pure joy

Posted on 2013/05/21 by daisyeyes

I can be a pretty serious person. I take things to close to heart and can become pretty defensive, pretty quickly. God brought a husband into my life that is crazy silly. And I’ve spent so many years not really appreciating that in him. I’ve spent too many years missing things because of this seriousness that leads to clenched hands trying to grasp control.

Last night I welcomed home my closest friend and her new little beauty from overseas. There is something about waiting for someone in an airport that you haven’t seen or talked to for weeks; added to the fact that you finally get to meet this little person that we’ve all been anxiously praying for for years and years. It was about as close to pure joy as you can get.

I’m reading Desperate: Hope for the Mom Who Needs to Breathe, by Sarah Mae and Sally Clarkson. It’s a super book so far, totally refreshing to read no matter what stage of parenting you are in, but it’s Sally Clarkson that reminds me that the seriousness in me is so smothering. It smothers the freedom and joy that I can have when I wake up every day anticipating life just as I kept looking through those glass doors last night for a glimpse of my friend.

Last night was a great reminder that despite what horribleness happens in the world (oh, how we are praying for Oklahoma) everyday is filled with anticipation. And we have a choice to take that anticipation with stoic seriousness or to open ourselves up to trust.

It’s a chance for us to shower our families, our callings, our anything with grace and joy. His grace and joy.

stepping out

Posted on 2013/05/18 by daisyeyes

Today was a lesson in stepping out, bravery, humility and ignoring the voices of doubt.
I’ve participated in group sales a few times previously, but this weekend was the first time I had participated in a large event. Like a bring your own tent, set it up and make it look nice and then watch people come in and look over your stuff.

For the past couple of weeks I’ve been furiously building up stock, figuring out what to sell and how much to price things. I’ve been figuring out things like sales tax and what to say to people when the ask about certain things and how to “sell” yourself. But nothing, nothing preps you for how to handle the barrage of people who might walk into your booth, glance at your stuff and then walk out.

Today was a lesson in being free and courageous. My personality loves etsy. I have time to respond to people’s requests. I will more than likely never have to see the person that I might have rolled my eyes at. And I don’t have to sell myself with my personality…I just have to do it with photos and the words I write.
So.much.safer.

So, today was successful in an emotional way (sadly not a monetary way). It forced me to see something through. To keep climbing this crazy trying to start a business learning curve that never stops. It forced me to step waaaay out of my comfort zone and to stop listening to the voices of doubt. Because my worth is not in how many people bought (or didn’t) stuff. Whether I’m “doing the right thing” with this path I’m on isn’t dictated by how many people walked into my booth.

I’m proud of what I’m doing. I’m convinced that I’m doing what our gracious God would have me do and I’m thankful. I’m thankful for opportunities to stretch myself, but also beyond thankful for the security of my home.

more looking back

Posted on 2013/05/08 by daisyeyes

Looking back through the archives again is so thrilling and fun. I remember all the things I was making when I started this little adventure into sewing and business making.

This post reminded me of how much I love these bibs and it has been forever since I made any of them. I remember there was one with a lion that was probably one of my favorite things ever I have stitched. Then these nursery rhyme themed t-shirts were fun too!

Then there was the time that I was mentioned on Sew Mama Sew’s blog for this awesome outfit by Children’s Corner. Funny, I don’t even remember this!

Here was my first try at writing a tutorial for a Leapster Bag that I designed. It had some major flaws (math is not my strong suit) but served both my children well for the years since.

One of my most popular posts has been our Easter Tomb tradition. I have to admit that as my children have grown older, we aren’t so effective at really taking the time and effort to do this. We did do it this year, but our sweet tomb was lacking in the key element of the Crosses. But it was still a great tradition and reminder of traditions that we have in our family.

And then I started the huge quilt project. I’m walking through the archives of the years 2008-09 and in 2009, I started to make a quilt for my daughter’s room. It’s still held together and I hope it’s something that she’ll take off to college with her.

And this is by far one of my most favorite things I’ve sewn ever.

That’s about all the looking back time I’ve got for today. I’m doing my first vendor experience at the local farmer’s market in less than 2 weeks so I have to get busy…like seriously nose to the grindstone busy.

years and years

Posted on 2013/04/02 by daisyeyes

I was laying in relaxation at the end of my yoga class today thinking about years.
Today I am thirty-eight years.
I laid there thinking of what a blessing those thirty-eight years are.
Those years are more than memories, more than days that I was allowed to wake up again.
They are an amazing passage of time full of such rich things.
Then I started thanking God for the almost sixteen years with my husband.
The almost ten years with my son and six with my daughter.
If I started thinking of friendships that I have…
there are so many people in my life that I have connections with that strand so many years back.
What an amazing blessing that the strand is still connected and going on.

