it's been over a year

I feel like I should start with my usual... "I'm really bad at updating this blog." Since my last post I...

• quit my job
• got a new (better!) job
• bought a house
• moved
• got married

We moved to NH last September - for me, I'm in the next town over from where I grew up so its a very familiar area. For Ryan, he's always lived in the same town in MA (we lived there after we graduated from school) so NH was somewhat new to him aside from the visits to my parents house.

We're still slowly unpacking - I think the only thing we (I) really have left to unpack is my sewing stuff. We're painting every room in the house so we didn't want to unpack everything and then have to move it out of the way to paint. The office/sewing room has been completely painted, so I really just need to set aside time to get in there and organize everything. I've been wanting to sew something (anything) so as the urge gets stronger, I'll get everything unpacked.

The new house!

While we were in the house-buying and moving process, we were also planning/getting ready for our wedding. We got married at Sugarbush Ski Resort in Warren, VT. So now Ryan's really stuck with me. :P

We did what we could for the wedding - we made centerpieces, my mom whipped up the table runners for me, I bought all the candles that went on the tables, did the table numbers, the guest Mad Libs sheets, the card box, the favors, the decor we placed around the room, my mom made the cake... We had an amazing photographer, Caroline (www.birkephoto.com) and an amazing florist, Randi (www.silvertoad.com) to help us with those details that we couldn't do on our own. We kept the guest list small and limited it to mostly family and close friends. We had a great time and it seemed like everyone else did too. :)

Reluctant (Lazy?) Bride

Wow, I'm still really bad at this blogging thing. I wanted to actually update it on a regular basis. Truth is, I haven't been doing much sewing.

Anywhooo - R and I have been officially engaged for almost a year now. How much wedding planning have we done? .... zip. zero. nil. It's not that either of us want to get married to each other - we are fully committed to putting up with each other for the rest of our lives (or at least until next week). It's just that we don't have much interest in actually planning a wedding.

Maybe it's because we know we don't want a traditional wedding - we'd rather just have people over for a BBQ. Not to mention my dislike for wearing makeup and R's dislike for getting really dressed up. So since we aren't going to do the traditional church ceremony and have a registry full of the things we need to start a life together (ha), maybe that's why we're stuck. There aren't blogs and magazines and books about planning a non-wedding wedding.

There's also the part about not wanting to spend a ton of money on ... whatever it is we end up doing. And if we are going to spend a significant chunk of money, we'd rather have it go towards the honeymoon - we're thinking at least 3 weeks away from work, stress, life in general.

So looks like BBQ in the backyard... and signing up on this site (http://thebigday.com/) or a similar one. Unless someone wants to volunteer to plan everything... for free. ;D

going gluten free

last week we made the decision to go gluten free.

for those of you who don't know, Ryan has Chron's Disease. a while ago, his GI doctor suggested he try the Specific Carbohydrate Diet. which to us, seemed a bit extreme since it doesn't allow glutens, starches, or sugars. Ryan is a typical Irish guy - his diet consists mostly of meat and potatoes. how on earth was he (and I, since I live with him) going to be able to do this diet?

we never really pursued the SCD. I think it was just too overwhelming and we didn't know where to start. the only thing that we cut out of our diets at that point was anything heavily processed or containing HFCS (which Ryan still can't stay away from - Moxie doesn't come in a natural sugar version)...

lately I've had more and more (online and real life) acquaintances switch to a gluten free diet. I did some research and the benefits for Ryan would include some possible relief of the digestive issues he has from the Chron's. benefits for both of us would be gaining more energy and potential weight loss. gaining energy would be a huge help - the Chron's disease makes Ryan feel tired, and my stupid job makes me feel tired.

so after talking about it, we figured why not? can't hurt and the outcomes could really help both of us (but I'm hoping it'll help him a lot more than me).

today was my first baking venture into the GF world. I made cupcakes from a mix that we bought at our local grocery store (we'll probably make our own from here on out, but the xanthan gum we ordered online won't arrive for a few more days).

batter taste: cornmeal-y texture. didn't taste chocolatey. got a slight zing from the aftertaste due to the cayenne.

batter viscosity: once it was mixed, it looked, stirred, and poured like a normal cake mix would.

cupcake taste (the important part!): not too bad. I was still getting a cornmeal-ish texture. I mentioned it to Ryan and he said he wouldn't have noticed if I hadn't pointed it out. I think next time if we buy a mix again, I'd get the one without cayenne in it.

crankypants

Anyone who has made their own clothing before knows that most of the patterns you can purchase require some, if not a lot, of altering to fit your own body shape.

