sweet little bird

a new journal! i just finished this one and ahh i had so many problems with it at the end! knotted thread, binding it wrong, another knot...just a big pain i didnt want to deal with. BUT all is well now and its in my shop waiting to fly to a new home!

i plan on making another journal real soon here...a little bit different than the ones ive been making recently, more along the style from when i first started journals. it involves a monster, purple, and prehaps some green...you'll see it by the middle of next week!

cloudy day, eh?

i just finished a set of 3 pocketbooks for a girl on etsy. her etsy name is boomshesdead, but she doesnt have a shop. i was so excited to make these for her! each has about 80 recycled-paper pages.

im going to be adding more journals to the shop SOOON. cant wait!

you'll do just fine, little bird

im out of the paper i need to make journals, but since i was itching to make something anyway, i made this little pocket book. i listed it on etsy hoping that somebody who has the same problem as me can swoop it up. everytime i go somewhere, somebody always tells me about something thats going on or gives me their address or something like that. well i never have anywhere to write it down and i always lose the paper i write it on anyway, so why not have a little booklet to carry between credit cards? this way you can just write everything down and always have it handy! perfect.

i have to work tonight and i do NOT want to. i hate working on friday and saturday nights, especially now that the weather is getting nice. AH its the worst thing ever, working at night. i go in at about 3:30 today...i will probably get off at around 10:30 but what good does that do me? tomorrow i start at 5 and i will get off at about 11:30 at night, which sucks even more.

anyway, have a lovely day!

tweet!

i just finished this journal...im on a bookbinding kick right now. its bound with dark brown waxed linen thread. i created the yellow box pattern with yellow acrylic paint and used black india ink for all the drawings. this is another small journal, only about 5 inches wide by 6 inches tall. i really love making the small books, they have more character it seems. 80 pages of 80 lb drawing paper. im off to etsy to list it right now.

in other news, i have today off. i have to go grocery shopping right after i do this etsy thing, which sucks since i hate the grocery store and hate spending money on food...i should be a farmer! but since im NOT a farmer i have to go to the store, which is guaranteed pissed offness for erin. hmph. we're having our friends over tonight, im going to make fajitas for dinner. im pretty excited about that. mmm chicken and cheese and flour tortillas...mushrooms and salsa and sour cream...ooooh red bell peppers would be great too, but a waste of money.

theres a siren going off right now- i hate sirens. when i was about 7 i was outside playing with my toads in the yard and this really long siren started blairing. so my mom told me i should come inside, it might be a tornado warning or something. i was so scared and lost one of my dear little toads which left me with only one. i kept them in a shoebox with a chicken wire cover. aww. i miss my childhood almost too much. its like i just cant let go of the great memories. i guess that if i ever have kids it would be kind of neat since i could do the stuff i used to do. that would be great. anyway theres a new siren going now from a different town, so i should go investigate.

anyway, enough blabbing. have a good day!

woohoo! i just finished this journal. it has red trees printed on kraft paper, rust colored thread, 80 pages of 80 lb drawing paper. im off to my etsy shop to list it now!

