Check out the North Park Festival of the Arts this Sunday, from 10 to 6 pm on University between 30th and 32nd. There will be fine art along with handmade goods from local crafts people, plus lots of good eating. I won’t be vending there this year, but I WILL be pouring beer in the Craft Beer Tent, so buy tickets and come visit me there! The non-beer portion of the event is free, though, and super family friendly. Plus, the weather is supposed to be beautiful this weekend, so no excuses. See you there!
Click here for more information
One of my least favorite aspects of running our Etsy store is taking the product photos. My apartment is dark, I don’t have any charming backgrounds that all the other arty types seem to have, and holding a camera “steady” is not in my shaky-handed wheelhouse. Another issue is my complete inability to grasp light and composition. I’m great at taking self portraits for my Facebook profile, but that’s where my photography skills begin and end.
Great photos are a no-brainer when it comes to marketing and advertising. In fact, that would be the first piece of advice I’d give to someone- get photos that highlight your work. But apparently I operate in a “do as I say, not as I do” manner, because the whole process of taking photos is so daunting that I have managed to rationalize bad photos with such excuses as “oh, they’ll get the idea” and “it’s DIY, if it looks too professional, it will turn people off.”
I would still be on that denial train, if I had not become friends with a product photographer (jarednelson.com, check out his site, he does more than products although that’s his specialty). Seeing how he can turn a simple kitchen whisk into a work of art made me realize there might be something to actually representing your product properly. I periodically work for him as a hand model (where I also discovered the advantages of photoshop) and when I compared what I saw with my own eyes vs how the photos turn out, it became obvious that proper lighting and angles can make or break an advertisement.
Since he’s educated me on the subject, now I notice terrible photos on menus, flyers and websites all the time. When that happens, I always think “why wouldn’t they spend a little to make a huge difference in profit?”
That was also when I realized, I was one of those people. Why would I spend money on something nice when I could do something horrible for free?
Finally, I hired him to shoot a few pillows for me. Witness the difference:
The cowpoke pillow-
Red sugar skull pillow-
Fiesta Pillow-
Fridge Art Pillow:
Tattoo Flash Pillow-
Since I swapped out the photos, I have sold more pillows in two months than I did last year, without any other marketing efforts. Now, when someone sees my products, they can really SEE them, which makes them want to buy them. I admit, I was stubborn about acknowledging this simple fact for way too long. With my ignorance behind me, I can now move on to showcase the rest of my products in the same awesome manner!
If you need the same kind of help, check out jarednelson.com. He’s good.
Like a lot of people with great taste, I recently went koo-koo for Downton Abbey. I watched season 1 on Netflix Instant over the Christmas break, taking trips to the Abbey in between family time and parties. A friend who is savvy with the internet managed to score me season 2 before it aired in the States, and some friends and I watched it all in a few evenings, obsessively worrying about Bates, cheering for Sybil, and wanting nothing more than to hate Livinia and then hating that we couldn’t.
I had mentioned on Facebook that I really wanted to start rocking Downton Abbey-esque Edwardian hairdos but lack the skill to do so. That post lead to the revelation that my friend Kirsten used to be a wig stylist with considerable skill in the up-do arena. I put together a “hey, we’ll give you brownies and wine if you do our hair way too fancy-pants style considering it’s a Wednesday night” get-together and boom, a half hour and 32 hair pins later, I had a glorious crown of twists and rings.
Here is what she came up with for me. I loved it, but sadly it only lasted a short while. One thing I have that the Downton ladies do not? Layers. Turns out, short layers can really break the staying power of an intricate up-do.
Love all the rolls and twists:
The short layers at the base decided to break away from the rest of the gang with a quickness:
And finally, the Visually Impaired Edwardian Hipster look:
Photos courtesy of Jared Nelson Photography.
When my nephew was a year old, I took a knitting class where we learned to make this Baby Bobbi Bear pattern. I gave him the bear for Christmas that year, and it became one of his favorites, eventually receiving the kind of handling and necessary washings that the yarn just really wasn’t equipped to handle. The poor thing was soon worn down, so much so that I made him this replacement awhile back.
There was no replacing the original, however, and “Cuddly Bear”, as he calls it, has had many minor surgeries. At this point, I don’t think he has any of his original stuffing and only a few of his original threads.
I was called in for yet another emergency stitch session the other day, and this is the condition I found him in:
Not so great. I did what I could, but he is definitely looking more than a little Frankenstein-y at this point:
When I asked Shane what had happened, and what sort of monster had eaten his bear’s belly, his response was, “I don’t know what happened, I just loved him too hard!”
How can you argue with that?
In honor of Valentine’s Day I’d like to talk about things I currently love. Not like- LOVE.
