Preparation

My first weekend off in what seems like an eternity. I would like to say I have been lounging around the house, looking at my favorite blogs, and sipping chai lattes all day but alas that is my alter ego I dream about.

Lets just say this girl has done none of thee above.

Instead so far today, we have mailed packages, got new pieces ready for photographing, finished jewelry for orders, emptied out my entire kitchen, started stripping my cabinets, walked the dogs, and planed what I am going to do with out kitchen for the next week. I guess not make the Ratatouille I was planning on making and then freezing for the winter which is right around the corner.

But enough living in the moment, lets look at the past, the past month that is.

This month started off with one of my favorite shows, Jesse James Days in Northfield, MN. This show is always super fun. I love the crowd that comes to this show, its a  nice mix of college students and professors wives. They all have excellent taste in jewelry I might add, as they all seem to like my stuff.

One of my favorite things about this show is on Sunday they have this giant rubber duckie raffle. Where the dump thousands of rubber ducks down the river the first one to get to the yellow line wins. Here is a far away glimpse at this madness.

After Jesse James days we did the Creative Connection. This is a really neat event which takes place in MN and brings together all different types of creative women, from crafting, cooking, and even blogging.

I got to meet lots of cool people from all over the world. People came from as far as Australia for this event. I  shared a booth with my good friend Laura of Lolamade Monsters.

Here is me with my booth, my hair bump had gone flat by this point. I need to figure out how to keep that thing up high and voluminous. I guess I will ask my new hair dresser this week.

After Creative Connection we flew on out to the East Coast, I was doing the Harvest Fest in Sharon Spings, NY. Harvest Fest is this very neat festival put on by the Fabulous Beekman Boys. (Whose TV show in now on Netflix Watch Instantly) While I forgot to snap photos of course, the show was a blast. I did it with my Mom who owns a store in upstate NY called the Apple Barrel.  It was suppose to rain but ended up being great weather and all the leaves were just turning colors. While I love MN and dont plan on leaving, I sure do miss the rolling hills of upstate NY.

While we were on the great East Coast adventure I spent one day going to my dead stock warehouses. (All you are getting to get out of me is that they are on the east coast, a girl never reveals her age or her dead stock warehouse locations.) I definitely hit the jackpot this time around and scored some amazing pieces which I am already sketching and planning into new designs like giant Cameo rings.

Exploring these warehouses if very overwhelming and if I was not always in such a rush there, I would say breaks are mandatory. This photo here only shows a glimpse of the warehouse it is 3 floors and each row is about 60 feet long and 20 feet high.  Definitely a lot for the mind to process.

We also are now in 4 more stores this month, please welcome to the Larissa Loden Jewelry Retailers Corset in Hopkins, MN, Mill City Museum Store in Minneapolis, MN, Northfield Arts Guild in Northfield, MN, and Little Bo’Tique in Cooperstown, NY.

Now onto this month. October is a month of preparation here at Larissa Loden the busy holiday season is right around the corner and we want to be prepared so orders can go out smoothly and we can keep sleeping at night. If you know you would like to order a custom map necklace for the holidays I would advise ordering it now. It helps keep us sane and will guarantee you get a well in time for the holidays. You can pick up a regular pendant or locket here, Larissa Loden.

Also in the great month of October we are the featured Minneconmony artist at the Electric Fetus. For this month only you can find all of our stuff at all three Electric Fetus locations (Minneapolis, Duluth, and Saint Cloud.) Being the Minneconmony artist means a larger selection of my items in the stores and also you get 20% off. Yes! They have a great selection of maps necklace and the license plate state cut out necklaces.

And to finish off the great month of October is RAWards.  In August, I participated in RAW and had an amazing time. They are now having RAWards; RAWards are a national competition against all other RAW artists in your category. I am up against all other accessories designers. (Put em up accessories I can take ever last one of yeah) The first round is local voting, which is where people vote for you and at the end of two weeks the person with the most votes in their category and city goes onto the next round. So I need your help people as winning means lots of press and cool prizes.

So just go to my RAW profile and vote for me. That simple. Also you can do it every day. So if you pinky swear promise to do it every day I might give you something cool.

Promise.

A dash of this and a dash of that.

When I set out to make my new website, I also set out to make a new blog. I was very excited about the idea of a new blog, as I am an epic blog reader myself. I view my new blog as a catchall for all things things that interest me, and what interest me is making.  While I view myself as an artist, I mostly view myself as a maker. I love making things, be it in the studio, in the kitchen, or in the garden.

While I do not claim to have anything to do with making seeds, I do consider gardening a process of making. You are taking a little seed and turning it into something extraordinary. In my garden right now I have many things growing but today I would like to focus on la San Marzano tomatoes.  For some of you, light bulbs might be going off in your heads right now thinking I have heard of that name before, but where? San Marzano tomatoes are used by any pizza or Italian place that are worth their weight. (Yes, Punch Pizza does use them, hmm yum Punch Pizza) The reason San Marano tomatoes are so prized is they have very little seeds and pulp and are mostly just yummy tomato meat. The are most commonly grown in the Naples region of Italy.

This year I plan on canning lots of tomatoes for the long winter season. I even plan on showing you how! But not yet, as this yield below is all I have at the moment from my 5 San Marzano plants and well when you can you should have a lot because well canning can be quite the wonderful and time consuming process.

Besides playing in the jardin, I have been busy working on new designs for Powderhorn Art Fair this weekend. So I got busy on my little stash of wonderful antiquities from the french flea market. This collection of necklaces is simple yet fun and edgy. I really wanted the metal stampings to be the showcase piece as they have developed such a wonderful patina.

1970′s metal gun stamping, with tons of little filigree design on the gun. Then large copper 1970′s chain with filigree designs on the links.

Copper stamping of a leaf art noveau design, adorned with tiny smoky quartz briolettes.

Super fun 1980′s brass stampings all adorned with vintage french Lucite beads.

While making pieces for powderhorn art fair, I have also started planning and sketching pieces I will be showing at this months RAW Minneapolis showcase. I attended the RAW Showcase last month and had a great time. It was part music concert, part runway show, part visual art show all in one amazing event. The showcase I am going to be in Fusion is going to have TWO fashion shows, even better.

To attend Raw at the fine line, you do have to buy a ticket, but they are very reasonable priced at $10 dollars.  When was the last time you got to see a fashion show and music show for ten dollars I ask. You can buy a ticket right here. Just make sure my name is selected, because you really want to support me, because with out your support I could not do what I do.

Hope to see you this weekend at the powderhorn art fair, it is going to be gorgeous.