The same goes for the dress dummies/dressforms you can buy.

I have this one:

And of course the measurements for when you buy one of these do not always line up with your actual measurements. Just like patterns. Hooray! /sarcasm

So I went to re-adjust mine today after re-measuring my plumpish body.

And I broke mine.

Apparently when you have the hips on one of the smaller sizes, you cannot put the waist on one of the larger sizes. So apple-shaped sewers - stay away from this dressform.

Quick post

After the craft fair letdown (see last post), I decided to focus on making things for ME (acting very much like The Selfish Seamstress) and not worry about trying to make things to sell/make things that people want to buy.

But then the other day on Twitter, Tia (of http://christopherandtia.blogspot.com/) said she was looking for someone to make some binky (pacifier) leashes for her ADORABLE kids. (Yes, adorable needed to be in caps.) I said I could make them for her and for a low cost (mostly because I need a morale boost over here and because I have a huuuuge fabric stash that I need to start paring down).

She choose 7 different fabrics from my stash and I whipped them up yesterday:

yesterday.

setup:

not too bad, right?

yeah, didn't sell anything.

I'm gonna stop sewing for potential customers and just focus on things that I want to make for myself.

[[ for more pics of what I was attempting to sell, click here ]]

done!

Simplicity 2648

Pattern Description:
Misses dress with individual pattern pieces for slim, average and curvy fit and for A, B, C, or D cup sizes. This pattern has either a round or v-neck, short sleeves, cap sleeves, or no sleeves and princess seams.

Pattern Sizing:
I bought the 16-24 envelope. I cut View C, size 16, but I think a 14 would have been better. I cut the C-cup for the top and definitely used the "curvy" pieces for my curvy bottom.

Did it look like the photo/drawing on the pattern envelope once you were done sewing with it?
Yes. In the picture I show of my finished garment I don't have the little tab at the waist but after wearing it today, I decided it definitely needs an embellishment at the waist.

Were the instructions easy to follow?
I'm a stubborn engineer... I don't follow directions. ;D

What did you particularly like or dislike about the pattern?
I definitely liked the different sizing options (cup size and hip/butt adjustments). Even though I usually just throw the directions back in the envelope, I kept these out to check every once in a while to make sure I was on track... it's been a while since I've made a dress for myself! I noticed that they wanted you to sew the side seams wrong sides together to help fit the dress better (before sewing the final side seams). This seemed a little weird to me and of course I didn't do that because it wasn't one of the steps in my made-up directions.

Fabric Used:
I used stuff I had in my stash. I honestly don't know what it is... some sort of cotton blend. The lining was cheap stuff from Jo-Anns that I also already had in my stash.

Pattern alterations or any design changes you made:
I did the petite alterations (the ones already in the pattern).

Would you sew it again? Would you recommend it to others?
I think I will sew it again if it's not going to be too obvious that it's the same dress - perhaps next time I'll do the other sleeve option. And I think I would bring the front up a bit - it didn't seem to sit as flat against me as I'd like and if I bring the front up into the shoulder seam a little more it would sit better.

Conclusion:
I like it - and it's a great pattern to have for wardrobe building!

More pictures on my Flickr account: http://www.flickr.com/photos/kcroteau/sets/72157624843610186

Oh! And I almost forgot! I was in the Etsy Finds email on Tuesday - it was one of my mason jar pincushions. I've sold a few of those since the email, so that was a nice surprise. :)

woo hoo! sewing room has been relocated! :)

Previous sewing room location: basement.

New location: what used to be the office (on the first floor!).

I love the new location. A few more pictures can be found here.

One of the cutting tables had to stay downstairs and as a result, I had to downsize on the size cutting mat I can use (unless I put the ginormous one on the dining room table). But everything else fit rather well into the room. I would have made it work no matter what - I wanted a first floor room!

After the new pictures were taken, we took a trip to Ikea to find some suitable chairs/stools. My desk is bar-height and I wanted something ~18" tall for the sewing table.

Desk chair:

... and stool for the sewing table (before & after):

Ikea really wanted me to buy one of their covers since the stool already came with the foam & interfacing-type covering stapled to it. It also already had the scratchy side of velcro on the undersides... I knew I could pull something out of my stash to make a cover so that's what I did.

