Time to clean

My dad got me a new shelf for my workspace today so I spent most of today cleaning and re-organizing. I ended up throwing quite a bit away (hooray!) and clearing out some bags of scraps to sell.It may not look like much to celebrate, but you should've seen it before! No, wait, you shouldn't have.
And I found Don Quixote hidden away under some junk. So now he has a special spot on the shelf.I have a lot more to do tomorrow; this was only half the battle. Wish me luck!

sweet salty smells

Ah, Dubois Park is just as I remembered.
Most of the 'remodeling' must have involved adding sandbags and a fence. We got there a bit late so I didn't go swimming (the lagoon was very cold and it was low tide), but sometimes all one needs is a little sunbath and their toes in the sand.
And a naked boy tried to steal my french fries! Which is okay, mostly since he's so darn cute.
We left as the sun went down and the no-see-ums started getting feisty. Allen and I will have to do this again. Sometime soon.

More pictures of beach fun on my other blog.

a Day at the Beach

I've got my swimsuit on and I'm ready to GO! Unfortunately, we're not supposed to meet our friends at the beach until 3pm so I'm a little too over-excited. I may just have to go early....
I used to go to this park all the time as a kid. There's a big lagoon area where you can swim safely away from boats and fishermen, and a huge beach on the other side facing the Atlantic. The last few times I've been out here the lagoon part was closed because they were remodeling (whatever that means - I guess they just shoved dirt and rocks around) so I'm excited to see if it's just as wonderful as I remember.

In the meantime - here's some fancy sandals for the beach!

badge a minit blues

Well, unfortunately for me, I have just a tiny bit of patience. After years of attempted improvement, I've managed to make my attention for something last beyond 1-2 attempts and have stretched it into 6 or 7. But then it's over and I get sent into tantrum mode, where things get broken and words like, "This is stupid!" get tossed around.
My point, you ask?

My darling Badge-a-minit is the point. After downloading the instructions off of their website, I attempted my badge-making to no avail. The plastic always manages to pull up on one side, making an imperfect and terrible seal. Of course, the instructions state that this is their most common complaint and it has to do with mucking up steps 3 and 4.
Well, thhpt. That doesn't really help me knowing that everyone else sucks at using this thing, too.
I tried to draw little arrows on the picture above, to illustrate where the separation occurs, but I'm sure if you've worked with one of these machines, you'll know what I'm talking about.
So, those of you who've battled the badge-a-Minit before, do you have any advise or words of comfort? I'm assuming practice makes perfect, but I may just run out of supplies before I get there.....

Another New Toy!

I got myself a Badge-A-Minit! Well, my mom got it for me at a rummage sale. But I'm so excited! It's used and in lots of pieces and so far I haven't had any luck actually making it work but.... I have a badge-a-minit! Hooray!! On the downside, the box that had most of the pinbacks also contained what appeared to be unhatched reptile eggs. So.... those will have to be cleaned. The pinbacks, not the eggs.

And I guess now I need to find a tutorial online and find out if I'm missing any pieces.

just a little

bug. a butterfly on a card case. I really need to get some of this stuff listed! :o

It's a brand new bag

A brand new bag that I can't show you because I forgot to take pictures of it.
Yesterday my amazing friend Naomi (aka - Bicycleocean) and I went on a sewing adventure to make her a new messenger-type bag. We both absolutely suck at following patterns and directions so the most we could hope for was sheer willpower to push us through the task at hand, And it worked! By the end of the day she had a really awesome purse that would rock your socks. But you'll have to take my word for it.

While she worked on her bag I found a new obsession with bugs:

My mother found a bunch of my old stamps that I had as a kid, including a bunch of creepy-crawlies! I love the seemingly screen-printed appearance it gives.

my new toy

The other night, while cleaning under a booth at my restaurant night job, I found a tiny lost toy. Not just any toy, mind you, but a bitty crossbow! After many failed attempts to launch toothpicks at my unsuspecting co-workers, I realized there was a hole in one side that had to be plugged for adequate toothpick-launching action. This problem was easily fixed by wadding a small piece of paper into a ball.
Hooray!
Many toothpicks were scattered about as spent ammunition. The kitchen staff was cowering in fear. My boss was left shaking his head and asking if I could find something less likely to send someone to the hospital with an impaled cornea.
More searching revealed that coffee stirrers fit quite nicely.
My co-workers better watch out tonight -.....

Bwahahahaahah!

Is it sandal weather yet?

Well, not today, but here in Florida we never really stop wearing our flip flops and fancy, strappy sandals. Today I'm going to try and come up with a new style before work tonight at the night job. We'll see how that goes.....

Here's two pair of sandals I already have listed in our store:

These are both made using exotic fish hide. The pair on the left has pink and orange sueded and the pair on the right is made with a blue sueded hide I dyed over silver.

weird

so..... I have these cool 3-D bug stickers.
After days of letting my mind wander over where I'll put them, I had an idea to sew them to leather. They're made from a thick plastic material and the one on my cell phone seems durable enough, so I went ahead with my idea.

Now I have this cute little coin purse with a bug:

I really wanted to use one of my larger stickers (about 2" long) but this was a first attempt, so I used a little green guy.
What do you think?