The Latest Bride to be All Wound Up

Remember this preview of my latest bridal set?  Well, I just got my hands on some of the pictures from the wedding.  :)

 Carrie, one of my previous AWU brides, had the honor of helping her little sister put on her jewelry.

Beautiful bride! 

All 5 ladies looking lovely in their AWU pretties!

They had a sweet little outdoor ceremony. *sigh*  I so love weddings.  I keep asking Brandon when we can have another one.

Congratulations to Faith and David!  Best wishes and many joys to you both in your marriage!

I just want to brag a bit...

I'm working on my LO for our visit to Ritter Sport with Sara in August. At the time, I took this picture with a mind to cropping it down to use as a page element for the LO, and I still think it's a good idea.  But, because the angle of the photo is just a tiny bit off, simply cropping it wasn't working out so well. So, I decided to just make my own.

It turned out pretty well, huh??  Man I love Photoshop.  :)  I'll post the whole LO when it's done.

Faith's Bridal Jewelry

The plan was originally to order the supplies for this jewelry as soon as I got to Florida, but since I'm obviously not going to make it to Florida, or to anywhere in the States in time to make the jewelry there, I went ahead and ordered the stuff here and prayed that it would get here in time.  It got here Friday, October 1st, I'm shipping it Monday, October 4, and the wedding is on the 17th.  

Can we say panic?

Well, anyway, now it's finished, photographed, and packed, just waiting to be sent on to the blushing bride in Florida.  Now I have to pray that it reaches her in time.

This is her jewelry:

And this is what her bride's maids will be wearing:

Pottery

 I started painting this set of jungle figurines for Elora 2 years ago, while I was still pregnant.

I got the elephant and the giraffe finished, but the zebra has been sitting alone and half-done for 2 years.  Well, now that my move is pending and I officially ran out of time, I got him done.

The set is finally complete.

While I was at it, I painted a couple of the mini figurines.  One will be joining the jungle set, the other will find its way into a Christmas stocking this December.

I sponged them both a solid green, then painted on some of the details with the glaze, so that they're textured.  It wasn't quite the color I was expecting, but I still like the final result.

Voilà! Dresses of Voile

Brandon was kind enough to let me spend last evening at the shop, getting some more sewing done.  I actually crashed a party of quilters who had come for the long evening as well-- did you know they're open until 9 on Thursdays now?  They were terribly sweet in welcoming me to join them, and we had a good evening.  They all oohed and aahed over the little dresses I was working on, which of course pleased me to no end.  And while I sat shirring away, I got to watch them all working on Irish chain quilts, offering my opinion of color when asked.  I was grateful that while my project was just as tedious, it was far less complicated.

Oh goodness, and I nearly forgot the sideways-rain and umbrella-theft portion of my night.  I made a run to Subway to get dinner for myself and a few of the other ladies, hoping to make it there and back before the bottom dropped out of the sky.  I borrowed an umbrella from the office since it had already started to rain.  It worked well until I was about a third of the way there, when it started to come down in heavy, sideways-blowing torrents.  I was soaked from the knees down.  When I got there, I left the umbrella by the door to order the sandwiches, but when I went to leave, the umbrella was gone.

That's right, someone stole the umbrella.

Thankfully, the rain slowed to the merest drizzle while I walked back, before resuming its previous downpour.  I made it back no wetter than I was when I reached the Subway.  Kelly had already left, and Mary assured me that it was only an umbrella left behind by a customer at some point, but still.  Oh well, at least we got a good laugh out of it all.

I got the repairs done to that first little dress, and stitched the straps on the back.  (They're actually just tucked in to the front, in the picture.)  I put them in the wrong place, though, so I have since taken them off, to be put back on in the right place later.

And, I got the green one done, except for the straps.  I just left them off completely on this one, because I was pretty sure the blue ones were wrong.  Since Sara will be here this afternoon, I probably won't get them on until after she leaves.  But since summer has already pulled a peace out, I don't think it matters.  I just hope it's still warm in Florida (definitely) and Virginia (probably) when we get there. 

I'm so excited about Sara being here!  We have a lot of fun stuff planned, starting with a trip to Salzburg, and a stop at Neuswanstein en route, this weekend.  Plus, she's going to help me with some of the not-so-fun moving stuff, which is going to be awesome.  Bring it on!

Shirring Really IS Easy!!

I spent a good 4 or 5 hours with a sewing machine yesterday.  I got the fabric cut for my shirred voile skirt, then realized I probably ought to start with something smaller and less daunting and switched to working on Elora's matching dress.  I'm not going to lie, I was pretty intimidated by this whole shirring thing, despite being told numerous times that it's ridiculously easy.  But you know, they were right!

I managed to get Elora's dress almost completely finished (sorry for the crummy picture).  All I had left to do was to sew on the straps, but I wanted to try it on her before I added them.  I had this nagging suspicion that the elastic around the top would be too tight, and I was right. (Sometimes, I really hate being right.)  So, I am going to take apart the very top of the dress so I can take out the elastic.  Then, once I get it put back together, I am going to add 2 more rows of shirring at the top to replace it.  I know it's going to be dodgy trying to do the shirring with it already put together, but hopefully it won't be too bad.

I Did It!

