Post-Christmas tear down

Having a full fledged crafty business means that almost every weekend during the holiday season I am out of town vending at shows. Last year, between craft shows, getting engaged and buying and moving into our new house I never had time to put up a tree or deck out the house for Christmas. I spent all of 2011 getting excited about being able to decorate our new house for Christmas this year, and as an end result, I might have over compensated just a little...

Along with all of the usual fanfare of the tree/ornaments/indoor and outdoor lights, I decided to test drive some decor ideas I was thinking of using for the wedding. I had been seeing some really fun paper pinwheel backdrops on wedding blogs this year, but I wondered how practical it would be to try to complete such a large scale display in a limited amount of time.

I'm guessing this is probably the best our big, blank dining room wall has ever looked.

I like that Horrocks had cut greenery in their flower section so I could make a winter white arrangement accented  with pine boughs.

The dining room wall looked so festive that I couldn't resist making a photo backdrop for the basement. Since I didn't want to deal with the mess of adhesive on our permanently installed blackboard, I hot glued this set of pinwheels to a foam core board backing, then propped it up on the blackboard ledge. Since it's not actually attached to anything, I was able to take it down afterwards and keep it for use in future years!

Anyone who knows me well is aware of my obsession with all things Anthropologie. Among other things, their store displays are always awe inspiring, and on a very large scale. A  couple of years ago their holiday displays incorporated huge hanging flurries of paper snowflakes. I decided to make my own 'snow storms' in two opposing corners of our basement. To make the displays I used Honeycomb balls and pinwheels from a local party supply store, disco ball Christmas ornaments I already owned, round paper lanterns from Party City, silver stars from the dollar store, and some tissue paper poms I had made for a party last spring. I was really happy with the overall effect, and in total I spent less than $50 for all of the supplies for both the pinwheel displays AND the hanging snowstorms.

A snow flurry in the basement.

To cap it all off, once the house was decorated I couldn't resist having a party. Since I've always believed that a themed party is infinitely more awesome than an ordinary party, we threw a masquerade ball. Check out what Mr. Mammoth and I wore:

Mr. Mammoth sports the Honey Badger scarf I made him for Christmas, along with a very poetic thrifted jacket.

If I could get away with dressing like this every day, I probably would. Vintage Sequin dress purchased years ago at a church rummage sale, tiny tophat from the party supply store, and a really fun makeup job thanks to the lovely Bre.

First post ever! Whoa!

Two weekends ago future Mr. Mammoth and I drug ourselves out of bed really early and headed halfway across the state to set up my shop at the summer Shadow Art Fair in Ypsilanti. This was my second time at this show, having done the winter version of it in 2009, and it is totally one of the best Michigan shows to vend at. It's held at the Corner Brewery, which is the official pub for Arbor Brewing Company beers, so they have tasty beverages and really friendly staff. The best part, though is the seemingly endless stream of really awesome customers.

I sold my last shark to this little guy who then spent the rest of the afternoon running around the show making chomping sounds. If he can't make you smile, there's probably no hope for you.

I was slightly devastated when my first ever purple hippo walked out the door, but apparently this guys mom LOVES hippos more than anything, and has a huge collection, so I figure First Hippo Ever is going to a good home where he will have lots of other hippo friends to play with.

When we first bought our house, it was the middle of winter, and my studio space upstairs needed a huge amount of work and custom built-ins before it was going to be ready for use. Unfortunately my dad who did the woodwork for me, had to wait until spring to set up his wood shop in the garage. It meant that I went about four months without sewing or producing anything new for the Woolly Mammoth line. I figured it was a long shot when I applied for SAF, since they don't usually allow repeat vendors. I had a bit of panic when I got my acceptance notice a month and a half before the show and had no product, but I think in the end I managed to put together a pretty decent amount of stuff (which I then sold almost all of and am back to square one. sigh.)

That's me, making awkward faces and sewing on seahorse eyes behind the booth.

Future Mr. Mammoth, awesome as he is, helped me scramble to get read the night before the show, and assembled all of my bitty bunting necklaces. I'm not entirely sure how I ever survived without him!

Probably the best BEST part of the whole day was when a girl came up to the booth to tell me that her brother had given her one of my monster change purses for christmas, and that they had loved it so much they made their own blog out of it. Awesome.