 Hey, six people watching, more than just me. Hi guys, how are you today? I'm going to arrange everything here. Let's see. Usually you know my face isn't on the camera, you just see my hands. So I've gotta move that camera around. So I'm not, you know, cut off right here. I think that's good. All right, let's open up the chat. There we go. Alicia, Josie, Amy, Victor, hey Evelyn, hey everybody. So as I was trying to set this up and set the raffle copter up, my boxes are so full that they started to pop open. So I'm gonna tape them, which you guys might hear and I apologize in advance if the sound is obnoxious. Thank you, I, you know, it's taken me a long time to get this room where I really, really love it. If you don't know the little short and I'll tell it very quick because it's not why we're on, but we're gonna do a Q and A to while we're here if you guys have questions for me. I used to be in the garage and I got hurt at work and now I have asthma. That's the really short like abbreviated story. I couldn't work out there anymore. It was bad for my asthma. So we moved me into the house. We had this extra room anyway. And I already loved the color. It was actually already painted this color, but it's taken me a long time to like get my stuff situated in the room where I really like it and purge things down to just the things I love. And I think I'm, if not right there, almost there and have them arranged in a way for me that makes sense. So I really love it in here now. And I just recently bought these new cabinets you see over my shoulder with my pens in them on my work table. Those are from Michaels and I love them. Oh yay, I'm so glad. This is totally impromptu and I was gonna film this and do a, oh sorry, this cabinet's over here. There's a little bit of a delay on the YouTube so I can see where I'm pointing in the wrong direction, but I got all of these big white drawers and these white cabinets with the pens in them at Michaels. Anyway, I was gonna do a video, a recording and videotape it and I decided, yeah, no, why don't we get on camera and do it live, why not? And this is one of the boxes that doesn't wanna stay closed. It's just totally, as you can see, completely full. There is a lot of stuff in it and they're all full. Each one is a little bit different. They all have a pencil case in them. They all have pens in them. They all have a couple of Twinkly H2Os in them. They all have a watercolor sample palette in them and a journal or pad of paper and some of my artwork and whatever few extra goodies I could jam in there. Thank you so much. No worries, Victor. I'm the queen of technology fails, so no worries. So anyway, if you guys all didn't see or don't know about, don't subscribe to Mike Deakin's channel here on YouTube. He did a 7,000 subscriber giveaway recently and because he hit the $7,000 mark, he decided to give away seven gifts. And I love that idea. And I just recently hit 6,000. So we are at 6,000, what are we at? 6,000 something. It's over 6,000. I was waiting for parts to come in. 61, 13 as of right this second. So because of that, I have six, whoa. I have six of these small priority mailboxes that I'm gonna give away. Each one's a little bit different and I'm gonna give them all away. It's open to everybody worldwide. I love and appreciate all of you so much that I'm gonna open it up worldwide. And the raffle copter link is live right now. I just set it up a couple seconds ago and the link is in the description below. So go over and enter, because I would love for you all to enter and yeah, I can't wait to see who wins. Let's see. And Victor, I have some stuff that I think I'm gonna send to you. I just need some money for the postage. So I'm waiting a little bit to get the funds for the postage, it's expensive to send things to you. So, but I have some things I think that you would enjoy very much. So I'm gonna send a box off to you. Let's see. Southern Angels boutique, hey, I'm good, how are you? And I think Josie, I see you and Victor talking about something that you sent him, but I do think from anywhere in the world it takes a while to get things over to him. I don't think postage is quick. All right, I'm drinking some water. I'm just chilling this morning. I do have stuff I need to do, but I'm just chilling out this morning. What are you guys all doing? But yeah, we are gonna give away six of these little boxes. So I hope that you all, if you're just here for the giveaway announcement, that's what we're giving away. There's stuff with watercolor paints, gel pens, pencil bags, paper, journals, artwork. Each one's a little bit different. So, oops. So if you are just here for this, you can just go to the link in the description below and join the giveaway. If you're here for some questions and answers, I'm happy to stay on for a little while and let's do that and fire away. 6,000 subscribers and over 1,000 videos. And I, for a channel that started by accident, that's not bad. I never thought I'd be in this place. I'm really not that outgoing of a person. So for me to be a YouTuber is kind of shocking. For those people who've known me for a long time and grown up with me, they're a little bit surprised when they find out. Yeah, over 1,000 videos. Cause you know, I have a habit of figuring if I'm going to just, if I'm gonna create, I might as well turn the camera on. And so I always do that. And because I always do that, I have a lot of videos. And because I update, I upload content on a pretty regular basis every single week. It doesn't take long to get a lot of videos up. When you upload videos three or more times a week and there's 52 weeks in a year, times however many years I've been on YouTube, which is like three or so, yeah, it's a lot of videos. Thanks. I'm trying, I even put makeup on for you guys this morning, see? I haven't painted anything yet. I haven't gotten that far yet this morning. On some days lately or like that, I don't get much painting done. I just get a doodle done just because there's a lot of changes and upheaval going on around our house. For those of you who don't know that don't follow me on social media, we are now empty nesters. The daughter moved out with her boyfriend. She's got her own place. They do come over for Fridays for dinner. And so it's not today's Friday, so they'll be over for dinner. So it's different. It's aided in the purging process because it was really easy to do a mask kind of purging the weekend. She moved out because she took a bunch of stuff with her. So that was handy. Thanks. The doodling is a lot of fun. And if I don't have time for anything else, I make time to do a doodle. It's really important to just keep in a daily art