spiralling chats and new friends.

guess what - stalking pays off and results in new friends! based on my neighbourhood picture taking, i have been asked by the toronto craft alert to write an interview with local street artists (among other things), anna pantchev and james gauvreau. we had a lovely chat at poor john's about their collaborative work, trend, geometry, public art, physics, theoretical science, mutual friends, quilting, triangles and more.

shannon was right; i love these guys.

after all the chatting we went for a brief stroll in the new spring to visit the few of their nearby pieces that i had not yet found. here are some sneak previews:

look for the full interview on the tca in about a week (okay, maybe a week and a half).

best laid plans.

map flags and labelled tags. yes, the absence of these was the only thing standing between me and infinite home/thought organization.

help at the factory.

today, my friend peter came over to help me with buttons/barter. it's so lovely to have a friend to chat with while making buttons all day, even if he did interview me and then break me down to a character archetype while we worked. for those who are interested, he settled on cynical idealist.

those buttons there are part of our output - hand silk screened buttons for the triumphant run of jesjit gill's $$ button sets. they should be hitting the world in about a week.

monthly planning.

as the frost lifts, i am getting my thoughts and schedules in order for this impending spring tour (and an unrelated fall tour across the ocean). it is intensely exciting for me to start planning an escape. i love being in motion (even though sometimes it is terrifying, sad, exhausting and/or exacerbating). i wonder how far into my planning that twig pencil will last...

homespun.

"oh, honey, if you're going into the bathroom, watch out - the cast iron frying pan is hanging from some yarn on the back of the door."

the interconectedness of it all (or, i got a new tin).

yesterday, leah, jen and i all made a plan for a last-ditch meet-up at the st. lawrence antique market before leah takes off to berlin forever. it was pretty fun. i got to eat a cruddy fried breakfast (in the best possible way) and scored a great vintage tin from holland for a dollar. what a deal! i got it from a man named morris who used to run a shop here called fun-o-rama. the shop existed before my time in toronto but it just so happens that he knew the entire rest of the fun family (uncle fun, sister fun, paper boy, sideshow, big fun, fun rockin'...). i am happy to say that this network of novelty shops is very dear to me. they provide a great amount of infrastructure (not to mention fun and friendship) to our touring. we have not met all the folks involved in this network yet (our travels have not yet been to cleveland or new orleans much). but maybe this next time...

i like it when the world seems smaller. i also like deals.

output.

must stop spinning. must pack today's orders.