The Road to Re:Make

It's been quiet over here on the blog and I wanted to pop in and share some photos of what I've been working on.  The preparation for Re:Make has been a lot more intense that I expected it to be.  It's been heads-down/plow-through for the last couple of weeks.

I'm debuting a collection of spring scarves at the event and I couldn't be more excited to show you!  There's vintage fabrics, bleached denim and lots of fabric dying going on over here.  Seriously stoked and totally nervous about this first show in Texas.  I've shown on the East Coast at Crafty Bastards, BUST and countless anime conventions (an awesome un-tapped audience, you guys), but this first show in my home state is definitely giving me anxiety haha!  There are so many amazing makers here who have been so welcoming and supportive, I just want to make a good showing.

Here's some snapshots of the madness that is our apartment right now ^_^

Sprinkles doesn't appreciate the lack of attention.  But, she generally doesn't approve of much, really.

But despite Sprinkles feelings on the whole thing, you should totally come out to the show!  Check out this post to see more details.  I'd love to meet you!

Collections • Kokeshi Dolls

I am totally fascinated with Japanese culture (as evidenced by my blog name haha).  Japanese art history in particular is just so cool and my Kokeshi doll collection is a great example of how the culture of the time impacted the art.  They were made in the 1600s by artisans who normally specialized in tableware.  The artisans used a lathe in their regular trade and started making small dolls as souvenirs for people who would visit hot baths near their villages in the winter.  They grew in popularity and started to spread all over Japan.

I found this amazing video of different artists who still make them today.  It's so cool to see them take shape and see how each artist decorates their work differently.

Some of mine are newer and mass-produced, others are vintage and handmade.  I've gotten them as gifts from Andy, as thrift store finds and as vintage boutique treasures.  Some even have hand drawn signatures on the bottom and would LOVE to find the artists who made them! 

I don't really have any favorites because each one is so different, it would just be impossible to choose.  I love all my girls, and one boy, equally!

This is an ever-growing collection and I can't resist a new one when I find it.  It's just physically impossible.  So if you ever see one you think is cute, let me know!  I always need more help scouting them out ^_^

10 Random Facts

So, I usually feel weird about posting things like this.  I wonder who really cares about the random stuff about me.  But I always love reading them about other people, and Kaelah inspired me to just do it.  Because it's fun :P

1. I've been a cat lady my whole life.  I grew up with three cats, one I rescued off the street when someone just threw her out the window of their truck on our street.  Don't worry, she was totally fine and lived a wonderful kitten life!  But yeah, I had cat curtains, cat sweaters...it was a whole thing even since I was little.
2. I hate Easter grass with the flaming passion of a thousand suns.  It sticks to everything and you inevitably get a piece stuck to the bottom of your foot in the middle of November and it's the worst thing ever.
3. I'm a recovering procrastinator.  It was so bad in school in that my dad had to help me catch like 50 bugs the night before a giant bug collection was due freshman year.  But by making lists every day of all I want to accomplish, I've been able to curb my desire to put everything off till the last minute.  I'm definitely not perfect...Buzzfeed still exists afterall.  But it's so much better and I feel a lot more at peace during the days because it's not a constant frenzy to get stuff done.
4. I grind my teeth at night like a crazy person.  After I got my braces off, I had one of those plastic retainers and literally ground holes in it!  But I got a new, beefy retainer that acts more like a mouth guard than it does keeping my teeth straight haha.
5. I have a love for chocolate that rivals Deanna Troi's.  I'm pretty sure we've got something chocolate in the house at all times.  My mom always said, it's not dessert if it's not chocolate.  A mantra to live by.
6.  When I was 16, my family moved from Texas to Maryland.  It was one of the hardest times in my life.  Looking back, I wouldn't trade those years for anything and I think I'd be a totally different person if I'd stayed in Texas.  Having DC and Baltimore so close, it was incredible to experience those cities and grow up in such a diverse place.  Plus, I met my husband...so I'm eternally grateful for that move.
7. As a teen in the 90s, my most favorite boy band was Hanson.  I was absolutely one of those girls with the t-shirts and a bedroom covered in posters.  I might still follow them and have all their albums :P It seems like people judge my taste in music when they find that out...but I'll always love them.  There's nothing I can do haha!
8. Sometimes I measure how good a movie is by how many times it made me cry.  So far Return of the King is the best movie ever made.
9. If there are tortilla chips in front of me, I will eat them till they're gone.  Especially if there's queso.  Baskets at restaurants...gone.  Open bag on the couch...whole thing gone in one sitting.  There's really no such thing as moderation when it comes to tortilla chips.  Now I really want some.
10. Pink has aways been my favorite color.  I even rocked bright pink hair for 3 years.  I just think it's a fun color it makes me happy to see it ^_^

You Can't Use Up Creativity

Lately, my creative juices have been flowing so much that I've got stacks of notebooks full of new ideas and projects.  So much so that it's hard to figure out what to do first...I want to do everything!

When I was at TxSC this summer, Elsie and Emma were the keynote speakers and they addressed a question about running out of ideas.  If they were ever afraid they'd get burnt out and just run out of new stuff to write about.  Their answer was great.  It's just not something they think about.  Ideas come when you're inspired and those ideas breed even more.

So I guess the moral of the story is not worry about running out of ideas.  It's a pretty great state of mind.  Just let the ideas flow.  And for goodness sake always write them down!

30 is the new 20

Today is my 30th birthday!

Everyone's been saying about how this is a big one, talking about the last few days of my 20s and that got me thinking on the past and how I really spent the last decade of my life.

The start of my 20s was in Maryland.  I was spending time getting a business degree from community college and working as a manager for a video game store.   Working with my friends, going out eat on the weekends and generally playing lots of games and making stuff.  I was still at home and it was a pretty care-free time to be hanging out in Annapolis.  I was close enough to DC and Baltimore to go to rock shows.  Living on 4 hours of sleep a night between the shows and my video games was no big deal.

A couple of years later I started The Pink Samurai.  The blog and my Etsy shop where I just kind made whatever I wanted and wrote about silly stuff (seriously...do not go through these archives haha!).  Growing up surrounded by a family of artists, entrepreneurs and community leaders it was kind of inevitable that I started my own business.  And after having spaces on Angel Fire (please tell me you remember Angel Fire pages!), Live Journal, Xanga and MySpace, a real blog was the next step.

After working as a bank teller for a little while and getting steady business on Etsy selling pin-back buttons at the time, I decided to finish up my four year degree.  I ended up going to a school on the Eastern Shore of Maryland.  The campus was half an hour from the beach, which was a big selling point haha!  Despite being well into my 20s, I had still been living at home, a more common occurrence even now, and this was the first time I'd be moving out on my own.

I loved my classes and graduated with honors, an award and was obsessed with graphic design.  This was when I really started following tons of blogs and evolving my personal style.  I just wanted to be plugged in with the design scene all the time.  Constantly looking for inspiration, I was designing buttons, prints, bags, just anything I could get my hands on.  I was lucky enough to a design job pretty soon after school and met this cool dude who quickly turned into my bff.  I was in awe of Andy's talent and I don't think he knew how much of an influence he was (and still is) on the evolution of my drawing style.

Without going into too much detail, I had been in a relationship for about 9 years, a majority of my 20s, that didn't end well.  But out of that difficulty came the best thing to ever happen to me.  I learned a lot about myself during that time.  What I wanted from life, how I wanted to spend my time and most importantly, how I wanted to be treated.  I found the most perfect person on the planet for me and married him up!

The last three years of my 20s were incredible.  Full of love and fun and growth and kittens!  I've been traveling, making new stuff and really building a future with my husband.  I couldn't ask for anything more.

• • • • •

It's really amazing how much your life can change in just ten years.  Life has a funny way of throwing you for a loop.  I think it's good to be open-minded and really embrace those changes and use them to evolve.  So bring on the 30s!  I'm so stoked for this new chapter!

