Spring Break 2011
... and the WORST trip to IKEA EVER!!! :(

First of all, I want to thank all of you for the most wonderful comments and warm wishes regarding our MODKID HQ. We are thrilled about this new adventure and are working tirelessly to make it all come together. Of course, since not everything always works out how you'd expect it to, we signed the papers just days before we were supposed to leave for our Spring Break trip.... something we had planned a long time ago. We couldn't cancel it because reservations were made and other family members were meeting us there too, so that would've been just plain rude. Plus, the kids deserved a fun trip (Jon and I did too, but in all honesty, we just wanted to move into the office right away).

So, we packed our bags and headed to Hilton Head Island, South Carolina, where it was all about fun in the sun — a far cry from the 30 degree weather we left behind...

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On one particular day, the sun was out and the skies were clear but it was just a tad too cool to go in the water, so we took a nice walk on the beach and I took the opportunity to shoot some photos for a new pattern coming out in April (yes, folks... it's SNEAK PEEK TIME!) :)

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Another day, we found out that Savannah, GA was just a short 35 minute drive from our resort so we decided to make a day of it. Jon and I had visited before on our 5th wedding anniversary, but we really wanted to go again with the kids and my parents.

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A rare shot with me in it...

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I just adore the architecture in Savannah. All that exposed brick and stone make my heart sing. The history and culture is palpable in every nook and cranny of this place.

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Loved this dragon lamp post!

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The kids loved it too... thank goodness!

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Then, as I tweeted our location, a sweet tweep told me to check out Savannah Bee Company and boy, am I so glad she did! This place was AH-MAZING! Honey tasting, bath soaps and other products made with wax, a place for the kids to play and watch movies...it was just so cool!

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And of course... bee and honeycomb imagery EVERYWHERE (you know I felt right at home!)

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On our way back home we spent the night in Asheville, North Carolina, a town that Jon and I have been wanting to visit for quite some time now. It was everything we expected and more!

The night we arrived, we had dinner at a wonderful Thai restaurant with a relative I had never met before! This is Josephine, a cousin of mine from my paternal grandfather's side of the family.

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The next morning as we drove through the picturesque Historic Biltmore Village in search for a place to eat, we accidentally ran into Waechter's Fine Fabrics. I immediately recognized the name because they appeared in an episode of "On the Road with Austin and Santino" in which I had spotted several of my MODKID patterns made up into store samples. What a treat!

Sydney looked out our car window and shouted... it's mama's fabric on the window! They had a wonderful display of knits right on the front window!

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Inside, the place was a sewist's paradise!

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We even got our picture taken with the owner, Joyce Yarling, holding one of their fine creations... a Sydney Hooded Dress made with dupioni silks, created for the Holiday issue of SEW WOW magazine (pages 109-110)

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The nice ladies at Waechter's told us to eat at Books and Breadboard. What a lovely cafe! Wonderful service, food and presentation. (You know I'm a sucker for nice packaging!)

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The rest of our day was spent galavanting through Asheville. We drove by the Biltmore Estates, visited the Grove Arcade and spent some quality time at a park across form the Courthouse.

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Photo opps galore!

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It was the perfect trip!

So here's the part where you feel sorry for me:

When we got back home, Jon and I headed to IKEA so we could get some things for the office. I had a specific list (on my iPhone notes app) and a budget in mind. We were so proud of ourselves for keeping to the budget while still staying true to our aesthetic. When, BAM! My iPhone4 gets stolen practically in front of our eyes! :( I say "practically" because I did walk away from it momentarily while I looked at a piece of furniture, but it was gone in a flash! As soon as I turned around and saw it was gone, I yelled over to Jon to call my phone. He did and the jerk actually answered it! Jon heard some muffled voices for a few seconds (like they had their hand covering the speaker and were trying to decide what to do) then they hung up. We called it like a thousand more times and never heard a response so they must've turned it off immediately. JERKS! I spent some quality time with IKEA security and visited the Lost & Found and few times, exchanging numbers just in case, but nothing.

And before you all start telling me about Find My iPhone and Mobile Me or any other tracking device, let me just say that I was stupid enough not to turn on the Find my iPhone setting on my lost phone so there's no way to track it. I also did not have it passcoded (yes, stupid, I know!) We have tried everything under the sun to find it, believe me! Of course, after we figured out it was a lost cause, we deactivated the service and changed all my passwords, etc. so at least the jerk can't get into my accounts or use the phone. They can still sell it in the Black Market but oh, well, what can I do? In the meantime, I'll be using this lovely replacement because I'll be damned if I'm gonna spend another $700 on a new iPhone just 2 months before the iPhone5 is released!

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In case you're wondering, that ^^^ is my old iPhone 3GS that broke right before Spring Quilt Market, last year. And the year before that I had a broken booth. Hmmm... hope there's no correlation! I can make & receive calls with it but the screen is way too damaged to type on it so I can't email, tweet or text. :(

Anyway... that was my sob story! Now, make me feel better by voting for Flora & Fauna at the Modern Madness game over on FatQuarterly. I am so proud of my girl, F&F, for making it into the Sweet 16!!! :)

xoxo

17 comments:

  1. First off, the photos of your kids are beautiful.

    Second, that is awful. I can't believe someone stole your phone like that. And then was stupid enough to answer it! Hopefully karma will find them.

    I know when they announced "find my phone" I turned it on immediately. Shortly after my brother was beaten up and robbed and they took his phone and I was wishing that he'd had an iPhone so maybe then the police would have actually done something...

