Luna's Baublebilities

What a year.


Here's where I was in January. 

We've come a long way since then.  We are in our new house.  My new studio is functional when it is clean - though a bit chilly this time of year.  The rest of the house is coming together and every project we finish in the rest of the house frees up time & space in my studio.  (You can read more about our project on the house over at The Beorningstead.)   I've developed some new product lines and I'm slowly learning how to manage my studio time better.


I still haven't gotten to finishing those tee shirts yet but I keep playing with screen printing design possibilities and I'm feeling almost brave enough to actually get one started.


Maxx is doing much better. Fewer fits, more friends at school, generally healthier.  He is learning how to read - though it is a real struggle, especially compared with Molly who was reading almost straight out of the womb.  His math skills are excellent.  He is happier at Church and more likely to interact in lessons and pay attention and process information well.  As much as I worry about some of the pitfalls of public education, I know that Maxx is really benefiting from the environment and services he enjoys in his classroom.  His teacher this year is incredible!

Molly is doing well at school.  She is admittedly bored and frustrated with the History/Social Studies and Literature classes.  She loves many of her teachers, is doing surprisingly well in Math and thrives in Music class.  You should hear her incredible voice.  Her range has expanded and she is quite a chamelion - she can sing in a very mature, sophisticated, operatic style or she can jazz it down quite a bit.  She had callbacks for the musical last night - we'll find out this afternoon what part she gets.

Bry has a job he likes - though it is over an hour away from home.  We're struggling with how long he is gone every day.  Luckily, his supervisor is very understanding and has encouraged him to take his time and be wise about traveling on the bad roads this winter.  His assistant lives 5 minutes from the school so if the roads are awful or impassible out our way, he can take some extra time getting in.  He has reached a level of frustration with the house because he has so few hours to work each day.  We're really looking forward to some holiday time to work on the house and relax this week.

I am healthy-ish.  What a pleasant surprise that has been.  Last fall, I was beginning to think that I would rather just die and get it over with than continue to suffer with so many viral illnesses and subsequent sinus (or ear) infections over and over again.  Why am I healthy all of a sudden?  I think there are several factors:  Maxx's immunity is a bit stronger than it was so he's sick less often and not mixing up as many mutations for me.  Using Progest has had a profound effect on my entire body.  I am entirely convinced that my endocrine system was completely off kilter and estrogen dominant for most of my life (WHY couldn't doctors have figured that out 20 years ago???) and the Progest has given me a balance that I've been needing for decades.  Everything is better.  Except maybe my weight - that is proving to be a bit difficult but I have established an equilibrium in the last couple of months and hopefully that means I'll be able to start bringing it down instead of watching it continue to creep up. 

I have left Etsy.  I cannot begin to tell you what a tremendous relief that is.  My cash flow has taken a painful hit but I'm no longer playing the re-newing game and spending dozens of dollars each week just to keep my items in a search.  Want to read more about Etsy Fail?  Look here.  I'm not going to talk about it anymore. 

Now I'm examining my business plan again - or still.  There are several issues that I need to resolve in the coming weeks and I'm looking forward to taking a few days this holiday to contemplate my business goals and personal goals and how I will get them to mesh comfortably this year.  Mostly, I want to be a healthier, less-stressed mom and create more.  I really want to get back to writing and Complex Cloth.  Most of my dyeing in the past several years have been targeted for mainstream sales - which is great.  We all love having those glorious silks floating around on rinse days.  I also want to experiment with some more in-depth surface design techniques.  Hopefully I can make time and space for that in my life next year.

















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