April Etsy Shop Update!

 I just added some fun new Spring items to my shop!  April 2nd- April 30th all proceeds from my Etsy shop will go to the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society.  Robin and I are crazy, so we've committed to biking 100 miles around Lake Tahoe a second year in a row!!!! We will be riding in memory of Robin's Mom, Mary, who passed away last August.  Here you can read about us riding and fundraising last year....  We were able to raise over $9,000!  

Veggies

 bikes, cabins and trees in blue

 bikes and succulents in pink, and peach

red cabins, cherry blossom trees and cupcakes too!

The weather is getting warmer and this weekend we start our outdoor rides and a lot of fundraising events too!  If you would like to make a donation, please check out our site.   I can't wait to get out on my bike this weekend!

REPEAT

Woo Hoo! I've been selected as one of the 10 finalists to compete in The Printed Bolt's REPEAT competition! The Grand Prize Winner will get a trip to the International Quilt Market in Houston, Texas! In addition a quilt will be made out of the winner's designs and displayed at the show. How cool is that?

Each month we will be given a design challenge and a few designers will be eliminated (Project Runway style) This month the assignment is "Tiny Dwellings."

Here is the awesome care package I received from organizers Ellen and Madeleine.  It included a Spoonflower color chart, delicious smelling tea and A Field Guide to Fabric Design by Kimberely Kight, who is one of my favorite bloggers and will be a guest judge in the competition!  I can't wait to see what everyone comes up with!

Is it Spring yet?

It feels like Spring today, so I've opened all the windows in the studio!  Yay!  I thought I would share this succulent  inspired ditsy pattern I made a few months ago!  I wanted to experiment and see how watercolor drawings would look printed on fabric.  Here's the color sketches in my sketchbook.

 I scanned these and played with the colors, repeat and scale in the computer for awhile.  I couldn't wait to see what it looked like so I ordered a swatch test from Spoonflower.  The texture of the watercolor didn't print as well in spots were it was painted very lightly so I decided to darken some of those spots so they would read a little better.

 I had it printed again and this time I was much happier with the results!

 I made a little pencil case and it's for sale in my Etsy shop today!

I've got some exciting projects on the horizon including the launch of a brand new website!  More about that next time.

Everyone Loves Squids!

I love squid, octopus, cuttlefish (Cephalopods in general.) I've been busy sewing things for the sale but I took a night to make this squid fabric for the Spoonflower contest.

I scanned some ink blobs and played with them on the computer! I'm really happy with how this turned out and can't wait to see it printed on fabric

Please...go vote for my fabric in the Spoonflower contest this week! Click on contest and you can select any of the designs you like, there are some really good ones! Once you've viewed all the pages just push "Save votes!" It's up until Tuesday. Thanks guys!

Cupcake continued...

As Spring is approaching I'm picking up speed. I ordered this sweet stamp from Rubber Stamps.net and I've been stamping all my paper goods like crazy!

I was able to upload an image that used my handwritten text and they shipped it very quickly.

I find stamping and labeling things extremely satisfying!

Also received a test swatch of cupcake fabric in the mail from Spoonflower!

In the past I've struggled with getting the colors to print faithfully. Often the way they appear on the screen is very different from how they turn up on fabric. This time I went through the process of creating a test strip where I tried a few different colors for each color (light brown, brown, blue, yellow and pink)to see how it would look.

Overall, I was really happy with this little experiment and I think from now on this is a really safe way to check my colors before purchasing a large amount of fabric.

Robin started printing me some stickers at work. : ) I can't wait to have these up in the store too!

Providence Patterns

I first came to Rhode Island on a college visit. I explored the city nervously, trying to picture myself here as an art student for the next four years. After a tour of the campus and wandering around I fell in love with Providence's architecture and of course RISD.

Since 2003 I've been living here on and off again (yikes!) There are definitely times when I take it for granted, or forget my initial reaction to the city of Providence.

Visiting Japan was a similar experience. Everything looked so different; the buildings, people and transportation are all scaled smaller. Tall people might find this disconcerting... but I loved being able to reach the handholds in the subway.

I also loved living in the picturesque countryside of Kyoto. No matter how grumpy I felt a quick ride on my bike always brightened my mood. There is really nothing better than casually biking past fragrant fields of rice, vegetables, streams and small houses. I also developed an affinity for the surrounding mountains, they offered a fantastic backdrop and landmark visible from almost anywhere in the city.

