This trio of outfits was FUN and so easy (which I needed desperately because at the time I was 7 months pregnant with Charlotte).

I give you the Dread Pirate Roberts, Inigo Montoya, and one fierce Rodent of Unusual Size (R.O.U.S.):

In my experience, the best costume themes have a “punch line” (funny part), and in this set, the overscaled Rodent is an immediate visual pun. Add in a name tag for Inigo Montoya quoting his most famous line of the movie, and you’ve got two layered jokes in the costumes already.

Let’s start with the Dread Pirate himself:

We ordered a Zoro costume and used the shirt and the mask. I added a Black bandana and Black waist sash (my scarf) to be more like the man in black. The black gloves were from an old Darth Vader costume. Suede Boots (girls! Shhh!) I got at a thrift store for a few bucks. He wore his own black jeans. Add in a play sword and you are all set!

Then, of course we have our R.O.U.S. (Rodent of Unusual Size):

I went simple here. Grey jeans, black shirt, and this wolf costume ($12 bucks!) from Amazon.

Lastly, the one and only Inigo Montoya:

Side note: it is SO much fun to put a cute korean kid in a big crazy wig! Must do more of this.

For Lance’s costume we used the peasant/prisoner costume from 2016, added boot covers from the previous pirate costume, a sword, a Jesus wig (which I gave a haircut and removed the beard), and then a “hello” nametag with his most famous line. I drew the mustache on with eyeliner.

I mean, could he be any cuter? Don’t think so.

It would have been more fun if I had a real “hello” nametag like you wear at conferences, but this did the job and it was too late to go out and buy one. It really pulled the whole outfit together. (That, and Lance’s crazy grin.)

These guys have no personality at all. None.

The fact is most of my life, diy, creative and otherwise, happens on instagram nowadays. If it happens at all (because 4 kids and a business don’t always leave time)! However, this time of year, Pinterest picks up hot and heavy with pins and shares of Cameron’s famous Toy Army Guy costume, or Lance’s Fire truck costume, and I start getting the emails. “Do I still DIY costumes?” (Yes.) “Do the kids always choose a theme together?” (Definitely yes.) “Would I mind sharing other costumes I’ve done over the years?” (Well, why not?)

Although I’ve shared the finished product (again, on instagram), the only way to really share the fun ideas and DIY hacks with someone who might be looking for inspiration AND the nitty-gritty how-to is to blog it. Ahh, the good old-fashioned blog post. Forgive me, I’m a little rusty, but I’m going to give it a shot!

Let’s start off with Halloween 2016! I’m going to skip 2014 and 2015 because those years the boys insisted on Star Wars costumes (one of round of bad guys and one round of heroes), so those were dark times for this DIY mama. I had visions of them choosing store-bought costumes forever. But no, a light came at the end of the tunnel, and after we moved to our new old house, they chose a fun theme: Pirate. Specifically, a Pirate, a Prisoner, and a Treasure Chest.

Enough paragraphs without pictures!! Let’s take a look, shall we?

A Prisoner, a Prisoner and a treasure Chest! Trick. Argh! Treat.

Cameron’s Pirate costume I mostly purchased and cobbled together from things I previously had (the hat, spyglass and boot covers). I like to give the boys high quality dress up clothes (and I’m no seamstress), so I tend to buy one high quality costume and DIY the rest, rather than three cheap ones.

Lance, my ridiculously happy Prisoner :), I threw together with a peasant’s shirt and pants, a plastic chain from Amazon, and a set of old keys (metal, great for play because they feel real).

Kip the Treasure Chest was my real DIY hack this year! Usually, one of my kids gets to be a cardboard box (Lance as Firetruck, Kip as Castle), and this year was no different. I wanted to make a chest with a curved top, because I like making things hard. ;-).

I apologize in advance for the blurry iPhone pictures here. I simply wasn’t thinking about blogging it, and these are all I have! They get the point across, albeit not in a pretty fashion.

I began by rounding up all of our scrap cardboard. We were remodeling our kitchen so it was quite easy.

I used reinforcement corners (from an appliance box) to make detailing on the chest, and cut out circles and other straps from more cardboard.

I used chipboard and hot glue to make the curved top:

Then I spray-painted it all gold. Rustoleum Bright Coat, of course.

Next up was the treasure! I bought a bag of gems, a bag of mardi gras beads and a bag of coins on Amazon, and I simply hot-glued them on in layers:

…until I had enough. Draping the beads off the sides and top adds depth and fullness.

Last up was the try on! I always keep my under-costume simple: black pants, black turtleneck, and black satin straps to hold the whole thing up.

