*sigh*

I am having bug issues
really our desktop is so slow...
one laptop screen is totally black, 
I can't download any pictures on the other laptop! 


I am also having issues that bug me.
Things that don't make me happy at this very moment.


I wanna keep blogging but I can't right now.
I want to blog about happy things.
I hope I am back soon.


I think I owe this line to you my friends.  I will take a break.  I need to find the light at the end of the tunnel.


xoxo


Claudia

Tweet

Season's Change Second Edition...Spring Week 8

For a whole year I will try to find the awesomeness 

included in all four seasons,

perhaps the weather or a nature shot...

maybe display the holidays in turn

who knows?

The sky is the limit.

Riding my bike on Sunday mornings I have made a lot of discoveries.

I want a front entrance like this on my porch.

It's funny how I rode back home grabbed my camera got on my truck and drove to look for this house again and had the hardest time finding it.  It only shows that I gotta slow down.

Tweet

Counting Blessings

Xavi was very happy this weekend because his cousins came over to celebrate Mother's day and my brother gave him a crochet angry bird hat that he bought for him!  Xavi is in love with it.

When I picked him up from school on Monday after he had shared his angry bird hat with his friends he started counting his blessings on the way back home.

He numbered them as many as he has fingers on his hands.

1. I have an angry bird hat.
2. I have two beyblades.
3. I have a TaeKwonDo class.
4. I have lots of toys in my room.
5. I have a cleaning mom
6. I have a dad that lets me take food upstairs.*
7. I have an awesome teacher.
8. I have an awesome school
9. I have my own room.
10. I have my friend Ruben. 

* I am not very happy with that one!! :/

As an extra bonus he said:

I will make a sacrifice for everyone in my family

...I will try though!

This really touched my heart I pray to God that my 5 year old keeps counting his blessings years from now.  I also, secretly thank him because sometimes I forget to count mine.

Tweet

Mother's Day Celebration

This Mother's Day was great.

 There were pretty flowers, family and lots of good food!

 There were the bad boys

...and the pretty girls!

but there were better little things ;)

Doesn't she just look like that doll on Sophia's stroller??

Hope you had a good day too.

Tweet

Seasons Change Second Edition...Spring Week 7

For a whole year I will try to find the awesomeness 

included in all four seasons,

perhaps the weather or a nature shot...

maybe display the holidays in turn

who knows?

The sky is the limit.

This pond is right next to my house.  On a good rainy season you would not believe it but it overflows to the street!! Not this year unfortunately.  You see that tube going up the hill?  The City feeds water to it or pumps water out.  Pond life happens here, all kinds of creatures live here birds, ducks, frogs, toads and tadpoles I am sure.  When we first moved here and discovered what what that noise at night I got a queasy stomach just at the thought of so many frogs and toads together...now I am used to it.

It's funny because right after it gets dark a single loud call by one of them gets the rest started on the croaking.

And then the symphony it's all night long.
I think the call means they are looking for a mate...ugghh! 
mating frogs...ugghh again!

Now we've found stray ones in the garage or in our garden area.  Just yesterday I saw one in the front porch, I wonder how it got there??  get back I tell it I don't want any problems.

Tweet

Old Glasses for New Eyes

Sophia has been wearing glasses ever since she was in Kindergarten.  She got them about a month or so after she started school.  It was funny because the very first day she took them to school she almost came home without them!  Sophia took her brand new pink glasses off for recess as she was not used to wearing them and her best friend put them in her backpack and was planning on taking them home because she had 'liked' them.  Sophia will never forget that story and I am sure her Kindergarten teacher never will either as she told me that she had gone crazy looking for the glasses thinking "Sophia's mom will kill me if she losses her glasses on her first day!"

I have reading glasses also but really hardly wear them, I only sport them when I want to look intellectual or nerdy! Or when I want to get some oh's and ah's out of people...people that know me that is.

Sophia gets a new pair every year, but what to do with those old glasses?  A few years ago I researched and found out that I could donate them to the Lions Club  there is a great need for eyeglasses in undeveloped countries and Sophia is able to help by donating her old glasses.  Now my mom and dad put in their two cents also.  During their morning and afternoon strolls they always manage to find one or two pairs of lost or left behind glasses and save them for me.  So when I have a bunch I make a trip to a local optometrist and I drop off the glasses to be donated to the Lions Club.  I leave with a great feeling that those old glasses will make a difference on new eyes.  I've been doing this for some years now.

So what do you do with your old glasses??  here is the how you can help link to Lion's Club international if interested.

The pink pair was Sophia's so hopefully soon a new princess will have her new pair to help her read!

