Six years. Long enough to have a baby and raise him/her until they are school ready. Long enough to date, get married and launch a career. Six years is long enough to remodel a house, launch a business, go to graduate school or change the course of your life. Six years is a substantial commitment and you may not believe this, but: I have been blogging for six years.

I will give pause for you to roll your eyes. You should. And you might think I am about to pontificate about my ability to own a soapbox, talk incessantly and blog blog blog into the horizon. Yet: there are more pressing matters, such as Halloween. And most importantly: what fancy, and wicked awesome drinks you will serve your party-comers.

The reason ‘six years’ is relevant is simply this: one of my most popular posts over the course of SIX years is my Dead Spider Martini. Apparently I have a penchant for Halloween cocktails. My tagline does state: janelle is known to wield knives, pitchforks and martinis. All things considered, I have a reputation for [inspired] drinks to uphold.

My quick two cents on Halloween cocktails:

• my quite famous Drunken Spider (or as I sometimes call it the Dead Spider Martini; it’s the hairy legs coming out of the glass that everyone loves).
• Purple People Eater
• Mummy Juice (when NOT Halloween I affectionately refer to this as Mommy Juice). For Halloween: wrap the glass in gauze.
• this year, I wanted to offer top shelf, classic Gin and/or Vodka martinis. Which means: a clear drink. Which then means: Halloween is captured in the garnish… the devil is in the details;).

Devil’s Martini: Up. Chilled. Blood-stained dark as hell olives.

Vodka or gin
Vermouth if required (I usually chill the glass, then put in a tsp. or so of vermouth, swirl it around and pour in well-chilled/ice-muddled vodka or gin)

Chilled, muddled, strained and served up with skewers of black olives (I filled mine with slices of red peppadews).Six years. Long enough to have a baby and raise him/her until they are school ready. Long enough to date, get married and launch a career. Six years is long enough to remodel a house, launch a business, go to graduate school or change the course of your life. Six years is a substantial commitment and you may not believe this, but: I have been blogging for six years.

I will give pause for you to roll your eyes. You should. And you might think I am about to pontificate about my ability to own a soapbox, talk incessantly and blog blog blog into the horizon. Yet: there are more pressing matters, such as Halloween. And most importantly: what fancy, and wicked awesome drinks you will serve your party-comers.

The reason ‘six years’ is relevant is simply this: one of my most popular posts over the course of SIX years is my Dead Spider Martini. Apparently I have a penchant for Halloween cocktails. My tagline does state: janelle is known to wield knives, pitchforks and martinis. All things considered, I have a reputation for [inspired] drinks to uphold.

My quick two cents on Halloween cocktails:

• my quite famous Drunken Spider (or as I sometimes call it the Dead Spider Martini; it’s the hairy legs coming out of the glass that everyone loves).
• Purple People Eater
• Mummy Juice (when NOT Halloween I affectionately refer to this as Mommy Juice). For Halloween: wrap the glass in gauze.
• this year, I wanted to offer top shelf, classic Gin and/or Vodka martinis. Which means: a clear drink. Which then means: Halloween is captured in the garnish… the devil is in the details;).

Devil’s Martini: Up. Chilled. Blood-stained dark as hell olives.

Vodka or gin
Vermouth if required (I usually chill the glass, then put in a tsp. or so of vermouth, swirl it around and pour in well-chilled/ice-muddled vodka or gin)

Chilled, muddled, strained and served up with skewers of black olives (I filled mine with slices of red peppadews).

How to Make a Flower Pinata (instructions below photo)

(photos correspond by row from left to right)

Materials:
One 10inch balloon
Newspaper
White liquid school glue
Pinch of Salt
¼ cup Warm water
Spray paint
Tissue paper
Brads
Hot glue gun

STEP ONE: Cut newspaper into strips. Mix ¾ cup of glue with one ¼ cup of warm water to create paste. Add a generous pinch of salt and mix in. The salt will stop your piñata from molding. VERY important!

Blow up balloon, tie the end, and tie a long piece of string or ribbon to the knot. Dip newspaper strips into paste and layer onto balloon. Do two layers at a time, and let dry completely by suspending from ceiling (or other tall space!) with ribbon/string. I did four layers total, but you can do up to eight.

Note: to speed up the drying process, set one or multiple fans directly underneath your piñata, facing upward. Two layers will dry in less than half a day- no joke! (My husband’s idea – GENIUS!)

