Category Archives: Blog

Simple Finds Review for Mimi!

Check out Simple Finds today!! Christie did a spectacular review on Mimi Green and there is a giveaway going on — leave a comment on the Simple Finds post telling her what kind of dog you have and what your fav Mimi collar is to enter to win a collar for your pup! 

And check out the cool ad we made for the occasion :  (and P.S., it is no joke)

Greenwithenvy

Her name was Lola, she was a showdog

With a yellow Mimi Green collar in her hair and a dress, well no dress. She doesn’t really like to wear clothes…  

lola was a showdog

Introducing Lola, my little sister. My parents and sisters adopted her when she was just a tiny pup and now she is a monster! That is an x-large collar on her! 

My sister Paula told me that Lola was walking around so proud last night. I think she knows just how pretty she is! 

I finally gave one to Lola on Saturday when my mom and sisters came over to help me sew. It is August and I am already preparing for Winter shows — they are going to sneak up on me I just know it. It was so good to have them in the studio, lots of good energy floating around. And we got a ton done! Yahoo!

Check out Mimi’s New Home!

I totally broke down and hired a web designer. I always have this delusion that I can and should do everything myself, but after hours and hours of trying to design my own website when I have ZERO knowledge of HTML I gave up. My existing website it okay, it functions and it doesn’t suck. But my new one, my new one is phenomenal! Here is a sneak peek at what designer Felicia Montoya created for Mimi Green …New Website for Mimi Green

How beautiful is this!! I am really happy with her initial concept, and look at my Cessie — front and center! 

Okay off to the shower I go. I have instituted a no pajama wearing while working rule. It is a non-negotiable rule. My friend Allissa told me about non-negotiable rules last night. I had no idea that those existed — I can’t wait to tell Dan. Haha. 

Oh and I cut all my hair off last week, check that out too– so strange!
amanda new haircut

Buying a Sewing Chair and Tracing an Image for Embroidery 101

You gotta love Craigslist. I have been looking for weeks for a chair that I can use in my studio to both sew and work on my computer. I want it to have wheels, or legs thick enough to add wheels, be made of wood and upholstery, and be a color that will brighten my life.
As you can imagine, this hasn’t been an easy find. Then last weekend I see this gold chair on Criagslist that looks like it is screaming for someone to embroider in. Not necessarily the chair that I am in need of, but a cool chair non the less. And the price tag? $10. A total steal!
I put it in my room near my two favorite windows in the house.  
It fits in perfectly like it was always meant to be there.
Oh and what’s even better — when I got to the woman’s house to pay for it I only had a twenty dollar bill and she didn’t have change so she gave it to me for free!
She said that she just wanted it to have a good home, and a good home it now has. I totally love it.
And… I’ve already been doing some sewing in it. Wanna see?

embroidered bug
This is just a peek, I am making an art quilt of sorts and will be posting bits and pieces of it here and there until I can reveal the finished piece.
To get a real bug shape in motion I printed out a picture of a live bug from the Internet, taped it down to my light box, and traced it onto the fabric. Totally easy solution to putting an image onto fabric to embroider. I’ve also heard of using a window for the same technique. Just tape the image up to a sunny window and trace away!
Oh and you can get the water soluble marker to do this at JoAnn’s– they are like $2 if you have the 40% off coupon. I don’t know what brand it is, but I love love love the blue one that is marked “Water Erasable Fabric Marking Pen”  All you have to do to erase it when you are done embroidering is take a damp paper towel and blot the area. Off it comes, simple as that! But thankfully it doesn’t come off very easily when you need it to stay put while sewing.
Of course the bug I traced didn’t have a purple butt or hot pink eyes. That was all me;)

Has Yoga gone to the Dogs?

On my morning trek to Starbucks this morning I heard a segment on the radio about how popular dog yoga is becoming around the world. Now, God knows I love my dogs, and I really do love yoga. But in conjunction, not so sure about that. Its kind of like how I love Salmon and I love peanut butter, but together they’d be a pretty big mess.

So I came home to read about it — try to expand my understanding of the subject. Turns out it is quite the phenomenon. Dog Yoga…hmm…makes sense I guess. I mean where did they come up with downward facing dog anyway? Pooch inspired???