I am easy to become overwhelmed with expectation which leads to frustration when those expectations aren’t met.
But today I am walking through with an intention to be at ease.
(can you tell I’ve been in yoga class;)
An intention to savor this day that numbers another year.
It numbers another year of grace.
Grace that I’ve been gifted with by the One who has graciously given me all these years.

what’s up…

Posted on 2013/02/18 by daisyeyes

Things are a little nutty around here. That’s the way life goes I guess.
The stomach bug reared it’s ugly head for at least a week last week and boy I’m so happy to see it gone.

We sold almost every table and chair we own this weekend in less than 24 hours. Standing in our empty kitchen we both wondered if we had done something irrational (don’t answer that!) and we are now eating on my grandmothers rickety antique table that has served as a table on and off for us for more years than it should. That said, our reward is a new matching table and chairs for our upcoming anniversary. Sixteen years is a long time to wait for a matching set!

I decided to do a little local blog advertising right about the same time I was offered an interim teaching position. Great planning. But I’m clinging to the promise that the Lord never gives us more than we can handle and I’m planning on keeping the shop up and running…just the felt cape kits are on a requested basis only.

Talking about the little bit of advertising love: head on over to frugalissa finds and read about the history of my little shop, some of my favorite items and enter in a give away for either an embroidered pendant or 5 DIY felt cape sets.

And say a prayer that our family makes it through the next few weeks with me working full time, plus etsy, plus more I’m sure that I don’t even want to think about.

But you know what? Irregardless of how crazy the next few weeks are, I’m crazy thankful for this opportunity and the reality of how well God takes care of me.

If you are visiting here from frugalissa finds…consider yourself welcomed!

frames

Posted on 2013/01/29 by daisyeyes

Frames. I long for my life to fit into these nice neat frames. But more often than not, my life is like this window. Half painted, covered in grime waiting to become what it should be.

I want my life to fit into these little squares. But more often than not my life overflows out of these little boxes. Not enough space to write all the things that I think need to be done or have to be done. And that is the issue. I have a choice each day to say “yes” and to say “no.” My “no’s” allow me to say “yes” to other things and my “yes’” open myself up to so much.

This is what my life should be framed by. My family. My husband and my children. That I would let my boxes and frames overflow with grace and love for them and for those that come into contact with our family. That I wouldn’t live life rushing through it thinking that it’s all over if I don’t cross off all those words in those little boxes.

These frames…they are a beautiful picture. A puzzle coming to life day by day. Piece by piece. Sometimes the piece doesn’t fit and I have to go searching for the next piece. But in the end, something amazing is going to come out.

Bit by bit.

2013 goals: post 1

Posted on 2013/01/03 by daisyeyes

I’ve got another 2013 goals oriented post up my sleeve in the coming week, but today I was hit with a couple of quotes that really summed up for me where I am at as I enter into this new year.

Last year was an amazing, eye opening kind of year for me. Etsy and embroidery in general had always been just a hobby for me. Sometimes I earned a little extra money sewing on the side for others, but for the most part it was just for fun. I always had a yearning to make more of it, but really didn’t believe I could.

Then came last February. I came up with the idea for the felt capes sets and things just blossomed from there. I’ve grown from a shop that just had a little bit of embroidery to one that sells all sorts of things “from embroidery to felt.” It was a steep learning curve and I feel like I’m still deeply in that curve as I walk into this year.

I’ve struggled some as I’ve had these past few weeks off with whether daisyeyes was something I really even wanted to continue. I’ve thought about giving up more than once on it and most of the time it’s because I was listening to those voices telling me that I’m never really going to make it, I’m just “playing” at having a business, it’s never going to amount to anything etc etc.

Then today I got on facebook (of all places!) and first read a quote from a girl in my town that has her own small handmade business. She was thanking everyone for the last 3 years and remarked on how she never knew she could paint. Then she started to paint and now considers it a gift. I feel the same way about embroidery. I struggle with what I’m making is even really art or really even creative. She reminded me that it’s not how I see it but how others see it. I’m doing what I do because others love it and want it. I’m doing what I do because I love to make something just right for someone. And I am an artist in my own way. I’m not this amazing photographer or graphic designer or painter. But what I can do, this gift I have been given, is just that: a gift that I long to share with others.

