CMM

camps

I had a creative block for camps this summer. I sat for hours just staring at an empty calendar. I love the camps and I love to plan, but I just couldn’t organize my ideas. 
The big picture was just too big. I was overwhelmed with the idea of coming up with great ideas for the entire summer. I was worried about being stale and not trying new things. I was worried about growing with my kids and coming up with ideas that were still fun and challenging. That’s a lot to have rolling around in the ol’ brain while just staring at a blank calendar. 
I finally got over my mental block simply by asking the girls what the heck we should do. The ideas just flowed from them. Emoji camp, Cake Boss, Princesses, Donuts, Hamburgers…Paint. Cook. Paint. Repeat. 
Why didn’t I start with these little ladies in the first place???
We had a busy week of camps with Emoji Madness and Cake Boss. Two of their brain children and absolute favs. 
Loving Annabelle’s Emoji Pizza
And then it was Cake Boss time: 
We added the painting to the camps and everyone seems really excited about it. For Cake Boss we painted cake slice boxes. 
Our niece Reagan joined us for both camps this week and a sleepover. 
Those are some good lookin’ cakes. 

belle princess party

Miss Gwyneth helped me to organize the Belle Camp at Blue Mountain Kitchen. She loves the princesses. She didn’t ask to invite a friend along today; she was very just very happy to help. 
My girl loves princesses.  She loves the movies, the magic, the dresses and all things sparkly and fancy. I love that she still has this innocence. I was wondering if she would outgrow this phase and think maybe she never will. Maybe she is our little princess and will always love the glitter of it all. 
Have I mentioned that she has gone through a major growth spurt also? She’s so flippin’ tall!

national donut day

As I get older I’m losing my sweet tooth. I’m more of a savory girl these days. I have two weaknesses in the sweets department still: donuts and birthday cake. 
We were back at the Kitchen today for a mini-camp honoring National Donut Day. We had the special treat of having my niece, Reagan join us today too! The girls are always very excited to see their cousin. The never want their time together to end and they always beg for more time and sleepovers. 
B helped the girls make donut holes

We took a break from eating donuts to paint donuts. They turned out so great and I even took the opportunity to paint with them. 
Look at all those fabulous donuts!

B made a homemade glaze and chocolate icing for the donuts. My girls were kind enough to share with me and believe me I ate my fair share. They were delicious!

Sweet cousins
Gwyneth even sported some donut earrings!

42nd street

Summer camps are in full swing and we started with a sold out house. We hosted an ice cream social at Blue Mountain Kitchen and partnered up with Color Me Mine. We painted ice cream bowls and then the kids got to take a trip through our ice cream sundae bar. 
We are offering more and more camps combining cooking and painting and the kids are loving it! Shaping up to be a busy summer and we couldn’t be happier about that. 

Our summer walks to 7-11 for slurpees.
Our girls are spoiled rotten. I wanted to get my nails done so the girls tagged along. They were treated to mani/pedis. I’m pretty sure I’m creating little monsters, but I sure do love this time with them. 
We are all super ticklish! Each ones of us laughed harder than the next while getting our toes done. 
These ladies sure do clean up nice. The four of us went to see 42nd Street at the Candlelight Playhouse. I don’t think it was anyone’s favorite, but I absolutely loved it. The girls and I loved all the tap dancing. B probably could have lived without it. It was a lovely night together regardless, but we’re thinking next time we go to a show it will be just the girls and we’ll give B a night off! 

girl scouts | painting party

Tonight was the last night of Brownies! What a journey we have been on with these little ladies. We started as Daisies in kindergarten and now they are going to be in fourth grade and Juniors. It has certainly been an adventure. 
I asked around to see if anyone wanted to keep on going and we had just one girl drop out of the troop. Soooo, we celebrated tonight, we’re taking the summer off, and we’re going to start up again next year for our FIFTH year. I feel quite lucky to be a leader for this amazing troop of young ladies. 
We had our end of year celebration at Color Me Mine. I thought these ladies (especially mine) would be sick and tired of this place, but nope! They all still love to paint and throw in a little pizza and the night was a big ol’ hit. 

Not all the girls could make it tonight, but the ones who did brought along a few siblings (and a few sneaked away before I could get a group photo).

paint night with g

Gwyneth and I met some friends at Color Me Mine for a special paint night. She painted a lovely Easter Egg plate and I painted a little spring plate. I’m painting more and more these days and I’m really enjoying the connection with my girls and to this little business. Couldn’t have asked for a better night with my littlest lady!

new color me mine store

I have been crazy, overwhelmed this week and here’s why:
We started with this and had about 3 weeks to get it ready for our move. 
yeah, that is an understatement of how I was feeling…
There was a lot of hustle and lost sleep while the new location was being built out. We stayed open in our current location until Feb 20th because it was a holiday and I didn’t want to miss out on that much need day of revenue (someone has to pay for all this!). We closed that location on the 21st and had to be completely out by the 22nd when my lease was up. Not a lot of time for packing and moving. 

I have an amazing staff who pitched in to wrap up all that pottery to move to the new location. It was just a few doors down, but there was a lot to move. I also had three guys come out from the corporate office to help which included moving all the furniture and my kilns. The former owner was messy and a packrat so I just started stuffing trash bags. I filled up three large dumsters with her old mess.

Did I also mention that I have one pretty terrific husband helping me too? He was packing, moving, unpacking, carting the kids around, keeping our lives in check, and talking me down from every drama. These are not small things and he never asked for anything in return. Well, maybe for me to calm down a bit, or to sleep, or to stop crying every now and then… but I guess those are all reasonable requests.

