Back to School

Our first week of school is coming to an end... Oliver started Kindergarten on Tuesday, and Oakley is back at Preschool.

I thought for sure I would cry when I dropped Oliver off for his first full morning of school, (he goes five days a week in the mornings) but I didn't. Today was close though, since I left him at the gate instead of where they drop off their backpacks. I'm trying to let him gain independence and be a little less of a worrisome mother hen. It's hard. I know he works differently than most kids, and it's so hard to let go.

When I picked him up from school yesterday, I asked him how his day went and what he had done. He said, "Well," in his overly dramatic tone, "I'll tell you later after the sun goes down." When I asked him later, after the sun went down of course, I could only get snippets of what he had done. It's not really unusual for him. I badly wanted to ask his teacher how he's doing so far, but all my self control told me to wait at least one more week. I'm trying to not become one of those mothers.

Oakley is doing great so far at preschool. It's his second year, and there's a bunch of kids in his class from last year, so it's helped him come out of his shell early :) Oh, I feel I should mention these kids are all back because they can do a two-year program, not because they flunked or anything. Last year, it took him most of the year to warm up to his teacher in class, but once we were back in the car, he couldn't stop talking about how much he loved school and his teacher and classmates. He surprised everyone by talking SO MUCH on the first day! At first when he found out he was going to have a different teacher than last year, he was really upset, and Oliver was really upset that Oakley would have his old teacher and that he would have a new teacher in Kindergarten, but so far, everything seems to be working out. (Until Oakley found out this morning that Oliver had school on Fridays and he didn't, and when Elliot found out that he wasn't going to school at all...)

Little League

I think I just volunteered to coach Oakley's soccer team....

A Parks and Rec employee called me while I was still in my sleepy phase and told me they were short on coaches, so of course, my mouth thought it would be a good idea to blurt out, "Sure! My husband and I both played in high school!"

What could possibly go wrong?

(Any advice for coaching a team of four year olds would be appreciated!)

Curtain Fix-Up

Several months ago, our dog, Rocket, had chewed a hole in our bedroom curtains. I wasn't sure how to patch up the hole since the curtains are kind of sheer, and was lazy and left it for a bit. Then Rocket tried to fit his head through the hole, and then his whole body, and the curtain just was in a sad state.
I'm not sure why I felt so reluctant to just toss them since I paid a whopping $10 for them (Target clearance!) but I was determined to try and fix them.

For about $5 in fabric, and an hour's worth of work...

Luckily, the hole had stretched across horizontally, and not vertically. I chopped off the bottom 12 inches, and just made a panel out of a linen type fabric that matches our neutral wall in the master bedroom.


I'm very pleased with the results!

October!

I'm so excited for the month of October!


Things that are going to be happening:
1.) Visiting my brother and his family in Nova Scotia (tickets are being looked at right now while we wait for the boys' passports to arrive in the next couple of weeks) We are hoping to be there for my niece's 7th birthday and thanksgiving in Canada :) I'll get to show my kids what a "real autumn" should look like.

Photo taken from Google Images

2.) Nike Women's Half Marathon. I'm beyond thrilled for this race, I seriously can't even tell you.

3.) Going to the musical "Jersey Boys" with my mom. We just bought our tickets! And no, it's not about the cast of the MTV show... It's music I grew up with and I'm really excited to go see my first musical.

October is going to be magical!

Why I'm an Idiot....

Why I'm an idiot...

Let's see, I was invited to a birthday party on Wednesday. The party was tonight, Saturday. Not being sure what to get my friend for her birthday, I decided to make a quilt. That's right. A quilt. 'Cause they're so quick and easy to make.


So I spent the rest of Wednesday questioning my decision, and Thursday afternoon started cutting fabric. I had a giant (free!) stash of fabric in patriotic colours. I was adamant to make something without a pattern, I wanted it to be my own design.


Needless to say, I haven't gotten much sleep over the last two days, but it got done. 

I wanted to keep the quilting light, so the blue area is done in a square spiral, and the stripes  each have two rows of a vine pattern.

I'm so happy with the way it turned out! And I found out that if you're really dedicated, and willing to loose sleep, you can finish a quilt in about 48 hours. It's also got me thinking that I should get on to making a Canadian flag quilt, too! But first I have about five or six other projects that need finishing.

Farewell to the School Year

Today was the last day of Preschool for this school year.

I about started to cry when we got into the school and some of the decorations were already taken down (Things like the kids' name tags since the teachers were giving them to the kids...) 