practice. And I'm sorry, I'm just, I'm looking at the camera is fine. YouTube is having issues. So let's see here, quality. I'm gonna change, let's see. Yeah, I just, you know, and I don't do anything else now. Since I got hurt at work, I'm not really working. I'm just doing the art. So I have more time than some to do this. I'm too productive maybe. I don't know, is there such a thing? I love art and I love sharing and I love teaching and I love sharing my adventures, be they good or bad, failures or successes with the rest of you. And it's a lot of fun. I just love it. I don't know how to explain it. And it's not something I ever thought I'd be doing. Yeah, I don't have a day job anymore. So when I first started the channel, I did and now I don't. So I have lots of free time on my hands. Oh, thanks. I look pretty good with makeup on, you know. It hides the flaws and the wrinkles and I've got the gray hairs covered up and you know, all that stuff yesterday. So it's a good day to be on camera. Oh, thanks. I love this tealy blue aqua color is one of my favorites. And it's really light and bright and airy. And I've slowly been replacing my furniture with things that are white or a similar color of the blue to really have a light, bright, happy room. At some point, I think this little table with the drawer in it, you see over my shoulder with the candles and feathers and things on it under the cross. That's painted like in a distressed coppery metal color right now. At some point I could see me painting that white and distressing it a bit. And the black box you see in front of that is like a little cabinet where I store my rubber stamps inventory. Hey, Ayan, how are you? We're just here chatting and announcing the fact that I'm gonna do a giveaway. I'm giving away six small priority packages full of arty goodness, watercolor samples and gel pens and pencil bags and paper and smart work. And yeah, the link is in the description below. So if you wanna enter, it would be really pretty shabby chic. So I'm going to, I think that's gonna be a future project and I might do it on camera. I'm thinking about getting some deco art chalk paint and trying it on there. Oh, good. Alicia, you're in the same journey which I've had so many journeys, I figure. I feel like I don't know where I'm going, you guys. I think this week things, I guess they're coming to a head with, we didn't even get all the way back from Alaska before we found out the daughter was moving out and we were gonna be empty nesters officially, although we knew it was coming. It was still shocking because we didn't know it was happening that soon and it was literally the weekend after we got back. So we came back, we landed, we tried to go back to our normal routine and then move the daughter out. And there's been other things that are happening in between there and now it looks like our dog might be sick and he's getting old, so I'm a little concerned in. And anyway, so, and we've got the giveaway and I'm planning for 2017 and oh my God, I've gotta do bookkeeping. I shouldn't show you guys, look. I haven't done receipts in a while. I hate bookkeeping. So anyway, my anxiety is a little bit crazy right now. I have anxiety disorder and I'm not medicated. I try not to be, but anyway, I almost blocked myself out of the house the other day. So just try to remember to breathe. Just, you know, yeah, we only have the one and she is 21, she's gonna be 22 soon. And yeah, she's a blessing. We love her boyfriend, her partner. He's fabulous and they're a great couple and they, you know, I need to ask them tonight if they'll help us move a couple of things around and they're gonna help us actually redo hubby's office, which is a dark black hole and it's time he had a happy cheery place to do some of his hubby stuff in. So we're gonna work on that soon. Maybe I'll film some of it. That would be fun. Yeah, so, you know, it's really sad when pets pass away and if you're like me, you know, they're really part of the family, kind of a kid, really. And this is the third one, you know, and he might be the last one because I don't think I could do this again, at least not for a long time. And I wanna travel more and it's hard to do that when you've got a pet. So, ah, student teacher. That's a fun journey, Alicia. Yeah, man cave. You know, he's all for the idea actually. He has things in there that he doesn't want in there and he would like to have, there's a twin bed in his office that he would actually not, he would prefer not to have in there, because it was our only place to squeeze in a guest bed. And I think we're gonna take that out and he wants to get a, you know, big over stuff, easy chair to stick in there and a lamp and we're gonna take down the girly curtains and put up, you know, something more manly over the window, blinds or something and we're gonna repaint it for him and it's painted a color he doesn't like, yellow. So we're gonna, he gets to pick all of that stuff. I think we're saving one cabinet, his computer equipment and I think that's it. We're replacing the desk, which is a hand me down. We're replacing the printer cabinet, which is a hand me down. We're getting rid of the twin bed, which is my daughter's old twin bed. The drapes are going, the wall color is going and it has paneling in there. The house was built in 1969, has this really ugly paneling in there. We're gonna replace that too. So he does a lot of reading in there. Online, he reads digital books, watching Game of Thrones and computer work and bill paying. He also does work from home occasionally and he needs to be able to have an office. He can close the door and have video conference calls. He's also getting back into model making and miniatures, which is something he hasn't done in a really long time. And so he would really like to have room in his office to do that in his office and not have to come in here or do it in the garage, which right now summer in California is like five million degrees. Yeah, I think he's gonna be really happy in there. We can clear the clutter, which he's really like, it's his idea. I'm not forcing him to do it. And he's seen me do it with my space and other spaces around the house. And now he's like, can we do my office? So, you know, he's got a lot of, you know, artwork in there on the walls and his bulletin board. He gets to figure out where everything goes. I'm just helping. Crafting on the surface of the sun, exactly. The only place it would be hotter is if maybe the garage was uninsulated in Las Vegas in the summer, but it's pretty hot out there. And San Jose has been like triple digits for a while. And it's not now, it's cooling off a little bit, but it'll