The Velvet Alchemist

A witchy Michigander and her handmade whimsy…

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Lifelong Michigander, practicing Pagan for over 25 years, frequent beach-goer, collector of hobbies.

  • The Plastic Canvas Capers!

    All right, strap in, this story’s gonna be a long’n.

    When I was a kid, I had an Auntie Ree. Auntie Ree (Marie)was an elder sister to my maternal grandpa, and lived in town in this beautiful yellow house with a detached garage. I loved visiting her as she always kept a closet of games and toys, and she had this absolutely gorgeous polished hunk of petoskey stone that her husband had found and hand-polished every night until it shone like glass.

    As humans do, one day she and her family decided that it was time to downsize and move into a care facility up north. This meant her kids going through her house and deciding what she’d take with her, what they’d divvy up amongst themselves, and what would be put into a yard sale. My grandparents and I assisted with this, and I got to run the cash table.

    There’s a whole story about me having a moment where my brain borked and I forgot how to operate a calculator and give change and almost spiraled out but that’s a tale for another day…

    Auntie Ree was a crafter and had plenty of craft supplies that ended up in this yard sale, including a bunch of yarn and something I’d never come across before. Plastic canvas. For those playing the home game, plastic canvas is a gridded sheet of plastic, stiff or soft, clear or colored, where you use a yarn needle and some basic yarn like Red Heart to stitch designs through the holes. You can make flat designs, or you can do 3D items. Simple things like Kleenex box covers, or complex things like the Barbie doll house I saw at the county fair in the 4H building.

    I expressed interest in the bundle, and was immediately met with one of Auntie Ree’s adult children sneering at me and snarking they weren’t giving it to me for free. Even as a little kid I was taken aback by their attitude. Did I demand it for free? Did I expect it free? Eesh. I’m unsure which of my grandparents ponied up the cash for me to have this bundle of craft supplies to appease the uppity offspring, but I ended up spending down-time at the cash table flipping through the booklets and learning how to make things out of plastic canvas.

    Fast forward a few years, and I discover a new little craft store in my hometown. The Lamb’s Loft, half craft store half trinket trove. She carried basic yarn, knitting needles and crochet hooks, plastic canvas, yarn needles, basic Darice jewelry findings and beads, pattern books, DMC floss… all the basic items for simple granny crafts. It was about a mile from my house, so I was allowed to ride my bike there when I had pocket money. One afternoon I picked up a pattern book to make a doll travel case out of plastic canvas. The case itself is Barbie pink with “travel stickers” on the sides. When you open it up, a carpet and a vanity table unfold from the center. There are mirrors, little drawers, two secret compartments behind the mirrors, 2 closet spaces, and accessories such as a chaise lounge with matching pillow, vanity bench that opens up for storage, and a folding screen for changing. I immediately wanted to make it.

    What followed was many instances of me begging a few bucks off my grandpa so I could go back down to the Loft for yet another couple sheets of canvas or another skein of yarn. I slowly but surely worked on building this case. Unfortunately, grandpa died when I was 14, and I had as-of-yet-undiagnosed ADHD, so he didn’t get to see the finished project. Every so often I’d clean or rearrange my room, find the half-finished case, and knock out a little more. I even worked on it during Saturday detention in high school! No, I didn’t technically earn detentions by misbehaving; our school’s attendance policy meant if you missed more than 3 days you had to make up hours via after school or Saturday detention. To me, detention was FAR preferable to actual class as everyone in detention kept to themselves and it was generally quiet. I could finish my homework after school, and then Saturdays were for reading novels, writing stories, or working on my little yarn projects… well, unless that one teacher was hosting Saturday detention. He was a curmudgeon whose room rule was you could ONLY work on homework and nothing else. I spent several hours with loose leaf paper and a pen free writing and journaling and being bored out of my gourd after he forbid me from working on my stitching.

    I still have nightmares that I didn’t make up all my hours and have to go back to school to complete my credits and I end up giving up and signing up to get my GED.

