Small update….

My my!!! long time no see!

more than a year and a half… Still can’t believe how time flies… I’ve been quite quiet here i should say 😉

A quick update to let you know what I’m up to is indeed in need haha!

So I’m still working with Cul de Sac but less than what i was doing since… I went back to school!!! Oh yeah!

I have done a semester so far (5 to go!) and I’m in nursing school and loviiiing every part of it!

It feels so good to have found something i do love and just can’t wait to start working (but studies first!). It’s quite an organization with 3 kids, the house and the school work but it’s going smoothly.

Rachel is growing fast and in first grade now (she’s 7). She played soccer all summer and she will start dancing lessons soon and just can’t wait for it 🙂

Camille is now 12 and in grade 6 and wants to go to International program in high school. She is still scouting and so is Julien. She is growing to be a fine woman with such an easy going way!

Julien is now 10 and in grade 5. He loves soccer, gaming and playing with friends.  He’s talking as much as he used to hehe!

I still love to photograph but don’t have much time and inspiration  now since I’m very tired with school and everything, but once in a while I’m lucky to capture something special 😉

I won’t be writing much here since life got so busy, but I got my first cell phone (iPhone woot woot!) and opened an Instagram account yeah! so I’ll be busy over here if you still wanna know what’s is going around my place 🙂 (and what I’m sewing and everything!) (follow me culdesacetcie )

I’ve been missing you guys, and would love to follow you on Instagram so please join me in the fun!

a new look!

have you seen my new header!!? Isn’t it nice looking! I went and lucked out on the best graphic designer 🙂 ok, to tell the truth, she asked me if I was interested to have my own personal custom made business signature…  I went and I looked up her design page and really like what a saw there, so as you can guess I said yes! And ever glad I did!   Ah! this is much much,  a whole world of much better than Vista Print! I loved working with Audrey 🙂 Everything went so smoothly. I got to know her a bit and I think we have lots in common, fell in love with her blog and just wish I’ll meet her sometimes soon for real…

So, this is my new business signature  🙂 the curly bits are for my bouclenoire part from my curly hair, and the dotty bits and the needle is for sewing and hand embroidering and Audrey used the way I’m writing in her font. I fell in love with that signature when I first saw it! So me!

She made me a new timeline picture for my fan page and provided the signature and bunting part with transparent background to use as watermark on my pictures and to help me make whatever header I wanted (so I made my WordPress header myself  using pic monkey 🙂

Thanks Audrey for asking me out of my comfort zone!! I’m so happy I did!

Avez-vous vu ma nouvelle bannière WordPress !? Elle est magnifique n’est-ce pas! Ça fait parti du beau travail qu’Adrey d’Envol design m’a concocté! J’ai donc maintenant une nouvelle signature pour Cul de Sac, une nouvelle bannière pour ma page Facebook, et bientôt de nouvelles cartes d’affaires!  J’ai tellement hâte de les recevoir 🙂 J’aime comment elle a crée ma signature, elle s’est inspirée de mes cheveux et de mon autre nom, bouclenoire, pour les petites spirales, les pointillés et l’aiguille sont pour la broderie et la couture et elle s’est inspirée de mon écriture pour créer les lettres (font). La couleur rouge est ma couleur préférée 😉 Et ça le tout me va comme un gant! J’ai même ma signature en format transparent pour ajouter sur mes photos. Dire que je suis super satisfaite du résultat n’est pas assez fort…! Merci belle Audrey pour ton superbe travail!

the going on…

Hey guys!

Now, go get up, pour yourself a big glass of water (or wine…  your liking!), grab that throw pillow and sit comfortably in your favorite chair. Yep. This is going to be a looooong post! Are you ready for the ride?!

Still trying to figure out where to start with all this…

Ok, let’s try with my Facebook fan page….

Back 2 months or 2 1/2 months ago, my fan page was sitting there with its lucky 295 fans. everything was smooth and cool. My friend Mélissa over at Rizada asked on her fan page (over 2000 fans!!) for people with a crafty page to link up in the comments so we could discover new talents… which i did! and then, with that link, reached the 340 fans. Next thing I know? Facebook is sending me (?) an email congratulating me to reaching over 300 fans along with  50$ coupon for advertisement (?) I was like.. really???

