Announcing the Opening of the Artful Giving Shop!

Beautiful Handmade Artwork Represents a Childhood Dream Come True.

 

 

When I was a little girl, I dreamed of sharing my art with the world. Today, I’m excited to announce that my dream has come true with the launch of my online gift store, the Artful Giving Shop. Browse the handmade cards, original artwork, and prints to see what sparks joy in your soul. Each piece arose from a place in my heart where those sparks were truly needed.

Handmade art restores creators, givers, and receivers. 
Happy days were scarce while growing up in Japan during the bleak days following the end of World War II. My fondest memories, were making colorful hand-made items using paper, yarn and scraps of Japanese fabrics. I sold them to the neighborhood kids in exchange for play money. I still remember the expressions of joy on their faces as they carefully picked out their choices from the handmade tags, cloth bean bags and origami folded candy wrappers while visiting my make-believe store. It made me feel special when Mother marveled at the array of artwork and craft items I created and exclaimed, “Keiko, wait and see. When you grow up, you will have your own gift store!”

At the age of 11, when my mother brought me to America, I began the arduous task of learning English and acclimating to the American school system. It was often difficult and humiliating, but when things got a little bit too hard for me to take, I always brought out my watercolor set and painted. Art was the one thing that uplifted my spirit, no matter how bad things were.

Artful Giving Shop was created to bring some of those magical moments that I have experienced. I’d love to have you visit my new on-line store, click on the SHOP tab above or go to www.artfulgivingshop.com. While browsing, I hope you find the perfect something that will bring you the same joy that I experienced while creating it.

When you buy my art, you are giving a helping hand to abused animals.

A 10% of proceeds from every sale will be donated  to rescue and rehabilitate abused farm and domestic animals.

 

www.pasadosafehaven.org    www.olddoghaven.org

 

Spring Flower Fever + a Gift for You

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For eight years, I’ve been joyfully stamping, drawing, painting and making pretty things and I want to share my excitement with you.

When people see the things I’ve made, they often say, “I wish I could make things like this, but I don’t have a creative bone in my body!”

My answer to them is, “Yes, you do have creative bones in your body and yes, you can do it!” Read more

How to Transform Grocery Bags into Beautiful Decorations

Do you want to create a beautiful and whimsical environment for the holidays?

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Who’d ever think that transforming plain brown paper bags into ornaments can be an affordable way to differentiate your business from others?

If you are a client of my hair salon, Studio 904, you’ve seen the unique ways in how I keep the facility fresh and pleasing to the eye by changing things up every season.

I put hours of time into making hand-made decorations for my salon because I believe seeing something fresh and new on a regular basis is stimulating and puts customers in a good mood. If it’s pleasing to our customers, just think how happy it makes our staff to come to a beautiful work environment daily.

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Many businesses make the mistake of becoming stagnated with lack of change in their environment and service offerings, a sure way for a slow death of your business.

So I say, “Change it Up!” Look around your business and come up with ways to refresh and invigorate your environment.

 

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I made these Owl Angels (more like Urban Angels) this year for the holidays. I love how these cute critters came out. They are not rustic looking like the owls I’ve seen. The white body and the glittered net wings give them a fresh and sophisticated look. So I wanted to share with you how I made them.

Oh, they are so cute. Nothing is more satisfying to me than looking at their cuteness every day.
Without a fail, these owls put a big smile on my face and helps me to have a happy day.

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How to make “Owl Angels” from paper bags.

 Cut bags into 6” x 8” pieces
Paint one side of each cut pieces with white gesso (it takes two pieces to make one owl)
Draw a simple shape of an owl on one of the pieces (this becomes the front of the owl)
Draw eyes, decorate the body using a black Sharpie marker
Sew the outline with a machine (leave an opening at the bottom)
Stuff with small amount of cotton (this will puff the owls up)
Sew and close the bottom opening (optional: insert feet made of black felt before sewing up the opening)
Cut out small wings (I used paper and ribbon netting)

Good luck with your decorations! I’d love to hear your ideas on affordable decorating ideas for the holidays which is right around the corner.

Celebrating Valentines!

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Owning a salon business for thirty six years, I’ve spent tons of time studying the customer’s point of view. How to get out of my space of how a business should be to how would I feel walking into a business and what would make me feel good about being inside of a business? One thing I learned through my own experiences and talking to many of our customers is “We want to feel uplifted and inspired and most of all, leave the establishment feeling happy!”

This is the reason why I spend hours decorating my salon to keep up with seasonal changes. I started to use holidays and seasons as a bench-mark to create new decorative scenery in the salon, using colorful papers and various crafting techniques. I noticed our clients really loved what I did and it made my staff and me feel so good to work in this energy-filled environment.

What I know for sure… our minds are filled with problems and challenges life throws our way. It is often difficult to see the positive aspects of our everyday living.

I want my salon to be a place where people can visit and enjoy the positive energy of colorful decorations, personal pampering and our community service programs. It makes it all worthwhile when I see them leaving looking great with smiles on their faces! Take a look at our Valentine decorations.

 

 

 

Colorful skulls

Halloween Decorations

I am not fond of the typical scary Halloween decorations. I wanted to decorate my salon, Studio 904 with items which represent the season… filled with bright colors, whimsey and humor. I racked my brain for a while and all of a sudden an idea came to me. Why not use my favorite staples, brown grocery bags and hand painted water color paper. So I went to town and made dozens of owls, skulls and houses to decorate the whole salon!

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I painted this skull with turquoise acrylic paint, sewed and stuffed them.

 

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I painted the branches with black paint and hung these adorable ornaments on the branches.

 

 

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I had fun making these houses… painted water color paper     with black gesso and folded them to look like a house. I especially like the shiny roof tops in different colors.

 

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I painted the brown paper bags with black acrylic paint, decorated the face and body and gave the bat sparkly wings made of craft paper.

 

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They can be displayed like this if you don’t want to do a tree.

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Flower Crazy!

 

Flower made of colored scrapbooking paper
Flower made of colored scrapbooking paper

 

Just before spring arrives, I get motivated to try different flower designs using tissue, crepe, vellum, construction and any other paper sources I can get my hands on. Oh,forgot to mention paper bags, paper towels, napkins and cupcake holders! Before long, I can end up with a whole field of spring flowers!

Here are some things you can do with these flowers to create a happy day for yourself or for others. Read more