Last night was the beginning of my holiday celebrations. A couple lady friends and I gathered together for some serious gingerbread house crafting. From the looks of it I'd say it was pretty successful, don't you??

Well now I'm off for the holidays! Mr.T and I will be flying away to Colorado and Texas. I hope your holiday is filled with good company, yummy foods, and safe travels. See you next year!

A moment of self indulgence

I know the holidays are about giving to others but in my search for others, I've seen so many things I want to give myself!

2013 Astrology Wall Calender

2013 Prisms Calendar

Moon Phases Scarf

Lapis Ring

Holiday lights

Caribou throw and basically everything in that shop.


Happy gift giving people! Thanks for letting me indulge myself for a moment. Ok, back to searching for others!

Today is 12.12.12. and there are three great things about today. One, it's 12.12.12. How cool is that?? Two, it's my birthday!! Someone told me it's my platinum birthday. Oooo fancy. And three, the online shop is open!! Sorry if there are a few bugs here and there. It's been a bit of push to get me to finish it, and I really wanted to celebrate its opening with my own day of birth. So in celebration of today's power of three, I'm gifting all purchases with free shipping until Sunday, December 16th. Just enter: BIRTHDAY at check out. You'll also receive the items in time for the holidays if ordered by December 16th.

Happy 12.12.12. Everybody!!

I finally found the time to add a some much-needed holiday spirit to my life. It's a tiny tree but oh so mighty! And if you can't tell, my last minute wood grain tree skirt takes fake tree to whole new level. Let the holidays begin!

Shuttle service to the Moon?

Yes, please! I was just talking about this with Mr.T the other day. An everyday person like him or me would never be able to experience outer space. Imagine how crazy that would be! It's so crazy I can't even begin fathoming what it would actually be like. It seemed so unfair that space travel wasn't even an option available to us normal people. But hey! Looks like someone's trying to make it happen...ok, maybe it's just for super rich people right now but I'll appreciate the efforts.

image via Design Taxi

Renegade Recap

Renegade was a blast! It was exciting, overwhelming, exhausting, exhilarating, crowded...it was great. There was a constant flow of people so I barely had any time to walk around or shop but here are a few snapshots I was able to sneak in.

Vendors setting up. 

Yup, this is me right before the show opened. I think there's a smile trying to come out from beneath fear and excitement twisting around in my stomach.

A view from the balcony just as the show is opening up.

Here's one of my booth neighbors, Pieces of Craft, a group of 6 local Chicagoans gathering together to make awesome stuff. Here's Dan among his plethora of hand made prints.

And here's my other booth neighbor, Lets Be Friends. They make ridiculously cute plush monster dolls and letter pressed paper goods.

This is Mr.T. I couldn't have survived this event without him by my side the entire time. I'm so grateful for him!

And here's my friend, Dallas! She exhibited at Renegade too with her UH-mazing jewelry. 

I can't thank all my friends who stopped by to say hi and all the people that stopped by my booth enough. I feel so grateful that I was able to share my jewelry for the first time in such a supportive, positive, and creative environment. Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!

Up next, getting my online shop together! I hope to have it up and running in a week so stay tuned!

Day one of Renegade was a whirlwind! Here's a quick shot I was able to sneak in during a moment of breathing time. Excited for day two!!

Renegade Craft Fair this weekend! Booth 106. If you're in Chicago, stop on by!

A bit of creative inspiration to keep you going

Sometimes making things is HARD. If you're a fellow creative maker and find yourself in a dry spell, and you're giving yourself a hard time about it, DON'T, and listen to this TED Talk by Elizabeth Gilbert. It'll warm your spirit and make you feel better.

Daaaaang

Check out the latest craziness from my day job! Our hand wax carver just whipped this up. You know, no big deal. It's just a skull...wearing a crown...with a ROSE in its mouth! If I had skills like our carver...oh the things I would make...

The other day it was a foggy and misty morning. I think the moon was still out.

Experimenting with a new finish: satin + silver black + brass brush = AWESOME.

It's a dirty job but somebody's gotta do it.

The great thing about having friends who own and operate their own ceramics studio...free gorgeous pottery! Above is my most recent acquisition. My lovely friends, Chris & Paige, started the local ceramics studio, Penguin Foot Pottery, 2 years ago. If you're in Chicago and want to get your clay on, check out them out. Oh and on Saturday nights, they have 'happy hour'. Clay + booze = fun.

Progress

Weekday morning rituals: coffee, file, coffee.

Packaging & Props

Renegade is going to be my first craft show and right now planning my table seems to be the most challenging part. So I'm trying to prepare my booth and packaging supplies as early as possible. There's so many things to think about! Banners, props, concepts, color schemes, is my table going to be visually stimulating? how much is too much? how can I do this on the cheap?? 

My first stop this weekend was American Science & Surplus.

From the outside, it looks like your typical strip mall, brick and mortar shop. But the inside is a magical, treasure trove of oddities, hobby and tech-y science supplies. If you live in Chicago and need random supplies, this place is a must. I didn't find everything I needed but I did pick up these two little guys below. Not sure what their purpose is yet but I do know they will serve some function on my table. Holding price tags perhaps?

At my second stop, Home Depot, I picked up this textured, metallic black paint by Martha Stewart. Enough said. Let's see how it looks on these two random drawers I have. Ok!