    But I digress. As soon as I graduated I applied to a job at JoAnn, and there I stayed for the next quarter century. In those first couple years there I used my discount to get the yarn and canvas needed to finish the case.

    By this time I’d been working on it for over a decade. Thing is, plastic canvas doesn’t hold up well in areas that aren’t climate controlled. The constant shift of humidity causes the plastic to dry out and become brittle, plus all the manipulation of the pieces while stitching it all into place caused many pieces to break and crumble. Also… there are a LOT of design flaws. If a girl plays with it on a table top and doesn’t open and close it often, it will last a long time. If a girl tries to tote it around as it looks like you should be able to, it WILL fall apart. Once you’ve got all the pieces tucked inside, plus a doll, plus all her accessories, it’s too heavy for the little handles and buckles.

    I was about 20 when I finished it. My sisters were 15 and 10, and they both enjoyed the fruit of my labors. I may have been an adult, but I still loved making Barbie items. Hell, I’m 44 now and I still want to make doll things! I’ve got a ton of patterns for doll clothes, and I save my decent sized scraps for when I get frisky to make tiny things. I used to make wiggle dresses out of old socks, cutting the foot off, adding lace to the bottom and ribbon straps to the top. My sisters LOVED what I made.

    Alas…

    Let me take you back, well before I was born. One of my mom’s biggest gripes about grandma was how frequently grandma would go through mom’s clothes and toys and collect bags and boxes of things to donate to charity. Grandma wouldn’t ask permission or consult with her children; she’d just decide they were done playing with certain items and that was that. It drove my mom NUTS. Items of great sentimental value, items that had been taken care of, items that today are worth a tidy sum… gone.

    You’d think a woman who grew up in such a way would raise her children differently, yes? YOU’D BE WRONG. For my mother is a Boomer, and Boomers talk a good game about how they would never raise their children the same way but continuing the same old cycles.

    When I was little I did get to play with what toys mom was able to hang on to. Inflatable Barbie furniture, vintage clothes and accessories, Legos, board games (Hello Kerplunk and Knip Knop), and other things lost to memory. Her only rule was that I dismantle anything I build and put it away when I was done. If I didn’t, I wasn’t allowed to play with it any more. I learned to be careful with and take care of things. I took that threat to heart. Then came my siblings. Games lost pieces and cards, Barbies ended up half naked and without their shoes, stuffies got ridiculously filthy, things ended up broken… I once found half a deck of Sesame Street flash cards stuffed into the slot of an old videodisk player. Both siblings were also fond of getting into my things and stealing, which mom always said, “Write me a list and I’ll replace it.”

    Nothing was replaced.

    Anyway, they got the same rule I did. Put it away or lose it forever. They didn’t take it seriously, so many of our old toys and things ended up in a garbage sack and straight to the Goodwill donation bin. She also waited until we were all out of the house to do purges of clothes and the toy bins on the porch, so we’d come back from school or a friend’s house to find things suddenly missing. This wasn’t just items, it was pets too. We always ended up taking on stray cats who never got fixed, have a litter, and inevitably mom would wait until I was away for the weekend with a friend to give the entire litter away. I’d come home and immediately run to the porch or the barn to play with the kittens and… gone. No goodbye, no closure, just “stop being a baby.”

    I’m sure I should be unpacking this with a therapist, but I don’t have therapist money, so here we are.

    I’m still salty that mom donated my favorite bunny stuffy to Goodwill. I got it for Easter as a wee child; a 2′ giant monstrosity that was bigger than my baby sister when she was a baby. Mom was absolutely flabbergasted that I’d be upset at its disappearance. “You never play with it,” she said.

    “Ma! I used it in class when we needed to cobble together a mock Energizer Bunny for a parody video in 6th grade! I’ve had it all my life! Just because I don’t drag it around like I’m a kid doesn’t mean I didn’t want to keep it.”

