Just click here for the B&W, letter-size download that you can print at home. It includes a label for your box, the color-able princess village backdrop, and some sweet little extras; a wishing well and flower cart.

Hope your little ones have a great time personalizing their own set!
Ashley’s BEAUTIFUL example is shown below and tutorial is here.

i’ve had a life altering blog discovery a few weeks back. It’s called Li’l Blue Boo. have you seen it? You should. Artist, designer, painter, crafter, and creative ingenue, Ashley Hackshaw is the woman to know. She creates fabulous upcycled knit dresses with a patchwork, whimsical style that is too cool for school!! She also designs and lays down her own artwork as screens on the knits and incorporates those into the dresses! When she’s not sewing and screening, she’s raising an incredibly creative daughter and also painting gorgeous portraits and customized art for kids. And she shares her know how on all of the above through very easy-to-follow tutorials like this!

OK…..so now that THAT introduction is made, i’ll just tell you that after reading Ashley’s blog end-to-end in one sitting, i was oddly compelled to write her and tell her what an inspiration she is. i thought for sure she’d think i was a crazy lunatic, but most people do anyway, so i got to typing.

And she wrote back.

She was super sweet and wondered if i ever collaborated or wanted to? WHAT??? Me??? Of course!!!! Pinch me! i jumped onboard in a heartbeat and knew just what art i could send her to screen on these precious works of art. i sent the “When i Grow Up” print pictured above. More precisely, i sent her the outline of that art. She needed the one-color art for screening anyway, and i still had not figured out the fill.

The next day, it came to me. It needed to be filled with a joyous amalgam of color and texture. This was art meant for little girls and big girls who remember what it’s like to dream. It needed an injection of HAPPY! So i immediately pulled Baby Bohemia from my archive. After all, it’s been a very important piece to me. One that helped define my style and which has sold super well since day one. i had just recently made the artwork into a repeating pattern since i’ve been considering dabbling in a little textile design. Lucky for me, it was just perfecto for this project. See how it came together 1-2-3!

i wanted to make sure the print was listed in my etsy shop in plenty of time to coincide with the launch of our collaborative collection. Because, c’mon! Wouldn’t it be a sweet & super-unique gift idea to give a dress and the art that inspired it in one lovely package? Well at least i thought so.

Now, Ashley has been so kind as to give me the green light to use her photos to show glimpses of the work as it progresses. So far, she has selected ink colors and fabrics and made a pile of various screen printed fabrics to be pieced together in to these dresses. You can see those, along with some of the fabulous other offerings in her shop below. (The middle dress/tunic is BIG Blue Boo, for us stylish mamas!)

i am so, so excited for these dresses to hit the web. i give many, many thanks to Ashley for working with me. i mean, really, she’s doing about 95% of the work at this point! And i’d only offer one word-to-the-wise if you want to snag one of her creations anytime soon. LBB has a fiercely loyal and HUGE following, and dresses sell out FAST!, like- minutes after they’re posted fast. So be forewarned and be at the ready! Yippee!

This piece is really reflective of me as an individual. i’ve never been the best at zero-ing in on one interest, one field of study,  one art medium or one lifelong dream. i bet i would have written something like the above artwork when i was 6 years old, and then again at age 12 and maybe again as a young adult. You can see it in my artwork. It’s in the clashing of themes and colors and chaotic calamity of it all. But i think there is also a calm to it. i know who i am now. And rather than say i am “scattered”, i prefer to think of myself as appreciative of beauty in many forms. Yep. i like it. That’s me. Today i’m pretty much feelin the  cupcake sprinkler. Tomorrow maybe i’ll slip into my tap shoes.

We surely draw inspiration from within. Sometimes we just don’t realize it until distance gives us a little clarity. This is me. i’ve broken out.

Anyone seen my tutu?