The Twelve Days of Christmas: A Special Guest Post

I love Thanksgiving, but I really love Christmas. My Husband & I decided a few years ago to avoid overspending & going crazy during the holidays by limiting our children’s gifts. Being Christians and believing in Jesus birth story we landed on three gifts for the three wise men. Simple, right? Wrong! My children would give me there input on what they really wanted for those three gifts. Then, I would be out in the stores, meandering the aisles, and bam, I would see something that they would JUST LOVE but wasn’t on their list. Well what is a good mamma to do? She creates a new way to give them gifts, that’s what.

As I starting finding all these cute, little, inexpensive gifts I would stash them away. When we decorated the house for Christmas and hung our stockings on the fireplace, I was inspired. That is how the Twelve Days of Christmas was born. Twelve days before Christmas I place a small gift in each of their stockings. So each morning before school they run downstairs to see what we have left them. And, yes, they do know it is us that left it. No Santa needed for this project.

I wanted to share with you the types of items I buy. Most things can easily be found at the Dollar Store or in the $1 section of Target.

* Gum
* Christmas Candy
* Chapstick
* Lip gloss
* Pencils
* Funny erasers
* Bookmarks
* Stickers
* Books
* Headband Antlers
* Christmas themed door knockers

My children look forward to The Twelve Days of Christmas every year, even more so than Christmas. The excitement in their eyes with what will it be this time is priceless. I love shopping for these small tokens of love. This is one holiday tradition that I will love for a lifetime.

Merry Christmas Y'all!

~Christina

Christina is the creator and author behind A Closet Writer - A look into everyday life through dirty, child-smeared, finger-print laden windows. She is a wife, mom, sister, daughter, Christian & humorist living it up in Central Texas. Regardless of what is actually going on, she is a GLASS HALF FULL kind of gal. When you read her blog she prays you will laugh, smile, feel hope & come back again and again. Wash, rinse & repeat that’s all she’s saying! You can also find Christina chatting it up on her regular column with Examiner.com as the Austin Parenting Tween Examiner. She would love to connect with you either on Twitter or Facebook.

My Pledge to Buy Handmade & Local Items

As I gear back up to get back into blogging after taking a break to enjoy my sister and nephew having moved in with me and my hubby, I decided to take part in something great...

The Handmade Toy Alliance (http://www.handmadetoyalliance.org/) is coordinating a push to buy handmade and local products during American Craft Week (http://www.americancraftweek.com/).

Why am I participating in spreading the word? The reason is two-fold...

1. I myself am a small business owner, making my products by hand, and I strongly support consumers buying from their local businesses and supporting the small-business owners, who often have higher quality items, sometimes at a lower cost.

2. Now that there's a baby in the house, I understand better the importance of what types of toys we give our children and knowing where they came from.

So, I hope you'll consider joining in - or at least reading about the pledge and spreading the word...

To find out more about the pledge and how you can get involved, check out this site: http://www.handmadetoyalliance.org/Community/HandmadePledge.aspx.  You can also read their press release to learn more: http://www.pressreleasepoint.com/node/507012.

They also have a facebook and twitter page: www.facebook.com/toyalliance and @toyalliance.
When tweeting about it, if you'd like to spread the word, be sure to use the hashtag #HTApledge.

Thanks everyone!

The Winner Is...

So, I haven't posted in awhile, and no, Darren (aka @problogger), I'm not apologizing. :) I have a fully painted inside of the house because I've taken the last week off to paint! Yay!

Here's a photo - see all the paint cans? Yeah, I'm sore....

Anyhow, my main reason for posting today, before I get back to the regularly scheduled program, is to announce the winner of the 'Generating Post Ideas' giveaway. You all gave some great ideas and you'll be seeing them eventually, maybe with a shout out or link to your site...

But, without further ado... Cate from Real Life With Kids is our winner! She gets her choice of a prize too, pretty sweet huh? :)

Thanks everyone!

