Jen Bowles Design

Latest Flickr Faves

As always, such great inspiration!



1. altered plate series: "GIVE THANKS", 2. birdfolk love ikea, 3. canary, 4. The First order of the season, 5. lookatmebunny2, 6. advent bags, 7. 3 little beach huts, 8. 1, 2, 3, arbolito, 9. Ice Skating Afternoon, 10. windmill, 11. Art Nouveau Page Percher, 12. Pennies From Heaven

Two Pretty Things

As seen at the mall on Saturday night...
Love the colors and patterns in the pink snowflake wrapping paper and yet another idea for the 'Inspired by Retail' holiday decoration file at the Coach store.

Now back to writing out Christmas cards!

We have a Winner!

Congratulations Heidi!
Will picked #3 as the winning comment number for the flower pin giveaway and that's you!
Be sure to check out Heidi's delightful blog Everyday Cookies for loads of yummy eye candy : )

  Giving away stuff makes me happy (Friday)!

Yarn, Birds & Starbucks

I am not particularly a fan of Starbucks.  Mostly because I don't drink coffee.
 I don't seek Starbucks out, have to stop there every single time I leave the house, or have a wallet full of Starbucks gift cards (BGD...).  And I don't own stock in Starbucks (BGD, again).
There are some things I do like at Starbucks though.  The glazed lemon loaf, the collage-style artwork on the walls, the free stickers.  And then there are the holiday decorations.
They always the coolest decorations.  Last year they had the curled paper trees (I'm still hoping to make one of those someday).  This year's theme:  birds and yarn.
At least that's what I took away from it.  So yummy and striking that I got out of the car so I could take some pictures with my phone.  Very Anthropologie meets...Starbucks. 
Hey, that's not a bad idea.  Starbucks should start a line of home decor products.  They could sell them in their stores.  Yeah, yeah, that's the ticket.
Maybe I'd better head over to the Starbucks website and tell them my great idea.  Then they could hire me to be a part time visual merchandising apprentice.
Or maybe I could just put the yarn ball & ornament ball  wreath project on my to do list.

On second thought, does anybody know where all the old Starbucks holiday decorations go?  It's not like they re-use them or anything.  Gotta keep it fresh.  Do they have an annual warehouse sale  in Seattle?? Maybe Craig's List? 

So many questions.  So many other things to do ; )

{Don't forget about the giveaway, deadline is tomorrow at 3pm.  See the post from 12/2!}

Eames Elephant

I wonder if I'm too big for one of these...
  
Check them out at Design Public

Almost no other animal enjoys such popularity as the elephant. Admired for its majestic size and loved for its proverbial good-humor, it is part of our everyday experience as a child's cuddly toy, a storybook character and a majestic creature. Charles and Ray Eames also succumbed to their charms and in 1945 designed a toy elephant made of plywood. However, it never made it into mass production. The Eames elephant is now available for the first time in a plastic version for those it was originally intended for: children.

Whether used as a toy (also outdoors) or a decorative item in a children's room - this friendly-looking animal with its distinctive, over-sized ears is bound to bring cheer and enjoyment to many a child's and parent's heart.

Just reading their description makes me think, 'Hmmm, a lime green plastic elephant might just be the perfect mascot for my studio!'

Maybe if I wait a few years IKEA will make one for $9.99...

P.S.  Just 2 more days to enter to win the felted flower pin giveaway.  Just leave a comment on the giveaway post .
Good luck and thanks for reading!

Yo-yo's, Rice and a Giveaway!

Good morning!  Today I am blogging from the basement.  From my studio.
Last night I finally took advantage of the fact that I have a laptop computer and moved it from my desk upstairs to my studio.  Other than the fact that it's about 47 degrees down here, it's quite nice. 
I was down here last night, crafting up a thing or two to share.
Starting with my first two yo-yo's.  Ever.  I probably didn't have to mention that though, did I?
I made the small one on the left with the Clover Simple Yo-yo maker.  In just 14 steps you too can create a teeny tiny (or as they call it 'medium') sized fabric yo-yo.  Then I tried it on my own by tracing a bowl.  It took forever to stitch and was awkward to hold but the size was a bit better.  I'm not sure what I'll be doing with these, but I wanted to actually make one.
Check.
The next project came in handy just hours after I whipped it up.  It's a hot/cold therapy rice pillow.  I have visions of making a few of these for teacher gifts so I figured I'd better try it out, see how it works.  I bought a 25lb bag of jasmine rice at Costco and followed the excellent tutorial posted here.  The yo-yo's aren't attached, just perched on top.  When I finally crawled into bed last  night after several hours in the basement, my hands and feet were quite chilly.  I got back out of bed, microwaved my rice pillow and snuggled back into bed, my temperature rising steadily.  I added a few drops of lavender to the rice filling.  When I heated it up it had the faint odor of Fruit Loops so perhaps I'll skip that step on the ones I plan to give away.  Though I don't believe Toucan Sam is a bad guy or anything...

And finally...a GIVEAWAY!
I noticed the other day that I had 300 posts on this blog.  That's one of those blogging milestones that needs to be recognized, right?   To celebrate one lucky reader will receive this felted wool flower pin.  I made it last night, it's a bit different than the ones in my shop, in that the leaf isn't velvet, it's felted wool (I love the color green, scored that sweater on Friday!).  Just leave a comment on this post before Friday December 5 at 3pm.  I'll have one of my minions children draw a winner on Friday afternoon.

Thanks so much for reading and sharing the creative journey!!

Tales from a Crafty Sunday morning

Some of my favorite little (and big) people came to visit us this weekend.
Julia, Caroline and Ruby.
They like to craft.
I like to craft.
It was a lovely way to spend a rainy Sunday morning.

Our first task:  mixed media snowmen a la Cloth Paper Scissors.
Ebby decided to observe and entertain during this project.  She sang, danced and helped me pick out parts for my snowman.  Meanwhile, J, C & R went to town with the snowman crafting.     I love how Julia's shirt fits right in with the winter projects mood and I love the fun foam "pusher handle" Ruby made for her snowman ; )     

After finishing the snowmen, they were begging for more--and even convinced Ebby to join in.  I only had the one project planned so I had to think quick.  I came up with winter scene Altoid tins.  They sanded and painted, I tried to speed up the drying with my embossing/heat gun.  They made little snowmen out of the air dry clay and picked out paper scraps t0 line the tins (check out how Caroline re-worked her tin, taking the lid off the hinges and turning it horizontally).  They glued and glittered, I fired up the hot glue gun.  

Nearly two hours passed quickly by.   

The girls' projects all turned out so cute, lots of personality in each one.  It was lovely to have so many little (and big) crafters in the basement studio area, enjoying all the creativity.  And of course, I've already been instructed to start working on coming up with projects for our next visit!

By the way...Happy December?!