Category: Blog

Earlier in the week, my buddy Elysse took me to a bagel and pretzel-making class!!! It was kind of amazing. We got to take home the dough we made and have our way with it. I can’t say that mine turned out as beautiful as the ones in class, but, you know me, I’m a disaster in the kitchen! The up side and the down side of making bagels, is that there is some time to kill while waiting for dough to rest at various stages, so I made bagels while writing a crochet pattern. (I will have created 3 new items/patterns in 7 days! Eep! You will see them eventually!) I don’t feel right about posting our teacher’s recipe on my blog, so here is one from A Beautiful Mess to get you started. Some of our ingredients are different, and some of the resting times and the oven temperature are different, but I’m sure there are a million ways to make bagels, and you will find your own bagel-groove as well. My bagel-groove involved setting off the smoke alarm at 5 in the morning. (Too steamy during the bagel-boiling!) My bagel-groove will probably also never involve a digital kitchen scale, and our teacher was pretty insistent about those, but I’m guessing I’ll still get along okay. Have you ever tried to make your own bagels before? It’s actually not too overwhelming! I wonder what will happen when I try to add crazy stuff in them like chocolate chips or CHEESE!    

Have you guys heard of Knitsy? It’s a digital magazine out of the UK “for yarn tarts.” That’s us! Knitsy is designed for the iPad and iPhone and contains lots of fibertastic interviews and patterns for crocheters and knitters. It is really fun to swipe through!   Best of all? The issues are free! Go get inspired!

How many of you guys have an iPad? Do you use a lot of apps that are for iPad only? I don’t have an iPad, so the whole idea of iPad-only apps is a bit weird to me still, but the guys at Hop.in let me borrow one (so nice!) to explore their app. I would love it if you guys would explore it with me! Hop.in makes collecting cool stuff on the internet easy, with just a double-tap on some text, an image, or video that you want to remember for later. You can either do all your collecting privately, or you can do it publicly and share your feed. You can organize your goodies with hashtags so you can easily find all your #craft or #recipe collections. It’s also super easy to share your notes to Twitter or Evernote or whatever you like. Check out this video here! If you end up checking Hop.in and have any feedback about it, let me know! Let’s find each other and follow each other!

Oh my jeez! H0ld onto your butts! Sourpuss Clothing asked if Ahoy Miss and I would want to shoot photos together in their Shake & Shimmy Dresses in Pink and in Aqua. I was like, “We are buddies, but we still kinda live a couple hundred miles away from each other…!” and Sourpuss was like, “It’s the perfect excuse to get together!” OKAY YOU ARE RIGHT SOURPUSS CLOTHING! SO VERY RIGHT!  I was very lucky that she came for visits during Renegade Craft Fair a few weeks ago so we could make this happen! Hairy watched my booth while Danielle and I ran around outside Fort Mason. I am used to shooting photos of myself, by myself, with a remote clicker thingie, and I totally freeze up and get weird when someone else is pointing a camera at me. Danielle’s hubby Jose took all the photos, and he is super duper nice. He said something like, “Just let your individual personalities come through!” So I did this … I emailed Danielle that she was the lady and I was the spazz. Lady and The Spazz. That’s the name of our love story. I have to add that my dress was extremely comfy, flowy, and lightweight. Also I had the dresses crumpled up in a bag at the craft fair, and they didn’t really wrinkle, so they would be really perfect for traveling! My pink version has little black bows, adjustable spaghetti straps, and smocking in the waist for fit and comfort! Her aqua version has a cute peter pan collar, tiny pink buttons down the front,  some super cute pink ric-rac-kinda trim, and also that comfy smocking. If you haven’t had enough of us yet, you MUST watch this amazingly funny video that Danielle made! DO IT!!! IT’S AWESOME!! I’m allowed to say that with gusto because I didn’t make it. DO IT!!!!! Also wearing: my trusty necklace by AthinaLabella, my trusty T.U.K. boots from ModCloth, and a pepperoni pizza hair clip by me! (I might add that I may have chosen alternative footwear on any other day, but since I was vending and standing all day at a craft fair and having to take down my booth at the end of the day, comfort was KEY!) We also decided to copy TinyTangerines and pick some other stuff we liked from the Sourpuss website! 1. SOURPUSS PINEAPPLES DOLL BABY DRESS 2. PINKY PINUPS SLEEVELESS STRIPED A LINE DRESS  3. SOURPUSS VARSITY SKULL CARDIGAN PINK 4. PINUP COUTURE LIME WICKER BAGUETTE PURSE 5. COLLECTIF ANNIE BUNNY PINK SWEATER  6. SOURPUSS LIL LAMB BOWLER PURSE 7. T.U.K. PINK BROGUE BOOTS 8. SHARK ATTACK PLATFORM HEELS Sourpuss has also given our readers a 15% off discount code! The code is UNICORN (all caps) and is active until October 14th! (Just FYI, we do not make a commission off this code. It’s just for you guys to enjoy!) Check out Ahoy Miss for her photos and details!

