Thursday, July 17, 2008

Yay CA Tuesday


We didn't really have a top five list for Tuesday. We tried to go shopping at the beach and ended up at Venice beach. It was a bust for shopping. We stopped at a shopping mall towards the airport and just decided to get lunch, gas, and entertain ourselves at the airport. (As a public service announcement: If you find yourself thinking you should try eating at Yoshinoya sometime save yourself!)

It was still a good day. At this point we were pretty much exhausted anyway. I was looking forward to seeing Jim and sleeping in my own bed. You know how vacations are your excited to go but there's no place like home. Plus who wants to be in CA without Kelly? (Kelly inserting eye roll here:)

Wednesday, July 16, 2008

Yay CA Monday

Monday Top Five:
1) Breakfast at Lulu's. After picking Kelly up we* went to Lulu's for breakfast. I had Yummy chocolate chip banana pancakes!
2) Shopping with Kelly. SO much fun! Just wait for the what I bought section.


3) Meeting Joe. We had no idea that we were in the presence of greatness when we went to Zinnia. :) When we were checking out we realized that we all had Joe's stamps and my mom made him take a picture with them. Do you see him blushing?


4) Dinner at Canter's Deli. As we were driving back to the hotel from Kelly's we saw Canter's Deli. The pastries in the window called to us as we drove by so we stopped and had dinner. We couldn't believe how many types of mustard were on our table! My mom said the Pastrami on her sandwich was the prime rib of pastrami.


5) The Quiz. Once we go to the hotel my mom took all of my bags and I took all of her bags. We each took turns trying to remember all of the things we had bought. We each remembered most of what we had bought, The hard part was trying to remember each of the pens! Just wait for the what I bought section.

What I bought:

First stop- Kino-Buy-It-All (kinokuniya). This was a super cool book & Stationary store in Little Tokyo. I bought new pens and markers. (What, their are still pens and markers I don't own yet.) Mushroom tab stickers, and a really cool book Gallop (One for me and one for Kakes. Sssh, she doesn't know about it yet.) with moving Op Art pictures.


Second stop- Zinnia. Cute, cute,Cute. We were super lucky they opened on Monday just for us! I bought robot paper, the petal Maya Road Sheer Sheet, vintage gnomes, a glitter spider magnet, small buttons (not pictured-duh!), and my prized beetle bracelet! It is so me, super cute, I think the kids will love it, and it was a steal for under $12!


Third stop-Folk Tree. A store full of Mexican Folk art. I bought Papel Picado to hang at school for Dia de los Muertos and a small tin box. I've done these projects with my kids but it's always so much cooler when the kid can see a "real" on too!


Fourth stop- Dick Blick. I always order stuff for school from their catalogue so it was fun to go in person. I bought skull erasers and a hypotrochoid (Spirograph) art set. I'd been looking for a Spirograph and had not been able to find one at a reasonable price-I was so excited!


Next stops- Mimio and Paper Source. Both cool paper stores but I actually didn't buy anything. (Please don't faint.)


Final stop- Soap Plant /Wacko. This is a what0-not -shop and gallery. The Gallery is called La Luz De Jesus. I bought 2008 calendars of O'Keefe and Kahlo for only $1. I can cut them up to use for displays for the kid when we study these artists! Such a deal! Tiny skull stickers, and decorative packing tape. Besides being super cool the thin rolls were only $1.50 and two of the thick rolls were only $1!


Whew! What a day! IT was a total blast!

Yay CA Sunday

Sunday Top Five:
1) Not really sleeping. I think my mom and I were both too excited to sleep. We kept waking up and having conversations throughout the night until it was really time to get up.
2) Carpooling with Kelly to The Art Bar.
3) Breakfast at The Gypsy Den. This restaurant was yummy and really looked like a gypsy's den. Plus the bathroom had a cool design painted up one wall across teh celing and onto a second wall.


4) Fukoro Toji Book making class with Kelly. I missed this class last time when Kelly was in Scottsdale so it was great that she was teaching it while we were in CA!
5) Pizza & Fruit dinner. We were so tired, probably from lack of sleep and art exaustion, that we grabbed a pizza and fruit tray in the lobby of our hotel and had dinner in our room. This also left time to sort through some things from Kelly and work in out newly made journals.



Stuff I bought: Canvas Remixed, tiny glass bottles, mini ABC stencil, two artist rings, thin purple and red sharpie poaster markers, poision labels, Teresa Collins book covers and pages for the Zutter.

Tuesday, July 15, 2008

Yay CA! Saturday


Mom & I arrived safely home in AZ this evening with a bunch of new toys and great memories as well!

Realizing that I'd never be able to remember all of the great things that I'd want to tell all of my dear blog readers we decided to create a list of the top five each day. Due to the narration of the top five I will be breaking up the days at least a little. This along with the picture of the stuff I bought paint a great picture of our trip!


