Believe

Got this from my cousin Monica's Tumblr. It's not so much the actual print, but the message that makes it so striking. Love it.

Too bad it's been sold. Valentina, you must make some more!


(Print by Valentina Design on etsy)

Arts and Crafts

I've always enjoyed sewing. Yeah, even back in grade school when everybody else asked their yayas or lolas to do their sewing projects for them. I also love buying fabrics! I enjoy looking at prints and textures and thinking of the stuff I can make out of it. So I really hated it when my mom would come home with icky looking prints or the wrong fabric for my sewing projects, her excuse being, "It's cheap, you're going to ruin it anyway!". Now how about that for inspiration? Oh which reminds me, one time when I was in first year high school, we were asked to bring fabric for our pajama project, and my mom came home with a cool green and white striped material...in twill! What the? But well, after it was submitted and graded, I cut it off and voila! I had the perfect twill striped shorts for weekends! But girl, they were the stiffest pajamas in history ever!

Anyway, back to my story. I just like working with my hands. I enjoy repairing my dear husband's tattered shirts (he has a tendency to cling on to the rattiest stuff I swear), I even cut and hemmed a pair of slacks he bought that were way too long (saved us at least $20, you know how much people charge here for alterations). So its no wonder I love handmade stuff, be it clothes, bags, shoes or home decor. There's something about the manual labor involved that makes it so alluring. So yeah, machines are efficient, but there's just no soul see?

In this era of commercialization, where everything is mass made and more often than not of flimsy quality, it comes as no surprise that a new movement, let's call them the "handmade posse" or the "crafts cult" if you will, is slowly attracting a community of people who yearn for a time when things were assembled and produced by hand. And if you think that this is just a small community, well you're wrong buster!

Etsy, an "online marketplace for buying & selling all things handmade" boasts of a network of 100,000 sellers. And I have to say, I can spend hours just looking at the stuff in there! Therein lies treasures as far as your eyes can see! Sigh! Oh, and everything there just has personality and soul! I loves it! Loves loves loves it!

Reconstructionist's Clover Mini Bloomers


Trixiedelicious's Twisted Breakfast Set


PrincipessaTwinz' Tamago Nigiri and Ebi Nigiri Served with O-Cha Necklace


Redmag's Schrodingers White Cat and...


...The Flying Hilbert Owl


Enna's Matryoshka Wrapping Paper


Charmdesign's Purple Tsubaki - Reversible bag


And we have not yet even skimmed the tip of the iceberg -- I'm warning you!

P.S.
You should check out Jenny Gordy's designs! She has no items on sale in her Etsy shop right now, but just check out her blog to see and appreciate what I'm talking about!