I sold out of the initial run of corn dogs from Renegade Craft Fair, but now I’ve made them available for custom ordering on Etsy, which means, you get to choose between mustard or ketchup, bite, or no bite! If y’all think of other customizations you might want, just lemme know! I’m thinking of also turning him into an actual puppy dog or puppy corndog character with ears and a face! Also, I thought it would be cool to get a behind-the-scenes look at the stop-motion corn dog video that my buddy Justin made. Checkitout!  

I turned 37 today! Dang, right? Dang! Kat from RockNRollBride  and Sophie fromCrown and Glory sent me the most amazing head band from their new collection . Primarily designed for alternative brides who crave a little oomph, color, and sparkle in their head wear, these crowns, head bands, and bows are pretty terrific just for everyday, don’tcha think? I’m wearing the Liberace in the bunny ears style! I’m also pretty in love with the Rachel, with all those sweet, tiny, bright flowers. Obviously, my first instinct was to pair my Liberaces with a party frock, and I will probably do that later, but in the moment, in my comfy pink confetti sweater that was $10 on sale from H&M, Pajama Glam feels just about right! Also my hair was not behaving at all today, and sometimes it just wants to do its own thing. Kind of the perfect time to rock something sparkly! Don’t forget to check out the entire collection here!

Here’s the second installment of our cute t-shirt DIY by SZMOON.net using our Yummy You! – Ice Cream & Sunnies Tshirt! This one is no-sew! It’s like business in the front and party in the back! Don’t forget we’re also running a Facebook contest with a chance to win a shirt! Go to the Yummy You page to see the rules!

  Yes, yes, yes, it’s THAT TIME!!! LEFTOVERS SALE!!! Plus all new items I debuted at Renegade that have never been in my shop before! If you’re new around here, what I usually do after craft shows is put the leftover inventory on Etsy at the same sale-prices that I use at shows, for one week, so that people who are not able to make it to the shows can still benefit from a short sale. Discounts range from a few bucks off smaller items to 50% off scarves. Leftover sales last for one week, so you have until next Friday, August 9th, until prices go back to normal. I added a BUNCH of stuff. Check it out!

Cat from one of my favorite craft sites,  Cut Out + Keep, asked me some questions about my craft room and how I organize stuff. Check out more photos and our Q&A here!

