Puces Pop de Noël

man o man... the weeks go by soooo fast! The lack of blog posts does not reflect my wooly production though. I've been making larger animal pieces these days (bears, skunks, moles, rabbits) Here is the new Bear model I've been making these days, I will post more pics soon!
You can also come and see them for yourself at the winter Puces Pop edition (December 5-6th)... see you soon!

Halloween!

Halloween has come and gone and I didn't even eat one mini candy bar... what's up with that?

We were invited at the last minute (the last minute part sort of explains our costumes) to go play scary games with our friends. Gen was disguised as cardboard crocodile and I was disguised as the art toy Danboard . Our son was disguised as a jolly accountant with his briefcase and fuzzy moustache, I think the wool moustache tickled his nose a lot because he laughed the whole time. Even if our costumes are simple we had a blast making them and I can't wait to build my son's costume for next year... so far I'm leaning towards the Lego Space Man... but which color??? white, yellow, red... decisions decisions

Souvenir...

Rediscovering old pictures is so much fun!

A rat and another great find!

This is the new Squid Wool rat. It is a clean rat, he has never visited the sewage system (and hopefully he never will).
According to Wikipedia, the main difference between mice and rats is the size. Here is a demonstration:



On another subject, Christopher has once again made a great find at our local VdeV. A lot of French volumes by Miroslav Sasek published by Casterman in the 60's. They are in perfect condition, which means clean inside but they have wear on the covers. If they were in mint condition maybe we would be afraid to let our kid have them. Of course he doesn't read yet- he can barely grab objects - and already books overflow on each side of his library.


I'm in love with Sasek's representation of cities! They seem so alive. And there are always a lot of architectural elements depicted. I have learned that Sasek trained as an architect in Prague (his parents didn't want him to become a painter). It could explain why there are so many architectural elements in his illustrations and their quality. Not every illustrator likes to draw buildings over and over. I like cities and architecture, so I feel spoiled with Sasek's work!

New York Times Square

London tube

Parisian concierge

Venitian pigeons

Puces Pop Bounty!

First off... a HUGE thank you to everyone who stopped by my colorful stand with the brown background! I know I said this before but it's a blast for me to see people smile or outright laugh when they look at my schtuff!

Second off... shown below are our weekend purchases or trades. It's hard to resist buying from each table but one must set a budget or else one will have to trade one's clothes for a barrel.

This year's Puce Pop Bounty are: a lovely Stitch Face plaid beaver, books from the Colosse table, sexy tea towels from Bespoke Uprising, When I was Young book from illustrator Lea Heinrich, a fridge wallet from Broundoor that I had my eye on for a while, two beautiful capsules by artist Vanessa Yanow and a sweet acrorn necklace from Nea.



Third off... I made these new brooches right before the fair and they were gone pretty quickly... so I'll be making more donkeys and foxes in the next weeks.

Inspiration Friday / Pokémon

These are old pictures from a lot of Pokémon Christopher once sold on ebay. Not everybody likes the Pokémon (i.e. my father used to think they were too violent), but we do. They are contemporary mainstream toys with lots of creativity in them. Designers in Japan must have had a blast creating many of them. Throughout the years, we even ended up keeping the ones we found interesting.

Like this fish, who rather looks like it could be from a Czech animation movie from the 60's...


or these very simple ones.

For sure, when our son will grow up, we will not like everything he likes. And it's alright. But if he ends up liking Pokémon figures (if they are still around by then) I'll be happy since Pokémon can probably trigger imagination more than most of the licensed toys we are seeing on the shelves today.

Psych Mice

I feel a little mousey these days and have been making mice non-stop. I keep making the brown and grey mice but I've been having fun making these psychedelic mice too! I'll bring my new rodent friends at the Puce Pop craft fair this weekend.



Bonus Pics. Scud was jealous and decided to come and pose with the mice... or maybe he's waiting for me to go away to take a bite out of one.

Coloring Day

What to do on a cold&rainy Sunday afternoon? Invite friends over for a coloring get-together of course!
I know what you are thinking... and you're right, my friends ARE awesome!
These colored Squid Wool stickers will be for my swanky bags for the upcoming Puces Pop fair.
If you are in Montreal next weekend (3-4 October) come on over and say hey. 105 St-Viateur Ouest - 11h-19h.

