Fandango!

Wow! It's been too long since I've blogged - I've been thinking about it everyday, but haven't been able to put my latest stuff up because all of it has been made for people's birthdays and other celebrations. Which of course, because I've been so busy and sort of backed up on presents, means that I make them late, then have to wait until I've sent them to be able to post them and talk about them. But finally, I can show off my latest endeavor with embroidery.

My most recent gift was inspired by a beautiful art piece Chris and I got for our friends Jesse and Anita for their wedding present last year. It was a metal piece made in Latin America (I can't remember exactly where) of the joyous fandango image. I love the idea of that image as a celebratory symbol of a marriage and the hope that a wedding inspires in it's participants. One of my oldest friends from high school, Katie, who I love very much got married earlier this year and unfortunately because of time and too much on my plate, I never got to make her a gift for her wedding. But I had always had it in my mind that I would get around to doing something for her. So I found one of my Sublime Stitching patterns of the fandango wedding image and made Katie and John's present. I hope they like it and I hope it blesses their home and marriage so that they are "together forever!"

But I don't just want to talk about my work here. I also want to use this blog as a place where I can share the craftiness of my friends too. So, to that end....

My neighbor, Darlene is amazing at knitting and crocheting and recently finished this piece that she made for her mother's birthday. It is such delicate work and I am absolutely in awe of her patience and skill. I especially love the feelings it inspires in me to look at this piece. I don't know many people who had really crafty women in their families. Growing up I knew plenty of people whose families were "artists," but not "crafters." But my family is chock full of them.

When I was young and was living with my grandparents for a time, my grandmother had a sewing room in the basement and my grandfather had a workshop in the garage. Grandpa would cut out wood squares and rectangles for me to glue together to make birdhouses while he worked and Grandma was always either sewing something or painting something. Eventually they moved to Florida, built another home from the ground up and started a small business called Our Place, which were beautifully crafted wood pieces, including puzzles, clocks, toys and boxes. They toured around craft fairs throughout the South and did pretty well.

Anyway, the women in my grandmother's family were all crafters of some kind or anther: knitting, crocheting, tatting, embroidery, etc. My mom inherited a huge store of great and great, great grandmothers' and aunts' doilies. I have inherited a bunch of them and really see them as art pieces to be cherished.








I think the women in my family were so talented and I am incredibly thankful that I got whatever gene is responsible for love of crafting, which I am sure I inherited from all of them. To see the care and love that Darlene put into her mother's doily make my heart sing because of the craft, but also because it invokes nostalgic feelings and feelings of pride in women who do this kind of art, like the women in my family. And Darlene, who I am so lucky to live next to. She's such a wonderful woman, not only because of her craftiness, but because of who she is as a person. I just adore her, simply put.

Sweetie Chicken!

So, I'm well known for the nickname that I have for most everyone that I come into contact with - chicken. And for those that I especially love and adore, the term transforms into Sweetie Chicken.

I'm afraid to say that Sweetie Chicken is not a creation of my own, rather it was something Lori used to say all of the time. Lori is the amazing woman that I used to nanny for in high school. I adored watching her love her pets, just as I have always loved mine. We are kindred spirits that way. She is from New York and has the thick accent to prove it, and is a knock out beauty. Wearing lipstick never stopped her from planting big, fat smooches on all of her pets - which of course meant there was ALWAYS evidence of Lori loving everyone that lived in the house, including husband, child, pets and the babysitter! Anyway, I could go on about her (I simply adore her more than I could ever really convey with words), but to the point - she used to have a beautiful Siamese kitty named Davey and I will never forget watching her love him in particular, saying "There you are Davey, my little sweetie chicken! Come here you, sweetie chicken, you!" and then she would plaster the top of his little kitty head with lipstick kisses. And he loved every minute of it. It was a joy to watch.

Eventually I moved away and was no longer an active part of the family anymore, but I suppose something unconscious in me wanted to keep Lori and my love for her family alive by adopting the "Sweetie Chicken" term and it's stuck ever since... we have since reunited and now Lori and her family have met my partner and are absolutely in love with him, as we both are with them. Their daughter I used to nanny has grown into a beautiful young woman and I am so excited to see the things she will do in this world. They are, hands down, some of our favorite people in the world.

Which brings me to the point of this post, which is, I call lots of people Chicken at work and many folks, even after working with me for so long, still don't get it - but some do. And one of those people is Jocelyn. I adore her. She's great. I love how level headed and calm she is and she has the loveliest smile and contagious laugh. Her birthday passed recently and I wanted to make her something, but I wanted it to be something that she would use.
So...

I thought I would delve into the world of eyeglass cases. It's the first one I've ever made. It was made in honor of her being one of my favorite Sweetie Chickens in my life right now. I like how it turned out, I hope she gets lots of miles out of it. I might have to experiment with these some more...

