Change sucks, patch-covered blazers are cool

So, after more than a year of living together and continuing to enjoy each other's company excessively, Joshua left today to stay in Kentucky for a while with our friend, Steven. Steven is in the process of getting out of the army and Joshua is more or less going to keep him company and help him stay sane until they can both make their way back to California. Could be anywhere from a few months to a year or so before they're officially back, and even though I plan to go visit in December, I'm definitely having a less than great day.

In any case, before Steven came for his two-week visit here, I finished up the patches I was making for Joshua and got them all hand sewn onto his blazer. I thought I'd post a couple action shots and close-ups of how it turned out for you all:


  
Hanging out downtown...


Look at how mature I am!

  
Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Man Man, Ween, Modest Mouse, Queens of the Stone Age, Atmosphere // The Features, Nine Inch Nails, The Pixies
  
Gogol Bordello, The Clash, buttons // The Unicorns, Tilly and the Wall, Spoon, Dead Kennedys, Grandaddy
  
Madness and Specials armbands // Leonard Cohen back patch

  
Arcade Fire, Okkervil River


I'm pretty proud of having pushed myself further than I've gone before in terms of making patches (thanks for not being easy on me, jerkface). With a somewhat replenished fabric marker supply, I should be starting on more soon - I already have another ten commissioned by another friend.
As upsetting as it is to not have Joshua here anymore (I really don't think it has sunk in yet...ugh), I've definitely got a lot to keep me distracted this summer. I want to make a whole bunch of new things and I've got to get rid of a bunch of stuff to get ready for moving to San Francisco for grad school, plus I have at least three concerts and Comic-Con to look forward to. Even still, I'm pretty sure I've never looked forward to December so much...

Patches, patches, and more patches...

Lately all I feel like I've been doing is stenciling and sewing up patches. I've made them before for sure, but this whole bout of creativity started with an urge to channel all of my Portal 2 love into something. I started with a turret and an outline of Chell for myself, but my friends took an interest in them and I ended up making more:

Turret, two versions of Wheatley, two Companion Cubes, Chell, and GlaD0S!

After that, I figured it only made sense to try to get some patches into my shop, and what better way than by sketching up some monsters and stenciling them?

Currently available =)

But as great as keeping things simple and black and white is, there would have to be some color, too...

Yay, bright colors!

After that, some friends started making some special requests since they liked my Portal patches so much:

Pokemon badges, a Pokeball, and the Assassin's Creed symbol

And ALL THAT left me with a big pile of patches and designs on my desk...so I decided to make a listing in my shop for anyone who liked the things I had already made and wanted one, or who had their own idea in mind and wanted a custom patch. Now you can click here to check that out =)

So many patches...

 Oh, but even that wasn't the end...because then Joshua asked me if I would help make his dream of a patched up blazer come true. Needless to say, I obliged, and I am now little more than a band-logo-patch-making machine:

Not even all of them...

Please don't let my fabric markers run dry too soon.

<3

Black Friday/Cyber Monday Sale! Plus my b-day and those secret projects...

Yes, I know, I just had a birthday sale of sorts...but now it's Black Friday (and soon to be Cyber Monday), which means an even bigger sale!

I made a brand new HOLIDAY SALE section - more than half of the items in my shop have migrated over into it and they are all 25% off! And the rest of the items in my shop now have FREE shipping =D I rarely have sales throughout the year and this is an especially big one for me, so take advantage of it while you can - the sale ends Monday night at midnight (or, well, Tuesday morning if you want to be technical).

Black Friday/Cyber Monday Sale!

11/26 -- 11/30

In other news, last Friday was my 21st birthday and it was AWESOME. I went to Disneyland with Joshua, my friend Cat, who I share my birthday with (I'm older by 2 years and 1 hour ^^), her sister, and our friends  Nick, Jen, and Hayden. We had far more fun than people our age should there...haha. Here's a picture!

