weekend snapshots.

Posted on May 6, 2012 by Natalie

The beginning of May has been pretty nice so far! I snuck out between rain storms and filled a pot that my grandma gave me with pretty pink petunias (and another type of flower whose name I can’t recall), and the perennial irises outside the house have finally begun blooming! The yard is suddenly wild with weeds and overgrown grass because we’ve been getting so much rain, but the weather has given me a good excuse to lock myself in the studio and work on preparations for the upcoming Half Asleep Studio shop. I’ve got some big plans!

I hope you’re all having a nice weekend too! Get outside & smell some flowers if you can. xx

weekly wrap-up: 3/11-3/17.

Posted on March 17, 2012 by Natalie

What a gorgeous week in Minneapolis it has been! 60-70 degrees everyday and only one cloudy day – amazing for March, really, especially compared to last year’s snowpocolypse. It’s so strange though for it to be so warm and sunny and then there are still huge dirty snowbanks in parking lots and ice over all of the lakes! That’s Max up there discovering how cold the water still is.

I’ve spent this week thinking very hard about my shop and the items I want to sell in it. I seem to have all of the details squared away for my first item… I can’t tell you what it is yet, but there’s a hint above from one of my explorations! I picked out some gorgeous fabric on Wednesday and it’s very exciting to see my plans finally getting underway and almost becoming a reality. Suddenly getting everything ready to launch by May 30th doesn’t seem as crazy.

I just picked up a brand new pack of watercolor paints and paper and have been having a lot of fun playing with the colors to try to create branding for the new web site, the shop, business cards, and basically anything that will be created for the business! My goal for next week is to try to come up with an official logo in varying sizes that I can use to make the image of the business cohesive throughout all avenues (i.e. Facebook, Twitter, etc.).

And I’ve renewed my subscription to Lynda.com (a fabulous online training web site if you haven’t already heard of it) so I can brush up on some of my Illustrator and Photoshop skills. I use those programs on a daily basis so I feel pretty comfortable with them, but I don’t think it could possibly be a bad thing to get to know how to use them even better, right?!

Have a fabulous weekend and I’ll see you next week with some more updates!

my week in photographs #2.

Posted on December 10, 2011 by Natalie

My Week in Photographs

Flower Throw Pillow

I have been crafting and designing up a storm lately! This year I’ve made a commitment to handcraft as many of my holiday gifts as possible as a way to save money, be more resourceful, and get a little extra creative experience under my belt. I made the throw pillow above for my grandma out of some fabric remnants that were on sale. I had no idea what I was getting into at the beginning of this, and I was pleasantly surprised when it all came together. I ended up really liking how the thinness of the pink fabric lets all the overlapping petals show through. I kinda tried to match my grandma’s decor which basically all revolves around her iconic off-white couch with reddish pink flowers all over it.

Hot Chocolate

Mmm, hot chocolate! I’ve had an overwhelming amount of things on my to do list lately and my new favorite mug has been keeping me good company. Christmas with my Grandma, Grandpa, my brother, and Max got moved up to tomorrow and I just found out a week ago. It’s been all about designing The Flood during the day and nightly solo craft parties in the studio.

Mini Christmas Tree

They were selling tiny Christmas trees at Trader Joe’s so I picked one up for my grandma because she no longer sets up a tree anymore and I wanted to give her one that would be a little more manageable for fun. I bought a couple of ornaments to put on it including a big sparkly red “J” (because both my grandma & grandpa’s names start with it: Janet & Jim), a funky little sparkly white orb arrangement, and a picture frame wreath that I put a picture of my grandma & grandpa inside of. I wrapped up the pillow for them as well and made cards for everyone.

For my brother Jeremy, I had ordered one of the Skyline Equalizer t-shirts I designed for ScaredPanda.com but ended up having to settle with just putting a picture of it in his card for now because I couldn’t quite get it in time.

Grandma & Grandpa

Here’s the original picture of my grandma & grandpa pre-framing! It’s definitely one of my favorite pictures. They’ve been married for 30 years and I think this photo was either taken on or right around their wedding day.

