Malt bunny's cousins

Awhile back I showed you the malt bunny that I got for Lachlan. Well, Lachlan loved Malty Bunny so much that he decided that his cousins needed to have Bunny's cousins for Christmas (is it odd that one of Malt Bunny's cousins is a Malt Doggy?). And so that there is no mistaking which animal belongs to which cousin, they each have their own custom knit sweater with the girls' initials and made in their favorite color. They are being shipped up north today.

Now Lachlan's Malt Bunny is feeling naked, so he's going to get his own custom sweater early next year. :)

If you need your own sweatered animal, you can visit Emily at Yarn Miracle.

Packages

It's been a busy few weeks for the packaging department of my Etsy shops. My new packaging supply shop has been particularly busy recently between the Heartsy deal and everyone gearing up to wrap Christmas/holiday presents. I've had almost 140 orders -- most of them for multiple items -- since the beginning of November! Let's just say that because of my twice-daily visits to the post office to drop off packages, Lachlan and I are on a first-name basis with all of the people who work there.

Speaking of packages, I just picked up this one at the post office this morning. It's from an Etsy seller in Lithuania. I can't show you what's inside because most of them are Christmas presents (I'll show them to you once they get to their new homes!), but I thought the package was so neat. It's great to get mail any day, especially a package of goodies, but it's extra special when you know it's traveled so far to get to you. And I love seeing how postal services in other countries label and stamp their mail.

This week has been really hectic and I'm feeling exhausted and Lachlan and Sadie are feeling neglected, so I'll be taking the afternoon off to sip hot chocolate (they say it's going to start snowing any minute) and finally put my own wrapping supplies to good use as I get busy with all the Christmas presents that are stacked up in my closet!

I hope you all have a wonderful weekend!

November giveaway winner: G&M

Thanks to everyone who entered the November giveaway! The winner was comment 2 left by G&M. Yay! I'll contact you in just a bit to get your address. The African critters are packed and ready to move to their new home!

Thanks so much to everyone who entered the giveaway! You all qualify for 50% off everything in the shop today through December 4. Use the code handwork50 (be sure to enter it in the area for "coupon code" NOT in the notes to seller) to get anything you want, including your own set of critters! I still need to list a lot of the discontinued critters in the shop, so if you are interested in a particular animal, send me an email and I'll let you know if I have any. :D

The critter cards are back! November giveaway

I'm sliding in just under the wire with November's giveaway! The new and improved critter cards are finally back! I have four sets -- woodland, farmyard, African, and Australian/New Zealand -- with four different animals/colors in each set of 12.

The winner of this giveaway will get their choice of one 12-pack set of any critter collection. To enter, check out the shop to see all four collections and then post a comment here letting me know what critter set you'd like to win! Open to international entries. Deadline for entries is midnight EST November 30.

And while you're in the shop, feel free to take advantage of the 25% discount good now through November 28. Use code THNKS25.

I hope everyone has a wonderful Thanksgiving, and I'll see you back here next week!

Paper and Present + Heartsy

Update: I got my days mixed up, and the Heartsy deal is currently available to VIPs today, even though it doesn't "officially" start until tomorrow. ;)

The Heartsy deal for Paper and Present starts on Wednesday the 23rd, but it's for VIPs only. Only 50 vouchers will be available, so get yours in a hurry if you're interested (and are a VIP). Or you can use your own special discount, which is good through November 26. :)

Paper and Present

Well, I've been talking about it for long enough, so here it is: my other, other Etsy shop, Paper and Present.

For as long as I can remember I have loooved packaging supplies -- stickers, little bags, fancy doo-dads to dress up packages, pretty ribbons and strings, pretty tissue paper, etc. And I'm in love with the new trend of kraft paper and baker's twine!

After Lachlan was born I found it difficult to keep up with my letterpress printing. The presses are out in the workshop in an environment that isn't exactly practical for an infant, let alone a toddler. So I put a lot of my big plans for my letterpress shop (like wedding invitations) on hold for now and decided to limit my offerings to things that I could easily print in just an hour or two while the baby sitter or the husband is available.

But I'm the kind of person who is just itching to be doing something all the time, and my letterpress shop gave me the Etsy bug.

