Christmas here

Happy Holidays
to All of You!

We are relaxing, with not much going on in the Ebay shop and not many reasons to go out of the house. We are going to try to avoid the stores all together for this holiday rush - no reason for us to be there and get run over!

Playing EVE a little more. Mark did brave the stores last week to get an accelerated graphics card so I can play on my computer while he plays on his. It is a really detailed game with lots of opportunity for those who like to trade goods (me), create 'inventions' (soon!) and run about shooting up bad guys (Mark). We can even play together in a 'corporation' in the game and use both of our strengths to help the other.

Esme is growing a lot - she is over 10 lbs now (10# 5oz last I checked) and making lots of different noises than she has before. I'm getting better at bathing her, which was one of the more difficult things for me up until I found a good routine. I got a b.c. shot at the doctor last week that will last for 3 months minimum .. and it has been making me quite tired, either that or I'm coming down with something. The tiredness started a few days after the shot so I'm thinking that was it.

I'm also putting more energy into my Knitowl toy shop - as some custom orders have come in (and went out) and I've gotten a few loving reviews about my 'lead free toys'. Cotton cloth with polyester filling and embroidered eyes... yea pretty lead free ;) I've had a few people suggest new patterns to try to make as well.

We're not sure what is going to happen after the first of the year, but right now it is Christmas and we'll wait a week or so before we grind hard on that stone again.

Mark is coming home today!

Some of you were out of the loop, sorry about that -- but I thought it best not to post that Mark had left for his trip until he was on his way back. He is coming home today in a few hours :))

He went over half the midsection of the country - through Arkansas, Oklahoma, Kansas, New Mexico, Arizona, Utah, Wyoming and Colorado. He did a stopover at a family friend's store in Utah to talk about some merchandise and maybe partnering up for some shipping and supplying later on.

He saw the Very Large Array in New Mexico, and the Hoover Dam, and took some pictures.

I hope I have everything ready for him to have a nice hot bath, Southern style tea and a good steak dinner when he gets home, oh -- and a crushing bear hug from me ;)

Heard on the News: I heard something interesting on the radio (NPR) yesterday. Think you've seen more babies this year? (I was surprised to hear my brother's wife was pregnant, but so were they) and Rhiannon is expecting a baby boy, after her sister also had a baby last year. Quote: "For the first time since 1971, the nation’s overall fertility rate rose past the replacement rate, increasing 2 percent in 2006 to 2,101 births per 1,000 women. Women of almost every age had more children last year than the year before, except girls under 15 and women over 45." From this news article

Mark's family's friend Bert had a beautiful thing to say when he heard about Esme: 'You're replenishing the Earth, that is the way it should be.' Those words resonated in me when I looked at Esme today. Someday, she'll have her own baby perhaps. I'm sure my mother thought the same thing when she held me nearly thirty years ago ;)

A Big Move - to Where?

Asking for advice!

Mark and I are looking to open a brick and mortar type retail shop. We've been discussing this since last year (well, January of this year actually), but there have been several things, besides Baby Bazooka, that have kept us from making any decisions.

If we had been able to tie those things up before, we wouldn't have waited so long. Now, we're waiting for Bazooka to arrive, and trying to make plans on what information we can get through the Internet and friends. We're not even sure exactly what region of the country we would like to be in yet, but we do have some criteria. One of the hardest things is I can't travel very far to check anything out, and probably won't be physically able for a month or so after the baby is born. However, we would really like to know where we are going before December rolls around.

We would like to be have our store near a population center but live a little further out of town in a 'farmland' type area, on an acre or more. If we could have the store and house on the same property (say off a highway exit or intersection) that would be ideal.

Our store would be a mixture of computers, electronics, coffee shop and workshop facilities. It would be a unique kind of place, with both parts and materials to buy, coffee and snacks to hang out in the lounge area with, and maybe classes and projects going on by local artists. Think about sitting in a coffee shop while people next to you build a Rube Goldberg machine in one corner and other geeks take turns between LAN gaming and fixing their machines with shop tools. There might be a 'yarn bar' and an assortment of basic art materials for sale, as well as promotion of local artisans and in-house reference materials on a variety of crafty and technical subjects.

Of course, this would be our ultimate goal. We'll have to start small. Our Ebay store is already getting to the point where we can rely on it for a little bit while we get settled. Where we go will definitely direct how much we can do how soon.

But where to go? Neither of us have real strong feelings about location. We've been looking at a few different regions of the country but would like suggestions!

So, here are the criteria we are working with:
Near high population but still some rural land nearby.
A welcoming environment, we're both eccentric geeks and we're hoping to attract other like-minded people. Maybe near a university or technological center, people who want to learn and tinker with things. Moderate temperatures, not too hot or cold. I grew up in Minnesota and can't take really high heat, while Mark grew up here and places more Southern, so he avoids the colder weather as well.

Suggestions please!
Invite your friends to give us some ideas too!
We'd like to hear your opinions about different areas!