I LOVE REAL SIMPLE + COASTAL LIVING + BLUEJEAN BALL Yarmouth Style

okay--this week was lovely...Real Simple Magazine put the hand screened bark cloth print in the Mag under deals and well, we have had a ton of orders and a lot of hits--thank you so so much! WIND is out there in the world in a BIG way thanks to this amazing Mag and amazing April Hardwick (amazing writer who got me in Country Living and now REAL SIMPLE...)


Another amazing super surprise blurp was that a dear friend sent me a text that my print AU's "Mrs. Robinson" Raincoat Cotton Zip SPRINT in LEMON is on Page 66 of OCTOBER in COASTAL LIVING!. What a wonderful little silo pic of this bag that I actually picked out for me personally out of all the Mrs. Robinson bags. 


Great for AU--I hope they sell like mad for them! I can't tell you how powerful these little blurps are...such gifts--every single one of them...


Recovering today from ARY Birthday Party Madness--will post that next..it was a perfect raining day for a tea party. 


The other thing I wanted to post is a fun poster I was asked to do for a new up and coming fund raiser event presented by the Yarmouth Education Foundation: BLUEJEAN BALL! Music + Food + Dance with Live music from thiswayband! 


xo e

Grandma Vivian

I have been out of my mind busy last two or so weeks--more then normal. Totally behind on all things, but thankful work is sweeping in + the cool days here are telling me that Fall has arrived.


I love to just hunker down and create during the Winter months (let's face it, this girl loves to work on design anything:)---so many cool projects..two new shapes for bags, round pillows that I am seriously in love with and more prints then I could ever print in 10 years. What to do with them all? I wish I had more time to just burn new screens daily so I can just see them instantly on fabric, wood, paper--what ever. Never enough time but so so thankful.


I have been missing my grandmother who moved to Arizona from here in Maine a lot lately and been finding myself sending her flowers randomly when ever I miss her more then I can bare. Her name is Vivian. I don't even know how long she has been gone. I think I blocked it out--I think it is 2 years now. Some how her voice smiling on the other end of the telephone as she tells me all about each individual flower, petal by petal, every delicious detail and color makes me a little less sad. 


From the time I was a little girl she has been a beacon of light for me. Strong, nurturing and has these sweet gray blue eyes that melt your heart no matter what the circumstances. She just has this way about her that makes me smile, just miss that.  

 Because I knew somehow that it would be a long time before I saw her again, I talked her into doing a photoshoot with me and Cliff Kucine. (A dear dear friend who captures people amazingly)...I wanted a few shots of us just being together--no kids, no husbands or any other family member. Selfishly I wanted her all to myself...and I wanted to remember that moment. It was funny, as soon as I heard she was moving, I missed her...I was not ready for her to move, or move on or go anywhere for that matter. She moved here to Maine and was here 5 or so years and I loved it. I would visit often and she and I would sit and drink ice tea on her porch. As time went on I did not visit as often being so busy as we all get, but our time spent together was not wasted. We would chat it up for hours...


As a 30 something woman, I really didn't feel any different holding her hand from the many days as a little girl looking up into her eyes and laughing. You establish a bond between a grandparent..it changes you, fullfills you and makes you whole. Our walks talking would guide me, nurture me, mold me. God how I miss her. I haven't looked at these pics since she left and finally pulled out this glorious CD of images. I made her a book a few holidays back of all the great shots--but not until now have I really looked at them, or studied them, needing to see her eyes, the wrinkles, her soul. I just wanted or needed to look at them. 


Pulling them out made me smile, laugh, remember, cry...but they have been good to see. Thank you so much Cliff for taking the time to capture these moments that I so needed to remember today. 