I've just loved watching the kids learn so much and make new friends over the last nine months, and the teachers have been beyond awesome. Even though Oakley is going back next year, and Elliot will be going the year after, I'm really going to miss them. They put so much extra time and effort in making sure everybody is learning and able to keep up with the rest of the class all while making it look like effortless fun to the kids.


"Graduation" is tomorrow, and before this year, I'd always thought that preschool or kindergarten graduations were just about the dumbest thing out there, but now I'm seeing that it's a step where your "baby" goes from toddler to a mini-grown up. I don't know how I'm going to hold it together tomorrow. I'm not usually one to be emotional, but this just seems like such a final and abrupt end to the school year. I know I'm being a big sissy about it, but there it is.

Table Refinish and Office Organization

A few years ago at a yard sale, I bought this table for $15.

These pictures do not do justice to how ugly this table was, but it had potential.

Lots of ugly red and yellow crackle paint. Yuck.

 The day I bought it, I had big plans of refinishing it, but I had a baby, then we moved, and it sat in the basement, mostly unused for almost five years. Yup, I really got on the ball with that project!


But, I'm actually really glad I didn't just finish it the way I was originally thinking I would so many years ago since I came across such a neat idea on Pinterest a few weeks ago. (If I knew how to be fancy and link it, I would.... if you follow me on Pinterest, you'll see the pin though.)


I dragged the table upstairs (and out of the pile of cardboard boxes that house most of my crafting supplies) and started sanding off what I'm pretty sure was lead paint. I started with a palm sander that had pretty light-weight grit paper on it, and the paint wasn't even budging, so I called my husband and asked if there was heavier paper for it, or something else I should be using. He suggested some heavy duty paint stripping chemical that he had, and I went to work on that. Now, luckily, my brother-in-law was visiting and pretty bored that day, so after the chemical sat for a while, he grabbed a scrapper and helped me scrape off the paint for the next few hours. Whoever owned this table before me had  stained it with really goopy stain, painted a few coats of exterior (lead?) paint, a few coats of the gross yellow paint, the crackle finish, and then some varnish. There were some serious layers to this table.


We scraped and scraped, and sanded and sanded, using the palm sander more, a belt sander, sandpaper, and a little dremel sander. Literally my whole day was spent on stripping this table. (Thanks for the help, Brian!)

The beautiful natural wood underneath the layers of paint.

Pattern that I hand-painted on the middle section of the table.

I spray painted the legs a crisp white, using a primer + paint spray I found so I wouldn't have to try and sand the curved legs. That just seemed like an extra headache, and the legs weren't coated nearly as heavily as the top had been. I then looked for stencils at the store, but not finding any I liked, I bought template paper and looked online. I found this cool pattern, and after trying to cut it out twice, realized there wasn't a way to cut out all the parts and have it be in one piece to be able to use it was a stencil, so I sketched it out and painted it by hand, which took so much longer, but I loved the pattern.


I was hesitant to do the next step since the table was looking so nice already, but the light wood just really wasn't what I wanted for the space, so I took a deep breath and put on ebony stain right over the hours of sanding and painting.

This isn't a great picture, but you get the idea of what it looks like.

The cool thing about doing it this way, is that the stain brings out the grain of the wood beautifully, and only slightly colours the paint that is "stenciled." I'm glad I only painted the pattern on the middle part of the table, even if that decision was originally made out of laziness.

Again, sorry about the poor pictures. The garage doesn't have optimum lighting.

My sewing machine's new home!

I mentioned earlier that most of my crafting supplies were stored in cardboard boxes.... Except for my scrapbooking supplies, everything else has been kept in boxes from when we moved into our house. It's really a pain to get to whatever I need and I never meant for it to stay that way for so long, but sometimes there are just more important things to do than finding a suitable home for things you use only a few times a year. My mom was awesome enough for Mother's Day to spoil me with some storage cubbies for all my crafting/quilting stuff.

We're slowly working on getting the basement finished, but now the office is actually usable! (The table looks oddly small in that last picture.) I got rid of a bunch of odds and ends that I haven't touched in years, and spent most of yesterday cleaning out things so that I don't look like a "Hoarder:The Early Years." The only thing I haven't put back yet is my scrapbooking stuff, since it takes up so much room and it's really tricky to work on with kids. I've been mostly sewing lately, and that's something I can put down easily if I need to quit unexpectedly.

