Patchwork Indie Arts and Crafts Festival

Today, my boyfriend and I went to the Patchwork Indie Arts and Crafts Festival in Santa Ana. It was warm. I wore a hat for the first time in YEARS. And I bought lots of lovely things!

Of course my first purchase had something to do with buttons. And such cute earrings these are! I never thought of just turning my buttons into studs! Nina Brito of Tacos 'n' Eggrolls Jewelry was very nice. I'm rather shy but I like it when the sellers are friendly (there were some sellers who didn't even say hi when we walked into their empty booths...). I walked away with two pairs of vintage button studs. LOVE.

The next booth I checked out was from Shari of Bonnin Designs (visit her shop here.) I actually heard about this festival on her blog. And like a nerd (remember how I said I'm shy?), I walked into her booth and said "Do you have a blog on blogger? I totally follow you..." GEEK! CREEPY! "I follow you"??? Jeez. Lol. ANYWAY, I bought these super cute hair pins that she made with glass beads and wire. They usually run $10 a pair, but for today, Shari had them for $8. Lucky me! :D

It honestly seemed like my poor boyfriend was totally bored. He was wonderful and pointed out things to me that I should be doing or things he thought I would like but I didn't think he was finding anything HE liked. Then we walked by the Two Hand Design table. These little handmade beauties are created from the artist's own illustrations, vintage clip-art, or rubber stamps. She uses a letterpress to hand print these gems, which my boyfriend just loves! He's been dying to get a tabletop letterpress but we can't afford it right now (I wish I could get it for him for our anniversary...). ANYHOO, we bought a pack of thank you tags. And they are adorable!

Our last stop was to visit Yolanda's Clay and Jewelry Creations. Such pretties! All hand made by Yolanda. All so cute! My boyfriend bought me the owl pendant and I have to make something for myself with it and I bought a little pack of beads which had 2 shank buttons. *SQUEAL!* I love that color. I'm seeing a pretty bracelet rising from that pile of beads...

It was so much fun seeing all the local artists. It made me want to go home and just MAKE SOMETHING!

So I made these :D

Seed beads, brass chain flower link, brass dragonfly, and Czech fire polished beads. I might change the wire to a stud. They're rather long... Do you like long earrings? My neck is kinda short so I don't but I can imagine some of my friends wearing long earrings and they just look stunning in them!

So that was my day today. And it was fun. On a side note, I started another blog about how I struggle with bringing myself to create things... it's called Reclaiming Rose because I want to take back my life... get back on track. We'll see how that goes. Lol.

Bloggy links tomorrow! Hope everyone had a great weekend!