What a difference a year can make. One minute we are packing up the Suburban and the Twist-T Traveling Trailer and rolling across the Wisconsin hills....and the next moment someone is dropping a shiny copper key in our hand opening the door to a building that has become our new canvas. What a difference a year can make. This little family, our little family, started out on this adventure several years ago--to be honest it has been a lifelong adventure, and continues to be. Remember those days of creating the cut out flowers and leaves and snowflakes to decorate the refrigerator each season? Remember those birthday banners celebrating another year of life, colored with every crayon in the house? Remember all those theatrics complete with costumes and programs and 'special effects' (those squirt guns and flashlights got a serious workout!). Blink, and we are trying to figure out how our child creative fits into the adult persona. How does it, though? Time for more deep and thoughtful reflection, taking us back to moments with special people, and places, and times. Iowa in the summer selling sweet corn with cousins and hanging all the clothes on the line at Grandma's. Why did ALL the clothes have to go out there like that? Seriously. And then the long drives to Ohio in Autumn. Only to get in the van the very next day and drive some more...making stops at every second hand shop in the suburban radius! How do those moments bring me back to now? What does that have to do with being creative, and how? The sites, the smells, the bits of fabric. The collection of salt and pepper shakers, quilts, photo albums, sappy old novels. All those precious things that carry with them warm hugs and kisses, laughter and innocent wishes! And if I find a shard or a piece of any one of those reminiscent treasures that doesn't mean it's broken, it's just a seed for a new something that can grow into more smiles and laughter and joy. Today the shelves at our store are full of laughter in the shape of a handmade basket, or a tea cup garden, or paintings of the scapes that have rolled past our window on the way to adventure. What a difference a year can make. I just know there is more creativity in us yet to be discovered and shared, and I can't wait!