Stella is just getting so big. It breaks my heart to see her growing so fast, but it's so much fun to see her develop. She's 10 months now - almost 11. And although she cannot say any words (though grandma swears she can), she understands so much.

Words Stella knows at 10 months:
Zebra
Light
Fan
Bottle
Bear (her Hop on Pop stuffed animal)
Fox (Fox in Socks)
Giraffe
Kitty
Bunny


Ok, so most of them are animals, but who's counting?

new.stuff.at stellajames.etsy.com

Guitar picks! Now available in blue, green, clear, black, red, and yellow. They are $5 for a set of three.

And guitar picks made into necklaces! They are $13 a piece and can be ordered on an 18-inch ball chain, as well as a black silk cord with barrel clasp or a wire choker.

Prunes, prunes the magical fruit

Stella has been eating Gerber fruits and veggies for a while now. Probably about three months. We started with the veggies and are now finishing up fruits, and, well, her last fruit to try was prunes. I'd been putting them off and putting them off, because, well, Stella still spews quite a bit and I wasn't looking forward to scrubbing "purple stuff" off her clothes. Today was Stella's first and last day of prunes, at least for now. I got a call at work this afternoon from my dad (grandpa and grandma are Stella's daycare), who said, "No more prunes." Little Stella had an accident...all over her grandpa, and grandpa's carpet and her pretty white onesie - and this time I'm not talking about the gunk that comes out of her mouth. Oops!

Last night Jen and I went on a date - dinner and a movie. We finally saw "Sex and the City," which we vowed to do before it left the theater. I must say...it's one thing to see a graphic sex scene on a television screen, and quite another to see it play out in front of you on a movie screen. Just a tad uncomfortable, but not as uncomfortable as it was for me to be PMSing. That movie definitely packs a rollercoaster of emotions, and there were at least a couple times I had to work pretty damn hard to hold back the tears so poor Jen didn't find out how sappy I really am.

Stella!

Vegas, baby...Vegas!

Only one more week until Vegas - or as Trisha said and Jen reiterated - 7 days...7 effin' days until the three of us are soaking up the sun in lovely (and sweltering) Vegas. I'm looking forward to it. It will be my first time away from Stella, and that will be infinitely hard. But it has to happen every once and a while to keep my sanity in tact. Love the child more than anything, but sometimes a mom just needs a break from all the diapers and wet wipes. For three nights and four days I will happily replace wet wipes and diapers with sun and beer.

Also...it's Craft Saturday time again. I've been working on some new items, including guitar picks made from vinyl. I'm also taking those guitar picks and making them into necklaces. Hopefully I'll have more inventory at Craft Saturday than last time.

wholesale

I sent out a package of my bracelets last week to Diane at Napa Farmhouse 1885. Diane is my hero. She's retired and lives in Napa Valley and is starting an online business that sells recycled, reused and renewed products. I'm very lucky she decided to include my record cuffs. Read her blog here.

another.blog

I am currently being featured in fellow Iowan and Etsian Plaidfuzz's blog . She makes beautiful cards and crocheted items - and like me, is also a mom. I've included a photo of one of my favorite items from her store right now. It says, "God couldn't be everywhere, so he made moms." I love this saying now that I'm a mom, but I'm pretty sure I would have rolled my eyes at my mom if she had said it to me when I was younger. Oh well.

another.happy.customer

I've got another happy customer.
In other news...I'm engaged! Brian asked me to marry him on Wednesday and of course I said yes. I'm already stressed out about a guest list and reception location and blah blah blah. Mark your calendars for sometime September of 09.

featured.in.blog

My record coasters were featured in this blog today. Many thanks go out to Moesewco.

sale.sale.sale

In honor of Record Store day on Saturday, I'm offering FREE shipping via USPS parcel post to anywhere in the continental United States. This deal will last through Saturday.

In other news, I bought the BEST lampshade on Etsy. It's made out of old slides of state "welcome signs." I bought it from here. And here's a photo of my lampshade:

Give.Me.More

I'm really bad about updating this thing. I'm going to attempt to be better, but that's not a promise.

I sold four items in 24 hours, and I was really excited. So far my best-selling item is my vinyl record coasters, which are pictured above. For some reason my shop has been getting a lot of traffic over the past week. I'm not complaining. Of course, any money I made went right back into the "business," as I call it, buying more supplies, so hopefully the attention doesn't wear off.

In other exciting news, my items are now available at ZZZ Records, and hopefully soon will be available at another shop in Kansas City that may or may not be named at a later date.

In the meantime, I'm off to work on my next line of items. If there is something you'd like to see, let me know!

April.Fools?