STEP TWO: To make the points (and this is where you can get creative – you don’t have to have points, you can add whatever shapes you desire!) I folded cereal boxes into cones using a bone folder to score the folds, and secured them with masking tape. When attaching the cones to the balloon, be sure to use multiple layers of tape for security.

Cover entire form with at least a couple more layers of newspaper and glue mix, paying extra attention to the areas where the points and balloon meet – those are the weakest areas.

STEP THREE: Spray paint! Mine needed three coats – but that will depend on your color choice. Let dry.

STEP FOUR: Push a pin or needle all the way through on side of the balloon to allow the balloon to deflate and air to escape. Using a craft knife, cut three sides of a square to create a flap big enough to insert your candy through. Insert candy, and tape closed if desired (don’t worry, you won’t see it later!)

STEP FIVE: Cut lots of tissue paper flowers. If you are one of those lucky folks with a die-cut machine, I’m sure this will take you all of two minutes. For the rest of us, I drew the flowers free-hand and then cut them out by hand. Because tissue paper is so thin you can cut multiple flowers at once.

STEP SIX: Make sure you have a variety of flower colors and shapes

STEP SEVEN: Cut some strips of tissue paper to use as streamers. They don’t have to be perfect or exact – make them whatever length and thickness your heart desires!

STEP EIGHT: (not shown) Grab a couple of flowers in varying sizes, and stick a brad through the middle and fold over in back. I just used regular scrapbooking brads from Hobby Lobby.

Using a glue gun, attach the assembled flowers to the piñata form. Overlap them slightly and “froof” (I know that’s not really a word!) the petals so that they have some volume and don’t just lay flat. The closer the flowers are together, the cooler it looks! Be sure to cover the entire form, and check for “NAKED” spots!

STEP NINE: And you’re done! Based on how you’re going to hang it, you may need to cut some small slits or holes at the top of your piñata to allow rope to be tied though. Hang, hit, and enjoy!

NOTE: I didn’t made the piñata stick shown – but it would be easy to do with a lightweight wooden dowel from a craft store and some more tissue paper.

More Cinco de Mayo/Fiesta ideas here!

Published on: May 2, 2009

Dot’s Mom’s Blueberry Pie:

Ingredients
Pastry for top & bottom of 9 in pie *
4 c fresh or frozen blueberries (I used frozen ones from my parents haul this summer)
3/4 c sugar
3 Tbs flour
1/2 tsp grated lemon rind (doh! no fresh lemons on hand today, so I left out)
dash salt
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp nutmeg
1-2 tsp lemon juice
1 Tbs butter
*Although it’s certainly not that hard to make your own piecrust pastry, I cheated here and used the all-ready type rolled pastry you can find in the refrigerated section of your grocery store, near the cookie dough rolls and biscuit dough tubes.

(row 1)Combine sugar,flour, spices and peel in a large bowl
Toss with blueberries
Line 9″ pie pan with pastry.
Pour blueberry mixture into shell
(row 2)Sprinkle with Lemon Juice, Dot with butter.
Top with top crust**
Crimp crust edges together, squeezing with your fingers.
(row 3)To avoid too brown crust edges, use aluminum foil to make little strips to cover the edges of the pie. (Unless you have a pie crust shield like this or this)
Sprinkle with xtra sugar and cinnamon.
(row 4)Bake 375 for 35-40 minutes (reduce heat if needed to keep crust from over browning)
Pie is done with nicely tan on top, and blueberry juice is oozing through the holes in the top. Mine took about 15 min longer than the recommendation above.

**For my top crust I used a handy cheat – a Lattice Pie Top Cutter –basically a giant cookie cutter that gives the appearance of a lattice crust. You can do anything you want here (if you use a solid sheet, be sure to prick the top of the pie), including making a ‘real’ lattice top, or using cookie cutters to cut out shapes.

If you click through to flickr, the picture above contains notes explaining all the steps – a one stop recipe!

Several people asked where to get the lattice top maker: You can get a Fox Run Lattice Pie Top Cutter HERE!

View other PHOTO RECIPES

Like this blog? Subscribe!

Recent

• Illustration Friday – “Poise”
• Tumblr as a Portfolio platform
• Illustration “Tuesday” – Subtract
• New Dabbled Buttons

This doll dancer was a creation from a while back–she was a character in a book I was collaborating on–so I decided to reinterpret her in watercolor. I think she shows great poise!