Wow, what a weekend! We vended at Renegade Craft Fair in Fort Mason on Saturday and Sunday, and it was quite the whirlwind! A lot of people were really complimentary about the booth and the stuff in the booth, and that was super nice. On the first day, Tiffany Star helped me out in the booth, and it’s always fun to have girlfriend time while you’re working a show. I kept forgetting to force her to take a picture with me, though. DOH. Luckily I found one on Instagram. HAHHA. (Instagram photos are at the bottom of this entry.) In case you hadn’t been following along, I was going for a Carnival theme for my booth, and I tried to incorporate some new products to match that theme, like corn dog pen cozies, cotton candy pen cozies, soft pretzel brooches, and snow cone hair clips. I get really worked up and sleep-deprived over each craft fair, and sometimes I wonder if they are bad for my health! But this fair also reminded me of all the new and old friends I get to see, and that’s really what makes the whole thing so fun.   Here’s a blurry pic I stole from Mali who has been visiting my booth for years! Here’s a collage of photos from Instagram. Top left: me and Susan from ModCloth.  Isn’t she the cutest pixie ever? Top right: stole this pic from Zambi. I told her to take a pic WITH me, but I was denied! :P.  Middle left: There’s me and Tiffany. I think what’s happening here is, whenever people asked, “Is it ok if I take a picture?” I never knew if they meant the booth, or also me/us in the booth, so usually, I wouldn’t look at the camera or try to look a certain way, in case they were just taking a picture of a pizza hair clip or something. Then, you get pics like this where we are kinda like MEEHHHHHRRRRRRRR….   Middle right: There’s the adorable Ahoy Miss in the Ice Cream Scoop scarf I just designed! The last two pics are me and Danielle/Ahoy Miss being goofy.  Do you like our dresses? They are by Sourpuss, and you’ll be seeing a lot more of them soon…. I was going to post a video, too, but I didn’t get very good video of my booth, and I didn’t really record anything overly interesting. There’s just this one clip of when we threw Danielle and Jose in the back of our Uhaul van…. And for those of you familiar with how I do: I will be posting a Leftovers Sale on Etshy with craft-fair-pricing on some items as soon as I can. The sale usually lasts a week. I’ll try to take photos and get them up by the end of this week, but I also have a new Michaels.com pattern to bang out as well!  

So, I am kind of realizing I don’t have THAT much STUFF for my tables at Renegade. I went over to my parents’ house tonight, so my mom could help me sew clothing labels onto things, and the number of scarves I have is… paltry. Well, okay, I have a lot of non-scarf items, just not a lot of scarf items…. Soooooo I started making a pickle scarf!! We’ll see if I have time to finish it. Anyhoo, here are some sneaks that I’ve been posting on Instagram! Also, don’t forget to check out this super-cute stop-motion animation featuring one of my new crocheted corn dogs!

  Bay Area friends: Don’t forget to come visit me in my booth this weekend at Renegade Craft Fair, SF! 11am – 7pm at Fort Mason. The first 10 people to spend over $50 will get a special, crocheted, goldfish prize (to go with the carnival theme!).

There’s all this stuff I want to photograph and also blog about (like when Manda and I went to see NKOTB!), but I am full-on freaking out about prepping for Renegade, so for now, here’s a sneak peek at one of the patches I drew and am having made for my slushee drawstring bags! I made extras to sell separately, cuz I think I would just want this on my jacket!   This is just a digital proof that was emailed to me. I haven’t seen any of the 4 designs in person yet, and I hope they really are in fact COOL!  

Oh my jeez! I’m so happy to finally be able to show you guys the fun photos we took at Cafe 50’s in LA! I’m usually in the habit of being lazy and just using myself to model my items, so it was fun and different to watch other people do it! Thanks so much to Irene Yuen, our photographer,  Jessi Jae Joplin and Zilla 308, our adorable & cheerful models, and also the wonderful staff at Cafe 50’s who let us run around the place for a few hours! I was worried we would bug the people eating there, but I think generally people were curious and thought the girls were in a band! I am actually on the look-out for Yummy You! models in the SF Bay Area for local shoots of upcoming products. If you are interested and able to get yourself to places from San Francisco to San Jose, depending on shoot locations, please drop me a line with a link to your portfolio!

  Here’s a few shots of my current mani!! I was trying to have more control over my polka dots, and I think I am sorta getting better at them   Sorry about my really dry hands and horrible cuticles! I keep hand lotion everywhere and in my purse, too, but nothing really seems to help that much. I should try cuticle oil or rubbing Vitamin E on them or something, but…yeah, I’m probably not prioritizing that right now! Countdown to Renegade Craft Fair! EEEP!

