Facebook Imitates Life

Yes I’m on a Facebook roll!

You know the old phrase, “art imitates life”?  Well sometimes I think Facebook should be art’s stunt double.  Or in my particular case, this blog’s stunt double!  I’m finding that if I want to post something, whether it’s a project I’m working on or a rant I have or just whatnot blather about my kids, I’m more and more turning to Facebook to do that.

Couple of reasons:  1, it’s like Mc’Donalds for social addicts like me.  Hot, fast, and cheap!  I can update my status with pics, text, links or whatever from my cellphone.  Replies are instant and I get a text on my phone when someone replies.  2, I’ve got a lot more people viewing my Facebook profile than I do this blog.  Hence a lot more interaction.

So what does that mean for my happy little Fimo home here?  Well, I think it means that I’m gonna need to integrate them a little better.  Because blogs really do give a much better place to ramble on and on about a subject.  You can have a full-course meal in a blog post, where that’s really not too practical in a Facebook post.  (Yes, you could write a Facebook Note.  But really, who reads those things??!!)  If I want to go into detail about a project, and would prefer not to break it up into cookie-sized bites, a blog is a way better way to go.

I’m adding a link in the sidebar to my Facebook profile, so if you are wondering what I’m up to (and it seems like it’s been a long time since I’ve posted in my blog), then click on the Facebook link and you’ll be able to keep up with what I’ve been doing.

Today I posted in Facebook that I was ‘sperimentin’ with something that’s been sitting in my craft closet for a few years:  Sophisticated Finishes Metallic Surfacers.  They’re very much like the Swellegant line of ground metals suspended in a clear acrylic medium.  Great for all kinds of craft projects, whether you work in polymer clay or not.  I’ve got some Memorial Beads projects percolating in the back of my brain for using these surfacers, so you’ll probably be seeing more of this subject in the future.

 

Facebook Page: Timeline

I gotta think out loud.

What I mean to say is, that I tend to think better when I can get it down on virtual paper, or talk it over with a friend.  Okay, hundreds of friends, in the case of this post.  But you get the idea.  And right now I’m thinking about the fact that I’ve procrastinated — drug my feet — on dealing with the new Timeline format for my Facebook business page.  I personally don’t like the Timeline.  So happily in denial, I ignored the coming change-over until the fait accompli had happened.

Dun-dun-dun…..

Today is the first day of the rest of your……facebook business life.  Right.

So what I’m up against here is the fact that I’m one gal who has three distinct businesses under a single label.  How do you make one facebook page that “covers” the spectrum?

The answer… I think…. is that you don’t.

This morning I started doing some reading on the new Timeline layout, to find out what the marketing guru-ru-rus advise.  They said things like making a clear, emotionally appealing statement with your cover photo and the first 140 characters of your “about” section.

Hmmm….. how to sum up C. A. Therien Polymer Clay Arts in an 851-x-351 photo and 140 characters.  Yeah, not gonna happen.  If I tried to put all 3 divisions under one Facebook cover, it’s gonna dilute them all to the point of confusion.  I know this for sure because I have one main website that tries to funnel customers to all 3 divisions, and I occasionally get the eyebrow-raised question from customers. If you follow the “100 rule” — for each person who takes the time to mention their confusion, there are 100 who thought the same thing but never made a comment — then you know you’ve got a slight problem.  People coming to my facebook page for Fimo Nail Art aren’t going to be interested in Memorial Beads.  And the Memorial Beads customers aren’t going to be interested in cane layering tutorials.  Etcetera, etcetera, ad infinitum.

So that means I’ve got to have 3 facebook pages in order to have them be effective for reaching the customers they serve.  I’m not happy about adding extra work on my plate, but reality is what it is, and I should have made this decision a long time ago.  I gotta put my big girl panties on and deal with it.

*Deep breath*  Alright then.  To work.

I’ve already got the one main facebook page — somewhat sorely neglected, but not abandoned — which has the C. A. Therien label to it.  I’ll probably use that one for my tutorials, videos, etsy cane shop and ebay store.

Then I’ll open a facebook page for Memorial Beads’ website and etsy shop, and Brides & Bracelets’ website-in-progress (two sides of the same coin, floral remembrance keepsakes).

And finally open a facebook page for Fimo Nail Art.

