Introducing... Calia's Cottage

My latest time thief of mine has been starting my own little business or as my mom said, Mica’s sweat shop. I have been ruminating about some day selling my crafts and last summer in talking with my friend Dana about my quilts, she suggested that I sell some in her consignment store. A few things postponed my immediate desire to do that including school, making many other friend’s baby quilts, and then of course the holidays.

So here I am. It’s now May. And I did it! Calia’s Cottage has been created (I will tell you the story behind the name another day). I finally made a backlog of quilts and dropped them off at Blooming Kids. After talking to Dana and getting more ideas I promptly went home to make more baby stuff. So there are now taggies and binky clips to match the quilts that are at her store.

For all you non local’s, I also started an Etsy shop, which is where I also sell my crafts online! You can see my shop when you look at the top of this page at the tab called Calia’s Cottage – My Etsy Shop. There I am selling all the items I make. Since all my quilts are at Blooming Kids at the moment and I am still working on the next one, I only have binky clips, taggies, carseat canopy’s, minky blankets, and burp cloths available at the moment.

I also created a facebook page where you can see what items are at Dana’s shop Blooming Kids, what items are on Etsy, pictures of all the items I make, and the quilt patterns I can make. That is also a tab at the top of this page called Calia’s Cottage – Facebook page . If you see something on there that you like, but it is not currently on my etsy shop, or you want a different color you can contact me at Caliascottage@gmail.com and we can work something out! The final tab is simply my pinterest boards where you can see what I like J

To top it all off, a friend of mine who started her own little shop eeBee Ones, is going to be sharing a booth with me this summer at Art on the Ave on July 14th and 15th and Proctor Arts Fest on August 4th! I will definitely remind all you locals to come visit us here in Tacoma

Now that I have linked you to everything you could possibly see about Calia’s Cottage, I am off to make more baby stuff.

Swords and Plants

Thomas finally used his fencing lesson from last year's birthday! He now knows way to much about fencing. Note: He is using a saber in this picture.

Summer in WA is always an exciting time because you really don’t know what you are going to get. For instance last year we had 1 month of summer. This year, we have already had 1 month of summer and it is only May! I should say that my definition of summer has changed drastically from my So Cal upbringing to my WA adulthood. Summer is now multiple sunny days where I can wear a tank top and not freeze.

This is our farmer's market tomato plant.

So we are already filling up our calendar clear out into August. Between the gardening/yard work days, the camping, and the craft fairs, we will be quite busy this summer! We did our first yard work/gardening day 2 week's ago. Thomas and I have both discovered that we love to garden, but mainly when we are with other people (each other). In college I would go to a lady named Jean’s house once a week and help her with her garden. Now San Diego gardening and WA gardening again are quite different, but it all started there as a time to chat while we tended to her plants. So now Thomas and I chat and tend our plants.

This year is our year to redo our backyard. We have been in our house for the 4^th summer and we now know what survived and what needed to be redone.

So we are in the redoing phase. But we along with our yearly geraniums, we also bought a new hydrangea and we planted our garden which includes lettuce, spinach, bell peppers, green beans, cucumbers, spinach, sweet peas, brussels sprouts, kale, rhubarb, and our raspberry shoots from our friend Randi. 

 I copied a pinterest idea (2nd tab on top) and used cinder blocks as a planter border. Soon there will be little flowers in each mini planter :) And Thomas is destroying the stump of our apple tree that we took out cause it was so sad and old. We absolutely love the summers here, but we get so busy we have to schedule weekends to clean and breath!

Just a wee bit o' Ireland

Thomas and I flew to Ireland for a little vaca and to hang out with one of my college roomies Katie.

After a very long travel day and with a police escort (they kindly took us to her house when we were lost) we made it to Katie's house in Coleraine.

After church on Sunday, our first tourist visit was to the Giant's Causeway. This was an amazing place where there are hexagonal basalt columns. Crazy amazing.

Thomas has the traditional Ulster Fry.

We visited the Mussenden Temple, which is a library right on the water. Thomas and I decided we will have a library on the water someday.

 It might look a little something like the above.

 Thomas decided to stay in the car while Katie and I explored the Carrick a rede rope bridge, which I did not think was all that bad.

 Every where we turned there were sheep. All spray painted so the shepard's could tell them apart.

 College friends.

 Coastal town homes.

 The Dublin Castle

 A Irish phone booth in Gaelic.

 Our absolute favorite city, Kilkenny.

 More in our favorite city.

 The Kells Priory just moments from Kilkenny. Probably the most beautiful place in my opinion. Could have been the sunshine though.

 A wee bit of hilly countryside.

 Our experience in Cork.

 Naturally we had to visit the Blarney Castle/Stone. We had to climb to the top, which Thomas quickly headed for the exit as you can see in the below picture. Not so much with the heights.