Jewelry is Art, Art Can Be Jewelry

Jewelry is art, art can be jewelry

Alexander Calder was well known for his mobiles - but he also was a prolific jeweler. The Seattle Art Museum has an exhibit going on right now of Calder's work and there is a workshop this month exploring his line of jewelry.

This year I started making little mobile earrings, motivated by friends of mine that would hold my mini mobiles up to their ears and ask me to make them earrings. I have lots of little bits of scrap glass left over from large installations, so this is a great project! Tiny little mini glass mobiles that be worn as jewelry. I love wearing them, they are completely unusual and strange, but somehow really cute a the same time. And they dance - which makes me smile. - related post: New: Mobile Earrings

Awesome Handmade Goodness: a Holiday Wreath

This wreath is made of candy, wire, ribbon, hotglue and fake flowers, oh and and plushy santa! Isn't it simply awesome! The piece de resistance is the plastic scissors hanging off the bottom by a bit of x-mas ribbon... these scissors are for cutting off the candy for consumption!!!

backstory: if you're interested - cuz I did not make this - Tim came home with it tonight! One of his regulars made this for him - and I just think it is absolutely awesome. Complete with scissors! I couldn't resist giving it a full on photo-shoot and sharing its crafty goodness!!!

...and of course I am eating a few Werthers Originals... yum... damn those scissors are handy :)

Urban Craft Uprising 2009 Here I come!

This will be my first experience with Urban Craft Uprising - and I am very excited about it! I am driving up on Friday with my dear friend Aimee and we are going to go the Art Museum to check out the Calder exhibit (I have been looking forward to this for weeks!) and then to the exhibition hall set up my little booth in the afternoon... Saturday and Sunday will be two days of vending. I do hope people in Seattle want to buy some mobiles for holiday gifts... that would be awesome. Otherwise its going to be an expensive holiday vacation! ha! I have high hopes and I'll be bringing as much of my glass art with me as humanly possible!

If you live in the Seattle area - come on out this weekend! The first hundred people in the door each day get free bags of gifts from the artists - and they are no chumpy gifts of business cards and whatnot... these bags will be filled with real goodies (there were strict rules we had to follow in our contributions, everyone had to put in real creations and coupons, not just business cards!)

Some Background info on the show (from their website):
Since its early beginnings at its first holiday show back in 2004 with just 50 crafter booths and overflow crowds, Urban Craft Uprising now holds the largest indie craft event in Seattle and the Pacific Northwest with its Winter Show. In 2008, Urban Craft Uprising's annual Winter Show saw over 8,000 attendees and over 130 crafters, artists and designers from around the world.

Busy Bees in the Garden

Production continues here in the Garden of Leah... I am right in the middle of my big holiday retail shows... last weekend at the Portland Saturday Market was pretty hectic... now this coming weekend is going to get even crazier... and then the weekend after that I'll be in two different places! Oh my.
Last night I made some 50 little mini mobiles. I even suckered the boys into helping me, sticking labels to packages and whatnot... good help is key! This morning I am back at it with more wire bending, making all these little bits of glass and wire into cool gifty things... the two red triangles in this picture above made me smile - the wire from one is trapped in the corner of the other piece. They are best friends forever :) woops.

This weekend I will be up in Seattle at Urban Craft Uprising - I'll blog about it when I can find the image for this show (for some reason they don't have it on their website, but the poster/postcard this year is awesome, so I'm gonna scan it)

Saturday Market 11-29-09

Saturday Market 11-29-09
Originally uploaded by LeahPellegrini

this little video shows a 360degree view from my booth at the market... ahh the memories... next year I have a different spot...this year has been sweet!

Outdoor Market in the Winter?

I found this picture in my booth last weekend - I thought it'd be funny to share what I look like all wrapped up in layers

It gets cold in Portland by December, not crazy cold (just sorta in the 40s) and no snow (just rain), but cold enough to make you wonder who the crazy artists are that are selling their work at an outdoor market.

There are techniques: heaters (no plug in units because they use too much electricity so we use the ones that hook up to tanks of gas), the little hand warmers (you know the things you put in your pockets that heat up from a chemical reaction), heat pads to sit on (like small electric blankets - in fact some vendors bring down electric blankets - although again we have electricity rules: each vendor is only allowed to consume so much juice and between the extra lighting and holiday twinkling lights we already use more power per booth in the winter, the plug-in heaters are really not so much the best thing to use down there) and then there are the other normal strategies of layering longjohns, turtlnecks, sweaters and jackets, mittens, wool socks, warm boots, hats and scarves. We may look silly all wrapped up in layers - but thousands of shoppers come out to do their holiday shopping at the Portland Saturday Market. So we are there.

Cyber Monday 2009 Sale!

Shopping for Cyber Monday Sales? Here ya go!!


Orcchini Collection
great gifts at only $12.50ea
on SALE for $10ea

I have a large stock of these in
many colors - so if you’d like to
order in quantity just let me know!



Want to get
a show stopper this year?

Something to really stun
the whole family...
this mobile is a favorite of
mine - it needs a good home!



How about gifts for the office?

Computer Mobiles!!

Regular Price: $25ea

Sale Price: $15ea


Sale is only 11-30-09 from 10am-10pm PST and I am throwing in some extra fun sale action:

FREE SHIPPING + a FREE gift with every order!!

fine print: contact me when you have finished shopping and I will send you a revised invoice reflecting the sale price