I'm sorry that it's taken me so long to post these, Lizy, but I've hardly had a moment to call my own the last several days.  Anyway, for those who are not lucky enough to see me all the time, here is a terrible self-portrait of what my hair looked like before:

And here are the immediately after shots:

This is one that I had taken with my stylist, Carolina.  She is so sweet, and such a good stylist!  When I left the salon, I went to Jennifer's to collect Elora, and she was kind enough to snap a few more pictures for me--even after looking after Elora while I was off getting my hair did. 

I really like the cut, she did it exactly the way I asked her to, but I wasn't such a fan of the curled style she did.  It was just a little too poofy for me, though everyone at the shop thought it was just darling with the curls. (Thank you, ladies, for the ego boost.  ^_^)   If I could get both sides to look like the (Photo) right side, I would love it.  I'll have to experiment more with curls, to see if I can't get it to work.

And this is what it looked like pulled up into a clip.  This I really like!  It shows off that I have long bangs now, which is what I wanted.  I have some pictures now of what it looks like without the curl, but I haven't put them on my computer yet so that will just have to go in another post.  At least I got these up.

New Jewelry

My latest creations:

Turquoise, ceramic and glass wire wrapped necklace with "antique brass" wire and findings.  It's definitely not typical of my style, but I think I like it.

Also turquoise and antique brass wire wrapped.

8mm Swarovski crystal pearls in Rosaline, Peach, and Gray, with silver clasp.

6mm Swarovski crystal pearls in Brown, Copper, Gold, Antique Brass and Bronze, with adjustable gold clasp.  I'm wearing it at its shortest length.

6 and 10 mm Swarovski crystal pearls in Bordeaux, antique brass findings, wire wrapped.

Earrings to match.

And last but not least, a sneak peek at my latest bridal design.  This one features 6 and 8 mm Swarovski crystal pearls, with 4mm Swarovski Light Colorado Topaz bicone crystals.

Elora fell down and bumped her head while Brandon was trying to take pictures for me, so we got a few pictures of her too.  Sorry Rachel, not much to read in this one.  :)

Thinking Inside the Box

We just got some new scrapbook papers in  The Shop this week, and I fell in love with them.  I had to have a few of them, at least, even though I haven't done any paper scrapping since last February.  (Seriously, it's been that long.)  But, as Kelly pointed out in her digi-scrap class on Saturday, there are other things you can do with scrapbook papers.  Things like decoupage.  

I am a pack rat.  I can't throw anything away, not if I think I might be able to use it later.  In this case, it actually served me well.  I'd held on to a pair of boxes that had once contained Godiva chocolates, thinking that I could use them for wrapping gifts.  Instead, I decided to re-wrap them.  So,

plus

 with a little bit of

 equals

Ta-da!  I used one of the papers from Kaisercraft's Utopia Collection for the top, and a sage green from my stash for the bottom.  I love it!  I loved it so much that I did another one.

I'm not liking this one as much.  I love the top (this time from the Tea at Elsie's Collection, also by Kaisercraft) and I love the bottom (another from my stash)--but independently.  They just don't look as good together as I thought they would.  I guess that means I'm just going to have to go to the PX and get another box of chocolates, so I can make matching mates for those mismatched box halves.

Darn.

Cards and Tags

I've been playing more with my logo.  I updated my business card design using my new color scheme, and I made a sample tag that I can use for my larger items.  The good news is that (I think) they look great.

The bad news is that for both of them, the whole things are in color and it will take a lot of ink to print them.  So I tried taking away the "cardstock" background.

Maybe it would help to print them on ivory cardstock?  Though I hate to order more, since I already have some of the white.

It Finally Clicked.

What do you think?  Because I think I'm in love.

Coming Soon to a Blog Near You!

This is a project that I've been working on now for a few weeks.  Or, more to the point, I haven't been working on it. So here is the sneak preview:

And these lovelies are soon going to find themselves made into purses.  When, exactly?  Oh, I have no idea.  But the ideas are there, rolling around in my head, and they will not give me peace until I bring them to fruition.

These last few days of sunshine have imbued me with new energy.  It's so much easier to get up in the morning when there is sunlight streaming in through my windows, rather than the insipid, watery light of an overcast sky.  Really, it's amazing how much better I feel.  (Brandon, bless his heart, told me that I have it backwards.  I don't feel better because it's sunny, it's sunny because I feel better.)  I've actually been getting up with Elora, rather than changing her, giving her milk and putting her back in her crib so that I can go and crawl back under the covers. I've been getting things done around the house, getting a head start on dinner, and taking her out to play.  

I got my first flowers from my little girl. She just kept bringing them to me yesterday!

All except the ones she tried to eat.

She's doing a lot more exploring now that she can get around on two feet.  I kept having to get up and bring her back to our blanket, and most of my pictures are of her walking away from me. 

I have a feeling that I am going to be seeing this side of her a lot more from now on.

We went outside again today, but I didn't bother with the blanket.  I just followed her around with the camera so she could explore to her heart's content.  I made the mistake of doing it without sunscreen, though, and since I was wearing a cami tank, I'm pretty sure that my back and shoulders are a bit burned.  We weren't out very long; hopefully it won't be too bad.  Those pictures are still in my camera,  so they'll be going in my next post.