pamgarrison

are you in portland right now?!?!

Happy Cinco de Mayo friends.  This painting I'm working on above seems fitting for today. It also reminds me of my friend Jennifer Mercede's work. Which brings me to the Portland question of the post title....if you are in Portland right now, you've got to get over to Jennifer's studio and scoop up some treasures! I am so sad that she's letting go of so much at such great prices and I'm missing out due to loacation. She said things are flying out the door but has more left if you are in the area: 

Jennifer Mercede BlowOUt Art Sale:

Today!

3015 NE 19th Ave, Portland.

{Ed: Sunday- if you missed it and want to make arrangements to pop by while she's packing up today, email her at: jmercede@hotmail.com}

Hurry, and then torture me with photos of what you got! I love love love her artwork as you know.

For those of you like me, far away, here are a few more shots of color around here this morning:

is your private information too easily accessible??

I recently learned about a site www.spokeo.com that says, "Spokeo is  a people search engine that organizes vast quantities of white-pages listings, social information, and other people-related data from a large variety of public sources."  They have tons of your personal information available, either for free or for a very small fee. Information like family memebers names and ages, income, home phone, and if you scroll down on your info page, an image of your house and surrounding streets etc.  While I understand that they are just culling information from public records (such as birthdate, home purchase price, taxes etc.), this site in particular makes it way to easy for others to access in my mind, and for who knows what use.

Here's how to remove your information if you don't want it there:

1.go to www.spokeo.com

2. enter your name and search

3. once you have found your page, copy the url in the browser window

4.scroll down to bottom and click on tiny light gray "privacy" link

5.scroll down to bottom and paste your url, enter email addy and security code word

6.go to your email and approve , your information should be removed pretty quickly.

7. you may need to do this a few times for nicknames or other addresses, you can only do 2x per email, so if you have more than two listings for yourself, use a different email.

That's it. Do you know of any other sites like this? Please let us know in the comments if you do!

 

the new (& even better) Souvenir Magazine

Heather has re-vamped her lovely Souvenir and has gone from a nostalgic gazette to a full blown beauty. You can hear Heather describe the changes here, and follow the Facebook page for it here.

 

{Instagram taken after gathering up some supplies and getting ready to head out the door for photo shoot}

I'm very happy to continue contributing to the beauty she is creating. This issue I had the most fun when playing photographers assitant/flower arranger/prop stylist alongside Amy while Heather captured the magic right before our eyes.

           {more photoshoot supplies instagrammed before loading into the car, Souvenir bound!}
  {one last instagram taken of flowers I'd been arranging before rushing out the door to get my son}

You can sign up to be notified each time a new issue is available right here . The newly formated Souvenir launches Tuesday, March 20th, hope you'll be savoring the beauty too!

i ♥ meg duerksen

Seriously. I really do love Meg, and her blog peeps (welcome Meg's peeps!). I love Meg's honesty that comes through loud and clear on her blog, along with her witty writing, and her style, and her photographs, and her love for creativity, and those red and white striped bowls in her kitchen! In a nutshell, I think she's cool. She's authentic and real and funny; my favorite qualities in a person.

We'd very briefly met before, and then she reached out and said just the right words to push me over the edge to really commiting to getting the prints made.

And for that I am grateful. I love the prints and appreciate everyone that encouraged me to make them. I'm thrilled that a whole new world is opening up for me as far as my art is concerned. I have always loved to doodle and color and make patterns etc. and it seems like it's all coming together and I'm having to stretch and grow at the same time, with the photoshop learning I'm having to do (more on that another day) in order to make the prints. I'm glad she was the whisper in my ear that caused me to push through my resistance to all the work I knew I didn't know how to do. I can't wait to create more, the ideas are flowing, just need to find the time.

Anyway, back to Meg and my reason for introducing you to her today. Recently she offered to host a  giveaway of one of my prints on her blog.  {Just look at her photos (all of these on this post) which are a million times better than mine (ok, she is a photographer after all). }  She took great photos (and generously shared them with me), posted about the prints, invited her readers and what a response she got...over 800 comments in 1 day!!! Yowza!!!  And many etsy print sales for me too. So, what can I say other than THANKS MEG!!!! I owe you one, and I hope you know that you

by many. xo

 

 

gift tags for you

            

I hope you are having the happiest of holidays! If you aren't done with all your wrapping and labeling, I've made some free downloadable tags for you to use if you'd like. I printed the one above and below on art paper, but any cardstock would do nicely. In the very top photo, you can see the art paper print on top of a print on regular thin printer paper. The pdf is below, with an added black and white version in case the kiddies (of all ages) want to color them to match your paper.  Merry Merry! xo

 

Download Pam garrison gift tags

Download Pam garrison gift tags 2011 colored in

Here's a link to last year's tags for you: gift tags 2010

new postcards on etsy

I've got a new postcard set over at etsy. I'm still working on getting the posters perfected to sell (and getting so close), but in the meantime, here are smaller renditions of my hand drawn and doodley-decorated statements, sized for snail mail sending. In each set you get 6 Hugs and Kisses cards and 6 Thank You cards. Here's a closer look at them:

The back was kept pretty plain so you have room to jot a quick note:

I hope you like them as much as I do, they are printed on a lovely recycled, matte paper that is soft to the touch. I've been working on some just for Valentine's Day too, something fun to pop in the mail for loved ones. So many ideas...just need a little more time...but you know how that goes I'm sure!!! xo

etsy restocked with happy day samplers

pamg.etsy.com

holiday gift tags for you

 

 

 

My friend Charlotte made a downloadable pdf file using some of my illustrations for you. Just click here, print, cut out and enjoy! She also made some adorable gift tags for you, and I love these super cute gift tags as well. Happy wrapping! xo

congratulations to:

 

Prize No. 1:

 

stanna rysdam said:

Love your blog and would love to win the prize...