last night i was thinking about a lot of stuff...how i wanted to start with paper arts and move onto something bigger and better when i had the time. well, i dont have the time right now and i probably wont for quite awhile. my big thing is that i want to make products for the home. everything from pillows to placemats to prints for the wall. i have a lot of ideas for pillow designs, its just a matter of MAKING them. i really have to learn how to embroider one of these days too. i feel like ive put a lot of money into bookbinding already though, i would feel guilty about buying the stuff i need for the new projects i want to do. i had 2 sales right away in my new etsy shop...traffic doesnt seem very high in the shop though, which is probably okay since i should be planning our wedding. but in all honesty, i really. really. reallllly dont feel like planning the wedding. i was so excited to do it for the longest time...about a year before we even got engaged i started writing ideas down. but now i just think "wedding? ugh. i'd rather make things for people who will be happy with their new items" because anytime i talk about our wedding, people tend to give a funny look. and i know that its "our wedding, do what WE want" but im seriously so sick of the blank stares when they ask all excitedly "where did you buy your dress?!" i tell them that a girl made it for me. i would go into full blown detail- how she was in school for fashion design, this is her OWN business, all the money goes directly to her, i like supporting that type of thing...but the couple times i have mentioned it, they lose interest. i personally think my dress is beautiful, chrissy from wai-ching made it. if you want to see it, its the "symphony dress"...white with fall colors. then people say how they want to help, yadda yadda. while i appreciate the offer and know that we will need help, im tired of explaining why i dont want people to do "our flowers" because WE ARENT HAVING FLOWERS. is that so wrong? i didnt think so either, until almost everybody ive told just stared and asked "why?". the bridesmaids are carrying lanterns. im carrying a bouquet, a really simple bouquet though that im making (why would i let someone else make my bouquet when i want to do it myself?) but thats pretty much all the flowers we're having. just my bouquet. a lot of people are asking where im getting my hair and makeup done...they all tell me "no, dont do that" when i say that im doing it myself. dont do that?? im sorry, but fuck you. im making my necklace, another thing people think is "out there". you know, planning a wedding was something that i couldnt wait to do. but now that everyone has their own ideas about how our wedding should be, and arent supportive of my ideas, its really putting a damper on things. i knew from the start that people would kind of think it was strange about this or that...but i 1) didnt think they'd openly admit it and 2) didnt think they would have such a strong opinion. the only people so far who have been open to MY ideas are my mom, my moh- kaitlin, our friends rod and tricia, and my aunt judy. my mom backs me up all the time when family members ask "oh where did you buy your dress?" im so happy that my parents are supportive of this type of thing. i wasnt exactly raised like that, i mean i wasnt taught to do things "differently" than most people, but they are pretty supportive when i tell them about my crafty ideas, which is great. my dad is all about asking me about the things ive been making, he wants to help with things too. maybe when i get around to screenprinting i can use his help. my mom is going to be helping me a lot this summer with making the stuff for the wedding, since she doesnt work in the summer (must be awesome, huh?). at any rate, this post was mostly a rant about how im upset that people cant see the simple things in life and that im sick of that fact. i put my homemade tags on gifts i give to people and they dont care that i made them...or when we wrap our christmas presents in kraft paper and stamp the paper or tie pretty ribbon around it (since i love the way it looks) people say "what, all you could afford was a grocery bag?" and it pisses me off. thats what I like, its MY gift to you (greedy bastard), its recycling (when i have gifts small enough to actually use the grocery bags, otherwise its kraft paper), and YES, its saves us money and makes ME happy to make it.

anyways. enough bitching, time for sleep.

wow a whole week since the last post! i have a lot of new ideas for a few new creations but i havent actually gone through with anything yet. im torn between letting go of crafting for a bit till the wedding is over or if i should just keep crafting and slowly get wedding stuff finished...hmmm. anyhow, here is the finished product for an alchemy request at etsy. its a coptic bound journal for monica of "stuff on strings". 128 pages (biggest journal i have made yet! the rest of mine are usually 96 pages, but i LOVE the thickness of this book), 80 lb drawing paper...about 6"x9". she wanted a skeleton on the cover who was a bit saucy...after about 3634 drawings i think i finally got it. the ends of the pages were inked to make them red (something im NEVER doing again, HUUUUGE mess) ties with a black ribbon, and the skeleton is holding marigolds which she wanted as well. cover reads "its not that nursery mouth i came back for" which was a quote she wanted on the cover. she hasnt seen it yet but i hope she likes it!!

i just bought this patch set from etsy. i HAD to buy it because it was super cute. who can resist roosters, horses and trees?! and cool houses with neat fences? ive seen this fabric somewhere before, i know it.

anyway, i purchased it from here

new tags in the shop!
im not doing the color challenge thing today, mainly because i cant find much orange in my house! and also because i have been busy updating my shop, and the chores i was supposed to do yesterday never got done. so im going to today.

