Recouperation after remuneration

Last week was an amazing week!  Red Stem participated in three shows:  a craft fair for Google employees on Google’s Mountain View campus on December 2nd, the Handmade Hodown in San Francisco on December 3rd, and the Lightbox SF show on December 5th.  Thank you so much to Heather, my lovely assistant and roomate, and to Chris, my other lovely assistant and husband, for all of your help and support.  I couldn’t have done it without you.  The Handmade Hodown crew were fantastically supportive, and Shelly and Genevieve from Lightbox SF were great as well.

I also had an opportunity to contribute to the Handmade Hodown blog.  You can read more here.

Can’t wait to do it all again!  Now on to handcrafting my holiday gifts.

news:

I started a fine silver line that will be available for purchase in my etsy shop very soon.  For now, you can view photos from this line in my catalogue.

Artist in Residence

My husband and I are now lucky enough to have a good childhood friend of mine living with us.

Heather Lynne Mercer is a poet and essayist who just moved here from Eastern Oregon where she was teaching at university.

You can find some of her poetry here.

Heather has been of great help to me as I develop new ideas and directions for Red Stem.  It is always great to rekindle a friendship.

Winter Craft Fairs

Red Stem will be a participating vendor at two (2!) San Francisco craft fairs in December.

Be sure to come check them out–both events are free to the public.

 

Handmade Hodown

Thursday, December 3rd 6pm-Midnight
1015 Folsom St.
San Francisco, Ca 94131

 

Lightbox SF

Saturday, December 5th 12 noon-5pm

The Makeout Room

3225 22nd St
San Francisco, CA 94110-3006
(415) 647-2888

New hooks, pictures…

new hooks!

So I have a new earring hook style that allows me to have a more standard size. Not quite as whimsical looking as my hand formed hooks, but (in my opinion) much more comfortable and sturdy than before. Additionally, I am working on a pendant design that I am eager to debut.

Be sure to check out the Museum of Craft and Folk Art’s “50 for $50″ Winter holiday sale. I’m a participating artist, so please stop by!

Long time, no blog.

Well, I have been pestered into updating my blog.  Admittedly, it has been quite a while since I last wrote.  Many things have happened since then:  I have developed a bracelet design, figured out a delicious recipe for pad thai, and have items for sale at the San Francisco Museum of Craft and Folk Art. Go check it out!

More soon.

honey comb storage, by me

I have been to two Anthropologie stores within the past two weeks, and have noticed a “honey” theme. Avoiding the implications of this (which are discussed in depth here), I was inspired by this and decided to create my own storage, honeycomb style. 

Which has been more difficult than it looks.  The window displays at Anthropologie are made from cardboard.  I thought, “Hey, we have copious amounts of cardboard from all of the wedding registry presents we recieved. I’ll use THAT.”

so far, so good.  I am using this as a guideline, even though it isn’t made from cardboard:

I’ll share pics of the finished product.  Right now it just looks like chaos.

Polymer Clay experiments

I bought some white sculpey clay over the weekend and decided I was going to try to make a “tree” from which to hang my earrings for photos.  I didn’t realize until expending much effort and spinning my wheels that I should have created a frame in wire and then built on to it with the clay.  Live and learn, I suppose.  What I did end up with is not too bad and  will get some use, despite it’s lack of durability.

branch? coral?

My husband and I also did intensive work on my website this weekend– in that it now exists where there once was nothing.  It is a start, but I need to put up a photos page and I need to make some of the information a little bit more readable.

Insomnia

Agh.  I can’t sleep, so naturally I am out cruising etsy shops without my glasses on.  It is more of a challenge that way.

I just recently purchased a Gocco print from SepiaLepus and it is RAD!

In other news, I am expanding my repertoire of designs.  I just re-discovered a book I have had sitting on my shelf for a few years titled, The Mustard Seed Garden Manual of Painting. First published in 1679 in early Qing Dynasty China,  it is what it’s title describes–a painting manual.

Now to appropriate some ideas from its pages, mua hahahaha.

Happy Mother’s Day!

Though I am far from home, I still wish all those that I hold dear to my heart a happy mother’s day, ESPECIALLY my own mother! My birthday was yesterday and Chris, my husband, made me a birthday carrot cake from scratch.  He shredded the carrots himself, he was so proud.  We went to Walnut Creek for dinner and had Indian food (my favorite…).  We then walked over to Pyramid Brewery and proudly announced that it was my birthday–free beer!!

I have a custom order to complete and send off by Wednesday and can’t wait to get started on some new items.

I have some new and exciting items all ready to list in my Etsy shop, get ready!!

In other news…

I am excited to share Garfunkel and Oates with you.