Ok, if you have been wondering if Facebook advertisement is working.. the answer is: HELL YEAH! I made the advertisement only for Québec and went to 340 something to over 840 fans in less than a month… WOAH! can we say c.r.a.z.y here?! I was kind of overwhelmed with that. And not prepare a bit to received that overflowing of custom orders that went with it! I got about 15 custom requests in less than 2 weeks and was having anxiety over them since I was trying to figure out how to keep track of everything! My small dry erase picture frame wasn’t gonna make it… actually I think I heard it agonizing…

Enter superman: aka hubby. Did I ever say that accountants are boring? Scratch that. He just snapped his magic and easily made me an awesome  google doc with many boards to follow my sales, production and orders! (ok, they can still be boring sometimes… ha!) That helped me a lot  to stay organized and keep track of everything (with even the numbers adding to themselves… told you! Magic!) even my Facebook email links are there so I don’t have to sift through all emails to find the one that request that special order.

Now back to that facebook page… (you still there??)  Many people asked if they could drive and get their custom order themselves instead of me shipping it out… that wasn’t a problem but on my page I had listed that my small business was in Montréal since I thought it would be easier to discover if I listed the big city instead of my small south-shore town. Being tired of explaining to every and single one that I wasn’t exactly on the island I got up and changed it to my real city on my page. Next morning?? there was a journalist sending an email to ask if he could interview me for the local paper (with photograph and all!) WHAT THE….???? I jumped up and down said yes, of course!!  So, i spend more than 2 hours with that nice journalist (with him even dolling out tips!) had the photograph in and 2 weeks later I was feature in the local papers! ( the net version, in french, and please, just skip the picture…) It’s kind of weird going to the grocery store and having people say to you: Hey, I saw you in the paper! That was an experience!! It made some people call to request more custom orders… ( have you heard me whisper: panicking! here?)

All that while preparing for a big craft fair that I was helping to make it happens… (ok, maybe, I said, maybe I wasn’t whispering… i might have cry  Panicking out loud!)

and then, that nice journalist told me, since he’s from the old generation, he would have like my phone number to be on my fan page because he would have prefer to call me instead of typing out an email. Since I’m a good girl (?) i followed his tip and went and added it to the page.

Three days later? I had a well known (but for me!) Lady calling in to ask if they could feature me on the weekly well knwon magazine we have here in Québec (it’s called Le Lundi)..  I was listening to the lady while looking at my hubby wondering if it was a prank or something… here’s the proof it wasn’t….

Sooooooo, I had my big craft fair (everything went well, thank you very much!), still working my way out of my custom request list (being out of it should happen sometimes in the upcoming year!), and still trying to adjust myself to the busy schedule and feeling of craziness… (that may or may not subdued in the following months…)! I do have lots of stuff to share here since I haven’t written much in the last months 😉 And glad that I’m back to read all the wonderful stories and projects you shared. I’ve missed you. More than I can say!

Still alive!

Hey peeps! Yep, still alive 🙂 I’ve missed you so much guys… Just can’t wait to be back on the blog-o-sphere and read what you have all have been up to, and commenting and spreading some blog love to my heart content! I’ll be surely emerging from the business craziness fog next week… with my big craft fair saturday, I’ll be back to myself again after some rest sunday ah! It’s 2 in the morning here… I thought I wasn’t that stressed out but my body is telling me otherwise 😦 I went to bed before the kiddos with a migraine, and now I can’t sleep anymore and have heart burns… crazy body.

I have so much stuff to tell you…! Looks like the business is taking off 🙂 but more on that next week. In the meanwhile, I hope everyone will have a great weekend and that you are all safe and sound! Love you all! Lots.

(sorry for the lack of pictures haha!)

(LOL what the h… with wordpress?? they suggested for tags: mental-health, aviation, transportation and gaming….! )

French toasts!

I’m sure everyone has a good recipe for that…. but mine is better 🙂 don’t you think it’s like the spaghetti sauce recipe? everyone has the best one!

But my recipe for french toasts has a secret ingredient for it that is making a nice crunchy outer layer…

I always make it around this time of the year since my husband always get a loaf of bread from work in march… don’t ask, we don’t even remember why they are getting it 😉 And since it’s not a really good loaf I always use it to make french toasts, to my kids delight!

First thing, you need to have stale bread. Using fresh bread will make your toasts soggy and slump.  Since the bread we get is quite dry, i just let it sit unwrapped on the counter for a whole 24 hours. Switching side once in a while to make sure it dries evenly.

Next, you need to slice you bread about 1/2 inches thick. (if your bread is really moist, slice and let stale half a day or a whole day)

And then you make the eggs mix 🙂

here’s my recipe:

4 eggs

1 to 1 1/2  cup milk

a bit of vanilla

and …. a big table spoon of granulated sugar! (that’s my secret ingredient….!)

