Betsy & Iya Jewelry


Posts Tagged ‘dreaming’

The Workshop: coLLABorations.

Tuesday, February 16th, 2010
(picture I took of Maple XO pieces from Radish Underground event …Love Is In the Air)

It turns out that my Old Turns New line is super popular; I never even had the chance to add most of them to my online shop.  I have nearly sold out of the pieces I created for the Junk to Funk show and subsequent holiday events.  Radish was a HUGE champion of that work during the holidays and after…and I’m so thrilled by it all.  This line has shocked me out of ANYTHING ordinary—and i LOVE it.  I can’t wait to make more.

In the spirit of sustainability, I’d like to introduce two folks whose work embodies that idea.   Two folks who truly inspire me and who I’d like to collaborate with one day:

1) Isaac B. Watson and his amazing Focal Length Designs.I WILL own one of his rad cuffs one day.  I am awed by his creative, agile mind and his infectous, positive attitude.  Every time I see him, he makes me feel happy.  Isaac and I have already been cooking up some steamy yum ideas together.  (Remember that men’s jewelry line I mentioned…???)

speaking of collaboration…check out the amazing project he’s working on with Etsy and local art school PNCAI Heart Art, Portland.  I’m sad that I won’t be able to make the opening meet ‘n’ greet on February 26th, (because I’ll be at the OLYMPICS..what!?)…but YOU should definitely go!

2) Lindsay Jo from Maple XO.

For 5 years, Lindsay Jo (a super betty skateboarder), has transformed old, otherwise useless, skateboards into fine fine pieces of jewelry.  I looooove the bangles she makes!  We sat next to each other at the Radish Underground event, where we were making custom jewelry for Valentine’s Day and well…we sort of…fell in love (in a fellow-crafy-jewelry-maker-on-valentine’s kind of way).

I’m so excited about the possibility of working with these two geniuses one day.  I’ll definitely let you know when the magical meetings occur.

In the meantime…Happy Tuesday!

***Song of the Moment: The House with Two Front Doors, by The Finches***

Confessions: Unabashed Confidence.

Friday, February 5th, 2010

This morning I had this equally exhilarating and terrifying thought:

I am exactly where I need to be.

(And somehow that thought corresponds with this wicked picture I took of my good friend, SQ.  beautiful.  hard.  soft.  lovely.).

I hope you all have unabashedly confident weekends.

xox~betsy

***Song of the Moment: Godspeed, by Jenny Lewis***  (okay okay, I’ll switch it up next time.  I’m just really loving Ms. Lewis this week).

Confessions: train relief

Friday, January 22nd, 2010

Sometimes I like it when I’m stopped by the train on the way to work.  It’s sort of like the way I feel about flying—an excuse to do absolutely nothing and resign myself over to the stillness.

feeling a little raw today. yes.

look forward. think. about. everything. or nothing.

pretty. in that sad sort of way.

geometry. yum.

mysterious morning.

i see you.

cool.

I didn’t want to waste the entire half hour just staring away at my steering wheel.  I remembered my camera was in the car.  Above are flashes of the experience I had, being forced to wait in the car this morning on the way to work.

It was nice.

Have lovely weekends.

And remember, if you’re in Portland, come see Truth & Beauty (tonight & saturday and next thursday, fri, sat only) 8:30 pm @ Shaking the Tree Studio 1407 SE Stark.

***Song of the Moment: Down is the New Up, by Radiohead***

Wife.

Monday, October 5th, 2009

It means nothing but what we make of it.

hawaii mirror camera(the following pictures = the wife in her many states.)

“It is also good to love: because love is difficult. For one human being to love another human being: that is perhaps the most difficult task that has been entrusted to us, the ultimate task, the final test and proof, the work for which all other work is merely preparation.”  -Rainer Maria Rilke

Photo 39(love her)

mirror super(New York ready)

The other day, W took time out of his crazy work schedule to tell me (via email), that something I had said the night before had impressed him.  He did the kind of thing that one usually does when courting another…not after knowing them for 10 years.  It reminded me that we both do that sort of thing more often than I think; and that I admire that about our relationship.

When I read his words, it gave me butterflies (the free, colorful kind, not the dark, trapped kind) in my stomach.  I pointed out that we must be doing something right if we can still make the other feel:  chills from a new hand accidentally brushing our own, tingling lips the way a first kiss awakens us, (in a instant) loneliness transforming entirely into familial warmth—after all these years we’re still learning about each other as if we’re anxiously awaiting only our 3rd conversation—so much that lives inside the beautiful shell of a person, undiscovered, who sits in front of you, only waiting to be discovered by you…and you by them.

Photo 110(morning and glasses.)

mirror(meet: great grandma betsy)

newness.  When we decided to get married, this is one thing that I knew I couldn’t live without and I knew we had found in each other.  passion.  for life, in each other, and in all things we do (together or apart)…recognizing this in the other person and constantly supporting it, ferociously. wholeness. We would not be together, would not have truly uninhibitedly seen the other if we were not first whole within our own selves.  I find solace in this idea.  I find strength in my own independence, through my husband—crazy, I know.  ambition. to push yourself and your partner farther than you ever thought you could go.  music and art. inspire each other.  do these things together.  a lot.  support. faith and loyalty in all things we do.  love. strong, deep, the never-stopping-always-searching-for-more kind of love.  truth and honesty. who are you without these two things?  You owe them to the other and you owe them to yourself…for all time.  we must always seek out the deepest of truths and then we are honoring our purest and most beautiful selves.

mirror 2(business and crispness)

Photo 158(wife.  wiiiiiiiife?  wife. WIFE.  wife!!  wife.)

I really like the German poet, Rilke’s Letters to a Young Poet and highly recommend reading it if you have even a glimpse of a human heart.  It’s a quick read and it moves me every time.

I am a wife.

I like being one.

it is an honor.

***Song of the Moment: Stillness is the Move, by the Dirty Projectors***