WHEW! WIPE-OUT......

OMG...what a week!! I'm exhausted after just having my website up & having items in my Etsy shop for just a few days. What a whirlwind!! It's been exciting... I've already sold 7 items on Etsy & there's a bid (& 10 watchers) on my kaleidoscope on eBay, plus several watchers on my heart bead, too... auctions ends Sunday night. Can't wait to see how it all unfolds!!

I've sold out of just about everything I brought down to the boutique in Minneapolis... they asked if I can make up some more ornaments, pens, bottle openers, etc... yikes!! I counted & have already taken in 46 ornaments & they still want more!! LOL! Don't know how much I can do between now & next Wednesday when I'm down there volunteering again. It's almost Christmas & they think they're going to be getting a ton of last minute (male) shoppers toward the end of the week next week, so I'm going to try to get some items made up & delivered to them on Wednesday when I volunteer again. Fun, fun, fun!! :o) There's only one kaleidoscope left, too! Yippee!!! LOL! I'll try to do some more of those, too. Holy Crap!

I definitely need to learn how to balance everything, though. This is a great learning experience & is just showing me how much I need to prepare for earlier & in greater quantity next year!

IN THE MEADOW WE CAN BUILD A SNOWMAN...

So... when my 12 year old was in kindergarten, I couldn't simply purchase some plain cupcakes for his class birthday celebration, NOOOOOOOOoooo... I had to TOP them with something "above average". So, since he has a January birthday, the WINTER theme was a little obvious. As I was scowering the cake decorating store for inspiration, I came across a package of small bowling pins that were made to top a cake. I remember seeing a cute snowman SOMEWHERE made from a paper mache' bowling pin & thought that these little pins would be PERFECT to make into snowmen for these cupcakes. I made something like 25 of these, drew eyes & dotted "coal" mouths, & little painted orange noses! I decked them all out in pipe cleaner scarves & hats or ear muffs & put toothpicks into their little bottom holes :o) to stick into the cupcake. ... they were FABULOUS!! :o) Fun. (excuse the old pictures!)



The next year I decided to do it again but make them something that could stand up on their own, but I couldn't find the plastic pins, so I made them out of polymer clay & glued them to clear glass pebbles. So cute.

I've made them many times since then. Last year I was party mom for my younger child's 3rd grade class & when I was hunting for a craft for them to do @ their "Winter (Christmas) Party", I found this little snowglobe ornament in Family Fun magazine that had a little plastic deer standing in a snow-covered forest. The "dome" was a clear Solo cup. It was the cutest thing I had ever seen.

Well... w/ lots of searching, I found that these cute little plastic deer were about $1/each. There was no way I could spend THAT much out of the party funds for a small part of a craft, so I decided that for only about $5, I could make a few dozen snowmen out of clay for these ornaments, they'd be perfect... & they WERE!! I prepared most of everything up front for these, the kids just glued them together.

Here's my youngest w/ his ornament & then the prototype that I made w/ my niece.

...SO... (yes, there's more, LOL!) once I started lampworking, I KNEW I was going to have to try to make some snowmen out of glass!

This is my first glass snowman (girl)... she cracked. :o(




















Here is one grouping of some coordinating ones:











Then, of course, I had to "rethink" the snow dome. I couldn't very well put a plastic cup over the top of some cute glass snowmen, could I?? Noooooooo. :o) So, I hunted down some small glass domes (used by pocketwatch collectors) & made the footed wooden bases & there you go, my own original design, 8 years in the making...