The current work-in-progress:

Which will be Simplicity 2648 when it's done.

I have high hopes for this pattern since its got different fits - different bust sizes and different hip shapes (slim, average, curvy). Mine will be black - I had the cloth in my stash for a looong time so I have no idea what it really is or where it came from. It's kind of like a heavyweight linen, if that makes sense.

And one more work-in-progress:

We also picked up one of these benches at Ikea to go at the end of our bed. We know we (and by we, I really mean me) want to cover the top. The Mr. didn't think two layers of quilt batting was enough of a cushion for his cute little bottom, so at some point I have to go to Jo-Anns and get some foam. And figure out what I'm going to cover it with...

I'm going to try...

...to be better at updating this. And after reading everyone else's sewing blogs, I'm going to try to put more sewing stuff on here.

What I'm currently working on:

Its a trial of what I'll hopefully be selling at shows this fall/winter.

I'm horrible at updating this.

Quickly since the last update:
1. sold my new sewing machine - didn't like it. especially the reverse button.
2. old trustworthy machine is broken - need to take it somewhere to be serviced.
3. got engaged... officially, I guess. the jerk bought me a ring too - even though I told him not to :P
4. we're trying to move up to the Burlington, VT area. right now we're applying for jobs without too much luck... well, I'm not having too much luck. Ryan pretty much has a job once the employer has more money roll in with some anticipated contracts.

ok, and now since I'm bored:

Bold the ones you've read COMPLETELY, italicize the ones you've read part of. Watching the movie or the cartoon doesn't count. Abridged versions don't count either. BTW, according to the BBC if you've read 7 of these, you are above the average.


1 Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen
2 The Lord of the Rings-JRR Tolkein
3 Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte
4 Harry Potter Series- J.K. Rowling
5 To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee
6 The Bible
7 Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte
8 Nineteen Eighty-Four - George Orwell
9 His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman
10 Great Expectations-Charles Dickens
11 Little Women - Louisa M Alcott
12 Tess of the D'Ubervilles-Thomas Hardy
13 Catch 22 - Joseph Heller
14 Complete Works of Shakespeare
15 Rebecca - Daphne Du Maurier
16 The Hobbit - JRR Tolkien
17 Birdsong - Sebastian Faulk
18 Catcher in the Rye - JD Salinger
19 The Time Traveler’s Wife - Audrey Niffenegger
20 Middlemarch - George Eliot
21 Gone With The Wind - Margaret Mitchell
22 The Great Gatsby - F Scott Fitzgerald
23 Bleak House - Charles Dickens
24 War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy
25 The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy- Douglas Adams
26 Brideshead Revisited - Evelyn Waugh
27 Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
28 Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck
29 Alice in Wonderland-Lewis Carroll
30 The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame
31 Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy
32 David Copperfield - Charles Dickens
33 Chronicles of Narnia - CS Lewis
34 Emma - Jane Austen
35 Persuasion - Jane Austen
36 The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe - CS Lewis
37 The Kite Runner-Khaled Hosseini
38 Captain Corelli's Mandolin - Louis De Bernieres
39 Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden
40 Winnie the Pooh - AA Milne
41 Animal Farm - George Orwell
42 The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown
43 One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
44 A Prayer for Owen Meaney - John Irving
45 The Woman in White - Wilkie Collins
46 Anne of Green Gables - LM Montgomery
47 Far From The Madding Crowd - Thomas Hardy
48 The Handmaid's Tale - Margaret Atwood
49 Lord of the Flies - William Golding
50 Atonement - Ian McEwan
51 Life of Pi-Yann Martel
52 Dune - Frank Herbert
53 Cold Comfort Farm - Stella Gibbons
54 Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen
55 A Suitable Boy - Vikram Seth
56 The Shadow of the Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafon
57 A Tale of Two Cities-Charles Dickens
58 Brave New World - Aldous Huxley
59 The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night - Mark Haddon
60 Love In The Time Of Cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
61 Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck
62 Lolita - Vladimir Nabokov
63 The Secret History - Donna Tartt
64 The Lovely Bones- Alice Sebold
65 Count of Monte Cristo - Alexandre Dumas (though I'm not sure if it was the abridged version or not)
66 On The Road - Jack Kerouac
67 Jude the Obscure - Thomas Hardy
68 Bridget Jones's Diary - Helen Fielding
69 Midnight's Children - Salman Rushdie
70 Moby Dick - Herman Melville
71 Oliver Twist - Charles Dickens
72 Dracula - Bram Stoker
73 The Secret Garden - Frances Hodgson Burnett
74 Notes From A Small Island - Bill Bryson
75 Ulysses - James Joyce
76 The Inferno - Dante
77 Swallows and Amazons - Arthur Ransome
78 Germinal - Emile Zola
79 Vanity Fair - William Makepeace Thackeray
80 Possession - AS Byatt
81 A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens
82 Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell
83 The Color Purple - Alice Walker
84 The Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro
85 Madam Bovary - Gustave Flaubert
86 A Fine Balance - Rohinton Mistry
87 Charlotte's Web - EB White
88 The Five People You Meet In Heaven - Mitch Albom
89 Adventures of Sherlock Holmes - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
90 The Faraway Tree Collection - Enid Blyton
91 Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad
92 The Little Prince - Antoine De Saint-Exupery (I read the French version!)
93 The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks
94 Watership Down -Richard Adams
95 A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole
96 A Town Like Alice - Nevil Shute
97 The Three Musketeers - Alexandre Dumas
98 Hamlet - William Shakespeare
99 Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - Roald Dahl
100 Les Miserables - Victor Hugo