Prize No. 2: 

Megan The Binding Bee said:

Your blog is a source of weekly inspiration for me. Thank you so much for sharing!! 

Please email me your shipping address and I'll get your prizes in the mail to you!!! Thanks for playing everyone, I wish I had prizes for all!

great big giveaway

This weekend Jenny's Crescendoh is having it's launch party. I can't believe she started her new venture only 3 months ago. I hope you've gone over and checked out the daily cool links chosen by artists. In celebration of her success, I'm hosting a big giveaway. Leave a comment before Sunday midnight (pacific time) and consider yourself entered. Wanna know what the winners (yep, there are 2 big winners) have to look forward to?

Prize number 1 will include:

Where Women Create book of Inspiration by Jo Packham and Jenny Doh:

It's a great book full of inspiration as the title promises. Lots of great studios. It's an honor to be included with the other featured artists: Danita, Connie Govea Stuart, Hanne Matthiesen, Ashley Carter, Lori Oles, Vickie Howell, Amy Hanna, Bonzie, Laurie Mika, Susan Tuttle, Ulla Milbrath, Suzie Millions, Teresa McFayden, Joanna Figueroa, Alisa Burke, Nicol Sayre, Jo Packham, Angela Cartwright, Luana Rubin, Janice Lowry, Line Christensen, and Jenny Doh. I'll be happy to sign or doodle if you are going to keep it for yourself. I'll wait to do that though, in case you want to give it as a gift.

The second part of  prize is this sweet necklace from Crescendoh. I bought one for myself and liked it so much that I bought one to include in the giveaway:

The necklace comes wrapped with one of Jenny's crochet mini hemp single flower necklace too!

The next Crescendoh product to be included in prize one is a set of stamps designed for Crescendoh by your truly:

 

Also one of their signature totes:

and I'm going to wrap it all up and ship it to you in some hand made, just for you, brown paper packaging. Hopefully you'll share with us how you reuse it:

All that is included in prize number one!!! Prize number two is very similar, but will feature a signed book from Amy Hanna

and a set of her beautiful handcrafted earrings instead of the art saves necklace.

All the rest is the same! Two great packages as far as I'm concerned. Just leave your comment and we'll see who the lucky winners are. {One comment per person please, even though there are two prizes- prize one will be given to first name drawn, prize two to the second name drawn, thanks!} All in all I think the prizes are a great way to celebrate Crescendoh's launch, don't you? Congratulations to Jenny and the Crescendoh crew!

still painting

I've been working on 3 big pieces over the week. So fun. All are on wood art boards, all done with acrylics and watercolors.

 

I have no idea where I'm going with all this, but I'm sure that it's somewhere that my bank account wouldn't like. I find myself wanting to order more wood art boards, more paints, more brushes, an easel...oh my!

WIP

Having fun playing with paint on a big wooden canvas. {Ed: I ordered Wood Painting Panels from dickblick.com} I'm finally at a place where I feel like there is hope for it, ha! It's sure to change from here, but I feel like it's found a direction. It's 24x24 and I'm really enjoying working in this large size. Gonna set this aside for a bit and gesso another one now. Not sure what I enjoy more, the feel of the paintbrush on the wood, or mixing up my own colors (acrylics and watercolors). Feeling very lucky that I get to play this way. Constantly trying to grow creatively. Hope you get some creative play in today too.

and the winners are...

Kathy Hansen
auntiesisy@aol.com
“Wow, what a wonderful giveaway, I would love to be entered. Thanks so much for all you do for the art community, I cannot wait till my copy of the books arrives. I know you will a have a huge success on your hands what a gift to us all. Kathy H.”

Anita Anderson
ama1@cableone.net
“This book looks GREAT! When I grow up I wanna be just like you!”

michelleb.
mblaise29@yahoo.com
“How wonderful of all of you to share something so wonderful with all of us! Thanks!”

dawn
dawnpagano@yahoo.com
ohsopretty.typepad.com
“How lovely!! Please enter my name in the drawing.”

---

Wow, it’s so great to see there are so many kit-loving crafters out there. I’m sorry there can only be four winners, but I promise there'll be more giveaways in regards to Postmark: LA.

We are all so grateful and excited about your enthusiasm for our little project. If you’re one of the lucky winners, please send me an email at pmdgarrison@cox.net with your home address so I can send your package.

With much appreciation, Pam.

(Winners were chosen using a random number generator from random.org.)