Here’s another sneak peek at something new I’ll have at my booth at Renegade Craft Fair, San Francisco, July 27-28, in Fort Mason! These are going to be pins/brooches, and I’m gonna try suspending them in real pet-fish plastic baggies. I’ll be giving away 10 fishies to the first 10 customers who spend over $50.00. Or something like that. We’ll see!  

Our 4th of July was pretty mellow and food-oriented. We had a couple friends over, and Hairy got to try out his new meat thermometer. (WordPress seems to not want to load up any more photos right now…doh!) Of note: our friend Bella made this amazing cornbreadpuddingcasserole that of course I didn’t get a picture of, but it was soooooo delightful. I ate it for breakfast today, too! At night, we stayed in and watched television. I didn’t think our dogs were afraid of fireworks, but Bibi was really antsy and cried a lot, so I’m glad we were home. At least our dogs aren’t as crazy as my parents’ dogs. One of those guys poops or barfs in the dining room every year! Hopefully I will have some fun photos after this weekend. Tomorrow, we are all going canoeing (I am not an outdoors or watersports or be-outside person, so we’ll see how that goes), and then on Sunday, Manda and I have a girldate to the Package Tour, which includes Boyz II Men, 98 Degrees, and NKOTB. I was never actually into any of those groups, but I think it’s too funny to pass up! Gosh, what should I wear?!  

Sara from SoulCandyCrochet (the jar cozies pictured are hers) asked if I had any advice about finding a signature style for her crafting and her shop. In various q&a’s, I talk a lot about how I think it’s super important to have your own voice, so your work can stand out, but how do you find and cultivate that voice? Sara has a pretty clear idea about her work’s manifesto/philosophy, but she is uncertain about how to develop that into something tangible and physical in her crochet pieces. I think there are probably blogs and books about this very topic, and there are probably like “10 Steps to Blahblahblah” exercises that may or may not be helpful. I don’t fancy myself a small business guru, and I don’t pretend to have all the secrets to success, but I’m certainly open to sharing my story and some stuff I’ve learned along the way! For some people, finding your signature art/craft style is organic, and you just kinda do what you do, and it’s kinda different and out there, and people notice it, and you get featured on Etsy or Huff Post or Make:Craft blog or what have you. For others, there may be a creative urge and an artistic talent, but figuring out where you stand in the world needs more strategy or intention. For me, I think there was sort of a mix between organic and intentional. The women in my family always encouraged us to be creative and “go home and make it” (you may have heard me quote this before!). What I found myself doing was not necessarily making things I wanted to buy, but making things I wanted to HAVE and was not able to find in stores, whether they were presents for other people or just presents for myself. When I worked in an office, my boss always encouraged me to open up my own shop for handmade goods, but I always knew in the back of my mind, that my crafting was all over the place – real cereal picture frames, personalized pillow cases, funky Dr. Seussian hats, handpainted rocks – and that I wanted to have  a more refined concept before thinking I could sell anything to a complete stranger. So crafting had been in my blood for years, on a casual level, usually as a way to give unusual and memorable gifts to people. But the intentional part came from working in publishing and learning about branding (authors). I had learned that it was important to represent something specific and something unique, in order to appear like a sellable commodity, and since I hadn’t figured that out yet, I didn’t feel ready to put anything out into the world. In my “about” page and various bios, I talk about how moving to San Francisco inspired me to make myself some scarves. This is 100% true. I started making scarves for myself because the evenings here are chilly, but I wanted to wear something […]

