Future Momo Jewelry

New swap goodies

I just did a little swap with someone from Swap-Bot for some profile based surprises.  I was very pleasantly surprised by what I got from her.

Lots of French-themed things to play with.  I love the Eiffel Tower ribbon!  Plus some postcards because I collect those.  Love it!

I sent her a ton of origami paper, stationery, kawaii things, and some tea and postcards.

She really likes kawaii things and origami paper and I had so much of it that I wasn't using, I sent her as much as I could pack into the envelope.  I really hope she likes it all!

I also just picked up Easy Elegance by Atlanta Bartlett and it's amazing gorgeous.  I wish my house could like look every single picture in this book! 

It's super inspiring - go check it out!

Tags swap

I recently did joined a tag swap on Swap-bot just to force myself to finally get into the making pretty things world. The swap was for a group called Somerset Style that is based on artwork from the Somerset line of magazines. I've been too intimidated to participate in some of the swaps so far (like making a Marie Antoinette shoe), but this swap for a set of adorned tea-dyed tags was a great way to get some practice.

The swap was just for one decorated tag with a minimum of 1 yard of ribbon plus a piece of bling - super simple!  

My partner's favorite colors are sage green and mauve, so I headed to the fancy schmancy fabric store downtown to find some ribbon and lace in her favorite colors.  I got lucky and found a lovely sage green lace and a mauve ribbon, plus a beautiful cream colored Anna Sui lace - on sale! 

 

I tied on a vintage chandelier piece and added in a couple extra tags tied together with a vintage beaded button. 

 

Simple, but cute.  She loved it all, luckily.  I had to ship to Australia too, but fortunately it wasn't super expensive.

 

From my swap partner, I got

Pretty color coordinated laces, velvet ribbon and little birdie set cabochon and a handstamped tag

 

The tags she sent are pretty cool - she made them herself (a punch?) and they are huge - almost the size of a hand - for plenty of decoration possibilities for the extras she sent me.  I feel kind of bad I didn't send along an extra decorated one to my partner now, but she still loved everything so it's okay - next time!

Overseas mail goodies

I've been on Swap-Bot a lot lately doing some small swaps for new edible treats from other countries.  This last week, I really scored with an amazing package from Norway and a surprise early birthday treat from the US from another Swap Both member.

From Norway, I got delicious hot chocolate to try.  The La Festa one is marzipan flavor! 

And lots and lots of interesting new teas to taste...

I wish I knew what some of these were!  Luckily the pictures usually give clues.

I've only tried three so far, but they've all been really good.  Somehow, even Lipton's tastes good with another language on it!

And then an even bigger surprise came in the mail... I came home one day to find an Amazon box on my doorstep and was racking my brain trying to remember what I had bought and when I opened it up I found....

A Numi tea gift set!  I've always wanted to try one of their flowering teas and now I have nine different ones - how cool is that?

Complete with a little teapot.

I was so excited when I got both of these and even on difficult days, it's so heartening to think of the kindness of strangers sending these wonderful packages!

Catching up

It's been a very busy week for me, but it's been great to be so busy and to get to see friends.  On Wednesday, I went out with two friends for dinner for a very late Christmas get together.  One of the friends is moving on Monday down to Hollister, about an hour south of San Francisco, for work.  She runs an organic produce service that has exploded in popularity the past couple of years and needs to move closer to the farms where she gets her produce from.  It's sad to see her go, but she'll still be close by and it's better for her because she won't have to commute really far every week like she's been doing for years.   And because it's cheaper there, she and her husband can afford to rent a house, so I'm jealous!

She made me some homemade strawberry blueberry jam and also gave me a really nice sweet pea and vanilla candle and a set of nice bird correspondence cards.
 

And last night, my friend called me out of the blue and said she'd come over with her little girl, Lorelei, whom I haven't seen since her baptism in October.  She's getting so big and is walking and starting to talk already, so it's so cute to see her growing.  She'll be 1 next month so they are starting to plan the birthday party.


She's so happy, just always smiling and laughing, at least when I see her!  But my friend says she's a pretty good baby and doesn't cry and stuff too much so that's good.  I can't wait til her birthday party.

I am also super excited because I just signed up for my first ever art workshop weekend - La Petite Maison Blanc, hosted by Kim Caldwell.

 

I am really looking forward to finally attending one of these awesome weekends and meeting some great, artistic ladies.   There will be three projects, taught by the inspirational Pam Garrison, Amy Hanna and Teresa McFayden, and all the projects are related to the home.  I'll be going down on a Friday and have the classes on Sunday, so I'll have to find something to do on Saturday but that shouldn't be a problem.  Yay!

I also just completed a swap with Jenna.  I sent her some of my soaps and she sent me this cute custom made pinnie

 

Jenna gave me my choices of fabrics and I think this color combo came out really cute.  Now I need to get crafting and use it!

She also sent some nice papers and ribbons for crafting along with it

 

The weather has also been beautiful and very un-winterlike.  It's been about 70 or so every day for the last week and should last a few more days, so I will be enjoying it.   It's so strange that other people are experiencing Arctic freezes right now when I'm about to head for the beach, though.  Climate change.  What can you say.

Okay, going to clean up a bit and take a nice walk on the beach!

Catching up

I had a pretty busy weekend, so I am still catching up with everything that happened.

On Saturday night, I got together with old high school friends to see one friend who is leaving for Texas soon.  It's the first time she's ever moved away from the San Francisco area (the rest of our group have and have come back) and so it's a pretty big deal.  It's not very likely she'll ever move back here since her boyfriend is in the Coast Guard and they'll be getting married pretty soon.  Anyway, we all got together for a bbq and to celebrate our other friend's new baby, Lorelei. Isn't she cute?  She's the first one of our little group to have a kid (and to get married, actually.  The rest of us are pretending to be adults.) so we're all very excited about her arrival. 

I also got one part of a tea swap that I am in and got some yummy sounding things.  The teas were from the Netherlands.  The teas are smooth apple & cinnamon, rich almond taste & orange, refreshing air (what does air taste like?), sweet apricot & honey, ceylon, Brazilian baia, Russian taiga, chai thee, soft & sweet spices and sinaasappel, which I think is orange.  Interesting names and I am sure I will have fun trying them all out.  I'm still waiting for my other swap package from the Czech Republic too.

I also managed to go to an estate sale and picked up a cute little toddler's dress with a fleur de lys pattern in pink and aqua.  I was going to use it for the fabric, but I tried it on and it actually fits me as a tank top, so I'll probably just wear it.  Well, after I lose about 5 pounds it'll fit better! 

And I also got a pretty embroidered tablecloth that is virtually stain free and in good condition, which I'll use for something.  I couldn't get a decent shot of it draped over a table, but it's pretty large and is circular with a scalloped edge.