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I love having the top six spaces for current quilting projects, so they can be neatly sorted out (and labeled for easy access!) The cubbies and the fabric drawers in them are from the Martha Stewart line at Home Depot. 

The rest of the cubbies house painting, drawing, stamping, cricut-ing, clay, stationary and hair flower making supplies. 


I then, to my husband's great delight, went the extra mile and organized all our bookselves and purged them of books that we were never going to read again or simply had outgrown. And I organized all my fabric by colour, and got rid of scraps that were too tiny to do anything with, and fabric that I had been given that I just honestly wasn't ever going to use.

Fabric in the bins on the left, books arranged by owner, use and subject.

It may not seem all "wow" to anyone reading this, but trust me, this is a huge improvement to the chaos that was our "office" before yesterday. Also, you have to picture it with you know, walls, and decorations and some day even, matching bookshelves. 


Next weekend we're thinking of tackling the mountain of tote boxes in the basement.... I'm looking forward to having a functioning basement that isn't just for storage even if it is just unfinished (though framed!) space. Meanwhile, I get to keep looking/dreaming about what the bathroom, kitchenette, and den area will look like when it's not only concrete floors and 2x4s. :)


Have you done any fun or long-overdue projects lately?

Nike Women's Half Marathon 2012

I just cannot express how excited I am!
My team got into the NWHM for this October, and it's a big deal. 
I kind of want to go around telling everyone about it, but seeing how it's still six months away, I feel like people would get tired of hearing me talk about it.
Here's the thing:
1. I get to run with some of my favourite ladies, and about 24,995 other ladies.
2. We get Tiffany necklaces at the finish line. (Handed out by firemen, but that's not the part I'm excited about.)
3. This will be my third Half Marathon.
4. This was a lottery entry. The odds were NOT in our favour, and I got in on my first year. It was my team-mate Brenda's fifth year of registering, and she is beyond excited.
5. It's my first "destination" race. I've driven a few hours for races before, the furthest being Seattle, but this one I actually have to fly to. It's like a mini-vacation for me. (Mind you, I'm going to have to scrape every penny from now until October to pay for my plane ticket and hotel and to have spending money, but I think the experience will be so worth it!)


I just can't wait! I don't plan on trying to beat my PR since I want to be able to take it easy on the course and take pictures since I'm sure it will be a scenic race (Not to mention all those famous SF hills....)

101 Things To Do...

I'm flat out stealing Anna's idea from Day Zero Project. It's 101 things to do in 1,001 days. Which would put me ending at January 15, 2015 (my mother-in-law's birthday!)


Some of the things started to sound kind of New Year's Resolution-ish, but I kept to things I thought would be fun, necessary or doable. It's okay if you don't want to read the whole list, but if you do, hopefully it will inspire you to think up a fun list you'd like to tackle over the next couple of years....


