St. Johns Town Center Brings New Friends

I participated in the 1st Annual St. Johns Town Center Fine Arts Festival this past weekend. Being a first year show, the crowd was understandably small, but I enjoyed the event nonetheless. Jamie Hendrix of J. and Company Events is a great person to work with and takes great care of her artists! This was also my first experience doing a two day show by myself. Whitney had another obligation so I was on my own, and I learned something! Whitney, you will be happy to know that I have finally mastered the puzzle of getting ALL the tent sides to fit into the tent sides pouch on the tent bag without having to hold my breath while squirming and stuffing them in there! Whoo hoo! I was so proud of myself! (I know, I know...simple things amaze simple minds....) Now I just hope I remember what I did next time!

I also made some great new artist friends at this show, so I thought I'd give them all a little plug here. I actually met Anne Cullum, the artist behind EliSilas Designs, at my December Jacksonville Beach show (yes, we suffered through the miserable weather and, therefore, dismal crowd together), but she was right next door to me this time so we had more time to talk. She's pictured here with some of her work. She has such a unique art style. Really beautiful work! Anne will be showing her work in her first Amelia Island Shrimp Fesitval this weekend, too! I'm so excited for her! Visit Anne's website at here. And, if you are in the North Florida area, go see her this weekend at the Shrimp Festival!

To my right was a great ceramics artist and all around fun person, Patty Bodney, the force behind Padi Custom Ceramics. Patty and I hit it off right away, and I think she and I are going to make a great pair getting the Jacksonville Craft Mafia off the ground! More to come on that later! We hope to be neighbors again for Jamie's Jacksonville Beaches festival series this summer. Patty does lots of custom work, so be sure to visit her website at here.

Next door to Patty was Jen Eccleston, who makes totally adorable handbags. Jen has a unique mission behind her handbags, called the Sophie Ann Collection. She and her husband are in the process of working to adopt a child from an orphanage in China. All the proceeds from her handbag sales go towards the adoption and to supporting orphans worldwide improving their health, welfare and living conditions. She makes big girl purses, too, but I thought this picture of her daughter modeling one of her smaller bags was too cute! Take a look at more of her fun handbags and read about her story here. If you are in the Jacksonville area, she also does home parties!

Last but not least, is Sandy Walker, the artist behind Parts of Art. I first met Sandy at the fall San Marco Arts Festival. She is also a jewelry designer, but her style is totally different from mine. She does some very cool things with paint chips, believe it or not! I admired her work last time, but I had to actually purchase a necklace from her this time. You can view more of her work here.

Though I'll continue to have new pieces posted on my website, I'm taking the month of May off from the festival circuit and enjoying some much needed time at home! But be sure to keep up with the blog for Free Bling Friday!

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Behind the Camera: Budding Entrepreneurs

We now have two little budding entrepreneurs at home. Sarah and Livvie created their first necklaces this weekend.....all by themselves! Okay, so I tied the ribbon on the ends so they could tie them around their necks, but I promise, that's all I did. They are modeling them for you here.

Having twins is definitely an interesting study in the whole nature vs. nurture concept. Here you have two little girls born only three minutes apart to the same mother, being raised by the same parents in the same house, attending the same pre-school in the same class with the same teachers. Yet their personalities are very different. These necklaces are made out of pipe cleaner and little plastic heart beads. When creating their pieces, Sarah was very abstract, just grabbing random beads and stringing them on the pipe cleaner, while Olivia was very exact, making sure all the beads were turned in the same direction. I pointed this out to my husband and he tried to string a bead on Livvie's necklace, deliberately stringing it upside down. Livvie quickly corrected him, saying, "That's not how it goes, Daddy!" This difference in approach comes out in their coloring too. Sarah is very abstract while Livvie is very much about staying in the lines. And yes, in case you were wondering...the apples don't fall far from the tree. Sarah is very much like her daddy, both in temperment and appearance; Livvie looks and act very much like me.

Now that I have two little ones, I'm definitely not the neat freak I used to be....I'd go insane if I tried to keep up...but I do like to keep a clean house. And Livvie loves to clean! "Gimme a wipe, Mommy! I need to clean the floor!" No, this is not slave labor. But I definitely don't turn her down! I discovered Livvie's affinity for cleaning when she was about two years old. I was wiping off the kitchen counters when Livvie picked up a napkin off the kitchen table and started wiping everything down. And I mean everything. The floors, the chairs, the furniture. She'd wear out one napkin, bring it back to me and ask for another. This went on for at least 45 minutes. I finally had to break out the camera and take some pictures. I dug these two up.

After watching her for a while, and probably noticing that I was taking her sister's picture, Sarah decided to give it a shot. She did one cursory wipe of the table, decided cleaning was not her bag, and went back to playing with the legos. But she can build one heck of a mansion....she'll just hire Livvie to clean it for her.

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Getting Noticed!

I just clicked over to see the latest on one of my favorite sites, Scoutie Girl, and saw a pair of my very own earrings included in a listing for Wonderland Retreat, the site set up to benefit indie crafter and promoter extraordinaire Alison Gordon. Alison recently had a medical emergency requiring surgery, and like most full-time artists and craftsmen, has no medical insurance. Her friend Renee Gardner set up Wonderland Retreat to raise funds for her. Artists and craftsmen in the indie community were encouraged to donate some of their wares to the site, and I donated two pairs of earrings. One pair has already sold, but the second is still available. Here's the mention on Scoutie Girl. You can see my Magnolia earrings in the lower middle of the picture cluster! Visit all the great stuff to benefit Alison at the Wonderland Retreat Esty store here. Look for these earrings specifically here.

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The Healing Lick of a Dog

I found two treasures in my email this morning. The first was this picture. This is Daisy, of the St. Marys, Pennsylvania, Animal Welfare Foster Program. She was looking for a student to comfort on the Virginia Tech campus Friday, where a number of dogs were on hand to play and visit with students traumatized by Monday's tradegy. The photo was taken by Evan Vucci.

Then I stumbled across this quote on the about me page of an ebay seller a friend of mine sent me: "I believe that dogs and cats are quiet angels who lift us to our feet when our wings have trouble remembering how to fly." That quote is perfect for Daisy and her friends, isn't it? Here's this ebay seller's link. She has some pretty cool bracelets!

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Be a Johnny...

I rarely manage to post something here daily, much less twice in one day, but I just received this from a colleague of mine, Victor Collazo, who is also a dear friend. I thought it was the perfect answer to Yasmin's "cold America" she talks about in her story I posted Wednesday. Take a look at this video. Be a Johnny...

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