be hot again soon. Yeah, he's gonna get new flooring, which is I think the most important thing he's excited about, because our flooring for most of the house is from when we bought it in 1992. And let's just say it's a bit past it. That's being nice. So he's excited because he gets to get new flooring. Yeah, so he really likes that kind of thing. And he actually just got a new iPad too with the Apple Pen. And I am so excited he is getting back into drawing, which is something he hasn't done since he was in, you know, high school. So I love that. Yeah, Portland, Portland is, and Seattle have been unusually hot when I was there for the Alaska trip to get on the ship, it was unusually hot. We did not expect that. He got the Apple Pen for Father's Day, he loves it. And he's not even a drawer until he got the Apple Pen, just FYI, not like I said since high school, and he loves it. I do wanna borrow it in his iPad, I think. I don't understand what you mean by fire. Victor, there are some fires going on in California as there are every summer, and but they're not anywhere near me, not right now anyway, I'm safe. Yeah, we're over the flooring, the flooring is old. I just, you know, we have a lot of stuff though, so we need to keep purging and maybe do a couple of rooms at a time because yeah, we've lived here a long time. Oh yeah, there's fires going on a lot in California. And right now, I know near Yosemite, there's some going on Oakdale where I used to actually be in a gallery over there. There's a lot of fires going on. Where I'm in San Jose is pretty safe right now, there's no fires going on. We do have a large open space near my house that sometimes does catch on fire, but this year so far, cross your fingers, it has been fine. We have crazy drivers and idiots and people randomly shooting at cars because you know, I live in California and that's a smart thing to do, holy cow. Yeah, that's the other thing. It's not helping my anxiety. We have, there is a worldwide app called nextdoor.com. It's not only a website, but it's an app you can download for your phone and you put it in basically your location in the country or the world and it is like an online neighborhood bulletin board. At least I know it's the country, it may be the world. I shouldn't say that. I know it's for the USA, I don't know about the worldwide, but it may be. Anyway, I had to take the notifications off of my, out of my email because I kept getting notifications about all the crime in the area in San Jose and yeah, that wasn't helping. So yeah. Oh, thanks, the real Myrtle, thank you. Yeah, it's, you know, when I rearranged it by accident I had to move a lamp because there was no longer space in the old place for it. So I moved it over, moved it up and just, I just moved it a little bit. It made such a big difference in the lighting, especially for filming on the table over here behind me. I keep pointing over here, but it's over there. It's taken me Southern Angels boutique. So it's taken me, I've lost track. Three years I think, since I moved in here to really get it to where now I'm really happy. I keep changing things around a little bit and finally I just decided there was no way on the planet I was gonna get all of the arts and crafts stuff I'd saved for basically my whole life in a one little 10 by 10 room. This room is only 10 feet by 10 feet square. And then there were some of those supplies that holy cow, I just didn't even need. They were, you know, things that I had bought to try a new thing. And then I decided I don't like the thing. Well, I don't need to keep all that stuff. Why am I keeping it? So it's not making me happy. So I first started purging and I started selling those mystery boxes. And now that I've got my collection of supplies down enough that I can move around in the room and breathe in here and find everything, it's fabulous, I love it. Hey, Jessica. So I'll say it again, for those of you who are just joining, we are, I'm giving away six of these small priority mail boxes full of crafty goodness. The link for the rafflecopter is in the description below. I have posted random pictures on social media of packing these boxes. Each one's different. They have watercolor samples, gel pens, pencil bags, twinkling H2Os, two of them in each box, paper, artwork. Each one's a little bit different and I've just been, I've been shoving stuff in there until literally they were popping. I had to add more tape. Yeah, so when you have a limited space like I do, Decoratively Creative Stephanie, this is my room's 10 by 10. So the one thing I knew from the beginning was I wanted to keep the center of the floor as open as possible so that I could move around so that I could pull out my easel, which is in the closet should I want to. And should I, these boxes, Heidi, these boxes are free. So it's a raffle. So go to the rafflecopter link and sign up. And I'm giving them away. They don't cost anything. So go sign up. There's six of them. You have one in six chance. So what was I saying? So I knew I wanted to keep the floor clear. I knew I had some pieces of furniture from the garage. I loved like the table, which is on wheels and can be rolled around, not that I do in here, but, and there's some like storage under the table, things like that. But I've been rearranging, fussing with or buying new some other like storage things to purposefully go in this space. Some things had to go away that worked better in the garage than they do in here. And some things that are in here would never work in the garage space. I used to have all of my tools and equipment and tool craftsmen toolboxes. And when I first came in here, I just put the toolboxes in the closet, which worked temporarily to get me in here, but it wasn't a good solution. So I took them out a while back. You just have to play with it and figure out what works for you. And as you're doing it, I would recommend going through your stuff and really deciding, am I ever gonna use this again? Did I buy this and decide I don't like it? Can it just go away? Can I sell it or something like that? And Laura, welcome. Your first live broadcast, fabulous. I'm not doing any art. We're just chatting. Well, the real Myrtle, so enter the giveaway. And if you win a box, it's worldwide. And if you win a box, you'll get two of them to try. The colors are very random. I went through my collection of ones and decided which ones I just had that I could give away because I do have spares of some things like that. Of course I do. You all know that. And so, and I love my Twinkling H2Os and I didn't want to get rid of too many of them, but I did feel that I had enough. I could be generous and give some away. The