The No-Coast Craft-O-Rama was a success!
I think it might be because Jen and I were wearing our new uniforms. 
It’s hard to know — but marketing is SO important these days and we really do our best to be, as the kids say, cutting edge.
After the show, we packed our uniforms in bubble-wrap, sat by a roaring fire, and watched the snow fall.
And fall.
And fall.
That inspired a Chanukah card!
This goes out to my Jewish brothers and sisters:
And like the Canadian Goose, she stayed. She stayed and embraced the cold, using her derriére to warm the waters of her pond.
And by derriére, I mean “bottom” and by waters of her pond, I mean “the Midtown Market.”
What?!
It’s time for the No-Coast Craft-o-Rama! TOMORROW (Friday, December 7 AND Saturday, December 8)!!
Here’s what I’ve done to get ready: 
That’s a full cord of wood that I ordered.
AND I made this card:
Jen did everything else.
See you tomorrow!
xo,
Fran
A long, long time ago, when men roamed the wild, with sharp spears and heavy stones, a discovery was made: A charred nub-of-a-stick was scraped against the wall to create a picture, a representation of reality — why?
The need to communicate visually is unique to humans (and some elephants).
I wish I had a trunk.
Here’s what I need to communicate visually:
Secured to her bonnet with picture wire, butcher’s twine, and Christmas Spirit (egg-nog). That spruce-top sat atop her head for the entire season of Advent.
She knew that it offset her dour expression — an expression she couldn’t redesign. Oh, but the tiny tree brought delight to all she passed!
For those blissful weeks, nobody seemed to notice her stern glower, her face — twisted into the judgmental scowl went unnoticed. She imagined wearing other elaborate fancies on her head — but for now, this would do:
I was once one of them — an innocent amusement park customer. I looked down at them now, from the highest man-made point in Shakopee, Minnesota. I sighed and listened to the chug-chug-chugging from beneath our coaster — our lives depended on the integrity of a giant bicycle chain. Our open-casket hesitated for just a moment at the tippy-top of the steel summit — hesitated just enough for me to grasp the inevitable free-fall. And as we plummeted to our possible deaths, I screamed.
And wet my pants.
The End
How old was she?
Don’t judge me.
Obviously, I wasn’t born riding a roller coaster, I was born screaming. And wetting my pants.
*Hint: this photograph was taken close to the time of the event and **Double Hint: I’m not the baby.
Speaking of literary themes, there is a lot (not really) to dissect in this new (Holiday/Winter Season?) card:
The newspaper is delivered to our doorstep each morning (by horse and buggy) and I comb through it — if I find a particularly odd/sad/absurd story, I read it aloud to whomever (the dog) is nearby.
Here is an abbreviated digest of the only (two) articles I remember from the past (two) months: (In alphabetical order)
1) Stratosphere jump by daredevil, Felix Baumgartner: In an attempt to break the world record, Felix jumped from a capsule suspended 23 miles above Roswell, New Mexico.
I plan on breaking that record when I get tired of this whole letterpress thing.
2) Talking elephant in South Korea loves Zeichen Press. Strange but true.
Crazy?! I know! Koshik’s trainer must $*#%-love Zeichen Press.
Enough time-wasting.
Here is a new Christmas card (available NEXT Christmas. Sorry).
That Trader Joe’s Card Chick was wondering if I’d like to do some more cards for the stores. Doesn’t she understand that she can’t turn me on and off like some sort of magic faucet?
Doesn’t she understand that my creative process is a flowing, uninterruptible, inspired tangent? You bean counters! I will not submit to your big box schemes. You can’t make me. I’m an artist, a non-conformist! … What’s that? Our 401(k) is down to what? Well, that’s just fantastic… Once again, I’ll have to step in and kick-start the economy. I had really big plans for the week, none of which involved saving America. Well, I guess that my Winter Wardrobe is going to have to try itself on. I hope you’re happy, lady. I hope you’re happy.
Last Sunday, the basement of the Uptown VFW became home to the i Like You craft fair. The Uptown VFW seems to be three floors of basement. Wait, that’s every VFW. The water-stained, drop ceiling has soaked in more than 50 years of delicious cigarette smoke. The vinyl, accordion fold wall was straight out of my grandparent’s house. I felt like having a poached egg or a ham salad sandwich.
Oh, the VFW… so similar to the church basement. Or maybe a bomb shelter. A bomb shelter with awesome junk in it. I recently spent an evening in a VFW for the karaoke portion of a friend’s birthday party.