Thing is that my dogs seem pretty relaxed as it is. I mean, they wake up in my bed, take a run around the yard, pee, come in and eat, sleep, go back outside, pee….well you get the picture. Lots of eating and sleeping going on around here. I don’t think I’d be able to convince the husband that we should spend a cent of his hard earned money to help the dogs feel more relaxed. This isn’t to say that I haven’t met a dog or two in my time who would benefit from some chilling out. I just wonder if the dogs will really let you put them in the pose. When I want to cuddle and Cessie doesn’t there is no amount of force in my body that can get or or keep her lying next to me. All the sudden her 12lb body has the strength of 10 men. I can’t imagine trying to get her to stand in tree pose. (I am laughing out loud at this visual hehe)

After all the giggling I guess this is what I got from my research this morning: Some dogs, like people, cannot calm down to save their lives.  And really, as crazy as the whole thing might sound, the more things we have to make our world a calmer place, well I’m all for that.

ap photo dog yoga

So grab your dog, your mat, an open mind, and read about the whole thing here. 
 And Namaste, the God in me bows the the God in you, canine, human, whatever you may be 😉

Plush goodness; Francis Francis espresso maker badness.

I think I’ve fallen in love again, this time with a plush:

6a00df3520bf34883400e553b62e298833
Yes, that’s right. It is Matilda, my ‘Matilda”s name sake.  I am usually not a plush kind of gal, but this one is so beautiful!  

Even though she’s a French Bulldog, if I squint she looks like my puggy Ceccie. 

Lori Marie  totally outdid herself again. I wish I had an ounce of the creativity that she has! She also put some other pretty cool things up in her shop, so you should for sure check it out. 

The Matilda plush made my day a bit brighter yesterday after I found out that my Francis Francis X1 espresso maker is broken and it seems as if no one in the entire world is willing to fix it. And the one person I found said it would cost almost as much as I paid for it. All that is wrong is that I run way too many things at once in my kitchen and kept blowing the power which in turn blew the power switch. I am so sad because it isn’t like I can buy a new one– Francis Francis is making pod only makers now and who wants espresso from a pod? I want to pick the coffee out myself. I want to bite into the bean before i buy it. Then I want to grind it just to my liking. It is totally ruined if all I have to do it take a pod out of a box! I am so desisted about the whole thing. 
Anyone have an espresso maker that the love and can recommend? francis francis x1 broken
RIP Orange Francis Francis,  Nov. 07- July 08

Mimi Got Tagged Finally!

We got new labels! I feel like a real designer now!

 

Jewelleash
Actually we got them last week, and it was super exciting then, but I was too busy to share a picture of them 😉  I got to ship my order off to Dogville  in California with the new labels in tact. They are woven so I never have to deal with the whole raw edge thing I did on the others. These will not unravel, I don’t have to make them myself, and I have 500 of them. It is a glorious thing.
Label

You might notice another change– yes we stopped using white thread in favor of colored that matches the webbing. The one here on the Jewel set is Hunter Green. Unfortunately we couldn’t photograph the 5/8 xtra-small version because I tried out a new supplier who, after two weeks, sent me Teal Webbing. I sent it back. Then yesterday they sent me Kelly Green. Both totally beautiful, but neither came close to being Hunter Green like I needed! I am about to lose my mind over it.

 

But, all can’t go perfectly and the labels are enough to be happy about for quite awhile. They weren’t easy to get either. I’d been looking for a manufacture in the U.S. for a few months before I found one in New York. I have taken an oath to myself to not buy anything for Mimi Green that wasn’t made right here in the United States, and nowadays that isn’t an easy thing to live by.

 

Either way, after all that work I have a new appreciation for tags. From now on, I don’t care how itchy or scratchy it is, I am never ever going to cut a tag out of a shirt or from the back of pants out of respect for whomever had them made.  Well, never for today anyway…hehe….

Puppies on Parade

I love when customers send in photos of their dogs  wearing  Mimi.
Meet Millie, she belongs to Elizabeth:                                                       July 4th Pictures 008

Cosmo who belongs to Kimber of Great Scott
Cosmo

Lucy (and baby Ian) who both belong to Molly

LucyandIan

Shiva, whom Carol at Wires n’ Pliers bought this Matilda Collar for…Shiva3

And Kaya, whose Momma Mari was one of my first customers!Kaya2

It is a total pick me up to see “customers” (hehe) wearing my designs. And I sooo need a pick me up today! It has been kind of a tough week so far. Not having the security of a full time job and missing my co-workers has really been getting to me. But I know this will pass, I’ve said it once and I will say it again, quitting a job is like breaking up with a boyfriend. Maybe worse…hummm…

And speaking of pick me ups, although Starbucks is closing 500 locations somehow I am lucky enough to have one (with a drive thru no less) opening up just blocks away. Plus it is right by the entrance to the freeway! This is going to be hard on the pocketbook, I can already see it!