Hello Friends! Let me start out by saying that I just logged in to do a quick post, and had 27 comments waiting to be approved. I. am. so. sorry!! Normally I get an email when anyone comments and it gives me the option to approve it or spam it right there on the spot. I swear I haven’t just missed 27 emails in the past month!? Not sure what happened there! I replied to a few, but if I didn’t reply to yours and you STILL need help, comment again, or shoot me an email at rosemarygulledge@appliquecafe.com! I didn’t want to assume you still needed my help a month later…..

It’s been a while since I posted last. We had a great Christmas and low and behold it’s already almost February!? How in the world?? It’s going to be summer again before we know it. I say I had a great Christmas (and I/we did), but let me just tell you how fun it is (not) to have laryngitis for 3 weeks. I am just now getting somewhat back to normal. I woke up hoarse on December 19th, just as the kids were getting out of school. It went from bad to worse to ok-i-am-so-tired-of-this over the course of 3 weeks. I got several shots in my booty and made a couple of trips to various doctors. Finally after 3 weeks I went to see my ENT, who stuck something down my throat (gag!) and told me I had nodules on my vocal chords. Evidently this is pretty common with people who sing. I only sing in church with the rest of the congregation, so whatevs. Fast forward to today after 3 weeks of steroids, and I am finally (pretty much) back to normal. It could come back, but hopefully it WON’T!!! If anyone ever suffers from this, let me know and I can give you a list of helpful hints that were shared with me by friends who have experience with nodules!!

In other big news, I decided this week to return to the “real world” and will be returning to WORK next week *super* part time. Before I “retired” in 2007 to be home with my kids, I worked for a fabulous company for 10 years. They contacted me this week about coming back to work! I immediately declined because I have the craziest schedule with 3 kids in 2 schools, and wasn’t looking for a real job. However, after some back and forth and a lunch meeting on Thursday, I decided I was going to be an “adult” again. I start on Tuesday, and will be working 3 mornings a week from around 8:00 until 1:30. Not a bad schedule!! I will still have my Mondays, and my Fridays, and my afternoons, and library duty, and weekends, and I WILL STILL HAVE APPLIQUE CAFE!! I am actually hopeful that being structured again after 9 years of complete freedom and chaos will be good for me and I will probably get WAYYYYY more done with Applique Cafe than I do now. We will still come up with new designs! I will still do blog posts! I will continue to monogram and do appliques for my longtime local customers! I will still keep up with Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and all that! Nothing is going to change here, other than the fact that I get to put on real clothes and go somewhere a few mornings a week to work with adults. It’s super exciting and also scary! This will be a huge adjustment for me and my fam, but since I worked at this company before (for 10 years), I hope to pick back up where I left off! Stay tuned!

Speaking of new designs, I just listed these earlier today! Y’all. It’ll be Easter before we know it! I’ve also listed more new stuff since my last blog post, so check them all out at Applique Cafe! We hope to work on a new batch of designs over the weekend as well! Have a great weekend!