Category Archive for ‘how I love the postal service’

poster by: my little underground

lovin’ this entertaining wedding invitation by Kayrock!

Dani Cards. Sweet cards. Sweet stories.

you don't feel strapped in. you feel nervous. you want to puke.
but it's also euphoric.
kind of like taking risks and falling in love and traveling to foreign lands on your own...
you don't feel strapped in. you feel nervous. you want to puke.
but it's worth it. it's so worth it.

we were biking on a deserted road passing by hundreds of thick trees on our way to easter lunch. 
dylan had bought flowers to bring for miranda. i lagged behind on my old pedal bike. 
he stretched out his arms and the whole sunday smiled.

this little plane flew quietly overhead as i sat so small in front of the indian ocean. there was no point to the day, only to scavenge for shells and write things in the sand and maybe take a nap by the dunes. 
it reminded me that flying is hard. getting your wings together and gathering up belief and choosing to aim for the heavens, it's hard. but once you're up there, the view is...ridiculous. 
congratulations should always be in order for such things.

I’m one of  them.   Willy Wonka would say,  ”We are the music makers, the dreamers of  dreams” & i’ll add…”we are the list-makers.”  I just seem to make lists all the time…lists of things  I love, lists of things to get done, lists of people I need to write, & lists of random thoughts.   In the evening, I’ll even make a list of everything i’ve accomplished that day just to get the pure satisfaction of crossing everything off.  Something about these lists printed with white foil on 100% recycled paper caught my eye.

a few words of wisdom to keep in mind this weekend via the love shop.

I’m off to Boston today…looking forward to jewelry shows Wednesday and Thursday…wish me luck!

Poster by Ork & stationery (love the area codes) by Jet Set Paper

I woke up and the first thing on my mind was a grommet. Strange, huh? You’d think i’d be preparing for my two jewelry shows Boston this week, but I just couldn’t get grommets off my head. Grommets are those strange little-metal-thing-a-ma-jigs used for reinforcing holes. In my opinion, I think that they’re a pretty darn cool invention. Whether they be on shoes, clothing or stationery, I just like them. I especially like the envelopes where a string is tied with a grommet and you have to unwrap the string to open the envelope. Because i’m procrastinating from carefully packing up my 100′s of pieces of jewelry for the Boston trip, I figured that this morning would be the perfect time to figure out the whole grommet-envelope-string thing (and, of course I would have random grommets hanging around the house). I gotta say, stationery lovers, I really like the way my project turned out…I might be on to something.

An interesting enevelope arrives in the mail….hmmm.  When the envelope is opened and the paper is unfolded & handled, the following phrase is revealed: the future belongs to the few of us willing to get our hands dirty.  Unique concept and oh so very true.  Get out there & get dirty.

Poster created by Roland Tiangco

As many of you know,  stationery is my weakness.  Put me in a stationery store for the day and i’m good to go.  I love looking through each card, feeling the weight of the paper, running my fingers over the  indentation of the letterpress type, and the way each card is individually packaged in clear card jackets.   If there is a vast selection of pens and felt markers to test, I’m in heaven.  I make sure to tear the first “pen-tester-sheet” off the small notepad.  Of course, the top tester sheet on the stack is usually filled with doodles and random scribbles, and I love to have a clean test sheet to try each pen…making sure I give each one a fair try.  There is just something about making the first mark on a blank piece of paper.  As you can imagine,   I was thrilled to receive a few of my new paper packaging materials in the mail yesterday & just had  to take a few photos for you to see. I’ll be including these in each order from www.erinmcdermott.com.

What does lobster bisque, a Norwegian Sky, pumpkin pudding, an Arizona Sunset and a drizzly afternoon have in common?  They are all the names of colored pencils…and there are 495 other funky and unique names.  The 500 colored pencil set is the only set that matches the span and wonder of human creativity. Each pencil has a name, a story, and a gorgeous hue.  The coolest thing about this set is that you don’t get them all at once.  For 20 months you will receive 25 new pencils in the mail.  If you’re stuck in an artistic block, feeling uninspired, or need something just to keep you going, these pencils will awaken that creative spark.

I had so much fun sharing a booth with Cary Oliva the other weekend at the UVA Artisans Bazaar.  Cary, from ByCary, uses polariod transfers, paper, watercolors, rare images, and textiles to create gorgeous cards, calandars, marble coasters and other unique treasures.  

I love her quote on her etsy page:
“Where the spirit does not work with the hand there is no art”. – Leonardo Da Vinci

Simply put…I love hand-written letters.  I feel like handwriting can tell so much about a person. The calligraphy of Bryn Chernoff from Paperfinger caught my eye.  Paperfinger is based out of Brooklyn, New York  and Bryn encompasses a playful and unique style in her projects. Check out her work here.  Never underestimate the power of a hand-written letter.

I just came across these hand-made maple wood address files, far away mailboxes, and beautifully packaged stationery from  Lovely mail order.   The colors, design, and packaging just brightened my day.

I’m a big fan of Nikki McClure‘s intricate paper cuts.  She uses an x-acto knife to cut images from paper and creates images that depicts motherhood, hard labor, patience, and celebration.  

One of my (many) loves is letterpress.  I can rarely leave a stationery store without falling in love with a letterpress card, poster, or print.   I love the feel of the imprint on thick white paper and imagine an artist picking a specific font and hand-setting each letter onto the paper…letterpress also has a unique, vintage quality.   One of my goals this year is to learn how to make my own letterpress stationery.  One of my favorite letterpress businesses is Hammerpress.  Just look at these fabulous creations!  Hammerpress can design anything from CD packaging to a mural on a wall.  

We’ve all heard of a gaggle of geese, a pride of lions and a nest of hornets, right?   Well, have you heard of a bloat of hippos, a shoal of bass, a muster of peacocks, a parliament of owl, an unkindness of ravens, a business of ferrets, and a convocation of eagles?  I was thrilled to come across this t-shirt that lists the collective names of over 100 animals!  http://www.etsy.com/view_listing.php?listing_id=14616544

If you enjoy descriptive words and spacing – you’ll love this website!  I experimented with erinmcdermott.com and wordle came up with this “word cloud.”  I think that I might use the image for a business card.  What do you think?   

 click link below to see larger image:     

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