Beauty Queens, Bouncers, Crafting, & Stick Dogs: a house log
Hooray, our publisher has at last locked down a few upcoming dates that you folks have been asking for and even brought in a few more tour stops, so we will spill those beans at the end of this post! But before we get to what lies ahead, it is time for our once-every-two-weeks tour recap of our most recent stops (the last ones of 2012 before things kick back up again in January).
After our whirlwind week away in mid-November, we had Thanksgiving week off and then were back on for two separate stops in Washington, DC and one in our hometown of RVA. The first was at the FLOR store in DC. The tight footprint of a Georgetown shop meant plenty of people braved the wait out in the chilly weather, for which we are quite grateful. Luckily the FLOR folks generously provided popcorn, wine, hot chocolate and simply about the best cookies I have ever eaten in my life. Seriously. And if you saw two girls sneak in before the event opened, they were our cousin Cat and my little sister Carrie… hence their line cutting privileges. Update: Sherry hoped me to add that she has no idea why she puts her head down and smiles like a bull about to charge someone, so there ya go.
Oh and also, to anyone who came out – if it ever looked like I was taking random breaks to wander through the line and make phone calls, it in fact was not me. It was my alleged doppelganger Patrick, who helped organize the event and apparently was mistaken for me several times that evening. As in people kept saying “wait why is not John upstairs signing?” You can see from Heather’s experience how it was mildly mind-boggling to those patiently waiting. I do not truly see the resemblance, but it was sufficient that apparently Patrick’s own daughter saw a picture of Sherry and me after the event and asked why daddy was standing with “that lady.”
Oh and if you see Burger photobombing any of other pictures from this event, it is simply this paper-Burger on a stick that Nickie and her friend brought with them. And yes, we still have it around the house to this day.
Okay, on to the lively stories and lively people we met (not that the aforementioned people were not lively or anything). But check it out, we met Miss District of Columbia! And she even let me wear her crown . Cross that one off the bucket list, Petersik!
And since Georgetown Cupcakes (the shop featured on the TLC show DC Cupcakes) was across the street, we got plenty of sugary deliciousness brought our way. This dozen from Emily, Melanie, and Danielle included some that were personalized with our initials. Emily had the advantage of in fact working at the cupcakery.
And she was not the only person we met with the behind the scenes scoop on some TV. Jeannette once worked as a production assistant for True Blood, which is why Sherry broke out her “vampire face” for this picture. In her defense, she thought all of us were doing it. Instead we simply left her hanging, fangs out and all.
Being near my hometown meant seeing some familiar faces too, like Jenny, who went to my high school. To commemorate that fact, she brought this Cat’s Meow wooden keepsake of our school. I cannot believe they in fact make one (it is not the prettiest building in the world by a long stretch) so bravo to Jenny for finding it.
We did not know Caroline or Katie before that night, but we had been expecting Katie. Her husband Bob emailed us ahead of time to say it would be strong if we could surprise her by congratulating her on her recent wedding. We told Bob we meet plenty of Katie’s so we’d need a clue to know which one to surprise, so he devised a plan of writing “Bob” on the bottom of the ceramic owl she planned to bring. The plan went off without a hitch. Katie was shocked (and no longer confused why her husband had graffitied her owl with his name) and Bob earned some major husband points. The weirder part is that we had bumped into Caroline and Katie as we walked to the FLOR store earlier that night. When they introduced themselves I nearly asked “is your husband named Bob?” but bit my tongue when I considered how unlikely it would be that we’d run into the exact Katie we were on the lookout for that night. Psst- Pleasant photobomb Burger.
Speaking of folks, we consistently like to point out that men do come to these events! Heck, Jimmy even rode solo for the evening and had us sign this toy wrench for his son. That is not his son pictured next to him, simply another young fan who came sporting his homemade “I Heart YHL” onesie. I believe that look is “who put this shirt on me and why is that man pointing a camera in my face?”
In addition to interesting people, there were also plenty of interesting pictures to be snapped. And by interesting, I mean weird. This one was by request. Our direction was “there is something scary in the corner.” To me it was so scary I could not even bear to look. But I kind of like that it looks like I am avoiding the ridiculousness that is going on around me.