    That next Easter I had a new stuffy on the table with the baskets, but it was a poor replacement for my giant, faded, dirty, fatass bunny with the crooked ears.

    So, I told you that story to tell you THIS story. Picture it, Sicily… wait, no. Christmas Eve, and I’m… 22. Ish. Mom and my sisters (teen & tween at this point) are getting ready to leave grandma’s, and she mentions that she donated some of our old doll stuff to her then boyfriend’s friend’s daughter. Say what? Yup, she did it again. She decided we were all too old for toys and did a clean sweep, this time gathering up almost all the Barbie stuff she could find, and gave it away to a girl none of us never met. The jeeps, the horses, the boat, the furniture, the clothes and accessories… AND THE PLASTIC CANVAS TRUNK.

    Are. You. Effing. Kidding. Me. Right. Now.

    Again, mom was confused at our reactions. Why are we acting so angry? We’re too old for Barbies, why do we care? BECAUSE THEY’RE OUR THINGS! Why not say hey, there’s a little girl who won’t get a lot of presents, why don’t you go through your doll stuff and decide what to give her. Give US the choice to pare down our collection, not just take it and tell us to “stop being babies” about it.

    But the fact that she took my trunk. The one I took over a decade to complete. The FINAL project my grandpa bankrolled before he died. Gone. And it was broken! It was falling apart! If she wanted this girl to have one I could have cranked another one out for her birthday. One better structured, in brighter colors, with some supports stitched in to make it more sturdy.

    It’s half my life ago, and I’m STILL salty as hell over it.

    Fun fact: when my grandma moved from her apartment into hospice last year (she died a year ago as I type this), mom and my baby sister cleaned out her apartment. Mom immediately wanted to donate everything that wasn’t photos straight to Goodwill. Didn’t want to look through a single box. Thankfully my sister had a cooler head and made mom go through each box just in case. Many things we all thought lost or stolen were found. Go fig.

    I wasn’t invited to go through any of it to take anything of sentimental value. Yes, I’m salty. I did manage to get the green ceramic mixing bowl that grandpa and I used to make pancakes when I was a little bitty kid.

    Sadly, I found out that grandma didn’t save any of the hilarious racy joke items that she and grandpa used to have. The titty mug? Gone. Titty salt-n-pepper shakers? Gone. The Spanish dancer glasses that lost their fishnet undies when filled with cold drinks? Gone. The Peter Meter, the dirty joke greeting cards, the naked lady shot glasses? GONE.

    The nude lady playing cards that featured a young BETTY FREAKIN’ WHITE?! Gone. Grandma tossed most of it after grandpa died, and the rest came up missing in the decade after.

    I DID manage to salvage a book of dirty jokes published in 1951 called Over Sexteen. So all was not lost.

    As for grandma’s other things, the cross-stitch of her and grandpa on their wedding day is on the wall at mom’s house. The memory quilt of Ed’s shirts is on a bed. The buddy pillow, last I saw, was sitting on a stack of chairs. The blankets… no idea. One of her sweatshirts is on a hanger in my sewing room as I was replacing the zipper in front to one more arthritis friendly.

    Mom has been told that before she pitches ANYTHING else she’s to call me first. I’m not a hoarder, but a sentimental fool who wants to surround myself in comfort items I knew in my youth. Fight me.

    Ok, now we can emerge from that Forest of Woe to return to the Here and Now. Today, I have a Pinterest board with a sub-board dedicated to plastic canvas Barbie shenanigans. I had NO idea there were so many pattern books! On eBay right now there’s a $70 book to make an entire medieval castle! You have NO idea how bad I want to take a crack at that! There’s dining furniture, a washer and dryer, “wicker” furniture, a camper, several boutiques, entire doll houses… All of these booklets and pamphlets are old as Methuselah so people selling them want them for 3-4x what they were originally priced. I keep hoping someone uploaded all the patterns to some dodgy website so I can print them for my own shitz-n-giggles.

