Wordless Wednesday: Signs of Fall

It may still be in the 80's here in Florida, but I'm starting to see some signs of fall...

Kids Kottage Craft Fair Postmortem

Sadly, most of the pictures I took that day came out fuzzy. And yes, that's a fitted sheet on my table -- I swear the label said flat. Sigh.

When I was in college, I studied directing for theatre. After each student directed show, we would get together with our own mentor and teachers and analyze how the show went from start to finish. We would call this our postmortem. . .

Okay, so the craft fair was not a stupendous success, but it wasn't an entire waste either. I mainly got practice doing one: the prep work, all of the set up, selling my wares, etc. Actually, I don't really think of it as selling my wares, but really just chatting with folks and telling them a little bit about what I do. Truth be told, many people have no idea what chain maille really is. My warrior (with her false eyelashes, thank you very much!) modeling the coif drew many people over to my table and inspired many a conversation. I also spent some time weaving a new dice bag and demonstrating how the weave I used (Euro 4-1) could be made into other variations. I brought a whole bunch of beaded and wire wrapped jewelry, some supplies, and even a whole bunch of DIY Necklace Kits (perhaps soon to be added to my Etsy shop) that I wanted to move in addition to my maille. I made a few necklace sales and even a pair of earrings, but no maille sold. Sad.

There was a Pirate guy there making balloon animals for the kids who gave me a lead on a local pirate festival and another vendor offered me a position at a fair outside a coffee shop in another town. I'm not sure if the coffee shop thing is going to work out because it's over an hour away from me, but that pirate festival sounds promising. I'm going to have to make that call and build up my inventory!

I also met fellow Etsy seller Megan of meganclynch and fellow Etsy seller / Florida Etsy Street Team member Stacey of Elle Belle. You can see Stacey's set up here and Megan's here. Check out more pictures of my set up at my flickr.

History Comes to Life

I've always been interested in the medieval and renaissance time period. Even as a child, I would go to museums and gravitate towards the armour and swords of the time period. I took a medieval art course in college and learned that although I wasn't a huge fan of the painting, I loved the sculpture, stained glass, and tapestries. I love reading historical fiction, especially with strong female characters. I've always been a creative person involved with scrapbooks, candle making, collages, sketching, macrame and knotwork, and eventually beading. The thing with beading is that although I find beads to be quite beautiful, I've always loved metal jewelry more. So, when I came across a tutorial (Euro 4-1 Bracelet) to combine my interest in the past (armour) and my love of metal jewelry I just had to try it. And, as they say, the rest is history.

So, it confounds me to admit that despite this interest in history, armour, and entertainment I had never been to a Ren Faire until just a few years back. I'm originally from New York and just a few hours upstate is the famous Sterling Renaissance Festival as well as the New York Renaissance Faire. It wasn't until I moved down to FL with Scott that I ventured to the Bay Area Renaissance Festival. Why hadn't I done this sooner? My theatrical background loved the entertainment and my inner geek thoroughly enjoyed the atmosphere.

Although, it doesn't have a strict storyline like many other faires, it is still deeply rooted in the history of King Henry VIII and his sixth and final wife Catherine Parr. I also recently found out that there is a special day dedicated to bringing school children in; allowing teachers the opportunity to truly bring history to life for their students.

Unfortunately, I was unable to make it to the faire last year, but one way or another I plan to make it to at least one day of it's seven weekends this year. I have to. For research. . . ;)

I Think I'm Keeping Her. . .

How can this possibly be comfortable?

Well, it's been over a week and I haven't seen or heard anything about a "lost cat." It does seem like the neighbors recognize her, so she's been outside for a while. I considered trying to find her a good home, but I'm thinking that I might just keep her since, after all, she chose me. It's so odd having identified as a dog person my whole life to find myself bonding with this kitty. I've been calling her "Kit" which, of course, is short for kitty. I know it's not very original, but that's what I've been saying since I met her 2 months ago. Scott doesn't like "Kit" because it reminds him of the car from Knight Rider. If that's the case we can call her "KITT" when she's good and "KATT" when she's bad. I don't think I sold him on that idea just yet, but he also hasn't come up with any better ideas.

Cat and Coif

Not cat in coif (although I've seen that before), but updates on the cat and the coif.

Okay, the coif first. I keep forgetting to post these pictures. While Scott and I were still in the apartment, his sister and her kids (who live overseas) were in town visiting. They all so sweetly made a fuss about my coif and we managed to get pic's of two out of three of the kids wearing it and holding Scott's Gandalf sword from The Lord of the Rings Collection. Check 'em out. Don't they look awesome?

