Thanksgiving Stuffing

...but not the kind I would have expected! A year ago today, my shop was still an idea. I had no business card, no shop, and only a few drawings.  I didn't launch until the end of January, so I am very pleased with these past ten months.  This weekend, I started work on a new line of items: plush ornaments (and soon, toys) for the shop.  I am no seamstress, so my good friend Deb (of www.bunniescandream.etsy.com and www.harlequinlionhead.etsy.com) helped me out with the trial line. My very talented Aunt Judi will be my sewing partner, making sure the quality is very high and that the plush animals are delightful and whimsical.  Here are some shots from the first attempt!

Disaster afoot? Me with scissors.

Master Jeweler Debbie Liu at work with the sewing machine. Woman vs. Machine: who will win?

Stuffless animals.

Stuffed but not stitched...

A fabric menagerie. 

My Second Fair---Crafts in Chelsea

What a great experience! I shared again with my friend Deb, a talented and creative jeweler of Bunnies Can Dream Jewelry and Harlequin and Lionhead Jewelry.  We had a large space, 10x10 feet, as big as some Manhattan apartments, on a tree-lined street in Chelsea.  The day was gorgeous, crisp and perfectly autumn (with some pretty strong wind gusts, though our tent did not blow away), and after a few days of rain, lots of delightful shoppers came out.  Really, the best part was what I call my "market test".  It was great to see just what the reaction to the prints were.  Even if people didn't ultimately purchase anything, they always smiled looking at my work, and that made me really satisfied.  On top of that we were surrounded by some very creative individuals and I even came home with some really yummy vegan spicy caramel popcorn from Woodside Bakehouse (and later scored some vegan Peanutella there for my brother), and a really killer skirt from Rock and Salt. Love it.

Baskets of holiday cards and giclee prints

First attempt at a hanging display. 

Our whole tent...and one of the vendors from an amigurumi shop across the way.

Happy Halloween!

May today be filled with ghosts and goblins and witches.  May the air smell like dying leaves and candy.  May the sky remain a beautiful sapphire blue tonight.

Adrienne Adams, "A Woggle of Witches"

Where I work

We just moved into a larger, more affordable apartment in Queens.  It's a bit of an adjustment but I adore having a bit of space to work.  For the first time since college, I have a space that's just dedicated to drawing.   Right now it's just a card table but when money is less tight I'll invest in a nice table or desk. I decorated the space around the desk with things that make me happy and inspire me.  On the table you will see a porcelain lamp. What you can't see is that is is carved with trees to remind me of the woods.  There is also a little troll I bought as a present for myself after I received my master's degree and a piping pig reproduction of a medieval sculpture.  I have all of my supplies: pencils, pens, colored pencils, envelopes, giclée prints, cello bags, paper cutter, etc.  Some are kept in a castle tin I've had since I was a child.  Above the desk you'll see a signed print of a winter castle by Gennady Spirin, a lovely illustrator whose work looks like the Limbourg Brothers with a Russian twist.  Above that is a print of "Snow White and Rose Red" by Trina Schart Hyman, a woman whose detailed and gorgeous watercolors made me want to be an illustrator.  To the left is my own drawing of "Hans-My-Hedgehog," to keep me working with a sense of wonder, while to the right is an engraved reproduction from Rabelais' Dream of Pantagruel: it's a monster playing his nose as a flute. My brother bought that for me because I own two nose flutes.  Above that are two more medieval reproductions: a running knight and a jousting knight.  Below, we'll see a metal name plate of Zur Böttcherstraße, that street in Bremen with all of the toy shops that I loved as a child.  Below that is my self portrait as Snow White, and to the far left, a tiny print of Domenico Ghirlandaio's Giovanna Tornabuoni.  The photo oddly looks a bit fisheyed, but really, everything is straight.  So now, once grading is done, comes a drawing binge...and I can't wait.

My tiny, sweet "studio."

My Favorite Halloween Books

Halloween is my favorite day of the year.  My parents were very keen on the holiday, as was my aunt, who would send Halloween packages to our house that were the cause of eager excitement when they arrived.  My mom had Halloween records to play that were riffs on classic songs..."I've Been Working on my Costume"..., "When the Witches go Flying Along...", to which I still remember the lyrics.

But we'd always have a stack of Halloween books to read as well.  My favorites are here. You've heard me speak of #1 before. It's the most classic and won't really scare you but will get you in the spooky mood of the holiday.  The Haunted House and the Goblin are the two best ones for giving you slight chills up your spine.  Jack Prelutsky and Marilyn Hafner are geniuses for shaping my love of this day so much.

Another perennial favorite was Lonzo Anderson and Adrienne Adams' "The Halloween Party", the story of a boy named Faraday Folsom who, on the way to a Halloween party, wanders off into the night forest after a small troll. He's introduced into a world of trolls and witches and tiny elves.  It hits the perfect cold October-air sensation that you only get late in the month, where witches really do lurk in forests and ride their brooms high into the grey clouds that are lit by moonlight in a sapphire sky.

For its sweetness, I loved two other books: "How Spider Saved Halloween" by Robert Kraus, which tells the story of a spider who dresses up as a pumpkin after neighborhood tricksters smash the pumpkin at his friend's house, and "The Biggest Pumpkin Ever" by Steven Kroll, about two mice who unwittingly tend to the same pumpkin in the patch, making it...the biggest pumpkin ever.  