    I still own the booklet for the carrying case. Two nights ago, I dug out my stash of plastic canvas, tucked away in an old JoAnn shopping bag (old, as in the old forest green JoAnn logo) in my yarn closet, and started building another case. It’s not for anyone in particular; my nieces are 14 and 6, and neither are into Barbies. It’s more for my own satisfaction than anything. I still think the color schemes are dated as all hell, but I’m going to build it to pattern. If I’m still feeling itchy, I’m going to use the base patterns to design an all new case, one that will have “band stickers” instead of travel ones. Black, with hot pink. Make it look like the big cases that rock bands use to roll their equipment around. Find a Barbie that looks like the punk-rock Nana from the manga/anime of the same name. Fill the closet and drawers with tiny Vivienne Westwood-like duds. OR… find a doll I can make into a mini alter-ego me, with Manic Panic dyed hair and the funky tiny wardrobe of my dreams.

    My bestie, on a quest to find the 1000 books on this internet list she’s obsessed with, is keeping an eye out for the old Barbie plastic canvas booklets in exchange for helping her with her quest.

    Anyway, I’m sure that it won’t take me until I’m 54 to finish this case. I still have ADHD, but it’s plenty medicated and I’m not juggling homework or a retail schedule. I am, however, struggling with a black cat who wants to sleep on my pieces and eat my yarn.

    (Mom, if you’re reading this, NO TOUCHEE! MINE! MINE! MINE! GIT! GIT! GIT! GO! GO! GO!)

  • Credit Where Credit Is Due…

    To say that I’m the sole body, mind, and heart behind The Velvet Alchemist would be a massive lie. Sure, I’m the human who has ideas for the things, shops for the raw materials to make the things, crafts the things, takes photos of the things, markets and sells the things, schlepps the things from market to market (wondering how the eff I pack all the things in my mid sized sedan), ships the things… it’s not just ME. 

    First off, there’s my husband. He works his well-formed ass off so that I can indulge in my craft. He encourages me. He floats me new ideas. He teases me about the size of my stash and how it’s taken over the house. He makes little 3D printed trinkets for my booth. He accompanies me to fabric stores and craft shops and pushes my cart. He helps set up and tear down when I do local shows. 

    There are my friends, who share my posts, who like and comment, who model and wear my creations. Who always come to me when they have crafty questions or alteration needs, helping me grow my skills. Who are always down to go explore a new shop for supplies. Who send me reels and links and ideas for new products. Whose growing talents and skills push me to become better as well. 

    There’s my family who gush and rave over my talents. My niblings who gleefully wear handmade costumes every Halloween. My mom who insists on giving me my asking price on what she wants instead of expecting a “family discount”. My siblings who appreciate my hand made gifts. My mother-in-law who adored her “hippie blanket” (afghan). My niblings-in-law who still ask for blankets and things when they see me. The rest of my in-laws who suggested me and gave my socials to people who needed custom PPE for their businesses during 2020/2021.

    And even my dad, who let me use his spare bedroom to store my costumes and totes of fabric when I was living in an apartment and struggled to fit all of my Infinite Cosmic Crafting Supplies into an itty-bitty living space.

    My old coworkers at JoAnn who would always alert me to the new fabrics and such they knew were right up my alley. Who loved to see what I was working on.

    My regulars, whom I miss terribly. The ones that came in every Halloween to see that year’s costumes. The ones who wanted pictures of what I made. The ones who were invested in my work and brought printed pages of links and designs. The ones who brought pictures of their finished projects after I’d helped them through a rough spot. 

    Last and best and most… my maternal grandparents. 

    My grandpa, who taught me to knit, to bake, to do latch-hook. Who bought me art supplies. Who indulgently gave me pocket money so I could hit up the little craft store a mile away for more yarn, more plastic canvas, more needles. Who would drive me to GL Perry for costume supplies.