This has *got* to be an April Fool's joke. At least I hope it is.

take.me.away

I had a "how the hell did I get here" moment on Sunday night. It's not that I don't think about what my life has become, but sometimes I just have this moment of realization that my life has become something so foreign to me. And I don't mean in a bad way. I just never saw myself having the life I have now. Never - at least not at this age. On Sunday it hit me as I was wandering around the kitchen. I had Stella on my hip and Bickley in the other room watching cartoons. And I was attempting to juggle a wiggly baby not content perched on my hip while moving things in and out of the microwave for Bickley's dinner - all the while trying not to burn me or the baby. And I had it again later that night while I was laying on the couch trying to lull Stella to sleep (because she's having trouble doing it on her own) only to have a squeeling 6-year-old burst into the room laughing at something she'd seen on Cartoon Network and totally thwarting all of my efforts. I'm a mom to one and a stepmom to another and I had to step back and take a good, hard look at myself - and laugh. And then, of course, it was back to reality - and lulling Stella.

Rock me gently

Craft Saturday went well. It was a learning experience, just like Jen and I thought it would be. Hopefully we'll be able to do it again in June, though it sounds like they're revamping the application process.
I just got done rocking Stella to sleep. She used to be so good about putting herself to sleep, but lately it's been really hit or miss. Unfortunately Brian and I are not the "cry it out" type of parents. She makes one little noise and we're cribside putting her "plug" back in her mouth. Maybe someday we'll learn to back off, but right now we just don't feel like we're ready.
She's so much fun at this age, though. Her little personality is growing bigger everyday. She's learned to roll from her back to her stomach, so now she's a rolling machine. She'll only roll one way, though, so I keep having to "reset" her back to her original position every few minutes. She's also started to do an excercise that resembles ab crunches. When she's on her back she'll try real hard to lift up her head, like she's trying to sit up. It seems like it's only a matter of time now that she'll be more mobile. I'm both looking forward to and dreading that day.

Single mom syndrome

Brian has been out of town since Wednesday, so the lovely Stella and I have been on our own. It's been difficult. I can't even imagine how single moms must feel. I feel like I can't get anything done. My place has deteriorated into a mess of crafting materials, dirty clothes, dirty dishes, baby toys, etc. Between the poopy diapers, meltdowns, hunger pangs (and cries), and everything else, I feel like I've seriously neglected myself. I've missed meals, gone way too long without showers, let my leg hair grow way too long, lost sleep and forgoed any sense of "me" time. I'm exhausted and I can't wait for the boyfriend/dad to get home - which thankfully is tonight.

Here is one of my favorite photos of Miss Stella.

I'm hoping the stress will subside a little after Craft Saturday. I hope you're planning to come and visit me and Jen. There will be plenty of other talented people there selling their wares - god knows that if I make any money at all it will surely be spent buying other people's things. Like my Etsy store, the other vendors' stores seem to be bare, probably because of the craft show. Though I'm excited to participate, I can't wait for it to be here and over already, so I don't feel so rushed to create.

Craftacular

Come see me and Jen here on March 22:

Ain't motherhood grand?

A brand new blog for a brand new stage of my life. Looking back at my last online journal - which I abandoned some four years ago - my life was in such a state of flux. I was fresh out of college and already jaded while trying to figure out my path. I was loveless and love lost, and was sure I was going to spend the rest of my days alone and trying to live up to other people's expectations. Well, a lot has changed and I won't event attempt to try to catch you up on everything that's developed over the past four years (as if you care). In a nutshell, I've been in a committed (though sometimes turbulent) relationship for the past three years. And three months ago I gave birth to the new love of my life: Stella James. I can't remember what my life was like before her, and I would never try to.

Motherhood is the kind of pleasantry that you can't explain to someone who's not a parent. I used to watch my friends wipe their kids' noses - barehanded - and rub the snot on their jeans. And I used to think to myself that I could never be that kind of person. I was wrong. Motherhood breaks you in on all kinds of bodily fluids. Stella peed on my jeans last night while I was putting her in the bathtub - well, before I got her in the bathtub, when I was enjoying the laugh she lets out when I rub her neck with warm washcloth. We're talking about a full bladder, here. And instead of changing my jeans, I finished her bath, restored her diaper, dried and dressed her all before I relieved myself of my discomfort. (On the upside, we have a video perfect for "America's Funniest..." because Dad was capturing little Stella's funny laugh when I screamed, "SHE PEED ON ME!")

What I'm trying to say is that I will always put my daughter's needs before my own and that I love my daughter more than anything in this world "with the kind of love that makes you cry" (to borrow from Scott Baio's reality show) .

On a side note, I finally got my store up and running at Etsy. Visit www.stellajames.etsy.com and plan on coming to see me and my friend Jen at Craft Saturday (www.craftsaturday.com) on March 22.