Hihiwai Ornament

My Etsy shop, Achoo's Mudpit, opened last week on December 6th. To welcome the grand opening of my shop, I put up a hihiwai Christmas ornament for sale. Can you believe it? The dream of having my own shop, sharing my artistic talent and creativity to the public, has finally come true! I am in awe and disbelief, because it was only two months ago that I created this art blog. Now with the shop, everything is moving so fast and I am enjoying every moment of it.  

I opened the shop with a hihiwai ornament because it is the best representation of me. It illustrates my love of personifying things that I find interesting into cartoony characters. The ornament also shows a part of me that I've just recently discovered and have begun to embrace - it is following my mom's footsteps in sewing. I remember the very first thing I ever sewed was a pair of pink colored over-sized shorts. Of course I didn't wear it, but I enjoyed the experience entirely, especially when my mom walked me through the steps - making the pattern, cutting the fabric, working the sewing machine, etc...  These past few weeks, those memories came back and the holiday spirit illuminated everything around me. I wanted to sew and I decided to make my Christmas gifts this year. With the hihiwai ornament, I applied the same concepts my mom taught me but without the sewing machine. Below are photos of the materials I used to make the hihiwai ornament. 



Some of the materials I used include: 1) Felt: champagne, orange, and charcoal; 2) Cotton string: orange and black; 3) Thread: champagne, orange, black, and charcoal; and 4) Hawaiian fiber fill.  The fill is very soft and poofy. I also bought a pair of fabric scissors that can cut fine corners. 

The completed hihiwai Christmas ornament is a success! I made 7 so far and all of them look so adorable that I feel reluctant to give out. I hung one on my crazy plant so that I could take photos for my Etsy shop. Every time I look at the ornament, I wonder how in the world I can sew so evenly. Then I thought, must be my mom :)




I also made two cards to accompany this ornament. The first card is my not-so-business-like business card that has my logo and art blog website address. My logo is Achooish with a pooping pig. The second card is an information card that briefly describes the life of a hihiwai.


Currently, I am looking forward to sewing 15 more ornaments, as well as finalizing the colors of the other two stream animal characters. Please remember to check back for more updates on my art and my shop.

Achooish is on Etsy

I am so excited that I will soon open a shop on Etsy! Who is the culprit of my latest and greatest motivation? My good friend Emily of course. She is one of the craftiest person I know and her art is very inspiring. Lately, I received news that she has been knitting up a storm. She is making these beautiful animal ornaments, and one of them is a PIG! They are on sale at Etsy. While she is knitting up a storm in Baltimore, I am sewing crazily here in Honolulu. I am not giving away the big surprise, yet. When I have all of them completed, I will post along with my Etsy Shoppe link. In the meantime, you are welcome to guess what the big holiday suprise gift is :)