These guys are up on Etsy already, and I have lots more fun Japanese papers to come!

We’re down into the home stretch on days till full time printing and binding begin…some people would argue that those days have already begun, but it’s for real as of next Friday! Till then, I have a feeling these posts will be short and sweet, but loaded with pictures…enjoy!

I’d like to think I’m getting better at taking the occasional break from all things paper, but there’s always a little bit of a whisper that it’s about time to make some more covers, or tear some more paper down, or respond to emails. So…keeping with Sundays past, some fun new covers to share with you, from the most recent batch of really beautifully colored Japanese papers.

(I mean, how much do you love that chocolate paper with the blue bean burst pattern?!?)

And because everything needs a little poetry…

Eve’s Design
By Moira Linehan

Then there’s the Yemeni legend
of Eve in the Garden knitting
a pattern on the serpent’s back,
the snake unfinished like the rest
of creation, the first woman
thinking to add design, a sheath
of interlocking diamonds and stripes
along that sensuous S,
knitting giving her time to learn
what’s infinitely possible
with a few stitches, twisting cables,
hers a plan to mirror the divine
inner layer that can’t be shed
no matter what it rubs up against.

A few new journals - covered in Paris maps and vegetable seed packets - making their way to Etsy

And I’ll have several fun new printing projects to share with you soon. Plus, I’ll have some dates soon for bookbinding workshops here in Brooklyn!

For now, we’re just checking things off the almighty to-do list as it’s getting down to crunch time on the days till full time binding & printing…we’re at 16 days, and August 1st is only getting closer!

This last week has been a particularly busy one, putting together a lot of letterpress quotes for printing projects, working on some new designs, getting some books finished up and out the door, and trying to get all my ducks in a row, as the big transition from working-all-the-time-at-two-full-time-jobs shifts to working-all-the-time-at-one-full-time job! August 1 is only 3 weeks away!

In anticipation of the upcoming change, I’m making attempts to get supplies, schedules, plans, and projects-in-the-works as organized as possible, given that space and time are what they are at the moment. There are a lot of pieces spread around, and they do seem to be coming together, slowly but surely.

I’m also getting new journals and albums up on Etsy as regularly as I can (and there are plenty more to come!), and a few fun new guest books are in the works, too. In the meantime, off to relax just a little (and hopefully recover from a nagging little summer cold!), before another busy week is upon us!

New journal and album covers - lots of dental journals and maps!

And a little look around our roof over the weekend - just for fun!

We’re two extremely lucky people.

The cosmos and zinnias that I started from seeds are also coming right along. I’ve been thinning them out regularly and they’re enjoying the rain. So far, this year’s urban gardening experiment is a little more successful than last summer’s.

I also spent the holiday, rather unexpectedly, putting together card packaging. The day started off a little messy, but was very productive (and yes, I do actually manage to get a lot of work done, despite the sheer amount of supplies I’m surrounded by!)…

…and I think I came up with some nice results!

And now I really need to get back to enjoying the day and a half or so that’s still left in this weekend! More soon…including new journals and albums (yes, again!). Have a safe and relaxing holiday weekend, in the meantime! And…because I almost always need to share a little poetry, here are a few beautiful lines to read and recall the perspective, rhythms, stories, history, and our little lives that intersect with one another over and over and are always more complex than we first assume.

Today was a welcome day off which, right in line with my track record, ended up being one of the hardest working days I’ve had recently! Between invitation designs, sorting out pricing, responding to emails that have been piling up, and finishing up a few albums and journals on the ol’ to-do list, it’s somehow 3:48 in the afternoon…the last time I checked, I think it was about 8:20 this morning. I guess that’s what a little coffee & and a lot of plans will do for you!

I wanted to share a fun little bridal shower invitation that I printed earlier this week. The colors are wonderfully fun and summery and very, very watermelon. Enjoy!

Now I’m off to pick up some more paper, get myself a little more organized, and then have a great holiday weekend with the best live-in web designer in the world!

And I’ll have another small set of fun invitations to share very soon!

Journal and album covers ready to go!

So, there will be lots of new albums and journals soon…more pictures as things are done! In the meantime, I’m off to enjoy the remaining few precious minutes of my Sunday evening before this nicely shortened holiday week begins!

Another of Donald Justice’s beautiful American Sketches:

Crossing Kansas by Train
By Donald Justice

The telephone poles
Have been holding their
Arms out
A long time now
To birds
That will not
Settle there
But pass with
Strange cawings
Westward to
Where dark trees
Gather about a
Water hole this
Is Kansas the
Mountains start here
Just behind
The closed eyes
Of a farmer’s
Sons asleep
In their work clothes

(Just a heads up, if you’re a fan of Fawlty Towers, you’ll know exactly what I’m talking about here. If not, please go watch as many episodes as you can immediately! This is the gem of a segment that came to mind…start watching about 7 minutes, 55 seconds in…)

John Cleese’s mishap-prone Basil Fawlty and his judgmental but abiding wife, Prunella Scales’s equally hilarious Sybil Fawlty, are hosting a gourmet night in the dining room of their English hotel. They’ve shooed away “the riffraff” as Basil calls them, and have ended up with 2 couples game to take the plunge. Of course, comedy ensues and, after losing their alcoholic chef to his vice early on in the evening, Basil arranges two ducks from the nearby French restaurant instead, thereby scrapping the previously advertised menu for the evening in favor of Duck with Orange, Duck with Cherries, and Duck Surprise (duck without orange or cherries, of course). When the clientele questions the limited nature of the menu and asks, “So there’s only duck?”, Basil replies, “Yes, but done of course the three extremely different ways.”

I’ll admit that I thought of this exchange in the show because I’ve been considering packaging options for my cards to make them as marketable and eye-catching as possible, and pretty much keep coming up with ever-so-slight variations on essentially the same theme…cards done three extremely different ways: in a cellophane envelope with the card facing out on top, card not showing on top, with ribbon, without ribbon, or - the ultimate combo - card facing out on top WITH ribbon!

I don’t think it’s even up for debate to say that my family has always enjoyed Fawlty Towers because it seems so uncannily similar to many of the situations and reactions my own parents have had with their own business over the years. The family lives above the gallery? In the middle of downtown Marion, Iowa, where people do not do that? It’s bound to happen!

Possibly the most illuminating example is when my dad was performing Some Things You Need to Know Before the World Ends or A Final Evening with the Illuminati as part of the Liars Theatre season in the summer of oh, say, 1993. He had partially shaved pieces out of his hair to play the paranoid Reverend Eddie and, needless to say, the folks at Farmers State Bank were a bit concerned about him and the teller we always went to, Priscilla, pulled my mom aside one day while she was making a deposit to ask, “Is Craig ok?”.

So it’s not exactly that we had a questionably competent Spaniard like Manuel cleaning the place, or an overly astute and able manager like Polly, but I’m positive more Marionites walked in on the inner workings of family business on a daily basis than probably should have, but I’m sure it was almost as entertaining as a good, solid episode of Fawlty Towers.