I think he likes it, Mikey.

So there you have it! One Pirate, one Prisoner and one Treasure Chest. If you want to see years 2017 and 2018 (where we added a baby girl, but that’s another surprise story!), then you’ll have to stick around this week. It’s Halloween week around here, folks!

PS. If you’re glad the blog is back (albeit in random time and form), please hop into the comments and say hello here! I want to make sure I’m not just talking to the big black internet void. Thanks, friends!

We were in a bit of a food rut. I’d find that I’d stock my cupboards and fridge full of food and then arrive home from work near 6 pm with no idea what to make, look at Matt and ask: “What should we have for dinner?” His usual reply: “Well, what are our proteins?” (As in, what meats are in the fridge – just like a carnivore man. Yeesh.) Then I would throw together something from there, not terrible, but not super-inspired, either. Tacos, spaghetti, pizza, you know. Basic stuff.

So in order to break out of that malaise, I decided to try menu planning. I started it two weeks ago and so I am 14 days in, and let me tell you, it’s been a big hit! I start the shopping week (Saturdays for us) by going to the farmer’s market and buying what’s in season there. Strawberries, broccoli, cabbage, all the early spring leafy greens and herbs. Then I write out a menu based on recipe books/Pinterest (let’s face it, mostly Pinterest) using what I just bought. THEN, I go to the grocery store and pick up the other items needed for those recipes, trying to interchange meat, fish, and vegetarian options through the week.

I pin versions of all the recipes I use that week to my Pinterest board Eat the Rainbow, which you can follow if you’d like! But I mostly wing it on the recipes, and substitute/make my own for what fits our needs and schedule. So, do you want to see what we ate and made? Let’s do it!

Here was this week’s plan…

French Lentils with Mushrooms and Kale: This was a really good recipe, and would be vegan (except I added a teeny bit of cream and parmesan to finish it off, rather than coconut milk). Very excellent, with earthy mushrooms, a nice way to start the week off meatless.

The unedited photos of how it turned out:

Would make again for sure.

Paella Valenciana / Paella Mixta – We have three rabbits in our freezer gift to us by a friend from the FFA auction (future farmers of america). I need to see them through before we end up with a new year’s batch in there! This recipe used up one rabbit – you can easily substitute chicken. I added shrimp and mussels because the boys are crazy about them. We had impromptu company and still lots of leftovers.

Verdict: time consuming, so not every day, but a fun once-a-year dish. After you butcher and chop everything, it comes together quickly.

That day because it was Sunday, I also made pie! Our march pie from the Calendar is Banana Cream. Easy and fun.

The next day: We had leftovers.

Mahi Burrito bowls with Coconut-Cilantro lime Rice and Strawberry-Mango Salsa – I do not have a picture of this one, must have gotten distracted, but it was very good. We love burrito bowls because no tortillas necessary! Good use of all the strawberries I had from the market.

Korean Beef Tacos with Asian Slaw – I had a beef brisket in my freezer (this is not the corned/red kind) that I wanted to work through. Also, I had fresh cabbage from the market. I boiled the beef the way you would to make korean rice cake soup (seared in sesame oil, then simmered in water with green onion and leek), shredded it and added a korean barbecue sauce (We Rub You) plus some more chili paste. Shredded cabbage, green onion, cilantro and carrot in an asian style vinagerette (brown sugar, rice vinegar, sesame oil, ginger), and voila! Easy, tasty, done. It does take a while to cook the beef so I suggest you do it the day before.

The unedited photos of how it turned out:

There is always a Korean style taco somewhere in our month. Yum.

Spinach Chicken Curry Saag – If I did a korean dish, my sweet little punjabi boy will always ask if an indian/pakistani dish is up next! Saag is delicious and easy, I cut the fat by using greek yogurt instead of cream, and I served it with brown rice. Yum.

This was so much better than the restaurant kind to me! I’m not sure why – maybe less heavy, with beautiful fragrant new spices (I ground mine up fresh).

Tonight: leftovers and family movie night! I’m planning to make a pie because I still have one more crust.

PS I left out the salads/veggies we ate with these meals. We did eat salad and veggies.

This week’s budget was $140 for groceries and the market. This includes breakfast, lunches and dinners for 5 people, three of which are hungry boys. It was less than last week’s cost ($170) because I used two freezer meats – Rabbit and Brisket.

