Little Road Trip

Headed to Mexican Arts Imports, 340 N 24th St in Phoenix.  This place is filled and I mean filled with so much fun, colorful, beautiful, unique and fabulous things.  Pottery, wood carving, metal works, clothing, textiles, flowers, leather, home decor, garden decor, dishes, crosses, paintings, religious statues, water features, etc.

I recommend checking out the store.

 

Holiday show!

It was a nice day so having the show out on the patio worked out perfectly.  I had enough merchandise to fit both tables.  Overall the show went well and it was so much fun seeing friends.  I'm so grateful for their support of my art!  The only new jewelry was earrings made from recycle metals and loose beads.  

Wooden bead garland.

Vintage music pages used to make these cool trees.  The bases are  disc cut from our trees.

Recycle medicine bottle with a hand punched  metal disc.

Ornaments fun to make!

Fabric tree in all kinds of fabrics!

Love these pillows.  They were popular and all sold.  Making a few extras this week  on order.

Recycled frames with holiday greeting words.

Chalk art

Some of my handmade cards.  Not really a holiday item, but what the heck.

Vintage book pages with a printed "Merry Christmas" as a garland.

These turned out to be the best idea.  

106 Vintage Co.

While in Nebraska I visited a local shop.... 

Check out their Facebook page
facebook.com/106vintageco

The owner, Cammie Metheny told how she bought this old building on main street in Coleridge, Nebraska.  It has been a grocery store.  Once she started removing the drop ceiling she found this beautiful tin ceiling.  One the walls she found fresco painted murals.  

Inside her shop you will find many treasures.  She makes furniture out of her finds.

When I was there she was working on a large window, trying to remove the glass.  Her parents were collectors so she's been doing this her whole life.  She also let me got through her other building where she has so many cool things.  

I told her I wanted to come play whenever I was in the area.  She then said she was going to be taking down a barn....I laughed and said when, I'm in!   She said when it was warmer weather, I'm like I'll be back in May!  What a great find and I will be back every time I'm back in the area.  

I'm also presenting my jewelry to her with the hope she'll sell it in her shop!  Stay tuned Coleridge area.  If you ever find yourself in the Coleridge area make sure and stop in her shop.  Also check out her Facebook page.

 I found some treasures myself.  A religious portrait, fruit baskets, turquoise painted wood strips, card holder, wallpapers and the best thing was my ledger!

Twist of Pine

On my last trip I headed to northeast Nebraska and Yankton, South Dakota.  I have lots of family living in the Crofton, Nebraska area and all of them frequent the Yankton area. My sister-in-law, her two granddaughters and I stopped in the Twist of Pine.  A shop in a cool building near the Missouri river and this fabulous park. The coolest thing happens when you walk in with kids.  The kids are offered a small bag to fill will a variety of candies.  This was a great idea, the kids are occupied picking out their candy and we walked around the shop.  The shop is filled with soaps, candles, foods, small furniture pieces, signs and t-shirts.  I remember walking through several times trying to absorb everything I was seeing. I met the owner, Lisa  and she explained she is opening a Bed & Breakfast in the area and this is a step in that direction.  They offer a variety of classes at the shop.  They have a cooking class that uses the products sold in their store.  The plan is to use the recipes at their Bed & Breakfast.  The night before they offered a painting class, painting the American Flag on a large piece of wood.  

If you find yourself in Yankton, South Dakota make sure and stop in The Twist of Pine!  You won't be disappointed.

www.twistofpine.com

Lisa & Cady

Lisa explained each of her employees has a business card with their job title.  It's extremely creative. 

Creative Business Cards!

Lisa Kneifl- Chief Visionary of Creative Retail and Marketing Experiences, the owner.

Cady Van Surksum - Marketing Consultant and Event Coordinator, maker of marketing items.

Brenda - Director of Retail Merchandising & Customer Service, "Normal Employee".

Hallie - Junior Associate Usability Facilitator, she's 10 and the "taster"

Michele - Public Relations and customer Retention, she a nurse, cancer survivor and knows everybody.  

Jolene "Jo" - Principal Mobile Organic Branding Strategy & Product Solutions Specialist, she's a handy woman, and makes all their wood and craft items.  

She's also a Probation Officer.

Rylee - Minon and Customer Support Apprentice, 15yr old intern

Colette - CCO - Chief Cousin Officer, she's Lisa's cousin and a pharmaceutical rep

Presley - OCD Director and Volunteer Coordinator, high school senior and always brings friends to volunteer their help and also a clean freak.

Jane - Assistant Coordinator of Weekday Entertaining Experiences, she's 70 yrs old and she works two hours a week, on Tuesdays.  "Tasty Tuesday"

Owner/designer of GuruHoney

ANDREA WATKINS
GuruHoney:  2701 N 48th Street, Ste 2  Lincoln Nebraska
www.facebook.com/guruhoney.design

Here's some back story... on a previous trip to Lincoln I stopped in the GuruHoney shop on a random day at a random time but not at a random place.  While in college I lived up the street and was familiar with the neighborhood, University Place, along north 48th Street.  I used to walked pass these buildings all the time.  I loved her shop and even bought the coolest purse/bag there!   I got good vibes and thought someday I'd like to ask about putting my jewelry in her shop.  The clerk was very friendly and we exchanged Facebook information and she gave me a little information about the owner and the shop.  I didn't have my jewelry with me and it just didn't feel right at the time, plus I knew I would be back. 

On my most recent road trip I contacted Andrea Watkins to talk about my jewelry.  The minute I walked in and met her I got the goosebumps!  I set down my jewelry pieces and she loved them and again... I got goosebumps!  I have seven pieces for sale in her shop!

Here's some tidbits about Ms. Andrea Watkins and GuruHoney....

She went to college and graduated with a psych major, she was offered a job at a hospice and a marketing type job.  She took the marketing job because of the hours.  She worked her way up in the marketing field.   But she found she clicked with graphic design.  She is self-taught in graphic design,  she bought a big book on graphic design, studying all she could.  Keep in mind this was before the internet and Google.  She then took a "leap of faith" and left her stable job and went with a start up company.  She became creative director of a team of designers and the company became very successful. 

Three years ago, her dad got sick and he was dying of cancer.  She spent time with him and he was placed in Hospice the last six months of his life.  She recalls how full circle life was … being offered a job with Hospice when she graduated college.

Upon his death she was trustee of his estate and inherited set of buildings along North 48^th Street in the University Place neighborhood.  He did a lot for the area.  It was a huge project for Lincoln, trying to revitalizing the neighborhood.  The building GuruHoney is located  in is one of the buildings that belonged to her dad.  She once again took a "leap of faith", quit her job and became a landlord & a property manager.  It wasn't easy and she really struggled her first year.  With another "leap of faith", she figured since she had the building space why not open her own shop.  Along with a partner she opened GuruHoney.  She traveled to India with her previous job and lived there for six months.  She loved the culture and the name is a result of brainstorming and the thought of merging the culture of the east with the west.  Guru = high thinking   Bee = symbolic of hard work.  Creative & creating something good.  She began to design tshirts and was quite successful and told a story about one of her tshirt designs was worn by Mylie Cyrus in a photo shoot with People magazine.  She continues to revitalize the area in the spirit of father’s legacy and his vision for the area.  By the way the buildings are beautiful and the area is awesome.  It has a great vibe, a boho vibe.

I asked her how she refuels her soul.  She does Kosama – type of boot camp workouts, she loves to ride her bicycle, Lincoln has a great series of bike trails and yoga is another way she has found to refuel her soul.  She used to teach yoga and recently is finding herself being asked to teach yoga, again. 

She described herself as someone who has never been one that is not up for a challenge.  She talked about how tough it is because it’s a combination of what you know is in you and what you can do but it’s really hard because you feel you need a formal title, like artist, painter, designer, etc.  Creative people need to quit telling themselves “I’m not that”.  People wait around to be told they are “that” when they already are “that”.

I really enjoyed meeting Andrea Watkins!   She is a creative soul with so much ambition, nothing can stop her. 

Street fair in Casa Grande, AZ!

This is where I'll be..... Downtown Street Scene "Winter Wonderland"
x All repeats Just this repeat
Tuesday, December 03, 2013, 05:30pm - 09:00pm
This is a great "downtown social" with a different theme every month.  Local artisans and musicians are featured as well as  a Classic Car Show. Florence Street will by closed off and all the shops and restaurants will be open with special promotions.  This event is held the first Tuesday of each month from 5:30-9:00 pm. The location is at "The Alley" which is off Florence Street between 2nd and 4th Streets.  For more information, contact Rina Rien at 520-836-8744.  All downtown shops and restaurants will be open   I'll have holiday themed pendants, Christmas stockings, garlands, more pendants, necklaces and earrings.

Some updates & thoughts

Anyone who knows me, knows I have no concept of time.  I have no schedule, I rarely do anything the same, all things I make are one of a kind.  Taking my “having fun” in the craft room to working in my studio is where I'm at right now.  I have a blog, a Facebook page with a new web address, a logo, a business name, business cards, email and working on a project to log my creations.  Getting things together is a never ending process and I know there’s no time schedule to this creative journey I’m on. I named my business brokenwing, I have a collection of angels in my house and the thing they all have in common is every one of them has a broken wing and they’re perfect.  It’s one of those things I couldn’t explain how each one ended up with a broken wing that needed to be glued.   What it taught me … it doesn’t need to be perfect to be perfect, which describes my art, my jewelry, my photography, my cards, my studio, my home, everything Jobi.  My Facebook page address is www.facebook.com/the.brokenwing & my email is 

brokenwing @cox.net.  Here's my logo.

Business cards

Business cards, I find them a catch 22 for me.  I handed them out as a pencil and honestly I rarely have been contacted by anyone I've given them to. I figured what's the point, right?  Well this last trip I took I really felt like a business card would of been helpful and given me a professional edge.  Also, I don't feel like I'm organized of what info I wanted on the card.  I continue to move forward on this business monster thing.  I have met a few people who I plan to follow up with on combining my blog, my Facebook page, an Etsy shop, maybe even a "dot com" webpage.  So in the meantime, I decided to design a simple card with the info I have at this point. 

 

Pencil business card.  It's a cute idea and I get lots of compliments.

 

 I used one of my original paintings on the card and added "let's keep in touch"  Love how it came out.

 

On the back I put my email, Facebook and blog information.  I'm not sure how to do a Facebook page that doesn't have so many numbers.  I wonder if I should of made a Facebook account for JOBI and not a JOBI page.  But like I said I'm still on a learning curve on all how to connect everything.  I've looked at some of my favorite blogs and know there is a way to do it.  One of those things I continue in my dreams I have wings and I can fly things.