Sponge Painting

I followed a tutorial from Create Loves to sponge paint this chevron design on the wrapping paper and a smaller chevron print for the card. I used teal blue tissue paper inside to match! It was really fun but I probably should have thought twice before doing this on the rug…

Christmas Card

Here’s the front of the card when it’s finished. I cut out a bunch of Christmas-y illustrations from the Trader Joe’s grocery bag and it worked out perfectly with the kraft paper wrapping! I wish I could’ve managed to take a photo of my brother’s card… I embroidered red and green thread into the cardstock and it was a fun little experiment. I think it would be kind of nice to make every Christmas card different this year!

Well, I’ve got a fun weekend ahead with a pre-Christmas breakfast, an art show to check out, and lots of cleaning and crafting of more presents for Christmas and Hanukkah festivities. The cover of The Flood #6 and the articles & contributors will be announced later on this week!

the art of wanting.

Posted on November 12, 2011 by Natalie

In the spirit of this glorious season of plentiful greed, I’ve found myself wanting wanting wanting things lately. Stupid things. Pointless, yet beautiful things. But, I have no money and I’m saving up to go on a trip. So, instead of going credit card crazy, I will indulge myself vicariously through this post of things I would very much like to own but definitely maybe don’t NEED to have in my life this Christmahanakwanzika.

1. Pantone Christmas Ornaments
This is by far the worst thing on the list, I think, so I’ll get it out of the way immediately. I’m a Jew who wants Christmas ornaments – have I gone mad? It’s not like I’d put them on a Christmas tree or a “Hanukkah Bush” as some of my Christmas-loving Jew friends call it, I’d get an ornament holder! These beautiful two-toned dream orbs were recently designed by Selab Studio for Italian design house Seletti and seem like they are very hard to track down – the closest location where they carry it is in Chicago. It’s about on par in terms of the probability of the other dream of mine happening – to stay in every room of the Pantone Hotel in Belgium someday.

Sonya Winner Rugs 2. Sonya Winner Rainbow Rugs
When I first saw this on Apartment Therapy, I wanted to scream! These are the most beautiful, innovative rug designs I’ve ever seen in my entire life. These rugs were designed by a former graphic designer in the UK, Sonya Winner, but at around $5,000 a pop, they are quite a bit beyond my reach at this pre-”rockstar mastermind” time in my life.

3. Aesthetic Apparatus Screen Printed Posters
Umm, these guys rule! Right now they have the entire height of a gallery wall of their spectacular screen printed posters on display at the Walker Art Center’s current exhibition, Graphic Design: In Production. I actually already own two of these bad boys – one hangs over my couch & one over my bed (pictures will happen one of these days), but I, too, wouldn’t mind having an entire wall of them covering my studio wall.

4. The Handmade Marketplace by Kari Chapin
Spoiler alert: I’ve been seriously thinking about starting up my own little handmade shop online. I’m still in the research and prototype stages, however, so books like this one could really come in handy for me right now. The beautiful design, illustrations, and typography of The Handmade Marketplace are sure to make the learning process that much more fun and inspiring, too.

5. Diana F plus Camera Kit with Instant Back
This is a dreamy 120 medium format toy camera that produces photographs similarly to a Holga in a Polaroid-esque instant. The camera’s overpriced, the film is expensive, but boy I would have a lot of fun playing with this baby. This is something I will have to save for the days when I win the lottery – it’s gonna be soon, though, right? ♥

weekly wrap-up: 10/16/11.

Posted on October 16, 2011 by Natalie

It’s been quite a week trying to catch up on everything! I’m not even sure how I got so behind. Now that it’s the weekend I will finally have time to finish up the set-up of my new studio (and some new IKEA furniture!), work on an exciting new assignment for Camp Pikaland involving drawing maps (but not just ordinary maps!), and lots of tidying up the house while being attacked by kittens. I’ll be sharing lots of fun new creative developments soon now that I’ve found my missing camera batteries.

Until then, enjoy these snippets that made my internet week more beautiful: