The Coastal Grandma

06/12/2023

Hello friends, I’m back! This season was one I hope never to repeat! This hurricane devastated so many lives and all of these people trying to put their lives together and dealing with so much stress, we were all in need of some release.

So, I think everyone partied it out pretty hard this season, just to get a mental break from all the devastation. Which resulted in a shorter season as the first couple months everyone was focused on getting things handled.

For me personally, the first part of season was brutal financially and we were just coming off summer which is always slow so most of us were already stretched past our means. Thankfully it ramped up during the holiday season and kicked all our butts until about a month ago and now we’re all recovering physically and taking care of all that we put aside during season.

I’ve added so many awesome tools to create with and I can’t wait to get started! I’m currently working on filling a 64 drawer cabinet to house all my new metal pieces for designing with. All kinds of studs to attach my designs to, charms and beads, chain, etc., all the things you need to design great pieces!

I’m excited to share with you over the summer and into fall. I’m thinking I may end up only having my shop open from June to December and then having special drops throughout the rest of the year. From January to April/May I worked 50-60 hour weeks often and I can not do any more after that!

Anyway, it’s almost time! I’m shooting for August/September for my official launch, hopefully sooner!

02/16/2023

Finally decided I’m going to have to have an accountant, I really thought I’d be able to handle all aspects of running my business but throwing up the white flag of surrender on that! There’s just not enough time in the day.

We are finally getting busy at work over the last month and after having been slow for the last 7 months due to summer and then the hurricane hitting right when we are normally starting our season. So, it is fantastic and my bank account it much happier but I’m definitely feeling worn out after work! At Tiki this season which are generally 10:30-7:30 shifts and I am just whipped at the end of the day.

I get our grandson every other week for an overnight so there’s not a whole lot of time left for doctors appointment’s (more skin cancers to address as always, all my annuals hit in the next month or two, etc.) and all the other stuff we all have to do.

So in order to make things progress at this time, I’m going to need some help! I went to school for accounting so it’s a little irritating to have to pay someone but I figure it will probably save me money by not missing any deadlines and not stressing over it!

One day this dream will fall into place, finally! But I promised myself when I started this journey that I would not let it stress me out. The whole reason I wanted to do this was to get more into my art and to start the process of getting the business going so that years from now when I retire, I’ll have a little extra mad money. So no rush, no stress, it will come together when the time is right!

I’ve already learned so much more about the different mediums I’m using, which is exciting! And it gives me the ability to create more and instead of creating pieces not really knowing what the end result will be, I’m able to create exactly what it is that I have imagined-which is pretty cool!

Thanks for hanging in there with me and following the journey ❤️

02/01/2023

Had a wonderful visit with my boys, I can breathe normally again and feeling back to normal after Covid as of yesterday, finally!

Actually starting to get busy at work after Hurricane Ian, still lots of people waiting to get back into their homes but we are starting to see some either living in their homes again or getting their properties released back to them after the remediation workers have gotten some basics done. Now they can get their contractors in to do the finish work. So good to see some familiar faces back!

Our kitchen at the Tiki Bar, which is where I’m working this season, is finally opening this week so business will be getting better! Yay!

And, I’m back to creating and getting back on track with my art! I’ve been working on some trinket dishes for jewelry which I’ll share soon. Got one of my mermaid trinket dish molds that I was so excited for but the mold was bad and now I’m waiting another month or so for a new one 🙄 hopefully they figure it out because it really is beautiful but the mermaids elbow somehow wasn’t getting resin to it and the mold wasn’t level.

I started to get some prints made of my artwork and photography! I also have lots of new clay cutters, resin molds and glitter to play with tomorrow on my day off! I also resolved my issue with all the clay earring pieces I made that I did that gold trim on that wouldn’t dry. I found a way to seal it so I can get those sealed and assembled. I also have all those white pieces from the last batch of new cutters to play with. I want to try a few different techniques to finishing them, acrylic paint, watercolor paint, alcohol ink, and I used a different mix of clay for the white and the gold trim is adhering nicely to those so I’ll probably do several white and gold & silver and white pieces. Can’t wait to get back into my art room! Tomorrow is going to be a fun day of playing!