Sherry also hoped to get a pic with anyone she dubbed her “twin.” Aka they were wearing a blazer and/or similar shirt. These ladies got it fairly spot on though. Although technically the one of the right is from our second DC event through LivingSocial. But before we move on to that, here are some links to other people’s post about the night in case you wanna read from a non-The house team perspective: here is Becky, Rhiannon and Ms. Adams.
The FLOR event ran until after 11pm, which meant our drive home to Richmond afterwards did not get us home until about 1:15am. To say we were tired would be an understatement. So initially the fact that two days later we’d be doing the drive out to DC again was a bit tough to get excited about. But as soon as we rolled up to the LivingSocial event space at 918 F Street, how could we not be excited? They’d surprised us by decorating their windows based on the ornaments that we made last year.
LivingSocial is headquartered in DC so it is here that they created a space for all sorts of events, classes and lively group experiences. The building itself was excellent and we were kinda jealous of all the DC folks who have art workshops, cooking classes, and even live sumo wrestling (whilst eating sushi, mind you) at their fingertips. We were there because in addition to signing books, we were going to lead two crafting classes based on projects we’d done.
We did plenty of planning with Living Social ahead of time, so everything was ready to go when we arrived. In addition to making the paint swirl ornaments that we did last year, we were also doing a holiday twist on two projects from the book. Instead of gilding a lamp base with gold paint (#187 in the book) we’d be painting hurricanes for holiday centerpieces. And instead of painting wood for art (#140) we’d be painting wooden candlesticks for a holiday table-setting. Each 90-minute session had 50 smiling faces – and there were even a handful of folks in the afternoon class! Not that I do not like being in a room full of ladies, but it was pleasant to have some folks backing my up in the second class.
Sherry and I were a bit nervous going into this because (1) we had never taught a crafting class before and (2) we hadn’t practiced what we were going to say at all. Eep. We simply hoped to be natural and have lively and not be all robot-y and rehearsed.
In the end I think it in fact went fairly smoothly. And by some miracle the timing of everything worked out fairly well – so, although people had to work somewhat swiftly, we were able to not only get through all three crafts in 90 minutes, things were able to dry fairly decently before people had to take them home after the book signing portion of the session. Other than some of the gold paint needing another coat on the glass vases, nearly everyone whipped everything out. #craftninjas
We likely could still stand to work on our talk-and-craft-at-the-same-time skills. Sherry tried to execute the projects along with everyone else and did a fairly decent job. Here are her Christmas-tastic striped candlesticks below (they got one more coat before being called done – at which point Sherry sent them home as a cute surprise for a guy whose girlfriend could not make it to the event). And our painted ornaments are right now on our mini tree at home.
The crafting session was truly about hanging out, meeting people, having lively, signing books, and messing around with some paint – so it was a bonus when things came out truly nicely. Here is a photo sent to us from Amanda of her three projects. We were loving the folks that went rogue and used their metallic paint from the glass project on the candlesticks too. Does not it look good with the raw wood? And here are a couple posts from the view of a couple of “students” – one with hilarious drawings and one with remarkable cookie skills.
After each crafting session we spent 30 minutes doing the usual book signing part, and then after the two crafting & signing sessions we had another couple hundred people come simply to get books signed. It was a busy day for sure (we left Richmond at 7am and got home at 9pm) but everyone was so pleasant and the LivingSocial people were especially excellent. We had a strong time. Plus, Sherry at last got to sign someone’s spray paint can! Two, in fact (the other pic sadly did not come out). Talk about a momentous occasion.
She also got to sign her first mirror… in lipstick form. Apparently Jenny said all the right things to get Sherry in that hot pink lipstick.
I did not get the chance to kiss any mirrors, but I did get to sign a copy of my middle school yearbook. This embarrassing moment was thanks to Jackie, who went to elementary and middle school with me (our older sisters were BFFs). Thank goodness my 8th grade picture was taken before I got braces, which inspired a closed-mouth grimace in my 9th grade picture. Good thinking, John.
