Though this might be old news to you already, I’m excited to announce that A Cagey Bee is officially a Granville Island artist. The number 2 tourist destination in Vancouver (#1 being the oh so beautiful Stanley Park), Granville Island is such a special place & I couldn’t be more thrilled to be part of the scene.

How It Works

At least twice a month I will have a set of dates booked to be at the market. You know the big public market building in the northwest corner of the island where all the fresh produce & food is sold? With gorgeous views looking out over the water? That’s where I’ll be. It’s pretty awesome.

There are a rotating group of “day vendors” – artists of all different crafts that have juried to be part of the market. In the centre aisle there is a long row of tables of vendors, grouped into different little configurations depending on how many are booked for a specific day.

When Will I Be There?

This is what I currently have booked:

Wednesday to Sunday, May 8 – 11th

Monday to Wednesday, May 27 – 29th

Thursday to Sunday, June 27 – 30th

Canada Day, July 1st (outside)

Since the hours are crazy long (9am to 7pm), you may run into my mister helping out from time to time. Otherwise known as A Cagey Beard, he’s pretty awesome. There’s no way I’d be able to work such long hours AND still find time to paint without him. If you feel like saying hi, he’s always up for chatting about hockey, Magic the Gathering & scooters. I’m sure he wouldn’t say no to those little coke bottle gummy candies either. hehe

You can watch the video here:
https://vimeo.com/64426322

There’s a little intro about the episode & I’m the very first segment. It’s about 4 minutes long (my part, though the rest of the episode is interesting to watch too!).

After a fabulous show in Edmonton, I am happy to be home. And right back to work since Make It Vancouver kicks off tomorrow!

Despite the snow (yes, snow. It snowed. The dogs were very excited by the fact that they could now pee EVERYWHERE!), I always have a great time in Edmonton. The people are so lovely. From the shoppers at Make It to the sweetest little old lady offering me free samples of her homemade fudge while I poked around her antique store, everyone I encountered was incredibly kind. Speaking of that antique shop – mechanical chicken that poops out eggs? SOLD!

The pink hair makes playing “Where’s Kris?” a wee bit less challenging than “Where’s Waldo?” methinks.

The show was a huge success with over 7000 people through the doors. Needless to say, that means I haven’t had any time off since I’ve been home! I’ve been making wood block prints, packaging 8×10 prints, assembling lockets & there is still plenty I’d like to get done tonight. Good thing my mister is willing to help. And brought me salted caramel ice cream.

Friday, April 19
4pm to 9pm
Saturday, April 20
11am to 7pm
Sunday, April 21
11am to 5pm
@ The Croatian Cultural Centre
3250 Commercial Drive

Check out the Facebook event page here.

Next week I’ll be at Granville Island & then Got Craft on the weekend. Holy cats! Good thing I have the best job in the world.

We’re packed right to the roof, but me, my mister and the pooches are on our way to Edmonton for the spring Make It show! woot woot!

If you’re going to be in Edmonton this weekend, I’d love to see you.

Friday, April 12 – 11am to 9pm
Saturday, April 13 -11am to 6pm
Sunday, April 14 – 11am to 5pm
@ The Enjoy Centre
101 Riel Drive ~ St.Albert

Check out the Facebook event for more info.

Not to worry, my Vancouver lovelies! I’ll be back in beautiful BC next weekend for Make It Vancouver.

I have wanted pink hair ever since I was a little girl and saw the movie Grease. Remember when Frenchy messed up in beauty school and ended up with pink hair? I thought it looked AMAZING and have wanted to dye my own locks that color ever since.

Cut to 20 years later (gosh, has it been *that* long? yikes!) and I finally did it. I actually bought all the dye stuff months ago, but didn’t get up the courage to go through with it until now. It’s silly. It’s just hair! I don’t know what I was so afraid of, but as soon as I saw it, of course I wished I hadn’t waited so long to go pink!

Speaking of things I’m afraid of, the reason my studio is looking so sparkly clean in the photo above is because I had a TV crew interview me for a little segment on MyVancouver – a local show on the Telus Optik network.

It will only be a 4 minute segment, but they were at my studio for over 3 hours. That? That is my nightmare!

I’m leaps and bounds better than when I was a kid, but I’m still an introvert and quite shy. So the idea of being interviewed in HD video was absolutely terrifying. I even  managed to give myself the flu to postpone the whole thing.

But yesterday I sucked it up, faced my fears and did it anyway. Woohoo! High fives & happy dances all around!!

The thing is, once I was there & the cameras were rolling, I was fine. Nervous, sure, but it wasn’t live. I could stop & re-do my answer if I needed to. The editors will more than likely edit out all of my ummms & uhhhhhhs. And I’ll get to have (or at least link to) a professionally made video showing off my studio and my art. How cool is that???

I’m sure I’ll hate the way I look on camera & will cringe at the sound of my voice, but I bet even professional actors do that too. As long as I come across as somewhat close to my authentically dorky self, I’ll be happy.

Is there anything you’ve been putting off out of fear? Do you have a special trick that helps you feel the fear and “do it anyway”? I’d love to hear about it in the comments below.