It has been a challenging 4 months for sure but starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel! Feeling Thankful ❤️🥰

01/06/2023

Pretty pleased with this batch of goodies! A few issues here and there but that’s pretty normal with resin, a bubble here, a clump of mica powder that didn’t dissolve in the resin there and a few bubbles but overall everything looks to be really good and the blemishes look fixable so I’m happy!

01/05/2023

01/05/2023

Poured a bunch of resin pieces last night, trinket dishes and earrings 😍 always excited to demold them when I get home tonight!

12/27/2022

Update #3-I had a bunch of cutters that I hadn’t even had a chance to use yet! So that’s what I spent Christmas doing-a little gift to me to play!

In general, some cutters work great and others have a bit of a learning curve, so I wanted to try all these out and did the majority of them in white.

While I normally use whatever color of clay I want the piece to be, making these white was a conscious choice as I want to play with the others options! You can paint them-which gives you more dimensional pieces and makes them look really pretty and more realistic. You can use watercolors, acrylic paint, alcohol ink, soft pastels, glitter glued on, glitter in the top layer of resin over the clay and if you remember the debacle with the gold pen I used on a bunch of pieces?! Well that worked on these!

I made a mix of two clays and painted one of them last night and it’s now dry!!!! That excites me! Going to test a few more pieces before I go edging everything out just to make sure but very hopeful it’s going to work this time!

The last time, I had one pair of earrings that the paint dried perfectly on and it was the same brand but different type. (I keep notes on the pieces I make for this purpose!) So I mixed 2 parts of my normal clay with 1 part of the other clay on all these white ones and so far it appears to be a winning combo!

I’m looking forward to playing around with all of these! Finishing organizing my art room and the spare bedroom today. Tomorrow we have Christmas with Silas, YAY! And then I work the rest of the week. Hope you all had a wonderful holiday! ❤️🎄❤️

12/22/2022

Here’s the results from today! Definitely happy with the results! The shell mold pieces really turned out great! I’m equally as happy with the mermaid molds but they definitely require more work!

The small mermaid, I took out of the mold prior to baking. I took the time to detail certain areas and that makes it less work to do after it’s baked and hard as it is more time intensive after it’s baked.

The large one I left in the mold to bake as a couple areas didn’t appear solid enough to make the transfer while soft. So, I’ll have to try that again and see if I can get it to transfer while soft so I can do some detail work before baking.

And while you probably didn’t need so many pics, I need them. It’s so helpful to be able to see little things that need to be tweaked from the photos.

Soon, I’ll have it set up where I can start making videos while I’m working on creating things. It will give you an overhead view looking down at my table from above.

Which ones are you liking the most? I always love to hear your feedback!

12/21/2022

I’ve been working a LOT! Working at work, working when I come home and getting a little burnt out if I’m honest!

So, I got 3 new molds that I’m so excited about, so later today I’ll do more of the not so exciting work (more paperwork 😭) but for a few hours this afternoon I need to remind myself how much I absolutely love this part of the work!

The creative part, taking a lump of clay and turning it into something beautiful! I’ll follow up with some pics later today!

12/18/2022

So these are some of the things I’ve been brainstorming as I’ve gone thru all my molds and supplies.

Most molds are able to be used for plaster, resin, clay and even concrete! Endless amounts of possibilities! I’m not planning on having all of this available right away, more so things I’ll be adding to the selection throughout the next few years but I already have the materials so it’s just a matter of having the time to create everything.

Another reason it made more sense to get everything out and figure out what all I have here and what I can create with it. This way, I can focus and have a concrete idea of where I’m heading! I’m pretty excited about all the possibilities that lie ahead!

And while I’m working on getting all this paperwork and red tape sorted through so that I can launch, this plan helps me figure out what needs to be in storage and what needs to be close at hand so when I get free time everything is there and ready to go!

Please, if you have the time, give me some feedback on what ideas you love or hate! It is really helpful to me to get a better idea of what kind of items you all like and what would be most worth my time to work on.

Thank you so much to all of you that have been looking, commenting and liking! I really appreciate all of your support and your ideas & feedback!