Here’s What I’ve Been Doing at Bear&Bean This Past Month

It’s time for a check-in with Bear&Bean, my stu­dio where I draw and embroi­der cus­tom pet por­traits and wild animals—and cre­ate ways for you to do it, too! Here’s what I got into over the last month span­ning mid-Feb­ru­ary to almost-mid March.

(If you want to see what I’m work­ing on now, fol­low me on Insta­gram and sub­scribe to my newslet­ter!)

Here’s a peek into my illustration and embroidery studio, Bear&Bean, this past month.

Embroidered pet portraits

Thanks to a very kind arti­cle on My Mod­ern Met and a men­tion in 1440 newslet­ter, I received many com­mis­sions over the past month. Excit­ing! I’ve had the oppor­tu­ni­ty to draw a bunch of cute dogs and kit­ties that will even­tu­al­ly become patch­es, ban­ners, and hat designs.

All of my embroi­deries begin as dig­i­tal draw­ings, so in addi­tion to stitch­ing, I’ve been doing just as much draw­ing. If you’d like to your pet into a stitch­able pat­tern, scroll down! I have the work­shop for you.

52 Weeks to Ms. Frizzle

I’m work­ing away on week 30 of the project, which is a mole with a worm in its mouth. This is a lit­tle more slow-going than I’d like; with my oth­er stitched oblig­a­tions, how­ev­er, I work on it every cou­ple of days or so.

Make Your Own Menagerie (DIY)

I’m work­ing on a new kit! My Moo Deng design has got­ten a lot of atten­tion in my stick-and-stitch embroi­dery pack, so I am turn­ing it into a begin­ner-friend­ly, all-inclu­sive kit in a sim­i­lar style to my axolotl, red pan­da, sloth, and sea lion. When you’re done stitch­ing, it will become a stick-on patch. I’m plan­ning on debut­ing it at Crafty Won­der­land in Port­land on May 2nd and 3rd.

Workshops and more

Turn Your Pet into an Embroi­dery Pattern

I’ve got two embroi­dery work­shops com­ing up at Make Apothe­cary in Both­ell, WA. Come learn embroi­dery with me!

• Turn Your Pet into an Embroi­dery Pat­tern on April 5 from 4 PM to 6 PM — Learn to trans­form your fur­ry (or scaly!) friend into an embroi­dery pat­tern using your iPad. I’ll go over how to break down a pho­to so that it’s suit­able for stitch­ing. Then, we’ll print it on stick-and-stitch sta­bi­liz­er and get to stitching!
• Embroi­der a Menagerie on Cloth­ing on April 12 from 2 PM to 4 PM — Could that cozy shirt use a lit­tle ani­mal ener­gy? Trans­form your cloth­ing into a wear­able zoo with my help! I’ll pro­vide a vari­ety of ani­mal pat­terns that adhere to fabric—in addi­tion to thread, a nee­dle, and a hoop. You’ll just need to bring your garment!