What a morning! I'm still recovering from our little adventure. But I'll stop talking in vague terms and just tell you what's up! We (we being myself and Amanda) filmed a little segment this morning with Vanessa Coria from WVEC Channel 13 about handmade gifts and the Norfolk Craft Mafia!

I got an email last week from Vanessa saying that she was doing a story about holiday gift giving on a budget, she had stumbled across our website and wanted to do a segment about handmade! With a trembling voice I called Amanda and blurted out, "Do ya wanna be on TV?!?!" We decided to do it and I called all the mafia troops together to get some great handmade items to show off.

We filmed it all at Amanda's house this morning. Here she is getting mic'd up like a pro.

Vanessa and her cameraman (I'm so embarrassed I don't remember his name) were consummate professionals and made us feel totally at ease.

I was surprised how much time and filming goes into what will ultimately be a two-minute segment. We were there nearly two hours! I did the "talking head" part of the interview and blabbered on about the craft mafia, handmade gifts and the craft community in general. I talk so fast, but maybe that's finally a good thing if we have to squeeze it all into under two minutes. I didn't get nervous until after, and then my face blushed bright red. Ha.

Then Amanda walked her through all the awesome handmade fantasticness that the Norfolk Craft Mafia has to offer. She was so great! Amanda's a natural. As Twiggy says, "The camera loves you!"

Then we both demo'd how to make marble magnets/bookmarks/hair accessories. I guess I just sort of stood there dumbly while Amanda did it because then the camera man wanted me to "do something". The horrible knitter that I am, I didn't have any knitting with me. So Amanda tried to teach me to crochet on camera. We were brilliant. Hah.

Vanessa recorded her lead-in and then we wrapped things up!

It was a great experience and I'm so glad we had the opportunity. Thank you Vanessa!

And an extra-special thank you to all the mafia members who rallied so quickly to get me their lovely handmade items! We had mixed media collage by Jeannine, handmade plush and a quilted pillow by Cassie, more plush and accessories by Charmaine, pottery by Ashley, knitwear by Tasha, everything from tissue cozies to hair clips to plush by Amanda and also a few of my doggie items.

Be sure to tune in to watch our TV debut! It will air next Friday, October 19th on WVEC Channel 13 as part of their Daybreak show. Vanessa's segment is at 5:23 and 6:24 a.m. It will also re-air on LNC 5 from 7 a.m. to noon, so please check us out!