Speaking of which, just for reference, last week we had:

Corned Beef and roasted cabbage with Irish Soda bread
Shrimp Tacos with Cilantro slaw
Foil baked Salmon with mushroom quinoa
Chicken Tagine with preserved lemons
Thai Coconut Boullabaise

I plan to share my weekly menu on my instagram account each Friday or Saturday, with a recap of how it went, you can follow along there! I may occasionally pop in here to share my very favorite recipes.

So tell me, friends, how are you spicing up your day-to-day meals? Any great inspiration/finds  you’ve been cooking lately? I’d love to hear about them!

Happy weekend.

You guys. I want to share with you about our new old home. It’s a 1926 Tudor Revival, a vintage gem.

(Photo from the MLS listing)

Honestly, we have ALWAYS loved older homes with charm and character, but life back then handed us a newer, respectable, albeit rather bland home, and we worked with it, pouring all our love into renovating bit by bit, and gave it tons of newfound character and appeal. In fact, we’ve recently said that ONLY one of our “bucket list homes” (i.e. an older home with character close to downtown and the park) would ever make us move at this point. I wasn’t even really watching the real estate market, something I usually comb compulsively, because: once a real-estate-gawker, always a real-estate-gawker ;-). But we had been so busy with the stationery show, shipping orders, school being out, and then guess what? On a random Wednesday I checked the MLS and one of those older homes, one on our top four sheet, had just come up that day!

Things like this rarely happen: we saw it that same day, we fell in love, it was within our (dream home) budget, we made an offer (and I threw in a pleading letter about how much we love the home and the park and here’s a pic of my kids running races last year, etc.), and we waited for a bidding war or a counter or for them to hold out on us, and, and… they didn’t! They accepted our offer. Craziness.

(Okay, welcome to current day. Fast forward nine months and I’m writing the rest this afternoon (3/23/17) gearing up to share with you some before-and-afters,  but it seemed like posting the bit of history above was important.) Thanks for bearing with me, you guys are great!

So, we’ve been living here nine months and let me tell you, we love it. We’ve been working hard to preserve the historic charm and also remove inconsistencies and update it to shine as the gem that it is. So far, we’ve painted the interior, refinished/restored the original hardwood floors, completely overhauled the sunroom (as a result of unexpected wet rot), and remodeled the kitchen and butler’s pantry (which were both from the seventies era). We have not touched any of the bathrooms (some are original and need love, others are modern and ADA and need a historic renovation), nor have we delved into the master bedroom (which needs a revamp – again, ADA).

Soooo…. I want to share some of those before-and-afters, but before that, I think a mini-home tour is in order. Not the whole shebang, but bits and pieces so you can see what we’re loving on right now. (Pssst – if you follow me on instragram a lot of this is old news, including the remodel, my 13 weeks of basement kitchen, and house snaps filed under the hashtag #1926tudor).

Without further ado! (All photos here are from before we moved in);

This is our home:

This is the entryway:

Here was the living room, staged for sale:

And the dining room:

Kitchen (that is no more):

Butler’s pantry (also no more):

Sunroom (that has had a gut renovation since):

Office:

Upstairs Bedrooms:

SECRET room (we hadn’t even found this when we made an offer!!):

Upstairs lavender and tan bathroom (with original purple toilet!):

Downstairs original pink and green bathroom (with laundry chute to basement!):

Master bedroom (which is ginormous. Seriously huuuuge):

Master bathroom (ADA, verrrry open, and in need of a historical revamp, but that’s phase 2):

Hallway/Landing:

The cavernous basement:

And last, but not least, backyard:

Well, that’s a good little initial tour/overview!

It didn’t take us long to pull up the carpet upstairs and find original hardwood underneath. Which means, a little wood floor restoring was in order, during which we took the floors back closer to their original finish (that we found under layers and layers of carpet)…

Eeenie, Meenie, Minie, Moe…

Tada! Sneak peek of the refinished living room floor.

What do you think, friends? So glad to reconnect, thanks for your emails, comments and reaching out to see if you could take a glimpse at our new home.

OKAY, so if I’m not back here within a week or so with some durings and afters of the kitchen and sunroom – you blab at me and remind me to get on it!!

See you soon.

After eight (8!) amazing years renovating and loving our house, we are putting it on the market. Yup, we are selling our home. It’s kind of crazy to say, because, well, I started this blog partially to document our renovations, and some of you have followed along from the very beginning, seven years ago, when I shared our diy kitchen remodel. This house (and the love and hours we poured into it) put us on Brooklyn Limestone, the Nate Berkus Show, in Cottages and Bungalows Magazine, and even now, a little birdy told me our sideyard garden will be showing up somewhere special very soon (sh!).

