Say Yes to Michigan.

Today's post is a three part story, and kinda long-ish, but it's a story I'm fond of, so, yeah. Hereitgoes!

So, about a million years ago, (meaning 4 years), I randomly purchased these postcards from etsy because they were cheap and pretty and I thought they were funny. 

Thus concludes part two of the story. (I never promised they'd be in chronological order.)

A few weeks ago, my husband and I went on vacation. We had meant for it to be the Vacation of all Vacations, and we spent, like, 9 months "planning" it. Why the quotation marks, you might wonder? Well. Our planning process is highly theoretical; we are EXCELLENT at browsing and discussing and obsessive-compulsive-googling, and we are HORRENDOUS at decision-making. Just awful.

See, we have commitment issues when it comes to vacations. I had never really analyzed why all our previous vacations had been meandering road-trips; I thought that we could just book a cruise and buy plane tickets and chill until the day arrived, like normal people. Yeah, no. So after months, long, LONG months of constant deliberation, we were three weeks out from the Official Vacation Week, and we had nothing. No passports, no plane tickets, no hotel rooms, no ideas.

And then I saw photos on someone's instagram, (I can't remember whose, unfortunately!) of Holland, MI. My ideal vacation had included a beach, an Brian's had included sub-90's temperatures... Could it be? Michigan? Fast forward through another sleepless night of airbnb browsing, and the next day at work I met a woman from MI, and while we were speaking, another woman came in, and also started raving about Fabulous Michigan, and the switch in my brain, the broken decision-making switch, dusty from neglect, was flipped. I went home, texted Brian, booked a condo, and basked in the glow of decision-made-ness, as the gloomy cloud of planning-anxiety and exhaustion and uncertainty and googleoversaturation drifted away. Happy sigh!

So we went to Michigan. It. Was. Amazing. I think it was only our second day there, in Holland, (so Dutch!) that I found my new favorite t-shirt. "Just like the postcards!" I thought. "How funny!"

By sheer dumb luck, we ended up being there in the brief time between the summer tourist season and the fall foliage vacationers. We had entire beaches to ourselves (so what if it was a bit chilly!), and we never had to wait to get a table at any of the H'AWESOME restaurants we ate at. (Thanks, Yelp!)

Go to Michigan, people. Or don't, whatever-- it leaves more Michigan for me. I could go on for DAYS; it really truly is one of the most beautiful places I've ever seen. Photodump!

At some point during our trip, Brian mentioned something about "the last time we were in Michigan." "Whaa??" my brain's atrophied geography skills said; "We've never been to Michigan, have we?!?"

End part three of the story.

So here's part one:

There are two pieces that make up the Michigan pie, one on each side of the lake of the same name. Once upon a time, I took a train with my boyfriend to that "other" Michigan, to visit his sister and go to an apple orchard, and it was lovely.

And seven years ago today, that same boyfriend asked me to marry him. It was one of the easiest and best decisions I've ever made.

So I said yes. (In Michigan.)

Some Days.

All my drawings stink today.
And 75% of the clothes we own are on the floor of the sewing room, which is soon to be merged with the office, from which two bookcases (AND ALL THEIR BOOKS) and a couch need to be removed.
And before that happens, a piano needs to be moved, but only after a set of 3 lockers have been relocated, but only after everything has been taken out of them and has new places to live.
And there are other things, but I can't even remember what they are; but they add up to Dumb But Overwhelming.

I wish that every day was all sunshine and bluebirds singing and I am eternally super-productive and that every doodle is golden-sauce, but, UGH. Life ain't no ponyfarm. And with you, I am sharing my whine.

It's ok, though. If everything were always awesome, then awesome wouldn't be awesome... Lame days are just prep for sunshine/bluebird/farts-come-out-as-rainbows days. Actually, lame days are SECRET rainbow-fart days that I'm just too dumb to notice.

You can quote me there, friends. Make an inspirational poster, perhaps.

I philosophize deeply!

Whatcha doing' tomorrow?

I'm going to be at Katz Midtown Market, with loads of paper goodies that aren't even for sale on etsy yet... New cards, prints, and 13"x19" poster prints, my lovely printbox has been busy this week, earning it's keep.

Aaaaaand, they will all be at discounted local market prices, so, yeah, cheep stuff! There will also be a bunch of other awesome vendors, everything from local produce to baked goods to crafties to new and used books, all inside the historic Katz Pharmacy building, which is currently being transformed into artists' studios and gallery space. It's going to be kinda awesome, methinks?

Anyway, do stop by if you're so inclined, and I can talk your ear off abou Michigan, which may very well be the most beautiful place in the world. I'll be forcing vacation photos on you at some point, as soon as I find the old slide projector...

