crafty fanny

friday's confession: it was easier than I thought

There seems to be a theme throughout all of the lessons I'm learning on my journey. This was reconfirmed on Monday when I had the grand opening (cue trumpets!!!) of my etsy shop.

Here's what I realized: Launching the shop, posting my paintings, putting myself out there wasn't nearly as scary as I thought it would be. It wasn't nearly as hard as I had made it out to be. In fact, it was almost...dare I say it...easy.

Easy.

I almost feel scandalous just writing that word.

Note: I'm not trying to discount the work I did leading up to this. I did work, trust. I struggled, I powered through, I fought my vampires and won. And when I look back on it all, I realize that all I've done in the last year was work. Working through things, figuring things out, taking a whole lot of baby steps toward something that feels so big, I can only see portions of it.

For some reason, I wanted to make it all so hard. Such a struggle. And it doesn't have to be. I call it work. But what if all this "work" is just my journey? Just the path I'm supposed to be on?

What happens if we start a big change, a big shift, thinking, "It's ok if it's easy. It CAN be easy. It doesn't always have to be a struggle." What then?

We might just all delight in the ease of things. It's definitely worth a try, right?

Franny's Cup & Saucer

A few weeks ago, Tim and I headed up the coast to Sea Ranch for a couple of days to spend some time out of town with the family.

While there, we had the good fortune of a family friend introducing us to the CUTEST BAKERY IN THE WORLD! Seriously, y'all, I've seen plenty of cute in my day, and this place was swoon-worthy!

Franny's Cup & Saucer is located in Point Arena, CA and is well worth a visit if you're in the area. In fact, I would say that this adorable place could be the actual reason for a visit to this area if you're anywhere near it. It's that cute.

{Ahem} Please pardon the vacation hair and bummy clothes. This was an unexpected photo shoot!

The storefront is pretty small, but is full of the cutest little gifty items. And they even had a giraffe! Come on! Of course, I was completely smitten!

 

And, oh my...the baked goods really floored me! They had peanut butter and jelly macaroons that blew me away. They were just as good as the ones we had in France, if not a little bit better!

 

This place was such a treat and such a sweet surprise to find. I'll definitely be coming back on subsequent visits!

the Etsy shop has officially launched!

Friends! The day is here!

My etsy shop is live! 

 

WHOA. And, awesome! Now it's official -- I really AM an artist!

In other exciting news, my blogland friend, Nancy Orozco featured me and my art on her blog this morning! Thanks, Nancy, for the super sweet words! It's nice to have internet friends like you!!!

friday's confession: This is actually happening!

Um, you guys!!!

My etsy shop is launching on Monday! With my original paintings! And it's only the beginning!

Can you believe it!?!?!??!

Looking back, doing something like this seemed so daunting, so BIG. But now it's real. It still seems big, but in a different way. In a manageable way, in a this-is-something-really-good-but-not-scary way. 

Just for kicks, I reposted my You are Beautiful card as a sneak preview. I do love this card. 

Who wouldn't want to get this in the mail?

campaign wrap-up

My 8-week fundraising campaign for At the Crossroads is wrapping up tomorrow and I thought it would be fun to post all of the paintings I did in one place! It's not too late enter into the drawing to win the painting of your choice from these 8. All it takes is a $25 donation to a really amazing non-profit that is doing incredible work for homeless youth in San Francisco.

Without further ado, here are the paintings I did for my campaign:

 

The drawing will be held Friday, May 21 at 9:00 am PST (that's tomorrow!) so don't forget to donate and enter if you're interested in winning a painting!

Oh, and once the drawing is done, the remaining 7 paintings will go up for sale on my etsy shop on Monday (so excited!!!) with 15% of the proceeds going back to ATC as well. It's a win-win-win!

two things

I have 2 super fun things to share this morning:

1. Maggie graduated from her basic obedience class on Monday! I CANNOT believe that in the six months we've had her, she's gone from this:

to this:

Seriously, y'all, I don't know how people raise children without falling apart every second about how quickly they grow up.

2. May is Time Management Month over at Spring, and I just posted a video with my thoughts on the subject. Check it out and be sure to leave a comment to be entered into the perpetual calendar giveaway!

stopped in my tracks

True story:

The store where I work happens to be located right next door to an Anthropologie (danger! danger!). My usual M.O. is to not even go in. Not to look. Or just check things out. Not ever. I'm just not strong enough.

But, one day UPS mistakenly delivered a package meant for Anthro to our store. Where it got put in our backroom, soon to be buried under piles of paper and/or forgotten. So I did the right thing (cause I'm nice like that) and offered to take the package over. You know, just pop in quickly to drop off a box. In and out. Easy peasy.

Until I saw this:

Y'all, I was like one of those cartoon characters who sees a pretty girl and gets all starry-eyed. That was me in Anthropologie. Good thing I was on the clock or I could have looked at the pretty forever. It seems unfair to have something this lovely so close to where I spend quite a bit of my time.

Another example of Anthro's utter unfairness to my life would be this sweet number. Don't you think the girlfriend of a sailor needs this bag:

Yeah, me too.

ooh. la. la.

Here's a new painting that I did for my At the Crossroads campaign. It's my first France painting ever! Can we talk for a minute about how much fun I had with this one?

I recently started going back through my photos from our France trip and realized that I have so much material for my paintings. Get excited, y'all!

Happy France-iversary!

Happy Friday friends!

Earlier this week, Tim surprised me with a getaway down to Monterey to celebrate the one-year anniversary of our France trip -- or as I like to call it, our France-iversary! 

We had an awesome time, ate awesome food, and saw many beautiful things -- pics will be up next week!!

In the meantime, I hope you all have a really wonderful weekend and that you find something to celebrate! Shouldn't there always be something to celebrate?

I dare you to watch this.

Friends, do yourself a favor and watch this video. Especially if you have ever had a dream that you believed it but were too scared to share it with others. Especially if you've ever thought you might be judged for that crazy, but completely doable idea of yours. Especially if you've felt ready for something new for a long time, but haven't yet made that first step.

This video gave me chills.

I haven't yet read The Middle Place but I plan to soon.

Video found via the always lovely Kelly Rae Roberts