When the flowers start blooming in my back yard (the weeds, that is), I start feeling like I ought to make more of an intentional effort to beautify my garden. The thing is, I know myself, and I know that I don’t put in the time to take care of anything out there. I’m like the goldfish-mama who will birth the babies and then completely ignore them and maybe even EAT them. So I planted some stuff in the backyard, but the big experiment right now is my front porch. My mom bought me this tall, black planter to put plant-stuff in, and I have tried all sort of plants in it, and they ALWAYS die! Potted flowers: dead. Topiary bushes: dead. I call this phenomenon, The Curse. All green things are cursed on the porch! In my backyard, I have this generic ready-made pot of succulents that I bought at Home Depot last year. I don’t water it or anything, and it looks just as perfect as the day I bought it. I almost wonder if it’s fake. Succulents/cacti seem super trendy right now, and I’m one of those angry people who try to steer away from what’s trendy, but if succulents are what survive in my yard, I’m gonna go with that. So I selected a bunch of them and potted them and put them in the Tall Black Planter of Doom, and I’m crossing my fingers. The thing is, I don’t know that they really make the visual statement I would prefer! But I’m going to hold off on adding anything else right now. I want to see if these new guys survive The Curse…

Head on over to one of my most favoritest bloggers, AgentLover, and enter her giveaway! One lucky winner gets to go home with a Yummy You! x Sanrio Character-Cupcake scarf! Woohoo! Sorry for the radio silence! I was in Las Vegas this week for the big Licensing Expo. I don’t think we were really supposed to take photos inside there (although everyone was taking photos with the mascots running around, like the Power Rangers, The ICEE Slush Puppy, The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, and some random guys I didn’t recognize!), but it’s really cool to see the booth designs for big companies like Nickelodeon, My Little Pony, Sesame Street, stuff like that!

Last weekend, we headed down to LA to celebrate JapanLA’s 7th Bday, the launch of JapanLA Clothing’s Kitty Party line, and also to take Manda to Disneyland for her graduation! On our drive back home, we stopped by the Skirball Cultural Center to check out Gary Baseman‘s show “The Door is Always Open.” I’d seen a bunch of my LA friends post pics of the opening night on Instagram, plus when we had dinner with Onch and lunch with Amy on our trip, they both gave it a ringing endorsement! On the walk to the exhibition, there were big cut-outs of some of his characters.

You. Guys. You guys you guys you guys. You have to check out the Fab.com sale happening right now from Japanese brand Gladee. The sale ends in 6 days!!! Here are some of my favs from the Gladee site. Not all of these are available on Fab, but Fab definitely still has a great selection! So, note to friends and family: you can’t go wrong if you wanna buy me a Gladee present….! 😛

My Round Ups aren’t usually themed, but I started noticing there were kind of a lot of creatures and animals on my list! Chibi Owling gadget case by TomoIsland on Etsy. I am in heart with this little owl baby! TomoIsland also has tons of other cute stuff, like shoulder bags! Crochet Llama phone cozy by CuteMoonBunny on Etsy. I have almost bought this several times because he is so cute and pink and delicious! Of course, since it’s crocheted, I always tell myself I can make my own just for me, but…. who has time, right? Pastel Kittens printable garland by Mel Stringer. Don’t you have artist-crushes sometimes? I am definitely crushin’ on Mel Stringer! This men’s Workaholics Bear Coat from 80sTees is totally blowing my mind. I have never watched the show, but this coat is so pimp! Eager Achiever beaver bag on ModCloth. Amigurumi Seedlings by hellohappy on Etsy. I just love the idea that these are the little guys that are growing under your plant! And here’s a video Hairy sent me today with a bunch of local mascots in Japan dancing.

Hello, Italian friends and Italian-reading friends! I am in the latest issue of Cucito e Ricamo Magazine, a cute crafty mag available for you in the app store for iPhone/iPad. Just search for “Cucito e Ricamo” and you’ll find the “Casa Creativa” app. The app is free, and then you can decide which magazines you want to purchase. I also found this link to make a purchase, but I don’t know if they send you a PDF, or if it’s still app-related. I can’t read the instructions :P. The magazine looks really cute, though, and there’s 4 pages of Q&A in there with me!