Okay, now the cat. After much stress of deciding what to do with her, I finally decided to go with my instinct of getting her inside. With no claws, it's just not right for her to be outside: no way of getting food, no way of defending herself, even no way for escape by climbing up a tree. So, I stopped by PetSmart on the way home intending to pick up only the very basics, just in case "Lost Cat" signs get posted over the weekend. I came home and I saw her across the street. I made the "psst, psst, psst" sound that attracts her attention and, I kid you not, she galloped across the street to me. I took out one of the toys (I had to get her her something fun, not just kitty litter) and played with her for a little bit. I opened the door, went in and left the door open and let her decide what she wanted to do. I didn't try to entice her or anything and she came in. I let her check out things for a little bit and when she didn't make any move to head back for the door, I closed it. I gave her some food and she just scarfed it down. Looking at me and meowing, I kind of got the hint that she was still hungry so gave her some more. It was a fairly uneventful night with the exception of when I got up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom. I guess she thought I was up and it was time to play, because she followed me back to bed and started purring and nudging my hand. She's also a fairly good wake up call. The second my alarm went off this morning, she meowed from down the hall and came running in and started purring and nudging me again. She had another whole bowl of food for breakfast and successfully used the litter box during the night. I think she's still a little confused about where she is, but she seems content.

What do you think?

What is this thing in my face and why aren't you petting me?

Okay, I've got a bit of a conundrum. I posted a little while back about a cat that befriended Scott and I when we moved into our house. I usually see her a few times a week either napping outside the house or even as I'm coming outside she runs over to me meowing to get my attention. We spend a few minutes hanging out and then we go our separate ways. This weekend I saw her two nights in a row near the house. On Friday night, she was by the side of the house trying to stay out of the drizzly weather we were having. Saturday night, she just broke my heart. I got home really late from work, but still spent a few minutes outside petting and talking to her before going in. I sat down inside near our front door to take off my heels (which I never wear, so my feet were frickin' throbbing) and through the glass panel next to the door I see a pair of eyes reflecting in at me. I went outside again for a little bit because I felt so bad; she stayed there looking in and watching me doing stuff around the house for a good 15 minutes.

I'd love to take her in, but the thing is, I have absolutely no idea if she belongs to someone. I can just picture some 7 year old little girl in the neighborhood crying her eyes out because her kitty is gone. Then again, if she does belong to someone, they aren't taking very good care of her. She's outside all the time and has been declawed. She doesn't appear to be starving and her coat is nice and soft and clean. Maybe she was abandoned and her coat looks so good because she's still young? I just wish she could talk so that when I ask her "who belongs to her?" she could answer. The other big problem is money. I can only imagine what vet bills and food and everything would be like and I don't know if I can afford to really take care of her right now. It certainly seems like she's adopted me, now I have to figure out if I should adopt her. . .

I'm a Dog Person, But. . .

I'd like to introduce you to Kit (aka Kitty). Well, that's what I've been calling her anyway. The very first time Scott and I came to see what would become our new home, she befriended us. Ever since then, she intermittently comes and hangs out in front of our garage door or napping under my Jeep. One day while my mom was in town visiting, we were loading up my Jeep and getting ready to head to the beach. From out of nowhere I hear a "meow." She was calling out to us as she crossed the street almost to say, "Hey wait a minute! Don't forget about me." She's been a fun friend to have and not at all like any other cat I've met. I might just be a dog person and a cat person. Who knew?

We're Homeowners!

I know I've been fairly MIA as of late, but for a good reason! Things have been insane for the past few weeks with this whole house buying process. I must say, dealing with the banks and finding out your net worth is a very humbling experience. And then looking at your bank balance after your have them cut the cashier's check for closing is just damn depressing.

The weeks leading up to closing was spent like so: eat, sleep, work, pack, repeat. And not just packing up the apartment, but packing up tools to be brought over for repairs and such. We're big kids now, we even have a lawn mower.

Then immediately after closing the fun began: cleaning. I swear, I got into every crack, crevice, and surface that existed in this place. Some situations required yoga poses to reach. It was a little insane. I never thought I would be so sore from cleaning.

After a full week of cleaning, repairing, and painting, we finally got a bunch of Scott's absolutely amazing friends together to help us move furniture and boxes over.

And even had one special guest to help us move. ====>>

Needless to say, we're living out of boxes right now. The kitchen and bathrooms were the very first rooms I cleaned and moved in and once our furniture was in, we moved into the bedroom. But, aside from that. . . cleaning, repairs, and unpacking will continue. Oh, well. It will all be there tomorrow.

In close, here's a pic of me being super happy after closing in our very own pool!

Check out more pic's at flickr.

Florida Etsy Street Team is Being Organized!

I was reading through the Etsy Forums yesterday and saw a shout out to any Floridians in the Street Team Section. As we got to talking, we realized that there are currently street teams for Northern, Central, and Southern FL, but none of them really seem to be active. This led PaperScissorsArt to call for a chat last night to discuss how we would all like to go about organizing a Street Team that covers all of Florida. Check out Paper's Street Team Section post as well as her blog entry for an update on last night's chat and details if you're interested in taking part in the team. There's lots of great stuff planned already!

Personally, I'm very excited about this opportunity. I'm very much interested in being involved with the Etsy community as well as the opportunity to network, support, and get to know other Etsians around me. Plus, I'm in Clearwater, so it works out well!

I'm also a member of the fairly new Etsy Bloggers Street Team and am having a blast with that one, too. Check out the Etsy Bloggers Street Team Blog (of course we have one!) and the Etsy Bloggers Street Team Profile at Etsy if you're interested in joining that group. So far, we've had one group writing project (orange for Etsy) and are starting to do a weekly blog carnival with this week's writing project (subject: your studio/workspace).