It’s been 1.5 years of hardcore Madness for this family, for this Momma. Making my blog public and sharing with you my love of handmade and homemade everything has turned into so much more!  I’m back into clay work, finally selling on Etsy, planning my melon trellis, writing my ode to Nutella, COMPETING in crochet design battles and planning a crafters’ retreat for Spring 2014. A few short, busy months has brought about more changes than I can reasonably keep up with but I’m loving the challenge. Thank you folks for supporting me along the way.

TODAY is the day I’ve been waiting for. It’s been weeks now since I found out that I’d been accepted to compete in the Design Wars Challenge and TODAY the final product pics were released and voting has started! Eeeeeeeeeep!!! My design is called the Happy Everything Motif, and I would love your votes but I really want you to vote your conscience and vote for YOUR FAVORITE DESIGN.

Red Heart yarns is sponsoring this amazing event as well!!! No joke! Red Heart!! Not only have they provided the lovely yarn for us (more about that later) but they are providing a gift basket to one of the Voters as well! (Details can be found here.)

Throughout the competition, I’ve been able to interact with the other designers (some were friends already, some are handmade heroes of mine and some are new to me) and let me tell you something, THESE LADIES ARE AMAZING!  I’m going to be taking some time here on the blog to do a post about them, and highlight their individual styles and passions. Though this is a battle of sorts, as we pit our design skill against one another, we are also caught up in mutual respect for each others skills and styles. I love this group of talented Ladies and cannot wait to share more about each one of them with you.

In the meantime, make sure you head over to the Design Wars blog to see what they have each designed and to cast your vote~ YOU CAN VOTE EVERY TWELVE HOURS FOR TWO WEEKS, so be sure to make a note to return as often as you can to let your voice be heard.

Below is a pic of my sneak peek photo (mistake and all) . . . before you head over there to see the finished design feel free to leave a comment below with what you think the finished item is.

When the Design Wars Challenge is officially done and the votes have been tallied, I’ll be making the pattern available on Craftsy, Etsy and Ravelry. Can’t wait to show you more pics of the projects I’m making with it.

Are you familiar with Design Wars? It’s a wonderful crochet design challenge hosted by Baca Creations and now sponsored by Red Heart Yarns. I’ve been following this event since it started two rounds ago and one of my crochet world buddies won the DW2 challenge last time! Congratulations Jonna (Frayed Knot)!

So I’m writing this post to tell you about this awesome, incredible and inspiring event and also to announce that for some reason THEY ARE LETTING ME COMPETE IN THIS ROUND!!!! Whoohoo!!!!!

I received all of my gorgeous yarn from Red Heart and now I’m in the design phase. What an exciting venture this is going to be!

I can’t divulge too much just yet but I can say that starting tomorrow (4-24) there are going to be giveaways EVERY SINGLE DAY FOR 40 DAYS and SUPER DISCOUNTS IN EACH NEWSLETTER but you have to sign up for it in order to get the discount codes.

Thank you for coming along on this ride enjoy the DW3 challenge!!

I’ll be offering free patterns and Love Handles throughout the 40 days of freebies so be sure to follow the DW Facebook page to keep up with how to enter for each day’s goodies. Good luck!

I’m convinced that if we spent more time collaborating, then the millions of cottage industries around this country, and even the world, would be be able to make a dent in our own family economies. All us little guys sticking it out together are bound to be able to stand up and shout over the noise of the mundane, the massed produced, the monotonous.  VIVA LA HANDMADE REVOLUCION! I may not be Pancho Via, but I’m ready to overthrow the status quo.

Are you ready to join the Handmade Revolution? Buy Indie, Give Handmade! The amazing Merchants are counting on Folks like YOU to visit, to share and to shop BUT TODAY, THEY ARE GIVING SOMETHING AWAY!

Please follow this link, and enter to WIN $175 IN MAD MONEY! Good luck, may the Force be with you, may the Spirit of the Revolution free your soul!

There’s a lot more going on too. All quite suddenly, I’m so busy with Mad Mad me that I cannot keep up. How does this happen? It started exactly on January 1st, and has only gotten busier in a wonderful and exciting way. Wanna know what’s in the works?