Life Lately • Sleepy October

Things have been pretty quiet around here this October.  We had my sister-in-law visit last week, which was pretty much the best ever.  I love her so much and we had a blast taking her everywhere and feeding her everything.  Seriously.  We ate...so much.  

Other than that, it's been extra quiet and we've been taking it pretty slow.  I've been spending time arranging the house, playing with kittens and making bells in Animal Crossing.

We looove Animal Crossing!  How could you not?  I've got all my rooms and I'm currently expanding each one.  My house is pink and both Andy and I are stoked for all the silly Halloween things going on in the game.  So fun!

We haven't done much Halloween decorating, but I did get out my Hello Kitty buckets ^_^ I found the tin at Paper Bear last week and couldn't pass it up!  The candy inside is sour cherry (gross :P), so they're going to stay right where they are haha.

I totally forgot about this quick DIY I made a couple of weeks ago.  In my quest to store everything we own, I got a few plain wooden boxes and painted them with simple white details.  I'll definitely share them soon.  These shallow boxes are perfect for holding all our colored Copic markers.

Decorating our new home has been a slow but steady process.  A few new kokeshi dolls have turned up in the last few weeks.  I love how this collection is growing!

So things are quiet, but good.  I've spent the day organizing new posts and planning fun places to go and things to make.  I'm glad you guys are here to share in the things I get up to ^_^  Now I'm going to hop out to the post office in the frigid 50° weather to put a scarf in the mail.  Happy Wednesday!

A Vintage Weekend

This weekend we tootled down from North Austin to visit a couple of vintage sale events going on in town.  On Saturday we checked out North Loop for their sidewalk sale / block party.  Room Service Vintage, Ermine Vintage and Hog Wild Vintage all had huge sales and lots of stuff outside to peek through.  All the other shops around were participating, too.  There was music playing, plenty of people perusing the shops and a light cool breeze blowing.  Pretty much the perfect day.

Room Service had a bunch of furniture outside.

And lots of tschotskes!

I do have a smidge of bad news that we found out while checking out the shops.  Turns out the owner of Hog Wild Vintage is retiring and the 21st was their last day in business.  Cue, devastation.  I was introduced to a couple of the vendors, though, who are working on getting their own shop up and running.  So I'll definitely keep you posted on any new developments.  Hog Wild will be missed, but I'm glad it was by the owner's choice, and I wish him well in this next chapter of his life! 

On Sunday we took a trip over to South 1st St. to visit Amelia and check out her porch sale.  She brought a couple of other vendors to show in her wonderful back yard.  Our first stop, however, was Mellizoz Tacos!  I've been wanting to bring Andy here since I ate their ridiculous B.A.T. breakfast taco during a lunch break at Blogcademy.  It was such a gorgeous day to sit under the trees, with the cool breeze blowing and stuffing our faces with tacos :P 

After gorging ourselves, we took the quiet little back streets over to Amelia's.  She had so much great stuff!  And I got to meet Rebekka from Bloomers & Frocks!  Seriously...you guys need to buy everything these ladies sell.  They've got Etsy shops, too, in case you're not in the Austin area. (Amelia's Etsy, Bloomers & Frocks' Etsy)

I'm kicking myself for not getting a few things while we were there.  There was this little 40's polka dot number I'm still thinking about.  So cute!

The moral of the story is: move to Austin and frequent vintage shops ^_^  You find cool stuff and make fun new friends.

Did anyone else have a fabulous weekend?  I want to know else was going on during the first of Fall!

3 Places to find Creative Inspiration that aren't Pinterest

I  love Pinterest.  I really do!  It's one of my favorite sites and I use it every day.  But sometimes when I'm using it to find inspiration, I can get stuck in a downward spiral of pins and spend my hours searching instead of creating.  So while Pinterest can be a wonderful place to get ideas, it's time to close that tab and put your laptop to sleep.  Step away from the screens and the let the world inspire you!  These are all places I go to get away from the internet and soak up new ideas. 


