Please Hold…

I’m having a hard time staying on task lately. I think my brain shut off this week after Garage Galleries. Hopefully I can get back on track this weekend and have some posts ready next week. Do you have any plans for the holiday (in the US) weekend? We have no plans! It’s very exciting. Right now, Naoto is at a brewery tour with some work friends, so Presley and I have the apartment to ourselves. I’ve repotted my fall mums and a new spider plant and I feel like I’ve accomplished more in an hour than I did all last week. I’m going to try to take some fresh photos of my cards for my website and finish cleaning up around here. Things are out of hand since I decided to clean out a closet AND prepare for Garage Galleries in the same week. Big mistake.

Anyway, I hope you have a good weekend!

P.S. I know Bitmoji are passé but Naoto and I really love using them when we text each other and this one was very on point for my non-productive week.

Art Dans La Rue 2019

The reason I haven’t been reading is because I’ve been watching too much television and prepping for last week’s Art Dans La Rue. It was my first show of the summer and it went really well! It didn’t rain–the forecast was sketchy all day, but it ended up being hot and sticky but dryyyyy thankfully!

It was my first show sharing a booth with someone and it was so much fun! Alicia was such a great partner and even though we were selling the same product, our styles are so different that it didn’t feel like we were competing for customers. At one point, someone came into our booth and fawned over Alicia’s fabulous illustrations and funny pop culture cards and as they were leaving, the woman said, “Honey, your dad would love these!” about my cards. I felt very on-brand in that moment. It was also my first show testing out two card racks. I outgrew my first rack a long time ago, but I’ve been waffling between a floor spinner, a tabletop spinner, or just getting another rack. I don’t love that my set-up is less interesting now, but as long as I have a six-foot table, I can fit most of my frames along the side. Alicia was nice enough to let me use her tea crate for my extras. But I really think it helped my sales to have all of my designs visible. (I had been putting overflow cards in a bin.) I sold out of some designs that I didn’t think were popular. Apparently, if people can see your product, they might like it and buy it…who knew?Alicia had to leave early, so we moved our table to the center of the tent to finish out the night. As usual, I regret not taking more pictures. The street was crowded with people enjoying beignets, crepes, wine, baguettes, carrying flowers and browsing the art. It’s such a joyous little fest!

I need to work out my merchandising plans for Garage Galleries later this month. And I need to refill my card and envelope stock so I can make more product…it’s going to be happily busy around here for the next two weeks!

July Books

I had a very good reading month in July, which is great because I haven’t read anything since! Yikes!

“The Willows” by Algernon Blackwood

This short story was recommended as one of the scariest stories ever, and as you know, I love a scary book. I found “The Willows” to be really intense and a really great read. There is looming doom through the whole book. Definitely one to read in October if you have a chance. I am going to request this collection again this fall to see if I like any of his other “weird” short stories.

Howard’s End by E.M. Forster

This is supposedly Forster’s “masterpiece” but…I didn’t love this. Maybe it was over-hyped? While I appreciate Forster’s writing and I liked the story, it wasn’t a book that I was eager to pick up every day. I appreciate the social commentary–a modern, bohemian woman married to the conservative older man, and refusing to adapt to his old ideas–but this book just didn’t grab me the way that A Room with a View did. I do wonder if I would like it better after a book club discussion. (Fun fact: most of our book club reviews get better after the discussions!)

Stationery Fever by John Komurki

I borrowed this for the eye candy and ended up reading it. It’s full of pictures of vintage and new stationery, divided by topic. At the end of each chapter, there are a few pages highlighting stationery shops around the world. It was a good overview of the history of the most useful stationery supplies, and delves into classic companies that make them. It left me wanting more…not in a bad way…in a I’ve had a taste, now I want more details kind of way. Also, now I want to travel the world seeing the best stationery shops.

Red Harvest by Dashiell Hammett 

This was for book group. If you don’t know, Hammett wrote The Maltese Falcon and The Thin Man Series which were turned into some of my favorite old movies. In our group, the book got mixed reviews. It is about a detective hired to clean up a town that is out of control with corruption. The characters and alliances are very confusing…I actually made a character map to try to figure things out. As someone in book club said, once you give up trying to figure things out, it’s an enjoyable read. Hammett is a really sharp writer and there were so many quotes that I marked as perfect descriptions or things that made me laugh. I really love Film Noir and this book made me feel like I was reading an old movie. Supposedly The Glass Key is one of his best, so I’ve added that to my list for later this year.

Dandelion Wine by Ray Bradbury 

I can’t remember ever reading Bradbury before. This one came up in a discussion as a great summer read and I love a seasonal book so… It was really lovely. I just notice the library stickered it as Science Fiction, but it wasn’t sci-fi at all. It was a coming-of-age story (How many of those have I read this year?) about a boy growing up in a small town in Illinois. Basically, he realizes his mortality this summer and learns to appreciate the moments of life, especially the making of dandelion wine with his grandfather. The wine will be enjoyed over the winter and remind them all of specific happenings on these summer days. Supposedly the book is semi-autobiographical. Dandelion Wine was just a beautiful summer reading experience.

Bright Center of Heaven by William Maxwell

Have I mentioned how much I love William Maxwell? This was his first novel, and it definitely wasn’t as developed as Time Will Darken It or Song of the Lark or The Folded Leaf, but Maxwell already had honed his perfect ways in describing relationships and feelings. The story revolves around artistic guests and the lonely owner of a boarding house in the early 1930s. It takes awhile to get to the “conflict” which is the tension between the black lecturer who was invited to stay at the boarding house and the other guests, but even though the conflict is imperfect, the rest of the story is engaging and beautifully written. (But I may be biased…) I have one more Maxwell to read and then I’ll be finished with his novels…it feels bittersweet. I might save it as a Christmas present to myself.

This Saturday is book club and we’re reading an autobiography…looking forward to finishing my first book for August!