Stitching Up a Storm

Katie just moved into an adorable new apartment in Russian Hill, which gave us the perfect excuse for an crazy ambitious, late night craft project–pillow making. After discussing 3, 506 color/texture/pattern combination at Britex Fabrics (one can't just turn an art director brain off), Katie swiped her credit card, and we were committed.

Despite it being her virgin voyage with her sewing machine (even though she's owned it for four years), Katie and the machine preformed beautifully.





Sew a girl a pillow and she'll sleep well for a night. Teach a girl to sew and she'll sleep well for a lifetime. Or, until she finds new fabric she likes even better.

One-Upping Urban Outfitters

I have a love-hate relationship with Urban Outfitters. When I'm sick of sifting through dirty socks and logo-ed coffee cups at thrift stores, I love that I can go to UO, shell out five times more money and instantly get something that gives me some amount of hipster cred. I hate though, that when I go in there, I almost always also find some made-in-China version of something I've recently spent months making myself. I swear I'm in some secret Urban Outfitters focus group--a focus group that's so secret, I don't even know about it.

But this time, I'm one-upping Urban. I fell in love with this green fabric tapestry there. I backed it with brown cotton and now I'm quilting the hell out of it to create a queen-sized bed spread. Unfortunately, it probably won't be finished by the time UO is stealing my future children's creative ideas.

Bootie-licious

One of many pairs of baby booties I've cranked out lately. Stop reproducing people, I can't keep up!

Homemade Lip Gloss – Not As Charming As It Sounds

When I was home this Christmas, my mom, sisters, aunts and I tried a cranberry honey lip gloss recipe my mom had found in the newspaper.

As good as it looks simmering in that pot, I'm sad to report it didn't quite cut it as lip gloss. If it had been summertime, I'm sure a hummingbird would have tried to make out with my bright red, sugary lips.

Our Response to Threat Level Orange

A disclaimer: this isn't a current project. Mike and I screen printed this design back in 2005 (and if you're wondering, yes, the threat level was orange back then too. It'll be orange for my lifetime.) We made it as a sort of a joke. It was our way of reconciling the fact that we were going to endure another four years of Bush in the White House. Wearing it through the airport security line has proved to be quite an interesting social experiment.

Cohabitation Cooperation

What's a girl to do when she moves in with a boy who only has one pint-sized closet?

a. Each get rid of some clothes and share the closet
b. Buy plastic shelves at Home Depot and put them in the front hallway
c. Refinish some gym lockers and roll your clothes into little balls like you're in middle school P.E.

We agreed immediately A wasn't going to happen. We agreed not-so-immediately B wasn't going to happen (Boy needed a lot of convincing about why this wasn't an acceptable solution). And after several weeks of tripping over each other and our clothing carpet, we agreed C was the way to go.

I found some decent lockers on Craigslist and drove 40 miles to pick them up before work one day.

Once we got them up to our fourth floor apartment, I set to scrubbing, sanding and painting them on our fire escape.

I worked well into the night, many nights, spray painting by flashlight.


Our neighbors might now have slightly diminished lung capacity, but we have a bounty of new cubbies in which to store our stuff.

Stamping With Lotta Jansdotter

Recently Katie and I went to the Craft Gym (yes, can you believe this actually exists? Idea #483 that I wish I would have thought of.) Lotta Jandotter was there promoting her new book. Consequently, lots of crafty women, including me and Katie showed up to play with paint.

These are a few of the swatches we made with potato stamps. My mom used to make us potato stamps when I was little, and now they're how I decorate wrapping paper every Christmas.

Delicious Domestic Bliss

Two of my good friends are getting married (to each other--yay!) soon. They're a great match: the guy really loves to bake, and the girl really loves to eat, so I made them some aprons as a wedding gift.

Carton Craftiness

Katie and I just launched this spiffy new brand site for the California Milk Processor Board (the "got milk?" people.)

Being the crafty girls we are, we decided it would be cool to create some projects people could make from their empty milk cartons and jugs.

We designed the projects, cut, glued, taped, painted and even photographed the final products in our office (which looked like a pre-school classroom for much of March.) Fittingly, the site was launched on Earth Day.

Here are a few of recycled creations. See them all and download the instructions for each of them here.

The Everlasting Mother's Day Bouquet:




















Skimbot 2000, the Milk-Drinking Robot:





















Free as a Bird Feeder:




















Carton Cottage:


















Put Your Money Where Your Milk Is Wallet:

Commit To the Knit

Back in the Boulder days, Katie and I started a knitting club. One night a week we'd all meet at the Boulder Bookstore, order the $5 pie and chai special and get our knit on. Katie and I screen printed these skull-and-knitting-needle "Commit to the Knit" shirts for the crew.