I owe you an explanation...

It's been forever since I've written a blog post. Or a newsletter. Or posted on Facebook. I'm still here, I promise! Lately my focus has shifted to fulfilling a long-time dream. I live in an older home, it has great bones, but needed some TLC. Especially the garage; it was embarrassingly bad, but I knew someday it would be awesome. That someday is here, thanks to my awesome friend/neighbor/builder Tom. It's beautiful and every time I pull into the garage I can't believe it's really mine. I'm a little ashamed to post a before picture, but once you see what I've lived with for 27 years and what I have now, I hope you'll forgive me for being absent...

This is the day before demolition started, the worst it ever was. And no breezeway.

This is now. See what I mean? Am I forgiven?

Now that the garage is built, I've moved my destructive skills inside the house. I gutted my living/dining room and bedroom (that was hard work, but fun!) I've insulated, had new drywall hung, and have most of the new floors installed, I still have to finish the hallway & pantry. I'm working on the trim; it's making me a little crazy because none of the walls in my house are straight. In any direction - up & down, side to side, it's maddening. And I won't lie, I've cried a couple of times. But, it's getting there and every little bit that I do brings my 27 year dream a little closer to reality.

While I've been working I've been doing a lot of planning for Carla's Creations. When you're ripping out walls or painting you have a lot of time to think. I'll be sharing more in the near future, I promise!

Til later,

Carla

One Year Anniversary!

I can't believe it's been a year since I launched my Natural Skincare line? Seems like it's only been a couple of months, I can't even tell you where the time has gone. I've been thinking about where I was when I started and where I am now, it's been a crazy year!

My very first show was at my friends barn sale in August 2013. I had 4 choices (scent-wise) of soap, body butter, lotion bars & salt scrubs and two lip balm flavors. That was it. My table looks pretty empty now that I look at it, but back then I was so excited.

November 2013 we did two Christmas craft shows. One was a complete dud (ironically, that's the only one I have pictures of), the second one was great! My line had expanded to 8 choices of soap, body butter, lotion bars & salt scrubs, 3 flavors of lip balm, plus shampoo bars, pink Himalayan salt soap, honey sugar lip scrub and soap decks. I spent a painful night with a glue gun and foam board building the risers for my display and Brie and I did a dry run to tweak the setup before the shows (she's got a good eye!). Now my table didn't look as empty!

My darling daughter and I, November 2013 craft show.

Fast forward to June 2014. I now have 12 choices of soap, 10 body butter/lotion bar/salt scrubs, everything else mentioned above plus I added my absolute favorite moisturizer in the whole world,  Skin Nourishing Facial Serum. I added the custom banner that I'd been dreaming of for months. I had to arrange, rearrange and rearrange again to make everything fit and look good.

Wow, no wonder I've been so tired this year! But I'm not done yet, I have SO many things I want to add! (Lots of new stuff coming for Christmas!) And I've got to get busy sewing. Thank you for a great year, I'm looking forward to the next year!

Take care!
 Carla

Great diaper bag & lessons learned.....

I've finished my favorite project ever - an awesome diaper bag for my friend Nancy's daughter-in-law.

It's. Adorable.

Chasity chose her own fabric & the Multi-Tasking Tote design, she has great taste. I love the colors & textures. She picked a design her husband would willingly carry - he's a man's man type and pink just wouldn't fly (I swear he's 8' tall, which is killing me cause I've know him since he was a kid). Here it is....

All snapped up and ready to go!

The sides unsnap for easy access to all the necessities a little princess needs.

And trust me, there's room for everything she'll need, with room left over for big brothers stuff too!

As great as it turned out, it was not without issues. Chasity wanted a monogram, and this bag is perfect for that. I mocked up a couple of designs and I loved the one she picked (told you she had great taste). This is where my Note To Self moment came in - the design doesn't always turn out the way it looks in the mock-up. I had one letter that just wouldn't cooperate, it must have been digitized wrong. The first two letters stitched up great, so feeling way too confident, I lined up the last one, just knowing that it would be perfect. Imagine my surprise as I watched it stitch out sideways!!! 