1. Pilates. I bought a Groupon for classes at Club Pilates Encinitas and am now totally addicted. I don’t know what I’m going to do when the voucher expires, because machine pilates is expensive and I am very poor. If you’ve never taken a class using a reformer or springboard, do yourself a favor and change that with a quickness. I have really bad scoliosis (as my doctor says, “it’s significant”. Yes, I’m super sexy) and so my back is in constant need of stretching. Pilates puts you in touch with all of your muscles and when done right, you leave feeling longer and leaner. It’s a fun workout- who knew you could do so many different things with so little equipment!- and the smallest movements work your muscles deep inside them. I really, really love it.
2. Downton Abbey. Good gravy, if you aren’t watching the BBC mini-series currently airing on PBS, you need to catch up. Class struggles, repressed romance, politics, rad 1914s fashions, Maggie Smith’s smart-tongued Dowager…if you like a high-brow soap opera, you are going to love this. Season 1 is on Netflix and Amazon Instant.
3. Trader Joe’s Gone Bananas! Sliced bananas covered in chocolate and frozen. Perfect snack for when you want a little sweet with a little fruit.
4. Game of Thrones. Not the books- lord knows I don’t have time for books- but the HBO epic fantasy. J-Nels and I watched season 1 over the course of a week. All the creative names were a bit hard for us to keep track of, but even when you don’t know who a character is talking about, the action is still riveting. Lots of surprise twists, violence and mayhem. We have to re-watch it so we can finally learn everyone’s names before season 2 starts in April.
5. Being able to see. After eight years of perfect vision thanks to Lasik, age finally trumped science and my eyes started to lose power. I can still see much better than before the surgery, but I did notice that street signs have been getting blurry, and faces in crowds aren’t quite as sharp. So, I went to the optometrist and am now rocking the four-eyed look. Nerdy, yes, but wow, it sure I love being able to see properly!
This Saturday, from 5-9pm, join us at Bar Pink for a holiday bar-zaar! Lots of vendors with gifts under $20, and pink cocktails galore!
Man, this one is going to be fun! Join me on Sunday, the 4th from 11-5 at the Sono Holiday Fest and Chili Cook off. Food, beer/wine garden, bands, vendors so you can shop local for your holiday gifts…just good stuff!
Join me Sunday from 11-3pm at The Glaushaus to benefit The Museum School.
1815 Main Street, Suite B, San Diego, CA 92113
It’s going to be great, all the other vendors are awesome plus the MIHO truck will be there. Yeah. Good stuff!
You might think that with all these purses and bags behind me, I would be confident to the point of being unbearable. Cutting into any fabric, attempting anything with a sewing machine with a song in my heart and a spring in my scissor. This unfortunately, is not the case. I actually look to each new challenge as a way to fail miserably. I know that that is no way to be; my hub, who is not afraid of anything but lactose intolerance, reminds me constantly of that fact. But there it is.
That being said, I’m no coward. I do solider on, trying new things, because I’m also easily bored, and fucking up is the lesser of the two evils when choosing between that and punching out the same project over and over.
Enter Chad, an old friend of mine with a hugely intimidating project and the burning (pun to be revealed) desire to have me make it. Crap. Don’t worry….when I say intimidating, I’m talking in.tim.i.dating. Yes. That kind.
He is a firefighter and as such, noticed that when a small child needs to be rescued from a burning building, the solution is to tuck said infant or toddler under the firefighter’s bunker coat and smuggle them from the building. His idea was to implement the use of a large fireproof duffle with a reinforced bottom, complete with an oxygen supply, to place the child in. From there, the fireman would be able to carry the child out safely, or lower them from a window as need be.
This idea was met with enthusiasm from nearly all who heard about it, with the unfortunate exception of anyone who would be able to make the first prototype. After talking to me and being refused, Chad talked to a variety of people who actually knew what they were doing, but all professed to be too busy. Chad came back to me, this time with a one month deadline. He had an entrepreneurial presentation coming up and needed a completed bag to promote the project.
This is the kind of motivation it takes. Chad’s bag could save lives and I knew that this project was more important than me being chickenshit. So I made him one. It’s not perfect, but I’m pretty damn proud of it.
In a few days, Chad will be presenting at TedXFlint (http://www.tedxflint.com/) a local pow wow where the leading thinkers and doers in our area get together to brainstorm, “enlighten, inspire, and act upon ideas worth spreading”. He will be using the bag that he designed (and I finally made) during the presentation., and I could not be prouder of all he has done to bring this about. But I guess, if he can talk me out of my fears, he can do anything, really.