Please Welcome our guest blogger for today, the lovely Hello, I’m Sally from Pollywog’s Cakewalk! Today she brings us a really great tutorial on how to make a little gnome using needle felting. I’ve never tried this process, and it looks like a ton of fun… Thanks to Sally for sharing with us today! Dot

I’m not sure I’m thrilled with the colors – I tried taking some of the orangy-ness out here:
CLICK ME

In other news, I’m still collecting cool online shops for the holiday links page – if you have an etsy or other online shop, with cool stuff, click here for more info.

And I’m debating canceling the Holiday contest — I’m thinking this just may be too much on my plate, and I haven’t really heard any real interest yet. (And I’m definitely doing year 2 of the Black Hearted Valentine’s Day contest after the first of the year!) But if enough people are interested, I’ll do it :).

The Art Card Show (where you create a holiday greeting card or party invitation), however, I do want to do if enough people are interested, since we never really have contests for artists.

So do let me know in the comments if you are interested it either.

Today’s Dabbled Interview is with Jenifer Nakatsu Arntson, of JNA Designs – Handbuilt Vinyl Goods for your Beautiful Life. She does some fabulous work in vinyl, and I’ve asked her to share a little about her and her fun vinyl goods!

1. First the quickie background stuff: In three sentences or less.. who are you, what do you do, how long have you been doing it, and do you do it full time?

My name is Jenifer Nakatsu Arntson, I make bags, wallets and accessories. I started working in vinyl after falling in love with some glittery sparkle vinyl (1996-ish?) and I needed a bag that would withstand the sweatiness of commuter biking in summer in Texas, and general rough treatment (bartending in a music club at night, working as a blacksmith during the day). I make things part time, my 3.5 yr old son keeps me pretty busy, and I’ll soon have a second kiddo, due this spring.

2. Why Vinyl?

It is pretty intense, visceral work cutting and working on leather hides and I needed to take a break from it after doing a lot of that kind of work. I liked the colors and finishes available in vinyl and other synthetic materials, and I started making things for myself, and then for friends. I was disappointed in the quality of non-leather goods I saw (at the time, vinyl had a connotation of ‘cheap, and cheaply made’) and had destroyed many a bag through normal use. I repaired things all the time at the leather shop so craftsmanship, construction, and utility and are pretty important to me.

3. Without giving away trade secrets, can you share a little about your process for designing/creating your bags and wallets and so forth?

Usually a new design starts in my sketchbook and then gets broken down into a pattern and how I plan to put it together. Sometimes I build a paper model to visualize, or just start working in the materials, taking notes on the pattern and construction as I go. I always carry the prototype and take notes on things I’d change on the next version (I’m kind of a perfectionist about my work, so there are usually changes). I tend to ‘overbuild’ so I don’t have to do repairs — I’d
rather be making a new item!

4. For the crafty types out there, do you have any advice on working with vinyl in craft projects? Any great tips to share?

Vinyl is pretty easy to work by hand and a lot of leather tools (punches, snap setters) work great for vinyl and similar materials. If you are going to try to sew vinyl, know the limits of your sewing machine (some can handle it, others do better with lighter materials or the timing gets thrown off) because repairs can get pricey. Hand sewing with glovers needles (have sharpened tips that pierce) and a thimble works great as well. Think about how you will use the item — would that cuff bracelet be more comfortable backed in felt? Will the snaps or rivets need reinforcement?

5. Austin seems like the place where all the cool happenings are going on. Are you a native Texan? What’s your favorite thing to do in Austin?

You can see live music every night (and good bands!) and there is so much crafty stuff (Stitch, Blue Genie Bazaar, Moxie, Parts and Labour, Future Craft Collective, Austin Craft Mafia etc.) Great breakfast tacos! And it’s a pretty vegetarian-friendly place. I grew up in Japan and the midwest, but I’ve been in Austin for more than 20 yrs, minus one year I lived in Japan. I love hanging out with my hubby and son, biking, gardening or going to the park or pool, or working on house or craft projects together.

6. For a lot of creative types, the hard part is not creating, but actually marketing their items and getting their stuff out there in stores or online. How do you market your vinyl goods? Tips?

It used to be much harder I think before etsy and blogs. You had to build your own website and buy advertising, or swap links and banners and promo goods if you had crafty peers. Try different methods, and see what gives you the biggest return. Look at your web traffic logs. Ask customers how they found you. Build a good mailing list, become part of a supportive peer community, there are more people selling their crafts online so marketing is important to get notices and stand out. Keep trying different things!

