get muddy!

my pal, the super cool Gina, is offering ceramics classes at her super cool studio.

here is the official scoop:

"Hand built Ceramics Class - All Levels
Classes held at the Ceramic Studio of Gina DeSantis
Lake Erie Building (Lake Erie Screw Factory)
13000 Athens Ave
Lakewood, 44017
5 weeks: Tuesday evenings, June 30th - July 28th from 7-9 pm
Cost: $130, includes 1 25lb bag of clay, glazes and firings.

This class will focus on basic and intermediate hand building techniques. Students will learn the fundamentals of coil and slab construction. We will learn how to create sculptural or functional objects. A variety of decorative techniques will be covered as well." More information can be found here.

yay! new earring preview!

i am so excited about the way these turned out! i'll be listing them in the shop this week. eee! :)

Rocky River Fall Arts Fest! Call for Artists

mark your calendars, this should be a great show!

and since this is the first year, the city of Rocky River is not charging a table fee, just asking for a donation to the raffle at the Preview Party. sweet!

the two-day festival will be held in the Olde Detroit Shopping area on Friday, September 18th from 6 to 9 p.m. (including a Preview Party benefiting the Rocky River Parks and Recreation Foundation) and Saturday, September 19th from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.

apply to be a vendor here. (hurry! the deadline for applications is June 15th!!)

when i am seven inches tall

i want to live in Lindsay Brandt's mid-century modern terrariums. can you think of a cooler gift for someone who has everything? i cannot. her shop is on my list for father's day for sure! (and as an added bonus, she is one of the sweetest people!)

AND! she just got the rights from Dwell Magazine to make tiny miniature versions of their delicious periodical. see it there on the wee Hans J. Wegner chair? where else can a person satisfy the funny urge to collect and covet tiny things and still stick to their minimalist principles? :)

(all photos here by Lindsay Brandt)

see pretty things & learn french!

a super sweet lady, you can call her GeGe, writes a beautiful blog called lac' oKine and she chooses the most lovely things to feature. check out her 'own little treasury' The Ocean (which happens to showcase my fellow Clevey, Elleabelle!) yum! :)

WIN my earrings....

....well, not really 'my' earrings. i just make them for you. i didn't wear them and spend time with them. you know. hee hee. ANYWAY! go to ClevelandHandmade.com and follow the instructions (don't be scared, it's easy!) to enter to win a pair of teeming earrings (the winner will get to pick the colors, yay!) good luck! :)

salty not sweet indie craft show

oh my! it has been a long time since i've written here. hi! do you even remember me? :)

i break my fast of blog to tell you about the salty not sweet indie craft show, slated for September 5th in Cuyahoga Falls at the Quirk Cultural Center from 12-8pm.

this show is being produced by Candra Squire, a fellow Etsian and Oddmall vendor whose cards are so unbelievably funny that i nearly expired from laughing way too hard.

put it on your calendar! apply! vend! shop! be there! :)

call for artists, the oddmall show!

Hudson, Ohio will be the site of the first annual Oddmall Emporium of the Weird on Saturday, May 9th, 2009.

Oddmall needs you! Reserve your booth by February 8th and save 20%!

To apply for the show: "email a sample or three of your work (72 dpi jpegs, please) or a link to your website to Andy at mailto:andy@andyhopp.com?subject=Oddmall."

"We are looking for various performers to entertain the masses at Oddmall. If you are a musician, magician, juggler, dancer, balloon animal maker, or any other unusual performer and you'd like to strut your stuff at Oddmall please contact Andy at andy@andyhopp.com."

Smashing will be there, you should go too! ;)

this show is over, but i'm leaving this post and it's comments for historical record :)

last minute market vendor preview

(click any picture for artist information and to learn more about the item)

these are the Etsy sellers who will be at the Last Minute Market show! Cathy from CBF Designs and Ms. M from Sweetness by Marthumpa will also be there. this is gonna be so fun! :)

hey! i was interviewed by Cleveland Handmade. ;)

the rumors are true!

