Sourdough diversion

Totally un-glass-related: I've recently started a sourdough starter. Again. A couple years back I intended to try to recreate Cheese Board pizza. While I never expected it to be exactly like their delicious pies, I thought they passed quite well. Helping us clean our apartment that summer before a move was my mother-in-law (bless her helpful heart), who threw out what she thought was a moldy, nasty substance in our fridge. I was so sad when I found out that she tossed my sourdough starter that I'd worked on for months and thought I finally got right. I haven't tried again until now. This starter recipe I got online and I'm so happy I found the Wild Yeast blog. So far my concoction is growing splendidly. View the stinky sour bubbles!


My first thought was to make bread, but I forgot that my stone broke a few months ago. And since I'm too anxious to make something, I opted for an English Muffin recipe I could cook up that night. The more sour the better, for me, so I chose this "tangy" version...


I love how they cooked up! While they weren't filled with nooks and crannies like I'd hoped (probably due to my over-kneading), the flavor was delicious. It's getting humid out here in New England, why not try to start your own? Hope you all have a great weekend!

Holiday Weekend

Hope that everyone had a decent holiday weekend, without much in the way of traffic or bad weather. It was pleasant here in New England--a nice break from the heatwave that hit us earlier in the week. Maisy even got to play in the sprinkler, which she loves beyond words (or squeals, rather):


I got a lot done in the past few days. I've been stumbling over display for the shows this summer, so upon lots of pondering last week I took a shopping trip to a few places to snag some supplies. I'll post photos in the next few weeks. Since my studio is still a mess, I'm going to wait to clean it up to really dive into some serious display experiments.

I also took photos of some of the samples from my Woodland Pendant series. I've begun listing them on Etsy, and just a few are shown below. Many of them are just one-off color samples that I love, but they didn't fit into the final series.


I hope they find good homes over the next few months! I'll also be peddling them at shows this summer.

Family of Colors

It is hot here today, so we're spending a lot of time outside, in the shade and running through the sprinkler. We live in an attic apartment so it's not the most pleasant place to be on hot days. It's supposed to be a short 'hot spell', so I'm enjoying it while I can.

As mentioned in a previous post, I've spent little time at the studio this week due to Justin's day-job responsibilities. But that means I get to focus more effort on computer work that I can do around the house. I have managed to nail down a family of colors for the ornaments I'll be adding to my site later this year. At first I was just imagining my favorite color combinations, but they looked atrocious when seen together! That lead me to a nice, cohesive collection of colors that look smashing together:

The plummage and face details will be added when I'm actually working with the glass, but it's fun to play with the different options in Illustrator. I'm still going to make my previously mentioned "favorite" color combos (a few are below), but I'll make them as one-offs/limited editions and sell them at Art Star as well as on my own site.


Hope you all have a sunny holiday weekend ahead!

Blog press!

Happy Owl Glassworks was mentioned today on Meighan's lovely blog, My Love for You is a Stampede of Horses! Check out the site here...


Her site is full of people and work that I adore--please check it out if you care to be inspired! Thanks Meighan!

One more thing: I am swooning over this little owl:


I can't recall where I first found the link (was it on Flickr?) since I've been online too much lately. But boy, he's cute!

Weekend recap

This weekend was the best of both worlds--the sun and the rain. After a torturous winter, we have been basking in the sun most everyday--Maisy loves the new playground!


Perhaps we've been overindulging, some may say. Thankfully, yesterday we were given a healthy dose of rain and I was finally motivated to work on re-finishing my nightlight display while Maisy napped (nearly 3 hours!). What started off as a plain, faux wood display ended up being a regal, more attractive place to show the lights complete with its own "wallpaper".

The before and after, below, which I didn't necessarily hate, but I thought the wood background was a bit too light (no pun intended), given that it's for displaying nightlights which will be in a dark room--more contrast was needed. And let's face it, those outlets were ugly:


My foamcore panel and trusty brayer for the paper:


Et voila!


I love how the flocked paper creates a nice home for the lights, and without any sheen, it makes the lights stand out even more. A most satisfying little craft project: done!

Hope your weekend was fun and productive too! We have a busy week ahead, as it's the last week of classes for Justin. This means I won't get much time in at the studio--only the critical runs like shipping out orders and the like. But come next week it will be fun ahoy. I'm already going to start on my Christmas ornaments--not even June! How prompt I am this year!

Cufflinks sale!

To celebrate all-things-dad a bit early this year, and to serve as a reminder (I know I occasionally forget this holiday), we're having a sale on all cufflinks: $32/pair until June 21 (that's the actual holiday, need I remind you?)...

Shown below are the moose, but there are eight creatures to choose from:

Twist Fair Northampton!

A couple weeks back we did this new show we've never done before, the Twist Fair in Northampton, MA. We'd heard nothing-but-good so we had our sights relatively high. Luckily it turned out to be a solid show and though the weather threatened rain all weekend, we were spared and it turned out to be a lovely day on Saturday! Here is the booth in all its glory


There was even an afternoon lull where I got out for a walk in the sunshine and visited Liz of Sticks and Bricks:

Her shop was so nice--Liz refinishes furniture and I was all envy when I walked in (have I mentioned my desire to learn re-upholstering and furniture fixer-upping?).

We were situated between two of the best neighbors, both of which we'd never met before. Stage-left was Alison Tauber who screenprints her beautiful designs on the softest tees (I managed to score one by show's end). Stage-right was Twigs and Heather, who make fantastic jewelry--some of my favs are the maple seeds and twigs. They'll both be participating in the Renegade Brooklyn show, so hopefully we'll see some of you there!

Happy Owl Grand Re-opening

You may have noticed a certain lack of blog postings as of late. We have a few good excuses. Really.

For one, we've been earnestly toiling away at a completely new site design!


As a result of some wonderful collaboration with Aeolidia and numerous late nights of monitor work, we are now the proud owners a user-friendly HappyOwlGlass.com that is chock full of handy features. Some of our favorites include:

> A wishlist function that allows you to share your favorite Happy Owl treats with clueless friends and family. Perfect for thwarting boring socks and discount novels as last minute gifts.

> Gift certificates in any amount! Can't decide if your friend would prefer the skunk or the elephant shrew nightlight? Send them a gift certificate by snail mail or email.

> A site-specific search engine. Need an okapi gift A.S.A.P.? Just type Okapi into the search field and see what pops up!

These are just a few of the extras we've piled on. We're also excited by all of the time this new site will save us on the back-end of things. With its inventory and coupon capabilities we can track our items more easily and setup special sales whenever the mood strikes. Be sure to visit often to catch one!

The time-saving is a big help as we're also working on other things in the Happy Owl workshop. We're excited about the arrival of another little Owlet in the near future to join the family. Expect some downtime from the site around Labor Day!

We hope you enjoy the new site. As always, be in touch with comments and questions!