Meet the Extended Family

You've met the Austin Craft Mafia, now meet the extended family. Craft mafia was started by the ladies of the Austin Craft Mafia. Find the craft mafia in your city or start one of your own!

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Chicago Denton Louisville Richmond Fort Lauderdale Vancouver Pittsburgh San Antonio Kansas City, MO Seattle Albuquerque Charlottesville, VA Pleasanton Leeds, UK Tulsa Lubbock, TX

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In Other Words

I have the great fortune of being a volunteer at In Other Words Women's Books & Resources, a nonprofit feminist bookstore here in Portland. I get to find local crafty ladies to sell their wares at the store on consignment. I'm really excited because we got some new vendors last night including Superpheobe from Lov.li whom I highlighted in the last post. She brought in some kitten library cards as well as her new adorable Robot Library Cards and some of her hand screen printed felt pins. Also we have a couple of new Tit Totes on sale now!
And now for my new favorite: Mimi & Ginger, or rather Andrea Wyckoff who makes an amazing array of affordable vinyl pouches and wallets. She also has them for sale inside of Frock, a great handmade/vintage boutique which just moved into it's new location on 14th and NE Alberta Street in Portland.

Oh so Lov.li!

Lov.li is slowly taking Etsy's place in my heart. Does anyone else find Etsy a little overwhelming? Well, that's why Lov.li is amazing. It was started by a guy in Portland, OR which by default makes it sort of local (for us PNWers anyways), it's free, it's easy, and it creates a great sense of community among crafters. I even got notice that there is going to be a Lov.li craft fair in Portland on June 3rd! (More details to come). In any case, here are a few of my favorite items from Lov.li:

First: Kitten reading library cards, genius! These cards are created by Superpheobe in Portland, OR and are hand screen printed in bronze ink. They come in a pack of ten for $9 and are super cute!

Second: Pavlovamagic makes a multitude of adorable owl handbags. Althuogh kind of spendy, I think they are totally worth it considering the amount of tenderlovingcare that went into making these.

Third but not least: These screen printed coffee cozies ($5 & I just ordered one for myself!) are not only cute but help the environment too! They are created by Stitchella who also makes matching cell phone and iPod cozies!

Sweet Tooth

Robot Candy and Chet & Dot have been around for about 5 years and were both started by Jenn Hill and Jenny Tiffany here in Portland.

I've seen their table at various craft fairs and the scene is something like a cute wonderland full of shiny, sparkly, tiny, cute things, with the ladies flocking from all over the place. Their coasters are currently for sale in every shop in Portland and as many times as I see them I'm always tempted to add another to my collection!

Godmothers of Craft

The Austin Craft Mafia is made up of nine female independent business owners in Austin, TX. Each one own and operates her own business and website, each complete with some of the most amazing crafts you've ever seen.

Here's a couple of my faves:
Sublime Stiching & Hot Pink Pistol

The Boob as Craft

Tit Totes are a Portland, Oregon fave. I met the creator once at a craft fair (can't remember her name, oops) and she makes each one using only parts from the bra (except for the decorations of course!).




Tramp Lamps comes straight outta Nashville, Tennessee and each is a one-of-a-kind artifact hand made by this gal named Kelly. Kelly gets to make her lamps full time, oh I can only dream of making a living crafting full time!