The creativity is flowing!

Every fall I find myself sucked into an inspiring while of creativity. I bake like a mad woman, sew until my hands and back hurt, write until my brain aches, often do something unusual and different to my hair, and take on whatever else succumbs me.

As some of my friends already may know, a couple months ago I discovered the fantastic world of upcycled clothing. I've started a small online business of creating sweatercoats in a custom variety of colors. I'm in love with these silly articles of clothing!
How this happened is an interesting story. I found a little shop on a crafty website called Etsy. The shop's name is Katwise...and it is full of magical and glamorous upcycled sweatercoats! For those who don't understand, a sweatercoat is a long coat made completely out of unique and specific sweaters (I find all of mine in the local thrift stores). These coats have long "elf-point" hoods and are layer and layers of colorful awesome. Kat's coats are so popular that it is nearly impossible to purchase one. She places about a dozen or so up for sale, every two weeks on Etsy. Within five minutes they're sold out. If you don't have the site open when you know she's listing them, you've missed out. On top of that, they sell for a good $200-600!
Unable to gather up hundreds of dollars and battle it out on an online store, I decided it was time to attempt to make one of these, myself. And now here I am with my first sweatercoat being worn by myself on a regular basis, the original instructionals on how to create one and Kat's blessings as she answers all my questions, mentors me, and guides me into how to sell these beauties.
I've gathered about 50% of the sweaters for my next two coats- one is a custom commission for a friend of mine in the Netherlands and the other is a themed design called "Leaves of Autumn." I'm so excited to get started on these!

As for my other creative ventures, I'm trying not to think too hard about the fact that NaNoWriMo starts in one month. NaNoWriMo stands for "National Novel Writing Month." This is literally 30 days of literary abandonment. I pin myself to my computer for the whole of November and somehow always seem to end it with an entire novel. This is how the first book of my series that I plan to publish, The Chronicles of Shadovan, actually took form. I told myself I would finish editing this one and have my first query letters sent out to literary agents before I began writing book number two. So, I MUST finish it. I'm 90% of the way through it and SO close! My amazing copy-editor, Maggie, has helped me work a miracle. I have an agent in mind, as well. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that he'll take me on.

On the kitchen-witch side of the world, my spare time has been filled with the act of deconstructing recipes, oven timers and the smell of baking pumpkin...well...everything. Cookies. Cupcakes. Muffins. Breads. Pumpkins, cinnamon and nutmeg, oh my! I love it! This week several of my ladies and myself will be gathering together in our little cottage and having a baking fest. I'm refining a recipe to create a birthday cake for a friend. I swear, if she doesn't love it, I'm eating the blasted thing, myself!

At this moment, I'm preparing to hide myself in a cup of honeybush red tea and a brand new copy of the game, Dragon Age: Origins. I've been watching Michael play it on his console for the past few weeks and finally gave in. So far 5.6GB of 12.4GB have successfully been downloaded onto my computer. ... This may take a while. I may be too tea drunk by the time its done. Ah, well. We shall see. Until later, my loves!