 THE LIBRARY 
A magical place!  Take some time to peruse the stacks and venture of your discipline.  If you're a writer, wander the art history section.  If you're an artist, poke around in the magazines.  Think outside the box and wander around, reading the spines, flipping through the pages and keeping an open mind.  There's inspiration all around.

 WINDOW SHOPPING 
Take a walk.  Feed off the energy of your town and the people around you.  Peek in the shops and see what people are creating.  Window displays, merchandise, the folks on the sidewalk.  You might even make some new friends!

 THE OUTDOORS 
Find a park or walking trail where you can take in nature.  The sounds.  The colors.  The smells.  Take inspiration from the patterns and the animals.  Just sit and be for a while.  It's a great way to clear your head and get away. 

What's in my Bag: Real People Edition

 Everyone's seen blog posts about "what's in my bag".  They're nothing new, though I always love seeing them.  Except, most of them are bs.  I'm guilty of it, too. Carefully omitting the embarrassing stuff that you find in the deep in the bowels of your handbag, and only showing that cute lipstick and moleskin.  But this is not that kind of post.  I didn't sugar coat anything.  These were the exact contents of Kitty when I took the photo.  I'd just come back from the gym (there's one in our apartment complex), so my phone and keys weren't there.  But this is everything.  I'm showing you my soul...bandaid wrappers and all...

1. Vintage Around Town Guide 2013.  This had been crumpled in my purse since our first weekend in town.  I've had to scribble a lot of my own notes for other shops and details about them, though.  So this little piece of paper is invaluable to me!
2. Cards from TxSC, Blogcademy and from thrift shops I've visited.
3. All the makeup! Neutrogena lip balm, Sugar (I need this with me at all times), They're Real mascara, hand sanitizer from this weird ER we went to once, Revlon Colorburst Lip Butter in Lollipop, Essie nail polish in Mint Candy Apple, my inhaler cuz asthma sucks, the nail file I told you about here, my Hello Kitty compact from Sephora, hair ties/bobbi pins, empty prescription bottle and my favorite sunglasses.
4. My Square!  All makers should have one with them at all times.  I'll sell you the scarf off my neck!
5. Pens and pencils.  The pink pencil is from our wedding and I always keep a sharpie with me.  You never know when you'll need it.
6. My business cards.  I always have these with me, too.  It helps when I'm visiting thrift shops to give the folks a way to contact me and it kind of legitimizes what I'm doing haha.  I'm not just some creep in their shop :P  Oh...and my Hello Kitty tin with Tylenol.
7. A sticker from Room Service that I picked up when I visited a few weeks ago.
8. A pile of gum wrappers, lozenge wrappers and...band aid wrappers.  Gross!  I always keep band aids with me incase my shoes decide to eat my feet.  But sometimes there's not a trashcan and I Don't Mess with Texas.
9. Receipts!  Some of them I need for accounting purposes...but most are just trash.
10. My Hello Kitty coin purse...that's empty.  But I found two pennies at the bottom of my bag, so now they have a home.  I got it from the Sanrio store at Lakeline Mall.  I lost my mind when we found out it was there!  The employees might know me be name...
11. A drawing for plans we've got to build a shelving unit.  So excited to get started on this!
12. My Hello Kitty wallet from Sanrio.

That's it!  All forreals...nothing faked or added or taken away.  Not gonna lie, I'm little embarrassed at the amount of trash in there haha!  But it is what it is.  I cleaned it out after this shot anyway.  No more wrappers or receipts.  The rest went right back in, though.  Is there anything in your bag that's embarrassing?  

///A few of the product links are amazon affiliates.  I also recommend checking Sephora for any of the beauty products listed.  And you can pick up a couple of them at your local drugstore, or Target, too.  Let me know if you have any questions!

