Etsy Shop Birthday!

Happy 2nd birthday etsy shop! And boy, what a long way you've come! This also marks the anniversary of making crafts for an actual reason! Hooray!


This last year was certainly a great one with loads of lovely accomplishments including:

- skyrocketing my sales from 111 (of year 1) to 441
- expanding my button line to include 6 new designs
- making scientific culture postcards and pocket mirrors
and
- breaking into the world of craft shows!!!

Woo! Here's hoping the terrible twos doesn't apply to internet shops as I ramp up my geekery selling for year three! Yay!

Milk Jug Stormtrooper!

With halloween just around the corner - it is about time to get brainstorming and working on costumes! And when I came across this sweet stormtrooper helmet tutorial made from milk jugs, I just had to share it with all of you! Check it out:


Isn't that neat? Doesn't even look overly difficult either! Bonus! And ironically similar to the clone trooper costumes my friends whipped up two years ago. Tyler and jared certainly went all out that halloween:


Clearly all clone troopers go for starbucks with zombies (me) and wendy darling (wendy)! I have no clue what I am doing this halloween...but luckily the internet will provide some much needed inspiration! What are you going to be this year?

Paper Owl Totem

If you're craving a little more owl in your life (which, I'm sure, you are) let me take a moment to introduce you to my owl barn! It is a lovely blog full of neat owl related inspiration, projects, and products! What fun! It also did the lovely job of drawing my attention to this super fun paper owl totem from chobopop:


Isn't it cute? You can download the owl sections here (for free even) and get creating! And if owls aren't your thing, take a gander back at the paper doll project of everyone's fourth favourite new zealand comedy/folk duo I blogged about quite a while back! Fun for all! Now to hook up that colour printer...

Mini Break Recap!

Finally I've snafoozed a little time to recap my mini break to victoria and *whew* what a whirlwind trip that was! Five solid days of travel, shopping, music, and limited sleep really catch up on you! And to top it all off apparently I got so excited during the trip that I forgot to properly photo-document the super fun events! (Trust me - this isn't the first time this has happened...I am a legendary over-excited/forget to document type). But all hope is not lost, I did manage to snap a few pics and am here to share the extremely truncated highlights of my trip! Yay! Let's go!

My mini break included:

1) Super fun shops! Yup, even though I was on a strict "you still need to be able to afford food" budget, I did manage to get a few thrifty purchases in some of victoria's lovely crafty/artsy/indie shops! In fact, I am planning a "kate's top three shops in victoria" blog post to come up later in the week (so stay tuned!). I love how downtown victoria is scattered with lovely independently owned shops full of interesting and amazing products! My favourite destinations included chinatown (with fan tan alley), government street, and (the oh so lovely) lower johnson:



And as if that wasn't enough, the victoria harvest festival was going on with the market on sunday for extra fun! I love their poster:


It was really neat to get a chance to try loads of locally produced products with a particularly enjoyable time in the taste testing beer garden! Fun!

2) Music Music Music! Four days of music with 7 venues and 125 performers to chose from! What a sensory overload! My particular favourite parts were the warchild charity acoustic afternoon shows (with killer lineups and fantastic unplugged-ness):


I also enjoyed quite a few of the evening shows! There were a few duds we stumbled upon, but we quickly learned from our mistake (read those festival programs more closely) and some great new acts I've totally fallen for (i.e. Kate Miller-Heidke (who I am so in love with I will blog more about later...), Micheal Barnard Fitzgerald (shown above at warchild), and Clay George). I also got the wonderful pleasure of seeing Wooden Sky for the third time - except this time actually seeing them (and not being blocked by a packed house of taller than me folks). Check out the amazing venue they got to perform in:


3) Victoria Sites! Nothing like the capital city of British Columbia to make you swoon! Apparently I only took pictures of the Empress...

yup...close up of the Empress... (notice amazing tree grooming):


Oh...not entirely true. There were quite the number of reject photos I decided not to subject you to...but here is one of my in front of the parliament buildings for proof:


Ack! Awful! That limited sleep thing didn't exactly do wonders for my photogenic-ness. Haha. Alas, looks like I'll just need to plan another trip back soon so I can work on my photojournalism! Hooray! Or, more practically, just focus on taking pictures for my trip to smithers this next week...

Googling

If you're anything like lucas' mom - you love google. You love searching on it, referencing it, and (most importantly) using it as a verb as much as humanly possible! Now you can take a ride on the internet search engine bandwagon and get your business cards printed with it! Check out the cards how about orange's sweet google cards:


Fun! And such a great way to make a memorable impression on googling! Ji Lee even has the template available (for free) on his site! I figure jim will appreciate this one too after he roped me into a long winded discussion on "how if google was a fascist leader he would sign up to be a slave under it's all powerful and awesome reign!!!" I'm not sure I'm quite that dedicated yet...but I do think those business cards are pretty awesome...

