Cyber Monday

Tomorrow, November 30th, is CYBER MONDAY, so I am throwing a little promo in my shops:

$1 Shipping for each item WORLDWIDE!

That equates to a $2-$8 savings per item. Wahoo!

My inventory has gotten pretty low, but today I have added three items to Swirling Tree People and I'm in the process of adding 10 new brag books to my Swirling Tree shop. Also, some books that had been taken out of inventory for art shows are now back in again.

Here are some new things you will find:

Dala Horse Cards Sets, Four cards (one of each print) bound with a pretty ribbon. They come with envelopes. (These are good for framing, too):
Dala Horse Gift Tags, so adorable! Set of 8 (2 of each color):
Christmas Tree Man (or Solstice Tree Man) set of 8 gift tags:
Chartreuse Lotka paper brag book:
Cloud Brag Book with Pouch:
Rudolph brag book:

So that is what's new here.

Happy Monday and Happy Holiday season!

Dala Horses

My vegetable-people drawings are morphing into something new for Christmas...dala horses! For those that do not have Scandinavian ancestry (I mainly claim the Swede, though Norwegian and Danish blood runs through me system as well), dala horses are traditional hand carved and painted Swedish folk art. They are not particular to Christmas time, but for some reason I associate them with the holidays. Perhaps it's the fact that one's cultural heritage is really put into full swing this time of year (lefse, herring, glogg, rosettes, St. Lucia, rice pudding...).

I've really really been enjoying my new photoshop trick of designing original patterns. These drawings are full of vintage-looking patterns in all of my favorite colors. Basically, I drew one horse with some fun framing, then colored it in four different ways. My mom and I are currently searching for the perfect way to frame them all together. I have also created 5x7 greeting card packs and little gift tags which will appear soon in my shop. The prints-- in a 6"x6" format-- are in my shop right now.

Holiday Handmade

Join me and some friends for cider, cookies, and handmade items! I'm turning my little house on Lexington into a gallery for a day. I'm pretty pumped up about it!

I'm going to share some of my new work (some of it not yet on etsy!) and the other work over the next few days on ze blog here. Today I'll focus on myself and Stacey Lynn.

I will have quite a few new brag books. These came out of a collaboration with my sis-in-law Anna, I made the book and she the pouch for my mom-in-law. I've sold quite a few since then! They are fun to make, too. They come with 6 or 4 board "pages" adorned with photo corners:

Stacey from Gentry Night Studios and Jewelry by Stacey Lynn is bringing felt owls and other wonderfully whimsical items such as this fried egg Christmas ornament. Freddy has one of her owls and loves it. Who wouldn't? She's an etsy seller and also has a shop with jewelry as well...with items such as this awesome Yellow Calcite and Orange Necklace:

New Developments

I've been walking further down the "natural" road with more books. The first one uses some very cool paper made with carrot greens! It's very pretty. I also have a 5x7 nearly exactly the same as this in my shop, and tonight I finished a little notepad book which I will try to photograph tomorrow when the sun shines.

This one seems very much in the vain of vampire/goth/renaissance festival:

And some red marbled paper finishes this set of deckled edged books.

I have major mom guilt today. I was going to get the h1n1 for FGH, but time didn't allow for me to drive to our clinic (still in Litchfield) and back, and he was exhausted from ecfe, so I decided not to get it and now I feel like he's going to get sick. Peter is going to try to bring him tomorrow since I "work" at Peggy's Holiday Boutique in the afternoon. I'm just including this tidbit in case anyone else has insight with all the flu shot business.

Another tidbit, which fits under the label "New Developments" is that we will be moving to New Ulm, MN for the summer and possibly for the next chapter in our lives. Peter landed a summer position. Good work! We will be testing the waters this summer. I miss nature and New Ulm has that.

To celebrate I scored these buttons on etsy from XOhandworks:

Baby Craziness

It has been baby central around here this week!

Welcome to:

Evelyn Noa Eckberg born Nov. 9 at 5 lb. 12 oz!

Wesley Alton Schooler born Nov. 7 at 8 lb. 15 oz!

Ayla Brin Nelson born Nov. 8 at 8 lb. 5 oz!

Good Work Moms! (And Dads Too!)

Since I don't really have permission, I'm not going to share the first birth photos of these cute little kids. Just know that they are all adorable!

Creative Boost

I had a very creative morning yesterday and today I tried out some new photography techniques. I am happy with the results (both the books and pics). Natural lightening really DOES make a huge difference.

I stuck all but one of these books in my shop so far. They will be out of the shop already on Wednesday, so if anyone wants to snap one up, you have about one day to do it.

New Shop

My etsy shop was getting a little messy with the prints and notecards intermixed with all of my various books, so I decided to create a second etsy shop for these very non-book items.

Introducing: Swirling Tree People!

Check it out! Here's the link.

In other news...Sundays are my designated work day around here. Peter and FGH have a solid day together while I putz in my studio. Today I did more than putz, I finished 5 books (almost 6). They are much more organic and daring, so I'm excited to get them in my shop in a couple of weeks after the next show is finished (unless they sell, of course).

Art shows. I guess you win some and you lose some. It seems pretty risky with the time and money that usually go into them. My first show went pretty well, especially for the ST People prints. The second was a dud, I only sold two things. Most vendors had a bad day, so I didn't feel like a total loser. A million excuses come out of my mouth when I talk about it; the recession, the wrong type of customer, the weather... but it doesn't really matter. I'm just going to look forward to the Roseville show that starts next weekend (at the Roseville Skating Center for you locals!) and continue building my etsy shop.

Stay posted for more book photos in the near future.