7. I need that Skull Wallet!! So, where can people visit you online and/or buy your stuff?!

Online I have some at jnadesigns.com, and austinhandmade.com. In Austin I always recommend Moxie and Sparks, great for local flavor. I also participate in a few shows each year: handmade austin women, blue genie bazaar, stitch, austin city limits. I hope to finish the packaging for my kits, start wholesaling again, and have some special items on Etsy once things settle down a bit.

Thanks so much, Jenifer, for sharing with us! Fun and Inspiring!

More Dabbled Interviews:
Dave Gugel (Halloween)
Naomi Henderson (Cupcakes)
Cory Godbey (Author/Artist)
Shannon Riffe (Silkscreening Entrepreneur)
Diana Evans (Artist)
Diane Gilleland (Crafter Extraordinaire)

Subscribe to Dabbled!

This is really simple to make, and has tons of creative opportunities.

You’ll need:
“Rice” The base is your basic rice krispy treat recipe.
“Fish” – various dried fruits (mango, papaya, & candied ginger all work well, but just go wild in the dried fruit bins)
“Nori”- green or purple fruit leather (fruit rollups–or the natural stuff looks even better). If you can find nicely colored strips (like Yogos Rollers or Fruit by the Foot) that makes it even easier. For ours, we cut green fruit rollups into strips for the nigiri and used green Yogos for some of the maki. The Yogos doesn’t look as nice, but it worked in a pinch.
– Condiments: Wasabi Peas, Sliced Candied Ginger

1. Make the rice krispie treat mixture. You’ll need to work quickly, so make it right before you start.

2. Form the rice bases.
Nigiri:
While the rice krispie treats are still warm and workable, form little rectangular pillows with your hands, about 2-3 in long. We tried making a pan the right thickness and cutting out little bars, but I think this worked a little better (more realistic) — but you can do that and then just round them out with your hands.

Maki: Spread a 3/4 in thick slab (or whatever you want the height of your maki to be, should match the width of your nori strips), and use a small round cookie cutter (I think we used a tomato paste can) to cut circles for your faux maki.

3. Decorate
Nigiri:
Mango or Ginger can be used as is, just place on top and wrap with a strip of ‘Nori’.
Papaya looks great if you slice it, exposing it’s lovely orange-red center.
Maki:
Wrap the sides of the circle with a “nori” strip.
Press small chunks of various colors of fruit or candy into the center of the circle, to give the illusion of a roll.
Halloween option: If you have extra fruit leather in various colors, you can make these into eyes by cutting out a small circle (pupil) and a larger circle (iris), and placing them in the center, instead of the true sushi look.

4. Serve with wasabi peas and sliced candied ginger.

If you have any leftover rice krispie mixture, you can make these fun monster balls, using gummy body parts!

Some of my inspirations:
Evil Mad Scientist’s Dessert Sushi
not martha’s Snack Cake Sushi
Brownie Points super gorgeous Sweet Sushi

and a really cool sushi cake I ran across today from Bitter Betty – love it!

Related Posts:
Halloween Eyeballs
Halloween Flayed Skin Cheeseball
Silly sushi inspirations

1. Let’s get the standard stuff out of the way first… In three sentences or less.. who are you, what do you do, how long have you been doing it, and do you do it full time?

I’m Cory. I draw things, I’ve been doing it for a while, and it do it all the time.

2. So, Portland Studios.. your profile says you’re in South Carolina! Are y’all just trying to sound like you’re from Oregon!? Seriously, as a fellow southerner, what are your thoughts on being an artist in the South?

Portland was a place where we wanted to end up and somehow the name was supposed to help get us there. Fortunately, we got hung up on making things and doing the work rather than the name and after a while we never bothered to change it. As far as living the South, I deal just fine with humidity and the cost of living is unbeatable. We have some local clients but mostly our clients are scattered from NYC to LA so our region doesn’t really come into play all that much.

3. The quick personal question.. you married? have kids? if so, how does that effect your creative time?

Married with three cats. And a white couch in my office at home. The cats like to scratch it (and since it’s the only thing they go for we gave it up a long time ago) and my wife Erin will read or something if I’m working in the evenings.

4. I have no idea how (you know how it is with the internet!), but i first started following you when you started ‘The Photoshop Experiment‘ blog. Honestly, as an artist who was not really versed in PS as the time, it was a great help in honing my own techniques! What made you decide to share your Photoshop techniques with the world?

