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1. Friday.

It’s Friday somewhere in the world, right?  I started this post yesterday but then Abby came home from camp earlier than I expected.  I put is aside to go listen to stories about how boys are SUCH sooks and the girls kicked ass on all the camp activities including the confidence course. Boys are so useless, Mum.

 

Paul helping unload the trailer load of bags he transported to and from camp.

 

2. Small things make people happy.

Well, it’s a big thing with lots of little things in it. Jacob washed windows, mowed lawns and has even been collecting aluminium cans to recycle to save up for a fish tank. 

And this is a story full of small blessings really – from start to finish.

Originally Jacob was saving and watching trademe, and he found a fishtank he wanted but it was too much money.  He asked me for a loan.  I refused, giving him the speech about his income not being adequate enough to cover said loan.  The poor boy was so disappointed but it was a good budgeting lesson, I’m thinking to myself whilst trying to get over the guilt of turning him down.

Which is about when he heard about a competition on the ZM radio station called “Fix my Life”  The effort shifted to winning the competition.  He set an alarm to wake early enough each day to ring through.  He used 2 phones to try, on checking the recent calls on my phone he was trying 60-70 times each time that competition aired.  And that was on just one of the phones.

He eventually got through.  He told his story and they told him to hold.  He did.  Until his battery went flat.  The devastation in this house was huge. 

Cool thing though, ZM rang him back – listened to his story and gave him the rest of the money he needed to buy his tank.  First blessing.

He placed a bid on the tank he wanted – there were several other people bidding so he was nervous.  On the day the auction ended, noone else bid.  Second blessing.

The owners of the tank took it apart and drove an hour south to us to deliver it.  They kept the water in buckets so the fish wouldn’t go into shock being put into new water, they bought everything needed, they spent 1.5 hours setting it up for Jacob and gave him all their spare stuff, including all their fish and lengthy typed out instructions on how to look after the heated, filtered tank.   It was totally above and beyond what we expected.

There are good people in this world.  And the smile says it all.

Jacob next to the tank, with cabinet, that he won on trademe after saving and winning a radio competition.  Hard work pays off.

3. When one door shuts, another opens.

My regular travel and weekend work has had to stop, due to things going on here at home.  I’ve had to turn down a lot of teaching opportunities.  It’s sad, but you have to do what is right for those at home. 

But as this door shuts, another opens.  I was contacted by large US manufacturer, Prima Marketing, to put on an event here in New Zealand.  It’s a huge event that already has lots of interest in it.  It’s perfect for me right now because I can do all the organising at home beforehand and the travel is minimal at the time.  Just what I needed.

Save the date – 20th – 22nd Sept, Wairakei, NZ.  Registration opens in just over a week.

4. I love Fancy Pants.

I’ve always loved this company.  Great products, fabulous people behind the scenes.  I love that when they open a Design Team Call like this one, that they appreciate the international talent too. 

Fancy Pants Design Team call is open now – go here to find out more.

5. I still got it.

Last but not least – I might be 40 and I might have little legs, but I can still run with the best of them.  In fact I busted apart my 2.4km time this week, keeping a pace that led the pack (all 2 of them) right through the entire course, up hills, down hills and sprinting to the finish. 

I could hear the footsteps behind me and that pushed me to go faster, what I didn’t realise was that they were trying to keep up – I guess all 3 of us were pushed to beat our times. 

Photo taken by Karl, great PT, not so flash on finding the focus…
Laters.

Liz, myself & Danielle after wiping a full minute off our 2.4km run.

While most people would be thrilled to receive a box of new Tattered Angels colours in the mail, I admit to a little freaky freakout dance, don’t ask me to show you what that looks like,  when mine arrived in January.   I was 4 days away from getting on a plane to the USA and had managed to leave a thousand things to do until the last minute and the box of colours was only going to add more.   

I pulled out what was bound to be my favourite thing, a ‘Turquoise Precious Stone Aging System’ and got to work on a canvas that was also included in the box. 

