Handmade Arcade 2009!!!

This is it - tomorrow is the big day. It's time for another Handmade Arcade and I can't wait. Hours and hours of meeting new people and being surrounded by so much handmade awesome. I'll be at the L2 Design Collective booth showcasing our holiday cards and banners, totes and gift tags and whatever else we happen to make today (this morning I've just put the last coat of varnish on these little test print boxes, for instance).Stop on by (and I wouldn't be too too upset if you brought a cup of hot chocolate with you) and say hey.And here's one more little idea - this Christmas when you're thinking of how to spend your money, think handmade.

Keeping Secrets

I have been printing journal covers for the last few days. I'm pretty sure my favorite part of printing comes at the end of a run when I've successfully printed my stack of paper and filled my drying rack and I start looking around for anything else I can throw on the table and pull a print on. I have printed the walls and posts in our basement. I have printed cereal boxes, shirts, aprons, cardboard boxes, envelopes, shopping bags - anything that'll take the ink. A couple of weeks ago I printed the tractor on a wooden "box" frame. I liked it so much that I've decided to keep a stack of boxes handy. I started printing bits of the screens I've been using for my journal covers and out came this test print box!I love the test print randomness.I'm throwing a few coats of varnish on this and giving it to my best big brother for his birthday in a few days. He flies in tomorrow so don't say a word. Swear to it.

Warmer...warmer...

I am so stoked to report that I coated my first screens in my rinky-dink, basement darkroom this afternoon. The boy is asleep and it's snowing and the time seemed right to mix up the photo-emulsion and get to it. Hopefully this portends an avalanche of inspiration and printing! A great friend came by today with her girl and a box of cinnamon rolls. We spent a couple of hours watching the kids try each other on for size. She asked me to do an assemblage piece for her brother's 40th birthday. It is so great to be asked to create something "for the man who has everything." Thank you for your support! Off to enjoy the snow.