Straight from the dumpster? Yep. Tammy Roy, dumpster-diver par excellence can make scrap look good like it’s nobody’s business. Thankfully, One Eighty is her re-use design business.
Tammy trained in graphic design but went on a tangent after she realized that she couldn’t shake the dumpster-diving bug she inherited from her mom, also a recycle-based artist. She learned how to weld the reclaimed metal treasures that she found (metal disks, rebar and machinery parts from salvage yard and various waste from steel manufacturers) to design these wonderful and functional objects.
I’m seriously eyeing her Steel Pebble Holder to use indoors or out. [...]

Yesterday, in a cruelly teasing mood, Mother Nature rose the temps into the 60’s in the Chicago area. So, we all divested our heavy winter layers but still, there was a chill in the air. That’s what spring is all about… warm, cold, hot, warm, cold, hot…
Perfect solution to one -up the Mam Nature: The Shoul. It’s a simple yet brilliant variation of the shawl, or wrap, except much smarter. Why is it such a great accessory? As opposed to large bulky wraps, this one stays on your shoulders. You know, as opposed to the points of a normal wrap [...]

By Audrey van Petegem, Contributing Editor
One of my favorite toys growing up was my dollhouse. I spent many hours playing make-believe with it. It was a very basic square construction made of wood, with no stain or paint finish. My doll furniture was a mix of mismatched plastic pieces with a few wooden handmade ones my father had lovingly crafted for me. My dolls were a variety of stuffed animals, Barbies and an assortment of different figurines.
On a search to recreate my own childhood memories for my daughters, I came across a sophisticated and oh-so-stylish version of my own basic [...]

Yes, I know, I know, nothing beats the hand-written note and greeting card to show someone that you – really – care about them. In our electronic age, affixing a stamp to an envelope and popping it in the mailbox is the ultimate demonstration of love. But, let’s get real. I don’t always have the perfect card on hand, or the person’s address, or… And neither do you. So, sometimes, there has been room for wishes-via-email. I adopted ecards some years ago and then abandoned them. I couldn’t cope with all the “free” ecard sites that were either really spammy [...]

By Audrey van Petegem, Contributing Editor

My daughter lost her tooth yesterday. Thea came home from school and was excited to show us all.  After “the showing” Thea proudly took her tooth and put it under her pillow. For the rest of the day we had to hear about “the Tooth Fairy coming tonight”.
I wrote an article just before Christmas which featured the I Caught Santa website and knew that they had different characters at the Catch a Character website, specifically the Tooth Fairy for this very occasion. So, last night I tiptoed into Thea’s room and took a picture of [...]

I looooooooooooove this video. If you remember (you should, it was one of last decades most viral videos), OK Go is the band that made the Treadmill video.

The “Machine” in this video was invented and created by 20 (yes 20!) engineers. The construction of the Machine – using 10,ooo sq. ft. of space over two floors – must have been a daunting though thrilling task. I don’t even want to guess how many trials they had to go through to make this work. And how many pianos, TVs, mannequins and other items had to be smashed to get to that [...]

By Audrey van Petegem, Contributing Editor
I first discovered Audrey Heller’s photographs at the One Of A Kind show in Chicago and have “run” into her art work since.   Although Audrey calls San Francisco home, she travels much of the year showing her photographs. With a background as a lighting designer for theater and a great sense of humor, Audrey was able to use her unique abilities to create distinct and playful photos.
As you look at the photos they look like everyday items; a cup of coffee, a martini glass or a bowl of strawberries.  Taking a closer look each photo [...]

I’m no good on my own. For yoga and working out, that is… If I can’t make it to class and need to work out at home, my workout is invariably interrupted by any variety of suddenly important events (excuses, all of them).  I had been downloading podcasts of yoga classed through iTunes, hoping that these would give me the semblance of a class framework while at home. But, I was never enthralled by any of those and quickly gave up on that.
Now, as the iPhone app world is exploding, there are some better choices… I like the Yoga Stretch [...]

There’s a wave of nostalgia going around and being shared all over the internet. Among others there is the “My Mom, the Style Icon” blog (I wrote about it here), where you can submit way-back-when photos of your mom in stylish retro garb. And we’ve seen the endearing now & then pictures of best buddies in high school yearbooks. Now Ze Frank is giving everyone a platform to submit their before and after photos: the Young Me, Now Me website.
I can’t believe the effort some people went through to replicate the scene.

Note from the Succulent Wife: I am thrilled to present you with this first in a series of articles by Kym Tolson, Certified Hypnotherapist (among other things!). Even though I’ve experienced hypnotherapy with success on a number of occasions, it has always very mysterious to me and, I’m guessing perhaps to you too. So, after meeting Kym on 1000Markets where she has a shop, I thought I would invite her to share her thoughts and insights to help us demystify the subject. Enjoy and please share your thoughts.
By Kym Tolson, Guest Author
Did you know that you are hypnotized on a [...]

This “toy” or, shall we say craft, line got our attention because we thought it was the perfect manifestation of the combined ideals of teaching creativity and environmental awareness. The Castaway Kits are the invention of the Trash for Teaching (T4T) group. They collect all sorts of manufacturing cast-off materials that were destined for the landfill. Things like cardboard cones and tubes and die-cut chips and fabric scraps… All with various colors, shapes and textures. What a great way to inspire imagination and to enforce spatial development while also teaching our kids that fun & play does not need to [...]

So simple, yet we needed Whitelines® paper to show us how the paper we’ve been writing on all these years is actually… distracting. We never thought about it this way, but the dark lines + the dark ink that we write with fight for attention on the white paper. Whitelines “re-engineered” the paper so that it becomes white lines on a toned paper. See?

With the “old” way, the clashes of the ink on the dark lines reduce our concentration. This “interference” doesn’t happen with Whitelines which also boasts of other benefits of using their paper: it produces less glare in [...]