1. Come up with a cleaning schedule - and use it!
2. Cook dinner for Phil three times a month. (I've been blessed with a husband who likes to cook and is good at it, but I know sometimes he'd like a break.)
3. Learn to style my hair.
4. Count my shoes. I'm curious how many I have, and how many it takes before I'm admitted to shoe shoppers anonymous.
5. Run four half marathons.
6. Set up my sewing area.
7. Make a quilt for each of the boys.
8. Find a cheap hobby (if that exists....)
9. Re-read the Mandie, Elizabeth Gail, and Saddle Club books before I pass them down to my nieces.
10. Visit Nova Scotia.
11. Teach Oliver, Oakley, and Elliot to downhill ski.
12. Ride the roller coaster during S2S.
13. Give someone a thoughtful present without occasion. 
14. Reclaim Banff with happy memories.
15. Take more pictures.
16. Learn the features of my new sewing machine.
17. Not freak out when the boys have legos everywhere.
18. Start running with Rocket - we could both use it.
19. Keep the top of my dresser and nightstand clutter free.
20. Figure out ways to maximize the gas mileage in my Jeep.
21. Befriend other moms from preschool.
22. Read through the Bible.
23. Play outside with the kids.
24. Learn to save money.
25. Pay the bills with Phil so I'm aware of our finances.
26. Make an effort to keep in touch with friends.
27. Toilet train Elliot.
28. Floss enough so the the dentist won't scold me for not flossing.
29. Tend my garden more than three times per season.
30. Make the bed more often.
31. Remember to put other's needs before my own.
32. Wear lipstick (without feeling like a six-year old playing dress up, or a prostitute.)
33. Catch up on Downton Abbey and Mad Men.
34. Finish the hand quilt I started in 2006.
35. Pray for the neighbours that seem to hate us.
36. Get passports for the boys.
37. Visit Kenya before Phil's aunt moves stateside.
38. Get the rest of my things out of mom's house.
39. Actually use my treadmill.
40. Start working out again.
41. Do ten projects I've pinned on Pinterest.
42. Keep my orchid alive through summer.
43. Find a way to clean the nastiness out of my couches.
44. Get slip covers for my couches
45. Print and mail pictures to Phil's grandmas more often.
46. Make a chore list for the kids.
47. Make plans for a fabulous adult-only vacation.
48. Make plans for a fun-filled family vacation.
49. Figure out what I want to be when I "grow up." (Will I stay at home after the kids are in school full time? Should I go back to school myself? Etc....)
50. Not get annoyed so easily.
51. Learn the names of four other people on our street.
52. Set up play-dates for the kids.
53. Come up with projects/activities for the kids.
54. Use my crock pot!
55. Bring in a treat to the police station.
56. Teach Rocket to "shake."
57. Babysit for our neighbours so they can go out on a date. (Different neighbours than previously mentioned.)
58. Find the mouse in the garage!
59. Learn to use the BBQ.
60. Bike the kids to school (this depends on where they will go to Kindergarten.)
61. Wake up with a good attitude. (or fake it!)
62. Get Elliot's picture in the paper so we'll have had all three in there.
63. Try the new gel nailpolish.
64. Make 12 new scrapbook pages.
65. Make a curtain for the kitchen window.
66. Fix the holes in Oliver's jeans.
67. Hold my own in a conversation with Phil's family. (This is not easy when you have a lawyer, surgeon, medical researcher, and future biologists at the table.)
68. Visit the library once a month.
69. Learn how to bind quilts the correct way.
70. Update family pictures.
71. Correspond with an old friend electroniclessly.
72. Have a fun, themed party.
73. Figure out an occasion where I can wear evening gowns.
74. Get tickets to the masquerade at the Fox Theatre.
75. Support a local artist.
76. Get a perfect score on Nintendo Wii Archery.
77. Shoot a real bow and arrow.
78. See a doctor about the circulation in my fingers.
79. Go through the bottle of daily vitamins that Phil bought me.
80. Sew an article of clothing from a pattern.
81. Finish the autumn quilt I started last fall.
82. Beat my 5K and Half marathon PRs. 
83. Do the Mt. Si relay again - with a camera this time!
84. Take my guitar out of its case and see if I remember how to play.
85. Have one of my cakes up on the Sunday Sweets portion of Cake Wrecks.
86. Submit one of my cakes to the Sunday Sweets.
87. Find a non-dessert wine I like.
88. Go through my closet and get rid of dresses that no longer fit.
89. Sketch out the ideas for the children's book I have.
90. Find a babysitter! (That isn't my mom or sister-in-law.)
91. Sew covers for the throw pillows in the living room.
92. Build up a stash of fabric.
93. Get rid of tupperware that no longer has a lid, is only a lid or is grossly discoloured.
94. Send Grandmaman a birthday card.
95. Paint the laundry room.
96. Donate blood. (If I'm no longer anemic.) 
97. Keep keeping track of all the miles I run.
98. Get out my watercolours and paint something.
99. Learn how to make a hot latte and London Fog at home.
100. Start learning Italian.
101. Make jam from scratch on my own.

Snake River Half Marathon 2012

One of my New Year's resolutions was to beat my time from last year: I finished in 2:31:51, averaging 11.36/miles. I hadn't trained as much as I should have, and was hurting so badly the last four or five miles that I ended up walking most of those. I hadn't paced myself, starting out WAY too quickly, and I was very cocky thinking I could outrun my friends that I was there with because they are in their early forties. While I am glad I did it last year, it was not the funnest experience for me, and I wasn't planning on doing this race again anytime soon. Until I was guilted into it.

Sydne, Brenda, Dee, Ashley and I before the race.

In contrast, this year was AWESOME!!! 