link for the Heidi, the link for the raffles in the description below, if you go to the description below the video here, there should be an, it should say enter the giveaway here and there's a raffle copter link. You should be able to click on it. You don't have to have a YouTube channel to enter D, but you do have to be a subscriber to my channel on YouTube. So if you're not a subscriber, do that right now. Hey, sister Ella, how are you? No worries. Hey, I, you know, I like to give things away. So I used to do it a lot more than I do now. I just don't have time. So what else is new? I am working on a design team call for 2017. There's another announcement. So for 2017, instead of me going and asking people if they will be on my design team, I'm gonna have a design team call. So I'm gonna have it be at random. You're gonna be able to apply and send in a sample of artwork and or your social media links. And I'm gonna, I'm gonna, I have to type the whole thing up yet where it's a little early, but there's a little announcement of something that's coming up for next year. So I have, so NKNANA three, I have anxiety disorder. So I frequently don't remember anything. I almost locked myself out of the house the other day. I'm pretty well known for walking to the other side of the house to go do something. And when I get over there forgetting what it was I wanted to go do, just when I'm not in the best place, my memory is worse. So no, I don't always remember where stuff is, which is another reason to purge my, for me to purge my supplies down enough that I can, number one, find everything. Number two, they all have a home that I can easily get to and that all, everything is labeled. So I don't know how much of that you can see over my shoulder, but almost every drawer cabinet and bin in my office is labeled. And if it wasn't, it would be a problem. Anxiety disorder is rough. And especially if you have a major issue with it, I have a very, very good friend who does and she takes medication. Thankfully, at least at this point, mine is mild enough to not need medication or for me to say, okay, and they're okay with that. So for me to say, I'm sorry, for me to say, no, yeah. It has been suggested that I may need it at some point. So we're working on it. But yeah, if things aren't labeled, then I can't find anything, then that's a problem because it's just an issue. Every time I think that I'm done purging, open a bit, well, lately, hopefully, I think it's almost done, I'm almost done with this, but I think I'm done with it. And then I open a bin that I forgot about and then I'm like, oh crap, what is all this stuff? It needs to just go away. And I just finished Marie Kondo's book and what's the name of the book? One of you all helped me out. I don't remember the name of it, let's see. I just read it, finished it last night, see? That's all I'm talking about. Oh yeah, yeah, let me look on Facebook and see what's on here. Oh yeah, here we go. I'm broadcasting, so it's gonna take a second for it to load. Of course it is. The life-changing magic of tidying up by Marie Kondo. So I just finished it last night and while I didn't agree with everything in the book, she did have a lot of good points that I already was doing that I think are fabulous and really holding each thing and really thinking, do I really love this? Does it really spark joy? If it doesn't, it needs to go away. One thing she does talk about doing that I didn't do and I'm finding out why she says to do it is when you have a category of things that you're purging, gather all of the things in that category together and go through them all at once. And I'll just use the example of books because that's an easy one, but books. So you may have books in the living room, you may have books in the bedroom, I have books in the art room, there's books in my husband's office, you would gather all the books from all the rooms in the house and sit and go through them at the one time. If you don't do that, then you're like me with the arts and craft supplies and you miss a box. And then you find it later and you're like, oh crap. So yeah, we've been in our house Stephanie for, since 1992, I don't remember, I don't know how many years, it's a long time. So over 20 years, and so the longer you're in the house, the easier it is to just put stuff in a closet or storage and forget about it. And I could very easily be agoraphobic and not leave the house. So, and having asthma doesn't help that, that makes it worse. So, I'm allergic to the whole planet now, everything makes me cough and wheeze. So, it's just easier sometimes to stay home, rather than pump myself full of medication so that I can leave the house and go shopping or run errands with people who have too much perfume on or pollen or one of the other mills often wheeze now. That doesn't mean I don't do it, but frequently when you see me out and about or I've taken pictures out somewhere or on vacation, I'm usually medicated for the allergies and asthma because it's a problem. And I could very easily be a shut-in. That would be, all it would take would be something traumatic to happen and I'd be a shut-in. So Valerie, we're gonna go back to the book thing for a minute. I love books, I'm a big reader for those of you who don't know, I have three favorite loves in life besides my family. Art, cooking and reading, I love reading. I love reading a good trashy romance novel. One of my favorite things, I do also love reading art how-to books. I love Gene Haynes, but if it was up to me, I'd keep all the books I read. So I switched to a Kindle a long time ago, at least for the romance novels because otherwise I just wanna keep them all and at one point I have like a thousand paperbacks. Like that was just ridiculous. So I went to a Kindle, put them all on the Kindle and asked actually some of the older ones may actually be on the hard drive on the computer here and put them digital because I just can't, it would just be ridiculous. And so I love a good book and I do have some. Mostly now I keep our reference books and I really have to love it and know that I'm going to wanna refer back to it to keep it. If I liked it, but I don't think it's something I'm gonna wanna refer back to then it goes away. And I have quite a few cookbooks. Most of them are vintage and from my grandmother. Grandmother's a state when she passed away. And I have not been diagnosed with ADHD or any of the compulsive disorders, but it has been suggested, Laura. I saw that. At some point they just keep giving you different diagnoses and you're just like, uh-huh. So whatever, you know, whatever. I have been diagnosed officially with anxiety, disorder, depression