And last but not least, I took advantage of one of Renegade's thoughtful exhibitor gifts: free mini business cards from Moo.com. Oh! Maybe those two little guys can hold these...

So many ideas, too little time...but I'm on the right track and can't wait to see what the final table results look like!

Time for an art break

I've been staring at my jewelry for too long and need a visual snack. These tech-y mandalas by Leonardo Ulian seem to do the trick. I really like that I can get lost in the infinite patterns created by these objects. Is this a map of the cosmos? Is this a meditation guide? Will gazing upon this 'map' lead to spiritual awakening? Upon closer inspection, I realize these objects are familiar to me and actually created by mankind to aid in technological endeavors. Interesting contrast don't you think?

Progress

First round of castings have been cleaned up. Next step, polishing!

Daaaaang

I don't talk about my day job often mostly because it can be a very frustrating job to accept, but under all the crap there are times where it's pretty awesome and I get to see craaaazy things being made. Like this ring! Whoever is going to wear this ring is a baller! This thing is huge and in platinum (one of the costlier metals out there). Even with all that money, I wouldn't want a ring like this. It's so gaudy and flashy, not my type. I'll stick to minimal with subtle geometric influences :) But daaaaang, this ring is crazy don't you think??

Progress

I got my first round of castings back and am excited to include bronze into the mix! It'll be interesting to see my pieces in a yellow metal color. Alright, here we go! Time to get to work and crank out an entire inventory of pieces for Renegade. My hands will tire, my back will ache, and my eyes will strain, but it's gonna feel good when it's all finished.

RENEGADE!!!

I made it! I made it as a vendor for Renegade Craft Fair's Holiday Market in Chicago!! I'll be debuting my first ever collection at the market so everyone, come one, come all! This event has been a long time coming for me, and I'm so happy all that hard work has paid off. BUT HOLY MOLY! Do I have a lot more work to do till then! Stay tuned for progress updates.

Also, I know I seemed a little jaded in my last post, commenting about how my life isn't where it should be, yada yada yada. But I've also realized in the last 24 hours: Baby steps, I'll get there in baby steps. And this is just one more awesome baby step towards ultimate...Jewelry...DOMINATION! Oh, sorry, I mean *cough* running my own small business and *cough* creating my own jewelry :)

Happy Tuesday, everybody!

image via Renegade Craft Fair

Weekend

This weekend was...weird, for lack of a better word. It started off with grandiose plans of excitement and anticipation but didn't ripen to the fruits of my expectations. I was supposed to start the weekend off attending Chicago's Small Business Expo enriching my mind with information on how to start/run/maintain a small business. (Oh, because if you weren't aware, I'd like to start a new jewelry studio/retail space in Chicago, and yes, along with my own jewelry line...so many dreams...). And then after an early morning of inspiring business talk, I was going on a mini road trip to Arcadia, Missouri to attend the wedding of one of the first-in-eight-from-my-close-group-of-friends to get married. It was going to be an epic event! How could it not?? I've known these seven other friends for over 10 years now and we've made it our mission to meet up at least once a year. This was going to be a double whammy: wedding and reunion!

But nothing had turned out the way I had envisioned it. I missed the expo completely because the website gave me the wrong address. I barely had any time with my friends since most of the weekend was predominantly spent in the car driving to and from places, and 5 of the 7 friends were in the wedding so were preoccupied with wedding tasks. Sigh.

The weekend left me feeling sad, confused, worried, and...weird. I realized adult life creeping up on me. I realized my friends and I were getting older and as we aged, our reunions would be few and far between. I realized I'm getting older and my life is not where I want it to be. I realized too many things for a Monday morning and that I need to stop!

Finally, I realized that you have to stop and say to yourself instead, 'Ok, this is happening. How will you choose to handle this?' At this point, I'm not sure how. But making the choice to not get upset and think about it differently helps a lot. At least on my 2 hour commute to 'nowhere expo', I was able to see the beautiful Chicago skyline from a different view (pictured above). Yeah...at least there's that.

Hammer Time

I made a list the other day of everything I still need to do to bring this collection together and ready to sell. It overwhelmed me a little, not going to lie. It's all the small things you forget about that add up to insurmountable angst! But I stop...take it in...and then let it out....Yes, there are a lot of things to do, but there will always be a lot of things to do. All you can do at that moment, is accept it and be ok with it.

And so, I decide to focus on my tags. I hammered each one until the entire pile was finished. Let me tell you, hammering metal is very therapeutic. Sometimes you just gotta stop, breathe, and hammer it out.

So far, Fall's been good to me

Chicago's been beautiful ever since Fall hit! There's something about October that makes you breathe out a deep sigh and finally feel ok that it's not summer anymore. I hit off the fall season just right and hit up the Randolph Street Market with my bestie.

And a Sunday excursion to Walker Bros. Pancake House was even more awesome thanks to Mr.T and the breathtaking scenery that is Fall + Chicago.

First collection has been LAUNCHED!

I did it! My first collection is officially looking official. I hope to premier this collection at the Renegade Holiday Market. I'm in the process of applying and will keep you posted on whether they accept me. In the meantime, below are a few snapshots from my photo shoot.

View the entire collection here.