I finished packing up very, very late on the 22nd. It was bitter sweet. I fought so hard for that grody ol’ Color Me Mine. It was special to me and my family, but never really felt like mine. I was constantly making excuses and trying to distance myself from the previous owner. It was never my style, never felt like home. (It was so flippin’ dirty!! UGH!). I can’t say I will miss it, not one little bit. I did learn a lot here (mostly what I did NOT want) and for that I will always be grateful. 
I locked up those doors and headed over to see the new location:
This was very late Wednesday night and we were scheduled to open the doors Friday morning. If I’m being completely honest this is when the tears arrived. I was so, so tired and I couldn’t get the door locked when I was leaving. I just stood there and cried. That’s what a lack of sleep will do to you (and maybe a touch of fear and despair…).

Again, that husband of mine talked me off the ledge. He bought me a burrito and a beer and assured me it would all get done. He also did homework with the girls, went grocery shopping, made sure lunches, swim bags, and dance bags were packed, and still managed to run his own business for the week. I have always thought we made a great team, but this week I have fully realized that I have it far, far better in this marriage. My only hope is that he doesn’t realize it too or that he remains too kind to admit it. 
Thursday morning I woke up with renewed confidence and was determined to get that store in order for a Friday opening. I had several staff members come in and help me load shelves and get the kiln room in order. 
And we did it! We were ready to open Friday morning! We got that entire store unpacked and ready in one day! What the what?!?
I still can’t really believe it happened. The store wasn’t perfect (still isn’t), but it’s a work in progress and it is me. It was truly miraculous seeing my vision come together from a few drawings to this: 

I absolutely love it and it finally feels like ours! It’s modern and clean and I couldn’t be happier.
Thank you to everyone who made this possible. I’m feeling quite fortunate and grateful these days. 

vegas

It was rather horrible timing, but I committed to attend the Color Me Mine annual conference this week. All the owners from around the world and corporate staff gathered in Las Vegas and since I’m so very new to this I decided it would be really helpful. It was quite difficult to juggle all the logistics of the trip but B did an amazing job balancing work and running the girls around for the week. I could not be more grateful for him. 
I learned a ton this week although I missed my family terribly! 
Traveling solo. It’s been a while.
I stayed at the D in downtown Vegas. I didn’t do much exploring as I’m not a huge fan of Vegas, but managed to read my book a bit and had dinner with other fellow owners. 

I never ventured over to the strip and didn’t even really leave my hotel room on Fremont Street.

Man, I’m getting old. 

Have I mentioned how wonderfully fabulous our friends are??? B came out to Vegas for just one night and the girls stayed overnight with a friend back home. I was really nervous about leaving the girls because it was a school night, but Annabelle’s dear friend Karsen invited both girls for the night. Her mom, Terrie is terrific and we could never thank her enough. She picked the girls up from school, took them to Dave & Busters, did homework with them, put them all to bed (in one big king size bed so G wouldn’t be scared – how cute is that?), made them bacon for breakfast and got them all to school the next morning. The girls were truly spoiled and I don’t think they missed us one bit.

B and I didn’t have much time, but we certainly made the most of it! We had drinks on Fremont street, a fabulous dinner and even did a little gambling. I won 60 bucks on video poker, which was lovely since I don’t even really enjoy gambling.

Feeling very grateful to my husband and Terrie for all their help this week. I’m one lucky lady!

first assembly and first aid

Annabelle’s choir group was asked to sing at the First Friday Assembly. The girls were a little nervous in front of the whole school, but they did great. 

 We are working on the exterior of our new location for Color Me Mine. I wanted to get some before and after pictures. Here’s before: (stay tuned for after)

 Tonight a few girls and moms from Annabelle’s troop helped Gwyneth’s troop learn about First Aid. They learned so much and had a lot of fun.

Learning about 911: 
 Making first aid kits: 
 Wrapping up their wounds: 

 The Juniors…and a photobombing Brownie

butterflies

B typically has to work late on Wednesdays and it is the only day the girls do not have an after-school activity. Us gals decided that after dance on Monday and Tuesday we would work hard to get all the homework and projects done so we can have some fun after school on Wednesdays. I asked if they wanted to plan the activities together and they decided they wanted to be surprised. After our fun, we intend to meet up with B for dinner. We could all use a little mid-week fun! 
Let the fun begin….I gave the girls a choice today between butterflies and books (they have a gift card to Barnes and Noble to spend and truly love exploring at the book store). They choice butterflies so off we went to the Butterfly Pavilion. I really do enjoy this gem that is so close to home. 
I love the butterfly exhibit but I’m pretty sure the girls enjoy holding Rosie, the tarantula, the best. 
We had a great time exploring together and it was wonderful to see the girls engaged and asking questions. A lovely kick off to our Wednesdays-o-fun. 
We met B at the Orchards for dinner and to check out the progress on my new space. The construction work has finally started on my new studio! I have to admit — I’m a bit of a mess over this. It is a lot of work…and this work is not something I’m familiar or comfortable with and I’m really outside of my comfort zone.  B did most of the work building out Blue Mountain Kitchen and has been supportive and helpful, but the decisions for this one fall to me. I am afraid of being wrong, making a bad call, making a mistake. I’m questioning myself and my decisions and I’m losing a lot of sleep. It’s a learning experience and it’s hard and a bit scary.
With that said, I can’t wait to get in to this new space. I love putting my own spin on it and truly making it my own. It’s going to be amazing and it will all be worth it in the end!
The took out some very ugly flooring and a wall for me. Now it’s time to pretty this place up. 
Our girls sure have been through a lot of interesting experiences with mine and B’s careers. 
Let’s do this!