A quickie...

I just read a blog from one of my fellow bloggers http://www.lorimarie.com/ and she had this on her post...

Check it out, it is so darn adorable!!


http://www.milkandcookies.com/link/115646/detail/

Why???

I don't understand how people can be so cruel. This beautiful mama cat was found in Oswego by my friend Jessica. The mama cat ended up having one little tiny baby around 2 weeks old and they were living on the street. The mama cat is just skin and bones while the baby seems to be OK. Both were flea ridden and poor mama cat has other problems. Jessica was kind enough to rescue them off of the street and take them home.
Isn't this baby precious? His ears aren't even up yet and he is getting around but shaky.
Look at that face!
Jessica took them to S.P.E.A.K and cleaned them all up.
Needless to say this beautiful mama and baby are now being adopted by Jessica. She has named the mama Tiramisu and the baby will be named once he gets a little older so she can see what he looks like.

Both of our cats and our dog are adopted from a shelter or off of the street. I would never get a cat or dog from pet store. From now on I will only get rescue animals and promote adoption of stray/abused animals. Why do people get animals if they can't take care of them. This is just one story that has a happy ending.

After hearing about this, last night when I was leaving the studio I found two stray cats. Obviously ferrel, I tried to get close to them. Beautiful cats they are but they would only let me get within 3 feet from them. I will still try every time I go to the studio. I will make sure I have some cat food in the car for them as well. Maybe they could end up being our barn cats?

Coming down...

Well, I am finally hitting hard after a week of no sleep and the little house being opened. I worked today at the pottery studio from 9:30-12:30...I mixed two glazes, mopped half the studio, recycled clay, kiln washed shelves. I was a woman on a mission. Afterwards I dared to temp fate and go to the mall to look for some clothes. Fleece is out already! Hello, it's only July! After the disappointing shopping experience I headed to Wegmans for some groceries. We were down to the last pickings in the house. Also we sort of have a house guest. "Coach Tom" is sleeping at my in-laws and I guess splitting time between here and there. He is a soccer coach for the Red Bulls and is doing a camp up here this week. Needless to say half the house is off limits because I haven't cleaned it yet.

So that's it for now. I suppose I should go and start dinner. Ta-ta!

Little House Shop

So here is a peek of the shop in the little house. It was open yesterday as well as today. Slow on business but I noticed returning customers so that is a good thing! I guess I need to evaluate what I can do differently as far as getting customers here. I did place an ad in the paper, craig's list and sent postcards out.

I planned on having a Christmas in July sale this time around. A lot of the ornaments have sold...I think people are surprised to see a Christmas tree and Christmas music already.
I am going to keep plugging away at it for as long as I can.

The Storm Before the Calm

Well, I am sitting here at 12:13 AM est and my body is screaming for me to go to bed. The last 3 nights I have spent awake until 3:00 AM kiln sitting. I am afraid to go to bed with my kiln still on and I have been cramming all week for this weekends sale. So needless to say the kiln is on right now and stalling out on me at 1500 degrees. It is suppose to get to 2250!!! I have had it on since the middle of the afternoon. I am giving it another hour and if it doesn't go up that much...I am pulling the plug. CRAP!! I have so many things in there I wanted to have for the sale too! A lamp, chip and dip, bird bath, colander, pitcher, conversation blocks, ornaments, candle holders....among the few. I have a feeling I will have to be breaking down in the near future and buy new elements. BUMMER! Eventually some day my dream is to own an L&L kiln. Shhh...their about $1500.00 right now, I will be waiting quite a while for that one!

So...am I prepared, yes and no. The place looks good. There are some last minutes tid bits that I need to take care but all in all its fine. I hope I have a good turn out. I am still trying to convince Todd into going up to Greene and handing out flyer's. We'll see about that one!

I'll take some pics tomorrow before the mad rush cleans me out! Wish me luck!