and possible PTSD. So there you have it. I do have a therapist, but I don't see her on a regular basis. It's a very, I have a very mild case. So it's kind of a, if you need me, call me kind of situation. And I kind of prefer it that way unless it's really bad and my husband's dragging me out to the hospital. I got into romance novels because of my grandmother. She was a big Barbara Cartland fan. Anybody remember Barbara Cartland? And I have never been a kind of kid that could sit still. And I stopped arting and crafting for quite a few years when I lived with my grandmother. It was a stressful time and situation in my life. It was right around the same time I met my husband. So when he met me, poor thing did not know I was crafty. Poor guy. So I, it was all her fault and I love a good romance novel. I think they're good, especially, you know, if you like sci-fi with a little romance, that kind of thing in your movies, they have books for that, you know. So, you know, look into them. I love a good story with a little bit of romance. That's my thing. And let's see, I'm gonna try to catch up on some of the comments. So now you guys are all just chatty, which is good. Keep being chatty, okay. And the romance novels, The Real Myrtle, they just really kind of get you out of the current space that you're in. It's a fantasy thing and you can really just sort of get engrossed in the story and unload the rest of the, you know, stress that might be surrounding you at the time. They're really their entertainment. I love that. And Gail, so lots of extra stuff, question mark because I don't understand. Cause, you know, I don't know, I don't know. Let's see. So my favorite of Gene Haynes, ah, they're all good. Color in light and watercolor. This one. Color in light and watercolor. It's the first one that I got. I love this one. She has some really great lessons in here. And I had actually the paperback first. And it had, I think this hardback is a newer edition and it has a few different, it has additional lessons in it, I think. But this one, get this one. Get the new version if you can. But the paperback, the older version might be a little less expensive. So depending on your budget, but you won't go wrong either way. I love Gene Haynes. Big, big fan. No, you don't have to, Jessica. There are four or five different ways to enter the giveaway. You can do one of them. You can do all of them. One of them you can do every day. And I might be the Twitter one. Yeah, see a lot of people if, you know, we're not young. So you remember Barbara Cartland. So yeah. Oh, Valerie. I'm gonna have to look DJ Rob up. Yeah, too much reality, especially if you turn on the news. So I'm all for escaping that for a little bit. It helps me stay calm. Yeah, I have a habit of reading, sitting and reading a book until it's completely finished. And yeah, my husband's talking to me and I don't hear him because I'm in the book. That happens all the time. My family laughs about it actually. Yeah, so it's my grandmother Dorothy's fault and she and I didn't have a lot in common and we had more arguments than otherwise. And I won't get into it, but it was a stressful time in my life. And the one thing I did have from her is a love of romance novels. And so I thank her for that. And I met my husband around that time. So it's all good. Poor guy though had no idea that I was crafty and creative when he met me because I hadn't touched my sewing machine or anything in like five years. Poor guy. And I don't think I picked any of it up until after we were moving, we were living together. So I don't think he had a single clue. So I love a good art book and I love a good how-to art book like the Gene Haynes books. I do have the new one. I haven't cracked it open yet for more than just to do a cursory glance through but her books will always be on my bookshelf. They're some of my favorite. I also like I'm not gonna be able to find it now just cause I'm looking for it. Oh, here's the paperback. Okay, so this is the first one I got of Gene Haynes Color and Light and Watercolor in paperback. And this was the first edition. And I think this was the UK edition of the magazine. And this is the new collector's edition, the hard copy. So they're the same title, same book, but you can see that the collector's edition has more content. Look how much fatter it is than the paperback. So if you can get the hard copy, but if this one is the only one you can get, this one you'll love. But I love Emily Ball's drawing figures book. I love, she will always be in my art room. Yeah, there's a couple of Walter and there's a couple of really great color mixing books. You can't go wrong with having a good color mixing book. Of course, I have a few on mastering the art of watercolor and that sort of thing, urban sketching books. But probably if you said you can only take one set of books with you, it would be the Gene Haynes books and I'd leave the rest of them to be honest. You're welcome, sister Ella. So you know, it's something I do, I don't, so I used to do a lot of sewing. I used to be a dressmaker and make wedding dresses. I don't enjoy sewing. In fact, my first job at a high school, here's a little known fact that only you guys will get because you're live chatting with me now. Anybody have any idea what my first job at a high school was? I've mentioned it before, but I've mentioned it in passing. I was a fabric cutter and seamstress for Chuck E. Cheese. That's right. I made the costumes for the robotic characters for Chuck E. Cheese. I only had one skill and that was as a seamstress. That was the only skill I had at a high school and I had no, I had no, wait, there we go. I had no other skills. I was not headed to college. There was no money for that and I'd slacked off in high school so I did not have the grades for it. I wasn't a stupid kid, I just was bored. And so I got a job in the factory that made the Chuck E. Cheese characters as a cutter and a seamstress. And so I've know how to sew. It's not my favorite thing and oh my God, I can't stand fake fur for this day. Oh my God. But I do like the mixed media aspects of sewing. I do like making my own journal covers and pencil bags and things like that. So a lot of you have asked me over social media and friends that I've made on YouTube and that have asked me about sewing questions. So I'm glad to do it. I won't be showing you any dressmaking, proper dressmaking. I won't probably ever do that. There is a really great YouTube channel and let me see if I can find the link for you all that I recently just discovered I love her channel. And if anybody could get me back into dressmaking it would be this channel, I gotta tell