curbsidetreasure.org!

I am excited announce I am moving to my domain, http://curbsidetreasure.org. after nearly 4 years of blogging here, i think it is time for an official site. i hope you will join me over there, and please update your rss feeds on your blog readers.

ps. i am still working on my new site, so it is a work in progress and changes will come, slowly but surely. just lack of time/too much schoolwork is keeping me from devoting more time to blogging.

snail mail social + a call for correspondents

i'm excited to announce the Snail Mail Social, which is a letter writing social with vintage typewriters, custom stationery and rubber stamps. Carolee and I have organized it in conjunction with Arch Drafting Supply which is an awesome independent art store in the Portrero Hill neighborhood in San Francisco.




typewriters! rubber stamps! custom statonery designed by carolee! and if i can get it together, artistamps designed by me.


if you are in the SF Bay Area, definitely come in and write some letters, decorate your stationery and we will have rubber stamps and ephemera for you to use. i am hoping that after the first social, we will be able to hold more of these events in the future.

The Snail Mail Social will be held on October 8th, 1-4 pm
at ARCH 99 Missouri Street, SAN FRANCISCO, CA 94107


Even if you are not in san francisco, there's another way to participate! we want to have a list of willing correspondents available for anyone at the social to write to. maybe you would like a new penpal, or you're a mail artist looking to exchange postcards and other fun stuff. if you're interested in being on the list email me at seasecrets @ gmail dot com your name, address and interests. think of it as a penpal want ad! edit, due to the overwhelming response we have more than enough addresses. thank you everyone for submitting your penpal want ads/addresses!

instant collection (vintage stamps)

i'm pretty exhausted from this weekend's san francisco zine fest. i was finishing up a zine, assembling, folding and putting together all the copies and making sure i had enough stuff for my table and being very busy at school.

i just wanted to post up some recent postage stamps i bought from murph, who is a guy who sells unused USA vintage stamps at face value. send him an email, with preferences on themes and your address, he takes checks, only. he is very reliable & friendly - emurphy @ cot dot net

cute tape

it's the start of the fall semester for me, so i've had a hectic week all last week. of course, my favorite thing is back to school shopping. i love perusing art supply and office supply stores for pens, inks, paints and paper of course. i had a long list of things i needed for a rapid visualization class - which is a class where we learn to sketch quickly to render ideas. i needed pens, markers, pencils, drafting triangles, all the standard stuff, some of which i had already.

but every time i step into an art supply store to buy required items for school i always leave with at least one or two miscellaneous items...my fun purchase this time is this deco tape on sale for 1.99 at blick.



i ended up with 2 rolls! the one on the left, i bought several months ago at full price $4 because i couldn't resist. but i'm happy to buy them at half the price.

incoming/outgoing mail

here's my incoming letters! i love all the red, especially the wax seal which makes everything look official. i just bought some red sealing wax after receiving that letter from maureen. also in this photo are mini zines about india's post office and rubber stamp industry by alice, a letter from carolee who always has great handwriting and a photocopied typewriter manual for my smith corona + letter from donovan. all in all i had a good mail week!






here's some shots of my outgoing mail, which i still need to catch up on. i was excited to buy new stamps from my local post office and i bought the owney the dog stamps (he was a dog that traveled on mail trains in the 1890s) and of course the beautiful pixar stamps, which are here and even more exciting is that they are coming out with a second set of pixar characters including nemo, monster's inc, jessie and woody, the incredibles and a bug's life.

housewarming gift

my sister, anna recently moved out to have her own studio apartment. we went home goods shopping at Daiso, of course. it was the one trip where i only bought only one item from that store. i'm not sure how that was possible.

i was thinking about what to give as a housewarming present, sure a pretty bowl or tea towels would have been great - except i have never used tea towels. all i know is that they look pretty. but rather than the classic bottle of wine or vase, why not a giant pencil as a gift?

we have a small collection of giant objects that are normally very small, like a muni transfer, paper clip, clothespin and pen. so the giant pencil was the obvious addition for her new apartment.

i just tied some baker's twine and added a manila tag. some gifts don't need much wrapping.

giveaway winners!

i am very pleased to announce the two winners of the giveaway i hosted.

ihanna is the winner of UpperCase Magazine!
nina wins the tag stationery set!

thank you everyone for entering the giveaway.

i will be emailing both winners to get their contact information.