Filed under: card, design, doodle, gift, paper by ramune

Bear in Heaven – Sinful Nature

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I realize owls have been “hip” lately and it’s hard to go into a Paper Source without tripping all over the owl salt shakers, aprons, thumb tacks and stationery. As tired as I am of the over-saturation of all the owl paraphernalia, I cannot deny that owls are pretty swell creatures and I like drawing them, so here it is . . . an owl birthday card I made for someone who also likes owls.

Filed under: card, design, doodle, favorites, gift, holiday, paper by ramune

The Octopus Project – Music Is Happiness

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Octopi . . . what’s not to love? They are super intelligent and have a unique and amazing look to which I am consistently drawn. If I’m going to do anything for Valentine’s Day, I generally like to make something rather than buy a teddy bear or some other item that expresses one of many canned sentiments. This year I wanted to make a card with a bit of depth, so went with a layered pop-up card/diorama idea that seemed like the perfect opportunity to test out my cutting and diorama-creating skills. I am pretty happy with the result and think I might start making more of these.

Note: My Valentine gave me a card with octopi on it as well. Good taste!

Filed under: clothing, design, favorites, friends, gift by ramune

Crystal Stilts – Departure

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My friend Dirk moved with his family to DC from Luxembourg three and a half years ago for a temporary work assignment and this past weekend his stay here came to an end and he moved back to Luxembourg. I met him two years ago when I was getting more interested in photographing abandoned places and have really enjoyed getting to know him and going out on photo-excursions with him. He will be missed but I fully intend on making it out to Luxembourg sometime to visit.

As a going away gift, a group of us decided to make him a t-shirt. There were several design ideas going around, but the one we settled on was a graphic of his face in a comic book “kapow!” style. Here is the original design I created and a photo of Dirk wearing the shirt. We had the design printed at CustomInk and were really happy with the results.

Filed under: enamel, gift, jewelry by ramune

The Drums – Money

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Last weekend I was in Michigan honoring my maid of honor duties at my cousin’s wedding. It was a gorgeous wedding where all of the stars aligned at the last minute. The weather was perfect (after pouring rain the day before), the food was delicious and the DJ was by far the best wedding DJ I have ever seen. The dance floor was packed from the first song to the end of the night and people kept asking for more.

Backtrack a few months ago to when I signed up for enamels class after almost a year hiatus. When my cousin asked me to be her maid of honor, I knew I wanted to make her a cloisonné pendant as a gift. I am really happy with how it turned out and might have to make a similar one for myself. Here are some photos of the stages. I didn’t go into quite as much detail with the process here as I did with this commissioned piece, but you get the point.

Filed under: design, food, gift, holiday by ramune

Mucca Pazza – Modutrongulous

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Where did December go? I was all wrapped up in family/holiday/travel craziness and never got around to updating my posts.

I hope the new year is treating you well so far. I spent my New Years Eve in Chicago cosmic bowling with family (there were more than 20 of us) and seeing Mucca Pazza (probably the greatest band to see on New Years Eve, and one of the greatest bands to see live). The following morning my sister and I were the support crew for my brother and cousins who ran the polar bear 5k and plunged into Lake Michigan. After photographing them, I stripped down to my bathing suit and went for a quick dip as well. It was cold. Crazy cold . . . 22F with a 20 mph wind (so it felt like 2F). My feet and hands were so numb when I came out of the water that my sister had to help me get my clothes back on. Although it is one of the more insane things I’ve done, I felt pretty great after thawing out.

We followed the insanity at my brother’s friends’ place, where his chef friend (who also ran and plunged) fed us with delicious (warm!) matzo ball soup. It was the perfect thing to eat after a freezing dip in the lake. That evening was my aunt’s wedding, which was full of good times, and now I am back to reality . . .

Before Christmas I jarred and designed labels for the “Lithuanian” cherry liqueur I made with my mother this summer/autumn from tasty farmers market sour cherries. Here is the result . . .

Filed under: gift, knitting by ramune

Matthew Dear – Monkey

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Having pregnant friends means knitting tiny little things like baby hats . . . baby hats you secretly want to knit into full human sized hats for yourself. I found this pattern on ravelry.com and am pretty happy with how it turned out, I just hope it fits the little nugget. I might work on converting the pattern into something a little less childish that will fit on my head (perhaps without the neck strap).

Filed under: gift, knitting, photography by ramune

Patrick wearing the scarf I knit him (backwards, but that’s ok)

My friends Lilly and Brandy hosted a Christmas dinner/gift exchange at their house this past weekend. The food was delicious, the Eggnog dangerously tasty (I might have been 12 when I last tried Eggnog) and I was strangely too full for the large quantities of dessert (my second dessert stomach seriously let me down). After dessert we exchanged Secret Santa gifts. I was Patrick’s Secret Santa and knit him a scarf made from Peruvian Highland Wool. When I was at the yarn store it took me a good 10 minutes to decide which colors to get, they were all really lovely. I might have to go back and buy the other colors for another project.

Filed under: baby, favorites, friends, gift, knitting by ramune

Zarina and the baby blanket I knit (covering her very pregnant belly)

As I had mentioned before I had a few project that were a little more time consuming than the rest. Finally I can post this one because I just went to my friend Zarina’s baby shower this weekend.

Zarina and I have been friends since 4th grade and she is my first friend (my age) to have a baby, so I was pretty excited and wanted to knit a few things for the little nugget. I started off with two super soft wool winter hats (that should look different on a baby’s head than they do on a mini pumpkin) and then moved onto a slightly more complicated wavy baby blanket.

Below are a few photos of the items and a couple more are on my Flickr site.

Hat #1 keeping a pumpkin warm

Hat #2 keeping a pumpkin warm

Detail of the baby blanket

Filed under: gift by ramune