chinny chin chin

big time

I feel as though I have officially arrived because I have an awesome opportunity to show my fall line at the super hip, super gorgeous, super perfect store: Tallulah Jones! 
Here is the information:

Since the show is in Denver, I am really hoping that I will get a chance to see some of my friends there!  Also my m & p which is always a pleasure.
(Thank you Jen for already pledging to bring precious Adler by:))

a few more pics

Here are a few more pictures from the shoot with Kristen.  Check out the previous post to see some others, and check back to see some more:)   

my uber talented photographer friend!

I am so lucky that I have Kristen Besanceney as my friend because just look, look, look at these beautiful pictures she has taken of my fall line! 

 



 

 
We set up last Saturday as a potential photo shoot day and hoped for the best in terms of weather.  How perfect that after two or three gloomy days the sun was shining.  Kristen and I had emailed back and forth a few times to plan.  Really quickly I conveyed my ideas, she volunteered her kids as models (thank you m & c!!) and we planned to meet at the top of Bingham Hill at 11:00am.  I brought up the clothes, my own little models (willing subjects mind you:)), some toy trucks and very, very, plain, very non-messy snacks.  From the moment we started Kristen worked her magic.  All of the shots are gorgeous, artistic, simple, flattering of the kids and flattering of the clothes, and are absolutley keepsakes for me personally.  I am so grateful for the work Kristen did- it feels like an honor for someone to have taken so much effort in portraying my work so well!  If you live anywhere near Fort Collins you must call Kristen to take pictures of your family- she is incredible.  You know, her company name is Cattura Photography and that means 'capture' in Italian (Kristen has lived in Italy and speaks Italian!), and 'capture' is exactly what she does with her work.  When I look at the pictures she has taken over the years for us, I really see my kids just as I remember them.  They look so natural and yet they convey so much emotion.  Kristen- you are a wonder!
_{ps. In order to have typepad upload these images in any sort of reasonable timeframe, I had to resize them. In other words, they are not seen here at their full potential... in print they are going to be unbelievable!}

_{pps. More about my fall clothes later.....
I will be showing the whole line at the Sustainable Living Fair here in Fort Collins this Sunday, Sep. 21 at 3:00 on the main stage.}

chinny chin chin refocuses on e-commerce

I have deduced that people come to the Farmer's Market to buy corn, not cute stuff.  Therefore, I am reclaiming my Saturday mornings for drinking coffee on the porch with the family, and allocating all my marketing energy back into my etsy shop .  (By 'all my marketing energy', I mean the tiny portion of time that I am not sewing and am forced to think of ways to get my goods out there;) And here is a taste of what you will find for sale now:
   
            

wyoming sky

Wyoming Sky is the name of the fall 2008 collection that I am working on!  The pieces are all inspired by our  rv trip through Wyoming and Montana.  ( When Arlen says 'our rv', it sounds just like 'rrv':)) Our family had such an amazing time.  Ten days of pure rv bliss.  Maybe that sounds funny, but really, Mike and I were ready to sell the house and live on the open road.  It was that good.  On the last day all of us got pretty sad about returning to our hectic lives and going our separate ways each day.  We had to leave my brother and his family in Park City, Montana, and we had just wrapped up an awesome camping trip in the Beartooth Mountains with them, so it was all double sad.  All day the wind blew and the weather was dreary.  Then, around seven o'clock, as we neared Cheyenne, the sun came out and made this most incredible sky.  Even now I can picture it perfectly.  So enraptured by this sky was I, of course, that I didn't even think about taking a photo.  So try to follow this description.  To the left are dark clouds all the way to the horizon.  But they aren't gray and thunderous, they are deep, deep indigo.  They stretch into the distance and have a solid, inky feeling to them.  In front of this sky, being illuminated by thousands of low, late summer, sun rays, are rolling hills of sweet grass.  The grass is tall and the top wisps are almost glowing in the sun's light.  The color is somewhere between chartreuse and goldenrod.  The greenish tint is so alive, so vibrant, so fresh.  To the right, to the west, the sun is streaming through silver, left-over thunder clouds from the earlier storm.  The mountains to the west are hazy and gray too, and you can see every ridge in a slight, slight variation of color.  In between the sun and the indigo, there are patches of bright-as-can-be turquoise sky.  It's like an old set, for an old backdrop is behind the current sky which is peeling away.  And you can see that the sky from the set before, was meant to be a mid-July, mid-morning, knee-high by the Fourth of July cornfield sky.  Now, roll down your rv window and take a huge breath of fresh air, because this air is something special.  It smells like ozone, like rain on asphalt.  It smells like sweetgrass and sage.  And it smells like those things without a single other trace.  Its pure and far from everywhere and wild and free.  And it made me want to make clothes to wear out there.   So I am sewing and they are coming soon.
In the meantime, here are some of the pictures I did manage to take on our trip. 