Finding Your Niche is a World of Too Many Ideas (Repost)

*This post was originally my first guest post on The Work at Home Woman. I am sharing it here due to popular demand through a recent twitter chat.

When I came home and told my husband that I wanted to quit my teaching job and become the editor of a local magazine, he didn’t blink an eye. When I added, “And I want to start my own stationery business,” you could see the look of panic begin to cross his face.

For my entire working life, I’ve struggled to find a job that allowed creativity but that also paid well. My husband would say that there aren’t many out there, that a job is just a job, and that I shouldn’t worry about being happy, just about bringing home some money (the male point of view I guess). I don’t know about you, but for me, I have to love what I’m doing. It took awhile for him to get on board with my decisions, but when he did, he was very supportive.

But then the business started doing well, and I wanted to expand. I brainstormed things I could do: scrapbooking, handmade note cards… Then, I came across custom decorated clipboards – a perfect use for my extra scrapbook paper. It was a big hit! After that, I expanded to making decoupage domino necklaces using scraps of paper I already had. At this point, my husband warned me: “Don’t start doing too much, what you do won’t be special anymore.” I promised him I’d stick to things that used my scrapbook paper and not venture too far out of my current zone. We shook on it.

He was right. Expanding too much meant I wouldn’t be special anymore. I had to decide what made me special and create a niche out of it. But how? I had so many ideas filling my head and so many things I enjoyed creating. How did I know what to focus on?

Here’s what I learned:

Hobby vs. Business. There’s a difference between a hobby and a business. Just because I like doing something doesn’t mean I can make money at it. For the purpose of finding my niche, I’d have to determine which was which.

Group like Items. I like to bake, write, edit, read, sleep, scrapbook, design, and take photos. But, it doesn’t make sense to have a bake shop where I also sell invitations I designed. It doesn’t really fit well together. But, I can create a store where I sell birthday invitations and also items that make the perfect gift – it’s a one stop shop, and it covers many of my passions.

Realize the Need for Change. Yes, change. I started with just stationery. Then added some items; then cut back. It takes awhile to find your niche and what will work for you. Change is good and helps you get closer to finding what works for you.

Take Risks. This is kind of like changing. You won’t know what you’re really good at until you try it. You won’t know what sells until you put it out there for sale. This may mean taking risks, but ultimately, it will get you closer to finding your niche, and it will pay off.

On a final note, I didn’t find my niche by doing something I knew would make money. I found something that made me happy. Then, I found a way to make money at it. Have you found your niche?

Stepping Up for a Good Cause: Layla Grace Fundraising Event

What an awesome event! The Layla Grace Children's Cancer Research Foundation, founded by the parents of little Layla Grace, who lost her battle to cancer in March, was recently honored with an event called A Taste of Cy-Fair.

This event was on Sunday, June 13th at Northwest Forest Conference Center. More than 3,000 people came out to support the foundation, which raised over $26,000 from this event alone. The event was full of fun, all the food you could eat, and shopping, all for only about $10!

As a vendor at this event, I can only say WOW. There were so many people there, all to support Layla Grace. I sold special Layla Grace necklaces (which I still have a few of if you're interested), where 50% of each sale went to the foundation, and businesses from all over the country donated prize packs to help the cause. Want yours? Just email me at angela@alwaysbdesigns.com. :)

It was also my first event to pass out Mommy Bags at. If you haven't heard about Mommy Bag Marketing, you're missing out. Click here for the website, facebook page, and twitter page.

To see pictures from the event, click here. Also, to read more about Layla Grace or the foundation, click here.

Thanks!

Some Great News to Share on the Summer Blog Tour

Yay! It's finally here - my day on the Summer Blog Tour hosted by Abbey from Living My MoMent and Holly from The Work at Home Woman. I'm so excited to be a part of this tour and even more excited that you'll be the first to hear something I haven't told anyone else!

First though, let me share a little bit about myself and the women above. I met them via Twitter and they are both so great! In fact, Holly's having an awesome giveaway right now - a PR package valued at $250! You should definitely enter here.

