We Are Moving!

We've decided to migrate our blog over to the WordPress platform, and while we were at it, we thought we might as well move it to our actual website. So, from now on, it looks like this:

http://www.craftybroads.com/blog

Pretty, no? Please update your bookmarks and whatnot. All the posts and comments have been moved over already, so you can revisit your favorites on much better looking pages over there if you like. They will also remained archived here indefinitely.

But if you want new content, you're gonna have to relocate. If you use a reader to get our blog, the new feed is here: http://www.craftybroads.com/blog/feed

If you usually click through from Facbook (via Networked Blogs) or Twitter, you should continue to see our posts pop up there. Note that they will come throught Crafty Broads twitter account from now on, in addition to Cindy's personal one.

The first new post will be going up this afternoon, so look out for it. Thanks for reading!

Live. Work. Eat. (Or The State of our Union.)

Ok, I am sorry about that punny title. A little. There hasn't been a real post here in almost two weeks. For shame! (Nah, not really. This kind of writing should be done when one has something to say, not just because it's time, right?) Anyway... When last we met, my car was full of bullet holes and life was really busy. Let's catch up.

Life:
I'm told my car is no longer filled with holes (though one bullet may be stuck in there forever) and it's being painted and re-assembled and I should have it back next week. I'll note that Allstate has been speedy and helpful throughout, and the auto body shop calls me every few days to give me an update on the car.

We are still really, really busy.

Julia has been stitching away on costumes for Guys and Dolls at Theatre at the Center the past few weeks since Aladdin closed. She's about to start training to cover the wardrobe track for For the Boys up at the Marriott, after which she'll train to cover the stage manager for Sweeney Todd at Drury Lane. So - no days off for her until sometime after our upcoming trip to Portland. (Which we are so excited about! Julia has never been. My best friend lives there, and we'll get to see her, yay! It's going to be something like an actual vacation, woo!)

I had a ridiculously easy work week, with an extra long Labor Day weekend (I got Friday, Monday, and Tuesday off) which was followed by two days of work and this Friday off as well. I'm sorry, I'm really not trying to rub it in. Mainly, I say that because I got to spend most of those days off practicing being self-employed.

This morning we were talking about this blog. Julia feels like it is mine, all mine, because although way back when we started it, we actually wrote posts together and I typed "we" and "us" all the time, it somehow evolved into "I" and "me" and now you all know my writing voice and not hers. Totally true. I'm absolutely guilty of that. But. This was supposed to be OUR blog, not mine. So I'm hoping - WE'RE hoping - that in the future we'll each write about half of the posts, and maybe sometimes we'll even write together again. But probably not, because it turns out neither one of us especially likes to do that. And she made the excellent point that when we actually have time together, she would like to actually spend it with me, not writing a blog. (Please feel free to let Julia know in the comments that you want to hear from her too! And/or to send her a new computer and some extra hours in the day so that she is well-equipped to do so.)

Crafty Broads:
Here's what I was doing when I had all that "free time": setting up our accounting system, updating invoice and quote templates and actually using them to write up one of each, buying our very first advertising ever on A Practical Wedding, doing some much-needed updates to the website, and working on a couple of our sewing projects.

About the time of the last post, we took on a client who needed alterations to her wedding dress and a little shrug to wear over it in time for her wedding which is TOMORROW. Which is not a lot of time to get things sewn when we're both already working day jobs and are knee deep in another big sewing project. I did the alterations and Julia made a beautiful silk shrug. Our client was very happy with the results. We'll have a post on this project later this week, with pictures and everything.

We are less than a week away from the due date for our mockup of the wedding dress, bolero, and winter coat we are making. It is going to be so pretty. We are both extremely excited about this project. Hope to have some process pictures up on here or the Crafty Broads facebook page soon.

And, saving the best for last, Food:
Oh, boy, what have we been eating? Because of the business, we have not been cooking as much as usual. We have ordered in a few times and eaten out a few times. There goes our budget. Anyway, here are a couple things we've made at home lately that were pretty good:

Ricotta Gnocchi with Leeks and Fava Beans - So we were at the grocery store together (a rare miracle these days), and we passed the fresh fava beans, and just had to have some because they looked so good. No plan in mind for how to use them, total impulse purchase, completely against the menu planning rules. Which is ok because we didn't plan a menu at all that week anyway. Found this recipe and it was fantastic. It does take a bit of time, but it isn't particularly difficult, and it is definitely worth the effort.

