screen printing in the rubble

just look at that pegboard!

just look at that pegboard!

Making this move has had its ups and downs.  Sometimes you’ll be driving in the car for what seems like DAYS just to get to a decent Thai food place.  But then you go downstairs and realize:  “What??  I have a workshop?!  A real, live workshop!” and then suddenly pad thai accessibility doesn’t seem like such a deal breaker.

It should be noted that the nearest, decent Thai restaurant is only a ten minute drive away.  It should also be noted that I know I’m a crybaby.  City people are so spoiled.

Right now, the workshop kinda looks like this:

mystery boxes

mystery boxes

Even though we’re working with only 20% of floor space I had a chance to break out the ol’ screen printing tools and go to work today.  I had two onesie orders to fill from a couple weeks ago when all our stuff was in limbo, and Metal Feathers needed t-shirts so I got to work.

Click on the image to buy your own Harbor Seal Onesie!

Click on the image to buy your own Harbor Seal Onesie!

I made five of these in different sizes to complete the current stock I have.  If you think the harbor seal design is cute and want one of your own just click right here.

metal feathers

metal feathers

Then came the MFers tees — this was a tough design to print, because the glasses are so thick and the writing was pretty thin, so getting the ink saturation was difficult.  I had to go over it once and then a second time, with emphasis on the ‘m’ and the ‘s’ at the bottom/top of the design.  The guys said they came out well, though, so I guess my work here is done.

work!

work!

There are a lot of lovely things about the new house, but one thing in particular is the utility sink in the workshop.  Just genius.  So now instead of running up to the kitchen or outside to the hose I can just walk my screen over to the sink and wash it, no threat of getting ink in non-crafty places.  Well, I can wash it conveniently right after I drop it on the floor and start screaming at the Yudu machine.  Seriously — it’s the dumbest machine to rely heavily on because I refuse to learn the right way to do anything.  Anyways, check this out:

swoon

swoon

Mostly it was just really relaxing to actually start making things with my hands again.  They’ve been busy with packing boxes, lifting boxes, scraping walls, ripping up carpet, cleaning, cleaning, cleaning for the last month.  I also picked up some light, summer knitting (100% cotton happy beach time hair bands… coming soon…) to do while we watch the Netflixes.  Handwork is essential to me and I’m glad I don’t have to put it on the back burner anymore, even if there are about 100 boxes that need to be unpacked…

Little Eye Presents… Onesies!!

Awwwww…. New and coming soon to our Etsy shop:  little baby onesies!  Oh, the cuteness is killing us.  This design of a harbor seal was hand drawn by me (Audrey) and screen printed in our kitchen.  These onesies will be available at our booth at Picnic this weekend (Saturday!  Lincoln Park!) for $10 (special Picnic debut price).  We’ve also got a pretty substantial ‘discount bin’ that we’ll be toting along.  Without kids, it’s hard to know what to do with the mess-ups except sell them for $2 a pop!  Learning to screen print is hard… but the adorable factor is totally worth it.

Hope to see you this weekend!

–A.

Just in Time for Valentine’s: Little Eye on Cafe Press

S.W.A.K. -or- Seal With A Kiss. ©Image copyright by Audrey Hotchkiss 2012.

La-dee-da!  It’s not every Wednesday night you’re lounging around, looking for something to do and end up as productive as I have!  Little Eye has just opened her Cafe Press shop featuring, for now, just ONE lovely, Valentinesy designy.  The doodle is a little harbor seal pup I drew a few months back when I was making big plans for a screen printing machine J.R. and I had picked up at the craft store.  It’s still sitting in the same place in our art space, but I was desperate to see my drawings on some products.  Enter:  Cafe Press!

I added a heart and some text to the illustration et voilà, finis.  The illustration is also available without the heart and text so if you’d like me to add a product email me at littleeyedesigns at gmail.

Here is my favorite product, below, but the S.W.A.K. pup is also available in the Cafe Press Shop on tote bags, mouse pads, women’s wear, ringer T’s, thongs (!!!), pint glasses, water bottles and more!

Little Eye Onesies!! What the?! Awesome! Click image for onesie listing.

This is a relatively new venture for Little Eye so any feedback you have about the design, the product selection, pricing, or anything else you can think of is greatly appreciated.