Again, we were in the basement but I swear we didn’t go downstairs. I knew the night was over when I saw this:
I won’t say whose leg that body was attached to. That’s a silent shame she must carry to her grave. Note the glass of water I kindly placed by her body.
But enough about nighttime VFW! Here’s a photo I took of the Daytime VFW:
My fans are relentless, ”Fran, how do you do it? Please, let us in to that magical and mysterious world you call your brain. Give us, if you think we can handle it, a tiny snippet of what it’s like to experience your Creative Process.” Well, stand back; I’m about to blow your minds. BLOW YOUR MINDS. This will be a little bit like someone revealing the secrets of the universe, the meaning of life, and the riddle of the sphinx. Until now, there has only been speculation. Speculation and rumor. Just like the moon landing. So, just sit right down and call in sick to work – Ready, set, go; here’s the deal: Notebook + pencil + old printer’s cut =
The nice thing about owning your own company and producing your own line of goods is that: A) I won’t fire me for sexually harassing myself. B) I give myself outstanding quarterly reviews. C) I haven’t showered in God Knows How Long and nobody (hi Jen!) cares. D) I can write/design/print whatever I think is funny.
The other day, the Trader Joe’s Card Chick submitted three of my cards to TJ’s. Originally there were nine and after some pretty complicated calculations on my calculator, I figured that left six for us. (Eat that, Sister Diane, I told you I’d be able to apply my limited math skills to the real world!) Here’s a peek at the six rejects: Three are for sale in our online store. Why only three? I bet you’d like to know.
The Trader Joe’s Card Chick called and asked us to do some custom work for them.
I was like, “get in line lady, it’s not like Consumer Reports ranked Trader Joe’s the second-best supermarket chain in the nation.” And she was like, “yeah, they did.” And I was like, “I knew that, I was just testing you.”
Even without my lucky historical period costume we were able to produce some winners. (My teacher used to say, “we are all winners when we don’t use drugs” but I think she was using the word ‘we’ in the royal sense).
We gave nine cards to The Card Chick, she selected three to show to TJ’s and TJ’s is going to produce all three. They will be in the stores in March. They’ll be offset printing them, I feel good about that because I’m sure that Jen and I would be fingerless if we had to hand feed 80,000 cards into the jaws of The Beast.
When we create custom holiday cards for corporations/businesses, we are often asked to “make it not so, you know, Christmassy.” Here’s a new one for our own line – but we’re willing to share. Hey, Target Corporation: Want a few thousand?
Sort of. Not exactly. Technically we were not named in the newspaper but we feel like that must have been an oversight. Somebody is probably going to lose their job because of that little error. We’re just sorry that we can’t be there to see it. See, we designed and printed wedding celebration invitations for the couple who were in the Style Section of the New York Times – um, like, that’s a super big deal. It’s right here, in black and white.
Yesterday, I spent 10 straight hours sitting in the kitchen. I didn’t brush my hair or teeth.
(I once saw a medical show about a man who complained of stomach aches, they finally cut him open and discovered his partially re-absorbed, unborn twin in his own belly. It had hair and teeth. Not much else to it. A lot of hair. A lot.)
I stayed in my pajamas. I drank coffee and cold fried chicken. Disgusting? Undoubtably. Did I care? Not the slightest. I was being paid to sit there and provide art direction for a local ad agency. Me and my laptop and the kitchen table strewn with yesterday’s dinner dishes. Who cares? Certainly not me. My Grandma would have been disgusted. She also would have been confused by the “strange typewriter machine”. Anyway, I finished the job, went to The Happy Gnome with my mom and made one of the kids clean the kitchen. Here’s a picture of me after I finished the job: note the fried chicken triggered chin acne.
The Republican National Convention is coming to our town! Right after the State Fair! How can one state be so lucky? It’s like having Christmas and Easter back to back! We live in Minneapolis, so I guess we’ll be the GOafterP. We wanted to make something to commemorate this momentous occasion, postcards are a nice flat souvenir, we made some. Actually it was at the request of the owner of the Romeo and Juliet Shops in Gaviidae Commons. Apparently she loves politics. Oh, The Weisman Museum Store bought some yesterday, we’ll see how they do with the kids on campus. Buy some online:
I’ve heard home computers are all the rage. I’ve heard I could use a computer for design and something called a desktop printer to print my wonderful design. That sounds awfully complicated. Today I went into the shop~studio, dug around for an old cut, selected a nice fat face of type, locked it all up in my 7 pound cast iron chase, inked up my 2 ton cast iron printing press and printed a singe birthday card for Jen. She liked it.