Tweet

Featured artist oneandtwocompany

Today's feature interview is oneandtwocompany  right now I will tell you what I love about this interview, you see the first picture?  well that's her inspiration not winnie the pooh but the little one in the corner!  

1. Tell us as little or as much as you would like about yourself.

I began to crochet when I was a child. My mother and my grandma taught me and soon it became my passion. Since then I have walked a long way, learning more and more as the days passed, developing my own creations and devoting to it all the free time I had. After my daughter's birth I had a "peace period" which allowed me to discover Etsy (what a great discovery indeed). It meant to me the possibility to share my creativity with a huge community and to have another reason more to go on moving forward and developing new projects. People's response has be fascinating: to have the possibility to see how my designs go true miles from where I live is incredible and it goes on surprising me. I hope to improve more and more, with new and funny projects, without losing the spirit that inspired me at the beginning. I wish you would be along this way...

pure inspiration!

2. What do you sell? 
Crochet Patterns, Applique Crochet Patterns and Applique Templates.

Hedgehog Pillow PDF Crochet Pattern

3. Why handmade?
We are in a society where we consume  too much industrial products. Handmade products have an added merit to me. They require more effort, more illusion and they are more gratifying. It is marvelous when you can see how your ideas take shape and finally come true.


4. Where does your inspiration to create come from and/or your inspiration in life?
My main inspiration is my little daughter. She is very creative and she is telling me tales ans stories full of incredible characters... all the time. Many of them appear in my projects.

5. Besides creating what else do you do? Do you have a full time job?
I have been a nurse for ten years,  but nowadays I have a part-time job. It has been my biggest passion since I was a child. Now I am so lucky that I can do the two things I like most in my life.

Monsters Applique / Ornament PDF Crochet Pattern

6. When did you start thinking you were an artist?
I don´t consider myself to be an artist, since I think I have a long way to walk and there are a lot of things I have to learn. At the moment I am happy enjoying my designs and making other people enjoy them too.

7. Who has been most influential in your craft work?
My main influences are my mother and my grandma. They are sewing all the time, crocheting... They always are up to some project... They are my great source and my reference point.

8. Where would you like to be in five years?
I don´t know, but no matter where I would be, I want to go on doing the same I am doing today, together with my friends, my family, enjoying my life and learning something new everyday...

Bird Applique PDF pattern

9. Is there anything you'd like to try doing that you haven't done? crafts, sports, life in general?
I would like to have another baby, a sister for my daughter, and I´d love traveling much more.

Butterfly Applique PDF pattern

 10. Besides online where else do you sell?
I only sell online at the moment.

ways to contact you:

* shop * shop * shop * blog * facebook *  email

Tweet

April's winner from moncy3

Unfortunately for me the month of April was very very slow at my etsy shop.  I don't really want to complain because I know there are slow months and better months.  So let's hope for better months.

I made two sales to one single customer.

Congratulations to  kateobendorfer from San Diego she is also a returning customer so that makes me happy! The free item is a token of my appreciation for my customers.

Her item of choice was this set

These are the featured artists for April:

Scissaroo

Lariata

 misala

KingSoleil 

SecondWoodNature 

Tweet

Seasons Change Second Edition...Spring Week 6

For a whole year I will try to find the awesomeness 

included in all four seasons,

perhaps the weather or a nature shot...

maybe display the holidays in turn

who knows?

The sky is the limit.

I took this picture last week (same day as the deadly grass) I could not pass this opportunity to share the scenery with you.  After the rain everything looks so clean, so green, dirt free the sun ready to warm things up.

Don't you just love the morning after a rainy night?  I do.

Tweet

On Reading

Every week I make a trip to the Library to check out books for Xavi.  Sometimes I go by myself (for a faster trip) and others I take him with me. I am proud to say that he is reading pretty good.  He knows all of his 35 sight words (common words that he needs to memorize) and he knows all the letter sounds.  He still confuses b and d, I have to remind him the sounds at times but overall I am happy with his progress.

Unfortunately when Sophia was in Kindergarten I really did not do this with her.  Of course I read to her but not really as a daily habit.  She had this favorite book that I read to her over and over and over and to be honest sometimes I shortened it. Thankfully she likes reading and is at her appropriate reading grade level. 

When Xavi started school I promised myself that I would do my best to help him with his reading and to do better than I did with Sophia. 

He is constantly trying to read every word he sees and asks me how to spell things. I can see the reading bug or 'worm' is already in him.  At his Tae Kwon Do class he needs to read 20 books in order to get 2 star badges for his uniform.  There you go more incentives!

As you can see, this is tiresome for some little people.  A snack is needed green apple for him, red for me.  A break is also needed. Choosing books is good but the best part is the check out process.

Tweet