(from left: shaping the dough; making the marmalade; finished wrap)

White Cheddar and Bacon Piadina with Balsamic Fig and Onion Marmalade - This was the result of another impulse buy. The Figs. They looked SO GOOD. I am obsessed with figs when they are in season. Because they are awesome. We have more in our fridge right now, which are going to be drizzled with honey and served with hazelnut ice cream. Anyway - this recipe was another easy but somewhat time-consuming one. However, like the gnocchi, it was so worth it. We didn't have brie on hand, so we substituted some white cheddar, which paired nicely. We also lacked arugula, but didn't really miss it. This Italian flatbread sandwich was AMAZING. We could not save any for leftovers because it was too damn good.

Another Guest Post

...because clearly, I care more about posting elsewhere than here. No! It's not true. It's just - other people give me deadlines, and my deadline is "whenever I get around to it", so... you all know what that means. I guess I should pick a couple days a week and stick to them for posting like the real bloggers do. But I digress...

If you're wondering what I think about using mics (or not) for your wedding ceremony, you can go read all about it over on Frugally Wed.

I really promise to post soon. If you want, you can put a deadline in the comments for me. (It's got a pretty good chance of working, actually. Especially if you include a topic I should ramble about.)

What I Love About Chicago

(Hint: It's not Navy Pier or the Mag Mile.)

Oops, I blinked and missed it - my guest post has been up on Sarah's blog since Tuesday! Go check it out if you want to know what we love about Chicago.

I'll be back soon to tell you all about the belated anniversary dinner we had at Chalkboard on Friday night, and some of the drool-worthy meals my lovely wife has cooked for me on my vacation this week. (Which is sadly ending today.)

How to Vacation When You're Running A Side Business

[Well, I was going to write about the yummy things we ate this week, but turns out I want to write about what a vacation is like when you also are trying to start a business on the side.]

Oh, you guys, I am really trying to keep this blogging thing going, because I do enjoy it. But - when I get busy (which you know is often) it is hard for me to find the space in my brain to decide what to write about, and then get the chunk of time needed to actually write it. Some of you know I'm on vacation from yesterday through Sunday, and you might be thinking - of course she has time! And, yeah, I sort of do. The thing is, though, I think our little business is really starting to take off, and that has to be a priority.

So far on my "vacation", I have:

• Slept in until 7:30 or 8am!
• Written & revised our custom garment contract
• Worked on dress design sketches
• Hashed out some details for another wedding, including scoring a great deal with a vendor
• Set up a meeting with another potential client
• Actually started the Great T-Shirt Project of 2010
• Installed new operating system on my computer, and then new money software, and am currently in the midst of transferring all our data over from the old program and setting up our budget.
• Cleaned the house.
• Had happy hour with WhiskeyTime and some improvised Amaretto/Pear martinis. (ok, this part is like actual vacation.)
• SPENT TIME WITH MY WIFE. (Who is being the sweetest lady ever by pretending I am really on vacation and planning a weekend of fancy dinners that she is cooking for me. Boy do I love her. Last night, we had Roasted Chicken with Spiced Figs. OMG. Yum. On Saturday, she is planning some awesome thing where she cooks whole fish. She is the best. Sorry to all the rest of you who don't get to be married to her.)

Additional things I have scheduled to do on my vacation are:

• Hit the fabric store for swatching and inspiration for our client's wedding dress
• Meet with the aforementioned potential client
• Finish putting together sketches and estimate for the wedding dress
• Flesh out all the details of the wedding coming up and distribute them to vendors
• Maybe continue working on the Great T-Shirt Project of 2010 (which I guess I should write a post about, huh?)
• Write a guest post for a wedding blog
• Write a why having babies scared me before being a nanny vs. why they scare me now post for another blog
• Attempt to write something of substance for this here blog, that is not about how busy I am, and thus will not bore you to tears like this post
• CELEBRATE OUR ANNIVERSARY. Yeah, I know it was a month ago, and we did celebrate. But I think I mentioned we had been planning to go to a big fancy dinner only to find out that the restaurant we wanted to go to was closed. So. We rescheduled our anniversary for 'one of those upcoming weekends when we might have some time' (HA!) and here it is. We've got a reservation at Chalkboard for Friday night, and I'm hopeful we will be able to schedule some massages tomorrow or Saturday as well. Yay!