I’ve got galleries for all three, enough to fill a decent album or two.  And I’ll link the three pages together somehow… That’s going to be a bit of a challenge, but it’s not the main one.  The main one is that the new pages will have no Facebook histories attached to them, and I’ll want to explain that a bit.  Or not.  But probably will.

…..Later that day…..

Allen’s Corner Shelf

Allen on his 50th birthday, with our son, Steve. Fake mustaches were a party favor everyone was wearing, in Allen's honor.

My hubby is absolutely amazing.  He’s really getting into this whole working-with-copper thing.  Ever since he started experimenting with making crowns and ear cuffs for the Renaissance Faire last year, he’s been pushing his own boundaries with metal and solder.  I’m excited about all the learning he’s doing, and experimenting along the way.

So when the girls (Margo and Heather) decided they were going to remodel our very-sixties half-bath downstairs, Allen decided to construct some copper-and-wood wall shelving that would go in the corner over the toilet.

The corner shelving unit is made with 6-gauge copper wire and has these three open waves, which have brackets that the shelves are screwed onto.  The waves were soldered to a central undulating pair of wires, and the whole thing has this sensual beauty to it.  He cut and stained the shelves, which came out surprisingly beautiful for scrap pine.  I love how he used his router to give the edges a nice scallop.

We initially had a hard time finding knick-nacks that were small enough that they didn’t overpower the shelves and still left much of the construction visible.  A few collected shells, some polymer clay-covered tea-light candle holders, and my new faux stained glass egg where just right to display here.

Veggie Burgers

I’m trying to eat healthier, and one of my new favorites is veggie burgers.  So quick and easy… just pop it in the microwave for a couple minutes while I get the bun ready.  Bun, burger, condiments and all = around 300 calories, and 15 grams of protein.  Nice and filling.  And delicious!

The only thing I don’t like is the price.  These two brands, Morningstar Farms and Boca, are my favorites, but their burgers run about $1.00 apiece.  That’s kinda pricey and so I’m looking to start experimenting with some recipes.

I’d looked on my favorite cookbook site, allrecipes.com.  But I didn’t find anything that was really jumping out at me, though there were a few that piqued my interest.  I found quite a few on about.com though with promising results… or at least promising titles, like “Carnivore Approved Mushroom Burgers.”

If you’d like to try veggie burgers but are afraid you’ll think they aren’t tasty, then I’d recommend the Morningstar Farms Grillers Prime.  You truly will not taste the difference between hamburger and veggie burger with this one.  Veggie burgers are becoming more popular in the mainstream as people look to curb their red meat intake, and as veggie burger flavor has vastly improved.  Both the Morningstar Farms and Boca products can be found in your grocer’s freezer case (I’ve seen them at Wal-Mart, Kroger, and Schnuck’s).

I think out of the burger recipes I’ve looked at, I’m going to give this one a try:  Mushroom Veggie Burger.

–   –   –   –   –   –   –   –   –   –   –   –   –   –   –   –   –   –   –

Update on the Mushroom Veggie Burger recipe:

I have one thing to say about this recipe:  THESE BURGERS ROCK!!

Crispy on the outside, moist and meaty on the inside.  Taste great with ketchup and mustard on a sandwich thin.

Now as for the recipe, I made a few tweaks:

– I wanted my burgers to be uniform, like the patty shapes that Boca makes.  I’ve got this burger shaper thingy and I used 1/3 cup of mixture per patty.

– In order for the consistency of the patty shape, I needed to run my larger ingredients individually through my food processor, including the oats.  This resulted in a finer “grain” to the mixture.

– I added a tsp of Vital Wheat Gluten to the mix to increase elasticity, based on comments I’d read from people on another recipe.

– I drained the moisture from the mushroom/onion mixture after I sauteed it to keep the burgers from falling apart.

–The store I went to had Portobello and Shitake mushrooms but not Crimini.  So I substituted regular white mushrooms. I’d like to try it with the Crimini though.

–I read that you could add worchestershire sauce and smoke flavoring to veggie burger recipes.  I didn’t have any but added some steak seasoning.  Not a noticeable flavor that I could tell but didn’t hurt any.