I haven't updated this in a while

I've been busy... kind of.

Our office has officially moved to Waltham. It's a very nice building but the downside (which we all knew it would be) is the commute. I leave the house at 5:30am to get in at 6:30... assuming there are no major accidents shutting down both sides of 128 (like there was yesterday. twice.). There are now two other people in my dept close to my age (meaning they're not old enough to be my father) so that's nice. I don't feel like it's me vs the old men anymore when it comes to brining them into the 21st century with updated software programs.

I got a new motorcycle! A Honda Shadow Spirit (750cc). It's so much nicer than the Honda Rebel (250cc) I had before. So. much. nicer.

But... it's been raining. A LOT. There are usually around 8 days of rain in the month of June for New England. This year I think we had (no joke) 25 days with rain. [[This article confirms the ridiculous amount of rain]]

And July hasn't started off too well either. Today's downpours/heavy thunderstorms are flooding a lot of roads and causing a lot of power outages.

All this rain means I haven't been able to ride my new motorcycle. :(

hmm... what else...

I'm making a circus jacket thing for QueenVanna. :) It'll be red and sparkly.

aaaaand I've been trying to go to the gym and get back in shape. No change on the scale so far, but the muscles in my left leg are finally starting to return, so I'll count that as progress.

more lights!

Every time I turn on the lights for my sewing area, I still think this looks a little weird - having recessed lighting plus pendant lamps. Especially where the pendants over my cutting table are kinda close to the recessed lights.

Oh well. It works.

What I'd Rather Be Doing

What I'd rather be doing than sitting at my desk:

• setting up my new tables in my sewing room
• reading my book
• sewing
• buried under the blankets in bed watching a movie
• scanning old pictures

We went to Ikea last night. The intention was to get tables/desks. For the basement. Ryan wanted a table/desk primarily for soldering stuff. He's been playing around with electronics lately... for the grill. The desk in the office is too small and gets too cluttered if he tries to work up there. We still have an unused corner of the basement, so he wanted a table/desk to put down there so he wouldn't have to play mad scientist in the office.

Okay, so that's table/desk #1.

I kind of had an idea that I should get another table for my sewing area to use under my cutting mat. The problem is that my cutting mat is huge. I love it, but it doesn't fit on the table that I had which is now home to my sewing machine and eventually my serger once I move it over there. I was eyeing the Ikea dining room table that is the same style as the sewing machine table and my (custom!) ironing board. But then as we went through the desk/office area, I found a table that was on sale... if I bought 2 of those tables it would a) be cheaper than the dining room table I looked at and b) be larger than the dining room table I looked at. I'm hoping the cutting mat will fit on it. If not, then I'll use one of these tables for the sewing machines, and use the older table for the cutting mat again. Why is it so difficult to find appropriately-sized sewing room furniture? :P

So there's table/desk #2 and #3.

THEN as we went through the bedroom section, we start looking at bed frames. We totally did not go in there to look at bedroom stuff, but you know how Ikea is. You have to look at everything. Right now, with the frame we're currently using, the bed shakes if someone rolls over or gets out of bed. It shakes a lot. It bothers me more than it bothers Ryan, but I think he was getting tired of hearing me complain about it, so we ended up getting a new bed frame. This new one should be a lot sturdier than the one we're using, plus it'll allow the mattress to be lower (we won't have to use the box springs anymore). Aaaand it'll fit under the window. Right now the top of the frame is above the window sill, so the sill is getting a little beat up.

