death and texas (or, things on which to rely).

my favourite screen prints by timber!


custom letterpress coaster station from andrew le & tim cook


examples from heidie kenney's diy doll kits

i am way too zonked to pull actual thoughts together so i am just going to leave you with a few favourite images from today. i was also too zonked to take the whole event in properly - such is the beginning of a tour. the exhaustion of touring can never compare with the exhaustion of leaving home and i am a couple days away from feeling stable again. i know that there were more awesome vendors lurking in the depths of this show that i did not find. what i did happen into was lovely enough but i wish i had the mind power to see more. my photos from the whole show can be found here. yeehaw! now, off to sample some home-infused drinks i have heard about here.

trailer culture.

i have heard a lot about food trailer culture in austin but only just had my first experience today. i feel that this may be the beginning of a beautiful friendship.

lone stars (or renegade austin, day one).

today marked the first day of the second annual renegade craft fair austin. it was our first time doing this specific show and only the second time that austin has figured into our tours at all. texas is big and austin is very far away from everything (by american standards, anyway) so it was a great treat to find ourselves back in the lone start state.

we had a great time checking out all of the incredible interactive programming - including the friendship bracelet making station hosted by renegade (top) and the vintage baseball card set-up presented by local rock star collective, public school.

i even found a few moments right as the show was opening to build a brand new display for my diy security envelope installation kits (constructed from materials aquired on the way down, no less). the installation kits are a hard project to communicate to people, so i am hoping that this visual presentation will at least draw people in to ask questions.

and what launch of a tour would be complete without reunions and new friends? look below for some of the amazing crafters we collided with (berkley illustration, miss natalie/canoe, leah duncan). as per usual, i wish i could have collected so much stuff, but we restrained ourselves to two things on our touring survival list - a big key chain and little wood-burned pocket knife from miss natalie's new canoe line.

and now, if you will excuse me, i have a pool party to seek out.

austin translation.

the tour begins. our first fair is today. c'mon down and say howdy, austin!

a matter of degrees.

today was the longest driving day. in fact, today turned into tomorrow while we rolled from tennessee to texas. up there is a fried peanut butter and banana sandwich from our lunch stop in...you guessed it...memphis, tennessee. in the strip mall shadow of graceland, we plotted out course and ate touristy things. let's just say that saying i have done it is probably the highlight of that particular culinary experience.

we popped into mississippi for my first time ever, too. i got a perfect skirt and a goodwill then we moved on to arkansas. the weather is getting warmer and i needed something breezy.

these deceivingly bland images (above) are from the lovely gem of carlisle, arkansas. it is unclear whether or not the place is actually a gem worth recommending to other people but this town just east of little rock holds a special place in our hearts. it was a pit stop on our first ever craft tour in 2006 - before i was blogging or taking pictures - and our tours have not even passed by it since. it is also the backdrop for my most popular photo of all time. of all the places we have stopped back into (a favourite thrift shop was gone from memphis), carlisle has remained comfortingly the same. there have been changes, of course, but the trailer motel whose bargain basement prices lured us there in the first place is still under twenty dollars a night. we are hopeful for a stay on the way back up north to columbus. maybe you can't relive old magic but there is something about this gas station motel that sets me oddly at ease. arkansas, i want to know you better. i hardly ever even hear your name.

i will leave you with this message from an arkansas interstate:

photo by reverend aitor

part of the family.

as some of you may know, two nights before our departure some parkdale hooligan smashed both side mirrors off the car i had had for four days. above is the amazing fix-it job that my lovely mechanic eric came up with. with these new piercings, the as-yet-unnamed car is looking more like a frankenstein than boris did. also of note: zigzag afghan as seat cover. just trying to sync this ride up with the crafty lady who is going to live inside her for a third of a year.

day one in review.

waylaid by some car vandalism and general exhaustion, we left toronto later that we had hoped yesterday. this makes our journey to our first stop of austin a fairly stacked series of driving days. this means our adventuring and ability to update you all will be minimal through the weekend.

hopefully, we will actually get to visit some of these cities and towns on the way back up to columbus. anyone have any fun plans for memorial day that we can crash? arkansas? tennessee? kentucky?

but for now, we'll take that extra time zone hour and try to get some rest for tomorrow's big drive.