I have guest blogged on both of their blogs as well. I'll mention those later. I love to write and have edited two books and have a passion for crafting. That's where always B designs was born from. I stay busy all the time and am now even the Texas Coordinator for Mommy Bag Marketing, a great way for Christian businesses to connect with Christian moms.

So here are the two exciting pieces of news I had to share:

1. Remember I mentioned guest blogging? Well, when I guest blogged at The Work at Home Woman, I wrote about finding your niche. Once you do that, you might need business cards, so I'm doing a giveaway! You can enter to win 250 free business cards! (see at end of post on how to enter)


2. And the blog on Living My MoMent? That was on my journey to mommyhood and the struggle I've had to have a baby. At the time I wrote it, I was going through infertility treatments. And now... I'm pregnant! You're the first (non-family) to know! I probably should wait until I'm further along, but how perfect is it that I just found out in time for my day on the blog tour? :)

So, it was great 'meeting' all of you!

Here's how to enter the giveaway: (do at least one, and each entry should be a seperate comment) Giveaway ends May 26th. :)

• Comment below on advice for pregnancy or being a new mom (3 entries)
• Follow me on twitter - @alwaysbdesigns (1 entry)
• Follow me on twitter - @mommybagshou (1 entry)
• Fan always B designs on facebook (1 entry)
• Fan Mommy Bags Houston on facebook (1 entry)
• Follow this blog (2 entries)
• Tweet about my businesses, this giveaway, or my blog (2 entries) and make sure to include my twitter ID in the tweet

There goes my....

Okay, so something is wrong. Very wrong.


I'm on all these hormones to try to help me get pregnant and so far, I've...

1. Printed off custom invites for a customer and then realized I hadn't switched out the photo with the watermark still on it to the actual photo. Yeah. There goes my memory.


2. Busted my thumb, my RIGHT thumb, while trying to get a soda for my husband. Don't ask how, cause I don't know. But, here's a photo of it (granted, I took this with my iPhone and my left hand - not an easy task). Yeah. There goes my coordination.



3. Cried. I never cry. Never ever. But, my dog got overly excited to see me and wacked me in the eye. Blurry vision and tears to sting the open cut. (another self-photo). Yeah. There goes my emotional stability.

So, what does this mean?

I don't know... do you?
Angela

My Dog has the Munchies

More about my dog, I admit it, I love my pets.

However, this post isn't sunshiny and fun and full of cute pictures.

No, this is to show you how far my pet love goes. My husband and I have put up with our dog's eating habits for quite some time now.

Here's what she had for breakfast the other day:



















And for lunch:














And for dinner:

And for a midnight snack:














Yep, that's our dog. I should mention that her lunch was one of my former student's published books. Her dinner cost us $1000 to replace. And those cd's are all the photos from our wedding. Yeah. That bad. :)

Do you have any crazy dog/cat/pet stories like this? Do share! It'll help me feel better about my dog issues! :)

Angela

Proof that we can all get along...

Ever wonder about those people around you who drive you nuts? The people who you could never quite find enough kindness inside you to forgive? How much your husband, kids, friends, whoever, annoy you sometimes?


How do you handle it?


Do you walk away, fight back, yell, give the silent treatment? Do you write a letter then tear it up? Do you cry?


Then, do you make up?


Why fight in the first place? If they can do it, anyone can do it...





Who are they? My cute dog Virgo and handsome cat Jack. My babies. I've never seen two animals get along this well, and yet, they come from different worlds.


So, no matter how different we are, here's proof that we can all get along if we just give it a little try. :)


Angela

What a Week!

First off, let me say that I'm sorry I haven't been posting as frequently.

Second, it's so fun being parents! In the first week alone, we've gone homecoming dress shopping, made a mum, gone to a football game, and now she's having a sleepover. Wow.

The good thing is that I have a great helper on my hands - she's already shown interest in the things I make for my business and she's learned how to make a few necklaces. She wants to go to craft markets with me, and I can't wait!

I will try to post more frequently and about design stuff instead of parenting stuff... :)

Angela