Whisk everything well in a big bowl.

heat a skillet over medium high with BUTTER! (do yourself a favor, and please use butter!)

when your skillet is ready, working quickly coat your slices of bread with the egg mix, you DO NOT want the bread to suck it up. You  really just want to coat it quick. and just do the right number of slices for your skillet. Do not prepare more bread in the mix if they are not ready to go into the skillet.

let the bread get as golden as you like it and serve with a good maple sirup!!! The sugar will make a nice crunchy outer layer 🙂

We had ours with a nice side dish of fruit salad Rachel made all by herself!

Ma petite recette de pain doré 🙂 avec un ingrédient secret qui vous fait une bel extérieur croustillant!
Premièrement, vous aurez besoin d’un pain rassis (qui a séché quelque temps, pas un pain frais et tout moelleux!)
que vous couperez en tranche de 1/2 pouces.
Mélangez ensemble dans un grand bol:
4 oeufs
1 à 1 1/2 tasse de lait
un peu d’essence de vanille
et…. une grosse cuillère à soupe de sucre granulé! (le sucre va vous donner une bel extérieur croquant!)
Faites chauffer un poêlon à medium-high avec du BEURRE! (ok, laisser faire le régime et faites-vous plaisir! utiliser du beurre!)
En travaillant rapidement, trempez vos tranches de pain dans le mélange d’oeufs, ne les laissez pas se gorger du mélange, une trempette très rapide seulement et ajouter à votre poêlon. Cuire des 2 côtés jusqu’au degré de doré souhaité. Ne préparez pas d’avance les tranches de pain dans le mélange, sinon vous aurez des tranches de pain détrempées et molles.
Servir avec une bonne dose de sirop d’érable! et une salade de fruits préparée avec amour par une petite fille de 5 ans!

Preschool

Thursdays are Rachel Preschool days. She goes in for about 2 hours on those afternoons.

I can’t tell you how excited she is to go to school! She asks almost every day if it’s HER day 😉

and she just can’t wait to go all week long as her big brother and sister do, and taking that bus too! and having her own lunchbox! *sigh* I don’t have babies anymore… 😉

Last week I went in with her and took pictures.

I loved seeing how well and at ease she is. She’s sucking every things up, participating,  and working and being her best!

They finished some crafts, tried to continue lines, played, ate their snacks, read a story and sang and danced.

She was really happy to have me there and so proud to show me what she could do and being all big girl!

Les jeudis après-midi Rachel va à la prématernelle! Elle aime tellement ça, elle demande à tous les jours si aujourd’hui elle va à l’école comme son grand frère et sa grande soeur.. Elle veut prendre l’autobus, avoir sa boîte à lunch. 

La semaine dernière, je suis allée avec elle passer l’après-midi. Ce qu’elle était contente! Elle pouvait finalement me montrer toutes les activités auxquels elle prend part, et montrer comment elle est une grande fille! *soupir* mais où sont passés mes bébés???

Les copains ont donc fait la causerie, un bricolage, les jeux la collation, un travail écrit, l’histoire et les chansons. Ouf, ça fait un 2 heures bien rempli!

iPad case with removable gadget pouch

A nice lady asked if I could make her a iPad case with a removable gadget pouch for when she’s traveling…

We chatted on Facebook for quite a bit and ends up she’s living about 3 houses from my place! How fun!

So she came in and we choose the fabrics for the kit. I am so happy with how it turned out! I draw the pouch and wasn’t sure if it would be too small, but no, it’s perfect for the charger and cord 🙂

I used a longer strap for the pouch so it can be tied on the case when you need it and removable if you don’t!

Made from a necktie, pants, linen, nightgown, batting and a bracelet (used as a strap).

Une dame m’a demandé si je faisais des étuis à iPad avec un petit étui pour le chargeur et son fils…
En discutant avec elle sur Facebook, nous nous sommes rendues compte qu’elle habite à 3 maisons de chez moi!!! Trop drôle! Elle est donc venue et ensemble nous avons choisi les tissus pour son étui. Je me suis donc dessiné un patron pour faire le petit étui et je voulais qu’on puisse l’enlevé lorsqu’on en a pas besoin.
Je suis tout à fait satisfaite du résultat! Le bracelet sert aussi de ganse et fait plus féminin.
Le tout est fait d’un pantalon, chemise de nuit, restes de lin, bourre, cravate (bien sûr!) et bracelet.

New product!

Hehe!

Source: i66.photobucket.com via Josée on Pinterest

 

I love knitting. That is when my wrists let me knit a bit 😉 And at night, I’m way too tired to do something productive, even knitting  my shawl (no. I’m not done yet, but almost!) is too much often sometimes. Let say I was kind of tired of fingerless mitts….

