new collection time!

Oh, happy day!

You know how singers will complain in interviews that when they are on tour they get soo sick of singing the same song over and over again? Well, I kind of understand that.

It is time for something new!!

Luckily I have Dallas wholesale market coming up fast to jolt me into gear to design a new collection. And what fun it is!

Drumroll please...I would like to introduce the world to Privet. Privet, world.


Fast on Privet's heels came Clematis, Smokey Blossom redux, and two lovely fantastical birds that have yet to be named.

The bad news is that Dallas market is 3 weeks away and god help me that I am only 5 new designs in. 25~ to go.

Other fun news to report is that I have discovered books on tape. My motivation has skyrocketed. When I used to work out of my apartment, I would leave the TV on (MSNBC) and listen to it as background noise while I worked. The Obama pillows were designed during this time. Then I moved into my current studio at my mom's house and was relegated to my iTunes music library. That got old real fast. I thought I was burning out (how many months can one work with no day off?). This is my dream! Why am I dragging my feet?! Where is my television?? As much as I am obsessed with Beyonce, I was ready to throw her out the window.

Then came the audio book. My ideas are flowing again. I clammor for studio time. I banish visitors who come to taunt and distract me from my focused work. First I listened to Ian McEwan's "On Chesil Beach," (oh, the agony!) and now I am in the grips of Dan Brown's "Angel's and Demons." If religious iconography starts creeping into my pillow designs, you now know why.

Lot's of things happening over the next few weeks--

First off, this coming Saturday, May 30th, I will be at the Brooklyn Flea again. Last time was such a success, it was so nice to meet customers in the flesh! So I am really looking forward to that.

June 6 & 7, I am honored to have been chosen among a select group to be a part of the {newnew} team pop up shop for the Atlantic Avenue Artwalk festival! Come find us at 93 Nevins St. Aparently there is a block party on Saturday which i think will be terrific fun! www.atlanticavenueartwalk.com

Then on June 13th I am back at the Brooklyn Flea.

One (very short) week later, on June 22nd, I will be down in Dallas for wholesale market week. If there are any buyers located in the midwest who will be attending, please be sure to stop by and say hello! I will be with my team at Omni Sales Group in the World Trade Center.

Something fun to leave you with--when it rains, it pours, and in a sudden deluge I received a ton of orders for red Bud Explosion pillows. So I took a family shot. (there were actually 3 more, but they couldn't all fit into my set!) What a proud mama, I was!

Brooklyn Flea!

Yesterday, I participated in my first outdoor selling fair, the Brooklyn Flea.

I was coming off of a really rough work week in the city, and hadn't done any of the things I had wanted to to get ready. So try and picture it, Friday night at 10pm arriving in the studio for the first time all week trying to gather up everything I needed. Thank god my mom had had the foresight to pre-load the car with the table and chairs (the HEAVIEST table and chairs she could have found, mind you, think solid teak outdoor furniture, no kidding). The night before I had stayed up till 1am making my logo banner to hang on the fence behind me--I was actually really pleased with how that came out, given the hour. So I was a little cross-eyed by this point.

The next morning, the alarm went off at 5:45. Then 6. then 6:30 (I know myself). Catrina brought bagels and coffee from downstairs. It was so early and I was so tired, that I insisted that we sit down like human beings to eat. Breakfast then took an hour, so even though I had woken up on time, we still left an hour late.

All the stress of the previous 24 hours seemed to be for nothing once we arrived at the Brooklyn Flea. We were not the last to show up (fear #1). Unloading the car was not as difficult as I had imagined (fear #2). I did not get a parking ticket (fear #3). The tent, although called "EZ Up", was not as EZ as they suggested, but it did in fact go up with little drama (fear #4). Fear #5--that credit card processing via dial-in would be a nightmare, DID materialize. But by the end of the day, I had gotten the knack of it. And my wonderful patient customers didn't mind.

Best of all, I left the Brooklyn Flea that evening with a whole lot less pillows than I had arrived with. It was so nice actually meeting my customers - living in a digital world can be a mind-bender sometimes, with no any face to face contact! Cool moment-- a woman walks up, points to a pillow, and says, "I saw that in a photo shoot last week." She is a re-toucher and had worked on some photos for a magazine shoot that I had submitted pillows for.

Also really fun was getting to hang out with some of my newnew team mates, who were in the tent next door. Jennifer from joyella.etsy.com and I had interesting chats all day. Jody from aStudiobytheSea.etsy.com told us all about how her glass jewely is nearly indestructible. Debbie from MilkMade.etsy.com even gave me a pair of earrings (!!!). Check them out below--Relax! I love how it matches back to one of my pillows. Her grandfather used to collect all these milk caps from the early 20th century, and now Debbie is upcycling them into jewelry and magnets. Totally cool.


I'm really looking forward to being at the Brooklyn Flea again on May 30th. If you are in the NY area, please be sure to come on by!