Going Crafting Crazy

Man what did I get myself into? 

Since July my craft shack has been a storm of paper, glitter, ribbon and lord knows what in attempting to prepare for craft fairs. Here's some of the things I've been working on.

Preparing for the Holiday Season

In preparation for the holiday season craft fairs, I am attempting to  actually take a shot at selling stuff this year. Between the making of tags, bows, ornaments and cards I have ventured into some wreaths and table top decor as well.

Last night I attempted this Christmas tree.

I had a lot of fun creating this tree actually and it was some trial and error to actually getting it quite right. Here is what I did in a nutshell.

Supplies
-A paper cone from a craft store.
-Some kind of bling to glue to the top of the tree
-3 sheets of 12 x 12 paper (I used what I have) but this is where you can    experiment and even 2 sided decor paper would look fabulous!
-Some really good 2-sided adhesive, tape or glue. (Hot glue even works)
-Something to cut your strips with.

-a pen or pencil to curl the ends of the paper

Begin with cutting your paper. This was a bit experimental for me but I began by cutting 1x12 inch strips. You should get roughly 12 strips per sheet of paper. Then cut each strip to be 4 inches so you should then have 1x4 inch strips. You should eventually end up with 36 strips per sheet of paper.

Begin at the bottom of the cone and start adhering you paper around the cone. This part took me a few attempts it get it right. Just use your best judgement but be sure to leave enough room to curl the ends of your paper.

Once you have a full circle, start the next layer. I found that because I was using 1 sided decor paper that I wanted more space of the design side to show so I did not do the layers very tight. Just keep alternating your paper with each layer until you get to the top. At the top I had to pull out the ol glue gun to get the paper to adhere to the top of the code like I wanted. For this one I just used a pre-glittered styrafoam ball and hot glued it on top.

And that my friends was pretty much it. I plan on doing this with some pretty 2-sided paper and maybe all one design as well. Haven't decided exactly. 

Random Thoughts About Basic Time Management

The effort to manage good balance in ones life seems to be a never ending effort to maintain.

Sitting in my new favorite chair in my woman cave I reflect on my week so far and am puzzled as to how I am still going strong and have not passed out from utter exhaustion. This week has just been crazy at work and as usual I am busier than I expected to be once again. You would think that one would expect for the unexpected to be a daily occurrence to some degree however I never seem to allow for such within my schedule.

People are so complex but God made us that way for good reason I'm sure. For me, my different aspects of personality are always fighting to take priority in the way I operate. The planning and organized side seems to always come out at first but is only on top at the beginning. I plan out my work days and try to fit in some time to take care of personal business as well. However, as soon as I get that first phone call, text, instant message or urgent email, I fall into helpful mode and that personality trait takes over almost immediately.

Who doesn't want to be helpful right? Well I tend to struggle with the ability to say no when I need to. I can almost always see the other perspective and need and fall right into stopping what I am doing to help. While not always, this can be a bad thing. I cannot stand to see things fall through the cracks.

Next thing I know I spend the majority of my day doing that unexpected thing and get nothing done I should of have. But today I started thinking about why this happens so often. I make myself available in too many avenues. I answer the phone every time it ring instead of letting someone leave a message. I keep my instant messenger signed in and in 'available' status. I keep both my personal and work cell phones at my side at all times. But in addition, I have an alert to tell me when I get a new email and when it goes off I immediately go to see what has come in my inbox.

So addition to people being able to get ahold of me by coming to my desk, I have opened up 5 additional avenues for people to get ahold of me. I have also set the expectation to others that I will immediately respond to them. It's my own darn fault that I allowed this to happen and fallen into this trap lacking any discipline.

But the funny thing is I am not alone. Many people do the same thing and find themselves buried in work, unable to keep up and absolutely stressed out. I am writing this not so much for others but for myself and for different reasons. For one, I write about this to get my thoughts out and reflect on my current situation. But I also am writing about this as a means to have something to reflect back on if I allow myself to get this way in the future.

At this stage in my life I have finally realized that I cannot control how others think act or behave nor can I change them. The only person I can control or change is myself!

So to get things back to a manageable level, I have some work to do. One thing I have done already is realize I have an issue and have come to the understanding of the root causes.

I lack discipline and am easily distracted by others.

Next I need to evaluate how to get things back on track. So I mentioned earlier about having 6 different avenues for people to get hold of me. And of those 6, I let all of them take priority. So, when I have a full plate I need to close some of those avenues and learn to not let the ones I leave open take priority of what I already have to get done. And I need to be disciplined to do one thing at a time and not worry about all these distractions.

If I do these things I can focus on the task at hand, complete it and move on. As I sit here and write this all down it seems so simple actually. And really. If someone can't wait for me then they will figure out another way to get what they need anyway.

Finally some Accomplishment!

Subject of the day is; "Kirsty, just get r done already." 

So I woke up at the early hour of 5:50am like I normally do. Not because I necessarily want to but because our lovely feline companion, Tiddens seems to know the time better than the neighbors rooster. If she was not such  creature of habit (in a very literal sense) I would probably ignore my alarm clock several times and be late to just about everything. My normal reaction is to get up, follow her to the laundry room an proceed with the daily, fluffing of her dry cat food, replenish her soft food and water dish. 

However, while Tiddens may have a good sense of time, we have still not come to the understanding of the difference between a week day and the weekend. Its a work in progress. But today I just did not want to give into her prescient nature and was able to ignore for a little while. Eventually I gave in, performed our morning ritual but immediately returned to my nice cozy bed next to my husband. Wow, that word seems strange, husband. Probably because its a new word for me as we were just married 8 days ago. But with most things I will get used to the word eventually. 

Anyway, I fell back to sleep and next thing I know it's almost 11 and far into the day. I force myself to get up as I am still tired, get some wake up juice and attempt to be productive with what is left of my day. One thing I was determined to get done is the marriage announcements as I want to share our happy new relationship status with all my friends and family. We get dressed, gab a bite to eat then begin work on the computer. Having only 1/3 of the pics from our big day I sorted through the pics I had, cropped, straightened and formatted the color, resolution and exposure to my liking then got to shopping for online options to getting the cards made. I came across shutterfly.com and have to say I was impressed not only with the options available but the pricing was right on. I cannot wait to get the cards to see how they look! After placing my order I look up from the computer and realize the sun is almost done and I spent my daylight hours on sleeping and in front of a computer designing and ordering the marriage announcements. So much for getting any planting or weeding done today. Oh well there's always tomorrow.

Stationery card

Celebrate Us Sage Wedding Announcement

Invitations, announcements and greeting cards by Shutterfly.

View the entire collection of cards.