bad habits die hard

Generally, I'm pretty disappointed that Domino magazine is gone and that the publisher decided to give me Glamour Magazine to finish out my subscription. The two magazines are not remotely comparable, but as long as it's here, I read it. I have to give Glamour credit ,though, I actually found this recent article on sleep useful. I find myself in a vicious cycle of never getting enough sleep. What can you do if you're a mom that can't afford a nanny? When else, besides after the kids are in bed, are you ever going to have time for yourself or to make stuff or to work?

Even though I'm busier than ever with the opening of my Etsy shop and freelance work picking up, I decided to follow the recommendations in the article which is to try to get between 7 1/2  and 9 hours each night as well as go to bed and wake up at consistent times every day. I've never been able to do it in the past, but I decided I really need the extra energy, boost in mood, and bonus weight loss.  Really, it's so logical- we all know we feel better with more sleep, but why can't we follow through?

So I managed to get 8 1/2 hours for two days in a row! I had to force myself to not start any absorbing projects after the kids were in bed. The first day I woke up 1/2 hour before the alarm, went downstairs for a cup of coffee and a browse through the J.Crew catalog before the kids woke up and the chaos started. For some reason, it didn't seem so chaotic. For once I didn't yell at the kids to hurry up, and I wasn't late dropping my boy off at preschool. Hmmm.. this is pretty cool. The second day, I felt like running a marathon, but instead I did a boatload of design work for a client, did a bunch of push ups, actually got dressed and put make up on, and made a home-cooked meal for dinner. Rock on! Then day 3 came around and I only got 7 hours. I got hooked on a tv show and blew it on the bed time. Today I'm paying for it! I had chicken parmesan for breakfast, spent the morning web surfing, and spending too much discretionary income on silly stuff. I was supposed to be cranking out more designs for my loyal client who happens to have a deadline, but I went on Regretsy.com and couldn't help myself.

I bought this Regretsy t-shirt from zazzle.com . It's an actual quote from an Etsy seller. Do I need it? Absolutely not! The sale benefits something, I think- oh who cares! Next, I check out some of the Regretsy inside joke reader-designed fabric at Spoonflower. I really should do some work... oh look! They have fabrics with the Regretsy "clone kitty"!

designed by Lynda Williams

These are from a Photoshop contest on Regretsy. So other people besides me get sucked into wasting too much time on Regretsy!

 designed by Kurt Storey

designed by Sarah Robertson

designed by Natalie Backus

 designed by Christine Gunn

Spoonflower is a really neat resource. You can design your own fabric in Illustrator or Photoshop or whatever, send the file to Spoonflower, and have any amount of yardage printed up on your choice of fabric. Or you can buy other people's designs- then that person gets a commission. I'd really like to try it... first I think I'll buy a couple of yards of one of these. I love this last one by Christine Gunn. It  looks like a pretty paisley from a distance, but then a closer look shows it's the "clone kitty" and "garbage elephant"! It is so clever, I think I need to buy a few yards of it in bamboo/cotton just to see how it feels, make a skirt to go with my new t-shirt- some tax deductible R&D... oh crap, it's 1:30, I'm craving McDonald's, and I still have designs to start!

I'd like to do better tonight on the sleeping, but I might have to catch up on work and Project Runway is on...