Because the night belongs to lovers...

Because the night belongs to lovers...
Originally uploaded by SewcialButterfly.

84/365 #Project365

Moving...

I know it's been a while...it's been really busy. I've been working really hard at my day job and then working at nite on a new project. I am currently getting ready to re-launch SewcialButterfly.com. I have made the move over to WORDPRESS. I hope to host everything on one website. Please update your feeds or sign up for the new feed. I hope to have it 100% up and running in a couple of days. There are still a couple of bugs and a few unfinished pages but for the most part, the move is 95% complete. :) If anyone out there has suggestions, I am open to them. 

Thanks for not losing faith in me and this website. 

Yours truly,

Amy

New Business Cards

YAY! I finally received my business cards! Fabulous Stationary has the most wonderful designs. They sell these as personal calling cards. I couldnt resist ordering them as business cards.

I was using Moo cards as my business cards. They are conversation startes because of their unique size and I could use pictures of my own work on the back. HOWEVER, I've joined a few Young Professional groups and facilitate a Craft Sellers meetup group so I wanted a lil something on the more professional side for when I am networking.

You will notice there is no email address that usually is found on business cards.

1. I use many emails for Sewcial Butterfly, it is easier for me to have people visit the website and click the email button from the homepage.
2. This design only allowed for my name and one other line so I chose my phone number
3. Due to the length of the domain, no email address could fit. :(

Yes, my full phone number is on there, this scan was edited for privacy

I suggest you visit Fabulous Stationary and order something. Or just go there to see the FABULOUS designs. They have a wide variety to choose from and the customer service people are sooo nice.

If you need a coupon code, message me and I can get a $10 off code for you. That saved me shipping and handling on my order.

tags technorati : Fabulous Stationary, calling card, business card, retro, design, butterfly, Sewcial Butterfly

For my LOVE of fabric...

For my love of fabric, I spent 6 hours taking out all my fabric. Yes, ALL my fabric. It looked like a tornado had run through my studio. I arranged piles of fabric by color all throughout the small studio space. I cut swatches of them ALL. Cuttin out the swatches was tedious work and sitting on the floor, my leg kept falling asleep. Most of my fabric stash consists of fabrics I cannot bring myself to cut into. So cutting a swatch out of them forced me to get over that phobia and hopefully I can give myself permission to use them now in upcoming projects.

Then I refolded and restored my stash not only by color, I also arranged by my favorites. I put the ones that I love the MOST in the armoir I keep my supplies in. THEN arranged the swatches in a binder after ironing them all.

The swatch binder is filled with baseball card sleeves I bought from the local hobby store. Then I filled the sheets with my swatches by color (ROYGBIV kids...ROYGBIV!). I used a playing card as a template to cut out a swatch from each piece of fabric but the card was too slippery. So I decided to cut the template out of stiff craft felt. It was flexible enough but stayed in place because it was felt.

Now I have a catalog of all my fabrics. It is a great reference and good place to go for inspriation. Don't ask how many reds I have, they are so much alike but different enough to be justify so many...at least that is what I am telling myself to justify them all.

tags technorati : fabric, stash, organized, craft, 6 hours, swatches, samples, color, color coordinate, ROYGBIV, disaster area, mess

Who knew I'd fall in love with pincushions?

After Christmas I went antiquing. There is this one vendor who always has a sale going on and always has something that catches my eye. I visit this vendor every time I visit. I must have looked at these milk glass jars a million times but never thought they were anything special. They are old jars that face cream and lotion used to come in. I love milk glass and get excited at just the sight of it.

On my most recent trip, these milk glass jars called out to me. I had a vision of adding a velvet pincushion to them all. I wanted pink or light blue velvet but red was the best I could find. Over the past few nites I made them up and set them aside to dry.

I've been in a pin topper kick too. Found a whole bag of tiny doves for a DOLLAR! Rock On! SO I made up about a dozen or so of these dove pins and they look fabulous on these new pin cushions.

The only delimma is that they look unfinished. I've tried a few things to finish them up but none of those ideas look right. I'll spend another day or 2 at most to figure it out. Otherwise, they are going up on the shop as is.

Any ideas?

tags technorati : WIP, pin cushion, bird, red, velvet, jar, milk glass, pond's, vintage, crafty, Sewcial Butterfly, Blog, blogged, Valentine's

Memories of ME

Over the past several months I've been listening to a library of craft related podcasts on iTunes. A common theme I've found in them all is the questions that are asked. Often times an interviewer will ask questions such as, "Have you always been crafty?" or "Can you remember your 1st Craft?" Many interviewees respond the same way and tell stories of crafting with their mothers or grandmothers, some even their fathers.