Why are we moving? Well, we bought an old house! A charmer by the park! However, that is a story of its own, and worthy of its own blog post.

Honestly, I’m just popping in here to give a little tribute to my home that I have loved. And I know a home is just a thing, that you can’t take with you when you leave this earth, but I like to think that all the joy and memories, and making as many things just as beautiful and thoughtful as we could, are worth a little reflection and love. Plus, if you’ve ever wanted a full home tour, this is your chance!! I’ve never done one before here on the blog.

Here we go!

This is our home:

I don’t know if you remember the front, but this is how it used to look back when it was builder beige:

(Look how tiny Cameron was!)

The biggest changes we made to the exterior were paint (5 shades of grey to pop out the architectural details!), a new carriage house style garage door and larger scale lighting. Oh, and a new custom-made front door with an antique lion knocker we found at the Paris flea market.

This is the backyard:

Do you remember the before of this little sideyard? No?

The bocce court was there already, but we’ve resurfaced it to keep it happy. We added curtains to the pergola, and Matt’s fabulous reclaimed wood farmhouse table looks as good as new. The sideyard was one of my favorite additions, and one I’ll miss desparately. Even now, charming tomoatoes, squash and herbs are growing this very moment in what used to be a gravel dump. Ah, sideyard garden, I will miss you.

Behind the wooden gate next to the bocce is Matt’s woodshop, which he built and shaped out of a lean-to shed into a crafty man’s paradise. And deep in the big redwood trees, up high and so hidden you can’t even see it, is every little boy’s dream tree fort with rope ladder and swiss-family robinson style railing, built by Matt, of course. Over-engineered, of course.

But let’s back up to the front of the house and head inside!

This is the view from the front doorway:

Yes, my living room has changed since you saw it last! The floors, wood beams, paint and art are all the same, but I’ve reupholstered the chairs in a durable navy performance velvet (because: boys) and I finally got a new sofa! With no loose back cushions!! Aaah! Also, a rug on clearance from West Elm adds a graphic touch while lightening up the space.

Here is the space from a few different angles so you can see how it all flows together:

I don’t know if you remember, but we changed the surface of the walls A LOT (see this post for details, can you say “90’s niches”? No really, try and say that 10x fast.) and added bookcases, hand-scraped walnut floors (removing all the huge beige tile ourselves! Gah!), and big beams for architectural character.

This is the dining room, which is simple but lovely, with a large window looking at the prettiest Japanese Maple ever…

And the kitchen. Oh the kitchen. If you remember, there is a whole series of blog posts on that, and all the crazy diy work that ended me on the Nate Berkus Show.

I have loved on this kitchen and cooked crazy stuff in it for eight years. I will miss this place.

It’s pretty much the same since 2008, and has held up bee-you-tifully well over eight years of heavy use. The only thing here you see that is new is my fridge, which dispenses sparkling water(!) and has a built-in fruit and veggie drawer and is definitely coming with me, unless someone pries it out of my cold, dead fingers.

But memory lane calls – here is the 90’s builder before:

Next to the kitchen is our breakfast nook, which as we added kids in to our family became a tight squeeze, until we thought of custom building a banquet…

Now it can fit like eight kids, and two grown ups! I know because of cousin week, and not because I’m planning to have more than three.

Here is the study (which you can see our refresh of it in this old post):

I no longer have a computer at home, as I do my work entirely at the studio, so my hairpin desk is all about paintings we never got to hang in this house that will move to their new abode.

For posterity, the before:

And what used to be the nursery, but now houses a custom-made murphy bed that I never got to show you on the blog! We had plans to get a piano and turn it into the music room aka “conservatory” with guest murphy bed, but never finished the piano part, and the fact that there is a big open space and the dress up closet is in there has actually caused it to be labeled “the combat room” as in, “go wrestle in the combat room” or “no light saber battles near my lamps! take it to the combat room.”

That murphy bed though! Love it! Sad we didn’t get to use it more. Built by our favorite D’Amato and Lee, it is functional and beautiful at the same time.

Here is the kid/guest bath, which remodel got a feature in Cottages and Bungalow magazine:

And the before:

Heading to the hall bath, which I’m not sure I’ve shown you:

It’s tiny, but mighty. Matt installed the wainscot, and I finally(!) touched up the black trim just this Saturday. It’s only been bugging me for 8 years… #sigh

This is our master bedroom, which we remodeled in 2010. We installed chevron hardwood floors, black french doors, and we painted all the doors in our house black. I love this room. It’s simple, spacious and a serene retreat.