– It said to fry the burgers in olive oil but I thought I’d try baking them instead.  It was late, I was tired, and just wanted to be done, you know?  I sprayed the cookie sheet with non-stick cooking spray and baked 10 minutes each side at 350 degrees.  The burgers flipped over just great!  Baking, broiling, or frying, I think any of the methods would work.  Using a Foreman grill would work good, too.  If I was to use an outdoor grill though, I think I’d bake them a bit first and then put them on the grill.

Speaking of freezing, I’m sure these would work just like the Boca burgers as far as freezing and microwaving them for quick meals.  I’m so glad I gave this recipe a try.

 

It Takes A Village, Part 1

Over the last ten years or so, I’ve been collecting ceramic Christmas Village pieces from a variety of dollar stores.  A few dollars here, a few dollars there… and now I’ve got nearly a dozen buildings, people, trees, etc.

  When you go into the front door of our house, you’re met by a set of stairs and a shelf.  That shelf is where we put the Christmas Village last year, thanks to Margo’s suggestion.  I really liked having the village there, it was great.  But I wanted to improve it… and remembered a story Allen had told me of his childhood, how he had built a landscape for his Matchbox electric race car set.  I wondered if we could do something similar for the Christmas Village.

  Not only did he say it was possible, but we had a unique opportunity yesterday.  Allen was off work and so was Margo.  We decided on the spur of the moment to just go for it, so off to the home improvement store we went!

We decided to take advantage of the 20-foot ceiling in our entry way, and build the landscape into a mountain, cutting the wood and screwing it together into a base with three tiers.

We used chipboard for the flat surfaces and 1×2 pieces for the columns.  We quickly discovered the wood screws were splitting the 1×2′s, so we had to pre-drill holes in them before screwing them in place.

The whole thing will stand about 3 feet tall, and 3 feet long.  It will probably weigh 50 pounds when we get done.   I got a steal on rail road track – 25 cents per package – so we’re adding a train and tunnels.

Once the tiers were in place, we checked the placement of the village pieces.  We put everything on it, including the people and dogs and fire hydrants.  If you’re interested in a village, you can buy one for $36.oo from Dollar Tree.

In my case, I’ve been buying pieces from different dollar stores so I don’t have a matching set.  There are some pieces I really want… the sleigh ride and the nativity.  I’ll keep my eyes open for them, in coming years.

Once we had the placement of the pieces where we wanted them, it was time to start stapling on the chicken wire.  Allen and Margo even made shelves with the wire, to add another half-level down at the base near the ice skating pond.

We used a staple gun and 1/2 inch staples to attach the chicken wire.  We chose the square wire rather than the hexagon, because it was sturdier and we would only need one layer of wire instead of two.  All of the wood, wire, screws, staple gun and staples cost us about $35.00.  We used a table saw and miter saw to cut the pieces… but you could use a hand saw and still not take that much time.

After we got the chicken wire on, we put the village pieces back on and re-checked the placement.  We realized we needed a few little cliffs here and there, and a half-shelf for the tree house.  Our friend Becca did her Bexzilla impression.  Love you, Bex!

One of the things we quickly realized is that I have a whole LOT of pieces, and getting them all to fit on the landscape is gonna be a bit of a challenge.  Especially when you add in the electric lights in each of the buildings.  We pre-drilled holes in the chipboard underneath each building, so that there was a place for the string of LED holiday lights that will run underneath the plaster.  We hope someday to have a real working train on the track, so we left plenty of space in the back for train tunnels that would allow the train to run around and behind the mountain, coming out again on the other side.

Now comes the fun part… adding ‘flesh’ to the ‘bones’.  Or more accurately, putting newspaper strips dipped in plaster all over the base and tiers.  Our friend April selflessly cut paper after paper after paper.  I didn’t get a good picture of her but I will next week.  She cut strips of newspaper and then tablet paper, for hours!  We used plaster instead of starch or paper mache, because the plaster was all I had.  Come to find out it was a pretty good choice, as it dries fast!

I can’t tell you how messy this is.  Allen loaned us a couple of old t-shirts of his so that we wouldn’t get plaster all over our clothes.  You mix the plaster powder 2 to 1 ratio with warm water.

We quickly realized that this was gonna be a 3-person job.  The plaster gives you about a 10 minute working time before the plaster in the bowl starts to set.  Allen kept the bowl filled with fresh plaster so it wouldn’t dry out on us.

