little red fox

marceline; the little mushroom hunter

I am so happy to finally introduce Marceline, the little mushroom hunter I hinted at a few posts ago (here and here). Getting ready to open the Co-op (which happens this Saturday!), I spent a whole lot of time getting all the groups of characters and their corresponding little items ready all at once. In  my mind, it was a very simple venture but in reality--all the tiny little details almost did me in! Down to creating all the individual items' tags--it was quite an undertaking. But it all got done and, I have to say, it is incredibly satisfying to see all these creations I made all together on shelves in a real live store. I'll have pictures after Saturday, but for now--meet Marceline :)

A pretty little nerdy scientist, there isn't a mushroom she doesn't know or hasn't gathered...

...in her tiny little mushroom-hunting basket, of course!

She comes with three different mushrooms--one in her tiny apron pocket and two in her basket. The mushrooms are made from my original drawings of actual mushrooms...

...and are backed with red polka-dot cotton matching the apron...

Her hand attaches at the shoulder button with a loop of elastic on her hand which you can see in this picture...one of the many details it took me a bit to figure out...

She's about 20" long and 5" wide and she's made from organic and "upcycled" cottons, vintage lace and buttons, and felt. And her face is handpainted. 

And she's here in my shop.

And that's not all!

There's actually a little handmade book that will be coming along shortly detailing the beginning of Marceline's adventures, but it turns out that making a book from scratch takes longer than I thought! Indeed. But some characters in the story you can find here in this set of 10 canvas stickers. Again--from my original drawings...

It's a limited edition series and each has an official seal with your series' number and a list of the "ingredients." 

The set comes in a 5.5" by 7.5" kraft top-sealing envelope with my handmade label. And you can find it here!

I have a couple more Marceline-related goodies to share which I'll get to in the next few days. 

Lots to do! Also we're getting snow tonight. I could shrivel up and die. 

p.s. Hope you like the blog's little "facelift!" I felt like a change...

i might title this post 'seasonal affected disorder.'

Waiting for spring...waiting and waiting...we went on a beautiful hike over the weekend and felt so upbeat and excited about seeing trees and grass and all that stuff and woke up the next morning to...6 inches of snow. Twas horrifying. Which quickly gave way to depression. We were so looking forward to getting things going in the garden and really just ending our months-long confinement due to this unforgiving weather. When all is said and done we will have had almost half our year under snow! In some parts of the world that's the norm I guess but for me--a Southern girl who never even saw snow until college--it was an exotic event that turned exhausting as of a month ago. So it was with a kind of desperate glee that I saw these glorious and adorable little sprouts unfurling their tiny green heads in our starter-garden thingy. Soon (pleasepleaseplease) these little guys will be lettuces, tomatoes, basil, parsley and spinach. All is not lost! Things are happening!!

And something else is also happening--

Yucky photo but exciting contents! These bags are filled with allllll my handmade shop goodies for the Womens' Co-op I'm a part of! It's called Bliss Co-op and I know I alluded to it a few times but it's my first time being in a shop and being part of a co-op and I'm happy and excited and all of it. Especially my inner hippy which has been sadly ignored the last few years in the acting universe.

I'm starting small--only a couple of shelves at first--and I'm setting it all up tomorrow, in time for our Grand Opening on April 1st! I'm terribly excited to meet the other ladies involved so I'll have pics of our party and my "area" which will contain goodies like these (can't wait to tell you more about them--proper post coming later)...

(Note the mushroom...)

...and approximately 800 other items all of which I made the last two weeks. So--an official "whew." 

I know I haven't listed the hats yet--nor have we really been cooking too many exciting things--but that will change after April 1st. I've made a huge batch of vegetable soup, and other standards but some new and tasty ideas on the horizon (for example: the time has come to try Mug Cakes--thank you, Brendan.) 

That's it for now. I think I need to go sit underneath a special light bulb or something. Or maybe wine. Or both! 

I hope, hope, hope you're warm and cozy and happy wherever you are and that you know where to get full spectrum light bulbs and/or a tanning bed. Sigh.  

 

 

a milliner? why, yes, i am!

Ok--these are not great pictures but I'm just too excited not to share a little bit of what I've been up to the last little bit: hats! 

(The Dahlia: ivory cotton, black cotton, black with ivory polka dot cotton, with red vintage felt flower)

This is the newest coming from Dandy Fox!...

Beautiful hats made by my very own hands (and sewing machine)...I mentioned a while back that I wanted to take some millinery courses and I still do--definitely do and definitely will--but I got impatient and went online and poked around and bought some patterns, played around, adjusted here and there, invented here and there and like everything else--its totally learnable and totally doable! I really can't tell you how excited I am. Is there a better word than extremely?? 

(The Betty in cherry red)

I know, I know--extremely crappy photos, but hopefully you get the gist.

(The Laurel, in black textured cotton and ivory and black polka dot silk lining)

Essentially there are three different styles of cloche designs, one turban design, and two different headwraps...all made with beautiful fabrics in the Dandy Fox spring color palette: black, cherry red, and mint green (and of course black and ivory polka dots all over the place). And all lined in gorgeous, colorful silks. I can't wait to show more of those details...

