An American exchange student in Paris giveaway!

Love robots? Love screwed up Engrish-French? Then you'll love this shirt!

We have a limited number of robot t-shirts that we are giving away for absolutely FREE. Just leave a comment on this post and make sure there is some sort of obvious way for me to contact you if you are a winner.

We will choose 5-10 winners randomly on Tuesday September 1st at noon. Winners will have a choice in t-shirt size (some kid sizes available, too!) based on availability.

Please share this giveaway on your blog, twitter, facebook, or anywhere else where you have friends who like fun stuff for free! And visit our etsy shop for more fun t-shirt designs and other goodies.

Thanks for playing!

xo
andrea

A few things

1. Space Oddities was featured on the isthmus online last week! The article is HERE if you'd like to read it.

2. My grandmother passed away last week. I gets easier with time, right? I know it's only been a week but now that I'm back in town and the funeral and everything is over I am way more emotional. I wish I wasn't such an emotional person. I feel like I can't function and can't handle anyone asking me about her. I feel wrecked when I think about it.

3. I kept hearing about TWITTER while chatting in the etsy forums. Twitter this, tweet that. I vowed not to even look (just like I wasn't going to join indiepublic or flickr or facebook...) but of course curiousity took over and I checked it out and joined today. If you have also taken the plunge, please, come follow me! I pretty much have no idea what I'm doing yet. But it's apparent that it is quite addictive!

4. I am excited for winter shows! But I have not been motivated to make much. I'm going to try to get back in the groove of making new things this week. Instead of making new stuff I've been trying to clean and organize my house and have been taking pictures for my vintage shop. I listed this vintage french song book over the weekend. It's prettier on the inside. You can see it up close HERE. :)
























5. It's seventy degrees in Wisconsin today.

xo
andrea

fall shows, to-do lists, stuff

Look, a new mirror!


french text mirror
Originally uploaded by space oddities

I can't believe it's already Thursday! The week has flown by. This week at work I've decided to force myself to be severely cheerful. To my surprise, it's really working and is making my days go faster and things generally more pleasant. Not that my work isn't generally pleasant...it's just that lately there are a lot of times when I'd just rather be home with my family, you know? It's funny how the pretending to be in a good mood can work. I'm really in a good mood. But...well, it's 3 a.m. and we'll see how I feel at six when I get up to go to work again. Ha!

Today I made a massive list of things to do to prepare Space Oddities for upcoming fall shows (see the list on the top left for Fall Shows!) and the upcoming holiday season online and in brick & mortar shops. It turns out I have a LOT to do! One thing I have to do a lot of is packaging. I have a ton of pin and magnet sets and mirrors ready but need to make them look pretty and and finished. I've started to cut paper in bulk which makes things faster, and have realized that I should probably begin to print my labels instead of hand stamping them all due to the time it takes. But I really love the hand stamped look even if it's NOT so perfect and polished. So I think at least for now I'm sticking to it.

I'm excited for our non-eventful weekend. I'm hoping we can just hang out at home, maybe go to the market on Saturday, and spend some time crafting! I just ordered a batch of new tote bags to print on and just maaaybe I'll get them in time to bust out the gocco and print this weekend. Fingers crossed!

It was a beautiful day. Chad and I took the kids down to the farmer's market, dropped a small batch of items off to Anthology and then spent a lazy day at home. Jette's 2nd birthday is next week so we are trying to see if we can pull off getting our place decent enough for a party. Our house is still half packed! The urgency of unpacking is just not as great at the urgency of packing was a month ago. Not good!

I've been making lots of pocket mirrors and have been sifting through images for buttons and cards for geek-kon. I'm also working on a custom shirt order for a bachelorette party. Chad has been drawing a lot lately and is thinking about doing some simple Madison themed paintings this week. He actually had this idea and a certain style in mind years back and hadn't considered it in awhile. When we talked to Emily at the market this morning and she mentioned the popularity of Madison items he decided to give it a try. I hope he makes something quick so I can show it off!

Well, I've started to apply for some winter shows and have a few more I'm waiting on the applications to open up. I am going to try to fit in as many shows as I can in November and December. Unfortunately a couple of the shows/show dates I want to apply for are doubled up this year. But I should still be able to get at least 2 in for November and 2 in December. I hope! And I've been talking with another WIST team member about trying to coordinate another trunk show for the street team at Lazy Jane's this year. It was a nice little event last year and I hope we can make it happen again! I really WANT to apply for more shows that are coming up sooner but I know I won't be ready. Plus I've probably missed the deadline in most cases anyway. So...for the rest of the year it'll be all about the holiday shows!

I'm off to make more mirrors. I'll leave you with this one which is my favorite from last night's batch. The image is from an old French children's book. I seriously can't believe I cut it to pieces. It was gorgeous and perfectly aged. But also very damaged. I love this picture because it reminds me of my father who played piano from a very young age and talks about how when he was eight years old he would give the neighbor girls piano lessons. So cute. It also reminds me sitting on my daddy's lap playing piano when I was a child. Aww. So sappy, I know. :)