As I listen to these interviews I start to think about my own past and my own craftiness. I interview myself in my head and imagine how I would answer these questions if I were invited to discuss my craft business and latest hit sensation craft project. (That day is many years away)

My answers take me back to Mayfield Oaks, the street where I grew up. they take me back to the days of Lisa Frank, Babysitters Club & everything purple unicorn. Warm memories of school art projects and summer rainy day projects with mom. So many memories, a good place for inspiration. At times it is a little overwhelming and feels like too many memories to manage.

I am turning to these memories to try to find myself . I want to start to journal these memories, "Memories of Me" and everything that defines the crafty adult I am becoming. I am dedicated to making my little business grow and so I am doing a little soul searching. I am trying to appreciate my past and understand how it helped me become me so that I may better prepare for my future and become the me I want to be.

At times I feel a little intimidated, like today. I was listening to a back issue of the Craft Sanity podcast (I don't remember exactly who was being interviewed) and one of the pearls of wisdom bestowed upon us was the advise to find your own style, don't be all over the place. I found this quite discouraging. For a split second my dream seemed to fizzle, like a bubble popping after hitting the grass. Poof.

It's hard finding an identity in the modern craft revival. (I get choked up thinking about this) I want to try it ALL and find myself like a hummingbird fluttering from flower to flower trying to sample the nectar that each flower has to offer. I too want to sample the gems of the craft world: plushies, pincushions, embroidery, aprons, scrapbooking, general sewing, knitting, crocheting, to name a few. I had to remind myself of this and it is ok to try it all. For a second I had to tell myself I was not the timid and unsure person that one statement made me feel like.

I am strong. I was born to craft. This is who I am and not just what I do. Not just the crafting, the creating. I want to do it all and it's ok to be all over the place. Yes, I have a hard time finishing some projects before starting a new one but when I put my mind to it, I can. I have passion and heart and imagination and that is more important than finding a specific style this early in the game.

Patience. that is what my friend told me. He has a gift for reading people and he can tell how badly I want to grow this business. he told me to be patient. I've grown a little anxious that things have'nt been moving quite as quickly as I want or had dreamed. Getting published right of way fanned the flame of desire and I lost track of the overall goal.

Have fun, I tell myself. The rest will follow. I will use my own creativity to measure my progress and success. God does not hand out cookie cutter lives or destiny. I will experience the joys that life brings at the correct time. Like a little girl who wants to grow up too fast, I want to grow faster than is destined. Take your time Amy.

The ONLY down side to listening to some of these craft podcasts is that I start to feel like an outsider at times. Some of the veteran/professional crafters start paint the craft world as as an exclusive club and have project for the "cool girls/kids". I experienced a flashback to elementary, wanting to do what all the other girls are doing but being too young to join them.

That was until today. I was listening to the Craft Sanity (my new addiction) podcast archive. Jennifer was interviewing Greg Der Ananian, founder of Bazaar Bizarre. He made a statement about not being all the same as long as you are a nice person. That's all I am and never claim to be anything more than a crafty nice person. Thanks Greg for giving back my confidence in a simple statement.

(Sorry for such a long post, it was all weighing on my mind all day and couldn't go to bed until I had blogged it, Thank you for making it all the way down here)

Meeting of the Sewcial Butterflies and much much more

Meetup.com, oh how did I live without you before? last month I went on the hunt for a new craft group and resorted to good ole Craigslist. I posted a posting in th group section of interest for a 'Make' craft group. I received an email from Wendy inviting me to a scrapbooking meet.

I am not much of a scrapbooker but my sister has an interest more than I. I invited my sister to go with me and she was all for it. They meet the 1st Friday of the month. Convenient enough. Suzy and I got our scrapbooks and supplies and headed to the meet. We eventually made it after getting lost. We showed up end everyone was sooooo nice! We were welcomed into the group and found a group of people with similar interests.

The host, DJ, sells stampin up and Suzy bought a pretty cool punch. We signed up for the February meet and cannot wait to see what we make next. The group is organized on Meetup.com and we signed up.

I went exploring on the site and found several groups to join but no Crafty groups. Plenty of knitting groups. I never realized how many knitters there are out there. I found a list of people interested in a Craft Sellers group but no group established. So I started one.

