Ok, Moving on...

Let me catch you up one what you've missed these past few days, before the cranky pants showed up at my blog.  Erin arrived at the airport on Friday, late afternoon. I drove to Syracuse to pick her up, and it was great to see her walk through the airport. If only we lived closer, she's one of those people that you want to hang out with every second because she's positive, easy going and so rad!

We headed home and picked up Joe and then headed to our favorite Mexican restaurant for some grub. It was delicious! That night we did some last minute beading, and Erin created some earrings for our book that are going to knock your socks off. We talked shop, we talked shopping, we talked jewelry, and Christmas, and Family, we talked and beaded and enjoyed ourselves well into the night. 

Saturday morning, we enjoyed a great breakfast out, and then started getting everything set up for the Open house. The food is always my favorite part of this event- I made Chocolate Chip Zucchini bread, we had tomato pie, hummus, tabbouleh, pretzels, chips, french onion dip,  and Toffee crunch cookies (that unfortunately burned) The fire burned warmly in the fireplace. People started arriving about 2pm, and it was pretty steady for 2 hours.  Although I probably didn't sell as much as I did last year,  the sales equaled last years totals- all in all, a great success!

After that ended, Erin and I went out to Michael's so that she could pick up the beads for the Michael's challenge. (the reveal date is Dec 17th!)  Erin and I are so different in our shopping habits, Erin is a thinker. She plans things in her head as shops, where I get so distracted by the pretty that I just buy the first thing that catches my eye.  I ended up buying several boxes of Swarovski crystals in a myriad of colors, and some chain.

We headed next door to TJ Maxx, as I've been constantly thinking of better ways to store my jewelry. We were looking for jewelry stands but ended up finding the coolest fabric lined trays instead. I think these are wonderful. The compartments are big enough for even chunky necklaces and pieces don't get all tangled with each other, which is a goal lately! Of course we had to get one of each color!

That night we had a nice chat session with Nancy, since she got a new mac and we can now skype. That girl always makes me laugh, and it was cool to see Nancy and Erin talking face to face for the first time. Unfortunately the conversation was geared towards the cranky pants comments on the blog, and not more fun and interesting topics like beading and shopping. 

Got a great nights sleep that night, and Sunday we enjoyed an enormous brunch at the Radisson. Headed out to Syracuse, and stopped in at a local craft fair where Nancy was selling her wares. It was a packed show, they really had a wide range of different vendors. I snagged a couple of cute ceramic tumblers. 

From there we headed to the local Barnes & Noble to kill some time before Erin's flight. We had a chance to take a small video of the announcement of the Contributor winners. Now I just have to figure out how to get the video OFF the camera. I can see it's on there, but when I put the card in the computer, it doesn't show up. Reading the instructions would probably help but that's not how I roll. So if anyone has any suggestions,  please let me know!

It was sad to see Erin leave, and I am looking forward to our next visit to Amesbury this summer to see her, and Josh and the baby. But we are trying to plan a fun beady trip to NYC sometime in mid-January.  I hope it works out, I am dying to go back to Metalliferous again.

In other beady news, the contributor announcement will be happening very soon.  I am working on jewelry for our book first and foremost!,  a fun Secret Santa swap, the Michael's challenge, the Christmas party donation for the silent auction at work, and will be putting together posts for the 12 days of Christmas BOOK giveaways! Lots going on in the studio these days- I'm also planning on moving the studio downstairs to my office. A smaller space, but we are doing some rearranging upstairs to accommodate a new bed in the master bedroom. One that will allow more room for Miss Marley to stretch out her paws, and not lay on top of my legs every dang night.

Hope everyone is enjoying the comforts of home, the holiday hustle and bustle, and getting all their shopping done. Speaking of shopping, ours is currently on hold due to some fraud that ended up resulting in an empty bank account. :(  Hoping it all gets resolved soon!

Cheers!