I know I have been gone for quite a few weeks, and there are great stories and explanations for the hiatus. As I was talking about in previous posts, it was both my wedding anniversary and my upcoming trip to Chaos Wars that would make me have a long absence from the blogisphere. Both of those events have come to pass, and now I am back at home recovering and preparing for the next big thing. More news on that tomorrow.

For our anniversary, Dan and I went down to LA to ride rollercoasters at Magic Mountain. We both love doing this and have often contemplated joining ACES but have never actually taken the plunge. We then took off for California Extreme the next day. It was much more fun this year, and I liked the convention center they picked better this year even though there seemed to be fewer games and less variety. I blame the bad economy and high gas prices for people not being able to transport their games to the convention. After that it was off to the airport and a short plane ride to Salt Lake City to meet up with my friends from Ered Duath. They took me up to Idaho for Chaos Wars, which was my favorite Belegarth event of all time. I had a great time meeting up with old friends and getting to hang with new Hellhammer members that I had yet to meet. The picture above is all my dance gear that cannot be washed being aired out. While I am still sick with a cold that I picked up from the event, I am so glad to have gotten to take a part in all the fun and festivities. I miss everyone so much now even though there is a big piece of me happy to be home in my quiet confines with the plants and sewing machine again.

Things around the garden seemed to do fine with out me under the care of Dan's watchful eyes. Things are flowering again and starting to turn into fruits and vegetables. There are flowers on the chives:



And big flowers for zucchini:



As well as some young zucchini that will soon be ready to eat:



The tomato flowers are turning into small green tomatoes:



And we even have a green pepper or two:



Most surprising of all is that the lemon tree, while already full of young lemons, is already starting to flower again:



I guess this porch is going to be more fruitful than I thought! Well there is a ton to do today to get ready for some big things that are coming way faster than I can believe. Check back in tomorrow for an important announcement on the Fabulous Pants shop front!

( We took a wonderful hike on the 4th of July in <a href= )

In other news, I will be leaving on a few trips at the end of this week. All orders received before Thursday, July 9th will be mailed out before I leave. Anything ordered after I leave on Thursday will not be sent out until July 20th. I have a fun 5th wedding anniversary weekend planned with potential roller coasters and of course California Extreme is this weekend as well. I also have to sew up some clothes for me to wear while I am at Chaos Wars. So I am off to do some extremely fast sewing, so I can be ready for all that is to come. Perhaps more tomorrow... depends on progress today.

Ok so many of you must be wondering what happened to me and if I have closed up the shop. Well the answer is that I was on a hiatus and of course I would not just close up the shop! For a week and a half, I turned the sewing machines to work on my own personal costuming for Belegarth. Every year I promise myself that I will work on my costumes incrementally and not put it off till the last minute. Well we all know how that goes. I get wrapped up in working on Fabulous Pants and in my real life and my hobbies many times get put aside. This year I made several items for the event. I created an Afghani style tribal dress. It turned out better than I had even envisioned even though I had to finish hemming it on the train out to Idaho. (I will post a picture up here for you all to see sometime!)I also got a couple of pantaloons made for myself and a new choli to add to the bellydance trunk. The trip to Idaho for Chaos Wars was very fun, and the event was even better. The train trip out was one of the most exciting that I have ever experienced. I met a man who is walking around the world. This begged the question, "Why are you riding a train then?" He was actually on a break from the round the world walk. Once I find his business card again, I will post his blog for you all to read about him and his adventures. The site was gorgeous. We were lucky enough to be hosted on a horse ranch in Hailey, Idaho. The hosts were amazing, and their land was so beautiful. The event was action packed and filled with old and new friends, good fighting, and great food.

After one of the best Belegarth events I have ever attended, I returned home for one day to do some laundry and repacking. I then left for Illinois to visit family and let the husband have a well deserved vacation away. The trip was nice, and it made me realize exactly what I missed about the Midwest. One of those things being sweet corn. Californians may think they have sweet corn, but theirs has nothing over the corn of "home." We also got to have some wonderfully beautiful weather, especially for the Steam Show in Sycamore. Usually it is so hot, and then you are standing next to all these steam engines, you just want to get back to the air conditioning of a house. This year, I had a hard time leaving the Taylor Marshall Farm. It was a great day with wonderful weather and great music and threshing.

We finally returned home on Monday of this week, and I had a glut of laundry, cleaning, ordering, and appointments to keep. 826 Valencia needed some help, so I went there on Thursday. I finally got to turn some attention to the shop today. I went to get some supplies and will be working on some custom orders I have received. I also hope to get some falls and new belts made soon. Check back more often, seeing as I will be back to blogging now that computers are in reach and back logs of computer work are finally cleared! It is good to be back, and I cannot wait to get back to some costuming fabulousness!

So things are really busy all of a sudden. This always seems to happen for me at the oddest and not necessarily most convenient times, but it is great and I am not complaining in the least! On Thursday, I had an all day session at 826 for their summer program. When I returned home, I had a wonderful e-mail waiting for me - my first sale on Etsy! I have done many face to face and custom sales, but no sales off of a website yet, so this was very exciting. I also have a client I am working with on a custom pair. I have to run out to the store again because I do not have the correct color thread for the color of the pants I am making today. I also have a wonderful friend who is working with me on some pants orders. I need to remember to contact her about getting measurements. This of course is all converging on me in the time when I usually do my costuming for the Belegarth event that I attend in Idaho. I guess I will just have to get myself in gear earlier and work harder to get things done. So with out further adieu, I will be logging off here to get to public transit to get to the store. It is spare the air, and I intend to stick with my ever constant use of public transit! Here is to a busy week.

So I guess all my hard work paid off. Even though I could not wear the bra that went with the belt, my costume still looked great, and when I get some pictures, I will post them. I felt good performing this weekend. People seemed to like what I did, which is even better. I worked so hard on what to do and felt like my practices were always falling flat, but when the music started, and I was in front of the small group in the coffee shop, it all fell together. They seemed to really love the veil section of the piece the most, which is always odd to me. Veil seems so easy, but Ishara always said I had a special skill with that prop. I guess it is just something I tend to connect with better than other things. Yet, I still want to be a sword girl!

This week is the last week for tutoring at 826. I have only been at this for a few weeks, but it makes me really happy and miss teaching more than I thought. While I am working with a younger set of students than I am used to, I love the energy of learning. I will be in there on Wednesday and Thursday, the two last days before the summer programs take over.

So in the shop today... it is kind of a housewife day more than a designer day. The house has fallen into a state of disrepair due to the business and the show. I have been spending so much time on the internet trying to promote and working on my dancing that the house is kinda worse off than I would like. Floors need to be mopped and vacuumed, shelves dusted, and best of all cookies baked. Then there is that belt.... the one I have been meaning to finish for over a year. I will pick that up again today. I mean it! ;)

I am also looking into making some items for my annual trip to Idaho for Chaos Wars for Belegarth. I would really like to get a few new costume pieces done. I suppose it is time to take that first scary step and wash out my batik fabrics for my Afghani style dress that I want to wear on Monday for the set up day. I also need to order up some head scarves. I have decided to abandon my usual ranger hat in favor of something more period. I also want to come out with a new feasting ensemble. I am thinking something more in keeping with my bellydance side of my persona. I think my days of big European style dresses may be over. I want thing that are more multi purpose for me, and those big dresses would only be feasting outfits for me now. A nice ornate Byzantine style I could wear for shows as well. I guess this is enough rambling! I should get down to some work.