About a year ago I tried to start a craft group on Yahoo Goups. I had a few people sign up but nothing really materialized from that. I invited everyone on the interested list and very quickly, people started signing up! I was stoked how quickly people found an interest in the group.

I quickly set up a meet and greet to get to know all these wonderful people. Three in all. The first meet was this past Friday. It was a total of 6, all with a coffee in hand and a desire to grow our businesses. I really enjoyed the company of these members and look forward to meeting the rest of the group as we continue to 'Meetup'.

Stephanie makes the cutest monsters and has these bright business cards with a picture of one of the cutest on them. Her site is www.CurlyQCuties.com where you can find the latest cuties she's whipped up. She is very talented and I hope to learn from her how to work with fleece.

Marie makes Celtic themed products but has an appeal to a broad range of people. She makes candles and has these Dream pillows that even the most congested person can smell...he he he that person was me. Who doesn't love candles, right? Be sure to visit her site www.AmitysCandles.com for a view of her product line and her talent for blending herbs and essential oils.

I met Tracy at the scrapbook meetup. We hit it off at the Xmas page table. She is an RN, a mom and a crafty designer. She is an Indy crafter who embraces the Recycle lifestyle in her designs. check her etsy shop, RecycleWear.etsy.com, often as she is always creating something interesting.

Jessica joined us as a guest and I am glad she did. She is a graphic designer and owns JBMSDesign.com. She is new the the craft world an is interested in something that she can learn and make some money doing, all while having fun. We have some common Mac interests and I look forward to working with her. I hope she decides to join our Meetup group. ;) hint hint hint Jessica. (*update: Silly me...she joined 1/19, oops, sorry Jessica)

Last but never least is Tonniele. She is a transplant from New York. She makes the most fabulous beaded bracelets inspired by a bracelet her friend brought from Africa. This girl is a gem. She is smart and crafty. She is comfortable in both the worlds of science and art, a balancing act that is not too easy. I don't have her shop info but will be sure to post it as soon as I get it. *update: oh how could I forget the beautiful candles Tonniele makes. She makes wedding candles out of wedding invitiations. Be sure to visit her website, http://candlesforkeeps.com, if you or someone you love is getting married and would like a beautiful keepsake.

We shared a lot of ideas and had a very productive meet and greet. Every month the Sewcial Butterflies will meetup and socialize, craft and help each other with business. Also, fun activities will be planned once a month to feed the crafty side of us all, classes in mosaics, sewing, knitting, beading, a pottery painting party, Crafting at Rio Ritas. We are still in the planning phase. I have another meet and greet on Saturday and hope it does just as well. :)

Books we are reading:

Craft Inc: Turn Your Creative Hobby into a Business
By: Meg Mateo Ilasco

Wait for dial tone

Every Princess needs a Princess phone.

I've always wanted a princess phone. I love the reproduction phones from Crosley and have a vintage repro phone in the kitchen and my bedroom. I thrifted an aqua rotary phone for my studio, loved the look and nostalgia of a rotary phone, but the mouth piece mic does not work. I was heart broken when I fount that out..

For Xmas, my sister surprised me with a Crosley repro pink Princess phone. I am in love with it and just had the chance to take it out of the box tonight. I am stoked and cannot wait to use it. My sissie loves me.

(loving the new light box Santa gave me. Still trying to learn the manual settings on my camera)

Flattered but still no permission

I decided to google "Sewcial Butterfly" to see where in cyberspace my site shows up. One of the links I clicked on I found this. That is my logo and my banner that Jolleen made for me. I am very much flattered that this person found an interest in my & Jolleen's work but she never came to me to ask permission to use it for her banner.

Am I over reacting? Should I be upset?

*update 01/06/20008

V-I-C-T-O-R-Y!

I just checked and as of right now she has removed the banner. YAY! Thanks everyone!

Updates

The countdown to the new year has started and I am preparing to have a great nite at my sisters. This is my last post of 2007 and want to thank everyone for visiting and for making my 2007 a creative and successful year.

What started as a flickr account to share my craft projects has blossomed into a craft website, Etsy shop, tons of crafty friends and being published. I have a ton of ideas for 2008 and plan to make a trip to a major craft fair.

To help raise funds for my crafty trip, I will need to beef up shop updates. I have 2 updates coming up in the next couple of weeks. I just updated the shop last nite with the following:

Sew on the Go sewing kits

As featured in the Lark Publication "Pretty Little Pincushions", Sew on the Go sewing kits.