Busy, Hot and Tired

Well for sure this weekend was an extremely busy one. Saturday Todd and Graydon went on a bus trip to the Red Bulls Soccer game against the LA Galaxy (David Beckham's team). They left at 1:00 in the afternoon and got home at 1:30 in the morning. I on the other hand had the afternoon to my self. I threw some pottery and puttered around. I then went out with a friend and her friend. We ended up at Tioga Downs Race Track and to no luck I didn't win anything. After that we went to an irish bar to listen to a horrible band play. There are so many people that like this particular band but not me. I suppose if you like to listen to songs about what an a@##h#@# your neighbor is or Walmart then it's your kind of music. YUCK!

So after getting home at 12:30 (me) and 1:30 (Todd and Graydon) we got up at 6:30 and T&G went to a motorcycle race. Needless to say Graydon today is exhausted!! They had fun. The above photo is Graydon sitting in chairs that Todd made out of rocks.
See. I'm not the only one talented in this family. I guess everyone around them copied the afterwards. Graydon said they were comfortable except for the daddy long legs crawling on him...ewwww!!
I think this is Nick Wey a professional motorcross rider.
I guess this is some guy named Cooper...Graydon got an autograph jersey from him.
My big kid!

OK, so this is a photo of my many, many stamps that I have. I use to be a demonstrator for a rubber stamp company so yes I have butt loads of stamps.
AND, more stamps all organized per theme in bins. So why am I showing them to you, you ask?
I finally put them to good use! Ornaments and more ornaments....
I spent a good part of today painting each one. Am I crazy, why yes I am!! I feel like my eyeballs are going to fall out of my head. I guess that's what I get for not wearing my glasses to do this. But, they turned out so cute!!

Hurray it's Friday!

Yeah!! Got the computer up and running and this afternoon I will be creating the postcards. Tick, tock, tick, tock...times a ticking!!

Todd and Graydon are going to a Red Bulls soccer game tomorrow on a bus trip to NYC. I shall be staying home and getting some things done. Then late in the afternoon...shhh....I'm going gambling! Todd knows, but put me on a budget. I won't spend much though...just some to have fun! Maybe I'll even win a little.

Well...I'm off to pick Graydon and his friend up from summer enrichment and then home. It's going to be a scorcher today so inside for us for the most part. I'm sure some swimming will be close by.

F*R*U*S*T*R*A*T*E*D PART 2

Jeepers....

Jeepers.....

Jeepers..........!!!!

I picked the computer up yesterday and to my dismay all my programs are gone. Word, Excel, Adobe Photo Shop and Print Shop!! Dammit! I don't know what this guy did but I am ready to scream. Todd was going to call him today and ask him to load Word and Excel onto the computer but I have to find my Print Shop disk to load. I do EVERYTHING in Print Shop. All my flyer's, postcards, labels....UGH and double UGH!!!!

So needless to say I am a little STRESSED right now. Time is a ticking and I have no postcards. Maybe I'll just draw them by hand and mail them out that way.

So, off to drop Graydon off at Summer Enrichment, then to get my Great Aunts breakfast, then drive all the way back here and work and then pick Graydon up at a friends...THEN home, run the kiln, trim some pots I threw last night, sand some ornaments, create postcards, oh and yeah get something together for dinner......sleep? Maybe not in my near future!

F*R*U*S*T*R*A*T*E*D

Well, I am down my computer AGAIN. Hopefully the repair guy can get it back up and running for me TODAY!! I have so much stuff on it that I need right away that I am a little panicky right now. Trust me when I get it back I am moving everything over to the external hard drive we have. So needless to say I am using Graydons computer right now to check mail and that's just about it.

Sunday was spent stressing about the computer and creating. It was raining off and on and it was nice just to stay inside and work. I made two butter dishes and 4 vintage style aprons for the shop. The aprons turned out super cute and I'll try and post a pic when the computer comes back home.

Saturday was spent at a soccer tournament for Graydon. He scored a bunch of goals and the team played great together. They ended up winning the tournament...he was very happy!

Yesterday was spent at the studio working as an assistant. I mixed three glazes and loaded a kiln and cleaned, cleaned and cleaned. I noticed that my friend Nancy was on duty on Sunday http://www.therabbitmuse.blogspot.com and she always does a great job cleaning so I just added to her neatness.