    My grandma, who would show off my projects to anyone who came to the house, including the door-to-door vacuum sales guy. Who gave my name to all her friends who needed sewing jobs. Who used to hem and repair all my clothes and watched with pride as I did the same for her. Who was rendered speechless when I made her a portrait of her and grandpa in cross-stitch. Who always asked what I was working on whenever I visited her. Who always insisted on paying me fairly for everything I did, even if I tried to argue her down.

    Grandmas are like that. You aren’t leaving without a full belly and some pocket money. 

    When you visit my shop, come by my booth, have my posts pop up in your feed… you may only see my face, but know that behind me are hundreds of others who made it all possible. The village who supported me so I could get where I am today, and continue to support me as The Velvet Alchemist grows.

    Who taught you your skills? Who got you started on your creative safari? Who encouraged you then and cheers you on today?

  • 2026, Comin’ In Hot!

    Or not. Maybe we’ll all carefully open the door, remove our shoes, and gently tip-toe into the year, careful not to disturb anything or anyone. Y’know, play it cool until we get the hang of it.

    Yours Truly is starting the year with some sage wisdom. Some advice that was handed to me back in 1999 by a wise man named Baz Luhrmann.

    “If I could offer you only one tip for the future, sunscreen would be it.”

    I’m a Saltine American. A non-melenated individual. An 8.5×11. My DNA hails from Northwest Europe. I’m pale, freckled, blue-eyed, and my hair carries with it a hint of my redheaded ancestry. Therefore, the sun and I have an interesting relationship. My childhood summers were spent in various states of pink and peeling, being hosed down with Bactine by my grandma. My freckles, which had faded out during the long Michigan winters, would come roaring back and make me look like I stood behind a muddin’ truck as it took off in 3rd gear. I grew to hate how my face looked in summers. I thought I looked monstrous.

    Today I’m amused at how many non-freckled people want them so bad they go get them tattooed on.

    As an adult I am much better at wearing sunscreen. I put it on every time I go to the beach, making sure to get new bottles every year, and coating every inch of skin before putting on my swimsuit. I take a wide-brimmed hat and a coverup, and spend my time out of the water under the umbrella.

    When I’m not at the beach… well, I try. I have a bottle of CeraVe face lotion with spf30 that I try to use daily, have a selection of hats to wear when I’m working in the yard (shoutout to MC Chris for having a “nrrd grrl” ballcap in his merch line!), and I have a cute Battenberg lace style parasol that I carry when I go walking downtown.

    I’m not perfect. I’ve forgotten to wear sunscreen when going to the Ren Fest. One year I wore my late 15th century Italian gown, which left my shoulders and upper chest mostly bare, and I ended up blistering from a sunburn. My skin looked like a car hood that was beaded with rain.

    One year, when a friend of mine and I went to Key West, I somehow managed to not get sunscreen on the back of my right calf which resulted in a severe burn in the shape of a rum bottle. I ended up slathering that area multiple times with a Panama Jack after-sun lotion that had a mix of shea butter and aloe and smelled like limes. The burned skin peeled in one sheet, and left a rum-bottle tan on my leg for a YEAR.

    I’ve seen the damage I’ve done to my skin. My bestie Michelle, whose birthday falls near Halloween so her parties are always costume themed, had an Alice in Wonderland party that featured multiple blacklights in the basement. The fun thing about a quality blacklight is it can show you where you’ve incurred sun damage. In the mirror I saw where my glasses block some of the light, where it’s most pronounced on my five-head, cheeks, nose, and chin, and the large swath of my chest and shoulders where I’ve failed to protect my skin.

    2025 was the wake-up call. Over the summer I developed a pimple on the right side of my nose, right in the crease of the curve of my nostril, about where a piercing would sit. I’d been contemplating getting that side pierced for a while, but figured I’d wait until after the pimple cleared itself up.

    Thing is… it wouldn’t. I tried patches. I tried ointments. I tried leaving it alone. I tried popping it. THAT ended up opening a wound that bled. What was left was a scab that wouldn’t go away. Any time I messed with it just caused more bleeding. I finally got to a point where it smoothed out, but it was still an odd, pink patch that didn’t fade.