See my hooded-cat friend there at the front? I totally made that ^^

Joshua stayed to visit for a few days besides that and we had a lot of fun running around with all of our friends, seeing two concerts (The Features and Say Anything) and Boondock Saints 2 (so good), and just getting to spend time together again. All and all a good time.

Now! Secret projects! Haha, I haven't been able to tell you guys about the past two things I've made because they were both birthday presents - one for Joshua (Nov. 15) and one for Cat! Cat really liked the bat I made back in October and I decided to make her one similar - I don't have a picture of her and her new friend together just yet, but here he is right after I finished him:

Cat was very pleased with her bat...haha.

And as for Joshua...Joshua is very hard to get things for. Even harder to make things for...but I decided to risk it and try something new. I ended up asking him to tell me a design of some sort that he really liked that I could put onto something and that he wouldn't mind seeing a lot...because I wanted to try making him a new wallet =) He told me to use the Pixies "P-wing" logo and I went to work. I used fabric markers and hand-cut stencils to get the design onto some fabric, sewed up the edges and attached some backing fabric, and then sewed vinyl pockets to the inside (and, being the cheesy person I am, I stitched "I love you" into the inside...haha). I gave it to him on the bus shortly after he arrived and...he really liked it =) I was super excited and I got this really cute picture of him holding it before he left:

He rarely smiles or looks at the camera in pictures, so this is just AMAZING =D

And here's a look at the inside...and my cheesiness...haha.

He said he really liked it and immediately switched out his old wallet (and proceeded to show it off during the rest of the visit to everyone he could), so YAY! I think I may attempt more wallets in the future now.

Alllright...I considered writing about two other recent projects here as well, but I think I'll save those for another blog soon. Good night and please do check out my Black Friday/Cyber Monday sale!

<3

Adventures with Fabric Markers and My Day of Fame!

Hello again. See, I really am going to try to write more often! Haha...now, what to talk about...

There's a few different projects I've worked on over the past months, but I think today we'll talk about my fabric marker shirts. I've actually been messing around with fabric markers for a few years (I think I first got some in 2006), but I didn't start attempting to sell anything I did until the summer of 2008. I made four Elliott Smith shirts - he was an amazing musician, check him out - and sold three of them on eBay (the fourth went to the always awesome Joshua).

 

These are the first four shirts I made to sell - Joshua got the one at the bottom, which was my favorite.

I didn't make any shirts again until about a year later, a.k.a. earlier this summer, and I decided to put those ones on Etsy. Here's my favorite one:

Click on it to see it better, or check out the official Etsy listing.

Joshua actually gave me the idea for this one, but I came up with using the balloon string to write out Elliott's name. If you want to see the rest of the newer shirts, check out the Stenciled and Shaded Shirts section in my Etsy shop!

The original reason for making Elliott shirts came about after I made one for myself from a stencil I cut out from a picture. I posted it in an Elliott Smith community and got lots of positive responses and offers to buy any if I made more. Since Elliott is gone, there aren't exactly a ton of shirt options for fans, and I thought it would be something cool to do for the community.

The basic process for these shirts starts with finding a picture I like and then messing with it on the computer to make a grayscale stencil. From there, I print it out and then start cutting out small sections at a time to fill in with fabric marker on a shirt. I started experimenting with shading in the first batch of shirts when one of my markers started to go dead and it's been a pretty effective technique ever since =) Of course, dying markers only last for so long though...I'm thinking when I get the chance, I might try to just get a lightish gray fabric marker (I used Marvy fabric markers, by the way - they dry pretty quickly and hold up well and I love them).

Elliott Smith isn't the only person who's face I've put on a shirt though...I actually made an Amanda Palmer shirt in between the two sets of Elliott ones. If you don't know who Amanda is, please do yourself a favor and listen to her music and read her blogs - she's pretty fantastic =) Anyways, I made an AFP shirt and tried to submit it to be sold on her independent merch site, Post War Trade, but they felt like they had too many t-shirts as it was, so I ended up keeping it for myself. And, one day she announced that she would be in Hermosa Beach hosting a meet-up/photo shoot and after somehow miraculously convincing my friend Hayden to give me a ride the night before, we were off on an adventure! I even got to be in an impromptu music video with a ton of other fans, as you can see here!:

 

I'm the one holding up a giant yellow rubber duck =D

After the shoot, Amanda said she would hang out until everyone she met everyone who wanted to talk and have her sign things and take pictures and so on had gotten their chance.  Because she's just that awesome. I had decided to bring along the shirt I made and I asked her if she would write something on the back for me..:

The shirt, me holding the shirt as Amanda wrote, and her mysterious addition to the back. 