I wanted to do something at least a little creative but I needed to be able to do it while standing at my kitchen counter where I can keep an eye on Lachlan (and that I can easily put down to go play with him). I did a lot of soul searching and came up with the idea to try selling packaging and gift wrap supplies. I started small, just selling colored envelopes and stickers that I already stocked for my letterpress shop. I slowly added things a little at a time as more people discovered my shop. And as I mentioned in a previous post, this new shop is even busier than my letterpress shop!

Things are getting busy now as people gear up for holiday gift-giving. I have my shop almost completely stocked with items (even some letterpress goods!). I have just a few more things to add in the next few days. I have a Heartsy deal ($10 for $20 store credit) for the shop coming up very soon (I'll let you know when), but this deal will be limited to 50 vouchers and will be for VIPs only.

But all you lovely blog readers are VIPs to me! So I'd like to offer you the same deal, only better! Between now and November 26, you can purchase whatever you want from the shop for 50% off! And there is no $20 limit to hold you back, so feel free to go hog wild. Just use coupon code "Handwork" when you check out. I have plenty of almost everything (a few letterpress items are limited), so if something is sold out and you can't live without it, let me know and I'll get more into the shop for you.

Happy shopping! :D

Three sneak peeks

I mentioned yesterday that I have four different shops in the works. I have my letterpress stationery shop (Paper Ink Press) and my letterpress surplus shop (i.e., the stuff my mean husband says we don't have room for, aka I Heart Letterpress).

Then I mentioned that I have another Etsy shop that I opened this past May. I have something in the works for that shop right now, so I'll hold off on telling you about it until probably this Thursday or Friday.

And then I have this other shop. Well, it's not yet a shop. At the moment it's still mostly just a bunch of ideas rolling around in my head when I wake up at 3 AM and can't fall back asleep. But I'm slowly pulling the pieces of it together and sorting through my ideas. I had originally hoped to have the shop up and running by November 1, which then quickly became November 15. I had hoped to be ready for the holiday shopping frenzy, but then I had an honest talk with myself and decided there wasn't any way I could accomplish that while still maintaining my other projects and remaining even remotely sane.

I'm really excited about this new shop. It encompasses a lot of things I'm really interested in and passionate about. In the past I felt like I needed to just focus on one thing, but in reality I have so many different interests and I was always a bit sad that I didn't allow myself to follow up on some of them. That's how my latest Etsy shop first came up. It was the first small step forward in my attempt to branch out and do some things I really like while allowing me the flexibility to work at the kitchen counter while Lachlan hangs onto my pant leg.

As I mentioned yesterday, my latest Etsy shop has held its own so far, especially considering that I haven't done a single thing to promote it. And that gave me the confidence that maybe my ideas for this other shop will work, too. So now I'm following up on those ideas. I have big things in mind for this new shop, and I want to do things right. I hired a graphic designer to design the logo and all the business collateral, which is in the final stages of development at the moment. I also plan to really advertise and promote this shop, and because I want to do that in a thoughtful way, I probably will hold off on that--and the official opening--until next year.

In the meantime, I am hoping to have sort of a pre-grand opening hopefully by December 1 with a very limited offering of goods. I know how my mind works and I'll want several weeks to find my way with this new shop before I go whole hog with it. I'll also have some small items that will make great stocking stuffers, so I'm thinking of something along the lines of a small, limited time "pop-up shop" to make them available in time for the holidays. I'll certainly keep you posted on that, and on the general development of the shop in the coming weeks.

In the meantime, here are three small sneak peeks at a very small selection of things for the new shop. Confused? :)

HI (What's Up?)

What a perfectly appropriate title for today's blog post. I feel like it's been forever since I've been able to put any effort into this blog, and I apologize for that.

But up until this past Friday, the husband has been working in Australia. Except for about a week in September when he had a quick trip home, he's been gone for three months. I've been running myself into the ground trying to raise an infant, exercise and love a needy dog, design and print a whole bunch of new letterpress goods, start up and/or run four (yes, FOUR) different shops, and then do some freelance editing on top of it all (because I was SO stupid when I said yes to that project). Most days have extended to midnight or 1 AM, and at the end of that I just haven't had the brain power to blog.

But the husband is back now, and although I still haven't caught up on my sleep (somehow he always beats me to the couch for a nap) at least he has been around for a few days to occupy the two gremlins so I can start tying up some loose ends.