Yeah......that's supposed to be CML. This is not what I had in mind. It took me forever to get the orientation fixed and then I realized it wasn't sizing up right. No matter what I tried, it wouldn't shrink. Aahhh! So we had to regroup and start over (thank you Chasity for being so gracious). Here's the final result, much better!

The new little princess is ready for her Mommy & Daddy to take her out to meet her public. In style!!

And the lesson learned? Next time do a mock up AND check it on the machine before I commit. And always do a test run! (Thankfully I did this time. All I messed up was a scrap of fabric. Whew!)

Take care!

Carla

Playing With Toys

So, I have a new toy……….. a Silhouette Cameo!! {insert screams of joy here}  Ever since it arrived my mind has been full of ideas and I couldn’t wait for a chance to make them.  So I took advantage of a super hot afternoon to play.

  

First up was decorating my shiny new mailbox. Back in December someone decided to take a shortcut through my yard - he came 7 feet from turning my sewing room into a drive-thru and took out my mailbox and a very large rock in the process. I thought the new mailbox deserved a little decoration.  And not just numbers, cool looking numbers. And a little embellishment. I chose 77 pt Teen font for the numbers and found this cute little bird flourish in the Silhouette store.  I scaled the bird to be the same height as the numbers and the length at 15".  Perfect!!  The other side just has numbers because the flag was in the way, but I still think it still looks great!

Next was a set of plates that I’ve had for years. I love the colors but they always looked a little plain. Before I even got my Cameo I knew I wanted to decorate them with words, so this project was a no brainer. I used Script font for this and scaled it to fit the width of the center of the plate.  WARNING to those of you brave enough to try it; the teeny, tiny little lines were a pain to pull out so make sure you have plenty of patience. But it was worth it!

Can't wait for another hot/rainy/crappy day to knock out some more projects!

Take care!

Carla

Coffee Table Makeover

I inherited a vintage living room set from my Aunt & Uncle when they packed up and moved to Florida.  Love the furniture, it has great bones, but there was one teensy little problem.

Here we have the coffee table.  Notice the great turned legs and the rosette?  Love those details!! But the dark brown just didn't fit with my shabby vintage decor.  I saw this coffee table makeover at Recaptured Charm and fell in love!  So out came the paint and the drop cloth and ................   Waaalaaaa!  Now I can put my feet up when I'm watching TV and not feel guilty! Bonus - extra seating if needed. AND it's Mimi approved (she's already claimed it - she can lay on it and watch everything I do in comfort) Notice the furniture in the background? That's the rest of the set. It's been painted, still need to do the slipcovers. Someday............. Take care! Carla

Change happens.......

Forgive the wordy post, lots going on! If you follow me on Facebook you know all about the fast & furious changes that happened to the website over the winter. My former webhost made some sudden changes (thank you so much Microsoft) that forced me out of my little comfort zone and sent me in search of a new host. Which, honestly, I should have done a long time ago because I was never happy with the old site. But the thought of figuring out which hosting service was the best (there are sooo many options, reputable and not so reputable), rebuilding my website and doing all the little behind-the-scenes work to get it switched without any glitches…….. Totally. Freaked. Me. Out. So like any normal person, I hunkered down in my comfort zone. (thats what all normal people do, right?) Til the Big Guy upstairs decided to stretch me.  Yeah, He’s good at that, isn’t he? BUT, I followed His lead and as usual, He was right.  I found a great new host and built a website that I love, love, love!!!  What do ya think???

I wish I could say that I’ve been sewing like crazy.  But I can’t. I can only say that I’ve been crazy. I do have stuff on the sewing table, but I keep forgetting that I have a life. A Mom who had surgery, a daughter who needs me, a little dog that loves going to the park, a mild winter with a yard that started growing way too soon (we won’t even talk about the weeds).  And housework.  And a full time job. Yeah, that’s another God lesson - my plans aren’t necessarily His plans. (shhh, if you listen you can hear my Grandma laughing, she never could get me to understand that) So I’ve decided that life is gonna happen in spite of my plans so I will sew when I can (I have so many great designs waiting to come to life!) and be happy with it. Here’s a little hint at what’s in the works now (think Christmas purse style)……….

 

 

The finished products are looking great!!  Stay tuned..............

Until next time,

Carla