Lillstreet Screen-Print Party

Nestled in the northern Chicago neighborhoods of Ravenswood/Irving Park stands the Lillstreet Art Center.  The perfect venue for a bachelorette party or any social celebration.  They offer art parties in ceramics, painting & drawing, metals/jewelry/glass, textiles, digital arts & photography, and wedding inspired workshops.  When Lillstreet's, Claire Hurwitz (Community Outreach and Special Events Coordinator), teamed up with Events By Willow's, Kara and Cynthia, a stylish screen-print party was created.  This looks like so much fun!

Lillstreet Custom Party. I love that!

The materials.

A Lillstreet Artist explains how-to.

Besides the guidance of an expert artist, Lillstreet also provided all the materials and supplies to make a perfect screen-print.   

Events by Willow provided the stylish spread of snacks, cupcakes, juice, and of course...vino!

Did we mention that it was as easy as....

Step 1

Step 2

Step 3

So satisfied with her design!

Final Designs! 

Thanks to everyone who came out for the Art Party. I couldn't help but notice both Kara and Cynthia did telephones.  Might this have anything to do with Call me Maybe!?!

And thanks to Claire at Lillstreet! 

Happy Accidents

So there I was, in the middle of Chicago with 2 rolls of Ilford 400 and my old Nikon film camera (I swear this isn't a Public Speaking 101 speech).

I was on a mission given to me by my photography teacher. The mission, if I chose to accept it, was simple: Go take pictures. Sweet mission. I spent the next 3 hours or so meticulously framing shots, bending down on one knee, and climbing buildings in an attempt to get the best picture possible. After an afternoon spent in the city, I finally stepped off the train to begin walking back home. Looking down I realized there was one exposure left on my roll. I took the camera, pointed it randomly, cocked it at 45 degrees, and snapped my final shot for the day. Fast forward one week to photography class critique day. 

My awkwardly framed, absent minded, point and shoot picture of a train ended up being the class favorite. When asked to comment I remember saying something along the lines of, "I wanted to capture the humanity and frailty of modern machines and how we interact with sin". I didn't really say that, but I certainly acted like there was deeper meaning behind the image. 

I wonder why I felt the need to define or defend it. Was I embarrassed to admit that I was a fraud? 

The truth is, sometimes you try your hardest to design, to plan, to make, and to set up, but it just doesn't come out the way you anticipated. Relax, that's what we're here for. And guess what? Sometimes you point your tilted camera and it's the class favorite.

I love this story because it taught me to go shoot from the hip. It taught me to throw a camera up in the air with a timed shutter. It taught me to mix things that shouldn't be mixed and to do things that are taboo. It taught me to let inhibitions go and see what happens. After all, that's when the most beautiful things are made.

I leave you with a happy accident, taken as I tested a new memory card.  

Annie and Brittany's Garage Sale Challenge

So here is my new look for the beach bag i purchased last week on our garage sale challenge. If you followed our previous post, Annie and I decided to take garage sale finds and turn them into something new. And since I love the beach, like so much, I thought it would be fun to make something to put all my beach necessities in. I ended up cutting off the multi-colored flowers on the front of the bag (they were kinda tacky) and then I sprayed the bag with gold spray paint. I bought some silver fabric spray paint for the tassel and then just tied it around the bag. Now I am all set for all my summer beach days.

My garage sale challenge started with the brown, textured serving trays and banana yellow napkins.  Like Britt, I also decided to use a little silver spray paint to brighten things up for summer.

Alex and Max's Dino-Mite Birthday Party

March 10, 2012 was a celebration of Dino-Mite proportions for the Andrews Family& friends.  This adorable, British couple asked Kara to plan a birthday party for their sons, Alex and Max.  Just about the same time, I approached Kara and Cynthia with the idea of getting into children's birthday parties, and the rest is history.  I am so excited to be interning with EBW and proud to showcase their
very first kid's birthday party!

The Andrews Family

We planned this party to a T(-rex).  There was a photo booth with dinosaur noses, a coloring station, games like tug-o-war and pin-the-tail on the dinosaur, and hand-stamped, dinosaur goodie bags. There was even a REPTILE GUY who brought live reptiles for the kids to touch.  For food, the kids had a light supper, parents enjoyed drinks and snacks, and we topped it all off with the cutest cupcake display you've ever seen! 