We started at the top and worked our way down, dipping the strips of newspaper into the wet plaster and then laying it over the chicken wire.  At first, the plaster wasn’t sticking to the wire.

So we had to make the plaster a little bit thick for the initial layer on the wire.  It’s going to take about 5 layers of newspaper and plaster to get it thick enough that the edges are nicely rounded.

The first layer is finally done and drying.  This landscape is probably going to spend a week or two on our kitchen table as we continue adding layers, doing the stucco, and painting.

One of the reasons we decided to jump on this project and keep at it until the first plaster layer was on has to do with the timing of Allen’s Big 50th Birthday Bash on December 2nd.  We wanted this family project to be the first thing people see when they walk in the door.  I’m thinking of naming the village “Allentown” in his honor.  We couldn’t have done this without his direction and assistance.  He’s an awesome husband and father.

We nearly had a major disaster:  I had thoughtlessly started rinsing plaster down the kitchen sink.  Fortunately Allen caught me before too much of it went down the drain.  “You can’t do that!  It’ll clog up our house pipes!”  Hadn’t even occurred to me.  So we had to go out in the back yard – where it was raining cats and dogs – to rinse ourselves and our equipment off.

I was sooooo ready to be done.  We’d been working on this for 6 hours!  I had plaster up to my elbows.  I would have had it in my hair, too, had we been outside where I could have safely started a plaster fight with Margo.  I mean, c’mon… you gotta throw this stuff.  It’s just too much fun.  But since we were in the kitchen, I restrained myself.  I’ll be back with an update on the village when we finish getting all the layers of plaster on.

Grocery Shopping Motherlode

Go straight to the list, skip the chat:  Grocery Shopping Motherlode

There were times in our family’s life when we couldn’t afford to buy our six kids a lollipop at a softball game.  Literally every dollar I spent was compared to a gallon of milk, because we went through about a gallon a day, between drinking and cooking.  A typical grocery shopping trip looked like this:

The three older kids would each be pushing a grocery cart.  Two younger children would be laying across the bottom racks of two carts to connect them, like a steel-basketed bullet train, and the baby was in the seat of the first basket.  I would alternate between holding the list and the calculator,  holding the baby, holding the coupons, and holding my breath that nothing got broken.

We shopped about once a week or every two weeks at most.  Average monthly grocery bill: between $600 and $800, and this included toiletries, household goods, pet food, cleaning supplies, etc.  It wasn’t unusual for our grocery receipt to be five feet long!  Our older kids took perverse delight in telling the checkout clerk that we’d be back next week for the same amount of food.  It usually dropped the poor clerk’s jaw, which gave the kids a good laugh.

Alright, so that being said, we’ve had to learn some tools of the trade to become a semi-pro shopping team.  (See… you knew there was a reason we had all these kids!)  We’ve also had to deal with a couple of food allergies (me to dairy, and Margo to soy).  We’ve read books on coupon clipping, conparison shopped everything from big box stores to bread thrift stores, and scoured second hand stores and libraries for resources to help stretch every single dollar.

Today on Facebook I was invited to join a coupon club.  And while I’m no longer shopping for 8 people on a weekly basis, I’d offered to share some of the kitchen helper files I’d created in order to manage the kitchen chaos.  You’ll find here some downloadable forms that I’m glad to share with you.  They are in Microsoft Excel format, and you can edit them by downloading them to your computer and opening Excel.  (If you don’t have Excel, would you let me know?  I’d be glad to convert them to pdf for you.)

When you download the file, you’ll find four files within it.  They are:

• PRICE COMPARISON – a list done about a year ago, comparing prices of items we regularly purchased, from Sam’s Club, Wal-Mart, Aldi, and Schnucks.
• FREEZER INVENTORY – a list of everything we could ever want to put in our freezer.
• PANTRY INVENTORY – a list of everything we could ever want to put in our refrigerator and pantry.  Both lists are organized first by category and then by alphabet.
• ALDI PRICE LIST- if you’re lucky enough to have an Aldi store near you, then you really can save a lot of money on your groceries.  Even though most of our kids no longer live at home, we still shop Aldi every week, and our grocery budget for 4 adults is $150 a week, and still includes pet food, cleaning supplies, toiletries and the like.  This list was originally compiled by a discussion group, and I edited it for my own tastes.  But my prices are about a year old.  So I checked and there’s a gal who is keeping a current price comparison on her blog!

