i'm taking out my STITCHES!

.....and no, this post has NOTHING to do with valentine's day. i waited until today to post it to avoid any confusion.
so here i am..... 2010 well on it's way, GRSG still open, i'm back in the full swing of drawing and the luggage is still selling!

i tend to vent, rant, complain etc. on my blog. i don't mean to. i just let my brain unwind here and reflect. it's never my intention of using this blog as a dumping grounds for my trails. so today it's all about the good news.......

2009 ended on a sour note for me, details as to why NOT coming, but it threw me into this bizarre artistic hole. it caused a forced halt unlike anything i had ever experienced. it was a time for me to really look at my business. re-evaluate, toss around what-ifs, toy with new ideas, draw new designs, draw NOTHING AT ALL, take lots of pictures, hang out with my brother, try to draw, fail, try to draw, finish a bag, think about closing shop, actually putting the shop on vacation mode, opening back up even when i felt artistically cleaned out! i digress but only to get to make the ending that much sweeter.

the people of the etsy community, as well as the ones in my personal life, whispering in BOTH of my ears was a GRSG life-preserver if you will. i don't remember a specific day but this line from one of my favorite movies sums it up:

"You know the great thing, though, is that change can be so constant you don't even feel the difference until there is one. It can be so slow that you don't even notice that your life is better or worse, until it is." George (Kevin Kline) from Life is a House

so, february 15th 2010 is what i woke up to this morning, yes i know, we all did that. but here's the thing, i've been knocked off my feet in the best possible way. i crunched the numbers last night....
55 sales in January
33 so far in february
ACK! i couldn't be happier. that's some SERIOUS FAVOR for me and my shop.
and shop talk aside i could make a list a mile long of all the good things i've got in my life. so upward and onward! i don't want to make others feel as though my life is a bowl of cherries and i live in la-la land. i'm just choosing my focus right now- some days that's easier to do than others, i PROMISE i know. but GetReadySetGo isn't going anywhere! any thoughts i may have had about mnimizing or closing have been kicked to the curb and taken away by the garbage trucks.

so yes, i'm taking out my stitches! if you look real close the scar looks like one SPECTACULAR STAR! yeah, i'm fully aware i might be seeing things but all that matters is what i see.
and from where i'm standing.
the view is PHENOMENALLY BRIGHT WITH POSSIBILITY!

xox to ALL of you lovely faces (boys can be lovely faces too- just so ya know), you keep me going on the darkest of days:)
GRSG OUT!

crash n burn

ughhhhh. i got nothing done today. where is my mind? seriously?!? i do love the above train case i made last week. and i randomly made an Alice in Wonderland train case that i finished today. it was out of nowhere. i started with no idea and it just morphed.

i could really use a dose of smart pills because today i was apparently fed stupid pills. i suspect they were slipped into my coffee. i have no leads as to who put them there. i have nothing interesting to say but i thought i would try to keep up on my poor neglected blog and show those who read this but maybe missed the green treefingers case in my shop.

i want to live in a room that is painted bright teal and has white christmas lights and the biggest fluffiest bed in the planet. i want this room to look like the crate & barrel magazine i looked at this morning- and i NEVER EVER look at those. but everything was so clean and organized and comfortable and cohesive. my mind is craving all of those things. meanwhile our featherbed needs to be flipped and fluuffed as it's falling down in our sheets and bunched up over the bottom of our matress. i know, i know, i tempt you so with that image.
okay, off to fix the bed and then fall in it.

HELLO, my name is Rachel and i am a Blog Neglecter

..... no seriously. a few of us etsy kids were tweeting about this last night. if there were blog-protective services they would have come and snatched this thing right away from me and put me on the blog-neglecter list. i would never be allowed to own a blog again!

that being said, i have been living life. it's been 29 kinds of rough but as always, i get by and i'm confident in EVERY single thing having its purpose. this is how i sleep at night. this is why i get up day after day and keep trucking. there is so much beauty in this mixed up world. i am fortunate to be able to see it and feel it.

i could go on but i am up at 7 AM!?!?!?! and i have yet to put any coffee into my bloodstream, both things are recipes for a blogging train-wreck!

my friend kristin just started a blog. it's brilliant & you should follow:
Shout out Loud
so i leave you with a link and of course a giant XOX

~GRSG OUT!~