This blog has moved!!

Hi! I wanted to thank you for visiting my blog and share some exciting news! I’m pleased to announce that I have a new and improved blog!

Please visit my new blog at: www.goshery.typepad.com/goshery


One of the reasons I moved to a new blog platform is to offer my readers a better experience with more clickable links to quickly find what they are looking for and an improved comment function. I’ve heard from many of you that it’s difficult to leave comments and hopefully this change will improve that experience.

Thanks again for following my blog and please take a few minutes to view the new site!

Nancy
shop: http://www.goshery.etsy.com/

welcome!

I'm excited to announce that today I am the guest blogger on Lupin Handmade!  Lupin Handmade features wonderful items created from felt including flowers, bird brooches, felt flower hairbands / headbands, masks and disguises and other felt treats, plus felt squares and other colourful sewing supplies.

If you are visiting from Lupin Handmade . . . welcome to goshery!  I made these cupcakes just for you!

More exciting news:  I recently listed two new items in my Etsy shop; both listings are for paper flowers in two different color schemes.  I made the blue and yellow flowers and photographed them for my new blog banner and since they turned out so cute I made some more in maroon and yellow.  You can see them in my shop here and here.

The flower embellishments measure approximately 1.75" and would be an excellent addition to a scrapbook page or handmade card.  You may remember these flowers because the last time I made them I won the Handmade Accents Sweepstakes from Creating Keepsakes.  You can read about that here.

My new blog is coming together slow but sure.  I can't wait to share it with you!

documenting fall

photo taken by me at the MN Landscape Arboretum

Here in Minnesota we have had a beautiful fall season.   The only complaint might be that's it's been so hot, but no one really wants to say that out loud!  Following 8 straight days in the 80's (in October!) today is cool and rainy and I think our extended summer-like weather has come to an end.

Have you been enjoying the fall weather and fall colors where you live?  If so, I hope you are bringing your camera along and taking lots of pictures.  It's such a beautiful time of year and it's great to capture those memories.

Speaking of documenting fall, just a reminder that this mini album kit is available in my Etsy shop.

It is full of the colors of fall and would be a great way to document a trip to an apple orchard, visits to the pumpkin patch or even the fun costumes you see on Halloween, which is how I used the album.

This mini album kit and includes lots of stickers, die cuts, ribbon, etc. so you can print your photos and have this album ready to display super quick.  Love that.

working weekend

I've been spending the weekend working on a blog re-design just for you!  Actually for me too, because I'm kind of tired of the look of my blog!

I'm taking an online class from Elise Blaha, who is a gifted crafter and blogger.  I'm excited to be "working" with her and so far I have been very impressed with the class content, her teaching method (which includes text, photos, videos and handouts) and her quick response to questions.

The class involves some coding.  Ugh.  I've had very limited exposure to coding and report writing and they are certainly not "my thing".  I'm making progress though, and I've found that when I get stuck it helps to take a break and come back to it fresh.

This class has also pushed me to use my Photoshop software which I still find incredibly confusing.  I'm making progress there too; I have successfully edited photos and made several different blog banners all using the software this weekend.  YAY me!

I have another week of classes ahead of me and then I hope to have the new blog ready for you!  Watch for an announcement here!

paper

As much as I love paper, storing it can be a real a challenge.  You may remember that I bought this armoire to store craft supplies, including paper:

I love it, and it holds a lot of craft supplies, but it wasn't working that great for paper.  I had all of my paper in vertical paper holders and they just barely fit on the shelf in the armoire.  Because it was quite dark inside the armoire I always needed to take each paper holder out in order to see what I was looking for, which was a real pain.

Another problem in my craft area was in a corner of the room where I had stacked several plastic drawer units.  It looked messy and it was hard to get the drawers open because of the weight of multiple units stacked on top of one another.  Here's what it looked like:

In order to solve both of these problems I decided to buy 12" x 12" stackable paper trays, which would store my paper but keep it more visible.  I ordered 20 stackable trays but I knew that I would need something to set them on so that I could see the paper in the bottom tray without laying on the floor.

Luckily I found a table that was small enough to fit in the space but large enough to hold the trays.  I actually found two tables - and I have no idea what I'll do with the taller table but it was so cute I just had to have it.  Here's a look at both tables:

Cute, right?  I'm not crazy about the color of the taller table but once I decide where I'm going to use it I can give it a quick coat of paint and it will be awesome.  The shorter table is the one that I bought for my stackable paper trays.

I sorted my paper by color or theme and when the trays arrived I was excited to get that corner of my room looking better.  Here's a look at that corner now:

As you can see, the table fits perfectly and the trays are almost all full.  To be honest I have a lot of paper that's not in these trays - tablets of paper that I haven't taken apart.  I still might do that, but I kind of like having those tablets all in one piece because it's nice to have a whole tablet of coordinated paper for larger projects.  We'll see, I may end up taking them apart yet.  I was able to fit one of the plastic drawer units under the table and the other two fit nicely under my desk.

Freeing up a whole shelf in the armoire allowed me to fit some miscellaneous supplies inside rather than piled on the floor.  Now that I'm more organized I hope to actually get some crafting done!

it was good.

THE WEEKEND was good.

There was crafting.

There was yardwork.

There were walks and bike rides and naps and football and friends and egg salad and organization and laundry and sleep.

Yep, it was GOOD.

story telling.

Who doesn't love a good story?  I sure do!  I tend to creating stories in my head when I'm doing other things, like taking a walk, doing dishes, mowing lawn, riding a snowmobile, etc.  I don't even realize I'm doing it most of the time; I'll just be going along doing my thing and then realize that I just created a story.

I used to do a lot of snowmobiling through the Minnesota wilderness and I loved to pretend that I was on some great adventure, or in a race, or in a movie.  When our group would stop along the trail I would tell them the story I created, and then when we would start up again I would continue my story or maybe start a new one.

I was thinking about this last night as I went for a walk.  The end of my walk takes me through a beautiful park in my neighborhood, down a giant hill and then back up (the hard part).  I listen to music while I walk and there's a certain song I like to listen to as I go up the hill because it sets just the right pace to get me up the hill without having a near death experience.  Sometimes I need to pace around at the bottom of the hill waiting for the song to start (Elton John's Philadelphia Freedom).  The problem is that there's a creek at the bottom of the hill and I think it's creepy!  It's very overgrown and dark and I always worry that I'm going to see a dead body floating in the water.  I know!  Crazy, but that's the story in my head!  Here's what the area looks like:

Isn't it creepy?  It smells too.

Most of my stories are much more upbeat and Bruce Springsteen seems to be in a lot of them, but this one is clearly a bit dark.  And no, the dead body in my story is NOT The Boss.