Well I am off to get the kid ready for summer enrichment and then I am off to work. This afternoon will be spent hanging out with Graydon and hopefully a little creating along the way! Happy Tuesday!

Full Gears Ahead

Wow...where has the summer gone? I just looked, I mean really looked at the calender this morning and I have realized that summer is almost 1/2 over already. I need to get my butt in gear. I have so many things I need to do.

First off the sale is the little house is going to be on July 26th and July 27th from 9-5. I figured that is was a good date for this because the Greene Craft Show is on Saturday and I am hoping to get a lot of traffic from that. I am trying to convince my better 1/2 into going to Greene that day and putting little flyer's on cars in the parking lot. I think it may take A LOT of convincing!!!

So needless to say I have been trying to get things done for it. The theme is "Christmas in July" and we will have a whole room set up with Christmas items as well as Halloween and other things. I have a plan and I need to get over there and put it into play.

Well please spread the word for all you locals...and be sure to watch the mail for a postcard next week.

Yeah...

Yeah...my computer is back!!! For some reason it crashed on us on Sunday and I was seriously bumming. All my "stuff" is on it. But we took it to a repair guy and Viola, it's back! Thank you, thank you, thank you!!!

On another note, I have been working on some new little pottery things. Cute little conversation blocks. I'll post a pic at some point. They are a little tedious but so cute. At just 2-1/2" right now without the shrinkage they'll make for great shelf sitters. OH...and I put little pieces of clay in them to make them rattle.

Well, we are off to summer fun for Graydon and then I am off to work. Hope you all have a wonderful day!

A good day fishing...

Well we headed out about 12:00 to Nanticoke Lake up in Whitney Point. We had never been there before but heard the fish are plenty of catching. After driving through God's Country as Todd called it...many farm - cows, sheep....you name it, we finally came upon it.

Hiking about a 1/4 mile we came upon this beautiful lake.

I'm not sure if it is man made or not but it was pretty beautiful.
After fishing for a while with no bites and Graydon getting a

little frustrated, I managed to get the first one. A cute little sunny!

Then Todd reeled one it...Graydon was not happy at all!

Look at how pretty the colors are...some were this way and
others were really green, blue and yellow.

Finally, my kid reeled one in...
He was pretty proud of himself!

Then he kept reeling them in one after the other. Todd would bait the line and drop it in and Graydon would yell...I got another one!
We kept catching sunny after sunny until Todd
with the "Tweety Pole" caught this bass.

No, we didn't keep the fish although someone the day before had quite the feast. The was a camp fire and fish tails where we were set up. All in all Graydon caught 6 Sunny's, I caught 4 Sunny's and Todd caught 2 Sunny's and 1 bass.

Graydon was so happy and he said it was such a fun day... I agree!

The day after the 4th...

The day after the 4th leaves me with little energy. Not that we partied til the cows come home but I have been loagy all week. After the big hoopla of the garage sale last week I found myself not feeling very well. Massive sinus pressure, nausea and head congestion. I finally broke down and went to the doctors on Wednesday because I felt like my left eyeball was going to fall out. Much to my surprise (not really) it was viral and they couldn't give me anything. I am starting to feel better finally but still a little stuffy.

So needless to say nothing much was accomplished this week. I trimmed some pottery I made the following week and actually tried to throw a little on Thursday. A bunch of junk clay I ended up with...oh well there is always today or tomorrow.

Yesterday was spent weeding my veggie garden and making a yummy appetizer and an OK dessert for last night. We headed over to MBT aka http://hodgepodge-michelle.blogspot.com/ for some dinner and fun. The boys (3) played on a slip and slide and air foam gun things. We enjoyed laughter and drinks on the deck and a delicious meal. The neighbors performed a wonderful fireworks display which we enjoyed on the front porch. Then home and to bed at 10:30PM.

Today might be spent fishing and enjoying the family. I would like to see Hootie and the Blowfish at our Local "Dick's Open" golf tournament tonight but I have to convince my better half in going. A local artist Jared Campbell is performing before hand and I love his music. Check him out at http://www.myspace.com/jaredcampbell. He is one of my favs, Graydons too!!!