New in the shop!

A couple months ago Amy of A is for Ampersand (who took this gorgeous photo) asked me to knit her two pair of fox mittens, and I jumped at the chance. Instead of adapting a plain mitten pattern like a sane person, I made the pattern from scratch and these are what I wound up with. And I’m so happy with the finished product that I’m now selling custom fox mittens in the shop!

These will be made to order in any size from 2T to adult large. They’re 100% wool, with a tight fit so you don’t completely lose use of your hands like you do with loose mittens.

Eventually, when I get the nerve to tidy up my pattern and send it to a test knitter, I’ll be selling the pattern in the shop, as well. And then maybe even adapting it to make other cute kitschy mittens like kittens, pencils, and whatever else I can think of.

So what do you think? For more details and pictures check out the listing here.

As promised

This morning I added another piece to my shop!

I really love this piece. It’s just calm, calm, calm. Here’s the description from the listing:

This intricate embroidery is of river chickweed; a common weed in North America and Eurasia that I find incredibly beautiful, despite (or because of) its pervasiveness. The embroidery of the weed is based on an old botanical sketch of it.
Atop the weed I embroidered and painted “no expectations” in blue. For me, this makes the piece incredibly calming and sweet.
The fabric is a vintage very-light blue chambray. It is stitched in 100% cotton embroidery floss and the text is filled in with acrylic paint. It is framed in a simple vintage oak frame, measuring 9×11 inches. The stitching itself measures about 6.25×7.25 inches.
The back of the frame is cardboard with spots to hang the piece from nails, but no prop to stand it up on a flat surface.
Please feel free to ask me if you have questions about this or any other piece! Thank you for looking.

 

It’s aliiiiiive!

As of just about two minutes ago, The Psychodelicate is a real live Etsy shop! Here are some of my favorite pictures of new items. Click the pictures to find the listing!

Right now there are eleven gorgeous items in the shop – it’s fewer than I’d like, but such is life. There are several new items (mostly embroidery) that will be ready for posting in the next couple weeks, but didn’t quite make my August 1 deadline. As Seth Godin would say, I needed to ship it.

I love love love these garlands!

So! What’s next? A whole lot more embroidery. Inspired by words, nature, and vintage needlework. I can’t wait to share it with you! I’ll try to have two new pieces framed, photographed and listed by tomorrow morning.

Chug-chug-chugging.

It’s the last day before The Psychodelicate opens, and I’m busily finishing the final touches; perfecting listings, re-photographing a few items (thanks to a genius tip from Olivia), and then on to finish/frame/block the things that likely won’t be ready by tomorrow.

My camera strap looks really horribly photoshopped in this image. Like it’s been painted on. Phone photography is difficult.

Living-room photo-studio! It’s been working pretty well, if I do say so myself. I’ve been trying to photograph every piece outside as well as inside (using outdoor lighting), which is a pretty big time-suck but I think it’s worth it.

Anyway, I’m off to the living room to work more! Yikes! Tomorrow!

Millions of stitches

I haven’t been posting as often as I’d like, because we’re now in the home stretch of the shop opening so I’ve been busy tangling threads at every spare moment. Also my desk is currently set up to be a stitching/watching netflix area, so typing is just physically uncomfortable. #whitepeopleproblems

Anyway, here’s a sneak peek at something I’m working on for the shop. It should be finished by now, but I’m trying a new framing technique that is frankly quite horrifying, so I’m postponing it as long as possible. Framing in general really stresses me out. I’ve learned a lot of new useful techniques, but it remains that framing fabric is just difficult. In the future I’m going to try to make as many of my pieces as possible fit in an embroidery hoop, because using one of those as a frame is easy as pie.

Anyway, I must get back to stitching! After all, the shop opens in two days!

(Yikes. Two days. Feeling a little bit nauseous about it, actually. But it will be great! I promise!)

She wore green velvet

Huzzah! The velvet turban-headband I ordered from Monocled Lop on my birthday arrived today, and I love it. Super freaking cute. I love it so much that taking pictures of it to share was the only reason I put on makeup/that necklace today. I wanted to show it off that much.

Anyway, just thought I’d stop by to tell you how awesome Amy’s shop is. Their custom camera bags look incredible, and these cute baby slings kind of make me want another baby. (Not to worry! I don’t plan on any more babies. Not for a long time, at least.)

I’m off to watch some Doctor Who* and finish embroidering a piece for The Psychodelicate that I’m super excited about. It’s a text-based embroidery inspired (hell, ripped off from) one of the best compliments I’ve ever recieved.

*Watching it all the way through for the first time since high school! I’m so excited to see the episodes I’ve missed since then. Currently still in the first season and loving it.

Pre-pre-pre-announcement, plus a giveaway.

So, I’ve really actually actively finally started working on opening an Etsy shop. There has been less blogging because I’m devoting all of my free time to building stock and reading about online business and marketing. Anyway, I’m having doubts about the name of the store. Ideally, it would be the same name as this blog, but that’s just not going to happen yet. “Thrifted” as a shop name is taken.

So, here are my ideas. Anyone who leaves a comment in this post voting for one of the potential shop names will be entered in a giveaway for a 25% off coupon for one item in the store PLUS a custom embroidery. The coupon will never expire, but can only be used on items priced under $75. I’m planning on selling crocheted garlands, baby and toddler tights, embroidered pieces, embroidery kits, and more.

1. Thrift’d
2. coronet weeds
3. Little Day
4. wild, if you like
5. Idiot Love
6. psychodelicate
7. too damn pretty
8. Hold the Phone

(Yup, the ideas pretty much all came from Shakespeare, Millay, Firefly and Bowie. Big surprise.)

10 cool embroidered things

Yeah! Am I right?! Found over at craft.

This is just heinously beautiful. Click here and look at the detail in the hair.

Drunk-broidery

There’s something so sensuous about a French Knot. How can you look at this and not want to rub it all over your face? By Alexia Brown, found via Mr. XStitch

I had a really emotional reaction to this one. Moved to tears, to be honest.

Yeah! Antithesis!

Here’s a post on how to embroider a French Knot if you want to create your own little patch of sumptuousness.

Woah woah woah. There is just too much amazing stuff out there.

Mustaches always remind me of my old friend Spencer. Anyway, free embroidery pattern!

Ug. This use of white space is too brilliant. Doesn’t that look like it would be fun to make? Also, it is a unicorn. A UNICORN.

Yes, this is an eleventh “tenth thing.” There were two cool pictures on one pretty page, so you get a bonus. A Tesla bonus!