These stickers below are a selection of my favs (in no particular order)

Inspiration Friday / Squirrel

Sitting on a park bench with a bag of peanuts...
If you live in Montreal, you know that the real rulers of the city are the grey squirrel gangs.

Yesterday we found ourselves with an hour to kill in an neighbourhood which is not our own. I was thirsty, so we stopped at the corner shop to buy a drink. Christopher who was getting hungry also bought a bag of peanuts. We then went to the park across the street to drink and snack.
It didn't took long before a grey squirrel came to us, with his nose moving up and down - clearly smelling the bag of peanuts. We didn't call him or offered him anything, he just found us.
Eating peanuts in a park, what an idea! Of course the squirrel just wouldn't let go. After I finished my drink, and because we should not get too cozy with wild animals, we left. To our amusement, and even if we did not feed him, Squirrly followed us like a lost puppy until we finally crossed the invisible limit of his territory.

I kind of like squirrels. We share the same urban space and most of the time they just keep doing their business. Observing them can be entertaining. Soon will be the season when they get really fat and sometimes slower and clumsier.

From a purely aesthetic point of view, squirrels have some qualities. Just look at their elegant wavy run. It makes sense that squirrel are really popular in children's literature or in design in general.

Jadwiga Wernerova (text) and Janusz Grabianski (ill.). Rotfellchen. Berlin; Der Kinderbuchverlag. No date, but it's from the DDR...

Candy wrap. Gift from Belarus 2002.

For Squid Wool, the idea of a needle felted squirrel came quite naturally. Not only it is a popular animal, which characteristic make it easily recognizable, but it is also a symbol of the city we live in.

Other yard sale find

Picture bought at a yard sale recently...
At the same place, Christopher bought a family album for a big 2$ with a lot of great pictures from different periods (early 70's to 90's).
For exemple this...
this...this...this...
and finaly this one (for Sara).

Inspiration Friday /Moomin

It must be impossible not to love Tove Jansson's work. Moomin's universe is so imaginative, both in term of the aesthetics and in term of the story being told. Everybody should read Moomin (and the complete comic strip published by Drawn and Quarterly is probably the best way to do it).

Christopher made this Moomin for me about two years ago. In Squid Wool time, 2 years is a long time... He is far from perfect and he can't stand alone, but I think it is part of his charm.

Newcomers!

Donkeys!

Village des Valeurs (V de V) find

I found a great collection of vintage YPR and CRG children records at my local Value Village this week. The cover art is outstanding and they are in great condition to boot. It is refreshing to find children records that are not scratched and torn to shreds. My turntable is currently on the fritz... so I can't even listen to them... I can only enjoy the artwork for now. enjoy.

Hypno-Cat?

New member in the Squid Wool family

Squid Wool's "new associate" is now 2 weeks old. In about 3 years, we have great hope he will become the main Squid Wool product tester.
Of course Christopher has less time to work on wooly things, but he's back to it whenever he can (you should have seen him earlier felting a squirel with the baby sleeping on his lap).

useless nursery

As promised, here are some pics of our soon to be active nursery.... or as we call it these days a "useless nursery" since the baby doesn't seem to be interested in coming out.

The nursery was made on a budget. It is a mix of things we already had, Ikea, thrift shop and yard sale buys, the shelves were custom made by Gen's father.

Our cat Scud loves this room and I'm pretty sure he thinks we made it for him.



Wish Come True toys. I'm a little frightened when I think how many toys he will have, since my job is buying and selling vintage toys I've already put aside oodles of cool toys for various ages.




We snagged this awsome Zirma wooden figure from Taru Design. Actually it was a present from Gen to me but I guess now all my toys are now his.

The cute alligator booties were purchased on etsy, made by Jennifer Ladd


Original drawings by friend Sarah Butler, from her 50¢ Photocopy drawing exhibition.




We already collected children books but since Gen is pregnant we took it up a notch and I purchased every book that I liked the design (again my job helps me find great books at a great price).


My Squid Wool mobile between two Polish Posters



Plush-Partners in crime: Tri-Bunny by Velvet Moustache and Evil-Eye-Guy made by From to From


This is where he currently lives but his rent is overdue, we can't wait that he is evicted and joins us in our home.