I’ve started a professional network of handmade businesses and have about 60 amazing shops involved that truly represent the most talented Ladies I’ve had the pleasure to know. The group is called Mad Mad Makers, and my socks are being knocked off daily!

I have an active Etsy shop, finally!! My dream of helping Momma owned and handmade businesses is coming true. I’ve made some local contacts and I’m feeling brave enough to plan a yarn-centric meetup with some online friends (very brave indeed for me). And I’m going to be reaching out to a couple of local businesses to work on building a local Mad Mad me community and to start planning a Mad Crafters retreat for Spring of 2014!!!  On top of these exciting events, we’ve got a logo revamp by the amazing Mad Queen Mother (thanks Mom) and even graphics for my network group! So much, so fast, and it’s so exciting. Thank you Lord in Heaven for your rich and unexpected blessings!

You are so appreciated folks, I can never express my gratitude fully for your support and encouragement. So ‘muuaaahhhh!!’ a big smacker for you.

For the past two months we’ve been sick, infected, dizzy and busy. This old woman needs a real live break from the norm. And I could not be happier that Spring (the real deal, not the the calendar event) is just around the corner.

I’ve got grand plans with my outdoor space, we are in a different house this year, so I have to start over on my beds for the garden, but that is always fun. I’m definitely going to go melon crazy this year, with trellises and lots of lovely hanging melons that I cannot get in the stores.

And I’ve FINALLY picked up my clay work again. Really and truly picked it up and run with it. It’s been years since I’ve created new canes and I’m very out of practice but it is slowly coming back to me. I’ve got some pictures to show you all my first creative passion (besides guitar and singing).

I started working with Polymer clay when I was 17 years old, 24 years ago. And it is my first crafty love.
Here is the part that is simplest to do but the most difficult to plan. What shall I make this time? How shall I combine the colors this time? The endless possibilities are just boggling.

It was fun making anatomically incorrect butterflies, my ode to the 70′s.
And then applying the canework to various crochet hooks. Combining my two crafts is quite fun.
The ‘stained glass’ looking canes are still my favorite. There is no end to combining color and shapes and both the symmetry and contrast are very appealing to me.

More hooks!
This is my new workstation. I’ve got this set up in the corner of our bedroom and the creative clutter is both exciting and overwhelming at the same time. Thank goodness it stays over there, in the corner.

Hooks can be purchased in my Etsy shop.

Granny squares are easily my favorite crochet items. I’m amazed how they can showcase a lovely yarn, be made in any color, size, theme and then connected in a million different ways to create gabillion different creations.

So the idea of making granny squares for a purpose, to help others and to bring comfort to hurting families makes perfect sense to me.

Join the Love is a young organization, really just a group of people, that have come together to create memory blankets for families suffering from the recent loss of a child. Nothing can or will ever fill the void that a child has left behind, but when a family receives a blanket from Join the Love, they know that their child is not forgotten and that there are caring folks out there that are praying for them and thinking about them. Ultimately, the blanket is telling the families that they are not alone and that their child lives on in love, in memory and in eternity.

What started as a handful of women, making a few memory blankets, has blossomed into a network of over 100 volunteers and more requests than the group can keep up with. If you make granny squares, won’t you please consider donating your compassion, one square at a time, to Join the Love?

Join the Love is looking for avid square makers and skillful assemblers as well. The volunteers are worldwide, the need is universal, unfortunately there will always be families that are suffering this particular loss. If you are interested in volunteering, please visit this page to find out more.

If you have the skill and time, please search your heart to see if you have room to help, thank you.

This is her pattern (you can purchase it here). I had great time with this pattern, the Granny Square she wrote up is a perfect square, and I love perfect geometrics. This purse worked up very quickly too and testing the pattern for her pushed me to get it completely finished, thank goodness, because my life can currently be defined as a collection of works in progress.

Enjoy the photos!

I used Red Heart Boutique Treasure yarn for the colors here, the warm tones are from the colorway called Abstract, the cool colors are from the colorway called Watercolors, and Caron Simply Soft for the cream.  I lined the bag with muslin and I’m no seamstress so the inside looks a bit like a grade school Mother’s Day present but it does the job.