Two books bordered on creepy and TOO CREEPY for me, "In a Dark Dark Room and Other Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark" by Alvin Schwartz and "Very Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark." 

The first is more for kids, and has become the favorite book my nephew, Gavin:

It's illustrations are cartoonlike but creepy:

 

The second book, also by Schwartz, is the stuff of nightmares. It's illustrated with nightmarish imagination by Steven Gammel. Great job for scaring the CRAP out of me, Mr. Gammel. 

Creepy.

See what I mean?

The last book I've recently found. The watercolor paintings are exquisite and the story is intriguing.  Look for repeating details, like the moths, throughout the book.  It's called "Zen Ghosts" and it is by Jon J. Muth.

It's the most wonderful time  of the year!

Christmas on Coney Island

Last year was my first Christmas in New York. I wanted to have a card that varied from my usual style and that was fun and silly.  What better place for all that than Coney Island? My first visit to Coney was totally memorable.  As we watched the sideshow performers do crazy and terrible things to their bodies, I was called from the audience to pull the sword from the sword-swallower's throat.  It was terrifying and awesome and completely real.

I always liked these performers ever since the litany of Hissa the Snake Boy from the Frederick County Fair repeated itself about a million times as we stood in line for some ride or another, I think either the Zipper or the Ferris Wheel.  "Hissa! The Snake Boy! Alive, alive, crawling all over his body!"  One time I told my class about Hissa as we were looking at some circus imagery and I completely lost my composure by laughing.  It was the kind of I-couldn't-stop-this-laugh-even-if-you-put-a-gun-to-my-head laugh that leaves one speechless for a minute or two.  I vowed to never mention Hissa again in class, lest I risk all respectability as a professor.

My mom used to tell me about how my Grandpa, who passed away six years ago, used to go to Coney and ride the Cyclone.  I knew then how my card should look.

Have yourself a silly little Christmas! My plans for this year are even more bizarre.

"A Coney Island Christmas" Ink Drawing by Jessica Boehman, Digital Color by Meghan Boehman

The Pink Tomato Paperie and Me

Just over two years ago, I was living in Wooster, Ohio for a visiting professor position at the College of Wooster.  I was living downtown in a gorgeous studio over the local steakhouse.  On Saturday mornings, Amish farmers on their way to market would wake me with their horses on Market Street.  The college was a fine place to work and I truly enjoyed every day I spent there.  It was a relaxing, healing sojourn after the brutality of grad school.  It felt like a balm on my soul.   I explored the town a tiny bit at a time so it could continue to unfold for me during my short time there.

About a month or so before I moved there, I became engaged to my longtime beau, Mike, who is now my husband.  One afternoon, as I was exploring, I finally went into the Pink Tomato, a paperie and invitation shop (with its own Aroma Lab!).  I was looking for a stamp to use on wedding envelopes.  What I found was inspiration for my future.

That day before I left, I had ditched my plans to buy wedding invitations online and had designed my invitations with the professional help of Christy Hoffman, who was very pregnant with her handsome son Dane, who was born a few weeks later.  The invitations were just gorgeous. Before I left Wooster, they had also designed my save-the-dates, my table numbers, and my wedding programs, and had even printed my annual Christmas cards.

Wedding Program and Invite. (Photo by Love Me Do Photography)

My wedding invitation (Photo by Jessica Marie Boehman)

I remember when Christy saw my Christmas card, she said, partially in jest (I think!) that I should sell my stuff at her store.  I didn't really think so much about it until a few days later, when, during grading final exams, I decided to go and show them a portfolio.  I felt frantic with excitement for the next few days.  I had come to Wooster to teach art history and I had loved every second of it.  How could I be so lucky that this little town could give me the two things I loved the best?  It was a town full of blessings and it was the best place for me to be at that junction in my life.   Over the following months, I made a few designs for the Pink Tomato to use exclusively on wedding invites and other print cards.   About a year later, we would find a working relationship that suited us both better, and it came organically as I designed tattoos for Christy and her husband.

After I moved to New York, I was feeling restless and a bit out of myself. I hadn't yet started my jobs.  It was early summer and I teach college, so I had a few months.  I started conceiving the idea of an online shop.  I didn't know that NYC would provide the inspiration for me.  After we moved into our new apartment and I saw the Delacorte Clock at the Central Park Zoo, I knew which way I wanted to take the shop.  But it was during the rigor and exhaustion of teaching at three schools that I became desperate to find myself again.  That semester, my shop was born on the Staten Island Ferry.  It came to fruition in January 2011.

It pleases me so much that the beautiful ladies who sparked my imagination now play such an important part in my shop.  They print my beautiful cards and even sell them in their new shop on 221 Beall Avenue in Wooster.  Though I have left Wooster behind, my art is still there, and that makes me so happy.  Thanks for everything, Christy and Jodi!  I hope now you understand how you've changed my life.

My cards at the Pink Tomato Paperie in Wooster, Ohio

My Halloween Cards at the Pink Tomato Paperie in Wooster, Ohio

Penguin with Drum and the Brementown Musicians at the Pink Tomato Paperie in Wooster, Ohio

The Pink Tomato Paperie in Wooster, Ohio