Everything is still in the boxes, sitting on our dining room floor.... which eventually I'd like to get a new dining room table too, but that'll have to wait. :)


My stupid foot is doing well. 3 1/2 weeks after surgery, I went for an xray. I expected to have another cast put on after the xrays were taken, but my doctor walked into the exam room and said, "Well, it's been less than 4 weeks... but you're completely healed already. I don't know how but I'm not going to torture you by putting another cast on." Yay! So she kept the back half of the cast on, wrapped it in an ace bandage, and then sent me on my way (back) home to get my clonky velcro boot. I can already walk around the house fairly well without the boot, but to make sure my doctor will still be happy, I'm wearing it whenever I leave the house.

yay, Artfire!

I set up an Artfire shop a few weeks ago, but hadn't put anything in it... until today. I was very impressed with the listing process. It's all on one page, none of this 4 or 5-pg crap that Etsy has you go through so it's easy to look everything over and edit something before submitting the item.

Ryan and I *were* in the process of setting up my own shop at kcroteau.com but we've both been a little busy so I'm just going to have that redirect to the Artfire shop for now.

Store not available

A real post.

I suppose instead of just posting a link so you can use me as an Artfire referral... I could post a real update. Sort of.

I've been sitting on my ass for the past two weeks. I had surgery. Again. The last surgery was successful, but another problem came up as a result of that first surgery. Soooo I had another plate and a screw added. I think my left foot/ankle is around 75% bionic now. :D I'll try to see if I can get a copy of the xray I'm having next week or a print-out of it to post on my Flickr. The last one was pretty neat. :)

Christmas was nice, but too short. We went to Mary Jane's on Christmas Eve to visit with her, Claire, and Paul.

Christmas Day we drove to my parents' house and spent the night. My dad was actually home on Christmas - my mom wasn't sure if he would be since he was still working crazy amounts of hours to restore power to people who were still out from either the ice storm or the snow storm that came a week after the ice.

Ryan was too nice to me for Christmas and gave me a serger. :) This one, specifically:


Other than having surgery, nothing much has been happening with me. Guess there wasn't too much to update after all.

Artfire

If you're not on Artfire yet but you will be soon, use my name for a referral puh-leeeze.

kcroteau referral link

Perma-muted from the Etsy forums

Good fucking riddance, Etsy. I'll be moving my measly little shop to another venue as soon as I can choose which one I should be giving my money to instead.

The reason behind the perma-mute? 

background if you haven't seen this: http://youthoughtwewouldntnotice.com/blog3/?p=1631

edmdesigns ( http://www.etsy.com/shop.php?user_id=5000224 ) had the balls to put this in her shop profile: (mind you, this is definitely not the first time she violated Etsy's ToS by trying to air personal disputes in her shop announcement)

edmdesigns's Shop Announcement

♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ Due to the fact that a FORMER SELLER "RIVKASMOM" has illegally tampered with my account and has been shut down on ETSY, she is ONCE AGAIN (a total of THREE TIMES Today) creating bogus accounts and buying out all my listed items without a stop. THERE IS A MAJOR LAWSUIT IN PLACE AGAINST HER FOR NUMEROUS OFFENSES OVER THE PAST MONTHS AND SHE WILL HAVE TO DEAL WITH WHATS COMING HER WAY...IT WILL BE VERY COSTLY TO HER & I WILL SURELY WIN THIS AS I HAVE ALL THE EVIDENCE AND TESTIMONIES FROM HER FORMER FRIENDS WHO ARE DISGUSTED BY WHAT LENGTHS THIS UNSTABLE WOMAN HAS DONE. SHE IS STILL OUT THERE AND CAPABLE OF DOING THIS TO ANYONE SHE WANTS TO - BE CAREFUL !! But meanwhile, My shop "may appear empty" as long as she is out there able to do this. So far, she has "purchased" everything in my store - over 235 items - and then some to the tune of OVER $15,000.00. This is after purchasing some $13,000.00 and cleaning out my store just a few weeks ago. Please Check The Categories to The Right For ALL STEAMPUNK JEWELRY ------- >>> **** Special Thank Yous and hugs to all that have written to me to hang in and the caring support... It means a lot to see a tight knit community working together... A special hug to EB and she knows why... It's my honor to be amongst your talents and kind hearts **** Please don't be shy - feel free to write if there is something on your mind or if you have any questions. Thank you for your trust in my work. edmdesigns ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥ ~ ♥

This seller is all kinds of crazy - she thinks that by saying there's a lawsuit against Rivkasmom that one will magically appear.

