Bamboo Village Press on Etsy

Look at all those comments! Thank you for the inspiration, I'll be deciding *tomorrow night* what the newest monster in my shop will be named. I really enjoy having giveaways so my gratitude to all of you for participating... and those of you who have not, there is still another day left. :)

Speaking of things I love, my sister has decided to re-open her Etsy shop Bamboo Village Press. Yay! I feel like her timing couldn't be better; its been over a year since my nephews were born, although we're thinking about moving we are still comfortable and familiar with our current set-up, and reconnecting with a community of fellow artists is *always* a good thing. Saunter on over to her shop and check out her fabric, Gocco printed Journals, and delicate papercuts.

Other links behind Bamboo Village Press are here on Flickr and the story behind the fund, here on the Bamboo Village blog.

hello hello (and a giveaway)

Well, I would like to pretend that I hadn't just walked away from my blog for the last 4 months (or so) but... yes, I had. Its funny, since beginning to write in 2007 so many life-changing things have happened, and through all of them I've felt I was able to keep writing. But these last months have been such an effort that I was feeling pretty protective. I'm writing now in hopes that, truly, those times are passed.

Otherwise, yes, all the while I've been printing-printing-printing for the day I returned to this sweet blog home. So let's begin...

Visitors to my Etsy shop will notice some "summer" designs have come and gone, while the "winter" designs (dragons, snowflakes, and scarves I love so much) are returning. I still have ouou's Halloween printed card, too, in the shop until Thanksgiving. I'll be breaking some sets into collections in order to still offer the summery designs, these will be in the Mixed Set section this week.

There is also a new Gocco card in town, one in the spirit of Halloween. I've decided to hand-paint these little monsters (who are martians? or sea creatures? or bogeymen?) for a snappy two-tone effect. The reason they're so late to the shop... what do I name this critter? So, on my first post back after a long absence its high time for a BLOG GIVEAWAY!

Please, help me out on a name for this latest Gocco silkscreen card. Leave your suggestions in comments... (nothing outrageous, please)... I can't wait to read them :D The contest is open until next Wednesday, October 28th 9 p.m. est.

Let my readers be forewarned: the judging process will be *subjective*- the one I like the most will become his title. <3 The winner, of course, will get a free set of these cards or a 2 pack of any card in my shop.

Its good to be back. :)

bah humbug-type sentiments

It has been a while since I consistently blogged, so let's catch up:
My sister and her sons are back on the East coast for their twice-a-year visit with our family there. This means I've had the house to myself (yay!) in order to work hard on my Etsy shop, but it also means I've missed the opportunity to be together with my family (boo!). Little MNJ and SL just turned one year old a couple days ago, a really touching time to be celebrating back east. I'll put up a "one year!" post when they return and we have our party here, but meanwhile I'm glad that they had a fun time eating cupcakes and having their first birthday party celebration.

Around here I've started off the downtime with more drawing than production of new items, although there are introductions to be had. I realized its hard for me to enjoy blogging without photographs~ I'm an illustrator at heart and really rely on visual interpretations to express what I see, think, feel. Posts may be spotty for a while due to my broken camera, but I'll do my best to keep stopping by. :)

I am, it must be said, not having the best summer ever... although many of my friends who are having similar frustrations are encountering much larger challenges than myself. The year after uprooting everything and moving cross-country, I was bound to dig my heels into the ground with some consequences. It is no surprise that my irritations are showing up in my drawings. Anyway, the good news is that I'm able to amuse myself with these little Phooey sketches, and hope they cause you to have a little chuckle through life's inevitable unpleasantness's as well.

DRAT!

goods

Around these parts there have been developments upon developments. There's a comfort to sitting down to a Monday blog post and feel the good energy pouring into another string of days! I'm happy to say I'm going back to work, like a break in the clouds this is more relief than I can remember feeling in ages.

Wouldn't you know I'll be back at the company I'd left in the New Year. I feel truly lucky about this. As my readers know, my sudden unemployment right as I was getting ready to move in with C and her twin boys, and just a few months after re-opening my Etsy shop, was not planned for. In my (initially) lackadaisical way, I didn't expect finding a new job to be the challenge it has been, even as months have gone by I've felt "you've got to be kidding me" exasperation at the job hunt. On the other side of that search, the Etsy shop and my own work to expand my business is hitting a nice, steady pace. The last month alone has been loaded with so much effective change, and I can thank my friends, family, and those of you online that keep me in that space.

new Gocco Rainy Day cards and Bobby stationary

More good news is that our fantastic new *printer* arrived, C made a lovely investment knowing she is going to be printing up professional marketing media (and, you know, we take some pretty good photographs of the twins). I'm excited at the opportunity for home printing this opens up, although my summer will be concentrating on more by-hand Gocco work. Speaking of Gocco, among other things, there is an ever-expanding selection of Gocco coming into the Etsy shop these days. I'm printing for the shop, as well as stock that does not appear on Etsy, limited editions that I'll be using at craft fairs or for give aways and promotions. Stay tuned here and on Facebook for updates!

I'll also be selling cards in more Portland locations in the coming weeks. Right now I'm selling single cards at Piccolina on se Clinton, Children's Exchange on Division (where I have Gocco cards, too!), and se Stark at Paperdoll. All of these locations are fun and family friendly, so if you are in the Portland area, shop local and stop by! :)

update

Sky layer from Larger than the Sky Gocco print

In taking a moment to pull together new Gocco printed items that need photographs, I realized I've been something of a Gocco whirlwind over here. Should I even bother anymore saying "Well, I live in Portland, so... you know... it rains a lot." golly its hard to find the right day (hour?) to take pictures. Not that I'm complaining- this place has amazing weather. I'm still in the production stage on many of these, back-printing or whatever assembly I've got to finish, but I feel pretty accomplished for the couple of print runs around our home busyness.

One, Two, Three new watercolor aceos now in!

One, Two and Three are in the shop as of tonight. I'm finally willing to admit that my computer is having problems with Etsy - another reason I'm freeing up time from being there is I can't seem to use it. Don't worry, I'm still fulfilling orders and being a good shop keep, lucky for us we have 2 computers in the house. For Etsy, I'm using my sister's computer throughout the day, and brought in these three (finally!) tonight after everybody went to bed. I'm feeling ambivalent about the roadblock since I'm finding I had once spent a *lot* of time on Etsy, time spent mostly...? I hear that's pretty common.
Without a clear channel to it now I find I'm much more focused there when I log in from C's laptop.
Funny, life.

I do feel relieved to bring in new aceo's, though, as they've been finished and waiting patiently for about a month. I've got another Robot themed card (related, but not the same as Land of Cupcakes) that has also been waiting on my desk since April- I'll be bringing that one in toward the end of the week. Otherwise, get your Gocco boots on kiddies cause I've been elbow-deep in printing ink and will be bringing you news as often as the aperture lets in any light at all. Portland, Portland- time for the sun to shine again! Pretty please?

Land of Cupcakes, make room for more Robots.

Knitty

I've got some new ACEOs for the shop, but since I haven't had much photo editing time, I thought I'd continue on the Gocco theme. These shoulder tee's are the newest incarnation of Knitting Otter before his screen disintegrated. For now, all the baby clothes are one of a kind editions. The next step will be to collect several shirts of the same style and print all of those- but I've got a stack of mis-matched baby clothes standing next to the Gocco. At the end of the lives of these screens from last year, I'll be going through those and listing "Limited Edition" styles.

print print print

While my visiting family are enjoying the sunset on Mt. Tabor, I'm home alone with fresh strawberries, warm brownies, sleeping nephews.... time to sneak in a blog post!

Other than a week of uploading ACEOs, I've been behind the scenes using silkscreen, cutting and sewing. A nice, fruitful print run of last year's Gocco screens and the Knitting Otter left me with more than a few projects to stretch throughout the week. For the Gocco on fabric, neither my sister or I had any luck with using the press, so we squeegee our designs using a credit card. It makes for much cleaner, more uniform prints. It also kills the screen, which is meant to be used under the press but goes about as far as a handmade silkscreen would. This last run was the end of Knitting Otter. His screen peeled and tore. Seeing a screen fall apart of the first time was rather shocking, but I feel like I got a lot out of it.

"Knitting Otter" in brown ink

What a mess! I love printmaking.

Otter screen, peeling around the lines.

With any luck I'll be updating soon and bringing the clothing into the shop first, the sewn bits take a while longer.

While I'm online, I also wanted to mention Earth Mosaic. For those of you interested in Earth Day tomorrow, you can add an artistic and personal peice of flair to the holiday by contributing a photograph of a natural setting. The photo will then be used as part of a giant mosaic. They have a huge Flickr pool, too! The thing is, your camera has to record that the photo was taken on Earth Day~ so get out there and take a journalistic view of your big blue lovely Earth. If you read this, and have shared a photo- I would love a link in comments!

Happy Earth Day, everyone, and thank's for the strawberries Mother Earth. :)

update

A few more notes on Spring Cleaning~ today I listed Puddles and Dragons back in the shop. This design shows Girl in her rain slicker, romping through spring puddles with her best imaginary friend, Green Dragon. I have also changed the photographs back on the Gocco version of Sofie and the Bird, since my updated photograph that's been up all winter is not so clear.

Sofie, Shine and Steam(er)!

Steamer

Alright! What a weekend. I'm proud to announce several changes in the shop, as well as some new faces! Because I am irresistibly drawn to warm drinks and scarves as subject matter, I thought it was high time I bring in Steamer, a lovely friend drinking a warm cuppa. Classic ouou drawing, but without the Dragon. :)

Sofie and the Bird

I've brought back one of my personal favorites from last year, Sofie, in her printed version. I have the same design in silkscreen Gocco version, but these (along with the green envelopes I've got right now) printed cards are such a necessary piece of Spring in my shop.

Shine

And finally, also new today is Shine~ this wonderfully celebratory new card. I've begun announcing new designs on Flickr a few days before they appear in my shop. For me, this is great because I'm not able to blog every day, so check it out! There you can see the other projects I'm working on, and notes from my sketchbook too.

But there are a few more changes this week at ouou. I've consolidated several winter card designs into Mixed Sets here. So, cards like Smarty and Red Dragon Drinks Tea are now only listed as parts of Mixed Sets throughout the spring and summer. All card designs are available upon request, however, so no worries if mid-June you really need a set of bundly, cocoa drinking Dragons or something.



Lastly, I've brought back the Monkey products, in all his wiley forms. I'm planning a blog post about Gocco later in the week, so for now you can take a look at tags and the Moleskine selection in the Gocco Silkscreen section.

everything I know about Gocco

Today I'm going to bring you a rather long post, the wonderful gritty details of our Gocco experience. When I say "our", the Gocco machine actually belongs to my older sister, Celeste, who bought the machine last year at this time to spice up Bamboo Village Press, her Etsy shop, with printed paper goods. Since opening my own shop on Etsy the following November, I've gotten so much guidance from my wonderful sister that I forget sometimes there are people out there maneuvering the craft world or Etsy on their own.

So, here is any tips and sites from our experience that have come in very handy while thinking about setting off on a Gocco adventure! ***This is also my first attempt to edit my own HTML so that links open in a new window. If something doesn't work, let me know and I'll try to fix it/ get you the link. :)

The best site on the web for an introduction to Gocco is probably Save Gocco. This will give you the whole background and history behind the machine, and the campaign to keep RISO from taking them off the market. What they are are essentially silkscreen kits designed to fit in your home and be cleaner/ easier to use than using the press & squeegee method. I've done some home silk screening (wooden frame and tubs of ink) as well as printmaking in college and other than the questionably toxic bulbs that Gocco requires to create the screen image for you, I agree it is much cleaner/ easier.

(However, if you can help me to get my house to look like this... I would be really very grateful!)

The process is simple: you start with an image you want to use for your print and transfer this image (either using a Micron Pigma, carbon pen, or photocopy) to sized paper sheets Gocco provides you. This rests on the bottom of the machine. The upper most part of the frame has your screen and a removable bulb case that, when pressed down (as though you were making a stamp) will activate the bulbs and transfer the darks of your drawn image to the screen. Now you no longer need the paper drawing. Once you have made your screen you remove the bulb case, lay ink down over the dark transfered lines of your screen, and proceed to stamp away!

• One of the things I really love about this particular way of printing is that your transfered image is not backwards. It took some getting used to, since I was used to printmaking, but really it is so easy not to have to plan in reverse!

• What I've noticed a lot of fascinating and design savvy Gocco users will do is plot out their 2 or 3 color designs on a computer first. This way it is much easier to plot out how to proceed if your end image will have more than one color.

Our Gocco machine is a pg6. The pg6 is the largest Gocco model and my sister got this one in order to easier print on fabric. The pg6 measures 15.7"x 18.1" (our microwave, for example, is smaller) but it is pretty lightweight and the screens themselves can print an image almost as big as a normal 8 x 10 sheet of paper.

After printing with the pg6 for the last 6 months, I am eager to try out the smaller stamp Gocco, like this pg5. Why? well, the base of our printer is designed to move with the pressure you apply. This is a good thing considering you are smooshing ink through a screen, but can be tricky around the edges of such a large area if you have many images on one screen. Doing my own research about my favorite Gocco artists (mostly from Etsy, but Flickr is wonderful for Gocco info) I find that many people are using the smaller stamp models.

Now, lastly, let's be really honest about how expensive these little guys are. Our pg6 came from one of my favorite stationary suppliers, Paper Source. I fully trust them and their customer service is great, but they are on the high end of craft suppliers. Along with another set of supplies, bulbs, and shipping, the entire cost was almost $500.00. This does not include the cost of what you will be printing on. When I first started printing on paper, I would say about 1/3 attempts turned out to be mis-prints or not good enough for sale.

Also, despite the size of our printer, I have to date not successfully printed on fabric. Celeste has done some beautiful images which leads me to believe it is easier with bolder, thicker designs if you are going to tackle fabric (see above). But, she had a couple of hiccups with these cloth bound journals, so you have to factor in your supplies as well as whether your supplies work against you while considering the long-term costs.

If you still want to get a Gocco, my suggestion would be to practice, practice, practice with your basic inks and one color printing before expanding. Our secret weapon for supplies is Welsh Products, who seem to be a small company (you have to email your customer order to them) and are really friendly, helpful, reasonably priced. Shipping takes about a week, slower than most, but if you plan ahead its a company worth supporting. Lastly, there are constant discussions about Gocco in forums, both on Etsy and Flickr. Countless groups on both these communities, as well as IndiePublic, MySpace, Facebook, and even Yahoo are fantastic resources when you jump in!

I'll do my best to answer any other questions as they come up, but otherwise the very best of luck to all of you:

LOVE YOUR GOCCO!

We Have Gear!

Not so Painty Friday today, but TGIF to all my conventional friends out there. I'm interrupting what would normally be Painty Day to introduce ouou's expanded section: DIY and Clothing! Here I've had iron-ons in the shop for over a month, and will be offering several sheet designs altogether, the ouou children's gear I'm going to list will mostly be images that aren't on the sheets. The Little Monsters below are already up, Blush from above is going to be listed later this afternoon, 3 different styles and another onesie next week. :)

I've got to get outside into the crisp weather before thunder rolls in, but while I'm posting here are the things I'm working on for the weekend:

I'll be posting about my experience with Gocco since there have been a lot of questions coming in recently. Any new Gocco converts are awesome, but it really is a huge investment of money so I try to be upfront with people about what you will need/ run in to. I'll be mostly using my weekend for taxes (nervous! first year of 1099) but I'll release the new iron-on sheets Saturday and Sunday, too. My sister and I have been glued to Netflix of BSG Season 3 (we had been waiting for months) so with the
*taxes
*iron-ons
and *science fiction marathon
it promises to be a nerdy, nerdy weekend. :)

Happy Pretty

We had a break in the weather here today, the morning haze gone and 70 degree sunny skies taking over. Spring in PA is showing off its emerging reds, and now quite suddenly whites, in the impressive decorative flowering trees around town. I just got back from an irresistible stroll. These white buds here are a close-up of these white trees, the red are buds on a bush we also had in the yard of my childhood home:



Yesterday's second Etsy new listing is a very limited run of this design on small moleskines:

Since the design is exactly the same length as the Moleskine, it's just too risky to make too many of them (messing up on a $$ Moleskine is so terribly frustrating), so there are just a few of these little ladies in existence.

Everything Day & What Inspires You?

Today has been one of those Everything Days where it seems like every 30 minutes to an hour I'm off doing something different. Let's see if I have the attention span to get a blog post done:

Today's listing in a week of listing (forgot yesterday, so maybe I'll sneak one in tonight after my internet cut-off) is a collection of Gocco printed envelopes. I think I mentioned my serious addiction to paper goods a few entries ago... well it actually has worked out in my favor, really it has, since I've been using those precious papers for "extra ink" printings. I've amassed quite a collection by now and listed a grab-bag type collection today in the shop. I figure someone out there still writes letters. yes?
...yes?

This girl and lion have been kicking around my room for months. She was actually going to be the beginning of my alphabet series, but then I decided to watercolor those. Its weird because I have a strong desire to see this pattern on a pillow* but may offer her as an iron-on in the shop along with other not-on-card designs.
(*this information is useful later) Still need to broaden that DIY section, as the secret project for it won't be unveiled until late summer or fall. What do you think... is she iron-on material? Hmm...

Other than that today was more mailing and further sketches for a sticker project that is way off in the distance. In the afternoon I spontaneously went along with my sis to Philadelphia for one of her doctor visits and am lucky I did because we got to see another ultrasound! Thats just the most amazing thing.

I came home to a wonderful email from Amy over at Pikaland, who has set up a barter system for her ad space that I think is a great way to get people involved. I'm participating in a more free-form version since I don't yet know when my shop will re-open but still have all the proper information to fill out. One of her interview questions is "What inspires you?". I thought this would be a fun addition to the blog. I've spotlighted artists and Etsyians here before, but to take maybe a subject instead?

So this week I'll begin in textiles, with embroidery. Embroidery is something I've been wanting to get back into for the past 2 years. Its showing up everywhere in the fine art world and a beautiful canvas for the minimal art people are creating currently. Above is Littlebonbon by Takashi Iwasaki, whose images set off all those energized synapses in my brain.

Flickr has tons of groups for the embroidery nerd in me: check out embroidery and science! But one with a bright future is Children's Embroidery, where I got the above picture from. Check out this guy- I love it that children's embroidery ends up looking the same as their Crayola drawings. Way to be! Embroidery would also be a fun project to get that girl and lion on a pillow- but I'm gonna need some granny glasses before agreeing to that mission!

Oh, Hai.

(stretches arms) Good afternoon. Still here and its time to come back to the fun bits: hello again blog! :)

Recovery is going steadily along... little did I realize I would have to recover all over again Saturday when I began emerging from my drug-haze to find epic chaos had taken over my room. Sorry for that bad picture, but it was just remarkable I got any mailings out last week. Yikes!
The fun part was, I had sent away for new supplies from several companies in the beginning of the week, so while sipping my Jello and, well, staring off into space (I did a lot of that), little by little over the days all of the Moleskines and envelopes and such that keep the shop going marched into the home. I love mail. I really do.

The first thing to do (after calling my friends and telling them all of my not-so-gruesome tooth related drama, more driving practice and putting together some corn bread on Sunday) ...okay the first thing to do after all that was to get up to date with the Gocco items in my shop. This weekend the Gocco moved into my room as we get rid of furniture and pack the crafts up. It is not really the best space for it so I may have to sell out of Gocco and stop re-listing/ re-printing those soon. I spent a lot of time thinking about when to close up shop before the move and I'm aiming for either Monday, April 21st or Wednesday the 23rd.

While organizing and packing before the surgery last week I found these lovely green note cards left over from my college shopping adventures to Paper Source in Porter Square, outside Boston. (When it comes to paper goods, I really am a pack rat). I was printing up some Butterfly Sky cards anyway so I tried the image out on them... aren't they sweet? You can still see the true color here at Paper Source itself, my colors I believe are chartreuse and jadeite, and the listing in ouou here.

I think I have enough new items to list something new every day this week. No new Gocco print designs, its just a bit too close to packing up shop for that, but some fun things for the emerging springtime. My sister and I only have 21 days left in PA... and currently still deliberating over the details of this major move, but pretty soon I'll introduce you to all the characters on this journey and the route and such. I may not be blogging for those 2 weeks on the road, but I'll be keeping busy through my journals, postcards, and photos. There will be plenty to report over the next few months.

Thanks to everyone who kept me cheerful through this last rough bit. Between that and my awesome sister providing the most loveliest cheesecake in the universe (no lactose intolerance could keep me from it) it was a pretty darn good week after all!