www.TheTinTiara.com is Live!

I am so excited to announce that my website is finally live! I have been working on it for the last several months in my "spare" time :o) All of my inventory is not there yet, but I am working on getting it all transfered over. The biggest advantage to having my own website is that I can offer my inventory, list the yardage available and let people choose what they want, and how much of each without having to wait for me to create a custom listing for them. It is a much faster process for both of us! Shipping also is less expensive this way! I hope you all pop on over to www.TheTinTiara.com and check it out! I will be adding inventory every week, I got two new shipments in this week!

New Product In!!

I am so excited that my new product has been arriving! I have gotten about 4 new shipments that I have not yet had a chance to list, but I took some time yesterday to get some of it photographed and I am going to start listing this week. A sneak peak at of of the new products I am so excited to start carrying, this fantastic new metallic velvet!!! Oooh la la it is sooooo luscious! I got it in several colors, this is the violet. I know this is going to go beautifully with the glass glitter, I get twitterpated just thinking about it! I also got in some new colors and sizes in velvets, a shipment from crafty secrets, a shipment from Prima, and some other assorted wonderful goodies. Being surrounded by all of the goodness has made me positively creative! I just made an adorable little gift bag from a paper lunch sack, and used some of the scalloped velvet from my shop and a new Prima flower. I will post a picture and instructions soon!

Again with that Swap-Bot!!!

I am just loving that swap bot!!! It has challenged me to think, and to make small things beautiful. It has challenged me to be creative at a time when my concentration is shot. But it has brought me so much more. It has brought me friendship, compassion, joy, and of course mail! My girls look forward to checking the mail to see if any of "mommy's friends" have sent us anything today. It has given us all something to look forward to. The sending is as much fun as the receiving. I put this package together for a partner who is a chef in NY. She loved it! The girls and I had so much fun chosing things to put in the package, and how to display them. H is going to to be my designer. She already wants to decorate everything! When she was about 4, she was carefully placing treasures in the middle of the table and I asked what she was doing, and she said "Mommy. I am making my centerpiece!" Mmmmmm wonder where she gets that from?

Swap-Bot........Have you heard of it?

About 8 months ago, I was noticing some odd requests from some of my customers. They would purchase something and I would get a request like " please enclose a note that says from your swap-bot partner xyz, or from your etsy favorites on swap-bot" I finally asked one of my customers what the heck this swap-bot thing was. She directed me to the site http://www.swap-bot.com/ and a new addiction was born. When I first joined I was amazed at all of the cool swaps you could join and I crazily jumped in with both feet. After getting a few swaps under my belt and figuring out what swaps really interested me, I started joining some groups. Groups are generally set up on a theme or common interest and group memebers can participate in swaps for that group. Two of my favorite groups are Cotton Candy and Glitter, which is a group of gals who love shabby chic, vintages style, and the other one is Somerset Style, and is a group who appreciate the style of the Somerset magazine family. I joined a swap in the Somerset Style group where we took one of the templates that Somerset posts, and make it for our partner. My partner liked vintage, crazy quilts and steam punk. I had some scraps from a fantastic old crazy quilt, and I decided to us the shoe template and make a pair of fabulous slippers that my partner would love. She did too! I made the shoes from cream cardstock, I stamped vintage script on the insoles and inked the edges. I covered the toes with vintage crazy quilt pieces, trimmed them with black baby pom pom trim, black seambinding ribbons and some "steam punk" embellishments. I wrapped some extra surprises with black tulle and tucked them into the toes so the edges poked out. This was a really fun challenge. I would have probably not attempted it on my own, but in the swap I got to try something new and have fun with it. In doing so I discovered something that I really like. I already have ideas of more "shoes" I want to make. I even joined a new shoe swap, this time with a Marie Antoinette them. I am having dreams of brocade, and lush velvet ribbons and fancy millinery flowers. I can't wait to get started!

CHA

I attended CHA for the first time this year! I had so much fun! With everything that has gone on over the last 6 months, it has been my salvation to have this business. It keeps my mind and my fingers busy. I flew down to San Diego, and Mimi picked me up. We headed up to LA the next morning and spent 2 days from morning to night covering all the territory we could. We saw all kinds of new products, and did some really run make and takes. I got to see the fabulous Tim Holtz in person. That guy was all over the show! He was at Ranger, Sizzix, his own booth, he had to be exhausted! My favorite make and take was from his booth, we made some fantastic necklaces from some of his new parts and pieces. I will post a pic of it in the next few days. I came away with some new vendors, some new products and a whole lot of new inspiration! I also got to meet some of my current vendors, with who I have only corresponded thru e-mail. It was funny, when I first named my etsy shop, ChristopherPines, it was after our property. Our last name is Christopher and we live in the pines. You cannot change your name with etsy, so I have kept it. I had 3 vendors who I already order from tell me they thought I was a man named Christopher Pines! I never even thought they would assume that! It was a fun experience. I was glad to get to spend it with Mimi. We have been so busy with kids, and life, we haven't had any real girl time in a long time. I teasingly dubbed her my designer. She could actually be a great designer with her eye. She has alot of talent. I got my very first package from my CHA orders in the mail today and I am excited to start adding all the new goodies to the shop. I had better get a move on, because more is on it's way!! Keep checking the shop for the new arrivals!

Long time no posting.....

Hello my friends. It has been a long time, too long. Life threw me a curve ball this year and I am just now figuring out to make my way. 6/22/09 my wonderful 38 year old husband suffered a heart attack, brought on by a misdiagnosed heart valve problem. At the time our girls were 2 and 5. The youngest has since graduated to 3 and the oldest will be 6 this month. My husband is still in the hospital, mostly unresponsive and it is unknown if he will ever be able to come home to us again. With the tremendous support of family and friends we have come this far and continue to both move forward and be stuck in a kind of limbo as we wait to see what will happen. I have found a path, not the one I started out on, but a path none the less. I have fought with doctors, bureaucracy, insurance, hospitals, workers comp and many of those battles continue. I have decided it is time to come back to myself and part of that is this blog. I will be posting regularly from now on. I will have projects, a big announcement, ideas from my customers and more. Thank you for your support. For those of you that are interested in this journey we have been on, you can read the full story at www.deputyericchristopher.blogspot.com . See you soon!