Saturday Top Five:
(A little background- After landing in CA and getting our rental car we headed to the Fashion District. Top: Shirts I bought for only $6 & $8!)
1) Our first site of the Fashion District. Just imagine a swap meet that seems to go on for miles. The most exciting part was blocks of fabric stores with rolls and rolls of fabrics standing out on the street many accompanied by signs that said $1 a yard!
2) Telling off the Michael Levine Upholstery Sales Lady. I know this sounds terrible but just hear me out. First, you should know that their are few restrooms in the fashion district so imagine our surprise when we asked the sales lady where we could find a restroom and she said we have one at the back of our store. We find the restroom discover that it is a pay restroom scramble for a quarter turn the knob-nothing. We return to the counter tell the lady what happened she first starts talking to the other sales ladies in another language, they look through a drawer, tell us their must be someone in the restroom to go back and knock. We follow the directions as annoying as they are. An irritated man yells from behind a door marked employee's only go to the counter they have a key. My mom stays at the restroom just in case someone comes out where the already annoyed man continues to yell at her about not having the key. I go to the front wait a very long time while the sales lady avoids me. Finally, she says I don't have a key you have to go across the street! I was like, oh no! I said, "You have got to be kidding me. I asked where there was a restroom. You told me to use your restroom when you knew it did not work and you did not have a key!" She said, "You just have to go across the street." Very unsympathetically. I said, "And how will I pay to use the restroom across the street when you had me put my quarter in your broken restroom door? If your restroom was broken you should have told me to go across the street in the first place and not lied to me and said that someone must have been using it. Now you have waisted my time and my money." This sales started talking about how she'd just have to call the manager (I wanted to say, "Thanks, please do!") When another sales lady magically found a quarter to give to me. When we crossed the street to Michael Levine Fabric Paradise (We loved this store.) we found a line of people holding the door for each other so no one would have to pay-HA! I did find the cool skull fabric below for a pair of PJ bottoms.


3) The Skirt Steal. The Loft, a Michael Levine remnant shop, sold fabric by the pound and I found the most gorgeous fabric (purple above) for my mom to make a skirt out of. About 4 yards for $2! Wowie!


4) Waiting for dinner. We went to dinner at a beach. When we put our names in they took my cell number and told us that we could go look around for 30 minutes and they'd call us when our table was ready-how cool is that! We spent 30 minutes walking on the beach. It was the best wait ever!
5) Falling. We got to sit upstairs for dinner which was cool. The transition from being out side to being in a dark restaurant did not happen quickly for me. I totally did not see the second step and fell forward going up the stairs. Being used to falling in public I recovered quickly and my mom did not even notice this blunder. When it was time to go I was in the restroom noticed my mom coming down the stairs and just as we met at the bottom of the stairs she missed the same step that I tripped on and fell hard on the floor. I did the normal daughter response, "Mom are you okay? You've got to get up." (You know that's what you'd say if you just saw your mom fall down too) Now if you've ever fallen especially in public you know it takes a second to get up. The guy from the restaurant runs over-probably in his 20's and says, "Mam are you okay do you need me to call the ambulance?" My mom just gave him the look, got up said, I'm okay, and started walking out. Although it was not funny right in the moment it was hilarious by the time we returned to the car.

Stuff I bought: Shirts, fabric, 1 yard of lace with metal thing on it pictured above with fabric. Mom bought me the skull patch. Please bear with the bad hotel lighting in these photos. I had to take all the picture before I rearranged teh goodies to come home. :)

Friday, July 11, 2008

Gwen Stefani Paper Dolls

Do you have some time to kill or are you looking for some great girls for collage? Check out this site. You can make great Gwen Stefani Paper Dolls for free! I found this site a while ago but just used it for a top secret project. Stay tuned for a few more weeks if your dieing to find out what it is!

Tomorrow Mom and I embark on our mother daughter CA art adventure. We have all sorts of craziness planned including meeting up with Kelly Kilmer! I'll be away from my computer until Wednesday morning but expect a great blog post then!

When Jim and I go out of town together we are willing to pay $10 a day for Internet access so he can monitor his fantasy teams. He considers this an investment. While I'm gone with out him I'd rather spend $10 on art supplies! Go figure.

Thursday, July 10, 2008

How Could I Forget?

I was so excited about the buttons that I forgot to mention how excited I was that Debbie had sprockets in stock and waiting for me when I arrived today! These sprockets are so fun to play with check out what I've made this afternoon. I love the grungy metal combinations.



I also made a set of people inchies. I decided to use the last set of people inchies I made for the red exchange instead.

Button PaLooZa

Oh my gosh! When I signed up for Button PaLooZa with Rosie a class description had not been posted online yet. Imagine my surprise when I arrived and found out that I got to make not only a baker's dozen of buttons but a carrying case as well! Oooh! It's these little details that make Rosie so fabulous!


We were able to bring our own artwork to put inside our buttons or use the loads of Rosie Original artwork to create our mini masterpieces. We added words and star glitter to help createthe magic.


I LOVE my buttons! (I even had to buy two additional buttons because I couldn't live without them!) I am having so much fun just starring at them, and taking them in and out of the box. If you missed this class not to worry. Rosie will be having more button classes with even more new artwork! If you are thinking that sounds fun but what will I do with so many buttons Rosie will show you how to make them into magnets or even adorable dangles for your projects. Trust me, you need to take this class at least one time! It was a blast!

See other class by Rosie at Frenzy here!