HOW TO USE THE LISTS:

1.  Edit the lists to add the food items you usually buy, and delete the ones you don’t.

2.  Print your lists.

3.  Clip the lists to a clipboard, or put them into a binder with sheet protectors.

4.  Go through your freezer, refrigerator, and pantry.  Mark an X for each item you have in the list.  For example:  if you have five 6-oz cans of tomato sauce, then mark 5 X’s next to the tomato sauce in your list.  As you use the cans, put a line through an X each time you use one.

Bonus points:  Print out a pantry list and put it on a clip board.  Tie some yarn around a sharpened pencil and hang the pencil from the clip board.  Hang a hook in your pantry or dry goods/canned food cupboard.  Put the clip board on the hook.  Repeat on the front of your refrigerator and freezer with those appropriate lists.  Every time you use something up from the list, mark it off.  Now take your lists and go shopping.  You are a semi-pro shopper, because you’ll never have to return to the grocery store for something you forgot to put on your list, and you saved money and time, too!

If you’ve read this far and haven’t downloaded the list yet, here’s the list link again (so you don’t have to scroll up):  Grocery Shopping Motherlode

A final note about coupons:  they can be a great help to you, if what you usually buy is an item that you have a coupon for, AND if the item is on sale.  But in reality, coupons present a lot of temptation to buy things that might not be in your budget.  So keep your head about you when it comes to clipping those coupons, because you could actually be spending more money than you would save.

If you need help with knowing what’s on sale at your local grocery stores, try this wonderful resource:  mygrocerydeals.com

And if you need some help with your finances in general – you know, things are a mess, and you just don’t know where to start – then I can’t recommend Ellie Kay enough.  She’ll get you back on track and get your finances under control.  Go check out her website, at EllieKay.com.

Peg’s Dress – Alternative Sewing Finale

If you’ve been following my blog for long, you’ll remember that I’ve been working on a dress for a friend who is wheelchair bound with MS.  Her name is Peg, and she just celebrated 40 years being married to her best friend, Joe.  She’d wanted something really special to wear to her anniversary party, and so hired me to make her an outfit.  I’d talked about the beginning of the process in the post, “Sewing Adaptive Patterns.”  An adaptive pattern is one that is altered so that a person with limited mobility can have clothes that are easy to put on, and yet attractive.

I’d made a necktie for Joe, and it wasn’t easy to sell him on a flowered pattern!  Peggy can be a stinker, and up to the day before the party, she was telling Joe that I’d sewn a bow tie for him.  I think he tried to hide his disappointment at that news, so he was a little surprised when I delivered a standard tie.   He looked really good in black pants, a black button-down oxford shirt, and his flowered tie.  Of course the tie didn’t last long, and we didn’t get a picture of him wearing it.  But here it is, draped over Peg’s dress.

So the dress:  I loved how it looked on her once we got it all tailored.  But let me say that the dress that we finished with looks only vaguely like the flannel mock-up I made.  So from the starting point, I had altered a Chinese-style shirt pattern, so that the hem was long enough and wide enough to turn it into a dress.  Then I made the mock-up, which we further altered to add in princess seams and a back zipper.  From there we cut the actual dress cloth, which was further altered to lower the collar, narrow the cuffs, add mock sleeve buttons, etc.

What this means is that I can’t go back to my flannel mock-up to create another dress for her.  Too much altering has happened to it.  On the other hand, this was a great learning experience that stretched both of us!  We had to get out of our comfort zones and we didn’t know what would be the result when we were done.

We were both pleasantly surprised with how well the dress came out.  She looked beautiful in it (but then, I think she’s beautiful anyway).  We had a wonderful time at their anniversary party.  Joe was so funny as he gave a monologue roast of some of his family and friends.  It was neat that he introduced us to the people who have shaped his and Peggy’s lives.  It helps newer friends like us to get a taste of the breadth and scope of who they are.

In other news…

I’m nearly done with taking the Acai Berry… the bottle is almost empty.  I’ve updated my “Acai Berry Craze” post to add in my latest findings with this experiment.