealed, ooohed and aaahhed over it. One problem: the bag is WAAY too big for our Princess Buttercup.



Just look at the size of that thing! WAH. So I deciced last night to work on it and maybe reduce the size just a tad, no? The trick here is that the bag is made from oilcloth (not true oilcloth, mind you or there would be no problem) so I'm basically punching a hole in plastic every time I sew it.

She's off to her dad's again this weekend, I'll fix it up then probably adding some interfacing (live and learn) to reinforce the stitches just a tad. Wish me luck!

The good thing is that her classmates we're ga-ga over the bag and one of them asked if I could make one for her too. Sure I can, kid....for $35 bucks! aaahahaha! Just-kidding-but-not-really since once I get the logistics down, I think these would be adorable bags to add to my etsy shop!