you. I'm gonna put it in the comments right here. She's fabulous. I love her accent. I love her kooky style. I love her tutorials are fabulous. If you wanna learn more about dressmaking and she does some sewing 101 stuff too she calls it something else. But fabulous, fabulous sewing channel. I can't recommend her enough. With sewing pool, but I didn't know how to swim. It didn't occur to me to get a job as a lifeguard. Printing, see I didn't think about anything. The only creative thing I could think of was sewing. See, well the real myrtle. My husband brought computers into the marriage because when I first met him I thought computers what do I need a computer for? I didn't even own an adding machine. Now look at me. There was, you're welcome. So I do recommend that you all go over to her channel. She's got a kooky fun sense of style her tutorials are really easy and she's gonna show you things on that channel. I probably never will show you because pattern drafting and garment creation is not my thing. If I'm not making baby clothes or costumes it's really not my thing. I'd rather go buy it. So it's just not my thing. But I love to make bags, journal covers, little dolls. So we'll be doing more of that. In fact I have to make a bunch more of these little dolls and they'll be in the Etsy shop. I just got some new stones. There was a question from somebody I know on Facebook today about buying a sewing machine. And she wants to do some sewing and or mixed media sewing work but she doesn't have a lot of money. And I don't recommend if you're gonna be sewing mixed media fabric or paper on your machine I don't recommend you buy an expensive machine anyway because it's not good for the machine. So what I do recommend that you do is go to your local thrift shops or sewing machine repair places and see if they have any older used machines that you can buy for a good price. And the repair places will probably already have fixed it up. It only needs, yeah Stephanie, it only needs to do straight stitch and zigzag. If you're doing mixed media stuff on it it doesn't need to do anything else. You also can see if your grandmother or aunt or somebody maybe has one sitting in the back of the closet they don't use anymore. And hey Gatana, hey everybody. I still have my overlock machine, my serger. And when I do so I do like to do like little t-shirt things. I've done a tank top tutorial and stuff like that. I love my serger I'll never get rid of it. It's an inexpensive serger I bought for 100 bucks when I had not the money to buy it I made payments. It's been the best little thing I love it. So when I do so I usually use that when I do any kind of garments. And I probably won't ever do a tutorial on that cause figuring out the serger is really a pain in the neck to be honest with you and I'm watching my language. But yeah, so don't buy an expensive machine if you're gonna do the sewing one-on-one videos and you're gonna do mixed media stuff on it don't buy an expensive machine. Buy a inexpensive machine get one used use your grandmother's old machine because the sewing through the paint and the paper and everything is hard on the machine and you can damage your machine. A serger is a special machine that sews and cuts at the same time. So if you look at the inside of your t-shirts the seams have a sewn wrapped cut small little seam allowance. A serger is the machine that does that stitch and it sews and cuts and finishes the seam all at the same time. If I show it on camera it will be to show you guys how it worked but it won't you know I don't know. I don't know about doing a tutorial. Old ones are very sturdy yeah so I would say if you're gonna do any sort of you know mixed media things on a machine get an older one they have metal parts in them not plastic generally so you're probably better off they're kind of heavy to lift but yeah I would definitely look for an older machine. Overlockers yeah they're called you know baby lock, overlockers, sergers they're all basically the same machine. I have a four thread overlock. There's a lot of yeah usually when you're working on a serger I always when I did the tank top tutorial which is here on YouTube I said at that time I believe I said I recommend having making sure you have extra scraps of fabric not paper fabric to adjust the tension settings before you sew your garment cause each kind of fabric is gonna be different and unique and I sometimes set all my tension knobs back to zero and then sew a little bit and then start my adjustments and I have a chart I refer to every time I do it that came with a machine and then I just fiddle with that until I get it right and then I start sewing the machine I mean the garment if you don't do that then you're gonna have that whirl to hurt you're gonna be so frustrated you'll never use your serger again. Yeah two needles, one knife and four threads. Well that's on mine there are three thread and I think there's five thread but I have minus of four but it's an older one friend who has one of those fancy sewing machines that you that does the automatic embroidery for you plus regular sewing it's very complicated I'll never own one of these. When I say to people when they ask me you know what kind of arts and crafts that you do and I say if you go into any of your big box craft stores I can do or have done or have tried 90% of everything in the store that's not a lie. My creative journey to get to finding what I truly love has taken my whole life and it's been a long journey I finally am in a place where I know what I like to do and I know what departments to just avoid unless I'm working on a special project floral design so not my bag. Yeah so going back to Sister Ella. So yeah so my machine in the owner's manual came with a little chart with examples on it of what tension problems you may have and underneath the picture it has the suggested adjustments. I took that a long time ago and I blew it up and made a photocopy of it and I have that laminated with my machine and when I'm adjusting the tensions on it I have my extra scrap of the same fabric and I've moved everything back to zero and I sew a little bit see what the stitches are doing refer to my chart make my adjustments and then keep going until I get it perfect. So I do that every time I use my serger before I get started. It saves you a lot of headache if you do. It is easier to say what I haven't done Stephanie definitely it's easier. Okay Stephanie see you later. Yeah sewing is just, sewing frustrates me probably because I'm a closet perfectionist and I've been able to let it go with regards to mixed media art but I never have with regards to sewing, not for garment