I don't feel sad often, I rarely get unhappy...but missing someone is like a windy day where you can't seem to take a breath...where the constant pushing and pulling comes in waves then lingers... soon I will just get on a plane--solo if I have to (total wimp about traveling alone) just be close to her for a weekend to reconnect. Thank God for phones, but I miss her sweet smell of perfume and her laughing eyes by my side. Soon..soon we will drink tea and I will be mesmerized by her strength and beauty, and not while holding a piece of plastic, but holding her hand.


e 

Aryana is turning 4!

Ary Is turning 4. I know. Crazy. So cliche but seriously it has gone so fast--where does the time go? 


Her little vision to me is dress up + tea. (her latest obsession is mint tea in the morning?) So her little request for a tea party party made perfect sense to me.


I just finished this little invite for her and hopefully will screen print some little t-shirts for her friends the day of the party. It is always a highlight for the kids to see us mix ink and print. So so fun. 


Looking forward to all the new work I am doing right now and seriously obsessing about what to print and on what.  A lot of  things in the works as far as new licensing opportunities but none are confirms or a done deal at the moment. Seems like they come in waves...and so thankful people are asking for custom designs and graphic design work...keep it coming! These girls need to go to college ! :)


Happy Weekend everyone...
Best, e

Picnic 2011

 Photo By kai paine http://www.yandp.tv/

Left to Right// Olan Boardman from Ktaadn, Eliza Jane Curtis, Jennifer Judd-Mcgee +
myself, Erin Flett + little Breshia out front. 

PICNIC – music + arts festival was a great success with over 100 vendors nestled in Lincoln Park down town Portland, Maine. It is always my favorite show due to the amazing variety of cool vintage venders as well as friends old and new that are in this unique world of selling their passion--what ever that may be. 

Maslen and I hung our newest creation of curtain panels done up in the STACKED DECO repeat pattern as well as brought VERA our vintage dress form that displayed my new hand screened bark cloth bags---

Breshia + Ary (my sweet girls sitting in the photo above) came by courtesy of Mimi (Maslen's Mum) and stayed for a while and visited our neighbor every other second (Aimsel, dear friend that creates amazing paper journal books that are recycled record albums). It turned out to be a beautiful perfect day before IRENE came through...we all were in homemade denial bliss... 

A call out to some amazing designers that I was among...Eliza Jane Curtis, Olan Boardman from Ktaadn, and lovely Jennifer judd-mcgee.

I took all but the amazing collage that was taken from  kai paine lovely blog: YOUNG & PRETTY. Enjoy. e

MUSHROOMS (Images from our woods in back of our home)

 

Just a few of the million images I have taken out on our many walks in the woods lately. I have had ample time with little Ary since B is back in school. Our ritual is to go on our "mommie day" walks and find cool anythings that we find around our home. We have 4 acres of woods behind our home that we explore, walk around and of course, lately climb in since Ary and B both have discovered climbing trees...which is a thrilling and often for me terrifying event. I love seeing them in the trees but, yes..afraid that they will fall and break something. But with both of them, I am finding that they do fall...but bounce up and do it all over again. No broken bones to date. (A great metaphor for life for me really).


But on our most recent walks I have discovered the mushroom. I am so overwhelmed by the simple beauty of these little specs of color in the mist of all the dead leaves and twigs. The ground floor of the woods are deep with many many layers of leaves and branches and due to the large amounts of rain recently..these little gems are popping up everywhere. They force themselves up from the sea of layers...which always inspires me due to all the textures, color and sometimes lack of color. The ridges and detail of every facet of these mushrooms are amazing. My family and Mas (husband) and most likely my kids at this point are over them, or over me obsessing over them...but I find them to be a amazing piece of soft sculpture in this very rough and most of the time hard and rough elements here in our Maine forest. I don't always share photos of my finds around here but I could not resist sharing these little magic moments.


The prints that I am inspired to create from these images are twig like, sprigs, and round mounds of color and shapes. Doesn't the yellow just make you happy? In all the mist of browns, and greens...the yellow is a welcome hello to me. They scream...come on in and take a look around. And that is what we did--Ary + me. xo e