In other news - I am back from my mini break but my busy busy schedule has left me limited time to blog and recap - stay tuned! I'll share some highlights soon!

Keyboard shortcuts come to life!

I came across this image a while ago on ManMadeDIY and just had to share it with you:


It is always nice to see that there are people out there with a mission to bring keyboard shortcuts to life! It is also pleasant to see that there are folks out there just as geeky as I am with such a charmingly quirky sense of humor! Time to grab a sharpie and get labeling...

Ikea + 100 cats

It is common knowledge to those close to me (and recurring blog fans) that I am crazy about two things - cats and Ikea! So I'm sure you can imagine how excited I was when Ikea set 100 cats loose in their store one night for an advertising campaign. If you're an avid blog reader (or tv watcher) I'm sure you've seen the commercial, but I was particularly taken by this video about the project (with the ad at the end). Take a peek (it's super adorable):

Now all I need to do is fix fraser's allergy to cats, purchase a house filled with ikea goodness (with lotto winnings of course), and then get kitty herding! Okay - so in reality it wouldn't take very long for the ikea house to start smelling terrible...so I guess the commercial will have to do for now! But I'll keep brainstorming...

The Black Spot!

A while back I read a blog post from elycia showing some adorable pictures of her kitty anakin! I (of course) instantly fell in love with such a charming ginger cat and love all the little black specks on his nose. Take a peek:


I told you he was cute! And what a great picture! Well, this got to me thinking - I have always wondered why my mom's evil cat percy mysteriously had a black spot appear on his nose one day and it turns out this is a common thing in ginger kitties! After further investigation I learned that the dirt specks are because of a condition called lentigo simplex and is similar to freckling on humans! Yup all those little melanocytes just like to cluster together and cause the darker coloration! Fun!

Naturally I decided this was a perfect opportunity to snap some pictures of percy to show off his black spot (which honestly is sort of suiting - since percy is pure evil and a single black spot signifies the death card in pirate...) but of course this turned out to be a difficult task. Observe my series of snap shots where percy refuses to make eye contact:


Thanks stinkums. Finally I got a good evil glare out of him though (note black spot):


Okay percy. You win. No cute pictures for you today...this snaggle tooth one from a few months ago will have to do:


Perhaps he'll get a few more spots in his old age and the evil gene will be suppressed a bit! Here's hoping! At least he loves you mom...

Octo Building

Just in case you're craving more tentacles in your life take a look at this:


And don't go thinking it is just photoshopped - those are some genuine inflatable tentacles! If you like that check out from of FilthyLuker's other art collaborations over at deviantart! Happy Sunday!

Helping hands

Since I'm freshly moved into a new place (hopefully - I'm writing this pre-move and since I'll be internetless for the first while scheduling blog posts is a must), I'm no stranger to loads of boxes and lots of helping hands! Leslie came across this image on deviantart and I thought it was so cute I'd share it with all of you:


How charming! Here's to hoping my move was successful and that the internet connects soon so I can share all my pictures with you! Hooray!

Road Trip Hello!

A while back (july 4th to be exact) I shared a post about "faces in places", a lovely blog that showcases a collection of images of everyday items that appear to be looking at you! Well, as promised I have been keeping my eyes peeled for just the right item to add to their flickr group and my road trip to vancouver last sunday was it! My tea just couldn't help but shout "hello!" to me on our way out of town:


Good morning tea! Thanks for being so minty and settling my tummy for me! Yup - pretty excited to finally get a snapshot of an item with a face! Maybe it will even make its way over to their blog - or their book! What fun!

In other news the whirlwind vancouver trip was a success! We had a rainy smoke devouring drive down in time for some quick shopping and lunch in the heart of vancouver. Then it was back to the outskirts for some moving preparation mass shopping - at the best place on earth:


Hooray for Ikea! And an even bigger hooray for the sweet deals we got in their massive warehouse of amazing goods:


Yay! So much fun! I managed to get almost all the items on my "required furniture and goods for the new house" and didn't even max out my credit card! Now I just need to get the last few items (shower curtain, cutlery tray, and shoe rack) in town somewhere and we'll be set! Oh, and I have a week of insane packing and purging left as well...minor details...

Real World Illustration

Nothing like a little real world illustration to make you look at things differently. I love the works of Sandrine Boulet! Very creative and sort of funny at the same time. Check out my favs:

Monitor Darth:


Ironing Butterfly:
Grassy pom poms (I do love pom poms):

Umbrella skirt:


Cement Smoke (I thought of you when I saw this one mom...not totally sure why?):
Lovely! And ever so inspirational. Time for me to start looking at the world a little differently from time to time. Which do you like best?