And, let me say, I am NOT complaining. I love doing all these things. Not that I wouldn't love just sitting at the beach all day, in some semblance of what I imagine normal people do on vacation - I would love that. But - the reason why we're making this business happen is exactly because we LOVE doing these things and want to eventually do them full-time. Or at least enough of the time that we can pick and choose what shows or other work we want to do the rest of the time.

How to Stage Manage Your Wedding

Hey look - I'm back over at A Practical Wedding today with a post about stage managing your wedding. Go check it out! (And thanks Tim for stage managing ours!)

Hope your week is off to a good start. I'll be back in a day or two when I think of something compelling to write about...

Turkish Breakfast

Welcome to the next phase in our lives and this blog. I'm going to spend the rest of this week blogging about the crafty things we did for our wedding, and then I'll stop talking about it unless you all ask for more. Because this isn't a wedding blog. (If you need one of those, go here.) As mentioned previously, our first year of marriage has flown right by, and we're eating up the last bit of it tonight with a picnic on the beach where we exchanged our vows last summer. We're having Turkish breakfast, which you might have noticed on the menu post yesterday. Julia said I should explain what the hell that is a little bit better, so here goes. Two years ago, Julia had the amazing opportunity to travel to Turkey for a show she stage managed. She was gone for a week, and when she got home, she was obsessed with what they were fed for the first meal of each day. I wasn't there, but here's how I envision it. In a grand, open-air room, a long table overflows with the yummiest things artfully arranged on antique metal serving trays.* On these lovely dishes one finds warm, crusty, buttery bread; a generous assortment of fine cheeses**; fresh tomatoes and cucumbers; some herbs, maybe oregano or dill; and ripe native olives. There are, perhaps, some salads and salamis to choose from as well. You fill a plate with an assortment of these and lounge on overstuffed floor pillows next to a low table. The melody of a sitar player drifts in from the street below. A crisp Mediterranean breeze dances through an open window, swirling the aroma of dark, bold Turkish coffee around your head...*** Oh sorry. Got a little lost there. When we do it at home, it doesn't have quite the same ambiance, but it is, nevertheless, oh so delicious. We slice a loaf of crusty bread, butter it, and warm it up. And then we stack up tomatoes, cucumber, cheese (we like Dubliner or a good aged cheddar particularly; feta is also lovely), and whatever fresh herbs we have, and sometimes a good salami, and then we eat it like an open-faced sandwich. And Julia eats olives with it, if I remember to buy them. Quick and easy to prepare (unless you're making the bread from scratch like I'm doing right now) yet surprisingly filling, Turkish breakfast can also be a great lunch or dinner and it travels pretty well too. Go get yourself some! *Honey, if it was paper plates and catering trays, please, for the love, do not ever tell me so. **Really, I'm completely sold once you mention the cheese. ***Seriously, baby, if it wasn't as exotic and romantic and glorious as all this, I repeat, DO NOT EVER TELL ME SO.

Coming Soon: More Crafting!

Hi. Can you do something real quick for me? Look up at the top of the page. Do you see there, under the title, where it says, "eating our way through our first year of marriage"? Well. Julia and I are coming up on our first wedding anniversary on Tuesday. Which means that year of eating will be up, and this blog is going to enter its second year. (Yeah, I know, I really haven't been writing consistently for a year, and I didn't start on our wedding day either, but the year of eating is up, and now we must starve. Or something.)