I’m glad the The Photoshop Experiment was helpful! I even named it “Experiment” because it was an experiment for me to see if people even cared about how I get from point A to point B. It’s always helpful for me to see how another artist works. I got a crash-course lesson in Photoshop once and spent the next few weeks struggling to make anything look even remotely passable. I wanted to put something out there, sort of a catalogue of studies to give anyone who wanted a boost in Photoshop. It can be beyond frustrating learning it.

5. Your latest project is Ticket. I understand this is a labor of love, tell us a little about it! It looks way cool, though i admit I haven’t ordered it yet :) (ed-I ordered it! )

Well you better get on that, there are a few left! This post here : http://lightnightrains.blogspot.com/2008/07/ticket-how-why.html : contains a lot of pictures of what I’ll mention here about Ticket. I spent about 3 months worth of evenings, nights, and early mornings preparing the book. Work during the day was too full to hold anything else so when I came home I then worked on Ticket. The company gave me a chance to make something so I spent a lot of time thinking and making storyboards and thumbnails. I made a list of everything I like to draw and decided to sort of weave a loose story through them. I made a small book for my wife when we were dating called “Curious Events.” Curious Events (yet unreleased) has since developed into a little library of four distinct, interweaving stories. I think of Ticket as almost a “postlude” to Curious Events. You don’t have to have seen Curious Events to appreciate Ticket though, more or less, Ticket reprises most everything I love about these four little unreleased books.

6. Do you consider yourself a writer as well as an illustrator? What challenges did you face trying to do write the story? You did Ticket more independently, will you try to sell that to one of the ‘big’ publishers?

I love to write. My hero is Maurice Sendak. To make “story” and “pictures” that what I want. Really, what I’m most interested in is telling stories. With Ticket I knew that this would be “a story in pictures.” Part of the joy of that comes in finding what other people bring to the pictures or imagine the story to be. The original version of the “Curious Events” book I mentioned earlier had no climax, nothing happening exactly, just a collection of pictures that were (hopefully) interesting to look at. With Ticket I really wanted to make a rise and fall in the narrative — a definite climax and dénouement. As far as selling it to a big publisher, I don’t know. One of the reasons we are interested in self-publishing is that the artist is able to control ever step of the project. We have really been overwhelmed with the response Ticket has brought.

7. You just went to ComicCon in SanDiego… was that purely a work thing for Portland Studios? Do you go to other Cons? I’m sure it was a blast, but did you find it professionally rewarding as well?

It was work; we had a booth, we sold a lot of stuff, and met a ton of really awesome people. What I got out of it professionally, you could say, was sneaking away from the booth long enough to see the drawing and painting demonstrations by the likes of Jon Foster, Donato Giancola, and Gregory Manchess. Those demos were eye-opening. Also getting to chat with the guys at Flight and Imaginism was fantastic as well.

8. What advice would you give an artist just starting out?

Draw. All the time. And learn how to draw the human figure.

Check out (and buy!) Cory’s stuff here! https://store.portlandstudios.com/ is where you can find all of our products, including Ticket. A Big Thanks to Cory for taking the time to talk to us and share his art and vision!

Click here for All Previous Dabbled Interviews..

Interview 1: Craftypod * Interview 2: Diana Evans, Artist * All Interviews

For the 3rd Interview in the Dabbled Series, our focus is craft and the business of craft. Today we have Shannon Riffe, who writes the blog Make It – a blog about building a craft business, and is the silkscreening designer/crafter behind Rifferaff. I’ve been enjoying Make It for a while, and Shannon has documented a great deal about her journey to making it in her own craft business. A lot of times we only hear someone story after they’ve become established, but I think the process of how you get there is fascinating as well. So I’ve invited Shannon to share some of her wisdom here!

1) So, first off, the easy stuff… In 3 sentences or less, who are you, what do you do, how long have you been doing it, and is this your full time gig?
I’m Shannon Riffe, I currently live in Cambridge, MA but am moving to Ann Arbor, MI at the end of August with my boyfriend who will be a graduate student at the University of Michigan. I officially started my business in October 2007 making screenprinted paper goods. I work part-time as an office manager and part-time on Rifferaff.

2) You have some great designs… How did you get into printmaking?

Thank you! I left a full-time job in 2006 to take an unpaid internship with Mod Green Pod, a young organic textile and wallpaper company. What I lacked in income I made up for with exposure to design and the ins and outs of running a small creative business. Mod Green Pods products were all silkscreened, so that’s when I really saw up close the versatility of the medium. Up until that point I had experimented
on my own with batik and block printing with mixed results. Eventually I want to move into fabric design as well; I knew that teaching myself to silkscreen would allow me to do prints on paper and fabric.

3) Where do you get your inspiration? And what are your favorite sources of inspiration, both for your business and for your art?

I never get tired of reading about female design entrepreneurs. I’m fascinated by the businesses and the women behind Lotta Jansdotter, Orla Kiely, Port2Port Press, Virginia Johnson, Amy Butler, the Saltwater clothing line (I could go on and on…) These women are my business inspiration. They all have a unique and distinctive style, a playful sense of color, and their business are imbued with their personalities.

As for artistic inspiration, I strive to keep it simple. I want all my designs to look like they’ve been handrawn, or come from one of my block prints because they have. Design that’s done fully on the computer is just not interesting to me.

4) Without giving away trade secrets, what process do you use to create your art?

Everything starts with a drawing or block print on paper. I’ll scan that into the computer, manipulate it a bit in Illustrator and then send the digital file to a local t-shirt shop that makes my screens. When I get the screens back, I print all my products by hand using water-based inks that I mix into custom colors.

5) You’ve been documenting how you’ve started your business. Are you pleased with your progress thus far? Besides reading your blog (obviously!), what are your best hints for those who want to go into a crafting type business?

Yes and no. I’m really pleased with the reaction to my work, but not pleased with sales, for which I take full responsibility. I wasn’t confident enough in my product to really get aggressive about marketing it and getting the word out to stores and consumers. But now, 8 months in, I finally feel like I know what I’m doing and I’m
moving forward full steam ahead.

6) What has been the most challenging thing about starting your own business? What’s the thing you wish you’d known most at the outset?

Money. I’m proud to have never taken out a loan – I haven’t even asked family for money – so the entire venture has been funded by my personal savings. While that is a source of pride for me, I also think that going through the process of applying for a business loan would have been a good experience because it would have forced me to write a business plan and actually get serious about the direction I want to
take. As a result, I’ve floundered a bit as I started out; thinking I’d do one thing (gift wrap, selling via Etsy and craft shows) and have since shifted my focus (new emphasis on cards, pursuing more wholesale opportunities).

I wish I had actually run the numbers and had a business plan from the get go. Some people are able to start a successful business without a lot of pre-planning but I’ve learned that I can’t.

7) For all the readers who want to sell their stuff, what has been the most effective ways you’ve marketed your products? Least effective?

I don’t think I’ve been in business long enough – or had enough sales – to really answer that. I will say I think it’s extremely important to just think about getting the word out about your work in general. You may not see a direct correlation between advertising and sales, but every time you advertise you give someone a chance to see your work and you never know how that could play out. I was a little disappointed when I didn’t get a flood of orders from participating in The Sampler and Poppytalk Handmade Market, but now I realize that those experiences were still valuable because it got my work in front of new eyes I may not have reached any other way.

8) You’ve talked about lack of women of color in the design field. Do you think that affects your ability to sell your art? What would you like to say to women who feel like they don’t see ‘anyone like them’ in design? What would you like to say to ALL women?

No, it doesn’t affect my ability to sell my work. To other designers of color who feel like I do, I would say, keep doing the best work you can do so that you can be the one who gets on the cover of the design magazine or who gets a high profile licensing deal. I don’t want to whine about not seeing enough designers of color and then not do anything about it. I want to be the success story. This is one reason
I have a picture of myself on my blog – even though I’d be more than happy to take it off – I think it’s important that readers see me.

I think that’s a great tip for all designers. Really get personal with your audience and show them the person and the process behind your work. The Internet is so great for this, especially blogging. The revitalized interest in handmade items is all about a consumer’s desire to know where their stuff comes from. What better way to do
that than to see the person who made it!

9) So, where can we buy your cool stuff?

Right now you can get the full collection at rifferaff.etsy.com. I also have some items in Greenward (Cambridge, MA) and The Paper Place (Toronto, Canada). In the future I hope to start wholesaling my cards to more stores and have limit

ed edition items available exclusively on Etsy.

Thanks so much to Shannon for sharing a little of her journey toward ‘making it’ in the craft business!