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Winning! And Cat Lovers.

Thanks for entering, internets! The winners, randomly chosen by another section of the internets, are Raych and Sarah and Sarah! Sarah squared, I guess? H'Anyways, congrats, I shall email y'alls shortly.

So, we have a friend named James. This is him with Baxter and Rufus, who are fighting for his attention; small animals flock to him, enchanted by his pied-piper-pipings. Or... something like that.

James and his lovely wife, Estrella, have a cat named Henry. He is small and gray and adorable, and they are quite fond of him. This is the back of Henry's head (photo stolen from J's instagram):

At some point the four of us.(James and Estrella and Brian and I), were discussing how much we love our cats. I said that only the manliest men were willing to openly talk about how much they loved kitties, and James responded, "I LOVE my freaking cat!"
I think I said I was going to make a t-shirt out of that quote, or maybe I just thought it. Either way, I done did it.

Because, I love my freaking cat. 

And if you are so inclined, print/phone cases/tshirts/cards/ipad skins/etc. are available here:
http://society6.com/auntjune

Would You Like a Free Thing?

Woot, two posts in two days, I'm ON FIRE!

So, in addition to the Sign Language Alphabet posters I told you about yesterday, I'm also going to be selling some custom ASL goodness, in the form of prints and monogram notecards. Different colors! Different letters! Like a party!

And when I start doing any custom-thingies, I always make some samples to show what they looksa like. Usually I just pick one of my friends' kids' names, and they get another random Thing I Made.

So this time I thought, well, duh, Internet People are my friends, too! (Unless that weirds you out, and then I guess we aren't. Your choice, dude.) I've already made one sample for the lovely Ingrid, daughter of the also-lovely Ara Jane, and I think I'm going to do three more 8" x 10" custom name prints... For YOU! Well, for three of you, anyway.

So! How to enter? Hrmmm. I never think of these things in advance, and I am weirdly uncomfortable with incorporating the social-media-soup into giveaway-things, but I guess it's what people do? So.
I think we'll play it thusly...

 You can enter multiple times, in these ways:

-Comment on this blog post. Say anything. I won't even require a limerick this time!

-Say something about the giveaway on twitter? You can say anything about it, but link to this post and include the hashtag #iwantafreething so's I can find it. Theoretically, this is not really the best way to enter, though, because if other people see it and enter, you are statistically less likely to win. I am a social media CURMUDGEON, am I not?

-Post a picture of you, saying anything (G-rated) in ASL! Post it on twitter, instagram, flickr, facebook, or whatever-other-thing, but send me a link so I know about it. For doing this and thus exposing your Own Personal Face to the interwebs, you get THREE entries. Ka-ching?

Mkay. We'll shut it down Friday, midnight? Triumphant victors will be announced Monday-ish? I'm not good with timelines, folks.

Oh, and! Prints and notecards are already available in the etsy! Boom!

More Sign Language and Alphabets and the Postal Service's Sense of Humor.

So, I was kinda bummed when I realized I had to stop printing the ASL fabric. Honestly, the drawings took a while, and I just love all the happy little hands. But I had always planned to use them for more than just the fabric, and last week I finally had a chance to get it done! I promise I'll stop bombarding you with alphabet posters (eventually), but I am really enjoying doing them right now, and I plan on utilizing my kindergarten education to it's full extent.

Kinda fun, right? I wanted to do something really simple and graphic; that would be educational but not so institutional that it wasn't good for juss bein' purdy. Biased though I am, I think it came out pretty nicely.

So, obvs, it's in the etsy-- I've got the 8x10's up now, and shall be putting up 12x18's soon.

Now, friends, let's chat about me. A-duh, it's a blog, it's what I do. One of my many character flaws is my overdeveloped sense of "fairness". This sense of being the Ultimate Authority on Justice just happens to only pertain to following rules that I want to follow, and that, when not followed by others, tend to inconvenience me. They're all deeply first-world issues, the epicenter and victim of all these various injustices always happens to be, uhhhhhhm... Me?

One major trigger is proper driving practices, which would require a WHOLE other post to adequately cover. I have the most self-righteous road rage you have ever experienced. My blood pressure goes up a bit just thinking about all the different driving-stupidities I encounter regularly-- I CAN RANT FOR HOURS. Again, though, whole other post.

One of my other big issue is with lines. Or queues, for people from fancy-pants countries. I would like there to be a nationally instituted set of rules for standing in lines, which would be posted prominently in all public places where lines might occur. Like, ok, in a line at the bank, I HATE it when people don't fill out deposit slips beforehand. Especially when I am filling out my slip when they get in line, and then end up behind them as they do it when standing in front of the teller. Once I actually asked a man if he could move over so that I could make my already prepared, ahem, deposit. He did, and despite the bank employees thinking I was kinda insane, I felt triumphant for the rest of the day. Same thing with customs forms at the post office, same thing with people at the front of a long line who ask long series of questions when the answers to them are stated clearly on POSTERS on the WALL, with BIG LETTERS. These people are LITERATE. Grr.