 

So I thought of a way to be 1: productive and 2: be knitting! Enter this:

I know, I didn’t invented the wheel here, but it’s cute, functional, quick and fun to make!

Some of those coffee sleeves are adorned with recycled fabric covered buttons, some with a fake tea pouch.

They all made using reclaimed yarns of course 🙂

Have you seen my neat and great cardboard display for them!!?? I’m sooo happy with my drawing!  Just a look and you know what this product is use for. It will be a good thing for my fabric coffee sleeves since people at craft fairs were putting them on their wrist like a bracelet lol! Still need to make more, but i need to buy white cardboard first. I won’t be giving them away so when I’ll have enough made I will just use them over and over 😉 I think it looks really professional!

J’aime beaucoup le tricot… mais je suis bien trop fatiguée le soir pour tricoter mon châle en dentelle et de perles. Et puis, j’ai souvent trop mal aux poignets pour pouvoir m’y mettre vraiment. Je me suis donc trouvée un projet intéressant, vite fait et utile! Les manchons à café tricotés! Tous faits de laines recyclées (la plupart du temps de vieux chandails ou vestes) certains ont un bouton recyclé recouvert de tissu tandis que d’autre un semblant de poche de thé 😉 Je me suis même dessinée de beaux portes manchons en carton! J’en suis tellement contente! Maintenant on peut voir du premier coup d’oeil l’utilité de la chose… et les gens arrêteront de porter mes manchons en tissu autours de leur poignet lorsque je serai en exposition haha! Et mes cartons donnent un look professionnel à mon kiosque, enfin je pense…!

Hum….. hello??!

Yep, I’m still alive 🙂 and quite busy! Sorry I fell of the map for a couple of weeks… But lots is happening 😉

This morning we woke up to this…

and no electricity.

and an emergency water sump pump not working. In fact instead of removing water, it was adding more, making a flood on the floor… For which we spent half an hour going up and down the stairs with buckets of water. Let’s call that an early not funny work out. I made a trip to my front neighbor so he could call to know if school was open 😉 which was!

I really feel that I’m drowning into white cold fluffy cotton balls… Pictures was taken from my front and back porches since it was still snowing and didn’t want the camera to get wet.

Here’s a shot of my temporary fridge… 😉

My small sewing business seems to be taking off, but I’ll write more on that later ha!

Oui, oui, je suis toujours bien vivante…. et très occupée! Y’a tout plein de belles choses qui m’arrivent, mais je vous en parlerai plus tard!

Ce matin, nous nous sommes réveillés sous une belle couverture de neige! Sans électricité… et sans une pompe de puisard de secours fonctionnelle… Elle est connectée sur l’eau de la ville, au lieu de sortir l’eau du puisard, elle en rajoutait. Nous avons donc passé une bonne demie heure à écoper; monter et descendre les marches avec des sceaux et des sceaux d’eau! Un petit entraînement matinal pas vraiment amusant.  Les photos ont été prises sur les bords des portes avant et arrière. Je ne voulais surtout pas mouiller ma super caméra (assez, l’eau!). On a vraiment l’impression d’être entouré d’une belle ouate blanche 😉

Pattern try: Hans

Hey! You might think I dropped from the surface of the earth lol! I’ve been busy sewing, sewing, sewing like crazy 🙂 Making necktie bags, and custom orders. (I’ll post them later) and making dolls…

A nice lady asked for 3 dolls, one for each of her children. And one of her kids is a boy. You know me, can’t resist a Retromama pattern.

And timely she posted for sale a boy doll. His name’s Hans and he’s just awesome! So sweet looking! What a great excuse to yet buy another of her patterns lol!

I named mine Henri, he’s made from jeans (reminder to self: never use this stuff for Henri ever again, way too thick!) 2 men’s shirts, and t-shirts. I like using t-shirts instead of felt, first because it’s way cheaper, second because it makes me use my scarves remnants so less waste, and third it is really soft for kids!

I omitted the suspenders since the jeans was already thick and the pockets are functional! He was more time consuming than the girlies since he’s more detailed. But love the end product!

Here’s his 2 sisters…

Made from capri pants, and fabric remnant,t-shirts, beige fabric is from a linen coat.

Made from a skirt, fabric remnants and t-shirts

some group shots 🙂

 

Une gentille dame  m’a demandé de lui coudre 3 poupées, une pour chacun de ses enfants! alors voilà, un essai d’un nouveau patron pour le garçon 🙂 Il est tellement mignon  quoique plus long à coudre que ses soeurs, il a tellement de détails! Les poches sont fonctionnelles 🙂 IL est fait de jeans, 2 chemises pour homme, lin beige et t-shirts.  Très satisfaite du résultat final!