And I should mention that the book the case is sitting on is something I asked for, for Christmas this year, Craftivity: 40 Projects for the DIY Lifestyle. It's an awesome book full of kick ass projects. I held craft night at my house earlier this spring and had a bunch of women from work come over. I picked bleach stencil shirts from Craftivity for the night's project. I tried it out first and found that the directions didn't work for me, rather using a Clorox bleach pen was a lot easier and allowed me to improvise whatever design I initially had in mind once I started to "draw" on the shirt. The picture below is of one of my best girlfriends, Jodie, and her design from that night.

Foggy San Fran crafting

So, it's the summer here in San Francisco, which means a strange blend of winter weather and passive sweaty heat (meaning if you walk outside, you should wear a sweater or light jacket, but expect to sweat your ass off while being chilly - which annoyingly happens to me a lot since I walk everywhere!?!). This is the view of our beautiful back yard from our living room window. Beyond the building to the right of the window, you can usually see Sutro Tower atop Twin Peaks, just behind Buena Vista Park. The back yard view makes up for the fact that we live on very busy Fell Street. We are so lucky to live in the back of the building with such a lovely backyard serving as our regular view. I love laying on the couch and just staring out of the windows, so relaxing...

I wanted to share my latest endeavor, an embroidered jacket. I bought a very plain, blindingly white used Forever 21 jacket at Crossroads Trading Co. on Haight Street the other day and thought there must be the perfect embroidery pattern out there waiting to embellish and perk up this blase jacket. All I have to say is believe in the cliche "Ask and you shall receive!" because a couple of days later I received an email from my favorite embroidery queen, Jenny Hart at Sublime Stitching, announcing the arrival of new patterns, including an artist series featuring Kurt Halsey. I was instantly enamored for a couple of reasons: 1. his art is kick ass and cute, and 2. he is a dude! I love chicks but am so excited to see a male presence in the predominantly femme world of craft (although his art is not exclusively made for crafting, I love that he is lending his talents to the craft world).

So check it out! I love it and can't wait to wear it tomorrow!

A brand new space for a brand new start

I know I promised myself I would do all kinds of projects this weekend, but I got a bit distracted... and am so glad I did! On Saturday morning I decided that I needed to revamp my crafting space in order to maximize my potential and creativity, so I hit up ZipCar to reserve a ride for the trek across the Bay Bridge to IKEA. I got a great organizing box with 9 drawers for stashing stuff. The very best thing about the box is that it is unfinished wood, so not only does it provide great organizing, it's also a project in itself! Anyway, with a few other goodies I couldn't resist at IKEA, we headed back home to the city and I dove into organizing and rearranging my space.

I love it now! It's so wonderful and I feel so good sitting at it. The best part is that it's a mixed space - part altar, part craft center. Perfect! I can feel it now - many a wonderful thing will be crafted here!

During the process of pouring through all of my craft supplies, I came upon all of my business cards I used to get when I subscribed to Marie Kare's The Sampler (which I need to start doing again!). And this started me thinking how my obsession with crafting came to be...

When we first moved to the Bay Area, we knew lots of people, but we were getting used to being somewhere new and this promoted a bit of a nesting phenomenon, which lead to me trying to figure out how best to use my time at home. I started making purses. I can't believe I had never done it before that moment, but that was really the beginning of the serious crafting (while I was in college, I was so into my studies that I never really gave crafting the time it deserved so it never developed fully.) The purses eventually gave way to felt pins. I found out about a craft fair going on in Oakland and I thought, what would it hurt if I rented a table and tried to sell some of my pins? The craft fair was being sponsored by Rock Paper Scissors Collective. When I got there, before I even finished putting up all of my pins on my display board, I was mauled by a bunch of women ooo-ing and ahhh-ing over my stuff! It blew my mind! One of the women was Marie Kare, who had a small boutique called Mini Mart on Telegraph Ave, right down the street from UC Berkeley. She asked me if I wanted to sell my stuff there and I said sure, having no idea what I was in for! It was great, I spent a summer making stuff to sell at the store and all usually sold out immediately. Marie encouraged me to raise my prices a bit, and the woman who owned the larger store Mini Mart was located in wanted me to make things for her new store she was opening up... but the pressure got to me and I dropped out of the loop....BUT NOW I'M BACK! And I'm so excited!

So, moral of this story is, okay, well it's a couple of things: 1. do what you love and if it continues to offer doors to open, open the friggin' doors, sister! Don't run! 2. Marie rocks and Mini Mart turned into The Sampler, which kicks ass! and 3. Rock Paper Scissors is amazing and is the kind of model that all craft people should be uniting under to create healthy communities. I love them and want to get more involved with them. Check both of these projects out, you won't be disappointed, I promise!

Felt mascots and button pendants!

So with my surge of energy for crafting back in full swing (wow, I feel more like me again, amazing!) I did a tiny bit of shopping on Haight Street last weekend and picked up a few supplies I knew I needed, but also found some new treasures. I picked up two books and an embroidery stitch guide. One of the books is by Aranzi Aronzo books called The Cute Book. It's really.... cute! And it's got great ideas for making little felt mascots. It's great because of all of my experience with making felt pins; I never thought to make the things I did into 3D creations and since getting this book my brain's been brewing some new ideas beyond what's in the book. I've already tried my hand at one of their ideas, the squirrel, and then I re-made one of my old favorites into a mascot, the blue whale. I love them!If you have any suggestions, you should pass them along!