Never fear dear friends and people I've never met in Singapore (HI! You read every post! Who are you?) - the blog is not going anywhere. It's just going to be a little bit different. For the better, I think. Starting next week, I will be blogging about anything and everything, which will certainly still include food, and is likely to include sewing and crafting and stage managing weddings and starting a small business and trying to grow plants on our porch in the crazy-ass weather we've been having and life in general. So. I hope you're cool with that. And if you're just here for the food... I totally get that. Check my blogroll for some excellent food-only reading.

I'll be taking the rest of the weekend off blogging to celebrate (and also to stage manage Ms. Bunny's wedding, more on that later, maybe) so this will be it until Wednesday probably. I know, how will you live without me?*

Have an excellent long weekend, eat and drink good things, and please come back next week to see if you still like my ramblings.

*You'll be just fine. You did it for all those months when I wasn't posting, didn't you?

Welcome APW Readers!

Just a quick post to say hello to the awesome ladies (& gents?) popping over from A Practical Wedding today. Welcome! I'm glad you're here. Thought you might enjoy a brief summary of us and our blog.

Julia and I are theatre people. We both have lengthy backgrounds in stage management, and in more recent years we've also branched out into costuming. We met in 2006 at an opening night party for a show I was working on, became inseparable despite the fact that Julia started dating someone else, and eventually after relentless pursuit on my part, she realized what I already knew: that we were perfect for each other.

Julia and I got married just about a year ago and because we are crazy we didn't like the options we could afford, we decided to make our dresses, the cake, and do all the invitation and website design ourselves. And I wrote our ceremony from scratch with a little help from a great writer and equally excellent friend. (If you all want I can post the ceremony text. A chunk of it is on APW this morning. Which is maybe why you're here. But I digress...) It was awesome.

Around the time we were planning our wedding, we'd made an effort to start eating better and cooking more exciting food, so once the wedding madness was over, we started this blog to document our first year of marriage via the yummy things we were cooking and eating. You can read the very first post here.

Shortly thereafter, we decided to put our sewing and other creative skills to use and we started figuring out how to start a business doing the things we love. And thus, crafty broads was born. We are still figuring out exactly what we want to do, but for now we are focusing on custom clothing and corsets, and putting our stage management skills to good use offering sane wedding management. If you decide to check that link out, be warned: I haven't finishes the website yet.

That's enough rambling for today. Please poke around, stay for a while, comment if you feel so inclined, and have a great PRIDE week!

This Barely Qualifies as a Post.

Before I write my lame paragraph about why I haven't posted, quick, do one thing for me, ok? Post a comment and tell me why you read this blog. I have no idea who my audience is or what you want to hear. (more recipes? more rambling? both?) and I need your help. So please. Go now. I'll wait.

Seriously. You went and commented, right? Right??? (You guys know google stats tells me how many people read this post, don't you? I'll know if you didn't. I won't know who you are, per se, but I'll know. And more importantly - you will. I promise I'll never try to force you to comment again, ok?) Good. Carry on.

I know! It's been a week. I have pictures of something yummy on my camera to share with you as soon as I can muster up the energy to upload them here and then write about it. It was a busy week, wherein I madly wrote and edited and got other people to edit a blog post and went through 1100+ wedding pictures to put into said post about our wedding which will appear next week over at A Practical Wedding. I finished that late Thursday night and then dashed out of town for a quick weekend visit to St. Louis, which entailed a surprise 60th birthday party (hi, mom) and an equally short visit with my best friend ('sup yo?) and I was also trying to get at least a basic draft of our crafty broads website up (obviously not done yet if you clicked that link)... so no post happened over the weekend either.

But tomorrow? Tomorrow I'm done work at noon. I suppose I could manage to throw some pictures up here and blabber on about them. And you? You can comment again tomorrow, if you like.

A New Title!

It came to me in a flash of brilliance (while pondering what to blog about today.) What do you think of this:

CRAFTING A MARRIAGE
cooking, sewing, laughing, talking, dreaming, fighting, making up a life

...thoughts? edits? too cheesy? help.

[p.s. to anyone who wandered over here from Lollygag Blog today... I'm not usually this short-winded and boring. Sorry. Please check the archives for something more exciting. Perhaps our very first post, which features one P.J. Schoeny, wedding officiant extraordinaire. Or some New England Clam Chowder? I have a feeling you're a bunch that might appreciate that.]