Here’s the carpeted (including bathroom! Yuck!) before:

And my favorite room in the whole house… my bathroom. So much love and thought (and marble!) put into this thing:

We added the soaking tub, the chandelier, aaaaalll the marble, and the custom cabinetry and vanities. Oh, and we did it the same time as our other bath to save lots of money (and keep us very stinky for a few months). You can see a full FAQ about the bathroom here.

This was the before:

Lastly, let’s head upstairs to the boys room! Another place where you haven’t seen how it looks recently:

Yup, all three boys share this lofty space! We tore out the carpet, added wide plank pine (diy install on a budget), and it doesn’t usually look this severe, but we trimmed the loveys down to two each for the sale, and moved the toy kitchen and tool bench up to the attic temporarily. It’s a happy little place.

You might remember it from before when we had just two boys up there:

And this was the vanilla before:

Other bits the real estate pictures don’t cover include our laundry room and staircase which you can see here and here.

But wait, what happened to our letterpress studio? Well, when we moved downtown, Matt converted it into a game room:

We painted the acid green into a boy-friendly grey, and added a ping-pong table, foosball table and pool table, as well as dartboard and stash of board games. Clearly we’re trying to compensate for not allowing our kids any tv or video games.

I don’t have a super good shot of the other direction, other than this grainy panorama I did Christmas 2014, with Matt looking appropriately fierce as he shows off his new man cave:

The red wall is a chalk wall, hides the bathroom, and gets drawn all over by kids! It’s perfect for Cam’s cubscout troop that has met here this past year.

But for reference, this was the before:

And here it was back when it was a teeny letterpress studio (before we outgrew it and it got terribly messy):

And above the studio is an attic. With a treadmill and a pull-up bar and lots of storage. Storage that used to be messy (what can I say, Matt and the boys were in charge up there!), but is now neat as a pin:

That’s a wrap! Our home that we have loved. We have had easter egg hunts, a grand opening, a rabbit dinner party, a sit down dinner for 40 guests, and the world’s tallest christmas tree each year. We’ve used every little inch of the space (from woodshop to garage to sideyards to attics!) and loved every little bit.

My one sincere wish for this home, is that it would find someone who would love and appreciate it. Not keep everything exactly the same, per se, but genuinely enjoy it and use it and LIVE in it as we have as a happy family.

The end. If you want to see the listing you can find it here.

I’d love to hear your thoughts, friends! I’ve missed you! What’s your favorite part of what we did? Should I blog about the new house and remodel? Am I ready to start all over and charm a place up? Ack! Glad to be back talking to you. Happy, happy weekend.

Hello! Rebekah Tennis here, owner and designer and general boss lady at Wild Ink Press, and I’m delighted to take you behind the scenes of our stationery company!

I started Wild Ink Press­ in 2009, springing out of a desire to create a cherished, finished product. I have a BFA in Graphic Design, and after working in a corporate design firm, while I loved my job, I found the nature of branding design to be frustrating – Websites getting tweaked over and over, logos stretched out of proportion, with no finality to the work. I longed to create art that was both finished (forever!) and loved. Hence Wild Ink Press was born, to create beautiful paper goods that others would value and enjoy. My husband Matt listened to my wild-haired ideas and we both took a series of letterpress classes at the San Francisco Center for the Book, then made the plunge and purchased a 1908 Chandler and Price Platen Press on Ebay.

Our Original Chandler & Price 10 x 15 Platen Press

Our company has grown and expanded over the years, believe me through  lots of blood, sweat and tears, and we now are a staff of seven, have a retail and printing space in downtown Chico, in Northern California, converted from an old-soda bottling shop. It houses our letterpress machines, inventory, and also our creative and packaging space. When we bought the building it was abandoned, and it has been very rewarding to restore it to its former glory and let it shine as a 3200 square foot open studio workspace. We now have three Heidelberg Windmills, a 1912 Golding Jobber, a Vandercook Universal I, and a baby Kelsey 5 x 8 press (for the kids) in addition to our original C & P. And yes, we do print on all of them!

We have a small gift shop in front of our studio where we sell our cards as well as a select, curated group of other maker’s work that we admire. It has been so fun to have the retail space to connect more with our local community, and it really works for us because my packaging staff can run the shop without interrupting their activities too much, as the studio opens right into the front brick and mortar space.

Scenes from our little brick and mortar shop.

