Bay Area Maker Faire!

Yay... I GOT IN!

I kind of applied as a last minute decision & didn't realize what a big deal it was until Friday, the day of acceptance notification. I went to the maker faire website and read the tag line: 'world's largest DIY festival.' Oh brother!!

I always get so stressed out on notification days, obsessively checking my email & searching twitter for tweets about the fair & its vendors. Friday night, I went out to meet with my childhood friend. I hadn't seen her since middle school and it was wonderful. It was as if no time had passed :). Ugh, but in the back of my head was the constant question... DID I GET IN!? Buzz kill. Kevin was even checking Maker Faire's twitter every 15 minutes and texting me updates and reassuring words to stay calm & optimistic. Ohhhh brother.

It was 11pm and I said adieu to my friend. I decided to look at my phone one last time then walla... I GOT IN! Yeaaaahhhh! I'm absolutely thrilled and honored to be one of the 80 vendors. I'm especially excited about this festival because it's so much more than handmade crafts. It's about makers and technology, engineering, handmade goodies and everything in between. A community of tinkerers! :D

Here are a couple videos to give you a good idea of what is to come!

So yay! Buy your tickets & stop on by! I'd love to see you :)

Maker Faire Bay Area

San Mateo County Event Center
1346 Saratoga Drive
San Mateo, CA 94403

May 21 & 22, 10am - 6pm

Urban Burp SF

I bought a groupon on a whim: $40 for $20 worth of vintage fabric at Urban Burp. I had never been so I hopped on Bart & braved the wind & rain.

This was the building across the street. Reminds me of Paris or something.

I found the shop hidden behind a salon, which I later learned was Urban Burp's husband's salon. He bought the space, and they agreed to create a partition splitting the space so walla! You have the best curated fabric store I've ever been to :)

They specialize in 20s-70s fabrics. They have a whole section for vintage cowboys! I did find some nostalgic prints like carebears & fabric my mom used for Christmas table runners when I was a kid. An hour later with a significantly lighter wallet (beautiful but pricey fabrics oh boy), I walked away with these gems:

Not sure what I'll do with them yet. Perhaps a special vintage fabric line or something. Who knows. I'm content just staring at them :)

Thundercats Are Goooooooo!!

Looks like I'll be illustrating a children's book. Woo!

Ok, that is all.

:)

64

...is the number of plush I currently have. BAM! Magic! The goal is 75 for the summer craft fairs. Picture of my overflowing plush trunk soon to follow.

Yay I can post this now!

the gift has been given so i won't be ruining any surprises.

a custom order for rohin :)

Another dumb retail experience

So I went to Michael's to stock up on polyfil and watercolor paper. They have weekly 40% off coupons in the newspaper ads & online. Usually I just 'em my phone with the coupon pulled up and that works just fine. So today I went to Michael's with my sister with an expired coupon to see if their eyes would glaze over the date and a current coupon.

Cashier: Um, this has expired.

Me: Okay, let me pull one up on my phone.

Cashier: We don't accept those.

Me: Yes. I've done it before.

Cashier: Not at this Michael's.

Me: Sooo... now at this Michael's you want me to waste paper and print out a coupon?

Cashier: (beat) Yes.

So I just get one item using the good coupon.

Cashier, waving the expired coupon: Do you still want this?

Me: Do I still want an expired coupon?.... that you didn't let me use...?

She kind of grumbled, the people behind me laughed and I walked away shaking my head at how dumb some people are. Ha.

I'll just go back tomorrow with a fresh Sunday coupon for the polyfil. I refuse to print coupons that I can just pull up using my phone. So wasteful!

Oldies but goodies

I was sifting through my old sketchbooks and found this one. Now you know where the banner art came from. I was volunteering in a kindergarten class in Thailand and the kids borrowed my sketchbook to write the Thai alphabet & the days of the week in English :) . I can't believe that was more than a year ago. Oh brother I miss traveling, says the girl who was in Hong Kong less than two months ago.

Then I found this in an old new york sketchbook:

can you spot the sketches that later became the paintings below? :)