Here's one loose end that is getting tied up today: A new line of letterpress greeting cards.

It'll be part of a bigger post on another day, but for now let's just say that this past May I quietly opened up a new shop on Etsy (no, not i heart letterpress. A different shop). It's a little something I figured I'd try because I could easily do it at my kitchen counter while keeping an eye on Lachlan. And it has actually turned out to be somewhat successful. Quite successful, actually. In fact, except for my orders for birth announcements and sales generated through Heartsy, it is outperforming my letterpress shop.

And that got me thinking. It got me thinking that even though I have a whole room FULL of letterpress cards, I often find myself going to the store and (cringe) buying a card for someone for a particular occasion because 98% of my cards are generic flat cards for generic notes to someone. And these days, not a lot of people have the time to write generic notes. I know I don't.

So I've come up with a new line of greeting cards. They are two-color folded cards and they are for particular occasions, even if that occasion is just to let your friend know that you're still alive and thinking about them and wondering what they are up to these days.

I'm calling it my parenthetical collection. I've printed the first three cards, and this morning I ordered the plate for another 5 cards. They aren't anything over-the-top crazy in the design department. They get straight to the point. And these days, I'm all about straight to the point.

Here's the first one. So, yeah. Hi. What's up?

Extracurricular activities

I mentioned the other day that I'm working on another Etsy shop. Here's a tiny sneak peek at one of the things in the "new product development" department...

i heart letterpress

There is so much going on these days that I rarely even know what day of the week it is.

Here's one of the reasons I've been so busy, and thus a bad blogger.

It's one of my new Etsy shops: iheartletterpress. It's where I'm selling a lot of my antique letterpress type that I can't use and that the husband is tired of looking at. I have buckets and buckets and cases and buckets and boxes and cases and buckets of type to go through. I'm starting with the biggest size type because it takes up the most room. Right now I'm pulling out particular letters and selling them first. So far "ME & YOU" has been really popular. But I finally tracked down two Xs (which are always in short supply) so I think this XOXO will probably be a big hit, too. I also have a lot of antique wood type cases to sell, but I haven't had the time yet to figure out how to safely ship them at a reasonable price, so they'll be for sale hopefully one day soon.

And yes, you read that right. I said this is one of my new Etsy shops. That's another reason I'm so busy. More on that later. Well, hopefully sooner than later.

Malt bunny

I've been meaning to show you this adorable guy for awhile now. A few weeks ago, Emily from Yarn Miracle contacted me about getting some of my bear critter cards. She wanted to give them as thank you presents to people who were testing a bear knitting pattern for her.

Over the course of several emails back and forth, I got a real sense of what a fun woman Emily is. So out of curiousity I checked out her shop and blog and just fell in love with her animals. One thing led to another, and she got a few more cards from me and I sent one of her "Itty Bitty Buddies" to a friend who just had a baby.

Then one thing led to another again, and she got more of my cards and I got this AWESOME chocolate malt bunny.


I can't tell you how much I love him. Really. I just love him! I got him for Lachlan (because I love reading The Velveteen Rabbit to him), but I'm starting to think I'm going to keep him for myself!



If you need your own adorable companion animal or know someone who does, I can't recommend Emily enough. Act fast, though, because I noticed she has a note on her shop that her list fills up quickly for Christmas. Speaking of that, I'm heading back there now to look for some Christmas gifts!

And even if you don't plan to purchase a companion animal for someone, check out her listings anyway. They are so much fun to read! :)

Letterpress animal note cards on sale

For the past few months I've been working on streamlining some of my existing letterpress cards so that I can make room for some new things.

Probably the most popular thing I offer is the animal note cards in sets that include farm, woodland, African, and Australian animals. I also have a huge selection of dog breeds, and I was printing these cards in six different colors. It was difficult to keep so many different cards in so many colors in stock all the time, and the degree of difficulty increased exponentially once Lachlan was born. On top of that, the company that supplies my envelopes--which are the basis for my ink colors--discontinued one of my favorite colors and introduced a fun new color.

