A Dream, Realized AND So Much More - True Story

Everyone knows that St. Helena has The Best Fall Festival, this side of the Mississippi.

I did hear that Nativity in St. Paul has a snake pit and a freak-show…

But Saint Helena has rides and games and prizes — prizes like t-shirts that Jen and I made for the Duck Shoot!Yeehaw!!

Give a kid a cork gun, step back (STEP BACK), and watch the magic!Jen is DUCKing.

After spending $80,000 on climbing gear and an entourage of Sherpas in Nepal,

I’m sure it was glorious.

The relief, the pride, the joy!

BUT, she forgot one teeny-tiny thing: enough oxygen for her descent. With temperatures hovering around -30° and an altitude of 22,000 ft., she laid her body down on the side of the mountain. 

And died.

Lesson??

Never trust a Sherpa.

Zeichen Press reached a summit too! We’ve been climbing Mount Greeting Card for a looong time and we finally reached the tippity-top: Urban Outfitters.

…But now I’ll have to set a new goal… Suggestions?

Urban Outfitters bought this card — but just to be fancy, it will be printed with a bright blue ink:Let’s do this, indeed.

An ANTfestation in the shop required aggressive use of insecticide. Two waves of spray-on poison were needed to completely wipe out the colony hiding behind the Great Wall Of Cards.We murdered thousands of antsbefore Jen and I had an important meeting to decide which cards should be included in our next release.

Wait, after the genocide, but before the important meeting, Classic Pam got ahold of another baby rabbit. (See blog post: Fear and Dread) There was some backyard bedlam involving the dog and five kids chasing the cat… I got caught up in the chase but ended up somehow kicking the hopping baby rabbit. Don’t ask me how that happened.

DON’T ASK.

And without further adieu… the moment you’ve all been waiting for… OUR… NEW… CARDS!!!

“We’re Creek People now, mom… We’re Creek People…”What began as an optimistic, joy-filled journey down Minnehaha Creek turned into a somber, personal purgatory.

The creek didn’t mean to be a metaphor for life, but it was.

IT WAS.

We made it out alive and I’m so glad, I didn’t want to have to eat one, or more, of my children.

Did you know it’s Jen’s birthday today?? She celebrated by printing cards for Paper Source in our studio-turned-Easy-Bake Oven. She treated herself with a fan pointed at her back.

Tradition dictates that I make her a card. So, I did.

I’ve had so many (one) requests for bookplates!

Maybe you have a book that you don’t want someone (your mother) to “borrow” and “forget” to return? Maybe you need a bald man to protect your book?

You do??

I just made something for you AND because I’m generous (TO A FAULT), there are TWO bookplates on one piece of paper. 

Using radical letterpress technology (steel perfing rule) I was able to lay out TWO bald men PLUS a message in lead, that can be neatly separated and pasted into a beloved book.No, no… it’s not a miracle. Just one woman’s attempt to make the world a better place.

And on that note, here’s a card that touches on a preeetty sensitive subject:

I’m not afraid of heights or clowns or rats or bats or cemeteries or sharks. But I AM afraid of centipedes.

Once upon a time, I vacuumed up a centipede that was wearing Bill Cosby’s sweater.

But enough of that!

It’s August and time to dread Winter.

My research shows that Hell is being trapped in a snow cave with 1,000 centipedes. And here’s a card for Christmas.

WHAT?!

Jen held the garbage-pail lid and I swung the hammer, it is our shop gong and is ceremoniously banged when we receive an order over $1,000.

We bang it one thousand times and then Jen gets to printing.

Paper Source ordered a new (for them) card:Oh, what do I do after the gong show? I chase and scold the cat.

Classic Pam has single-pawedly wiped out an entire rabbit family.

Tsk, tsk!

This one survived…until it peed and died in my hands.

ALSO, Urban Outfitters (a real mom and pop joint) wants samples of some of our cards.Settle down. SETTLE DOWN. They’ve led us on before — I’m not going to fashion a wooden stool into a potty chair so that I can sit by the phone day and night.

I’m not. I’M NOT.

Jen has been toiling away at Zeichen Press Headquarters and I have been thinking about her toiling away at Zeichen Press Headquarters.

It’s hard for me to think about that when I am so busy staring at the ocean.

I also took the time to create this:

(I’m a giver.)

But I did make her a card.

(I hope she doesn’t really want me to help though.)So I think that makes us even.

The pilgrimage to Cape Cod was like a lil’ slice of Purgatory and I wept with joy as we pulled into the driveway. I also wept when we discovered the house-mascot had been murdered in cold blood.Who would do such a thing?

Don’t worry, everything else was in order:

The boats are in the harbor.

The hydrangeas are blue enough.And the dead people are still dead.PHEW!

Clip-clop-clip-clop… I watched her gracefully stroll down 28th Street. She, a 125 pound White Tailed Deer, came towards me on the sidewalk. Her head turned left and right, taking in the scenery like a tourist. I sat as still as a frightened rabbit, hoping she would mistake me for something non-threatening. The air was perfectly calm and the smoke from my cigarette rose straight into the sky. Oh, but she noticed me! We were locked in a staring contest for what felt like forever, and then she bounced away. Faster than I knew a deer could run, she bounded across Hennepin Avenue.And a bear wandered up to a strip mall last week in Cottage Grove. I felt it should be commemorated.