These traveling kits can go where you go and serve you on the fly with a tube the perfect size for buttons, needles, thread, and a custom-made, pop-out pincushion.

Novelty Straight Pin Toppers

I enjoy antiquin with my mom. yeserday I thrifted 4 pair of vintage plastic Barbie shoes & 1/2 a dozen mini plastic grenades at my local antique center. I couldn't resist turning them into novelty straight pin toppers. It was a ton of fun. I found a new passion.

When I spotted the package of shoes I knew I had to buy them. It wasn't until I spotted the grenades that I knew what I was going to do with them. Look for more novelty straight pin toppers in 2008.

That is it for the last 2007 updates. Look for a website redesign in the next month or so as well. Be sure to go out and buy Pretty Little Pincushions for your craft library.


Happy New Year's my dear friends. See you again in 2208!

Invitation to all to help me celebrate our friendship

Invitation to all to help me celebrate our friendship
Originally uploaded by SewcialButterfly.

I have decided to order a custom calendar from iPhoto services. My friend ordered one for our calendar exchange here at work and it is of super high quality.

So i decided, I too will order one. It won't make it in time for Xmas but hope I can make it for the begining of the new year.

BUT, I don't want just ANY calendar! I want to celebrate my onile friendships. A little something to keep me motivated throughout the year.

So this is a call to all my craftiverse friends: if you would like to join in the fun, send me a batch of pics to include in my calendar. Specify any special dates like birthday's, craft company important dates like shows or anniversaries. Simply email the highest resolution you have of the pics you would like to include to amy@sewcialbutterfly.com. Please indlude in your email that you give me permission to use your pic if it has been published on flicker with rights reserved. :) I am not limited to just 12 pics, i have 365 days and up to 7 pics for the month page + the cover page for a grand total of up to 450 pictures. :)

I will order 2 calendars and after I get them, i will hold a raffle of all participants and draw a name to receive one of these lucky calendars. :)

If you have any suggestions or ideas, please either email me or leave a comment.

Love you all.
Amy

Celebration & Motivation

Celebration
Originally uploaded by SewcialButterfly.

How extatic am I? We finally received our mailbox key yesterday. Amazing how much junk mail accumulates! But in that sea of to-be-recycled paper was a pleasant surprise. My blood, sweat & tears materialized...Pretty Little Pincushions. :)

This is all so surreal. I've slept on it and it still does not feel real yet.

More to come as it all sinks in.

Creativity Comeback

My deepest apologies for being M.I.A. for such a long while. It's been about a 6 month hiatus. I originally took time off to recover from surgery and it lead into taking more time off because my daytime job was wearing me out. Then it lead into me moving. I am now settled into the new house and I am working on setting up my new work studio.

My studio. Pure inspiration. I am so excited. The inspirations are coming back. I am working on several projects to get my site back up and running. Please forgive me if from time to time my blog is on the fritz. I am fighting with my site host to fix a ton of things as I update my site. I'm trying to move my blog from blogger to my site. :( NIGHTMARE!!!

I APOLOGIZE TO THOSE WHO VISITED MY SITE WHILE IT WAS IN HACKED STATUS. For those who did not experience this, my site was hacked and was auto directing people to PORN! Being on hiatus I don't know how long it was in this state. Slowly but surely things are getting back to normal.

I hope to have more updates real soon now that I have my studio set up and internet installed. Miss you all tons!

Wish me luck!

tags technorati : Sewcial Butterfly SewcialButterfly blog craft hiatus comeback hack blog

Site under construction

Sewcial Butterfly is currently under contruction. I started playing with site design this weekend. As a result, the graphics on my blog went M.I.A. as a result of deleting a folder off my server. DOH!

I updated my main page last nite. It was the spring color scheme. I decided I wanted something different for summer.

So I was playing around with some new photoshop brushes and came up with a new site design. Over the next week, all my pages (including my SB Myspace which missed the last update) will be transfered over to the new color scheme.

Wish me luck!

Case of the missing buttons

My blog is under construction. Navigation buttons to return this evening.

Custom mobile for The Gurule's

About a month ago I took in to work a mobile I made for my nephew and sister. My friend JG fell in love with it and comissioned one for his wife to celebrate their 1st wedding anniversary.