We are primarily a letterpress and foil print studio that prints our own greeting cards (which keeps us quite busy!), but we take a limited amount of custom wedding invitations each year, as well as custom printing on the occasional project for our local community. We have dabbled into combining offset with letterpress this past year, and it has been very rewarding to get to try new methods and experiment with new techniques. One of our claims to individuality is that we are not afraid to run a 3 or 4 color letterpress job, or multiple foil passes, to get that final, perfect card. Details matter, and we like them to be rich and sharp.

Ink mixing station.

We track our print jobs on a big chalkboard wall in the studio.

Also, from the beginning, I feel like our card mission has been a bit unique. Our greeting cards are clever and humorous and colorful and kind, without jabbing or malice. Dare I say, sometimes it is possible to be funny without snark?! I feel a good card should make both the person sending it and the one receiving it feel smarter, happier and more valued. Our pressman and production staff are true artisans who love what we are crafting, so the attention to detail that goes into even a single letterpress card is amazing. When you send a card from us you should know it has been labored on for hours and touched by at least four people who believe in excellence.

One of our new Valentine’s day releases. A bit corny, a bit sweet, a bit Andy Warhol.

On a typical workday at our studio, you’ll find our shipping manager sending out the day’s orders, our packaging team packing up product in the main studio space as well as running our little retail shop. We have two close to full-time packing employees because of our larger clients (like the Container Store which buys our gift wrap rolls) and we prefer to keep it all in-house for quality control (and keeping jobs local!), so that means a lot of hands-on production.

Our shipping area. Single card orders still get old fashioned stamps on each flat mailer.

Our card storage and inventory system.

Rolls and rolls of wrap each month

Our packaging area

We now have a full-time pressman, along with my husband (who has trained all of our operators and is a general machinery whiz), and usually we print two or so runs on our presses per day. The majority of time in a letterpress run is spent setting up the job, with precise measurements, registration, calculation, ink mixing, and make-ready on press all take a significant amount of time and care. We usually use all three Heidelbergs at once for one job, setting up inking, foil, and diecut/scoring all at the same time to guarantee accuracy and the perfect run.

I’d love to say I spent most of my day just designing cards, but that would be far from the truth. In the morning I answer emails, respond to shop inquiries, update our website, photoshoot and edit all of our product, design our catalog, purchase for our retail shop, and do general marketing for Wild Ink Press. (We are on the lookout for a quality part-time assistant to help me out on a lot of these items if you know someone fit for the job.) Then, in the late afternoon/early evening I settle in with my sketchbook and work on my latest drafts.

A photoshoot usually involves standing on a stool. Very high tech.

A cozy little nook to meet with clients in my office.

We produce 25-30 new products to correspond with each of the major trade shows (NY Now twice a year, and the Stationery Show in May), so there are always ideas in the hopper. I do all of the art and concepting for our entire line. I keep a little pocket size notebook with me at all times and jot down inspiration as it comes to me. (Of which, about 50 percent comes in the evening hanging out with my husband with a glass of wine or two, and another 10 percent comes when my attention drifts off in church. Truth talk.)

It seems we are always working on a new catalog (we’ve had two since this one!)

My design process is pretty traditional. It starts in a sketchbook with a pencil, followed by pen work (Pigma Micron 08 and 05 all the way baby!), along with tracing paper and multiple iterations of each design. I occasionally get to dabble in paint (I prefer goauche as it what I used in school), but mostly pen and ink is where I work.

Endless possibilities.

My drawing desk is seperate from my computer desk. It helps to separate my creative ideas from the day to day running of our business.

Three or more tracing drafts per design to work out the kinks.

Lately I’ve been working on exploring other mediums combined with letterpress.

From there, honestly, I take picture of the sketch with my iPhone(!) I found the scanner and the iPhone to be not that different as long as my lighting is good, and it is a quick and snappy way to keep the process moving and get the artwork onto my computer (through Airdrop, so fast and simple). I then clean it up in Photoshop, then move it into to Illustrator to turn it into a vector, clean up the lines a bit and add any color that I am planning for the card. I then send it to plating, either copper plates for our foil runs, or polymer for letterpress. On the occasions that we use a local offset printer, I usually bring my original artwork along to the press check – its the very best way to dial in the color and ensure the job is true to the original.

An offsite press check.

The finished product, a 14 page Cocktail Calendar  filled with illustrated recipes, hand-drawn and painted and then offset printed locally, and foil-stamped and lettepress printed in house.

