Just posted my newly created Hair Accessory Holders on the store- throw one over your bedroom or bathroom doorknob and your life will be much better! Click here to view them all!
I recently got a special order for three sets of my sushi napkins, from a lady who is throwing “make your own sushi parties” as a new business. That sounds like a super fun idea to me, especially the eating it part. If you are in New Jersey or southeastern Pennsylvania, look her up online at mysushiparty.com and book your own party.
Here are some pictures of my napkins at their latest event. The table looks so pretty!
My friend Michael planned a really cool bike ride where we rode around San Diego to see the exhibitions in Viva la Revolución: A Dialogue with the Urban Landscape. It was a really great day-sunny but cool, and I managed to get my heavy-ass bike up the hills without dying. Win! Here are some of the pieces we saw:
Shepard Fairey
South Park 2202 30th St (at Ivy) North wall (side of building)
Dr. Lakra/Vhils Collaboration
Parking lot on southeast corner of 11th Ave and Broadway
JR
Downtown, Southeast corner of 5th Ave and C St,2nd story, above clothing store
Barry McGee
Downtown, California Theatre; 4th Ave and C St
Vhils
Downtown, 1202 Kettner Blvd, Front of parking structure
Os Gemeos
Downtown, G St between 2nd and 3rd Aves, south wall of Horton Plaza parking structure
Dr. Lakra
Barrio Logan, 1660 Logan Ave, Parking lot of Miriello Grafico (on 17th St)
Stephan Doitschinoff (Calma)
Downtown, 320 16th St (at J St)
My bike cozies up to Amanda’s ride while we take a break to have drinks and food at Neighborhood. Get their sweet potato fries!
If you’d like to check out these pieces on your own, you can view the full map here. You can read more about the exhibition here.
My friend Laura recently started making sock monkeys, and their darling little faces made me want to write a haiku in their honor:
Monkeyface cuteness
socks too sweet to put in shoes
have a banana
Get your own monkey at Laura’s etsy store by clicking here!
When my nephew Shane was born, I knitted him a teddy bear using Blue Sky Alpaca’s Baby Bobbi Bear pattern. He’s five now, and this year he got really into stuffed animals. The bear became one of his favorites; he calls it “Cuddly Bear” and takes it everywhere, which is just all kinds of awesome. However, the poor thing has been loved hard and is pretty worn out. I told him I’d make him another, and this time I’d make it fatter and more cuddly, since he uses it as a pillow so often. His sister Paige told me to make her one, too, in purple. I was scared it would look like a Grateful Dead bear but it came out pretty cute. Here’s the final product:
And the happy recipients:
It’s a really good pattern, and much easier than you would think. The hardest part is dealing with four double-point needles at once, but if you aren’t clumsy like me than it’s not hard at all!
Okay, now this might sound like yet another justification, but I HAD to buy a new New Machine. The old New machine went haunted. For real.
I hear a noise. I go down into the basement to see what’s up. The sewing machine is like, “Oh, what’s up you? Just down here sewing some invisible stuff while you watch Office reruns.”
It has obviously been sewing on it’s own down there for quite awhile, because its light was glowing an exhausted yellow orange and there was a wad of bobbin thread the size of a marble under the plate. The needle had said “hellz naw” a long time ago and along with the pin that tightens it, had worked itself loose and made it as far as the floor beneath the sewing table before I intervened.
I know what you are thinking, and I did indeed check for industrious singing mice and elves hungry to be paid in first born children. Nada. All I had was one haunted machine in the midst of a major crisis.
So I was pretty much screwed at this point. It’s my main machine. I have loaned out the old Old Machine to someone else, all I have is this lunatic; unreliable at best and possessed by demons at worst. Maker Faire is looming at the end of July, I can’t put this thing in the shop and there’s no getting Stephen King’s ass on the line when you have a demon possessed piece of machinery.
And then I saw it. IT. This gorgeous piece of aqua steel, refurbished by a very nice French Canadian man in Québec. Angels purred. Milk turned to honey turned to wine turned to Newcastle. Fireworks went off in parts my brain that are only dimly lit by 2 watt bulbs any other time. I had to have it. Look at it….I don’t really think I need to explain. At least if this beautiful thing goes haunted there’s a pretty good chance that it’s haunted by some kick ass lady in kid gloves and pill box hat, who is just basically coming back to let me know it’s really not ladylike to sew skulls onto handbags.
I’m thinking being haunted by whoever owned something this amazing, is going to result in some pretty cool stuff. At least until the next new machine comes along.
I’m going to have a booth here, selling pillows, napkins, photo albums, baby bibs and Amy Kate’s one-of-a-kind amazing bags. Should be a super fun event with bands, food, beer and art! My booth will be somewhere between 30th and Ray Sts, come say hi!
Lately it seems as though everyone is having a baby or a birthday or something to where I need to give them a present. You already saw the amazingly silly baby bib I made for my friend Nate’s son, but here are a few other things I’ve made for people lately.
My friend and hairdresser Katie is expecting a son any minute, and because she’s the best hairdresser in the entire universe (seriously, you should see my hair right now. It’s amazing.) I had to make her something good. Since she’s doing the baby’s room in owls, I picked up this Alexander Henry fabric called “Spotted Owl” in green tea and made a blanket out of it, with brown minky fabric on the back.
Here’s a close-up of the owls. I love that they aren’t cute so much as arty and interesting:
My friend Lysa had a birthday, and since she and her man recently bought an awesome mid-century dining room table, I figured placemats were the perfect gift. Actually I only got the idea because Lysa showed me a picture of this mod fabric and strongly hinted about the fact that it would make great placemats, but I am totally thrilled if someone wants to guide me into making them something they’d actually love and use. Makes life easier and means I won’t waste my time creating something they just shove in a drawer.
I used the fabric she selected on the front, and made them reversible with the back being brown corduroy. I choose the corduroy to give the mats a bit more weight, and because I liked the contrast of basic brown cord with the more whimsical and colorful front fabric. If I make placemats again I’d probably include some interfacing, because though the cord helps weigh them down, I’d like them to have just a bit more heft. Here they are:
Next up, making products to sell on the store and at future craft fairs!
Recently, my friend Nate and his wife brought forth a super cute baby named Adam. When I heard that Nate was going to be a father again, of course I thought about what I could make as a gift. Being that he’s both a hunter (which, not my thing, at all, but you have to agree to disagree sometimes) and someone with a super twisted sense of humor, I came up with the following set of baby bibs and burp cloths:
Yeah, a hunter’s delight! Nate said that when he put the bib on him for the first time, Adam immediately stuck one of the deers in his mouth, so looks like baby is on track with daddy’s plans!
