St. John's Block Party

A summer would not be complete without the St. John's Block Party. It is by far the best local music festival in town and it gets better every year! This year they cut it down to one day but that did not mean that they skimped! The bands that played this year included: Pink Mink, Six Mile Grove, Lucy Michelle and the Velvet Lapelles, Martin Zellar, Solid Gold, and Ok Go.

All the bands were good (I have a girl crush on the lead singer from Pink Mink now!) but Solid Gold and Ok Go stole the  show! I have been obsessed with Solid Gold for a good while now. They played St. John's two years ago and it was mind blowingly good. They did not disappoint this year!

My blurry pictures do not do them justice. They are ALL super attractive. That also wins them points ; )


I had never seen Ok Go before this concert. I had of course heard some of their more popular songs that got radio play and had seen some of their videos but nothing prepared me for how good they were! Not that I was expecting them to be bad, but I did not expect them to become one of my new favorite bands. They also quickly shot up into my Top 5 concerts of All Time list. They sounded amazing live- which is kind of the point if you are going to play music for a living right? I might go so far as to say that I liked them better live than their recordings. The singer's voice is just so good. I kind of felt like he was singing to my soul. Then the played a song on handbells. HANDBELLS! I think I swooned.

Did I mention that they love confetti almost as much as I do?! Any band who uses a confetti cannon AT ALL during a show is in my good book, but they used it a ton! It was so hot out that confetti just kind of stuck to everyone. It was magical.

Since the concert I have been officially obsessed. I watched every music video I could find and I am quickly working on gathering their music into my own itunes library.  I am really in love with their creativity. I am adding 'work on an OK Go music video' to my bucket list.


Any other good outdoor concerts happening?

Tragedy

I had planned to post a mini review of the new Batman film today but the tragedy in Colorado is weighing on my mind. I am so sad for the families. My thoughts are with them.

Moonrise Kingdom

Moonrise Kingdom finally started playing in my town! It was so lovely and sweet and filled with Wes Anderson goodness.

Right now I am obsessed with the needle point project from the film. Wouldn't a handmade version make a great gift?

So much love.

Poison Ivy Cupcakes

Even though the weather has been sweltering lately I have been doing more baking than I have in a long time! My fishing themed cupcakes for my friend's bridal shower turned out cute...but I forgot my camera so I am waiting for my other friend to upload her pics from her camera (which she is notoriously slow at : ).

This week though one of my derby gals was in need of some cupcakes to go with her Poison Ivy costume. I jumped on that task! I knew what I wanted them to look like in my head and I think they turned out rather well. Nice bright red and green (it looked like Christmas threw up in my kitchen because I am a messy decorator!) in two flavors: Red Velvet and white. I threw in some green into the white batter to continue the theme.

All boxed up and ready to go! She really liked them but I am still waiting to hear if they were a hit at her event!

It might not have been one of the better Batman movies (understatement of the year) but I really loved Uma Thurman as Poison Ivy. She totally rocked it and looked like she was having an absolute blast!

Happy Independence Day!

Happy Independence Day! Hope you are not melting from the heat. And stay safe!

 

You know what looks not safe? This vintage postcard of a BABY with a FIRECRACKER. Sheesh.

Vintage Luggage Set

Do you remember that show Pan Am? Well it didn't do very well but it made a lot of people covet those super cute pan am bags.

Those super cute bags were also super expensive- at least for my shoestring crafty budget. Still it was what I really wanted to get for my friend Krista for her birthday. Thrifting to the the rescue! One day of visiting every thrift store in town uncovered these gems.

Then to personalize them even more I made a 'Pan Am' logo for the red bag. I took a picture of the logo from the internet and took out the name. Then I downloaded the same font and used that to put in her name "Krista". I played around with a couple different ways of getting the new logo on the bag but I ended up just tracing and painting it with some craft paint. To finish it off I tied vintage ladies ties to each bag.

And there  you have it a super cute personalized gift that cost way less than the store bought option. Plus we did some upcycling and made it 'handmade'. Epic win all around.





Anyone else make any cool gifts recently?

Cheers.

A Dessa Birthday

Weekday birthdays are always a little tricky. You want to do something fun but yet you still have to be on the responsible side of things. What to do? Well sometimes there is no good answer and then again sometimes things just fall into place. That is what happened this year for my good friend Krista's birthday. The day fell on a Thursday and in our town they have "Thursdays on First", a street fair with food and homemade vendors that fill 1st Street. They also have free music and it just so happened that Dessa was scheduled to perform on Krista's Birthday!!! Perfection. We would have gone anyway because we both love Dessa so much but it was just that much more awesome. The day of I lost my camera (and found it again this morning!) so I didn't get any pictures but I thought I would share this sweet new video from Doomtree (the hiphop collective that Dessa is a part of).

Enjoy!!