How to Stop Biting Your Nails

Now, I'm not a doctor, or a therapist, or an expert on habitual behavior.  But I used to bite and pick at my fingernails like whoa and figured out how to stop.  My nails were a hot mess.  Not gonna lie, I would even pick them down to the quick sometimes and they'd hurt like hell for days.  I know...it's gross! So I figured I would share what worked for me, incase you're ruining you're cute mani right now.


Noticing your Triggers 
I knew that my picking and occasional biting was a stress reaction.  A nervous habit.  My first step to stopping was to take note of when I was doing it.  Breaking out of that nail-trance could be difficult, but I found that I was really going for it during work.  I had a stressful job in a fast-paced environment, and it was starting to get to me. Specifically during meetings.  Once I knew this was when I exhibiting that habitual behavior, I could consciously stop myself from doing it.  It didn't always work, but just being aware helped me change the conditions and the behaviors.

Deep breaths and occupying my hands with other things helped when I noticed I was going to town.  Doodles in my note pad, holding my hands in my lap, and interlocking my fingers together and putting my hands on the desk infront of me (especially during meetings) would help focus my attention away from the habit and force myself to stop.

Nail Files are your BFFs 
So besides the stressful triggers, if there was a snag in my nail, I'd immediately go to pick at it.  This would ruin the nail with the snag, and if one nail was ruined, then the rest were fair game.  Carrying a nail file with me all the time really helped.  Instead of going to pick, I would go for the file instead.  This would stop the snag from getting any worse and remove the temptation to pick.  I just get those cheap-y little packs and they do the trick for me!  I've got a few in my bag, on my desk and in my car just in case.

Super Cute Mani 
Another way I avoided ruining my nails was to paint my nails.  For a while it was a weekly "me time" kind of thing.  Spending a little time each weekend choosing fun color palettes to use and just chillin' out while they dried.  Having my nails done acted as a deterrent, because I didn't want to ruin the cute polish.  It looked cute and I spent the time on them, so I didn't want to mess it up.  Just be careful you don't pick the polish off!


I hope these tips can help you out if you find yourself with lil nubbin nails!  I haven't picked or bitten my nails in over 3 months and I know you can cut it out, too.  Bad habits are hard to break, but not impossible!

Life Lately • Summer Days

As I decompress from another weekend of intense learning, I thought it would be fun to share a little bit about what's going on around Helms Deep.  We're gearing up for fall and still getting our new little home together.  Turks (above) is getting into everything.  Right now, at this very moment as I write, he's wiggin' out under the bed.  He loves the new bed skirt.  Weirdo.

Sprinkles is constantly in her favorite window spot and ignores most everything that's going on in the house.  Until you go to pour some water from the faucet.  To her, new water is better water and she's freaks out for it like treats.  Why are my cat's such weirdos?  They're way cute, thought, right?!  Look at that little paw!

Andy got me the coolest new cup! BMO! It's made my desk ever cuter and more fun ^_^ 

Our Tron collection is out and also fun and awesome.  We've been watching the new cartoon, which I really hope gets picked up for another season.  It's just such a cool world and the visuals are so different from everything else out there right now.  I would definitely recommend it if you're into the movies at all.

These are for a fun new project I teased a little bit about on instagram.  I've got a few made and I'm planning for a fun launch before the holidays!

It's been such a full month already and we've still got a couple of weeks left!  August is notoriously the hottest in Texas and I be lying if I said I didn't want a reason to wear a scarf right now haha!  How's August been treating you?  Are you ready for Fall...or want to hang on to Summer a little be longer?

Life Lately - Decorating for Fun and Creative Inspiration

As I mentioned in yesterday's Daily Drawing post (that have really turned into a diary of sorts), we've gotten most everything out of boxes and now we're on to decorating!  I've been referencing the Style Your Space e-course, that's offered over on A Beautiful Mess, and really taking my time with the process.  I want to make a space that's equal parts: homey, welcoming and creatively inspiring.