OH and i found a new template! so much nicer than the blue i had before!

brown...another one of my favorite colors! this posting daily thing is wearing me (and my camera batteries!) out!!! wow, what a task it is. you'd think "okay i have 13 extra minutes on my hands"...well an hour later and a half later, here i am. okay, part of the reason is because there are a few blogs that i HAVE to visit daily. and then i find even MORE that i love so i have to look at those ones too. but at any rate, here is only 1 brown picture. i have been going overboard lately! or at least thats how i feel.

today i went to the doctor, then to 2 boutiques and a craft store, then to the library, and then came home. i worked on an alchemy item for etsy for a bit and soon im going to start a new stationery set! i should really do some chores though...ugh. dishes and laundry. my least favorite thing ever is laundry. its not so bad when you own a washer and dryer, but in apts. it plain sucks. especially because each load needs at least 2 cycles of drying time, which a) takes foreverrr and b) usually eats my quarters at least once every week. anyhow, enough complaining, im off to craft.

green! yay! my favorite color is green but i never really realized it until i noticed that all of my top favorite things that i own are mostly green! i wanted to take more pictures but i figured i'd spare ya.

great little sugar...umm, holder...i found at goodwill and LOVE it to death!

green purse and green mittens. the mittens are so comfy! my friend kaitlin gave them to me for christmas. i wear them around the house and to bed too. i have a huge love for mittens.
and my green jacket. i havent had a winter jacket in over 2 years. i finally found one that i loved!

its self portrait tuesday. i wasnt going to do this but i was in a camera mood so i did...

blue

how exciting...shash from mecozy has introduced an awesome opportunity to take pictures of the things we all love...and organize them by color! each day is a different color, today is blue.

i dont have many blue things...this is handmade soap from my penpal chelle...

a glittery rose that joe gave me a couple years ago...i still love it!
my mom saw a set of these awesome stars when she was shopping and bought me 2 of them- you can put a candle in it and it looks rad but it makes the blue fade! you might be able to tell at the top point of the star...
aaand my blue bathroom stuff...i know i really need to stop buying things from these corporate giants and switch to other brands, but for now here are a few things i use...and dont really use, like the nail polish. i cant stand nail polish on my fingers! only on my toes.

today is a busy day. well, haha, its supposed to be. i have to drive to work to pick up my void check, go visit my lunatic-of-a-landlord, go birthday shopping for joe's sister...buy new jeans since i was already low on them and then got hairdye on one of the only pairs that i can wear to work. i HATE shopping for jeans. mainly because everything they have now has those pre-ripped, pre-bleached, super-ugly effects.

anyway, off to go do some stuff.

heres some of the stationery i made. i dont think im going to use the line stamp i made anymore on the stationery...takes tooooo much time and too much ink! its nice to have a blank piece of paper anyway, right? right.

beetle stationery- i accidently cut off part of his leg though! figures....

and tree stationery...worst pictures ever. well...almost. can you tell that they are trees? it took joe a minute to figure out what they were. hmph. the blue ink is a really lovely shade in person...not here though.

so my apt. NEVER gets any direct sunlight. the windows all face north. this is a bummer when it comes to taking pictures, i never have any patience with the whole process because i really dont like having to rely on apartment lighting...or lack thereof, for that matter! anyhow, i took a couple of pictures of the new stuff. i want to bring all of my stuff over to my parents to take my etsy pictures but im sure i wont get around to that anytime soon. i made a few more recycled booklets- these things flew off the table at my last show. i sold them for $5 a piece. these ones have 48 pages each with some little doodles inside. the images on the covers are blockprint mishaps. paper inside came from print outs, useless papers, extra paper from previous crafts, etc...some of it is colored paper, but most of it is white- which is why i added a few little drawings to spruce the inside up!

inside view

scissor print booklet

bird print booklet

heart print booklet