After I read that post I saw a quote that Simple Mom posted on facebook today and it really sums up where I am right now. It is a quote from Emily Freeman:

“Creativity actually births courage. It comes after, not before. If you wait until you feel ready, you could be stuck in your small story for a very long time. Dare to see the art in everything, take small risks with great faith. You may find the fear fade a bit, and courage just might rise up within you like two great walls of water on either side, high enough for you to get lost in a good way in the bigness of it all.”

And honestly I think that’s me.
I know that walking into this year I can make this happen.
Better yet, God is who is making this happen.
And it’s only with that knowledge can I walk headfirst into 2013 ready and waiting for the amazing things He is going to do this year with daisyeyes.

thoughts on creativity

Posted on 2012/09/18 by daisyeyes

Last Friday my bestest and I went to one of those painting classes where you sit in a room with 40 or so people and are led through painting a picture. I think this is the first time I’ve ever painted anything on a canvas. In the end it was liberating, but also stirred up a bunch of reflections on creativity.

My brother (who is a crazy talented photographer and video director) and I grew up in a rather “non-creative” house. Our parents, being from the generation they are from, are practical. While they never discouraged learning music, drawing or painting or playing with playdoh it was never a means to an end. It wasn’t practical. You could never make any money at it.
What I find humorous now is that we are both making money from very non-traditional means (he via photographer and me via sewing). But that wasn’t our first choice of careers in life. We both took a risk.

Now, as a parent with young children who are extremely dramatic, love music and the arts I wonder how to not stifle that creativity that is growing in them? They see me making a living with my sewing, they see their uncle making a living with his photography and they see their father providing for us by drawing designs for engineers. We are by default a fairly creative household.

Enter websites like Pinterest and I question whether this is an avenue for fostering creativity? My sweet friend KMac commented “That place {pinterest} is a competitive/self confidence shaking zone if you aren’t balanced and rock solid on who you are and what you love.” So there it is. Am I, are they, are we confident in who we are as artists? Because we are all artists. We are all creative in some way. I have to remind myself of this every time I sit down to sew on velcro for hours on end!

I listened to a TED talk yesterday by Sir Ken Robinson on how schools kill creativity. Now, mind you, we are public school people. While we’ve home schooled in the past and won’t rule it out in the future, for the time being that is where my kids are. But there was so much in his talk that just resonated with me and where I am right now. He reminds us that we are responsible for preparing the current generation for a very unpredictable future and when we separate creativity from “academics” we are in many ways harming our children. We live in the midst of a technological revolution that never would have come about without creative people taking a risk with their ideas. So how do we, how do I, balance that in my children? Fostering their academics at school and figuring out how that meshes with their creative lives? Because creativity is in everything.

And that is where I am at right now. Living in the midst of taking a risk with my heart and ideas. It was so funny this weekend when my kids saw the painting I had painted. The next thing I knew we were at the arts/crafts store spending birthday money buying a canvas and some paints. Sunday I found my painting flanked with theirs and questions as to where we would hang them all. And I guess that is where it starts. Reminding them always that school and home, learning and creativity are not separate things. They are in and of each other. Academics, learning, happens because people answered the call and risked. And it is in them.

finding a direction

Posted on 2012/09/17 by daisyeyes

One of the hardest things for me since I started blogging has been figuring out what to do with a blog. Why do I write it, do I have an audience at all…does that even matter?
Obviously as my etsy business has grown, this blog has morphed into showcasing some of the things I’ve been working on and honestly into cheap advertising.
Long ago I did split this blog and moved all my journalish, random writings off of this space and that seemed to help me find a little more focus. Now, I’m just wondering what to do with this space now and with my voice here and honestly the direction I need my etsy shop to go. I’m sitting at somewhat of a crossroads. As I seek to keep my business thriving and growing, while also trying to do all the legwork to start a new business that is really becoming more of a passion than etsy will ever be (more on that later).

I don’t want this space to primarily be a place showcasing etsy stuff. I do want to hold myself to continuing to sew for learning and for fun, not just for profit.
But I’m feeling a disconnect and in some ways I’m in a blogging funk. I feel like I’ve got five thousand projects to do and there are times when the pressure to complete a project so that it can be a great post becomes to great. Those are the times that I here a voice in my head saying: “step away from the blog or you will self-destruct.”
But that said, I do want some consistency here.
I love having a day to share stitching (thursday threads) and do want to continue to develop that into something.
I love having a day to combine a bunch of great ideas (fantastic fridays), but I’m at a loss for the rest of the week.

So here I am just rambling on and on and trying to figure out the whole blog world. And that said it will probably pretty much stay the way it is and the reality that I’m never going to be a “professional” blogger or find my blog pinned all over Pinterest remains.

And that’s a good thing.

Happy Monday!!