 

The warrior!  His name is actually Clyde and I have half a mind to spray paint 'Peaceful" right above:)

 

Self-explanatory:)

Starting a hike from East Rosebud Lake with the cousins Ryan (enthusiastically grinning in the orange shirt) and Dylan (also referred to as 'the trail boss').

Enid getting happy at Tecumseh's Trading Post in Cody, Wyoming.

Later on the hike when my nephew Dylan commented, 'This is the life, huh Dirk'.  He calls my brother,  his dad, Dirk, which is so hilarious to me. 

*Note how Dylan has appropriate footwear and socks, while Imogene is sporting no-support-Converse for the three mile trek.  Remind me to e-bay some hiking boots!

Here is a great photo of Dirk and Jinell, my sister-in-law, monitoring a moose's aggressiveness propensity from very close by.  In the end, it was determined that the moose probably wouldn't attack, and that one-by-one we ought to just pass right on by on the trail whilst my brother stood his ground between the moose and us with the bear spray at the ready. So exiting!

 

Immy-pim holding a tiny, tiny goat that was only one day old!  He had been born at the Montana State Fair!  Imogene made me proud because she was so gentle (of course), but also because she really knew her way around that little farm animal.  The goat rancher (you can see his moccasins) asked us if she raised goats at home.  I wish!!!

market day

Last night my brother-in-law Brian asked me, "Have you found your focus yet?"  I can't tell you how excited that question made me.  See, he is an artist and the phrasing made me feel really officially artistic.  I have indeed found my focus for the next batch of goods and here is the starting point.  Out with the florals, in with the geometrics!  I am looking to make a simple line of bright, modern, easy to wear, easy to wash, easy to layer pieces in a combination of knit and cotton.  I can't stray from my mission to be gentle on the earth by repurposing in-existence textiles, but I am also smitten with new fabric designs, so it is a combination effort.  Here is a halter dress that begins it all.  Alexander Henry fabric found miraculously at Jo-Ann, combined with a robin egg blue cotton from The Fancy Tiger DIY boutique in Denver. (Sorry there isn't a link.. it seems I have a new version of typepad and I can't quite figure that out right now:)).

I have been invited by some very talented local ladies to sell at their booth at the Farmer's Market tomorrow!  It will be my first time, and I get so nervous for people's response, but the market is so cool this year that I can't pass it up.  Plus, who doesn't love passing a morning with coffee and crafty ladies in the shade of a tent on a parking lot??

PS. Sorry for the hiatus.  I have been in major vacation mode.  Reading a bunch of other blogs.  Doing tons of yoga.  (By tons I mean three times a week:)).  Sewing and not photographing and not posting.  Plus, have I mentioned the RV?  We are owning it timeshare-style with some other friends, so many weekends we are up in the hills.  Like this:

 

What?? That doesn't look like camping?  It is a whole new era.......RV RESORTS of America here we come!

from my spring line...

A ladies cotton blouse, both superbly ruffled and superbly yellow, became a gorgeous toddler shift.

late post about an early morning

Here is Imogene hunting for eggs on snowy Easter morning.  She is wearing a dress that I made according to a new pattern that I am still fussing with.  I cut the dress portion from the softest vintage sheet.  I made the bodice from a brown corduroy that has a sort of damask brown-on-brown print to it.  The straps are from Amy Butler  polka-dot fabric.  I liked the final dress quite a bit, mostly because the dress part sort of flows and billows and rubs around your legs as though you were running through the laundry on the line.  It took way too much time though, and I sized it incorrectly at first.  So now two exist, but one has been given to my friends' daughter.  What I can't wait to see is the two of them in these peace loving frocks down by the river this summer! 
Here is Enid on Easter morning.