(The Mina, in mint with mustard yellow silk cotton lining and accent)

It's been so fun discovering and learning all about hat-making, sizing, embellishments. I'm using lots of 20s period stuff as research to bounce off of and then sort of modernize. I think these are a good balance of nostalgic and of-the-moment, so they aren't too costumey, but they are oh-so-clearly derivative of another era...

(The Iris headwrap, in black silk)

I've actually worn this one out a bunch over the last year (shows you how long this has been "in development") and I always get a bunch of compliments. It's funny but I tend to get a bit...nervousy about wearing out the things I've made. I know I love it, but it hasn't been confirmed by anyone else...(except Mr. Wood who loves everything I make because he's so incredibly sweet and supportive and the perfect husband:) My secret fear is what I call "thrift-store head." Which is a well-documented event in which 'one' goes into a thrift store and becomes slightly--or, perhaps, extremely--intoxicated and overwhelmed by not only the abundance of product and possibilities but also the low price point; and thus items that would normally be easily avoidable suddenly seem bathed in a shiny, golden light and are impossible not to purchase. And then of course, a few weeks and way too many dollars later, they make a U-turn right back into the thrift store in your donation pile because you got them home and they became shockingly ugly and therefore useless. I think it's an actual syndrome.

But of course I digress and knowing I love it is the point! 

(The Bebe in mint)

These aren't available just yet. Since I'm the model, photographer, stylist and maker, there are lots of little details that need to be ironed out. Like, ahem, hair-washing. But I'm hoping to have time to do it in the next couple of days after another trip to the city, and have them up and running by the weekend. I'll be making them to order, so they'll take anywhere from a few days to two weeks to ship but they'll be made for you and you alone :) 

In a few weeks I plan on teaching myself to make and shape hats from a basic straw "hood" its called. I've wanted to try this for so long, I'm so excited!! And its the next step in hat-making, I figure. 

Also in the summer wardrobe/style vein: I've been stocking up on vintage patterns for my personal spring and summer wardrobe via Etsy. These hat styles are a part of my master plan--and I can't wait to show you the rest of it! Mostly made from vintage patterns, some purchased new fabrics, some thrifted, reworked fabrics. I'm basically finished with three or four of the pieces and they're so cute! It's a lot of work, but I love it so much. More on that to come :)

In the meantime--as in right now--I have loads of work to do for the co-op. Including but not limited to: doll-making, stuffed raccoon-making, sticker-making, AND--perhaps most excitedly--book-making. Or maybe its a zine? Or maybe its a comic book? We shall see...More on that to come as well!

Hope everyone is doing wonderfully well!

 

the art of the mushroom (and a thank you)

Things have been busy, busy, busy over in this part of the woods! For starters--I finally got around to making these sweet little Thank You, or "Merci!" cards for the shop. Very excited to have them out in the world and out of my head. It was getting crowded in there. 

They are 4.25" by 5.5" and are printed onto pretty, lightly speckled ivory cards (with rounded corners). They're flat, so the back is blank for your charming message to the recipient. You can find the set of six cards here, and the individual cards here!

(As a side note: I poked around online a while back trying to find the origin of the paper moon photographs--and there are TONS of them--check out my flickr favorites for a bunch--but no one seems to know why it stuck like it did. It appears to have been a song first? Anyway--my research was far from exhaustive so if anybody out there knows anything about them, I'd love to know more!)

I really don't know why these took me so long--I've been in semi-desparate need of thank you cards for months and months and of course I wouldn't buy any because I knew I wanted to make these.

Anyway--here they are! Whew.

I also finally made some tags for my original homemade items--and their bottoms...

This picture makes me laugh :)

I've discovered this 'canvas paper' which has caused my brain to explode a little bit. I love this stuff. It's given me 89,000 new ideas. Like this, for one...

It's a little mushroom sticker using the canvas. The great thing about the canvas is that you can also sew with it, so something like this little sticker (about 3" by 3") can also be sewn on like a decorative patch onto bags or backpacks or quilts or whatever (and you can find them here!)...and I do have other uses in mind which I can't show you until I'm done with them as I'd like for them all to have their debut at once...but...here's a little sneak-peek :)

There's a little character I'm working with in my head that is about to see the light of day and a closer look at the picture above will tell you a lot about her.

But I must mention that strangely--the joy and sheer pleasure I've gotten out of drawing mushrooms (and I've been drawing a LOT of them) has been so deep and wonderful. Who knows why but not only do I find them incredibly beautiful in the strangest of ways to look at, and don't even get me started on how fun it is to find them out in the woods, but the act of drawing them is also incredibly (and surprisingly) satisfying. I can't wait to show more of this series of things...!!

A lot of my recent activity flurry has been because not only is pilot season quieting down audition-wise, but also I'm just over-the-moon excited about a new creative venture that I will describe in detail in a later post. For now I'll just say it has to do with these two words: women and co-op.

Guesses??