Until February 15th, Mad Mad me is sponsoring a giveaway with over 100 vendors. Each vendor offering something handmade, or an item that can be used to make something handmade. I promise that you will be inspired and excited as you browse through the album to see what is being offered.

To enter this Giant Amazing Giveaway, please head over to the Giveaway Page.  I’ve added a collage of just a handful of items to tease you. But really, there are dozens and dozens more. Enjoy!

This giveaway has ended…

We’ve been toying with the idea of making homemade marshmallows for a long time, but the recipes are so complicated that “thinking about it” is usually as far as we get. Until now.

Did I find a less complicated recipe? No. Did I get suckered by a two minute Chow video that made it look “so easy”? Yes. Yes I did. And the sticky sugar BOMB that became my counters, stoves, utensils, stand mixer, pot and self, were enough for me to feel just a bit frustrated that my now sticky sugar coated Boy had talked me into this. What was I thinking?

But the six hour wait time for the mallows to firm up gave me all the time I needed to soak everything down and de-sugar my kitchen. Would I even want to eat a marshmallow now? became the question.

So we waited. . . Have you ever tried to convince a seven year old boy to wait six hours for one marshmallow. Another hurdle. (tick tock tick tock)

Done! Slice them, coat them, eat them and WOW! It’s a completely different animal than the Jet Puff. (And to think, about six hours earlier I had considered chucking my mess and buying a bag for The Boy.) They were delicious, the recipe is available at Chow, and if you dare brave the mess, it will definitely win you some extra “Mommy love” points in the long run. Enjoy!

Then I found a cookbook that has become my favorite, The Joy of Cooking (the 1945 edition). You know that the first recipe I tried was, of course, the gingerbread recipe. And it passed the test and met my personal criteria with flying, merry Christmas colors.

I also enjoy altering a good recipe to make it fit all of my purposes, rather than spending ten more years hunting down the next perfect recipe. This recipe creates that classically dark gingerbread cookie, but sometimes, for the sake of interest and to add more variety in building elements, I want a more ‘blonde’ version. Something that fits all the above criteria, but contrasts the dark so we can make contrasting roofs or marbled cookies. I’ve included my own alternate ingredients to create a ‘blonde’  version in the parenthesis following the original ingredient.

(Recipe and information continue below photos…)

They had to test the gingerbread house decorations before they started. It was like setting a plate of Christmas magic down in front of them.

Three icing bags ready to go for three sets of eager hands.

This is how light the Blonde Gingerbread dough works up.

The Boy is my Christmas elf. He LOVES Christmas and all of the traditions that go along with it. He’s kept me on track with gifts, lists, decorating and wrapping presents. He is such a blessing!

Big Sister focuses on precision for the moment, I’ll get a pic of hers when she’s spent her hours designing and finishing it.

And here is The Boy’s creation, he did the whole thing by himself and couldn’t be prouder.

Gingerbread Cookies (blonde version substitute in parenthesis):
¹/₄ cup butter
¹/₂ cup brown sugar (blonde: ¹/₂ cup white sugar)
¹/₂ cup molasses (blonde: ¹/₂ cup corn syrup)
3 ¹/₂ cups, all-purpose flour
1 tsp baking soda
¹/₄ tsp cloves
¹/₂ tsp cinnamon
1 tsp ginger
¹/₂ tsp salt
¹/₄ cup warm water
My own additions (optional):
2 Tablespoons orange zest
1 tsp vanilla

Cream the butter and molasses together in one bowl (this is where you would add the orange zest and vanilla as well). In another bowl combine all the dry ingredients (original recipe asks to sift, but I don’t). To the creamed mixture, add ¹/₃ of the dry mixture and mix until stiff, then add ¹/₃ of the water, do this until dough is combined. The dough will be stiff, but moist when touched. Depending on the weather and moisture of other ingredients, I’ve had to use more or less water by a few tablespoons. I cheat and use a stand mixer, this dough is very thick and would be a bear to make without it, but it can be done.