“If you are working on something that you really care about, you don’t have to be pushed. The vision pulls you.” -Steve Jobs
Happy Sunday everyone! Hard to believe it is already September. Time has just flown by this year. I am really excited about Fall, because it is one of my favorite seasons. Pumpkins, Apple Pie, Cinnamon, Candles, and all that other delicious stuff. I love it. I had the entire house to myself this weekend while the family was busy with friends and football. I decided that since my schedule was so full over the next few weeks, I was going to get a little bit ahead of myself and decorate/clean the house for Fall. Once I finished I just sat in the living room with all my candles and read a book. So relaxing. I just loved it. No I needed it.
The last four weeks have been a bit of a nightmare for us. We woke up in the middle of the night to a very large puddle of water in our kitchen and living room. Very scary. After having to replace two refrigerators in July, this was not something I needed at the moment. The hard part was finding where all this water was coming from, and finding someone who was willing to do the work at a fair price. Hiring repairmen is not an easy task at all. I feel like I have to do hours of research before I hand them my money. Even though I did have a wonderful experience when we renovated our house five years ago. I will save that story for another day. After calling several plumbers, and leak detection companies, and paying them all to come out to the house, we discovered the leak was under our kitchen island and most likely in our concrete slab. Has anyone gone through something similar? Waking up to a puddle in your kitchen and living room is a horrible feeling. However, thinking that they may have to rip out our entire kitchen apart is terrifying.
We ended up completely shutting off the water in the entire house because we spent so many hours just trying to clean up the water. We had no other choice. We even had to turn off electricity in several parts of the house, because we did not feel safe. We filled every bathtub in the house with water just to flush the toilets and wash our hands. Our shop vac got a good workout. It was quite the ordeal, and I definitely have a new founded respect for water and how important it is in our life.
Oh and did I mention how much rain we have gotten in the last few weeks? A lot. Definitely more then we needed. This did not help matters. I was so worried about how much water had accumulated under the house, and whether or not we would have to deal with mold. I had such a hard time sleeping some nights.
After dealing with this mess for three weeks, we finally found an “old fashioned” plumber who was willing to open the concrete in front of our island and look for the leak under the cabinets. This helped us to at least keep the island in tact. If it did not work, we had nothing to lose. He wasted no time, as soon as he arrived at the house, he got right to work. He found the leak within minutes and fixed everything in a few hours. I cannot even begin to explain the relief I felt. I was actually excited to do laundry again. I just wanted……no needed…..everything to get back to normal. I hope I never have to go through something like this again, and my heart goes out to anyone facing a similar problem. BIG SIGH of relief.
I know I must sound like a drama queen, but sometimes I feel like life throws too many things at us. Maybe I am just getting older. I cannot wait to get online and let everyone know about our very nice new plumber. I want to do something special for him, since he was so quick to react to our problem. I should also mention that his price or quote was about 25% of what the other companies gave us. Isn’t that wonderful. Yes it is.
So now that I am not spending my morning’s mopping or drying towels, and school is back in full swing, I get to resume my schedule. The first priority was to get the machines back up and humming. I had several dresses that were delayed due to our Kitchen Puddle. Other than that, I thought I would share my week with you and the things that kept me busy or caught my eye. I hope you like this new blog idea. It is something I enjoy reading in the blogs I follow (which by the way, I mention a few of them below).
I hope everyone enjoys their 3-day weekend. It is nice to have an extra day to relax our minds and bodies. Stay safe and healthy.
1. Sleeves
More and more patterns are being released with sleeves, and if there is one question I get asked over and over again, it is about sleeves. So when one of our customers requested this dress with sleeves, I agreed to give it a go, and loved the look. This is definitely an option I will offer in the future. I also think it is important to mention that we have already sold through half of the Petit Fleur material, so if you want it, you may want to grab while it is still in stock.
2. Fall Fabrics
I have had an easier time organizing and planning for upcoming events. I usually spend Saturday or Sunday afternoons thinking about what to sew next, taking pictures, and posting to the blog, so here is what I put together for you. These are all new fabrics from Henry Glass, Riley Blake, and a few others.
3. Embroidery Designs
I have been working on my embroidery designs. After an incident last year as well as an oops this year, I have to be very careful to read the fine print on any design. Most embroidery artists do not want you to use their designs on dresses you sell. So I am in the process of trying to find a pumpkin that does not have copyright infringement laws attached. I will most likely use the ones I found on Peony Patterns and just add my own individual floral arrangement to their pumpkin. I know from a lawyer who I recently contacted as well as an executive from a major retailer that as long as your images do not have more than 30% of another image you will be fine. I have no intention of copying anyone, so I am in the process of creating my own design, and dismissing designs such as this. Don’t worry, I will have it done this weekend, and I promise you it will be pretty. Thank goodness my images are also protected by copyright laws.
Honestly, who can claim the rights on a pumpkin? It is just petty!
4. Recipes we love
I am such a huge fan of Half Baked Harvest. We tried her recipe recently called 30-Minute Pineapple Chicken with Coconut Rice. I cannot tell you how much we loved this recipe. YUM YUM YUM. The entire family gave it a thumbs up. Absolutely Delicious! Mouth-watering. All of her recipes are fantastic, and we love how she mixes up spices and makes her meals so interesting. Try her, and let me know what you think. I cook almost every night of the week, so finding new recipes is such a big deal to me. Any suggestions are greatly appreciated. Remember, they must be kid-friendly for a few more years. I intend to include Sheet Pan Sticky Ginger Sesame Chicken and Crispy Brussels Sprouts to next weeks meal plan.
5. Decorating for Fall
Walk into a store, or check out your Pinterest and Instagram feeds, and what do you see? FALL, FALL, FALL. How can you not be bitten by the FALL bug. Even though we are still in the 90’s here in Florida, and there is no sign of orange or yellow leaves on our trees, it just cannot be helped. In my case, I know that decorating now won’t stress me out next month when I release Christmas.
Here are just a few blogs I love to follow…….so be sure to sign up for their newsletter. It is such a treat to sit in bed and go through their beautiful pictures, and the links. They are full of inspiration for anything home decor, house interiors, garden, recipes…..