Say, "Roar!"

Coloring...

 Games...

What more could a kid want? A dinosaur goodie bag, filled with pop rocks, a dinosaur coloring book, and dinosaur finger puppets!

 The Reptile Guy

The adults snacked on dino-munchies and drinks.

The kids had supper.

I told you...cutest cupcake display ever! Cakes and cupcakes were displayed on a vintage cart as Kara lights the candles.

A special thanks to Kara's sister, Stephanie, for helping with the party, and to Lauren Hawkins for her photography.  

Stephanie and I.

Annie and Brittany: Design Interns on a Mission

A little nervous about our first blogpost...we put our heads together to come up with something cool and creative. And thus came our cheesy motto for the day: A+B=Coolness.

For aspiring designers, the summer months mean garage sales, flea markets, rummage sales, and dare I say...garbage picks. May though August are prime months for finding inexpensive design pieces. With a little TLC and creativity, one man's trash becomes our treasure.

Today, Britt and I went on a treasure hunt! We hit up local garage sales in the northwest suburb of Palatine. I don't know if we struck gold, but we did find some pieces with great potential. Here's what we found. Annie grabbed 3 serving trays and some banana yellow napkins for 5 dollars total. Brittany snatched up a straw bag and one big tassel for 4 dollars and fifty cents.

about to enter our first garage sale...

we knew this would be a good one:)

Stay tuned for next week's post where we reveal the final products.

Cheers,
A & B

We're proud to present to you our 2012 summer interns!

we're obsessed. 

meet them.

learn them.

love them.

xoxo

kara & cynthia

Brittany is from Chicago but went to Baylor University and is a Texas girl at heart. (if you listen closely she hasn't lost her Ya'll.)

She loves vintage style and her home is decorated with many flea market finds. She will travel at great lengths for vintage treasures.

She loves traveling and spending the day in little coffee shops.

She finds beauty in everyday life. From fashion to photography to cake making she likes to plan parties. Her motto is "If you are going to have a party, don't keep it simple."

Eric is a senior at Wheaton College. There, he studies Communications with a Media emphasis.

He has been told his hair cut looks like Zach Morris' and is unsure whether or not that is a compliment.

In his free time he finds himself botching movie quotes. Like that one time where he said, "Why so mysterious?" as the punch line to a batman joke.

He wishes he stuck with karate.

Annie was born and raised in Indiana.  Go Hoosiers!

After attending Wheaton College, Annie took a job as a teacher's associate in the north shore. She always wanted to work with kids and finds so much joy in teaching. Her students call her, "the artist," because she designs great bulletin boards. 

In March, Annie helped us plan our first children's birthday party. The dinosaur theme was a roaring good time! Annie values the details whether it's styling an outfit or throwing birthday parties for her friends.

Any given summer day in Chicago, Annie will be found at the beach picnicking, running, or in a game of beach volleyball.

Fried Fish, Friends, and Fraternizing

Left to right: Brittany, Annie, Eric, Kara, Cynthia

The beach where we ate some incredible fried fish

Today's post is not brought to you by the letter F. Instead, it is brought to you by Eric the intern. Now, I know you might be thinking, "F!", so I will keep this brief.

New things are exciting; a new job, a new life together, a new addition to the family. Oh, the places we'll go when our new horizons are in sight. But, like every journey, we face challenges on the way to those horizons.

Last Monday, I excitedly became a new intern at EbW. I wish you could have seen me as I was driving to the Starbucks where we met. There was a lot of awkward whistling, unnecessary steering wheel tapping, and even a little bit of GPS smashing (make a legal U-turn?!?!). I hate to admit it, but I was nervous. As I opened my car door, however, I was enthusiastically met with two huge hugs by Kara and Cynthia. Cynthia even let out a, "Woop woop!" Almost instantaneously my nerves were calmed and I felt comfortable amongst my bosses. Upon meeting Annie and Brittany, the two other EbW interns, I knew this summer was going to be an absolute blast.

Where am I going with this?

New things truly are exciting. But, they are also nerve-racking. What an amazing gift it is to work alongside such encouraging and accepting friends, old and new, amidst the nerve-racking adventure that is my internship.

So, here's to beautiful people.

Cheers,

Eric