Giveaway!!!

Very excited to announce that our two shops, The Crafter's Cove & The Pint Size Cove, are being featured today until tomorrow night at 11:59pm! Make sure you go there and check it out because we are giving away a free tote bag!! Go to the link to find out all of the details and be sure to follow her blog too!!!

http://alittlelilac.blogspot.com/

Here is the bag you could win!!

What....it's October!?!

Time just seems to be flying by. I can't believe Halloween is just around the corner and I hate to say that snow is just behind that. Not sure that I'm ready to see white again just yet. Fall isn't nearly long enough! I will say thought that Christmas music does wonders for our sewing. We had it playing in mom's sewing room the other day and we actually got some things done.

My life is finally starting to fall back into place. My sewing room has become my friend once again. It was definetly my enemy for the first month or so after my son was born but we have recently found each other again. My son is getting used to the noise of the sewing machine and I actually think that it puts him to sleep.....some days. Others I think he knows I really am in the mood to sew and I swear, the second my foot hits the presser foot, he cries! That is where my daughter comes in. She is in love with her little brother. If he cries she is right there to sing him Twinkle Twinkle Little Star and give him his pacifier. She looks forward to playing in the sewing room now and if I let her watch a movie it's even easier to convince her to go down there so mommy can sew :)

Mom's life is getting a bit easier during the day as well. Her two big girls are now in half day kindergarten four days a week so when they are gone and the two little ones are napping she can sneak into her her sewing room and work to!! We have been tag teaming some of our things where I will start the project and she will, for example, hand sew all of them shut. That is something she can do while sitting down and watching the kids without having to go into the other room. Lucky for me because that is one thing I hate doing so we make a good team!!

This craft show is really starting to sneak up on us!! We have just over a month to get our rears in gear and have all of our projects done. Luckily, we have started revamping our shops and some of the things we decided to not sell on there anymore will go to the craft show. We are trying to focus our shops on similar items and giving them more of a theme than having a few "mutt" shops as I like to call them. It's a slow process of narrowing down our product but in the end I think it will be great.

Hope you are all enjoying this beautiful fall season and we will chat again soon.

~Shannon

New Arrivals

So I know it's been a while since we wrote on our blog, we have been busy doing crafts for a show in November, making wool pumpkins for the website, and Shannon finally delivering her new baby boy! Today Joey is already two weeks old and she has no desire to craft at the moment which leaves me to create for the time being. I will be trying to get a number of things done as she gets a schedule down with the baby. His big sister is adjusting as well so everyone has been a little out of sorts lately. We will try and post the pumpkins in the next week or so onto the website for purchase. I am camera stupid and don't know how to put pictures on yet. My camera doesn't even have a memory stick....It's a dinosaur!!! Will have to invest in a new one soon. My husband has the good camera! It's amazing how time flies and fall will be just around the corner. We have had numerous tornado warnings in the last week and have facebooked from the basement shelter.....we are a little tired of it and the heat has been unbearable and heat and menopause just don't mix so I haven't even taken the daycare kids outside. Next week it will be cooler and more sane in my household if they can go out and play during the day. I try and craft when they sleep and now the two 5 year olds will be going to kindergarten in September. It will be nice for them. And I can still craft with the smaller kids. We didn't get as many projects done this summer as we were hoping, but maybe once Shannon's schedule with the baby gets settled and I get kids off to school we will have better luck.....We need a few SNOW days to be cooped up!!!!!! We craft well on those kind of days. I did turn the air colder in the house and played Christmas music to get into the mood of winter crafts and it did work for awhile but everyone thought I was crazy....I guess I am but that's another blog....have a great weekend and we'll talk soon.

Rene and Shannon

Lovely Minnesota Weather.....

So Mom and I thought we would spend a nice Saturday night crafting at her house since we have been creating a lot of new things and we wanted to get some of the new things on to our stores and we had a slight change of plans......Tornado Warning! We are now sitting under the stairs with my dad, my daughter, my niece & nephew and our 3 dogs. Not quite the way we wanted to spend our evening but it's almost over so hopefully we can come out soon.

We will update with another blog with our new items soon if we aren't in the land of Oz visiting Dorothy :)

Shannon & Rene

Christmas in July

Even though the temps outside are in the 80's & 90's we are setting our minds for the 20's & 30's. Our sewing room looks like the holidays exploded in here but we must prepare early for the holiday season. To help with inspiration there has even been a note or two of Christmas music played. We are at the moment working on Halloween Fabric Coaster sets and have already sold one to my sister without even finishing them!! We have several sets available in our shop but we are playing with mixed sets for the holidays which are turning out super cute!!

Another new item that we have available now in our shop is crocheted double layered potholders in a set of two. One solid and a coordinating multi-colored one. The coaster sets and potholder sets are a perfect gift for a housewarming party, hostess gift and don't forget your coworkers and teachers!!

Here are just a few samples of what is available now in our shop and be sure to check back as we have many new prints and colors coming soon!!

Thoughts of Fall and Christmas

Well I don't like to think of snow when it is 90 degrees out and neither does my daughter, but I have been getting crafts together for Christmas presents! My thought is to do winter crafts in the summer and summer crafts in the winter so you can stay ahead of yourself.....sometimes it works and sometimes not! I always seem to be rushed. We are waiting the arrival of my daughters baby in about 5 weeks and I am still learning how to deal with the two sites we have....I am technically challenged! But I am on Facebook now so I am getting there. The ideas are flowing for new projects, but time is a factor and there is never enough of it. I have been doing alot of crocheting because it is a no think craft. Some of my other things are taking longer than I want, but hopefully I will be motivated. The weather has been wonderful and the daycare kids have spent alot of time in the pool and outside. I always have my sketchbook handy for ideas as I sit with my feet in the pool. My sewing machine has been wondering where I have been. Although I did fix a few snugglies and one doll for the kids. They seem to be interested in sewing, but I don't know if I am ready to teach 3 five year olds how to do it. I did buy my 5 year old granddaughter a sewing machine so I may have to teach her how to use it. I am serger challenged right now so I haven't touched that for awhile. I know Shannon is trying to get her projects done for thepintsizecove site before jr. arrives. She will not have any time to craft once he gets here. Bring on the caffine so I can keep the juices flowing. Check our sites for new items for your co-workers, neighbors, friends and who ever else you buy for during the holidays....even a maillady would enjoy a nice mug, coaster set and a envelope of hot chocolate in the mailbox for Christmas! Mine do! For now we will keep plugging away and have a wonderful weekend.

Rene and Shannon

Introducing the launch of our second store!!

We have been quite busy lately. Mom and I decided to open up a second Etsy store and have one for our adult items and open a new one for our child and baby items. We have been working hard to get the second one up and running and it has been open for just over a month. The hard work has paid off as we finally got our first sale!! Mom has been wearing the creative hat lately and is coming up with some adorable children's crocheted hats!! Be sure to check them out!

Here is the link to our second shop:

http://www.thepintsizecove.etsy.com

We are still working on transferring our children's items over to the other shop but make sure you check in with both sites for new items!!!

We have also been working on making our items for the fall craft show in November. Still a ways out but it is a pretty busy show and gets lots of traffic through there so we want to make sure we have plenty of inventory.

In other news, Mom is just finishing up a quilt for a charity project which is wonderful. Two more blocks and it will be ready to put together. We will post a picture when it is finished, it's beautiful. We are also counting the weeks down to the new member of the family joining us soon. My son is due in 7 weeks so we are trying to get as much done as possible until that time comes.

We will check in again soon. Please make sure you check out the new shop and don't forget about The Crafter's Cove shop too :)

~Shannon