I had a training schedule, and I stuck to it as much as I could. Having three kids, running is not my highest priority, so I missed a few runs here and there, (some due to blizzard-like conditions) but I tried to make up for them when I could. I had fellow runners to keep me accountable. I've been learning to pace myself a lot better, to run through discomfort, to ignore the part of me that wants to stop and walk (unless I really am in pain.) Most importantly, I've learned to not judge runners by how they look. Yes, it's humbling to get passed by a 70 year old lady, but she's worked for it, and I overheard her talking about doing the Boston Marathon and Ironman this year, so clearly she's earned the right to pass a 24 year old. I tried to set more reasonable goals on the half this year than simply looking ahead and thinking I wanted to pass the old man ahead of me, or the overweight woman. Yes, it is a race, but everyone is running to their best ability, and it's an endurance race, so there's no point in killing myself to try and pass someone who's a better runner.


I feel like I've grown so much as a runner this past year.


The girls and I all met up in Coeur d'Alene to head down to the race together at 6:30. I was feeling pretty good, better than usual because I was able to eat actual food, which normally I have a hard time with. We got there earlier than we meant to, registered, got our "swag bags" (which were kind of lame this year) and wandered around trying to stay warm.
The race finally started, and I knew I needed to pace myself, but it just felt like I was going so slowly! But I passed the first mile marker at 9:19 or something like that, and knew I was probably still going faster than I should. By mile 2, that nagging voice in my head was telling me I was tired and wanted to walk, but I told it to be quiet and that we would run until mile 4. At mile 4, I told that voice to be quiet until 6, and so on. I tried to keep myself from thinking that I had so many more miles ahead of me by eavesdropping on conversations happening around me. I loved the enthusiasm of first time runners running in pairs, the cute old couple ahead of me going at a steady pace (they finished about 20 seconds before me!) quietly encouraging each other to press on, the loud music blaring out of young women's headphones.The steady fall of footprints around me. All of it seemed to equate to this peacefulness in the midst of around 700 runners.

Not sure how well you can see, but there are runners wrapped around the bend of the river. I am about in the middle of the pack.

The turn-around point at 6.5 miles was a big milestone for me. Last year at the point, I had already been walking a while, and just feeling so down on myself for not doing better. My ankles had been starting to hurt, and I was so discouraged that I was only halfway done. This year, I was still going strong, I had run through some shin pains, and as a bonus, I was ahead of everybody I knew at the race. (Victory for my ultra-competitive nature!) I turned around at 1:02:10.


The next few miles seemed to fly by since I had people to look for that were still heading to the turn-around. After mile nine, I started to get tired a bit, and strong head winds started to blow. And I mean strong! When you have to physically brace yourself and buckle down for it, you know it's going to be a tough four miles. 


The thing about this course is while it's kind of pretty in its own way, the landscape doesn't differ at all the whole way and it gets pretty boring. So I was overjoyed to see the herd of cows at the 11 mile mark (mile 2 on the way out) knowing that I was almost done. And really, when you've run 11, what's 2 more? It felt like I was running so slowly because of the wind, and I started to worry that I wouldn't be able to beat last year's time after all; especially when I overheard two girls say 2-15. I thought they meant we had already been going to 2 hours, 15 minutes, and there was no way I'd be able to finish under 2:31 with two miles left.


The wind still blowing like crazy, it was hard to resist the urge to walk. Thankfully, a water station was right ahead as I was seriously considering it, so I walked the few paces it took to down the water, then felt like I would be able to start running again. I was so thrilled to see the markers for miles 12 and 13! The last tenth of a mile went on forever it seemed. There were people everywhere and so it was hard to tell where the finish line was exactly, but finally I could see the clock. There's no better feeling than seeing that clock especially when it has a good time on it. A much better time than I was expecting with the wind and how slowly it felt I'd been going.

Okay, I look like a complete dork when I run, it turns out! But check out my calves ;)

I crossed the finish line at 2:11:25. Shaving off just over 20 minutes from last year's time! I was thrilled! And then a little less thrilled when I realized we didn't get medals this year, but still happy with my performance. 

The bonus about finishing first out of my friends is that I got to see them all finish! It was so exciting. It was Brenda's 17th Half Marathon, Ashley's 1st, Sydne's 2nd (? I think?) and Dee's 4th. We celebrated with Mimosas in the parking lot:

We keep things pretty classy!

So, here's to next year, and trying to beat this year's time! In the meantime, I have a few small races in the next few months, and then bigger ones in the summer, and hopefully we get into the Nike Women's Half lottery for the fall. 

New Years

It's January 2nd, and I just cannot believe it!


New Year's is a little different at our house because of Oliver's birthday. Can anyone believe that he is five already?!?

