August DIY and Business Book Club 2016

August DIY and business book club from Dear Handmade Life

A few years ago we started this yearly summer tradition. A few of us meet together on a Sunday night, and spend a few hours catching up with each others’ lives.  We always bring a dish that features bacon, and we bring all of our jewelry/beading supplies, and we sit and eat yummy bacon food, and make jewelry.  Oh, and we also drink peach margaritas.  This yearly tradition is 4 years strong, and we never can pin it down to a certain month, because we have to wait until the peaches are ready to be picked.  Sometimes that happens in early July, sometimes late, but it always happens, and it’s always a much anticipated event for all of us.  Conversation flows around the table, we laugh, we sigh, we roll our eyes at our kids antics.  We “oooh” and “ahhhh” over all the strange recipes that involve bacon in one way or another, we go back for seconds, and thirds. We toss out all our beads, our clasps, our chains, our tools, and we make things.  Everything in the middle of the table is up for grabs, and this year I think I’m going to put out the Beaded Jewelry book from our book club picks this month as something for everyone to look at and browse through for inspiration.

Here are our book club picks for this month:

  1. Quilting with a Modern Slant
  2. The Happiness Project
  3. Paper Illuminated
  4. Beaded Jewelry: Stringing Techniques

This month we do have some cool books in our selection.  And we are giving away 3 of them; Quilting with a Modern Slant, Paper Illuminated & Beaded Jewelry, to a lucky reader! To enter the contest, let me know if you’ve got a yearly tradition that you look forward to. Enter the contest by leaving a comment below, and make sure we have your email so we can let you know if you’ve won! Leave your comment by Aug 25th and we will send you some lovely books to read if you win!

The contest is now closed! Congrats to the winner Karen!

~Angie~

August DIY and business book club from Dear Handmade Life

12 Comments

  1. I always look forward to my annual “year in review” – spending a quiet night alone, sipping tea and taking a bath and digging into my year. I like thinking about what worked and what didn’t, celebrating the wins, and plotting my course of success for the next year.

  2. I look forward to celebrating Chinese New Year (Tet) with my family. We are Vietnamese and one of the things my parents do is make rice cakes from scratch to give to friends and elders as gifts. The cakes are labor intensive to make because there is a great deal of prep time and assembly required. And they need to be boiled for a long time. Anyone who receives a rice cake knows that they are receiving a special gift. The kids get excited to receive red envelopes that contain new money and I as a parent like to put them together to give out. This is only after they wish happy new year to whoever is giving them a red envelope. There so much more that happens during Chinese New Year celebrations. I love it all and hope my kids continue the tradition.

  3. Hi DIY – Thank you so much for all of the inspiration and motivation you share. I’ve been learning so much! Handmade items from your heart and hands are precious, creative gifts everyone should learn about and appreciate. Can you imagine a world filled with designing, creating and giving items with love? We would have a colorful and happy world 🙂

  4. I belong to a group called Women In Design here in Los Angeles. Although we do not meet as much as we used to, we still manage to meet up atleast once a year. It is wonderful to see everyone and what they are up to. We each bring a different dish of food from salads to desserts. The food is great and the company the best. We talk about life, design, art and everything in between.

    We just met up again two weeks ago.
    Thanks for writing about traditions, they are good to keep going.

  5. I always look forward to the change of the seasons and a way to celebrate them. Summer: time to grill seasonal produce Spring: plant flowers in the front yard, Fall: always make a big bowl of chili and corn bread and Winter: start a new knitting project. But really every day should be a celebration!

  6. My favorite celebrations are those around winter and Christmas. The boat parade, the Christmas tree, hot drinks, cool weather!
    These books look great!

  7. I look forward to my changing my summer bedding for my winter bedding. I love my winter bedding because it is super cozy and plush.

  8. A tradition I like to do is go to the hotels in SF and view the uniquely crafted gingerbread houses during Christmas time. It’s amazing how creative bakers are with sugar and candy! God bless

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