At first when I came back I had to fight the urge to point out how different everything is in the US. "Look at my giant coffee!" "Can you believe how loud those people are talking?" Coming back allowed me to see Providence with fresh eyes and of course appreciate the time I spent in Japan. ( The blue painted under porches in New England always makes me smile)

With that in mind I felt compelled to draw patterns of Kyoto and Providence for my East vs. West collection. Here's my Providence drawings...

After coloring it in the computer and about 3 trials of printing and tweaking the colors:

And a close up!

Here's the Kyoto side complete with trains and mountains!

Yay trains!

The fabrics were printed and being sewn into reversible totes, mostly so you don't have to pick one over the other.

They are for sale in my etsy store! A few other items are there that I made for the sale Claire and I did around Thanksgiving. The sale was a bust but at least I got a lot of work done!

Hurrah for getting things done!

To Infinity and Beyond!

Lately, I've been obsessed with the moon and the early stages of NASA. I've been reading lots of great books about space: Packing for Mars by Mary Roach. She asks all the right questions; who makes the food that goes into space? How do bathrooms work in space? Does space smell after 2 weeks? Her books are always written with a fun sense of curiosity and I always learn a ton of interesting facts. Here's an amazing poster of the moon that I've put up in the studio. It's from a 1969 National Geographic.

Between all the reading and documentary watching I've been wondering if there was a piece I could do about the moon or the 1960's. So when Etsy announced their joint contest with NASA it felt like perfect timing. The winner would get to see an actual shuttle launch and might even have their winning entry sent into space !! How cool is that? Anyways, I started sketching out various things related to NASA; shuttles, lunar modules, astronauts, and ham the chimp! I decided it would be fun to make a space pattern and sew it into something functional such as a laptop case!

I wanted the lining to look like a control panel, this one is pretty closely based off of the Apollo command module.

After studying the construction of popular laptop cases, I decided to create one that zipped 1/2 way down the side allowing easy removal of the laptop. You also can see and appreciate the lining more!

Here's a close up:

When I entered my case in the NASA contest I was hoping to make it to the voting stage, so I could rally friends and family to vote for me. I didn't get in and I was pretty bummed about it. Soon after, I saw this: Moon Embroidery, which also didn't make it to voting. I thought this piece was extremely innovative and beautiful. I couldnt imagine why it wasn't in the contest either. After linking to it yesterday, it appears there was some sort of glitch with the voting system, so who knows what happened...

Despite all that I'm glad I designed the fabric and made this! It's up for sale on Etsy and fits a 13" mac. I'm going to photograph some other stuff I've finished and put it up for sale sometime this week!

I'm pretty happy with how my case turned out! I'd never put in a zipper like this or done work with padding before but I managed! If you or someone you know is obsessed with space why not get them a sweet laptop case for the holidays? ; )

I've been so busy the last few weeks sewing for my first Craft Fair with my sister and finishing up a piece for They Draw And Cook's Holiday Contest.

Garlic and Vampires

Garlic and Onions are not the most exciting veggies, but they can definitely supply a lot of flavor. I decided to give these bulbs some credit and paint them on an Autumn like cloth. 3 weeks left of the CSA and I've done 12 veggie drawings so far!
Next week I'll be heading to the West Coast to check out A.P.E, the Alternative Press Expo. (Think Comic Con but with zines and small publishing companies) It looks like they will have some great speakers; including Lynda Barry and Daniel Clowes! I'm staying with my Aunt which is always fun and hopefully I can meet up with some friends, bloggers and potential clients. I've been busy putting together little zine like portfolio's I can hand out.

I can't believe its already October... I'm starting to plan an elaborate Halloween costume to make up for last year's complete absence of Halloween. Something involving a tiny red hat I picked up in Harajuku. If you like Halloween, vampires and fabric depicting them then head on over to Spoonflower. I entered this week's contest. Vote for my Vampires!

I missed the Kawaii competition that I desperately wanted to enter. So, I decided to make this a kawaii/vampire fabric. You might say that crosses and gravestones aren't cute... But that's cause you haven't seen a sleepy coffin or a crying stake.

Voting is up this week till October 13th! And while your there check out all the other awesome fabric people have made! Maybe I should do a post on my favorites sometime soon.... hmm