Despite my initial freakout at the lack of time, my love for what I call ‘Happy Grunge’ soon took care of what kind of look the project would take.  It’s a look that Finnabair made popular within scrapbooking circles but it’s quickly taken hold and has been interlaced and incorporated in all sorts of ways within projects and layouts worldwide now. 

I used the instructions on the Tattered Angels packet and created a turquoise background, no surprises there, and started to layer the goodness on.  Older Prima canvas items, older random Prima flowers, lots of chipboard from Imaginarium Designs and some of the trinkets I have been selling since SENZ last year. 

Spot the Imaginarium Designs chipboard shapes.
Crosshatch designed by Louise Nelson.

 

Once I made the start, I added a whole lot of adhesive, some leaves and wire, Tattered Angels colours including all the turquoise paints plus an old favourite ‘Key Lime’, some Rae Cooper inspired Rub’nBuff, a dash of 8-year-old-daughter-Abby-helping, some letting go of worry and just having fun, some drying time on the trampoline out in the late evening sun and finally this is what I came up with for the Tattered Angels booth.

Happy Days.  We’ve had a heck of time in the Howard household recently (most of which I don’t talk about on facebook or my blog.  Some stuff just doesn’t need to be made public, just remember us in your positive thoughts next time you are having words to your own personal ‘big guy’), so this serves as a little reminder that positivity plays a huge role in our everyday life.  Given the last few ingredients of what went into this canvas, I think it reflects it wonderfully.

Laters.

The Prima booth at CHA… a little Prima wonderland in the middle of a huge tradeshow full of gorgeous scrapbooking products and Prima’s definitely were some of the most gorgeous there.  I only saw 2 days of CHA and spent most of the time here, at the Prima booth. 

The inside was full of amazing projects, products, chandeliers and other pretty stuff.  The outside was where we set up our demo table to show everyone the amazing Prima releases and it was also a place for Leeza Gibbons to sign her book. I chatted to Leeza a little before she was swamped by the public, she is a gorgeous, gracious lady with time to chat to anyone that takes time to chat to her.  She was genuinely enthused about her new Prima product line too, which was very cool.

Janine & I with Leeza, jsut before everyone else figured out she was there!

It wasn’t long before we gained our demo area back from the crowds of people chatting to Leeza and then it was all on.  This is Anna (Finnabair) setting up for her project, a gorgeous headband.  I gained so much out of meeting Finn.  I was inspired by her amazing use of embellishments.  I was enthused by her “just get it done, enjoy it” attitude, and I was enthralled by long car-rides learning about Poland.  I did my best to memorise as much of the info as I could, and those that know me know that I don’t do geography or history detail very well, in the ear and out the other, but I thoroughly enjoyed learning about Poland and was able to impress my hubby with some very cool facts when I got home.  Our chats were a success, Anna, Paul was impressed.

Anna outside the Prima booth, ready to rock the crowds (and she did, seriously!)

I know this is sounding like the Finnabair-fan-show right now but I have to show you this. 

Just a little fun piece that she whipped up before the show.  I know.  Boom.  Serious talent, right there.

It was a very cool few days spent with the Prima staff.  Those of you that are retailers probably deal with some of these people – each one does an amazing job and I was thrilled to be able to finally meet them in person.

Gorgeous team, rocking the emerald green – did you know it’s the 2013 Pantone colour of the year?  I know.  Rocking those trends again. 

LAters

While I was only in the USA for a few days, I did have time to visit the Prima warehouse and see a little of CHA (the Craft and Hobby trade show) while I was there.  Since I know you’d all love an outsider’s view of what it was like, I’ve compiled a few photos. 

I arrived in California expecting it to have weather similar to New Zealand in September.  Or October.  Because California doesn’t really get that cold, right?

Wrong.  That’s snow.

And while it was sunny the whole time I was there, full sun meant no cloud… no cloud meant the temperatures plummeted to below freezing (I regularly saw –1 or –2) early in the night, like by 9pm.  I know I’m going to wear some abuse from those in the Sth Island but this northern girl couldn’t handle it!  Which is why I live in the Nth Island, not the Sth!