Cleveland Handmade will be enabling holiday shopping procrastination by offering a Last Minute Market! Saturday, December 20th from 5-9pm in Westlake.

ta da! the vendor list is up: click here!

yay! new things!

if you were at the MOCA or MOJO show this past weekend, you may have seen some new smashing things, but if you missed them, many will be appearing over the next week or so in the shop.
ps-i'm excited! there are more variations on the 'teeming' line and finally some things for dudes to wear! :)

happy thanksgiving weekend all! back soon! :)

the best food-related writing is the not the writing that makes you hungry for something in particular or tells you which restaurants to avoid, but it is the writing that manages to encompass the pleasant totality with which food is intertwined in our lives. no. wait. i like it best when it's funny. no, i like it best when it's all of those things.

(image stolen, with relish, ha ha, from The Cleveland Sandwich Board.)

Cleveland Handmade's trunk show!

Cleveland Handmade is having a trunk show at Mojo's Coffee in Bay Village! Come see us! Sunday, Nov 23rd! 10-4

printable PDF flyers and web badge codes are available here.

and if you are on Facebook you can visit the event's page on to rsvp and invite other people. Please help us get the word out :) thanks!

november shows!

i am super duper pleased to anounce that Arianne and i will be in the Tiny Canary *Indie Design Market* in Columbus again this year! we had a wonderful time last year and i hope to see you there :) here is the info:

Saturday and Sunday, November 15-16, 2008
10 a.m.- 6 p.m. (both days)
Junctionview Studios
889 Williams Street Columbus, Ohio 43212 (*map*)


i will also be in a show in Cleveland (weird, eh?) the MOCA ARTscape 2008
November 21-22, 2008
4:30 p.m.- 9:00 p.m. Friday
11:00 a.m. - 5:00 p.m. Saturday
8501 Carnegie Avenue Cleveland, Ohio 44106 (*map*)

so come see me! :)

holy clearance, batman!

weeeeeee i just reduced prices in my sale section. must. make. more. room. for new things! check it out, and maybe rescue a pretty from my recycling pile/crucible ;)

the only scary part is how much i love this

yay for fall. yay for putting away summer clothes. yay for campfires and cider. and yay for scarves! this scarf by Tricia of LazyTcrochet (a member and leader of ClevelandHandmade) may be the most perfect for the season. it is loooong and fringed and the colors are all of the colors of autumn and then some :) snatch it up and stay cozy!

(photo by Tricia/LazyTcrochet.etsy.com)

the smell of hot paint and metal in the air can only mean one thing:

it's really fall. the heat is on for the first time this year, warming the cockles of painted radiator hearts and it's dark during more of the chilly, starkly-lit day. this time of year always makes me think of victorian houses with spooky looming figures in the windows of widow's watches and pointy iron gates with ominous creaking hinges. and if i let my imagination go a little further i think of clandestine meetings in graveyards and the handwritten notes that might indicate when to meet.

and if you visit Cleveland artist Amber Anderson's shop, Beautiful Era, you can find one-of-a-kind, wearable (for you and your home) collages that encapsulate all of these autumnal, ephemeral and often haunting feelings. (how'd ya like that segue? too car salesman? you don't have to buy anything, i'll still love you, i just wanna say she rocks, ya know?) ;)

all photos by Amber Anderson

i couldn't sleep last night because of you....

...yes, you. i'm talking to you Haunters and the Haunted: 33 Days of Halloween flickr group! i was not ready! today was the first day of posting for the group and i added the picture you see here (edit: i have replaced the original picture with another due to a complaint that it was too scary) hoping i wouldn't frighten anyone HA! mine looks like casper next to these inventive and truly disturbing, without even necessarily being gorey, pictures.

this flickr group was started by Heather Lucille, a very cool and very funny and often totally sinister lady (with the coolest etsy shop now full of spooky handmade prints, btw!) she started the group as a countdown to Halloween and Dios de los Muertos, the day of the dead, which also happens to be her birthday (don't i know another frightastic lady born that day? ;)

so, check out the photos in the group's pool, but beware: i'm not kidding, there is enough material for far more than 33 night's worth of nightmares.