Laughter Gifts Children

With the fishbowl in the window because it is so warm these days, we get these lovely rainbows in the house for about an hour each day. When it isn't raining around here. Usually, it's raining.
Other than rainbows, this means I finally got to take pictures again (contented sigh). The newly re-printed Monkey tags are really happy about this!

Hi all! Fun things from this past week. It somehow became the week of conversations with people on Etsy about projects and possibilities... I met some amazing people, got blogged again by the incredible felt artisan Lupin (who, by the way, is featuring artists in her blog these days & her profiles are fantastic), and somewhere in the middle there finished a couple new designs!
But, you don't get to see those quite yet as our new order of *Gocco* screens arrives on Tuesday & they may be used to become Gocco prints. So, yes, I'm just wigglin' in my seat waiting for Tuesday.

We just got back from another lovely walk on the Wissahickon Trail, another week of what can no longer be described as "moderate" ...there should be a new term for this. I propose "eerily distemperate". When we first got outside it was cold, but I mean like 40 degrees cold... and I realized I'm still wearing my spring jacket in mid-January! Relatively, then, not-cold but eerily distemperate for mid-January.

There is a great article in this month's ID Magazine about the phenomena of "going green" itself, called "Too Yellow to be Green" by Barbara Flanagan. Not sure if I can post that link, so here is one just to ID. Enjoy!

Fun treasury report from last week (or, the week before?) is that Snow Day got into this fantastic treasury ... and made it's way to the front page! This was on a particularly grumpy day (I think the broken toe was playing a role in that- all better now!) and still up when I went to work, so really a jolt of emotional shift into excitement!

Other than family, I sold my first two Gocco prints that day! Since I have been planning to bring more Gocco into the shop, but wavering and unsure about new designs, I've also been looking at a lot of printmaking artists. Yep, getting pretty freaked out, too, about their level of skill and the altitude of my own learning curve. Those sales were a big boost to morale in Team OU!

One of the lovely ladies that purchased a Snow Day wrote one of the most generous and kind emails when she (finally!... packaging has it's own learning curve) received her print. At the bottom she attached a link to a video that she & her friends had posted on YouTube that I have been itching to blog about! You wanna see it? Okay, I hope this works:



Did you watch it? How adorable is that!? Just makes you feel happy inside and somewhat curious and goofy? Well, right, as it should be :) You can tell, so much love went into that project, the end result is a joy to have received!

These are the unexpected gifts of opening on Etsy, it is just priceless seeing what other people are working on! Thank you so, so much to Jacinta for the heart, Catherine Please for this amazing claymation treat & Dave End for the incredible music. Also (with hearts) to Mary Jane who was so sweet~ you guys look like you are having lots of fun!

And hold up, yo~ the fun just keeps going!
I also crossed paths with the owner of MayaBella on Etsy, who fits into three of my favorite categories:

• plush
• felt
• awesome!
  

Be prepared in your dealings with Etsy's felt artisans to be blown away by their sweetness! (Plus, you know I'm happy when I start itemizing things) Shannon of MayaBella dropped by to say hello right about the time I began some research for an upcoming blog post about plush stuffies. She hails from Oregon, destination April 2008, and has a bright, cheerful shop full of colorful stuffed animals, ornaments, and broaches! Check out Jack the Rabbit and his fluffy ears... talk about cute overload!

I had to make a note of her & her shop even before my Plush Issue, take a mosey on over to her shop for much more goodness than I can squeeze in here! She sent me this link of a great new blog to explore: theneedle.blogspot.org that previously featured her work, too! Sew much fun. (: I have yet to find a way to make prints, this is where many of my recent conversations on Etsy have come from, and have been grateful for everyone's patience on that note. Hopefully soon there will not only be new Gocco, but larger reproductions of some of the card images!

Thanks Everybody, and hopefully I'll catch up with all of this soon. :P Until then, watch that YouTube video again and have yourself a happy chuckle. Awwe, that's the ticket!


PS, almost forgot (whispering)... ninja treasury... (now thats genius!)... :)