So I made the painful decision to discontinue all of the dog breeds and all but the four most popular animals for the other sets of cards. Because I have a lot of these cards already printed and in stock, they're currently on sale in the shop in sets of 3 for $6 (down from $7.50). If you ever wanted to get some animal note cards, here's a great opportunity. Once they're gone, they're gone forever except for custom orders of large quantities. In a few cases, the animal will be kept in the new sets but will be printed in a different color.

Here are just a few of the animals on sale now. You can see all of them in the shop here.

In other news, my Etsy shop now has a Facebook page! Feel free to drop by to say hello and find out about some great discounts and offers!

Happy birthday, Bug Bug

Happy Birthday to Sadie Bug! Well, her birthday was actually last month, but please don't tell her. She's already ignored so much now that Lachlan is here, I don't think her fragile emotional state could handle knowing I'm a little late with her present this year.

To celebrate Bug's fourth year, I bought her a new collar and some new ID tags.

The collar is from 3pooches on Etsy and I LOVE it. It's even more gorgeous in person, and even prettier than the last collar I got from them. You can get your own fancy collar like this, in a pattern called Violet, right here.



Sadie also got two new ID tags. Because she spends some time in NM when I go to visit her grammy and Grandpa Jack, I got her one tag with their phone number and one with mine. I got these tags from the Etsy seller the Copper Poppy. They are hand-stamped aluminum and so pretty in person! These two tags are the Bella and the Perla (a listing for the Perla wasn't available at the time of this post).





Now I'd better get going on that doggie birthday cake...

Bulk envelopes

I have a lot of things in mind for my Etsy shop this spring. It's just taking some time to get things done, seeing how I can only work on it for small bits of time each day. First up is something I've been planning for awhile: offering colored envelopes and flat cards for sale in bulk quantities.

I've started with the envelopes, and I'll be offering them in packages of 24 in assorted colors. There are three colors for each package (8 envelopes of each color), but I can swap the colors around if someone has a need for a particular color(s).



These are great for people who like to make their own cards or who want to dress up their regular mail. And just between you and me, these are the same envelopes sold by a major paper retailer but at a lower cost (because I like you. :). You can find them in my Etsy shop here.



The envelopes are A2 size and hold one-quarter of a sheet of paper (4.25x5.5 inches) or half a sheet of paper folded in half.



I also have some A6 envelopes leftover from various projects that I'll be offering at clearance prices, in case anyone has a particular need for these. They'll go in the shop in the coming days.

I'll also be adding the bulk flat cards just as soon as I get time to get them cut, packaged, photographed, etc...

I have a few other things in the queue that I'll tell you about soon! Hint: Think pretty envelopes and new letterpress goodies! Oh, and I'll be having a little giveaway very, very soon. :D

Apple hat

I hope everyone had a great Christmas! Ours was pretty quiet. We're just sitting around waiting for Goober to get here.

While I wait, I've been cleaning like a maniac. Can I just say how amazed I am by how much dust and dog hair accumulates on TOP of the blades of the ceiling fans. Yikes.

I've also been accumulating more cute things for Goober. Like this hat. It was sent to me as a thank you by a client for doing her New Year's cards under such a tight deadline and unusual circumstances.



This is quite possibly one of the cutest baby hats I've seen. It is 100% wool but is SO soft and snuggly I can't believe it. It came beautifully packaged with a nice card. It's made by the Etsy shop My Market Stall, and she has lots of wonderful "veggie" hats and felted wool bowls and other cute hats. I think I may have to order the bunny hat. Seriously, how cute is that?!



If you're looking for a high-quality and unique baby gift for someone, I highly recommend this Etsy seller!

New custom cards

I'm adding a new line of custom cards to my shop. I've had the designs for awhile, but I'm just now getting around to printing some of them. I printed these cards in a dark blue ink called blueberry at the end of last week, and I spent yesterday getting to know my new camera by taking pictures of them.

I concluded that the camera is smarter than I am! But I'm slowly figuring it out, and also realizing that now would be a good time to learn how to use Photoshop... Here are a few of the inital pictures I took.

For those of you who remember my horror over the box of 50th anniversary cards for the husband's aunt and uncle that went MIA in a USPS facility, you'll be relieved to know that the new set of cards arrived safe and sound in Pennsylvania yesterday. Thank goodness!



These cards were a custom order, and they were shipped off to Philadelphia on Saturday. I hope Susan likes them!



And these cards were printed early for a Christmas present for my aunt. I really hope she's not reading this post...








I've been messing around with a few different papers to line the envelopes for my aunt's cards, and I think I might go with this blue florentine paper. What do you think?

Margaret Meyer and Becky Fowler

Yesterday I discovered the work of Margaret Meyer. She is an amazing artist in Portland who was so, so lucky (in my opinion) to work on designing and fabricating the costumes for the stop animation film Coraline.

I discovered Margaret because she sells some of her art in her Etsy shop, and she asks people to share the stories that they make up based on the characters in her paintings. My brilliant and funny and unbelievably creative friend Becky (the one who loved to quote Pee Wee Herman during knitting class) actually took her up on this offer. Yesterday, her story--Chapter 1 of “Finders Keepers: A Summer Story (that Ends Sadly and Happily in the Fall)”--was posted on Margaret's blog.

The story was inspired by the rabbit and bird in this painting of Margaret's, called "Lost," and it is well worth your time to read the short story that Becky wrote about them. (And I'm not just saying that because Becky is a friend!) I suspect that you, like me, will be left begging Becky to tell the rest of the story and can picture Becky writing the entire book with illustrations by Margaret. I can but hope!

Painting and photo by Margaret Meyer.

Weeks 5 and 6 of the Great Letterpress Giveaway

*Just updated with a photo of the papaya animals!

I hope everyone enjoyed some rest and a lot of food over the Thanksgiving weekend! I know I did.

But now we're back in the real world, so I wanted to remind you that there is still time to enter the combined Weeks 5 and 6 letterpress giveaway. If you haven't already done so, you can enter up to two times. Be sure you go to the original post to enter (don't comment on this post because it won't count!).

If you just can't wait to win the cards, you can buy some now. My Etsy shop is back open and stocked with cards, most of which you've seen here, but there are some new ones. Today is the last day of my buy one, get one free special: buy any single card or set of 3 cards and receive a second single card or set of 3 cards of the same style and color for free!
 

You can see the selection of cards for the giveaway that are printed in pansy, guava, and rhubarb pie ink in the original post. Later today I'll post photos of the critters I printed yesterday, including the giraffe (which is probably my favorite critter so far!). Today I'll be printing the beaver, elephant, dachsund, rhinoceros, and squirrel. I'm excited to print the elephant. I think he may turn out to be cuter than the giraffe!

Thanksgiving

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone! How will you be celebrating today?

I wish I was going to be at my house so that I could make my table look like this gorgeous creation by 100 Layer Cake.

Instead, we'll be going to Santa Fe to my cousin's place. It will be nice to sit back and just stuff my face with turkey and cranberries!

In case you decide to do any online shopping over the long weekend, I wanted to let you know that my Etsy store is finally open again. I still have to post a lot of goods on there, but at least it is alive and kicking again!

My 3/50 Project: May

I realized the other day how far behind I am on chronicling my participation in the 3/50 Project.

So, here are my purchases for the month of May.

I got this adorable little bag from an even more adorable knitting and sewing shop in downtown Grand Junction, CO called Tangle, where they suggest you "get in touch with your inner knitter." As soon as I have some free time (ha!) I'm going to take a refresher knitting course from them.



While I was at Tangle, I saw a display of the most AMAZING lotions and soaps. They are from etsy seller Dress Green. Although Dress Green isn't technically local, they are an etsy shop, and that counts in my book. I gave these to my mom as part of her mother's day present, so I can't personally vouch for how they worked out. But I can tell you that these are the most fabulous smelling lotions and soaps I think I've ever come across. I'm waiting for a "woe is me" day so I can justify buying some of them for myself!



In late May, I took the husband to Ouray, CO to celebrate his birthday. While we were there, we bought these amazing pottery pieces from San Juan Pottery. These two pieces are for us; we bought some other pieces, but they're future gifts for people so they have to remain secret. I just love the colors in these. I could stare at them for hours.



We stopped in another cute shop in Ouray. I forget the name of it, but the woman mostly takes vintage denim clothing and sews cute little buttons and lace on them. She also had a few other interesting antique items. The husband spotted this silk embroidered tapestry hanging on a wall.



He immediately fell in love with it.



The woman was unsure of the age or origins, but thought it is probably from Japan some time before World War II.



So we snatched it up before she could change her mind about selling it.