sewing. So yeah so it's a problem. So for those of you who have just joined or newly joined this is a giveaway announcement I am giving away six of these small priority mailboxes in honor of my YouTube channel hitting 6,000 subscribers we're over 6,000 now. So in the description below the video is a raffle copter link click on it and enter today. It's open to everybody in the world and I will be announcing the winners in about a week and we will probably do another live broadcast. Yeah I was a snot in school. So in home back in school I had a sewing teacher that was teaching us bound buttonholes and seam finishes and zippers and we had to do samples of all of these things for our final grade. So me and my brilliant idea even then I was a little snot I made a doll clothing wardrobe and on each garment in the wardrobe I did a different application and while she wasn't super pleased with that because that wasn't what she really wanted she wanted me to make a full size of people clothes she did think it was creative and I did get a and we will be covering some of those things in sewing 101. We are gonna be doing some things with different kind of seam finishes and making like a little sample book because some of those things you might wanna know to use in a mixed media application so we are gonna use them. I like these live broadcasts even if we're not doing art we're just chatting. It's like you're all here in my art room and we're having well water we're not having tea today. This is the address of my daughter's new apartment and this note is floating around my desk cause I'm supposed to enter it in the computer. And thanks Lisa for the congratulations. So yeah so I hope that you guys enjoy the content on the channel. If you have anything that you'd like to suggest that you would like to see let me know. We do have a, let's see I have notes hold on. I have notes. Okay so I am gonna be where I have explorations of me that I do with Cindy Utter is already filmed and loaded and edited through September. I'm gonna be working on finishing the year. I was thinking this week but probably now next week and getting that loaded. We are in sewing 101 gonna be working with my little genome which is my inexpensive less than a $100 machine. We're gonna be working on sewing with paper, doing fabric collage which we haven't really covered yet, bobbins, some more denim work. I may refilm the denim apron video. I haven't decided yet to do a denim apron live. And, oh yeah seams. Okay and we will be doing a little series where we do basic seams and then we'll be making a little like fabric reference book. We'll be doing basic seams. I may show you a couple kinds of buttonhole, different little things like that that I think you might wanna know how to do because they have interesting mixed media applications or maybe you just wanna make your granddaughter a Halloween costume or something like that. I will be doing the belly band video. A lot of people ask me about the belly band on my travel case. Hold on. This belly band on my travel case and I've already done a video on the traveled, the luggage tag. So I was looking yesterday for a case to use in a prop in the video, didn't find one but I realized during that process that I have something that work. So I'm gonna make a belly band for the other case that I have and I'm gonna show you how I did that. That's a video coming up. I'm trying to figure out where I can get some custom stickers made with my artwork on them like planner size stickers. Anna Brim I know from Mrs. Brimbles has her own stickers and I may see if I can message her if she would answer me. She might be too busy right now with her adopting a new baby and everything but I'm looking at that for 2017. Yeah, belly band. I love that name belly band. So we're gonna be working on that. So I'm looking for making stickers for 2017. We are going to be having a design team call for 2017 for my stamp design. I will be opening up the chat in the Facebook group for classes you all think are really interesting for 2017. So people can start planning now what classes they're gonna wanna take. And also we are gonna be doing something with regards to recording your year for 2017. We all know that I do a sort of year of my life journal. It's a really bad name and even recording your year is a bad name. If you guys all have better names, let me know. But I do it a little differently than everybody else and I did do a journal flip video recently and the video airs on the 20th. I'm going to set up my 2017 journal which will air sometime after that. And we are gonna be having like monthly sort of flip suggestion chatty things in the Facebook group and or YouTube for that. So if you all are interested in that, let me know. If there's anything else you wanna see, message me. Post something in the comments. Tag me in a Facebook post. But those are what I have that I know I'm going to, I am working on right now. And I think that's it right now. And bye, Josie. I'll talk to you later. And I need one for my belly. Yeah, well, I mean, you could do, you know, something else with a gale if you need to. But the belly band is also good. It could be made into a journal closure and I will probably show something with that. The parts are not expensive and or you could take apart thrift store finds or things that you have around the house to use for some of the parts. So I'll be covering all that in the video. And like I said, if you have, there's anything else that, you know, you guys would like to see, let me know. I am working on a bunch of stuff. I'm still working on the family cookbook which is not done yet. Cause I haven't, there's just not enough time in my week to type all these recipes. And some of them are not in English, they're in Italian and I don't speak Italian. And my aunt is busy. So it takes a long time for her to edit them and get them back to me. Belly band belt, see? It could be. So you could totally do the belly band as a belt, a real belt or a belt for your journal. So, and that'll be part of the video and I'll talk you through doing that. And I do think we're gonna do some more sewing 101s live cause that was a lot of fun. We tried that live and so I think we'll be doing that. And I'm working on having YouTube allow me to have paid content. And the reason for that is because then I would like to take all my classes that are paid for classes that are all over the place on the web and put them all on YouTube. It means I get less money, but that's not the point. But they'll all be in one place. And I love that and they'll be easily accessible. The prices will be very cheap and they will be coming off of the other places. So yeah, in some