The Absentee Blogger Returns!

Hey folks!

Well I've been seriously negligent on my blog posts and I apologize for that.  2013 was a doozy of a year.  Our business has been growing by leaps and bounds, major thanks in part to our awesome customers and friends.

Alongside our business upswing, life keeps happening.  (Funny how that works.)  When I started the Maisondestencils blog, I lived in sleepy Astoria, Oregon with my husband and our older son.  I treasured the rain, our amazing friends and neighbors, being a Goonie for life, and the historical significance of our town.  I loved our Craftsman home, which was featured in quite a few blog posts.  It turns 100 years old in 2014. we were going to throw it a birthday party. 

In April of 2013, our older son was diagnosed with Autism.  I was due to have our second son within weeks and we were faced with a very difficult dilemma of living near no family and suddenly needing a lot of support for his future.  You may or may not be aware that children diagnosed with Autism (or ASD) now have better support than ever and are eligible for amazing services, but these services vary wildly from state to state.  Oregon, we came to find out, did not offer us the best chance for our son's future.  So we left everything behind and moved back to California, where my Mom and Dad and Laura, (my sister and Maisondestencils founder) live.

The age 2-3 year is pretty pivotal for kids on the Autism spectrum.  Graham, my older son, is now 2.5 and we're knee deep in services for him (We do about 25 hours of therapy a week).  He's doing extremely well (He just asked me for pizza at 6 AM!)  and while we don't have a crystal ball, the future looks bright.   This is a major reason why I haven't been putting out many blog posts.  They would probably read, "I answered email and took Graham to speech therapy.  Answered email and went to occupational therapy."  lol!

We'd been in our new house in Southern California for a few months when my husband said to me, "I don't think I want to move anymore.  I think we're done."  And I agreed.  We've both moved a lot in our lives and while I had dreamed that we'd always live in Astoria, moving to So Cal had a note of finality to it.  So I made a custom stencil I had always wanted to make for my family, but for some reason, always put off.  I wanted something that would highlight every place we've lived, every stop on our journey. 

I really love the way it came out.  I bought a piece of plywood at Home Depot which my husband ripped down to size.  The denim blue color is actually a few old paint colors I mixed together.  Total cost, $6! 

I also want to point out that I attempted to pick up (Bless you people who actually stage your pictures) and still missed a sippy cup!  That's Graham in the picture.  He's watching Cars right now.  :)  

Laura came over (we only live 10 minutes away now, nice perk!) and she loved the sign.  She told me I needed to list the concept as a custom on the website, so I decided to do just that.  You can check it out here. 

Things are finally calming down now as we unpack our last boxes, so I hope to be back in the blogosphere more.  We also have plans to launch our Youtube channel with a little more oomph in 2014, so keep your eyes peeled for that.

Hope you've all been doing well.  I do keep on Facebook, so I see a lot of familiar faces there.  We truly feel blessed to have the nicest customers and it's our privilege to work with you guys.  I also want to mention that we love designing customs (obviously!) so if you ever have an idea you need help executing, email us at info@maisondestencils.com.

Take Care!

Feature Friday: New Custom Name and Date Stencil

Happy Friday!

Sometimes the idea for a stencil comes from purely selfish reasons.  We're not entirely altruistic here at Maison.  lol!  A while back while working on the pallet project, I realized I was going to have some leftover wood and wanted to make something for myself.  So I created a monster 24x24 pallet sign I wanted to fill a blank wall in my kitchen.  I didn't really know what to do with it though. 

I was browsing through our stencils for something to blow up that size when I started thinking about our custom name and date stencils.  They're really popular for crafters who want to make signs or pillows with the date they got married. 

There are some great options there, but I wanted something that had more of a vintage look, to go with the feel of my house.  So I designed a stencil that had a bit of a Victorian look and had it cut mega large for the 24x24 pallet.

I really love the way it came out, even if the sign is way crooked on the right side.  I thought about fixing it, but I like it imperfect.  We live in a crooked house, on a crooked street, just go with it, you know?  I'm pretty boring about reusing paint, you may have noticed.  So that red color is the same as our hearth pad for the wood burning stove, our staircase going to the second floor,  and several signs elsewhere in the house.  It's nice to have some continuity in color, I think.

Here's another photo of the kitchen.  We have a built-in breakfast nook my husband built.  That's what the sign is above.  It's one of my favorite spots in the house.  I sent a photo when it was all done to Laura and she really loved the design and insisted we make a pillow with it as well.  (I'm learning how to sew.)  So she dragged out her Viking and showed me how she makes her pillows and we used this stencil for my demo project.  The fabric is actually drop cloth from Home Depot.  Too cool!

So the pillow resides in the living room where it is most often loving sat upon by our orange cat, Moe. 

Nico, the tortiseshell, favors the other chair.  I love the way the pillow came out.  We used a 12x12 size for that and decided we want to offer it in the store.  So if you check out the custom category, you'll find this stencil there.  Like all of our custom stencils, just email us after purchase with the info you want plugged in and we'll design it for you.

That's all I've got for today, catch you next week!