One of the first places we visited was the Prima Warehouse.  This is what it looks like from the upstairs offices.  Boxes and boxes.  And boxes.  Boxes as far as the eye could see and in each box was gorgeous Prima product.

And even more boxes…

Exit signs … seriously… who would want to EXIT this place?  (Would you?)

Rows and rows of boxes with little holes in ready to pull a packet of goodness out.   I ran around like a mad thing putting my hands in boxes and seeing what surprise I could pull out.  That is some seriously cool lucky dip material, right there.  I wish you could all enjoy the experience.  It was mind boggling.

But it wasn’t all running around playing with gorgeous products, sometimes we sat down… I was in California with Janine Koczwara and Anna Dabrowska (Finnabair) – there’s a treat right there, right?  – we worked our butts off the night before CHA creating fabulous demos to teach at the Prima booth.  This is the classroom at the Prima Warehouse, I wish I’d got some of my favourite Prima staff in the shot too, but it was late at night and they’d already gone home.  Check out the winter coats.  I told you it was cold! If you look carefully you can see some of Jamie Dougherty’s artwork on the right… that lady is one AMAZING artist… if there was one lady I felt like I would have loved to watch work, it was her.  Can’t say enough about the talent she has.

And the next day it was booth set-up.  Here are some of the Prima staff ready to go home after setting up.

That’s my artwork centre stage right there.. proud?  yes. 

I loved the way these layouts hung under the cast iron hangers.   Have I been shopping on trademe for similar items?  Why yes I have.  The Prima frames look amazing with them.

Artwork above by myself and Janine.  It was a huge treat to see where my artwork was used.  I’ve sent artwork off to CHA for years, never really seeing how it’s been used.  It was great to be able to view the process of how everything is displayed.

This is outside the gorgeous Prima book – this was the table I did Make n Takes at.  Loved the wishes and dreams tree beside me.  Loved the gorgeous Prima product around me.  Loved the ladies I shared this space with… more of that next time.

Oh – before I go – my favourites in the Prima booth?  Has to be this line by A
nna Dabrowska (Finnabair).  The line is below – will I be getting it in to sell at Autumn Escape in April?  Why YES I will.  How could I not?

Laters – more Prima CHA next time.

The evening before I went to CHA I got an email from Prima asking me to donate a piece to the Charity Wings foundation.  It was to be something that could be auctioned off at the Prime Art*Venture I was attending in California.  

And you can cue the panic right there.  I had nothing I could think of to donate.

 

So Abby and I – who have been loving creating Finn-style tags together – got busy with Prima flowers, mists, trinkets and other gorgeous stuff and together we created this wishes and dreams photo frame.

 

 

Wishes and Dreams was almost the ‘theme’ of the CHA booth for Prima.  With Leeza Gibbon’s new Wishes and Dreams collection being released there was a lot of reflection on the whole theme.  Abby and I had fun putting this little tag together in the sun on a rushed Wednesday afternoon – and we’re pretty happy with the result.

I wasn’t at the event to see the frame auctioned off or to see who purchased it, I was proud that it made it there though, and all in the nick of time.  Amazing what can be done with a little mist, some resin shapes, some stick on sparklies, a few flowers and a some metal trinkets and shapes, keys and steampunk goodness from A Dozen Ideas.  (Etsy) or A Dozen Ideas (web).

House-sitter is here, I’m off to the beach for 5 days.  Much deserved break and family time together.

Laters.

AS I put the kids to bed tonight I whispered in their ears “Sleep tight, Mummy will be home in the morning”.  Each laughed at me and said “But you are home!”.  Yes, but tomorrow was the day I was meant to return home from my lengthy trip to the USA.  It’s wonderful to be home but I can’t help feeling a little sad that I didn’t finish what I started out to do in the USA.

I’ve been home a week now.  One minute I was eating dinner at a fabulous old-style Mexican restaurant in California, the next minute I had news that Paul’s Mum had been given hours to live after a brain haemorrhage.  Within hours I was on a plane home, having had the news that she had passed away.  Paul was having to deal with 3 grieving children alone, plus have to organise his Mum’s funeral alongside his sister.   Those hours before deciding to leave California (and Prima were amazingly supportive in letting me go from my contracted teaching work) and then those hours spent making trying to sleep and make small talk on the plane were some of the loneliest and saddest I have ever felt.  I thank goodness for great employers, fabulous friends and a wonderful family.

So a week on we have done some of the sad stuff – a funeral and then a burial up north.  There is so much more to do though, and I had no idea just how heartbreaking some of the after-the-funeral stuff could be. 

I’m also feeling sad about the USA.   Months of work, and it really was months of work (on and off, obviously), that didn’t get completed.  No closure.  All the preparations for me to be away from home, the work that I put in during times I should have been relaxing with the kids.  That is all sitting heavy with me.  Regrets that I didn’t spend enough time with certain people in the USA – had I known I’d be plucked away so quickly I would have done things differently in the few days I was there.  It’s all laying really heavily on me right now.

I love scrapbooking, or maybe I love storytelling.  I haven’t figured out which right now.  But sometimes.  Just sometimes I wonder the value of what I do with the teaching and the travelling, the eventing and being out there in public.  I can say in the hours that I wasn’t with them when they needed me most, that the distance apart from them was far too huge.  The last week has been a massive thinking time for me. 

For those of you at Art*Venture, I wish I could have been there.  I hope you understood.   I loved my projects dearly.  It would have been fabulous to teach them in person. I have heard the event turned out to be something out of this world, I knew it would be.

I have lots of people to thank.  People that sent flowers, texts, calls, emails, facebook messages, cards and best wishes.  The friends that got me on the plane, Prima who encouraged me to be with my family, the whole Prima team that one by one each consoled me during the craziness of CHA.  From the people I haven’t seen in years that turned up to the funeral, to the community of Mangakaramea that flew their town hall flag at half mast on the day we took Nannie North home to rest, to those that helped us drink to Nana North on Friday night, you were all part of making us feel better.  Each and every one was appreciated and I can safely say that my faith in humanity has been restored.  This is an amazing world we live in.

Laters

 

Abby and Nana North with some flowers picked from her garden, 2008.

Art*Venture project 1 – an altered from with removable layout using some of the newest Prima products.   There was also a 2nd layout to go with this class.

One cool thing about being involved with Prima Marketing is that I get given assignments or challenges to complete.  They push me to do artwork I might not otherwise do.  Sometimes I find myself creating things that aren't my usual.  I felt that way about this challenge. 

Here is the layout I created… it's a little different than my usual. 

If this colour scheme challenge looks like a bit of you, goodness knows it was a piece of me, check out those blues! , then see this blog post on the Prima blog.  You have til Jan 30th, Have fun with it 🙂

Laters

I’m a few hours from getting on a plane.  I’m a jittery wreck.  Luckily my kids have stepped up and are being helpful and kind.  Although I love the thought of being involved in CHA and being overseas, the day I leave is tough.

This is the scene that met me when I went to bed last night.   Looks so peaceful and deeply asleep, right?

Earlier in the evening we had tears and sad times as she tried to go to sleep.  She asked me not to leave.  When I asked her why she would miss me, she simply said “Because I love you”.

Cue melted heart.

I eventually tucked her into her bed and hoped she’d go off to sleep.

It seems she couldn’t, because a little while later I found her in my bed, with my jammies wrapped around her favourite teddy bear, the one she cuddles when she misses something.

I can only tell myself that she has a fab Dad, amazing grandparents, two strong brothers and my bestie to look after her.  And that she will be ok.

Something cool though – she woke this morning to an email from Tattered Angels requesting her artwork to display at CHA.  I sat her down and asked her if she understood.  “Do you know what this means, Abby?, the owner of the whole company wants to show your amazing artwork at the big tradeshow in America.”.

That cheered her up – her artwork is going with mama to America.

(Yep, she really made this by herself.  She really did).

Laters

(Metal Trinkets & heart thingie from A Dozen Ideas, lots ofother cool scrapbookey stuff from Scrapbook.com )