cases, Gail, that reading the writing is really difficult. So it takes literally like a team of family members to translate some of it. So this is English and this is a photocopy. I'm gonna switch views here. So I won't see the chat, but this is, where are we? This is English and this is a photocopy, but this is an example of the handwriting we're dealing with. This one's readable, this one's not bad. Some of them are really not great. So it's taking a long time. And we also are supposed to be working on a video, a book with some of my daily thoughts in it and some doodles and sort of things. Which I'm just, I'm having trouble with. I really need an assistant that can just like put stuff together for me. Oh, you're welcome. I'm just, my brain is bursting usually with information. So I could ask about that a lot too. It never really shuts off. All right, I think that's it for today. I have no idea how long we've been on. Probably a while. Let's see, does it stay on the other thing? Nope. Not that it matters. We'll just keep chatting. All right, but can you do it behind the screen? Oh, sure. Heidi, that's a good idea. Also, you should also post something in the Facebook group because I am crazy. Yes, the real moral. Yes, I'm nuts. We won't talk about that. Yeah, I'm nuts. Post something in the Facebook group too, Heidi, because there's a lot of people in there that do YouTube channels that can help. And right, yeah, I need like stronger. I don't, these are pretty strong, but I think these are, I am old people. I'm older than I look. For those of you who don't know, some people think I'm like, yeah, I'm not as, I'm old. Oh yeah, I'll be doing a lot more. Well, this is gonna be a regular basis. And it's been great having you all here. And we'll do a video one. In fact, it would be fun to do a live video one where I have the web camera. It's on a long cord and I could walk around the room with the webcam and show you how I have my camera set up. You can't really see it too much over. Well, let's see. If I move the webcam, let's see. I just moved it a little bit. Let's see. I was born in 1963. That's not super old, but I'm no spring chicken. Which is, you know, so do you see over me where that little shape that's on my shelf above my table? From here, it sort of looks like a little horse. That's actually my tripod, where my camera sits. Actually, I'll put the camera in there. So that's where my camera sits, Heidi. And it's there all the time and it's out of my way. It's semi inconspicuous, which I wanted. And the lights, I have, the light that you see, I have two of them. One is on the other side off camera pointing at the table. And it is very bright right there and it's the perfect setup for filming. That would, so that would be my first suggestion would be to figure out a way wherever you're gonna work to set up your filming station. So no, that's an HD camera. I do next to it, you can't really see it because it's white, there is a phone mount. So I can film with my phone, my smartphone or my video camera. But they're both pointed down at the table and I have these bright daylight bulbs and these clip lamps that are focused down at the table. So that would be my first suggestion before you go live is to figure out how to inexpensively with your budget and your room do some really great lighting and some, to get your camera or phone pointed in the right direction. Cause I was bad at, if you go back and look at my original videos, I was bad at that at first. I appreciate you too, sister Ella. Yeah, I have stronger reading glasses. I have one of those giant magnifying lights when I'm doing embroidery and sometimes I have to use that and the reading glasses because the stitches are too small. And Laura, you're just a baby in 1974. Yeah, that's a good idea. Yeah, Gail. Yeah, you sound like my dad does that. He'll have two or three pairs, but he's in his 70s. We're only as old as we feel, right? All right, just got word that my photo shoot pictures are ready, that means I can finish the magazine article I need to do today. So that's my camera setup and maybe it's a good idea to do a series of videos where I talk about how the room is set up and why it's set up and the camera mount and all of that stuff. But if you go back and look at my original couple of videos, they're not done well. They're either filmed with my phone or my iPad, which was like an iPad too at the time. So don't be afraid to just give it a shot and put out like a sample video, a test video and see what happens. I've done a few of those over the years. My mom is 75 and my dad is 77, just FYI. I'll be 50, I don't know how old I'm gonna be, 53 in August. August 2nd is my birthday. All right, that's it for today. I'm gonna go try to eat some lunch while it's still a decent time because I waited way too long yesterday and I did not feel good then later even after I ate. So I'm gonna go take care of that right now. And then I promised a friend of mine, I would go over to Tuesday morning and see if they've got the delusions journals in. They did get a delivery today, so I have no idea. So again, we're giving away six small priority mailboxes in honor of reaching 6,000 YouTube subscribers. And the link for the Rafflecopter is in the description below. Each one of the boxes has a little bit different selection in them, including artwork, watercolors, all kinds of stuff. So join the Rafflecopter, hopefully you'll win one. It's totally at random, it's through Rafflecopter. And you're welcome. And I love happy birthday mail. Don't go all out and break the budget, but I would love a postcard or something if you guys all wanna do that. That would be fabulous. My address, my link PO box is in the description below. Yeah, birthday's August 2nd, FYI. And every year on my birthday, I get a call from my parents who, like I said, are in their 70s. And okay, neither one of them is musical, but it's very cute, they call and sing me happy birthday. Totally off key, but it's cute. And then my mom usually says, how old are you? And then when I tell her, she says, shit, I'm getting old. So it's pretty fun. All right, that's it for right now, everybody. Don't forget the most important thing, you all know what that is, right? Go out and do something nice for yourself and maybe somebody else, because you deserve it and so do they. All right, I'll talk to you all later. Enter the giveaway, have some fun. Show Stitch List TV some love. Those of you who are loving Sewing 101, just trust me, you're gonna love her channel. She's kooky, but in a fun way, and I love her videos. All right, that's it for right now, everybody. I'm gonna go eat some lunch. I'll talk to you later, bye.