OK, catch up time again...

Ugh, it's been a long, rough month or so! I remember when I used to blog daily...no matter what! Not sure what happened, but it's so hard now to get into the rhythm of it anymore. Oh well. So here's the stuff that was at least photographed, and hogging up my hard drive...

On March 19th, Bella made some brownies mostly by herself! She loves to cook and bake, so we included it in our homeschool day. Daddy very much approves of this, lol!!!

Can you tell she's happy???

Love, love, love my Pampered Chef brownie pan! So much that I accidentally ordered it twice! One "family size" box of brownie mix is perfect for filling up all the wells. And now you don't have to cut them up!

While Thomas was home on leave, Bella opened up her "salon". Here she is all duded up, because you have to be "glam" if you are running a salon, of course!!!

Her vanity table has all the tools of the trade, and she made up a bunch of hair style pictures she taped to the wall above it. That kid has really got a great imagination!!! Although Daddy doesn't care much for the lipgloss, lol!!! I told Bella to keep the cap on and just pretend with him. He was OK with that plan!

Even after Daddy went back to work she still wanted to play! And if the customer refuses to go upstairs to the salon, the salon will come to them!!!

Doing Daddy's hair (what hair???) just so!

Afterwards Bella gives a nice shoulder massage! What a deal!!

Well, now it's time for the Spring Craft Fair photos. Although I love to craft and be around others who craft, I think I'm pretty much done with fairs. It's A LOT of work and stress, and I made less money at this one than the one I did two years ago!!! (It looks empty around me as we got there early to set up. Some sellers weren't even there when the fair started!!!)

I had two tables, and even though it looks like the one in the foreground is mostly empty, it's really not - only the weird angle I took the shot in.

I made up inserts for all the lockets I had on hand. I sold two.

The biggest seller for me was the Card-In-A-Box cards. I sold all but three of them! And no one fussed about the price either. There was no way I was pricing them cheaply (like I did with everything else!) because I put too much work into them and if they didn't sell, I could use them myself!

Lollipop roses? Total dud! The Easter bonnets didn't sell either, but that's OK as they are now hanging quite prettily on MY craft room wall!

I did sell most of the post-it note holders, which was nice. These were one of the first things I made before I got busy with homeschooling and insomnia, so I had lots of different ones and put more effort into them. The camera themed ones and the ladybugs were quick sell outs.

Didn't sell ONE of these!

Or any of these!

Or any of these!!!

I think I sold one pencil. Maybe two.

Each table had two water bottles with the "name" of the shop on it. I didn't submit a shop name because I don't have a business, but the woman running the show did this for me. Loved it! And the water came in handy too!!! The oh-so-cute bunny plant decorations? Yeah, brought all five back home with me too. I knew I should have brought along a plant to show it off!!!

So glad I stopped at two of these birdhouses!!! They are a ton of work for something so small and I didn't sell either one of them!

These butterfly magnets were a totally last minute idea, and I didn't take much time or care with them either. And guess what? I nearly sold all of them, lol!!!! Crazy! I knew I was going to use my cupcake stand to display something, but I didn't realize how well it would work for these. I think the more you can "raise up" whatever you're selling, the more likely they'll actually be seen by people walking by.

The other side of the table with more box cards.

I didn't sell ANYTHING from the foreground of this photo! All those cute dress cards too!!! Oh well, be on the lookout my friends...chances are you will be seeing one in your mailbox soon!

Pizza boxes with Easter gummie packets inside, and candy wrapper boxes filled with chocolate eggs. Didn't sell a single one!!!! (Seeing a theme here??)

I sold a couple of Easter baskets and a couple of matchboxes with jellybeans, but none of the jellybean rolls. Sold ALL of the Kleenex packs. Do you see why I'm so over doing craft fairs???? Wasted a lot of time and supplies, not to mention heaping unneeded stress in my life. All the items that had candy in them were donated to the USO on post. They do a lot in our community, and I figured people going there for the free meals might like them. It's amazing how much more people like things when they are free!!! I didn't think $0.25 and $0.50 were that much, but apparently I was wrong!

Bella has reading everyday (1 -2 chapters or so), and she really likes being able to use the Kindle app on her tablet to read books. I got a quick snapshot of her reading on her bed! She is on her 15th (!!!) large chapter book since starting homeschool two months ago! Most of those she read without being told to because she was so "into" the story. So I've managed to turn reading into something fun, along with math!! *happy face*

My latest obsession, lol, is with Elizabeth Craft Designs!! I'm pretty sure I first started hearing about these items on YouTube, when Karen Burnistan stopped doing things for Sizzix (and Stampin Up), and moved into a partnership with ECD instead. Then I started seeing finished cards on Facebook. Oh.My.Goodness!!! I had to get some stuff!!!

Copic colored glitter flowers!

They sell special adhesive sheets, which you put on card stock, and then you put their peel off stickers on. It's best to get black if you are going to be using your Copics, because the ink will color the silver or gold ones. Then you sprinkle on their special microfine glitter, dust off the excess and "polish" the remaining glitter with your finger. When you are finished no glitter comes off anymore!! Then when you color them -  it's sooooo sparkly and they look like glittery stained glass! I'll be using these two images on a card very soon....can't wait! I've already had three orders from them of various dies, peel off stickers and papers....with more on the way. Can't wait to play and show them off!!!

I knew we had a craft shop on post since we moved here, but I never actually made it into there until last week. They have a lot of room to carry many things, but mostly it's empty space!!! They have a little of this and that, but not much of any one thing. The paper crafting section is ridiculously small!!!!!! But! I did find something that I had never heard of before - glitter embossing powder!!! So cool! I picked black, because it looked the prettiest, and when we got home, I tried it out!

I've had these Magnolia peacock feather dies for ages, but I'm just now using it for this! I cut them out in black card stock, and then embossed all but the very bottom tip in the new glitter powder. The photo does NOT do them justice!!! They are very glittery, but it's also embossed too. Hard to describe, but it's gorgeous! No clue how I'm going to use them now that I've made them, but I'll figure something out!!!

We took half a week off  from homeschooling before the craft fair so I could waste my time make some more things to display sell, and then the following week Thomas was on leave, so we took "Spring break" then too. So now we are playing catch up with school!!! I know we make up our own schedule, but I really want Bella to start 5th grade "on time", which means we need to stick to the original schedule I made up. She's been really good about focusing and doing the added work each day to make up some time. By this time next week we'll be exactly where we should be! We have school for four, very solid hours in the morning, and then she does additional Reflex Math and reading. Still lots of time for playing salon or writing the latest issue of her newspaper! I have to say that she is totally blossoming since staying home! Her imagination, which was always great, has grown even bigger and her "play" is taking on such creative twists. I couldn't be more proud of her!!

OK, I think we are all caught up now. Hopefully all this pollen will GO AWAY soon, and I can stop blowing my nose and rubbing my eyes raw! I have lots of things I want to do around the house and crafting projects I want to dive into as well. Never enough time for everything, right??