    I've also password protected my phone now. I never used to but I do now. Especially after what happened to my brother I figure even if someone did steal my phone, they couldn't get into it. At least not before I could get home and change all my passwords.

    The amount of dishonest people out there is pretty staggering. I find it weird that thieves were shopping in Ikea. I don't know why it just seems like a strange place to be.

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  2. Jen, I am so, so sorry to hear about your brother. What a sad story. Yes, my next iPhone will be passcoded and trackable in every way possible. LOL! I've certainly learned my lesson. Oh, and about IKEA, I would've thought so too but this time around I saw lots of very scummy-looking people there... don't know why! Maybe I was more sensitive to that fact since I was looking for a thief amongst them. ;)

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  3. Your trip looks wonderful, I love your dds new hair cut & the pics are adorable!
    Doesn't ikea have security cameras? That stinks, I can't believe people sometimes, so sorry! :(
    hugs

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  4. Tammara, yup, I'm pretty sure they do have security cameras everywhere but what are you going to do if you see the thief? Once they're gone, they're gone and I'm pretty sure they bolted immediately! We looked everywhere and called the phone a million times, even in the parking lot. It's not like this is grand theft so I couldn't get the police involved. :(

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  5. Beautiful photos from your trip! Glad you had a fun time!

    So sorry about your phone! That is so rotten!

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  6. This post makes me even more homesick than I already am! I'm from the Charlotte NC area and we went to each of those places often! If you love the architecture in Savannah, you'd love Charleston SC too! It's my favorite place in the world! Sucks about the phone!

    Celesa

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  7. The Spring Break vacation looks awesome! I've recently made too many trips to IKEA to create a new home office... my husbands hands are starting to get blisters thanks to all the assembling. And what a bummer about the stolen iPhone!! My tech loving hubby just told me that Apple isn't releasing a new iPhone in June this year (he just read it on one of the tech blogs http://www.engadget.com/2011/03/28/no-iphone-5-at-wwdc-this-year-thats-how-it-looks-from-here/). I'm bummed because I've been waiting to replace mine since January thinking there'd be a new one in June... They might release one in September. *sigh*... do I wait THAT long to replace my 3Gs? I thought you might like to know ... since he told me that right after I read your blog.

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  8. Love the sneak peak. Can't wait for the sundress pattern to be available. Horrible about your phone. Not much honesty left in this world. On the plus side tho, it looks like you had a wonderful vacation. Too bad it had to end in such a way.

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  9. Thank you all!

    Ack, Crissy, that's terrible news! Nut thanks so much for letting me know. Now I need to rethink my plan. :(

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  10. Of course, I can't wait for the new line to come out. I told my husband about the new shop and I wanted to visit it at some point. He was all for it; he loves the clothes I make our kids from your patterns and fabrics.
    That really sucks about your phone. I finally got a smart phone, and it scares me to think of all the info that is stored on there getting into someone else's hands.

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  11. It looks like you had a wonderful Vacation!

    Sorry about your iPhone, two things though.
    1. I dont think the new iphone will be coming out as scheduled this year. I was reading on MacRumors blog today about it might be postponed to this fall or even next year.

    2. There are some places that will fix the glass in your phone. They are not related to Apple. I live in Jacksonville, Florida and just did a search online "fix the glass in iphone, jacksonville, fl" and several places popped up. It wasnt very expensive and most of the places will do it while you wait.

    Congrats on your new office space thats soo excited and I hope you'll post progress photos as you work on it.

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  12. Anonymous6:03 PM

    It's such a whomp in the stomach of feeling personally violated when someone steals something that is yours! It sure shakes trust in other human beings for awhile. Ugh!

    Love the pretty new sundress sneak peeks! Can't wait for the patterns to come out.

    You visited Carolina just in time, here in Fort Bragg it's been down to 40' again. Hurry and come back, Spring!

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  13. just a little tip so that you don't have to carry around a phone with a broken screen... my Mom dropped hers on a tile floor and it shattered just about the same way, she was able to find a $10 kit for a replacement glass for it and her and my Dad followed the instructions and were able to replace the screen in about 15 min. I don't have a link to where they found the kit, but I'm sure you could do a search and find something...

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  14. Glad you enjoyed Savannah Bee Patty! I am still loving my honey and also enjoying natural recipes from the Gena Knox cookbooks they sold in the store! Looks like you had a great trip and must have passed right by me here in Raleigh (sort of)! I could have shown you the real life hummingbird quilt I did for you a year or so ago! :) Love your photos, they are beautiful!

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  15. Patty! That explains why I haven't seen you around on Twitter!! Oh man, that stinks!! "jerks" is right!! But you know what? Broken Booth = Fantastic show; Broken Iphone = Spring Quilt Market success; SO, one can only deduce that Stolen Iphone = The best Modkid year EVER {with the HQ and all!} so, take it as a sign of fortune {although, maybe a white dove flying by would have been better/cheaper than a stolen Iphone, yes! but oh well}.
    So, what are you going to have at HQ??? Fabrics?? Patterns"" Finished products?? An office?? Please give us details!!! Glad you're doing fantastic!! xoxo

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  16. We were in Savannah at the same time!
    I bet we passed you on the River Walk and at the Bee store!

    Small World!
    Barb

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  17. Sorry about your phone. I had the exact same thing happen to a camera. You can't turn your back for a second.

    As for the broken screen, you should be able to fix it pretty easily. My boyfriend's iPhone screen got paint thinner on it once which caused cloudy marks all over it. He was able to replace it with a screen kit we bought off Amazon. It was really easy, cheap and made the phone seem like new again.

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