Belle & Boo

Speaking of adorable...

Last May, the husband I went to New York, where I couldn't resist loading up on paper goods. Of course!

One of the things I brought home was a simply adorable notebook by Belle & Boo, with this insanely cute illustration.


The reasons I love this notebook are three-fold:
1. Duh, it's adorable.
2. Bunny!
3. The husband and I like to imagine that this is what our future daughter will look like.

Back to the present, I stumbled across the Belle & Boo site and fell even more in love with their products.

Seriously thinking I may have to get these for a future Christmas card.


There are way too many cute things on their site, and I think I would take every one. But I will leave you with one last image to melt your heart.

Swoon

It's holiday card card time and I still have not picked mine out - a must-do this week! For now, I am just feasting on the eye candy of Disney illustrator Ralph Hulett's gorgeous Christmas cards.

I wish, wish, wish these were for sale today. They are too precious for words.

Holiday Wreath

I really love this hand-made felted wreath form West Elm, but unfortunately, it's out of stock. I think my next project will be figuring out how to craft a similar looking one for myself.


What holiday crafts are you making/have you made?

Mission Accomplished!

(In Bob Saget voice-over)

Kids, you may remember me mentioning Gallery 360 in past posts. Back in July of 2010, I had just entered the Red Hot Art Fair with my friends Maria and Tricia. The first day, I was approached by a woman who owned a gallery/shop and was interested in my book wreaths for a holiday display. What fortune!

Seriously, I felt so lucky to have the opportunity and over the next few months made more wreaths as well as lots of holiday ornaments. Some days I worked hard, lots of days I didn't do anything, so there was a mad rush the last few weeks to get finished.

I managed to get done in time and now my hard work is waiting for you to admire it. But if you can't get down to 50th and Xerxes (or just don't want to) I thought I'd post a few pictures for you to see what all the fuss has been about.



Here's some of the other beautiful work in the same nook as me:

Darling ceramic ornaments


Pretty pottery.
The most gorgeous folded book sculptures. I die.

If you have time, please go check out Gallery 360. They have great gifts throughout the shop (I'm jonesing for a pretty wooden spaghetti measure.)

Hard at Work

Hi all!

Just a quick update. I haven't posted much lately because I have been hard at work for the upcoming holiday exhibit at Gallery 360.

Currently making more book wreaths, incorporating new designs and structures into them. I'm also working on some ornaments for holiday tree-trimming.

I'm trying to dedicate at least an hour a day to production, but the wreaths are very time-consuming so it is slow-going. I'm also experimenting with ways to make the wreaths more durable, so if you have any ideas or tips, send them my way!

I'll post pictures as soon as I have more finished products!

Better Late Than Never

So, Red Hot was almost a month ago and I am finally just posting about it. I'm terrible.

The experience was wonderful and I had a great time. Very hot weather, but great company and lots of exciting opportunities.

Maria and I were lucky enough to get a booth next to our friend Tricia, who was displaying her amazing photographs.

Maria had a lot of interest in her burlesque-themed artwork and had tons of great merchandise.



I brought cards, garlands and wreaths and I was happy with the products I moved.


All in all it was a great experience and I am definitely planning on doing it again next year.

Sneak Peek!

I've been busy, busy, busy getting ready for the Red Hot Art Festival this weekend. Just thought I would pop in to give you a little preview of what I've been working on.

I'll definitely be posting more after the weekend is over. If you are in the area, stop by the festival this weekend and say howdy. Click here for details.

Wish List

Design*Sponge just had a piece featuring a new product from one of my favorite stationary lines, Rifle Paper Co.

I love creator Anna Bond's quirky illustrations and gorgeous lettering, and would be overjoyed to receive any of their products. They are definitely an inspiration to me and now they've outdone themselves with a drool-worthy recipe box collection to match their adorable recipe cards. The boxes are made over a three month process, using salvaged wood.

At $120 for the set, I can't justify the cost, so I will content myself with gazing at their loveliness online.

Update: Somehow my pictures got deleted. Sorry, folks. Check it out here.