He and I sketched out the mobile and I got to work. It is almost to a T the mobile we sketched out. I spent several weeks putting it together. I came across an obstacle or 2. The cats I originally wanted wouldn't work with the overall look and the french toast I tried to make just didn't look like...well, toast. I found creative solutions to move past those obstacles and this is the finished product. I am quite pleased.

The Superman/girl logo turned out 10 times better than I had imagined. :D I wish I had taken better pics of this thing. But all in all I am very proud.

I had breakfast with JG & Nicole this morning and delivered the mobile to them. It was an instant hit. We enjoyed breakfast and made plans to make a habit of getting together to enjoy good eats and good conversation.

JG handed me a check for payment of the gift...and it was $20- more than what we agreed. It was a pleasant surprise and quite flattering. I spent about a total of 8 hrs on the project and the Gurules said my time and creativity are worth it. :D

They want to place an order for a baby mobile for a friend's baby when they return from their 2nd honeymoon.

After breakfast I went thrifting and came up with a couple of finds. More on those later. All in all, the day so far has been a wonderful Sunday!

The Sad Little Shop

I sold the last pin cusion in my shop today. It will find a home with a nice customer in Canada. Her name is Maria. So I guess I better get on the ball and start sewing to fill 'er up again. :tear: My 1st wave of items sold out. Yay! I can do it.

I'm off to do some crafting. Wish me luck!

Square One

Creations Originally uploaded by SewcialButterfly

I designed and created a fun book cover for my new journal. I joined Weight Watchers again and need to make it fun or I will get bored. The journal is not hardcover and will not last the full 3 months with everyday use. So in order for it to last the 3 months I decided to make a little cover for it.

The old version of the journal used to fit in my day runner. They changed the journal to be a little more modern looking. I guess they want to target a younger demographic. But it is square now. Boooo. My day runner isn't square so I had to come up with a new cover for it. It is a 3 month journal and it won't last past 1 because I carry everything in my purse. I don't want it to fall apart. So I designed a cover for the journal.I like how it turned out. :D

I bought a point calculator. I soooo wanted one of these the 1st time around but they were only available overseas. So yay! I have one but hate the WW logo on everything. So being the crafty diva that I am decided to glue buttons on the calculator which makes it look more like a compact.

I know this is only 1/2 crafty. But I am back at square one and wanted to share with everyone my new journey. :D

Wish me luck!

Ta-Da! Originally uploaded by SewcialButterfly

tags technorati : www.WeightWatchers.com Weight Watchers new beginning SewcialButterfly craft journal calculator

Great Minds Swap Alike

I received my last swap for Jan/Feb. It was a newbie swap for stationary, note cards, post cards, etc. We had a list to choose from and we choose 3 to send. I received my packages this week. I was so happy to open them.

I opened the package Mandy sent from Canada. She sent THE cutest note cards. they look like little windows with green shutters and you can see a little note hanging in the window. Too cute. I fell in love with the crane note pad she included. I couldn't wait to open the next package that Danni sent me.

I opened it and
it was all wrapped up in a cute polka dot tissue paper. I love love love the note cards, vellum stickers and post it notes with dainty lil hearts on em...and to my surprise, a SECOND crane note pad.

What are the odds? Two totally different parts of the world. Two totally different people. :D Thanks ladies. Ya'll rock!

I signed up for 2 swaps for March. One is a top itunes CD swap (easy breezey) and a mobile swap. The mobile swap is going to be a challenge. I have it planned in my head. I need to get on the ball and plan it on paper and get started with making it. Too much fun!

I'm off to do some planning.

Wish me luck!

tags technorati : SewcialButterfly swap swap-bot.com stationary fun crafty crane note cards stickers postcards

Pincushion Swap

Cupcake Originally uploaded by SewcialButterfly

I received my pincushion yesterday from the pincushion swap on Swap-Bot. It arrived in a ver large box, too big for a pincushion. I opened it and in it were 2 cute boxes almost the size of a square tissue box. they both had an adorable knitted cupcake pincushion, ribbon, scissors and a seam ripper. One was purple and the other red. i was confused. "Were we supposed to send 2 to out partner?" I started to feel a lil guilty for only sending one.

I read the enclosed note that said the extra one was for my sister, Suzy. OMG! How freakin' nice is that? I don't even emember bloggin about her. Gigi must have read my blog top to bottom or something. I was sure to leave Gigi an excellent rating.

Thank you Gigi! I love it.

*picture above is only of the one I kept. Suzy kept the red one. I didn't get a chance to take a pic of it. Sorry.