St Charles Show

My husband accompanied me to St Charles this past wekend to attend the wholesale needlework show. I had a booth for Moonflower Designs. I also intended to get a list of all the new designs released at the show to include in Stitchers Village news. How naive of me. I needed every minute to get around to all of the designers rooms and did not have it due to my obligation to be in my room. Note to self - just attend the show next time, don't exhibit!

Here's my idea for my art project (when I get around to that!). I want to do portraits of how I picture people to look. You know, people I have never actually seen, but have either dealt with on the phone or by email or whatever. There is a woman here in Topeka who I have heard of through the Mulvane Art Museum and met at a gathering recently. Her name and activities had developed a persona in my mind and when I met her, she was nothing like I imagined. This is the same for one of the designers at the TNNA show. Tracy from Ink Circles. I had a very nice visit with her one evening, but kept thinking that she doesn't look as I had imagined her. Then she told me that she is an Engineer and it completely threw off my mental picture of her. Oh, well, file that idea for later!!

I am trying to finish the October newsletter for The Stitchers Village. My problem is that I need to finalize the plan for the village stitch-along. Cheryl from Glendon Place is providing a free Halloween design and has agreed to host a Village chat Halloween weekend. I can't decide how to coordinate it. So, I had better get back to work!!

Watch Out!

I learned recently that it is best to watch where you are walking. I was walking back from getting the mail across the street and happened to look down at the sidewalk in front of the house. There was a snake and I almost stepped on it or it almost ran across my foot. Either way, I have been looking around when outside now. One near miss is enough to keep me more alert!

It is now under two weeks to go until the TNNA wholesale show in St Charles, MO. I will make a final list tonight of everything needed. I've been stitching and printing and planning and just trying to keep on track. I'm a little nervous, but that is to be expected since this will be my first TNNA show as an exhibitor.

Great Customer Service Day

The award for best customer service goes to ATT!!! My daughter wanted an Iphone. She went to the apple store rather than ATT and was given misinformation regarding the portability of her phone number. I called ATT this morning anticipating that I would spend the morning trying to straighten it all out and - SURPRISE - it is the first time I have ever spoken with 3 customer service representatives, each one anticipated the upcoming activity, had the information transferred to the next step's department representative, and fixed it with as little hassle as possible!! Great job! I am so happy that I have all my services bundled together with this excellent company!!! Yeah for me!!

I also received a random email from someone and it looks like it, also, is a good thing I followed up. www.positiveyarn.com/wp/ You just never know how a day will go!! Wake up and expect good things.

Fall Decor

If I see Christmas decorations being sold do I need to hurry and put my fall things out? I could not believe it when I saw the Christmas decorations aisles. I know I have "moments" when I get distracted and then have to pause and think about what I was doing, but that made me stop and check - what is the date? Oh, yeah, August 31st!! I haven't lost time and suddenly regained conciousness - it's only September!! Time flies quickly enough without feeling like I completely missed a season!

I do need to work on the procrastination. I mean, I have it perfected, I need to stop! My time perspective is out of whack! Wonder if there is a pill for that. . . Or a life coach!

I managed to get the September newsletter posted on the 1st! I was tickled to see that I did not have any contest entries before the email was completely sent. That has fascinated me the past two months. As soon as I hit send on the email, I start getting entries from the contest. So, I decided it was too easy and tried something a little more difficult. Not too difficult. I could have made it harder, but didn't want anyone to pass it up because they didn't have the time.

What was it? Code XS. I made a 5x5 grid symbol substitution for each letter of the alphabet. I made a band sampler style design using the letters from two words (very obvious words) by making each symbol repeat 7 times connected across a line and then spelling the words down in rows. I added a spacer line that is obviously the word break to make it really easy. I think it has potential! I hope the Stitchers' Village members enjoy it. Pictures above are b/w and stitched on swamp colored fabric from Picture This Plus using bush baby colored silk thread from Dinky Dyes.