The weather is warming up and despite the fact that my allergies are going crazy, all I want to do is be outside! Instead, I’ve mostly been sitting inside on my computer, staring at lines and lines of code as I try to overhaul my website design.

There are still a bunch of tweaks that need to be made, but so far I’m quite happy with it. One day I’ll hire someone else to do all this stuff for me. For now, I like the challenge. Designing websites, especially tinkering with all the bits of code that go into templates like mine, is so totally different than painting. It’s fascinating! I feel like I’m back in high school French class where I’m starting to understand the gist of what I’m reading, but still kind of lost and constantly needing to look up certain phrases.

Getting out of our comfort zones every once in a while and stretching our brains is important, no matter what you do.

I’ve had some late nights trying to figure out how to make the changes I want. My eyes were tired and bloodshot. But when I finally got one more piece of the puzzle to click? Happy dance right in my office, baby!

I know…I know…some things are better left to the experts. Those horror DIY renovation story TV shows spring to mind! But by at least dipping your toe in and getting a feel for the project, you’ll either surprise yourself and learn a new skill OR you’ll figure out that you do need an expert and you’ll be in a better position to work *with* that expert.

With my website re-design, I’m sure there are a bunch of cleaner ways I could be doing things. And when I eventually do hire a pro, I’ll be able to ask those educated questions and actually understand how they way they do things is better.

In the meantime, I’m grabbing the dogs and going for a walk. Which I totally know how to do!

How about you? Have you learned anything new that felt like a big stretch? Did it end in glory? Or disaster?

I’ve been a vendor at Portobello West for several years now. It started off in the Rocky Mountaineer train station, a gorgeous space, and prided itself in being one of the first (maybe the first?) handmade market spotlighting local up & coming fashion designers. I remember my very first market there and being absolutely terrified of paying such a high rate for a table fee. When I first started selling my work in person, the markets I did were quite small with table rentals costing under $50. Portobello West was a big jump for me, but like many risks in life, it paid off. I’ve met so many lovely customers through this market. I’m so grateful I took the leap & went BIG!

Portobello has gone through some growing pains of its own. The Rocky Mountaineer venue is no longer available for on-going rentals, so they made a move over to False Creek in 2011 – into the newly built Creekside Community Centre, part of Athlete’s Village. Though the space is quite bright and airy, set right along the seawall, the first year in the new location was a bit challenging. As most Vancouverites know, Athlete’s Village was pretty much a ghost town for the first year or so. It took much longer than anticipated to finish the condos, then to sell the condos & rent out the apartments & store fronts.

Happily, there is now LIFE in that neighborhood! There’s a restaurant with a fabulous patio overlooking the water right in the Creekside building. The community centre is always bustling with people exercising or renting kayaks to take out in False Creek. There’s a bank, grocery store and one of my favorite wine shops – Legacy Liquor Store (seriously…these guys have *everything*). I’m sure the early renters and owners are thrilled to see their neighborhood filling up with families and friends.

I’d like to send out a huge thank you to all of the wonderful patrons who have supported Portobello West throughout the years. I will be there this Saturday & Sunday, March 23rd & 24th. Hope to see you there!

Have you ever experienced growing pains in your life or your business? I’d love to hear your thoughts in the comment section below!

Portobello West
March 23 & 24, 2013
11am-5pm
Creekside Community Centre ~ map

It’s been awfully rainy ’round these parts lately, perfect weather for cozy-ing up in the studio with a hot mug of coffee, bringing some new friends to life on my canvas.

I brought my “real” camera & a tripod down to the studio, so I’m going to try snapping some progress photos along the way. I’d like to figure out how to make a quasi-time lapse video of my painting. I say “quasi” because I keep moving the camera around, so it won’t exactly stitch together seamlessly! May have to try that another time…

What’s your favorite miserable weather activity?

The spring 2013 BC Home & Garden Show is just a few short days away & I’m excited to be participating once again. It’s a huge show at the BC Place Stadium & the energy of being part of such a large scale production is infectious.

Once again I’ll be part of a special Portobello West handmade artisan section along the concourse. There are 16 artists in total, so I’ll be in good company (& away from the guys selling blenders & mops!).

Want free tickets? Let me know!

I’ve been given a handful of free tickets to give out to my lovely customers, so if you want to check out the show, just leave me a comment or shoot me an email acageybee@gmail.com.

The speakers & design presentations are always awesome! Check out the schedule here.

You don’t realize how precious your health is while you’re still healthy. While my illness wasn’t serious, it was so frustrating to waste the days away moving from my bed to the couch while I knew my TO DO list was growing longer by the day & I was running out of time to get work done for my upcoming show. If I was going to take weeks off from work, it should at least be because I’m enjoying a beautiful beach somewhere, right?

Do you have any tried and true methods for staying healthy during flu season? When you do get sick, what do you do to make sure you feel better as soon as possible?

Lots of juice and rest and fruit later (my oh so sweet parents had a fruit basket delivered), I’m finally starting to feel like myself again. And starting to get caught up on work! I invested in a new printer this year, so I’ve been color correcting my print files to try to get the best results. The quality is gorgeous, but a little different than my old printer, so each & every file needs to be tweaked. Not fun!

Next up – more wood panel prints! My next show is only 6 days away, so I gotta get cracking!