She is wearing an adorable blue checked coat that I 'rescued' from the thrift store for a dollar and a half.  When I see handmade apparel  like this, I can't help but buy it because it just seems to have a sense of unique value.  I see it on the rack, then I think, "what if I could make something like this?  But someone already did...and its so cute...and it would have taken forever...and somebody else probably inherited it and they didn't see its worth and they brought it in with a bunch of cruddy Corning ware...but I can honor that first woman's work once again...I should just get it...even if she only wears it once"  Luckily, it is not a budget breaking hobby.  Now if only I could find more jackets like this...

My friend Lauren found this for Arlen way back in the fall.  He has worn it so many times, as I am sure a whole other family of boys once did too, and it still looks good.   Its like the Montgomery Ward of the sixties made it their mission to sell only indestructible blends of polyester.  One would think that there would be more around.  I love this jacket.  My favorite iteration has been with the Beatles t-shirt and distressed dark jeans.  Rocking.  That's Arlen.  Hair and all.  When Lauren gave it to me she said that she would like it back if the baby in her belly was a boy.  Well, not so long ago Winslow was born to Lauren, so the jacket has a new wearer.  All he has to do is gain more than the eight or so pounds he now weighs.  (Denise, if Lauren had had a girl, I was so going to package this coat up for the Beast.)
So there is a story with this picture and this is how it begins.
"Arlen, Omi hid a basket in the living room for you.  Can you find it?"
Arlen returns with this small basket of coasters that usually sits on an end table.
"Oh Arlen! You found a basket! Can you find another one?"

Arlen returns with this.
"Another one basket", he states.
"Yes, yes! Can you find another one?"

"Alright Arlen, you found it!"
"It has candy."

enid turns one

 
Enid turns one tomorrow, but she already had her first birthday bluebird party over the weekend so you see her here in the robin egg blue birthday dress I made for her, looking oh-so-cute, and flashing a toothy grin! I saw the fabric at a super cool shop in Denver, called the Fancy Tiger, late Saturday afternoon when Mandy and I stopped in after our day of shopping the Paris Street Market .  An hour from home... five o'clock in the evening...I could tell it was going to be a late night.

I maybe would/maybe wouldn't have been so determined to make this dress the night before her party, but the little shop also had these adorable vintage fabric covered buttons that sort of demanded to have a dress to be sewn onto.

I really like the look all put together.  It's kind of traditional because of the gathered neck/full skirt/flouncy sleeves, but not in a Suri/baby-Burberry kind of way.  (Is it that Tomkat's style really doesn't resonate with me, or might it also be that the high price tag makes me simultaneously desire  and feel the need to scorn those plaid dresses she sports in US magazine each week?) As afore mentioned, I am in love with the color.  And I made the pattern myself, from scratch, which lets me know that I am indeed learning as I am going.  Not so much in that it is a wonderful-easy-to-duplicate pattern, but in that I am starting to be able to design from a vision, without modifying/changing bought patterns, and the end product resembles the vision fairly closely.

Here is Enid trying to woo her little boyfriend Owen with her matchbox car prowess.  Thank you Heather for the beautiful pictures!

Finally, the whole fam getting in on the candle blowing action.  That's Imogene's head in the foreground. She arranged a strategic spot for both blowing assistance and cake dissemination which unfortunately left her facing awkwardly in the wrong direction for the family photo.   

best of 2008!

I was super lucky to have been nominated Best Found Fabric Clothing Line by the editors of the Rocky Mountain Chronicle!  The article is so very complimentary- the editor made me seem like my ultra cool future self, you know, the one that I hope to one day become:)
You can see the online version here!

And so I have been super inspired and super busy.  Here is a glimpse of one mini mini mini dress from my spring stuff modeled by one of my cutest fourth graders ever!  Its made of a vintage chambray and lined with some Amy Butler cotton.  Even the zipper didn't daunt me! The back is really interesting as well- I will post more pics of that later.