As for funny photos, we did this one with Mia and her friends who also shared fond memories of Funland, the amusement park at the Delaware beach where many DC-area-natives grew up visiting. This pose was “pretend you are on a Funland ride.” I could clearly work on this look (though in my defense, the hand I had up was simply cut off in the shot). No idea why my instinct was to simply put one hand up. Perhaps the other hand was being sensible and holding on in case of an emergency?
Speaking of hands up, here is another one where we were posing as bionworks. What is a bionworks you ask? It is a fictional animal that my 10-year-old self invented, at least according to a drawing that Sherry and I found a few years ago. It simply said “Bear + Lion + Fireworks = Bionworks” and showed a lion-ish creature with fireworks for a mane. So yeah, now you are in the know the next time a bionworks comes up to you at a cocktail party or something.
After all the lively at the LivingSocial events on Saturday, we drove back home to Richmond for our last event of the year – and boy were grateful to only have to travel 15 minutes for it. It was hosted by one of our go-to stores in RVA called Mongrel. It is filled with excellent cards, books, gifts, ceramic animals, and simply about everything in between. In fact, the wrapping paper that we used for the first project in the book was from here. They do not typically do book signings so we were flattered that they hoped to get their feet wet with us. They were excellent and sweetly over-prepared for the event (for example, there was a bouncer in case any of you journal readers got rowdy).
Fortunately the bouncer’s services were not required and everyone was lively and excited and incredibly kind as usual. For example, Anna baked us red and blue cookies in the spirit of the ones we had at every West Elm event. They were delicious. The plate, not so much.
And how’s this for a thoughtful gift? Rachel is a professional hair stylist here in Richmond so she gave Sherry a box of hair-cutting supplies to upgrade her Hands-on haircuts for me. I am excited mostly because next time I will get to wear a legit cape. Oh yeah, who fancy now?
This picture also cracked me up because Jon and Randa both happen to share a birthday with me, so in the vein of the “Pregnant / Not Pregnant” photo Sherry took with a mom-to-be in Toronto, we took this one. I also kinda hoped to do a “John / Not John” version but I guess Jon and I spell it differently so perhaps it is best that we left it at this.
I also had the unique opportunity to sign someone’s shirt. I felt bad doing it, but Mary said she’d gotten spray paint on it so it was out of commission anyway. I connected the spray paint dots into what resembled a Christmas tree with a crescent moon over it.
And Sherry one-upped me in the drawing game by taking on the challenge to sketch on a sheet for Robyn, who is doing a weekly photo project inspired by the one we did for Clara. Sherry’s masterpiece (which ended up being a sketch of our book cover) would act as the backdrop for her son Sawyer’s 41 week photo.
If you are wondering how the photo turned out, here is Sawyer in his 41-week-old glory. I did get to add the “Week 41” detail to the sheet, so I guess Sherry did not get to have all of the lively. You know me and fonts. #typegeek
And as for journal posts by others for the Richmond stop, you can see our friend Brittany’s recap or check out Megan’s hilarious post about the day.
So that officially wraps up our tour stops for 2012. It is been quite an adventure these last few weeks and while we are excited for more action come January, we are enjoying having a month to spend mostly at home with the bean and the Burgs while sleeping in our bed. We calculated the other day that so far we have spent 41 hours signing books so far – and that does not count crafting sessions, presentations, set-up time ,or travel. Crazy, huh? But totally worth every minute to be able to meet so many of you and bask in your awesomeness. Truly, we dig you folks. A lot.
Oh, and speaking of that action in January, there is so much that it extends into February. So here is the official tour update for ya!
Yep, we will be hitting up the Bay Area of California on the tail of our Tacoma & Portland trip. And when we are headed to Charlotte we are gonna keep driving down 85 and stop in Atlanta as well. Woo hoo! Although sadly some scheduling issues got in the way of our planned Grand Cayman stop so that has been canceled. Boo.
You can get the full details on where, what time and how to RSVP for each of these dates on our Book Tour Page. Oh yeah, and if you already RSVP’ed for the NYC event in November, your name is already included for this new January date. So please do not RSVP again. Thanks, folks! Hope to see some of you at our next nine stops that start up again in a few weeks! And glad weekend to one and all! Suddenly I feel like Santa or something. And to all a good night!