Here he is, about nine months old. (In California)

My big boy seems all grown up. On the one hand, I'm having trouble realizing that I've only had him in my life for five years (my, how the time flies!) but on the other hand, if you look at him, he seems so mature and old, I catch myself thinking, "wait, he's ONLY five?" It's a weird mix of emotions, to be sure. Part of him turning five meant finally taking him off his sippie cups. He's far too old for them, and I thought we'd have a big fight about it since the few times I brought it up in the days leading to his birthday, he was NOT a fan of the idea. So far, though, things are going pretty well; he's been just using a cup, and knows that he should keep it in the kitchen/dining room, and that he can't take anything to bed. Thank you Lord that it's going smoothly!

Oliver at six days old. Dressed up to go to church.

We're waiting to do his birthday party until Phil's mom and sister come into town in about a week and a half, so we haven't really celebrated him yet. I offered him dessert and ice cream last night saying we could put a candle in it and he could blow it out since it was his birthday, but he didn't want anything to do with that. What kid passes up dessert? We did play Candy Land with him and the other boys, and let him pick some of the day's activities yesterday and he got to go play at the neighbour's house for a little bit in the evening. I'm excited to do his birthday party though; I've had a few ideas for the last couple of months that I've been dying to do :)

Oliver at about six month old with Mr.Lion.

Things about my five year old:

He loves the colour red, trains, every thing to do with trains, dinosaurs, trucks, anything to do with construction, Go Diego Go!, the Backyardigans, school.

He's the tallest in his class, but not the oldest. He doesn't like when people call his hair red; to him, red is like the colour of a fire truck, so he thinks his hair is brown, and has sternly told strangers so. He loves to sing and make up songs. He does not like when Oakley tries to sing with him. He used to be terrified of dogs, then we got Rocket and now he loves them. Oliver does not like drawing or colouring; most of the papers he brings home from school have minimal work done on them. He's shy, but also likes being the center of attention. He's a hard worker. He's an early bird (like, really, really early.) Oliver has one of the best laughs, and likes pranks and slap-stick comedy. His favourite food is bacon, followed probably by ham. He will eat most anything if there is ketchup or sprinkles on it. Oliver is very good with his hands. He is always very curious how things are put together and work. He has a really good memory. He says Grandma and Oakley are his best friends.
As for New Year "resolutions," I'm keeping it simple this year:


1.) Keep track of all my mileage for running. I think it'll be really motivating at the end of the year to say I ran 500 miles or whatever it ends up being. That way next year I can make a mileage goal that I know is realistic.


2.) Run my second Half Marathon, and beat my time from last year. It's the same course and this year I have an actual training plan and a large support group (Plus, I know a bunch of girls running too) so I feel this is very doable. 


3.) Stay better organized/neater. If you've known me for any length of time, you know I'm a very messy person. While I've improved  A LOT since I've been married and had my own house, I still have a long way to go. I've been doing pretty great/good/better lately, and a big part of that is that the kids haven't been dragging all of their toys in the living room from the play room since we moved furniture around. IT'S AWESOME! I've also been doing better at keeping our kitchen and my part of our room picked up and cleaned, so I'd like to keep that going.


4.) Elliot getting potty trained! Sigh. I'm not looking forward to it. I've already done two boys and a dog.... this one comes free, then, right?


5.) Strengthening current relationships and forging new ones. I am a sucky people person. I don't communicate well (apart from my like-minded, quirky friends) and I tend to end up pushing people away, I think. So I'd like to make sure I try to get out of my comfort zone and talk to new people.

6.) Finish sewing projects that I have started! This doesn't automatically apply to the hand-quilt I've been working on for six years. That one I have to be in the right mood/frame of mind to work on, but I have a good-ish sewing machine now, and I have a big quilt started that I'd like to finish. It was supposed to be for Autumn 2011, but Autumn 2012 will do.


7.) Get better at decorating cakes. I don't get much practice because the only cakes I give myself time to do are ones for clients, so this year, I'd like to take the time to make faux cakes (I have styrofoam rounds) or real ones to practice fondant, sculpting, and icing skills. I'd also like to practice making gumpaste flowers some more. Along the cake line, I would also like to start charging more for the cakes; not to rip people off, but just so I could maybe make some actual money and not lose money, which is usually what happens because I feel badly charging more than $40. NO MORE! It would be nice to make more money so I could buy more tools too.


Well, that feels like a fairly ambitious list. What are your goals for 2012?