Year of the Crayon

If you're ever looking for new hobbies to take on - what about crayon carving? Diem Chau certainly makes it look good - check out her Chinese zodiac carvings:


Oh my! What a lot of work that would be! I think I'll leave the carving up to her. Check out her complete works on her site if you're interested. I can't believe how she gets so much amazing detail in each piece - take a look at my sign (rat):


Well done! Apparently people born on the year of the rat are forthright, tenacious, intense, meticulous, charismatic, sensitive, intellectual, industrious, charming, eloquent, sociable, artistic, and shrewd. Great. Not sure if I like the description. What zodiac animal are you?

How to be alone

Nothing like an artsy video to brighten up a thursday! I found this video amidst my daily visit to craft: and loved it! (One problem with scheduling posts weeks in advance = everyone has probably already seen this by now!) Plus it is wonderfully insightful and shot in Halifax! Take a moment to absorb:

What did you think? Are you motivated to go solo dancing? I'm not quite there yet...but I figure this video is a good place to start! What did you get out of it?

Pepsi Dude logo

The other day I was struggling with my dear old dying computer and was searching for an image of some button packaging. Seems random right? How does my eight year old PC have to do with packaging ideas? Well - I'm arranging selling some magnet sets wholesale to a new toy store opening in town and trying to figure out packaging options for the shop. I figure my button cards are great for post but not as good for a storefront! The shop owner asked me to send her a digital picture of my packaging idea but my digital camera won't connect to macs for whatever reason and since my PC is dead I ended up doing an internet search. Makes sense now right? I hope so!

Well amidst my internet browsing I came across the sweet art work of Lawrence Yang's blog blow at life and this pepsi logo image cracked me up:


I'm pretty sure that is all I am ever going to picture whenever I see that logo ever again! Too funny! The blog has some great sketches, doodles, and painting on there as well and I'm particularly tickled by the bear tower sketch. So cute!

Oh and as for my computer - I've purchased a new one and just waiting for it to finish being built. Thank goodness! I'll be back to digital picture wonderful blog posts soon enough! Yay!

cat versus human

I am very much a cat person and I'm sure if I lived in a world with unlimited funds, space, and no cat allergies I would own many, many cats and become a cat lady. I, however, hope never to become a crazy cat lady. The lovely blog "cat versus human" explains the difference quite well:


Here's to hoping that never happens to me...oh and that blog is wonderful. I totally recommend checking out all their sarcastic cat comics even if you're not into cats. It's that good.

Post-it Stop Motion!

Here is a fantastic video I found after checking out my lovely reader marci's blog! Because who doesn't like stop motion short videos, procrastinating when work needs to be done, and post its (especially for us list writing addicts)?

I totally loved the rain part the best! What was your favourite part?

Biz Baz Recap and Road Trip: Kelowna

Being sunday and all I usually fill in all my lovely blog readers on how my craft sales went from thursday's bizarre bazaar. Well...this week my sales officially reached an all time low! Oh dear! But not to worry, I didn't sell anything because my craft selling was canceled due to extremely awful rainy/thundery weather! So instead I went shopping with my sis downtown! Nothing like some shoe shopping to cheer up the day! Please note the atypical rainyness:


What fun! And since I'm in the mood of the photo recap, I thought I'd share some snapshots I took from my kelowna trip I took last week with fraser. No rain that day - just super awesome summery heat! Take a look:


I contemplated uploading each of those images separately and then explaining each one but I think the truncated montage deal is a little bit better. Highlights of the day included the wonderful relocation of my favourite kelowna destination (funktional!), some great strolls through the culture district (including rad koy pond), and a wonderful sunday brunch at the boho! It also lead to some sweet purchases I'm extra excited about:


Who can resist Canadian crafted accessories, porcelain kitty salt and pepper shakers, and some crafty business reading? Not me apparently! I'm super stoked about all of these buys making the trip that much more memorable. Thanks fraser! Oh and thanks les for the canceled biz baz rainy fun day! Hooray!!!

Random Puppies!

No better way to break up the monotonous kate blog post formula with some random puppies!


Aren't they cute? My sis shared this pic with me says they are wauzers (half westie and half miniature Schnauzer) that her friends from Haida Gwaii have! Too bad they are all spoken for otherwise I think leslie and I would need to take an emergency ferry ride over to snag them up! Hope the fuzzy cuteness perked up your day! Hooray!

So true...

I came across this and couldn't resist posting it:


Thanks internet for being there every morning when I get up, for letting do oodles of shopping in my pjs, and for being a constant source of inspiration and geekery! Yay!