This year has been a major year of growth for us as we bought and renovated our new studio, opened a retail space, hired (and lost a few) employees, expanded to exhibiting at three tradeshows per year, as well as started on some major collaborations (which I look forward to sharing as soon as we can!). It has been rewarding, but also incredibly challenging. I have three small boys, two of which are still preschool, and dividing my time, growing a business, managing a family and still having a life that is healthy for ME is the balance I am constantly working on. Things I have learned this year include be true to your brand (if it’s not you, it won’t work, no matter what the opportunity) and perfect is impossible, but finished is not, and that that is nearly always what makes the difference between success and failure.

Front sitting area in our studio.

Our storefront.

Thank you all so much for joining me behind the stationery at Wild Ink Press, it’s been a true pleasure to share our studio with you here on Oh So Beautiful Paper! I’ll be hanging out in the comments and welcome any questions you may have!

BONUS: these are ALL available at the Wild Ink Press Brick & Mortar shop! With free parking and no mall crowds! Chicoans, you’re pretty lucky. I’m just sayin’.

For the hostess with the mostess:

Clockwise from top left:

1. Mason Jar Lights (battery-operated), to make her home look like fairy town.
2. Adorable animal ornament. These little guys are made of the palm sago bush and are fair-trade from the Philippines. The fox may be sold-out but we have llamas and frogs and owls, oh my!
3. Holiday Coasters. A set of six little christmas trees with a cloth muslin bag. Designed by yours truly, etterpress printed here at Wild Ink Press.
4. A lovely seasonal candle. PF Candle co. is based in California and makes some amazing holiday scents. Spruce is GREAT (but Apple Picking is my favorite).
5. A set of tea towels. These lovelies are by the fabulous gals at 1Canoe2, but we have more than five styles of tea towels in stock, including holiday.
6. A happy little notepad. Edge-painted and letterpress printed, this little gift by my friend Meg at Moglea is sure to give a smile.
7. Dried Lavender Bundle. This is my current favorite hostess gift. Fresh 2015 crop, already dried and wrapped in brown paper tied up with string, ready to give. Who wouldn’t want to receive this as a hostess gift?!

Hope you enjoyed this little guide. You can find these online, or if you’re in Chico you can pick them up at our little shop downtown!

In honor of the anniversary (and similar to how I shared my kitchen remodel a year after the fact), I will be posting a whole series of before-and-after pics of the space!! If you know me at all, you know before-and-afters are my favorite, so I hope you like them as well. I feel like they sort of demystify the process of a design and remodel, and make it more accessible to your average DIY hack (read: me). So hold on to your seats – we’re starting with the exterior, but we’ll be covering, in no particular order: the pressroom, retail shop, shipping room, packaging area, my office, and a couple how-tos – how to tile a word, how to plan and layout a space on a computer (or on paper) and how to ombre paint a wall.

I hope you enjoy the ride! First off, to start at the beginning. We were desperately running out of space in our little two-story converted garage studio behind our house. You can see it in its original heyday here:

Lovely seating area, old presses, cabinet storage. Good for the occasional greeting card, and to meet brides and design custom invitations and print them on old presses.

But with our company, the greeting card section took off, and we had to hire employees for shipping, packaging as well as bring another pressman on. Also, we had to store our growing line of cards and gift wrap. So, around last summer, it looked more like this:

I’ll spare you the mess that was the attic stock room. With all that stuff, plus four employees coming each day, it was clear we needed to find a new space and find it fast.

I won’t bore you with huge long tale, but basically after poking around all over Chico, we found this empty office building downtown:

5200 square feet of blank dingy beige structure. It had been the assessor’s office for about 20 years, but for the last two it had been empty. Prior to that it had been a local title company (their space is now next door), but its original use was as a soda bottling plant – owned by Bowman’s Beverage Company and built in 1941. I searched around as well I could and these are the two best items I could come up with for the building’s history – the first, an ad for Bowman’s Beverage (bottom left) listing our address and what they bottled here:

And this bottle of squirt which lists Bowman’s Chico as its place of origin:

Apparently they also bottled Nehi soda here, We found a big vat of Nehi grape concentrate shoved in the rafters of the building when we remodeled (perhaps stopping a leak? Holding it up?). It was pretty wedged in there, so we left it right where it belonged.

Back to the story, we saw potential (rather I saw design/remodel potential, Matt saw space/equipment potential and we trusted each other to know what we do best), so we made an offer to buy the building and it was accepted.

So the fun begins!! How do you take a beige box and make it interesting? Turn it into a jewel box! First, a moodboard…

The plan was to use a really dark palette – rich green/blue (almost black), with glossy black subway tile, bent metal signage, revamped lighting, and a tile entry.