 Homey 
To me, this means photos.  All those great candids that give you a warm feeling as you remember where you were and who you were with.  Travel photos or just funny shots of the cats around the house.  A lot of homes in the house tours I see on design blogs are really missing out photographs and I think they seem a little sterile because of it. It's just so fun to share photos and moments with visitors! "Oh yeah, that's the time we climbed over the railing on White Rock Mesa and stood out on the edge!" or "That's when Andy was painting the custom domo I got him for Christmas!"  I love sharing those things and being able to relive them every day!

So there are lots of frames to buy and film to develop!  One of my goals for the summer is to take more photos so we can really record our first year here together.

 Welcoming 
I love Texas.  Anyone who knows me knows that I'm kind of ridiculously in love with this place.  So I want everyone I know to come stay with us so they can experience the people, the food, the fun community and everything else this great state has to offer!  In making our home welcoming, I want to have comfy places for people to crash, lost of seating so folks can sit around and watch movies and visit, and a fully stocked kitchen so I can feed everyone!  I want this to be a fun place and for everyone to know they're welcome anytime!

We sold / got ride of a lot of furniture for the move, but we've got some chairs that just need to be picked up and a lot of space that needs to be organized in the living room...but that's current longish-term goal.  There's some reupholstery in our future and the thought is kind of daunting haha!

 Creatively Inspiring 
Both of us are artists and are not shy to display all our geeky stuff.  I'm so excited to cover our walls with all the art we've been collecting together!  I've been working on our desk space and try to make it fun and bright with different textures and lots of color.  The two embroidered pieces are Andy's drawings and I made them just for that spot.  He actually drew Link right on the fabric!  In bringing different mediums to the space, I'm hoping to remind us that there are so many different ways to make awesome stuff ^_^  I think I'll do a couple of small paintings, too!  My goal is to have fun artwork everywhere you look in our space.

My next steps, which are on my to-do list today, is to measure all our un-framed pieces and pick up some frames!  I'm super excited to work on the gallery that will go above the couch, but we need so many frames!

So there's still a lot to do, but we've already come so far!  I'll post more photos as everything really starts to come together.  And maybe a few DIYs for some of the projects that are starting to pop up ^_^

Summer Magic

I can't tell you how much I love warm summer evenings.  When it's 8:30 before the sun starts going down and you can walk around outside, barefoot in shorts and tank top with a cool breeze that's not quite enough to give you a chill.  It's my favorite time of year!  Like literally...summer in the evening.  I like to be specific :P  

We put lights from our wedding up around the balcony (the fit so perfectly around the rail it's kind of silly) and we turn them on each night and spend a little time on the balcony.  The kittens hate it.  I know Turks would love nothing more than to come out here and immediately jump the 9 stories down to catch a bird.  And Sprinks is so bumbly she's be standing in the middle of the deck and fall off :/ 

 So we keep them safe outside, where they loooove to watch and yell at us from inside haha.  Anyway...it's a gorgeous evening and I'm outside working on some sketches, playing around online and listening to good music.  It's kind of the best.

Also, here's another photo of Sprinkles.

I've Been Everywhere

Spinkles and Me during a lazy Sunday ^_^


Andy and I are gearing up for a trip to Texas.  We've got a wonderful wedding to attend and I can't express how happy I am to be going back home for a bit.  It'll be nice to be around the gorgeous weather, phenomenal scenery and genuinely nice people.  I can't wait!

Daily Grind

Just checking in on the blog. My day job has been plugging along and most of the time it takes a lot out of me. By the time we both get home we're pretty wiped out and just veg out on the couch watching Star Trek TNG and Downton Abby. Not gonna lie, I kind of love it. But I do wish I had more time to spend on the things that I love doing. Making stuff...cooking...taking photos...

I like my day job and love the people I work with. I just wish that I could make buttons and design fun things while working instead of going to meetings haha. So it's time to be a little more dedicated and really make the time to do what I love ^_^

Feeling pretty good...here's giant photos of my face to prove it

<3