Loco for Gocco

I applied for a booth at the Red Hot Art Festival this year. I'm not sure if I will get to participate, but I thought I'd try.

In preparation, I finally broke out my new Print Gocco machine. I'm excited to give you a little preview of the first design for greeting cards I made using the machine.


This card was made from a ink and White-out drawing of birch trees I did at my day job about 3 years ago. The original has been hanging at my desk since, and I've always liked it.

I'm really excited about all the possibilities and hope this is just the beginning of lots of great work.

New Garlands!

I've been lacking inspiration lately, but I decided to recreate the first project I posted in a new way. I loved the look of the coffee filter garland and decided to replicate it in miniature using cupcake liners.

Here's the first attempt, after tea-staining white liners. They turned out quite nicely, in my opinion.


Here is the cupcake garland versus the coffee filter garland.


As I was putting the garland together, an idea struck. What if I used the already colored cupcake liners? Twenty minutes and one trip to Kowalski's later, I was in business. Well, actually I was soaking the liners so that they would dry flat. After a day of drying, I really was ready to work.

I think it is really adorable and that it would be a great decoration for a baby shower or kid's party, or even a barbecue. What do you think?

Spring!

Spring is definitely my favorite season and I feel like it does not last very long in Minnesota, so I try to enjoy it as much as possible while it's here. I was happy to get out in the sunshine this past weekend and go to the Lyndale Farmers' Market with my friend, Jen. I picked up a few herbs, flowers and veggies I wanted to plant, along with lots of fresh fruits and veggies!


Today, I got the chance to pot and plant my goodies. A few weeks ago, I had purchased some terra cotta planters and spruced them up with chalkboard paint. I thought it was a fun, cheap way to personalize my little container garden.


I've never really planted anything before, so I'm hoping this goes well!

Seeing Spots

I had plenty of time this weekend to work on a project that I had been looking forward to doing for a few months. All of the directions can be found here.


The whole thing consists of 377 felt circles; all of which needed to be traced and cut. This took a loooong time. Chris and I popped in all three Lord of the Rings movies and I got to work.


I'm really happy with the finished product, but I'm definitely scrapping my original idea of making these for the entire sunroom. I think one in the living room looks perfect.

Recycled T-Shirt Necklace

The April issue of Body + Soul magazine had an awesome recycled craft tutorial featuring an easy necklace that I had been itching to try out.

All you need is a pair of scissors and a soft cotton T-shirt.


First, cut off the hem of the shirt. Then, cut horizontal strips across the body of the shirt. I made my strips about 1/2 an inch to 3/4 of an inch.

Next, stretch the strips into loops, just like in the chew toy craft. Stack the loops so the seam(s) line up. My shirt had two seams, but if yours only has one, that works better.

Finally, take a scrap of the shirt and wrap it around the seams. I did this for both sides, then looped the necklace.

Book Wreath

My most recent project combined two things I love...books and crafting. While it may seem like sacrilege to some, I did not mind sacrificing a used book for this project. I just went out and bought one, instead of taking one from my own library. I chose one of my favorites, Les Miserables by Victor Hugo.

The project required very few materials: A wreath shape, book, hot glue gun with glue sticks and paint. I used a brownish-gray paint to "age" the edge of the book.


Then, I simply folded the pages multiple ways and glued them onto the wreath, starting at the outer edge. It took some experimenting to find shapes that I liked, and the project took a few hours to complete, but I'm really pleased with the result. I still have enough pages in Les Mis to make at least two more wreaths. I'm hoping to put a couple on my upcoming Etsy store.

Fun in the sun

I've been taking advantage of the sunny days and experimenting with my sun print kit. I bought it in December, so I've been itching to try it out.

Here are a few of my favorites.

I used some stencils I got with an Ani DiFranco album to make this one. I'd been saving them to use in some sort of project, but I wasn't sure what. This seemed perfect.

This was my first attempt. I love how it turned out. I used a necklace, and I think it looks like a constellation chart.

Since I liked the way one necklace looked, I thought I'd see what happened if I used several chains at once. I think that the result kind of looks like a map.

I'm looking forward to more sunny days, so I can try out even more ideas.