Life goes on.

My mother passed away on Monday. She was just 70 and had a lot of life left to live. Our family is now focusing on getting the memorial service put together and we are fortunate that Mom had so many dear friends. It’s great to have so many helping hands in a time of need! Every time the phone rings it’s someone calling to help. It really says a lot about Mom that she gathered so many wonderful people around her.

All I can say is Pancreatic cancer sucks. It has been devastating to watch Mom go through so much pain, especially after her surgery went so well this summer. We all miss her, but I am glad to know she isn’t suffering through this anymore. I just wish she never had to.

KimonoMomo is once again open for business, but please understand there will be delays in shipping out orders as most of my possessions, stock and shipping materials are in bags and boxes in at least three different locations. At some point things will settle down again and we can move on with getting the new stock listed and orders filled in a timely manner. Thank you for all the support!

The week from Hades, continued

So we’re in California now. The house in Oregon was packed in about 3 days with some help from friends, and the kids and I headed south to stay with family.  The Etsy shop and website sales will be closed until further notice as I’m not sure when I’ll be able to get back to work. We’re helping my mother through a stressful passage, coping with the aftermath of pancreatic cancer that, even after being removed this summer, has spread and taken up residence in other organs despite the work of several physicians and the care of her family.

So, I’ll still keep posting when I can.

The week from Hades, part I

Sunday: Post car for sale on craigslist. Really nice couple comes over to test drive car. I go to move car so I can vacuum out the child residue. Car won’t start. Nice couple drives me out to auto parts store to pick up new battery and even installs it while I’m digging through packed boxes looking for tools I no longer have. Car starts, barely. Test drive goes well, other than that.

Go see movie with ex and my son. Have a good time. Fall asleep early due to exhaustion.

Monday: Take car to mechanic to find out what is wrong. Fall asleep in car waiting almost an hour for mechanic. Very nice mechanic finds the problem. Fixing will cost more cash than I have, and it cost $40 just to find that out. Call nice couple and discuss problem and possible solutions.

Find out getting my ferret over the border into California will be exceptionally risky. Call all sorts of people including local vet to figure something out. Cry a lot. Call an old friend from high school. Laugh a little. Make soup. Eat. Pack boxes, throw stuff out.

Change in plans

Colorado will have to wait a while. We’re heading back to my hometown in the San Francisco Bay Area, at least temporarily. This puts us back in with the sort of people I’m most comfortable with, such as costumers, cosplayers, and historical re-enactors. My daughter and I are especially looking forward to attending the California Steampunk Convention Halloween weekend (if it doesn’t sell out first). Think I can get away with wearing a kimono to such an event? I just might try.

Trunk show, sale, and general craziness.

Catching up just a bit between scubbing floors and throwing out stuff… the kids and I are moving in a week and there is so much to do. Here’s a little bit of what is going on these days:

Friday, October 3rd was the fabulous, super amazing trunk show featuring KimonoMomo bags and scarves at King of Sole in downtown Bend, Oregon during the First Friday Art Hop. Wow! The response was fantastic and a lot of bags found new homes. One of my favorite scarves did, too. We’ve entered the holiday shopping season with a bang!

Here’s MJ, King of Sole’s proprietress, busy at work. She gave me a prime location in the shop and I couldn’t have asked for better. She’s a great buyer to work with and I’m grateful she gave me the opportunity to share her shop for the evening. Thanks, MJ!

Here are the ladies of the crew, including MJ’s mom. What a great team! There were blue drinks, cookies and chocolate at the door and they made sure everyone was having a good time.

I’ll miss you ladies!

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And now onto this week’s specials… The Etsy Supply Street Team (ESST) is having a sale right now with the theme “Supply your holidays” and as I am a member, I’m offering 20% off select items in the shop. Since I just finished a massive fabric sale, for this sale I have instead marked down my Folkwear patterns and sashiko supplies as they were not included in the previous sale. For those of you looking to get started on sashiko, now is the perfect time. For those of you who regularly visit my shop for sashiko supplies, this is a great time to stock up.

October is going to be a busy month with the move, so I hope you’ll stick around and leave a comment or two to let me know you’re still reading. This will be a big plunge for me and rather scary as we’ll be moving 1,000 miles away from our little town in Oregon to the city of Denver, Colorado.

Ripe plums are falling

Drop a comment here if you know where that line is from! It’s been in my head since yesterday, when the notion that I needed to eat some local produce tickled me and I found the neighborhood kids munching on yellow plums across the street from my house. The plum tree is usually hidden from my view by two fairly useless, unidentified-variety fruit trees in my own yard. These were all planted by the brilliant folks who developed our subdivision back in the ’80′s or ’90′s. What fruit most of these trees produce is anyone’s guess, and many of them don’t seem to produce well at all, aside from beautiful blossoms in spring. Our high desert climate and short growing season don’t make for lively orchards, evidently. But oh, golden plums!

I think they are a type of Italian prune. I’ll add pictures in the next post, hopefully someone will be able to identify the variety. They are beautifully sweet and have a delightful floral aroma. The plan is to turn most of them into plum butter once I settle on a recipe that I like. Tomorrow I’ll be off to the shops to pick up canning supplies and sugar. Times like these I wish I’d spent more time working in the kitchen with my mother, picking up canning skills. Maybe next summer?