Leisure Society Shop Is Open!

Psst, please visit my shop on Etsy! I am working on more pillows and a little booklet to hold all of your embroidery needles. Please check back often to see new styles.

www.leisuresociety.etsy.com

Pillows

My first batch of pillows are almost ready! The printed fabric on the fronts are vintage fabrics I have picked up here and there. The backs are solid, made with either reclaimed or new fabric. The fluffy inserts have filling made from recycled soda bottles. Now I am going to add a little hand-embroidered "graphic" to each one and they'll be ready for sale on Etsy and hopefully a few other places. Any feedback would be much appreciated.

Happy New Year

I had a quiet New years in the Catskills at this cabin we rented with some friends. No cable, no phone, no internet. There was a DVD player though. We cooked dinner, played Cranium, read books, talked, and watched the fire in the wood-burning stove. At midnight, we had our own countdown around the kitchen stove's digital clock. We had no noisemakers, so we used pots and pans to make lots of noise and ring in the new year. One night, we went night snow-tubing at a near-by ski resort. That was really, really fun!! I haven't had that much fun since I jumped off the high dive at Scott's this summer or got pulled around the lake on a tube by a motorboat. Wait, I see a tubing trend here.

For a few minutes, I felt like I missed out on something more raucous or social. But I know I didn't miss a thing. I was exactly where I was supposed to be.

The Cure For Anything Is Salt Water

OMG, I am so sorry I haven't blogged in so long! The holidays really got me into a lazy funk for a little while. But I'm back! And lazier than ever. No, just kidding. I have been trying to get up earlier while still maintaining a life of leisure. I received lots of Christmas gifts that are helping with Leisure Society. I got a few embroidery books, embroidery floss and hoops, an amazingly cute tiny paper cutter, just to rattle off a few. I got a great book called The Cure For Anything Is Salt Water, How I Threw My Life Overboard and Found Happiness At Sea by Mary South. It's an amazing, inspiring book by a woman who walked away from a big job in publishing, sold her house, and bought a 30 ton steel trawler boat. She took a short course in seamanship and set out on a journey from Florida to Maine with her 2 dogs and a classmate. As you may or may not know, my true home is the ocean so I absolutely loved the book. She braves storms, running aground, near-accidents, and comes through a first rate captain. As it says in the book, "Smooth seas do not make skillful sailors."

The pics above are of the lighthouse in CT that I grew up looking at. The kiddies are my niece and nephew on their first sailing trip. Ah, to be at sea.

Have a Very Leisurely Holiday

Here is what I have been doing to prepare for the upcoming holiday! Our Christmas tree is only 3 feet tall but I love it just the same. I made amazing peanut butter chocolate cookies and sugar cookies with neon icing. I made some really cute holiday cards for our loved ones. I decorated our wreath with some silver ornaments to spruce up our stairwell. I sure enjoyed that winter snowstorm, and didn't even need to leave the house all day! Phew! I think I am ready. Now I want to be relaxing by a fire with a good book and a cup of hot cocoa. I think you should do that now too. Happy New Year!

I Notice Things Now

I was walking in my favorite neighborhood, Chelsea, the other day and I noticed all these cool things I had just been skipping over before. I used to be in a mad rush all the time, on the verge of tears because I was always late, just stewing in my yucky thoughts. I feel like I just woke up again. I used to live in Chelsea for many years, and it has always been an area that is so beautiful to me (even before all the galleries took over). The quality of sunlight on 23rd Street between 8th and 9th Avenues is so clear and fresh and cheerful in the morning. So I decided to snap some photos of things I noticed, some for the first time. It's so nice to be out in the city during the day, and not chained to a desk or in a meeting.

Giving Thanks

It's that time of year again, and I have lots of families to see up over the holidays. We spent this Thanksgiving with my Dad and Stepmom up in the northwest corner of CT. The rest of my family spent the day together in another part of Connecticut. Since I knew we wouldn't be there, I sent my Mom two of those paper fold-out turkeys and wrote "Matt" on one and "Christina" on the other. I asked that the family put them at our places, take pictures with them, and send us the photos. I think I started a new tradition. My zany family went one better and here is one of the photos I got: