Happy.

Y'all, I am just a happy southern girl. Things are just going real good right now. It's Christmas time, my decorations have been up for over a week, I have bought a couple gifts, I have made some awesome friends here in South Carolina, AND my etsy business has been doing really well. Life is good.

Over the weekend we went to my friend Heather's house for some yummy taco soup an for a few games of Mexican Dominoes. That was so awesome. I love that living here has been so much easier for us, I love that we have made so many friends and feel at home here. Especially this time of year it is important and it means so much to me.

Now about my etsy store, I have been selling on etsy for about 8 months. Some months are better than others for sure and in the beginning I was completely reliant on facebook for marketing and spreading the word and all of my sales were to facebook friends who were so unbelievably supportive. Now I have broadened my horizons and am selling to all kinds of folks. :)
Here is the thing, I am not selling 10 things or 20 things a day on etsy, I wish I was, but I am not, I am however selling about one thing a day and sometimes 4 or 5 things a day, and that? is super cool. Etsy isn't going to make me rich, it's not even paying a bill. It will pay for a few Christmas presents and that makes me really happy. I also love when I send things out to all these different states and think 'wow, something I created is going to hang in the house of someone I never met, will never meet in another state', well that is just crazy!

Here are a few things that I have listed lately.

I made one similar to this to hang on my own front door and then I decided to make one to list too. I figured a little subtle hint to the jolly guy wouldn't hurt, right?

Then I listed a couple new clipboards, I have about half a dozen more coming tomorrow. They have been selling really well. Especially as teacher gifts.

So with all of this Christmas stuff coming up I have been thinking about all the friends and family we left back in California. Thinking about all the holidays we spent with them. Growing up Christmas Eve was a big holiday in my house. I am Italian and it's a cultural thing. We do Christmas Eve up real big and then Christmas day is just more about the immediate family. When my family kept dwindling and more and more people were passing away it made me sad to think that my kids weren't going to have that tradition and those memories like I did. I don't remember what year we started doing it, but we started inviting all of our friends over for Christmas Eve. A makeshift family. A new tradition was born. It was awesome. I would cook, I would make lots of food, meatballs, stuffed shells or lasagna, salad, tons of appetizers and desserts. It was the best day of the year for me. I would be stressed and some years were definitely better than others. But no matter how I felt every single year my kids LOVED that day. It began to be as important to them as my big family holiday was to me as a kid. I knew we had succeeded in creating a new tradition.

A picture of Christmas past...such  great memories.

So now here we are, in South Carolina. Which of course is way too far from California for all 25 people that used to come over to come out and celebrate with us. It's a little difficult. It will be a little easier of course because my in laws now live here so that is great. My friends will still miss the party though. They love a good party. We are going to have to figure out a new tradition. It might not be the same, and it is going to take a while to get used to whatever it will be but we will do it. We are a strong family and we are looking forward to seeing where this new holiday season will take us.