But, ok, I have gotten off track. Set up for the story: I am a big fan of trivial rules.

I send a lot of letters and packages via the USPS, and I have a system, so pretty much everything I send, I have sent hundreds of times before in the same way. And if I have any concerns about shipping something, I make sure that it is OK'ed by the nice folks at the post office. So, a few weeks ago I was surprised and a bit peeved to get a package returned to me, addressed identically to MANY before it. I was so irked by the injustice of it, that it took me a few minutes to realize that the USPS had told me a HILARIOUS joke. (note: names and addresses were not blurred out in real life.)

You see, some rule-lovin' postal worker had decided that the return address on my letter was in the wrong place. Because of this, they decided that the envelope could not be processed. And since it could not be processed, they would have to send it back to the UN-PROCESSABLE return address. Never mind the fact that a return address is not even a legal requirement to mail a letter, it's actually entirely optional, and the fact that I had mailed the package in-person at the post office, so it had been accepted and stamped by a human postal worker who saw no problem with it. This fine inspector had decided that I should be informed that my cutesy stickers were NOT appreciated, ahthankyouverymuch, and that I really need to get my act together with my return-address-protocol.

Seriously? It's hilarious. Maybe even worth the money I had to pay to re-send it. The women at my PO thought so too, and you KNOW they deserve a laugh at the system's expense. Have I learned my lesson? Probably not, but I did get to complain about something on the interwebs, so.

Alphabetized and Organized and Spectrally Ordinated.

You guys are nice. Thank you so much for all of your comments and encouragement and support, because, really? I wouldn't have the opportunity to do this if it wasn't for you. It's cheesy and sappy to say, but this ACTUALLY would not be possible without you, and some of you very directly. So, mwah! Mwah! (That's air kisses.) You're the best-- so thank you for enduring my rants and ridiculousness and thousands of cat photos.

AAAAAnyway, I am working on So. Much. Stuff. right now, and I'm really happy to finally be able to share some of my labor-fruit. I mentioned that the etsy shop is going to be shifting gears since I'll no longer be selling fabric yardage, and this stuff is the beginning of that... Introducing "The Happy Alphabet"!

So, the alphabet. It's handy, no? And rainbows, I love them dearly. And a sprinkling of teeny-tiny patterns, well, all the better as far as I'm concerned. Right now I have all of these prints listed in 8 x 10, but I will be selling them in 11 x 17 and 13 x 19 as well. I think they'd be LOVELY in a nursery or kids' room, but I think they would fit in a lot of different places, ya know?

There are both "Rainbow Bright" and "Rainbow Light" versions of the first print; so you can ingest only the amount of color-calories you'd like. 

The second variation has more of a nautical flavor, for all of you scalawags, sea-farers and even you beach-loving landlubbers. The "Wave Rainbow" print will soon have a lighter equivalent as well, and probably some more monochromatic versions... I'm thinking an aqua, coral, and gray, but what do you kids think?

Oh, and you might notice that I've put up some shiny new iPhone cases on Ye Olde Etsy-- those are available from my brand-spankin'-new society6 shop! You can take a gander at society6.com/auntjune or just click the thingy over on my sidebar to get there. There is a TON of really cool stuff on society6, so if you have some time to kill, I'd recommend wandering around to see all of the incredible artists and designers who are peddling their wares. And right now, they're having running a free-shipping-artist-promotion-dingy, so click HERE for that goodness.

Ugh, so now that I've photobombed you with etsy commercials (saaaaahhhhhhrrryyyyy...) I'mma finish with a bit of attempted organization. I'm a HUGE listmaker, but my books of lists are many, and I find it really difficult to keep them straight and prioritize them. So fabulous husband suggested making some sort of board to keep me focused, and allow me to jump around from one project to the next in a slightly more sensical way. So, armed with a bulletin board and some index cards, I created...

DUHN DUHN DUHHNNNNNNNNNNNN:

The Master Plan. Color coded, sequenced by importance: lists and sub-lists and sub-sub-lists. It's like my notebook exploded, and I love it. Now, will it function as I want it to? Jury is still out, friends. But isn't it lovely?

Oh, and, yeah, sorry about the blurring. I can't have everyone knowin' all my bid'ness, dude. There must be MYSTERIES.

Upcoming: Rule-Keeping, USPS Fail, Greeting Cards!