After the surprising success of my Groupon segway trip, I have been buying random activity deal coupons in an attempt to get myself to do things I wouldn’t normally do. Besides the wine tasting and restaurant deals, which were guaranteed to be enjoyable enough, I’ve also scored on Boot Camp and Bar Method classes, plus had a really awesome day on a boat watching blue whales.
On a high from those outings, I purchased one for a speedboat adventure. I’m not super down with the ocean- It’s beautiful, and amazing, and I like playing in it about as far out as the 8-year-olds go on their boogie boards, and I would say I have a healthy respect/fear of it. I had been worried about being out for 4 hours on a sailboat during that whale watching trip and it was totally fine, so I thought speed boating wouldn’t be any problem.
Megan and I headed down to the docks on a clear, fine Saturday. The general gist of the outing is this- two people get in a tiny little speedboat, and we head out into the bay and take a 1.5 hour cruise. The tour guide takes the first boat, and he is supposed to point out things of interest via walkie talkie. We are instructed to travel like ducks in a row, with about 300 feet between each boat. It doesn’t matter if you’ve never driven a speedboat before- as long as you are over 18, you are qualified.
The boats are teeny, and when I get in, my knees come high over the steering wheel. It was sorta awesome, like driving a car at an amusement park but without the track.
Here we are, all clueless and innocent:
I shift from neutral to about 5 miles per hour and we slowly cruise out through the marina. Megan is laughing about the life jacket requirement, and she’s blasting Jay-Z from her Iphone and we are trying to remember words to Little Mermaid songs. Life is good.
We are just barely out of the marina into the bay when the weather takes a turn for the worse. The skies go gray, the wind kicks up- suddenly it’s dark and ominous and her ipod switches to The Cure. Just like Mr. Smith, we too are alone above a raging sea.
(This was taken after the waves died down, so no smart remarks about how calm it looks. Couldn’t take pictures while we were ALMOST DYING)
Big boats- sailboats, cruise ships, obnoxious yachts, kayaks- all these started whizzing towards and around us, creating more waves and freaking us out with their dangerous games of sea-chicken.
Before our tour began, we were told that if we encountered waves, to go at them at a 45 degree angle. So great, all of a sudden I have to do geometry? Math has never been my area of expertise, and I’m expected to do it in a panic. My life literally depends on my ability to correctly judge angles. Awesome.
Now the sky is gray, the waves are big, and our tiny boat is catching serious air and slamming down HARD. The nose of the boat comes up way too high several times, causing us to shriek with each extreme up and down.
At this point, Megan is freaking out, and yells at me, “I don’t like this. I mean it, Stef. Go back! Get me back to the docks!” which of course, is not really possible. For a split second, I contemplate the logistics of jumping out and swimming to shore, but the idea of losing my purse and, more importantly, remembering that I don’t really know how to swim, keeps me from doing a panic-bail. Megan is still panicking hard tho, but her extreme fear somehow steadies me, and although I’m white-knuckling the steering wheel like it’s the only thing keeping me in the boat, I find a sense of calm and purpose and successfully get us over that first terrifying rough patch.
Us, after that first fight with the waves:
Soon after, we make it to a pier area that is covered in adorable, frolicking sea lions. It is almost as if they are saying, “Hey good job on not dying- enjoy the show we are putting on, and good luck with that whole ‘not dying thing’ at any point in the next 90 minutes.” Thanks, guys.
While we encountered more scary waves during the remainder of the tour, at a certain point I realized we were unlikely to fly out, or flip over, and I was finally able to relax a bit. We had some issues with the boaters in front of us; for some reason they were driving really, really slow, which meant we had to go slow, and it felt like we could have navigated the waves better if we went faster. For the most part, we cruised along at a medium speed. Our favorite parts were when the whole tour would slow down to about 5 miles per hour, to either let other boats go by or to check out the Midway or Coronado Bridge or one of the other sites. That was very relaxing and during those moments I could understand why people like boats.
The sun peaked out for a few minutes, and the reassurance that the blue skies brought me made me realize that the day would have been totally different if we had nicer weather. I would have just felt safer and more at ease if the sky and sun had cooperated!
After finally getting safely back to the marina and sharing our terror with the other members of the caravan, none of whom were the least bit rattled and all seemed to have had the BEST time, we also realized two other things that could have made the outing different. For one, neither of us have boating experience. If we had, we would have instinctively known that everything was normal and that each big wave was not a sign of imminent death. Also, all the other boaters were couples, so the ladies were treated to that inherent dude cockiness that would assure them that everything was fine, and it was handled, and they should just calm their silly little lady minds.
While I didn’t have the confidence to assure Megan that everything was indeed fine, I was pleased to find out that in the face of danger, I can remain calm and get me and my friend out of trouble. I literally navigated us through choppy waters, and knowing I have it in me is pretty awesome, and definitely worth the price of that Groupon.