So, the threads that were started last night in defense of Rivkasmom:

http://www.etsy.com/forums_thread.php?thread_id=5928806

http://www.etsy.com/forums_thread.php?thread_id=5928826

http://www.etsy.com/forums_thread.php?thread_id=5928838

http://www.etsy.com/forums_thread.php?thread_id=5928843

http://www.etsy.com/forums_thread.php?thread_id=5928842

There were a few more threads that didn't really reference the situation at all that HeyMichelle ran around closing for some odd reason. I think they were just getting paranoid at that point when they kept seeing the same people try to start a conversation in the forums.

So... let's recap, shall we? 

• Rivkasmom accuses edmdesigns of copying her.
• Rivkasmom gets her shop shut down by Etsy.
  
• edmdesigns violates Etsy's ToS on more than one occasion in her shop announcement, gets nothing more than a minor slap on the hand. Plus spots on the front page and in a gift guide to make her feel better.
  
• I publicly point out that edm is violating the ToS AGAIN and get perma-muted for it.
  
• edm still sits fat, dumb, and happy while continuing to kiss Emily's (an Admin member) ass.
  

I was kind of surprised that I got my "you violated community policies on Etsy so we're muting you indefinitely" email rather quickly - as in, no more than 15 minutes after the whole thing went down.

My response? (Which still hasn't been answered yet - I doubt they'll even attempt to respond.)

Well, that was awful fast. Isn't there typically some discussion behind the scenes about this? And who is officially administering this muting? There are no Admin names signed to this email - usually there are.

You can't play favorites forever, you know.

So as a warning against anyone else who points out Etsy's flaws and wrongdoings - they'll just mute you and then eventually shut down your shop. Move to another online venue now.

FOOD.

We're cooking Thanksgiving dinner on Thursday for my other half's mother, grandmother, and grandmother's friend.

Here are some of the recipes we're trying this year:


Carmel-pumpkin-gingersnap cheesecake. Mmmm.


Whiskey-glazed carrots. I don't like carrots, so I won't be eating these.


Crockpot stuffing. Won't be as good as my dad's, but I'm hoping it'll still be tasty.

I'll be washing all this down with my new favorite alcoholic beverage:



In addition to these yummy-looking dishes, we'll have the usual turkey, mashed potatoes, winter squash, rolls, cranberry sauce, and apple pie. Yay for stuffing ourselves with way too much food! :P

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!

Pictures!

A couple of pictures from Shaun & Becky's wedding on the photographer's blog: link!


I've been sewing lately - which makes me happy. Except for when I make a mistake and have to get out the seam ripper, but that hasn't happened too much in the past few days, so that's good. :) My mom and I are doing a craft fair at Millbury High School on December 7th, so I'm trying to get a bunch of stuff done so the table won't be filled with mostly her stuff. :P

Weddings.

This past weekend Ryan and I went to Shaun and Becky's wedding. It was wonderful and fun AND I got to see Heather for a little bit (she was a surprise for Shaun - he thought she wasn't going to be coming).

So even though it was beautiful, Heather and I were kind of overwhelmed with the amount of details that go into a wedding.

-- gifts for your bridesmaids, groomsmen
-- gifts for the guests who stay overnight at the hotel
-- knowing small children who will be the flowergirl and ring-bearer
-- picking a caterer
-- picking a cake
-- hiring a photographer
-- making sure your bridesmaids are happy with their dresses


And I'm sure there are a few other things we thought of that we're forgetting. Not to mention the formality of everything - especially if you're married in a church.

We (Heather and I) decided everything was too fancy for us and that it would be much easier if we eloped. Not together. But with whoever we're going to marry. :P

So yeah, the wedding was very nice and it was fun to hang out with everyone (except for the one person who decided she was going to be negative and pessimistic the whole time)...

I've been sewing - to make things for the craft fair I'm doing with my mom in December. Whatever doesn't sell there, I'll list on Etsy. So I won't be listing anytime soon, but I will be making things. :) ... in between all the traveling I have scheduled for work.

Oh and there's the 2nd surgery that I've scheduled for Dec 12th... fun fun.