I also saw in another book (which I didn't buy this time) the idea of putting small embroidered designs onto buttons. So, I gave that project a whirl too. I don't know how I feel about them.... they are cute, but there's something missing with these. I'll have to think more on them to give them that extra "something" that will make them too cute!
This weekend, I'm looking forward to going to Ikea to get a few things to make my crafty corner a bit more easy to deal with, settling in to learn some new embroidery stitches, crafty up a sweater I bought the other day and make an apron! Putting that all out there makes me so glad it's Friday! Just one day closer to heaven!

Remember, send me your ideas for mascots! I want to hear your thoughts!

Crafty cooking!

I first started cooking 'like an adult' when I was in college and living in the second place where I lived alone. I loved my apartment, the complex was known as the Gay Melrose Place of Albuquerque - and being there lived up to that reputation every day! At the time, I had a second job at Wild Oats and got a great discount, so grocery shopping became really fun while I worked there. I was usually so excited about pay day so that I could shop and finally purchase the things I had been eye-ing for weeks. I did a lot of exploration during that time. My friend, Big Al, bought me the Moosewood Cookbook and then it was really on! My favorite meal to cook was Moroccan Stew (vegetable tagine), which I would cook while drinking a beer and listening to Moroccan music. Ah, the joys of living alone... that was a little bit of heaven for me.

Since December I've been getting Real Simple magazine; it was a Christmas present from my friend Weezie. I wasn't really sure what to expect from this magazine, because I had never had a subscription to it. But I have been so pleasantly surprised. I especially love the recipes. And I love the change the recipes have had on my life, as well as the effect they have had on Chris and my life as a couple.

As an individual, I've used the recipes as a chance to take a breather and basically meditate in the middle of my day. My routine has now become: come home after work, turn on NPR (I love Fresh Air with Terry Gross, Counter Spin, As It Happens and the Tavis Smiley Show), open the recipe book and decide which one I'm going to make that night. What I love about cooking is that sense that this is the one time in my life when I don't have to make the decisions - yeah, I'm that kind of cook. I'm not creative, I don't taste something and think, 'that needs...' like Chris can. My creativity and courage doesn't infiltrate my cooking. I love the idea of letting the recipe guide me, tell me when to put what in the bowl, saute it for only x minutes, mix it with such and such at this moment, etc. I love it. I get to listen to the news and zone out a bit for a while during my day. I especially love prepping vegetables. I love cutting them into equally proportioned pieces and putting them in bowls with their partners in crime.

As a couple, I love that I've thoughtfully created a meal and Chris and I get a chance to sit down and enjoy a great meal together with a glass of wine. And laugh. We do a lot of that. Especially over dinner, we have a good time together. But for some reason, dinners are especially fun for us.

(One more thing that's been a boon with my cooking fever is that our pantry has shrunk down and the refrigerator is usually packed with FRESH food. We greatly decreased the amount of processed and packaged food we eat now.)

Anyway, my renewed interest in cooking has also come at a time when I have a renewed vigor for my crafting and my purpose in life (that'll come later - thanks Sarah-bug!). All of the cooking has required that I wear an apron and I luckily inherited my Grammie's old apron, which I love SO much! It reminds me of being really young, living with her, and sitting on the kitchen floor while she cooked. I love her. So, I treasure her apron. But the very best thing about her apron is, not only does it look totally cute, it's so utilitarian - it comes with a little pocket and a built in towel for wiping your hands! Genius!

So, I got some of my scrap and gifted fabric down from storage and am inspired to make some aprons! This is the only way I know how to lend creativity to my cooking - for me, the meditation method is my saving grace in this hectic life I'm living in San Francisco, so making fabulous accessories will serve as the creative outlet. I'm going to sell some of them, but I will definitely have to make myself AT LEAST one! I'm excited and I'll post pics as soon as some are done!

A quick look back as a start...

This past Winter Solstice/holiday, I decided to embroider all of my gifts - I've always made all of my holiday gifts - but this year was a new endeavor with embroidery. I love it! I am so addicted to Sublime Stitching by Jenny Hart and am interested in creating some of my own patterns soon (I'll keep you posted). Embroidery is like painting with thread and I am simply hooked!

So, anyway, this is one of my favorite pieces that I made for a holiday gift. It was for my best friend, Sarah-bug, who was living in Japan teaching English. I wanted to send her not just a holiday package, but a I-love-and-miss-you-terribly care package. I used a shirt that I bought from Gelugpa monks when they were visiting New Mexico (where I lived for many years), even the buttons from the shirt were put to use in this project!

I am so excited for the upcoming projects I've got planned and will definitely be posting them as they happen! That's it for now, I don't want to start babbling, as I'm still getting used to this blogging thing...