I am a busy mother to four children. I have two Bugs and two Belles. Originally this blog started as a way to promote my home based craft business and has transformed as my crafting and life has changed.

Bug n’ Belle started out as a humble ambition to make and sell swaddling blankets. Just after my second child was born in 2003 I started sewing extra large swaddling blankets for friends and the idea just kinda took off from there. After sewing up a few dozen I started looking for ways to sell them and ended up on eBay one night. On a whim I listed a few and the by the end of the next day I had sold 10!

Well that had me hooked on eBay and by fall 2004 I had discovered the Custom Boutique sellers on eBay and I was instantly inspired to try my own hand at crafting clothing for my daughter Amy who was then 18 months old. And that led to selling my creations.

Here is the first thing I ever made and sold on ebay in Fall 2004, look at my little Amy Belle she is just so darn cute it’s hard to believe she was ever so small.

Back in 2004 eBay was a new exciting frontier for both buying and selling. The children’s clothing “world” on eBay, especially the custom handmade arena was a fun and exciting place to be. I made many great online friends there, both customers and other designers/sellers. Some people I met in real life over the years, it’s always a sureal experience to meet IRL someone you’ve known online. Many of my eBay friends I still keep in touch with over on Facebook. It’s fun to see where they have ended up over the years, almost everyone has moved onto other activities very few are still selling on eBay. I loved eBay, I loved looking at the listings others put up. I loved fabric shopping on eBay, I think there was a time I looked on eBay first for just about anything I wanted to buy. Because you know, you can always get it cheaper on eBay right? But like many loves eBay began to wear on my nerves. I got tired of eBay’s changing personality, I got tired of dealing with auction templates, and having to upload pictures to the photohost. eBay was becoming a downright drag. And then one night I was out surfing the web and I spied a new frontier a small little craft site called etsy. It didn’t take me long to quickly dump boring old eBay and take up with etsy and in spring 2007 I sold my first item on etsy, and I never looked back. Ocassionally I have sucked it up and gone back to eBay to sell junk from around the house, and I do find a great “deal” there once in awhile. But for handcrafted items I am strictly an etsy buyer and seller. I Heart etsy, enough said.

Here is the second thing I ever sold on etsy back in spring 2007. It was a design I’d sold the previous year on eBay, but that’s okay. Etsy didn’t know it was leftover from a previous relationship. I have so many pictures of Amy standing at our front door (the porch in our old house had the best light!) One thing selling online did was make me get the camera out and take lots, and lots, of pictures.

I designed and sold on etsy for two and a half years, and still sell there now from time to time. You can see my shop here. As I’m typing this I just looked and I have 592 sales on my bugnbelle ID on etsy, Holy Cow! I can’t even imagine how I managed to have so many transactions in a little over 2 years, that is just a ton of sewing! I sewed up a storm through Christmas 2009 but when the holiday rush was over I made the decision to seriously cut back on custom design work. My oldest three kids were all in school and their activies had me seriously busy. I was pregnant with my happy little 4th addition and I knew something had to give, and etsy was what gave.

And so I have spent the last year doing very little sewing. I’ve done some small projects, sewn some things for the kids, whipped up a few custom items here and there for customers I adore. But relatively speaking my sewing machines have been gathering dust. I even *gasp* bought my kid’s Christmas Pajams because I didn’t have time to make them this year. But I am learning to accept that as things change, we adapt and move on.

But here is the thing… I am a creative person. I have always crafted in some way and I can’t just walk away from crafting. Just because I’m not actively selling my creations doesn’t mean I’m not going to sew, or do any of the crafty things I love. And blogging is a great way not only to share what you are up to, but to interact with others who love to craft. I’ve been reading craft blogs for months now and I decided it is time to get back in the Saddle. You can read all about my blogging resurrection here.

Besides crafting you will probably find me blogging about my new house. My very brown new house, the whole thing from exterior to interior is brown, brown, brown and just so BLAH! I have been busy working on it one room at a time and I can’t wait to share some of my projects. Moving also means the need to organize and I’ve been reading organizing blogs lately, just what a messy person needs. I now spend my late night computer time surfing blogs looking for the next idea I want to try, I’m currently in love with Ana-White. My husband is convinced I’m going to cut off a finger, but I am just enthralled with the idea of knocking off Pottery Barn.

When I’m not blathering on about crafting or decorating I’m not afraid to talk about my family. My husband, Pat loves to play and frequently drags me out of the house against my will it keeps my life interesting! I have packing for a weekend away down to a science. We decided when our kids were born that we would still go out into the world and the kids would be part of that lifestyle with us. We go boating, camping, fishing, skiing, hiking, golfing… and the kids have been there doing those things with us since they were small. Luckily I love photography too so even if I’m stuck on a boat I can always take pictures. One of my goals in my blog is to share the ways we get out with our kids and hopefully inspire others to seize the weekend!

Thank you for taking a few minutes to read about me, I hope that you will come back and I always appreciate reader comments and emails!

I had posted these pictures back when I first started this blog and I just didn’t have the heart to take them down:

A recent picture of the kids from Christmas 2010: