some endings, some beginnings

Oh what a crunch, getting everything into the shop before Valentine's day! How is it going with all of you? I hope everybody is having a good week, and looking forward to tomorrow's historic inauguration.

Yesterday was Sunday, and on Sundays I like to take advantage of the slow and quiet nature of the day~ going into work hours early (I'm a weekend worker) to paint and draw. These are leisurely hours with a whole building to myself, and one of the more anticipated parts of my week. I usually camp out in the printmaking studio, or in the back at the Production desk, listening to music and slowly nursing my coffee. After a little reading or doodling, this week it was straight into painting, those final touches on the originals I've been posting about these days. Finally finished!

Tea 2

Today was much more focused on home & Etsy. I finished all the painting I'll be doing for the next couple of weeks and took tons and tons of photos. Although it is windy and blustery here, we are still enjoying days of sunshine. From there is was hours of fun-filled photo editing, breaking up the monotony with some cleaning & organizing of the house. From there it was packaging the rest of my outstanding orders and posting my framed pieces! All of this as a build-up to tomorrow, my last day before vacation.

In order to make sure I'm still able to fulfill orders within the 3-5 business days I've promised in my Shipping section, I have decided to go on Vacation Mode for this time:

Wednesday January 21st to Friday January 23rd

Just a small string of days, and by its end I will still be in MA and can figure out at that time if I should wait out the remainder of my own vacation or open back up.

In this, my first year in Portland, it has been 8 months of moving (three times now!) ,transition, new friends and new family. Leaving for Massachusetts kicks off the end of yet another chapter in those months and the beginning of an all new adventure once we get back. I'm really looking forward to the upcoming months where I intend to~

1. get myself a studio space in our new home
2. learn letterpress and hopefully new skills in silkscreening
3. explore the state of Oregon and take a trip to California, too
4. grow some potted plants (oh how I miss you)
5. get back into reading, knitting, sewing and *cooking*!
6. begin serious work in freelance illustration

...and that makes up for not having posted a New Year * New Leaf post here on the blog. I'll be home with my family in a matter of days, catching up on all of the changes my nephews have gone through in the last month (the words "crawing" and "teething" and "laughing" are still too hard to believe). It has been heartwarming spending the last months in the company of the R Family, being a part of their day to day pattern of living. I'm so completely grateful for all of the help and friendship they have shown and all the new friends I've made in this exciting new city. A break will be good, seeing family will be great, and then taking the next steps into becoming established in Portland will be all the beter with these sweet people in my heart.

Thank you friends, thank you readers, thank you Etsy, and happy new year.

Hello from the windy and cold corners of Oregon, where the Spring-like days that blessed us throughout this past week are gone but not forgotten. The sun has been wild this week, after rain rain rain we were all a bit dazzled by 4 sunny days strung together in yellowy hues. We woke one morning to a magical, crystalline frost right about when it started getting cold again.

I'm packing my bags and getting ready for a trip home to my original coast, the Eastern one, so all these fluctuations in temperature have me thinking of my new home, and all the differences here, maybe hyper-aware of small changes or details. I'm pretty sure the shop will remain open through the vacation since I have people to help me with shipping. I am very much looking forward to going home (also because I have this place to come back to) and feel for some reason that it will prove to be a very inspirational trip.

I was able to get some pretty good shots of the frosty morning while out on a walk...

Alright, back to business: there are some changes going on in the shop as we enter 2009. Now that the Holiday season is over, I've taken out USPS Priority Shipping as my shipping method. I was thoroughly disappointed in Priority (this year was my first year using it as my primary shipping option) and saw no significant improvement. I bet "5.00" under shipping probably had some people scratching their heads, too, although my motivation was to have as little concern as possible for items arriving punctually. I'm putting my faith back in old reliable First Class and checking out my options in tracking... more on that beginning February.

As for now, there is an option in the shop to "order" Priority Shipping~ and that will include the cost of tracking/ insurance. I figure people ordering large orders or Gocco prints will like having this option and am more than happy to provide expedited shipping. Hopefully this will ease the shipping confusion of this past season, as well as get me back into one of the fun parts of this whole Etsy project for me: making packaging! Believe it or not, a lot of love went into my mailers last year. I'm particularly proud that when you order an ouou item, the whole production is a unified project.

together - hand drawn Valentine

Oh, and also- I've listed another Valentine- this one on a folded (and larger) card tonight. I was happy with the clarity of the photos, too! Next up are the little framed originals, but for tonight I'm considering whether or not I want to go into those with watercolor or leave them black and white in pen. Hmmm. Maybe I'll sleep on it.
:)

"Two of a Kind" Valentine

Here in the Pacific Northwest we are under a thick fog, the low-lying clouds of winter's constant rain. I moved here for this, an ongoing rainy day that grows moss on all the stone and wood around town, the incredible moody mountain vistas that slowly fade in and out of view on afternoons like today. I love days like this, even though it is a challenge to find the right situation for taking pictures, and have enjoyed spending much of my day off walking about.

After my scenic voyages, I've been finishing some touches on the smallest set of Valentines. These are all original pen and ink drawings using pencil and MicronPigma 005 pens. I am drawing them all (there will be more sizes later) on Arturo stationary, an Italian paper with a nice watercolor-type tooth to it. They come with envelopes, so I'm not quite sure what to classify them under on Etsy, they're in now as ACEO. An ACEO is a small collectible original art card. I'll release the next size up as cards, and the larger will be in art as paintings.

Yes~ this means there are many more to come!
Gosh, I do love this job. :)

The lovely lady Lupin (of Etsy, Dawanda, Folksy...) has opened up ad space on her blog Bugs and Fishes, and guess who came along for the ride?

Lupin was one of the first felt artists I came across on Etsy in my early days of looking around before opening a shop. I am totally smitten with both her work and her blog, and really thrilled to be appearing there as a sponsor. I'm even planning on some new tea-themed designs in the month ahead, a common thread we have in both of our art... the more the merrier!

photo shoot!

Ninja v Big Octo gets his picture taken

More photos that came out very satisfactorily from today's attempts playing around with my camera settings. I'm particularly excited about these because I'm introducing a new card size to my shop as of today. The understated A2 card size, smallest of the mailable card sizes, is now in the shop in a new section here. These will be select designs with smart colored or dark envelopes to match. Since this card size does waste some paper in production (more on that in a later post) I'll be keeping the A2 family pretty small, but they really are quite charming little guys.

Black Umbrellas - small version

tweaking

It appears the beginning of December is big on "brainstorm" mode. Between Thursday and today I've thought of countless versions of new ideas I want to try out in the shop, filling the corners of my tiny notebook I carry around for on-the-bus scribbles. This is encouraging for my whole relationship with the shop- it feels really good to have a longer view of being back on Etsy than just Christmas.

Right now projects have different levels of involvement since the shop is still in it's early stages of being back in circulation. Some of you may remember the mobile I made for my sister when the boys were first born, I would love to try out a few of those for ouou the shop. Involvement = high. Other things, like adding some 4 card sets to the currently only 6 card set stocked shop = manageable. It is the things in between, those just out of reach, that really have my imagination going these days...

I'm picking up on wholesaling to Brick & Mortar stores this season: more on that later. With the handy coincidence of working in the letterpress industry I've learned what I like to see on cards/ art, the value of having fun with design, and a thing or two about exceptional, minimal design. With another logo-avatar already inked I hope to have a small logo on the back of my cards on upcoming batches soon. Some designs that never quite flew last year, as well as a few that did but I never really felt were finished, are having small-detail makeovers before returning.

That's the news for tonight~ things are still in the works around here, behind the scenes. Before I go, let me just add that my sister absolutely made my day by bustin' out one of last year's iron-on ouou gear onesies. Shoghi is above sporting just such a design that never made it into the shop... not half bad! Thanks, sister... hopefully he'll fit this for more than a few seconds (smile). I'll be bringing the iron-ons back in full force any day now. Ah, sweet sweet encouragement.

the long road

tea with red dragon back in the shop!

I started this post early this morning, but now its night and C & I are hanging out with the twins (sleeping). It has been a while since I was consistently blogging... there are lots of reasons for that.

These days the boys sure are getting big- it seems ages ago it was summertime and there we were spending all that time at the hospital waiting to meet them. Now M is sucking his thumb, S is finding his smile (those gummy grins are killing me!), and just as a pattern has started to emerge around all of our schedules, C is off in no time at all to spend a couple months back home. Oh, and Lost is coming back on (wink sweet sister). While my nephews are getting to know the scratchy skyline of a New England winter, their auntie hopes to be full sail on art * art * art. Breakfast, lunch and dinner.

audrey and the flying fish back in the shop!

As for me, this month previous has found hard economic times at my place of employment, with growing anxiety and worried faces. With all the strife effecting myself and people I love and care about, it has been disheartening at times to get through the month. Normally I wouldn't get into things like that, but I know a lot of people are suffering through uncertain times and grave decisions right now.

Disheartening, but there has been a lot to be grateful for (now I'm realizing I missed the Thanksgiving post... I even had the obligatory "baby next to turkey" photo. damn.).

I feel lucky indeed to be able to joyfully re-enter my Etsy career, and even luckier that my customers have been good spirited and welcoming~ we could all use such simple kindnesses these days. I've sold out of every last Gocco printed journal that made the cross-country adventure of moving... within two weeks of having the shop open again. That was truly magical!

little monkey Gocco printed tags

* * *

My earnest desire is that my next move involves a place to unfurl the printmaking system again. Every precious moment of downtime is spent with a pencil in hand. Although, now that the shop is up, there is necessary computer time, too. Not many blogs I follow talk about the person behind the scenes, or the process of keeping one's self inspired (blog suggestions or reading material ALWAYS welcome, ladies and gents) but friends and neighbors let's just admit it's not always easy. There are more than enough distractions from the simple act of beginning and finishing a drawing.

Those of you following the blog last year know that it was intended to document the opening and beginning of my Etsy shop. Printmaking came next, and knitting, then cooking, then painting. Although I would love to pick up right where I left off, life is full of a million beginnings and endings, the rolling along of events. What I'm going to try and do is just begin with this week: I'm going to try and post every night until next Saturday. Revive the blog and see what kind of art can come around again from the bottom of a backpack, while house-sitting here with my sister. Why not? I've been living in flux for years now, and at least for a week my computer will be in one house, consistently. With any luck I could even become one of those people who do something crafty every day (...again)!
:)

Very heartfelt best to those of you out there who are having a difficult time this winter. Goodnight, dears, and don't forget the simple kindnesses.