Next came a digital mock-up so we could get the city’s approval:

And then, the dirty work of tear-down. In taking off the seventies-added fieldstone and stacked rock, we found a couple discoveries:

The original title company signage, and… windows!! Windows in the concrete that had been boarded up and stuccoed over previously.

Even another large window in the front, which balanced out the building greatly.

Also, beneath each front window we uncovered a little niche which had been sloppily filled in with brick before being  covered in stacked rock…

Perhaps it was for advertising, or a special tile design, but we wanted to keep them open of course, despite it adding cost to the project. They added a great deal of dimension to the front of the building.

Meantime, our sign was being bent out of raw steel by the talented Dave Richer at Earthen Iron:

Bent and welded. Aren’t those overlaps amazing? Such a cool process, I just had to show you a tiny bit of it.

Well, not belabor things, are you ready for the after pictures? Here goes…

Old school gilded lettering on the doors…

And here’s a “glamour” shot at twilight:

My favorite bit of the front:

And our hanging sign (different from my original concept, but I love this one):

We love our little shop, and I was so happy to transform this little empty spot and become a vibrant part of downtown Chico. What do you think? Would love to hear your thoughts in the comments!

Up early next week… stay tuned for the interior (it’s a doozy!)

I wanted to share with you our summer soirée (aka Official Grand Opening of our new studio, our six year anniversary as a letterpress studio and also the visiting Itinerant Printer). Many people were out of town as it was high summer (and June Saturday which means lots and lots of weddings), but so many others came out, and it was fantastic to meet new faces and show Chico around our studio space.

We made a little video of the event – so if you missed it, you can still enjoy the fun! Seriously, it is the. cutest. Even if you were there you should watch it. Just push play!!

Also, some photo highlights from the night…

We were just delighted with the evening, sharing it with MONCA (the Museum of Northern California Art, our register proceeds and bar cash for the evening went to them), the Itinerant Printer, Schubert’s Ice Cream, live jazz and live printing, and the lively community of Chico. We couldn’t be more proud or happy to be downtown!

I finally hit my goal weight in January, after 18 plus months of hard work (can I get a woohoo?)! Oh, wait, there’s a card for that (one of our new happy cards).

Now, I’m sure any of you who’ve seen me in person (or just in pictures) knows that my goal weight is not supermodel-thin, or actress-thin, or even average street-thin. Rather, it’s healthy and strong, and it’s the spot where I look in the mirror and think – “you look pretty good.” I recognize that unattainable goals can be a slippery slope, so I’m happy where I’ve parked myself, and here I stay.

My new goals (goals are important!) involve challenging myself – completing unnassisted pullups, holding a longer plank, stilling my mind more.

But the reason I popped in today is I wanted to share with you what is possibly my FAVORITE breakfast of the past almost two years. The breakfast that really got me through it all, made me happy and full and healthy each morning I had it.

I present to you… my version of Huevos Rancheros. It’s so simple and easy, one pan, done in 7 minutes. Total, start to finish.

Begin with 2-3 cups of fresh spinach – cook them in a pan over dry heat (no oil, no water necessary) until they wilt:

Add 1/4 to 1/3 cup of black beans (I use Trader Joe’s Organic as the sodium is lower). Add 1/2 cup of salsa, as hot or mild as you like, or as pico or rojo as you like. Sometimes in the summer I just use straight tomatoes.

Heat it all up, and make a bed for two eggs – crack them right in there and put the lid on.

Cook five or so minutes, depending on the heat of your pan and how done you like your eggs (I like mine medium/not too runny for this application).

Remove from heat, salt and pepper, and add less than a tablespoon of shredded cheese (I used to leave this off entirely), and some fresh cilantro:

Oh, and you can add in four tortilla chips (not more!! and no snacking from the bag!) to stud the top. I don’t usually add this, but it’s a fun level of decadence occasionally. Only add it if it won’t slip you down the slope of eating the whole bag.

Now, I like to save dishes, so to round out my ideal morning:

Just add water, coffee and the New York Times Crossword puzzle. Happy day.

This recipe has so many variations! Green onion, avocado, flax seed are all great additions. But just remember, the base is simple and easy and always there for you.

Nutritional Value:

Calories: 314 (287 without the 4 chips)

Fiber 6.7 grams

Sugars 4.8 grams

Protein 20.5 grams

Carbs 26 grams

Vitamin A  212%

Vitamin C 82%

Iron 28.3%

Calcium 28.9%

Not bad, right? For someone like me, who can’t handle drinking her breakfast in a smoothie, it’s a wonderful option. I can guarantee you, it also makes you feel very full.

So, for any of you on a similar journey here’s another card for you…

You’ve got this!!