Black Friday, Small Business Saturday & Cyber Monday

Did you survive Thanksgiving and Black Friday? We only made one shopping excursion to Lakefront Brewery in Milwaukee so my husband could buy their limited edition Black Friday beer, which is only sold today.  If you are trying to do the buy local - buy handmade - support small businesses - thing, here are some suggestions for both in-person shopping in SE Wisconsin and some on-line gift guides in the form of Etsy treasuries for those of you in the rest of the world.

If you live in southeast Wisconsin and are looking for some local, handmade holiday gifts, here are some upcoming craft shows & one workshop:

Saturday, November 30, 2013
Art Vs Craft (their last year) - Milwaukee WI at the Harley Davidson Museum 

Holly Craft Fair - DePere WI

Sat & Sun December 7-8, 2013
Crafter's Marketplace (presented by the ABK Weaving Center)
at the Jazz Gallery, 926 E Center ST, Milwaukee  (I'm participating in this one.)

Sat. December 7, 2013
Holiday card making workshop at Redline Milwaukee

MKE UP Market Holiday Bazaar and Fundraiser for the Philippines at SPIN Milwaukee

Sun. December 8, 2013
Hovercraft 2013 at Turner Hall

Buy Local Gift Fair - Lakefront Brewery

There are probably plenty of others that I am missing!

If you don't live in Wisconsin, you can still shop on-line. (My Etsy shop is here)  I've also been putting together some holiday Etsy gift guides ranging from the kooky & creepy to the fun & colorful.  I've tried to keep the focus on handmade, as well as feature some folks I know both in person and on-line, though there are also strangers included along with members of the Etsy Wisconsin Street Team (WIST).  Enjoy!

Home for the Holidays (little colorful houses)
https://www.etsy.com/treasury/NTIxNzIyOHwyNzI1MzM3NzY0/home-for-the-holidays

Spoiled Cats & Spoiled Dogs (gift ideas for pets & pet lovers)
https://www.etsy.com/treasury/NTIxNzIyOHwyNzI1MzE0OTM2/spoiled-cats
https://www.etsy.com/treasury/NTIxNzIyOHwyNzI1Mjg3OTU0/spoiled-dogs

Krampus (a mythical creature who accompanies St. Nicholas and punishes the naughty children)
https://www.etsy.com/treasury/NTIxNzIyOHwyNzIyNjY4MzM5/krampus

Zombie Holidaze (and there's a lot of holiday themed zombie stuff out there)
https://www.etsy.com/treasury/NTIxNzIyOHwyNzI1MjQ0MDI4/zombie-holidaze 

Kooky & Creepy Holidaze (if you prefer your holiday a little off-kilter)
https://www.etsy.com/treasury/NTIxNzIyOHwyNzIyNzE4ODgz/kooky-creepy-holidaze

Now time for leftover pumpkin pie and a nap.... 

Crochet Cthulhu and Other Yarn Craziness

I didn't mean to start crocheting again, but last year in one of my half-hearted attempts to clean and organize, I pulled out the box labeled "Knit & Crochet supplies" and thought I should get rid of this because I haven't knitted or crocheted in years. Then next thing I know I'm reading books on crochet flowers and amigurumi and then I'm pinning hat patterns on Pinterest and buying more yarn. My rationalization is that I needed to make things to sell for the MARN Artibles and Warped Milwaukee holiday craft shows, of course... The nice thing about crochet is that small projects are easy to carry around and work on in my spare time.

I had made a crochet Cthulhu as a (belated) Christmas present for my dear big brother, starting with the pattern posted on the Cthulhu Crochet blog but adding more rows and stitches to get the shape I wanted. Then some of my brother's co-workers also wanted Cthulhus (see above line up & what is the plural of Cthulhu?). Apparently they have "Take your Cthulhu to work" day there. If you're interested in a basic Cthulhu, check out my Etsy shop. Not satisfied with that original pattern, I also decided to add some legs and a tail, so I now have a deluxe Cthulhu available as well.

I was also looking for a fun hat pattern and found this design by Leslie Nelle-Urinyi of Wool Mountain Studio on Etsy. I made this hat to donate to the Southeast Wisconsin Alzheimer's Association fundraiser this spring as they had a wearable art auction.

So obviously that box of knit and crochet supplies did not go away. If I am a better blogger this summer, I'll take some photos of the experiments in yarn made from old t-shirts....

Some Etsy Treasuries

Well, it has been a busy spring, and I'm slowly working on trying to reorganize and consolidate my work areas (which will be a future blog post). In the meantime here are some Etsy Treasuries I posted recently. Click on the image to to go the treasury, where you'll find the links to each item featured.

For the Birds

Is It Spring Yet?

Robot Roll Call

Yes, this last one was inspired by Mystery Science Theatre 3000, and though it says it was created in December, that's just when I started it, and then it sat pending until Spring!

You can see all my treasuries here. The older the treasury, the more likely items will vanish as they are removed from folks' Etsy stores. You can check out my Etsy store here.

Art Trader, Pinterest & other Distractions

I realized that I never posted back in July that I was interviewed for the Summer 2011 issue of Art Trader Magazine, the FREE on-line 'zine for all things mail art. You can download the PDF file here. Be sure to check out their site because they also have contests and offer on-line workshops. (I took the Fantastic Faces workshop in the spring.)

Also this summer, I am attempting to reorganize my office/work area, though no one can tell when looking at the space, because it looks as messy as ever. I keep getting distracted by looking at other people's beautiful work spaces on-line and browsing for storage ideas. My friend Mel got me hooked on Pinterest, a site which allows you to "pin" links and images to your own themed boards. So perhaps I spent more time pinning inspiration to my Art Studio Ideas board than I should have....

And two of my Pinterest boards on cats and Edgar Allan Poe translated into my first Etsy treasuries. (And I was not in anyway procrastinating the cleaning and organizing when I made these.) And one of my minor accomplishments this summer was getting a few more of my quilted ornaments listed on Etsy. Now back to work...

I'm in a Day of the Dead Etsy Treasury!

Flores & Calaveras Treasury

Big thank you to MonkeyTree Creations for choosing my little art quilt Gossip for her treasury Flores and Calaveras. Check out all the cool stuff she found! And be sure to visit her store and blog. Adorable stuffies!

I'm in an Etsy Treasury!

Thanks to fellow birthday girl Meg at ME2Designs, I'm in my first Etsy treasury where I'm not an invisible alternate! What a fun birthday gift (and from a complete stranger)! My featured item is my La Sirena mini-art quilt.

I'm celebrating my birthday today by doing several loads of laundry and cleaning in the morning and then taking a workshop on making "Interlocked Double Accordion Books" in the afternoon at the Bay View Book Arts Gallery. My husband took me out to dinner at La Estacion last night (a great Mexican restaurant in an old train depot) so tonight we'll have leftovers and lounge around watching all our DVR'd TV shows from the week. Such excitement!