It is probably now one of my favorite shirts ever...I also got a hug and a kiss on the cheek and a fabric marker stolen by Amanda Effing Palmer. It was a pretty good day...=)

And uh, that's my awesome fabric marker shirt story! To think it all started one depressing summer when I decided to write lyrics all over a blank white shirt with a stain on it! And shortly after learned that Sharpie doesn't hold up well on shirts! Haha...

I'm hoping in the future to make more, different sorts of shirts, as well as some patches to put into my Etsy shop, but for now, there is Elliott. And who knows, maybe one day one of your custom requests?

<3

New plugs and my latest personal project...

Man, I meant to make this entry like a week ago...haha...sigh. Last Thursday I recieved my most recent Etsy purchase: a pair of 6 gauge glass plugs from iriejen! I got really excited when I realized that there are actually lots of plugs on Etsy and had been doing a lot of shopping around when I found iriejen, and I just thought these were a really neat, and not too expensive either...

(photo by iriejen)

And of course, the obligatory vain-happy-customer picture:

Yayyyy, now I am up another gauge size...haha. I don't intend to go any higher than 4 gauge because I don't want my ears to be permanently stretched, but it is a little addicting...plus, some of the most interesting plugs only come in bigger sizes! Sigh. I think I was always destined to be a modified individual...seeing my older sister get her first piercing when I was little and my dad with his couple of tattoos got body modification into my head early. So far, it's just a lip ring on the right side of my lower lip and the stretched ears (haha, and that actually started out of boredom...). When I have the money, though? Septum piercing for sureeee and some tattoos, the first of which will be something for my nephew (see last entry). Really really need to get that done soon...but alas, Etsy is my only job right now and I only had one sale last month. Hopefully things will pick up soon with the holiday season...that's what I keep hearing is supposed to happen on the forums...haha.


ANYWAYS! Personal project! Yay! Haha, so I have this jacket for a band whose music I like, but whose overall reputation and image I do not...I got it at a show of theirs that I got into for free because, quite frankly, it's practically impossible for me to go to a concert and not bring back some sort of merch. Plus I was in need of a smaller jacket at the time...anyways, the point is, because wearing said jacket now makes me feel like a jerk, I decided to cover up the part that has the band's name on it with a patch I made! And after doing that I figured, hey, I should just cover this whole damn thing with homemade patches! It'll be soooo punk rock! ...haha. See, I'm very serious about that "punk-rock poser" thing. Because Pokemon patches and the kinds of things and bands that I'm really into...are not punk rock. They are just dorky. And, well, the music isn't very punk at all.

I am rambling a lot today...back to the point! The patch I originally put on the jacket was one of three Pokemon patches I made a while back with an old shirt and fabric markers. I ended up safety pinning it and the other two onto the jacket in various places. A couple days ago, I made a patch of a red balloon on some new fabric I bought a 1/2 yard of, and last night, I took another old patch I made and put onto something else off of that something else (haha, yeah, make sense of that) and sewed it to the back of the jacket under the screen printed picture that's there that is really, seriously, not really all that related to the band - it's Ferdinand the Bull sitting under his cork tree. Strangely, this is also the same exact picture that my fiancé has tattooed onto his shoulder in honor of another musician who has a somewhat more logical (and less forced) connection to Ferdinand than this...other band...haha. I'm not sure why I am so adamant about not mentioning their name here, but it's kind of just for fun now. Okay, okay: PICTURES NOW!

Alllllrighttttt...that's more than enough for one day! Talk to you all later <3>