    In November, I went to the dermatologist for my first full-body skin check. We ascertained that other bumps and oddities were just scar tissue that would eventually mend themselves if I’d leave them alone, but the nose? Yikes. It was described as a “pearly pink papule” (say that 3 times fast) and would require a biopsy and a 10 day wait for results.

    Of course this meant I was Googling the different forms of skin cancer and their various modes of treatment. I joked with people that I had “face cancer” and may end up looking like The Ghoul from Fallout. “Y’know, maybe I can have the derm just punch a hole out of my nose to remove it and I’ll throw a hoop through it and it can be my most expensive piercing!”

    Thankfully it turned out to be a Basal Cell Carcinoma. Carcinooooomaaaaaaaa. It’s a fun word to say. Very woody. BCCs are the easiest to deal with with the best recovery rate. If you’re going to get a skin cancer, a BCC is what you hope for.

    Fast forward to December 30th when I had it removed. It was an outpatient, in-house procedure where I was numbed up (the worst part, honestly), had the carcinoma sliced off, the wound cauterized, and got to cool my heels for a half hour while they examined the excised flesh and rotated with two other patients who were in for the same procedure.

    Fortunately, the surgeon got it in one go. In the MOHS procedure, a slice is taken and examined, and if the margins aren’t clean they take another slice and repeat until they’ve got all of the affected tissue. After I got the all-clear, they gave me more numbing shots and stitched me up. The surgeon has cosmetic surgery training, so he and the assistant were able to smush my face together enough to sew a flap over the wound and secure it with about 10 stitches. I go back in 2 weeks to check on the healing.

    I won’t lie, when the numbing meds wore off it stung like a wicked bitch. I had regerts. I wanted to get in a time machine and slap my former self every time she walked outside without sunscreen. I wanted to slap myself ON the sunburns to really drive home the point.

    The real kick-in-the-pants right now is I’m slightly congested and my nose wants to run. I can’t blow it, so I’ve resorted to rolling up Kleenex and stuffing it in the nostril as to not to disturb the healing. I’ve got meds, I’ve got a nasal irrigation bottle from when my husband had his deviated septum worked on earlier this year, and I’ve got a humidifier for my bedroom. Still…

    Last night I got to remove the bandage and do some damage control. As a piercing enthusiast I have bottles of saline spray on hand which helped loosen up any crusties, and as a tattooed person I have plenty of Aquaphor to protect the wound. 24 hours later it’s pretty gnarly. Definitely looks like I brought my face to a knife fight and lost.

    Today it’s itchy, which is a good sign. Itchy means healing! It also means slapping my own hand every time I reach up to attempt to relieve the itch.

    Fun fact: I now have something in common with such famous people as Hugh Jackman and Christie Brinkley!

    I’m very fortunate that my BCC was small, that it was easily resolved, and that whatever scarring that remains will be easily disguised by makeup (or that 2nd nose piercing). But now I must dedicate myself to the Ultimate Victorian Goth Lifestyle ™ when it comes to my skin, as I’m now much more likely to develop more BCCs in the future. Aunt Francis style floppy hats (iykyk), caftans, parasols, sunglasses, perhaps somehow acquiring a permit to be on public beaches after sunset, taking lessons from HexBaby on Insta on how to be a “Domestic Vampire”, buying stock in various sunscreen companies (and doing research to make sure what I put on my skin is environmentally friendly!), giving thanks for my husband’s good job and access to insurance, and remembering to slather myself whenever I leave the house.

    So, my wish for everyone in the new year is to be kind to yourselves. Drink your water, take your meds, go for walkies, keep in touch with your chosen people, fill your enclosure with all manner of enrichment…

    And trust me on the sunscreen. 😉

    Bonus! A picture of me as The Red Queen under the blacklight! Spooky, unsettling, and you can see the line at the top of my fivehead where the sun damage starts!

    Coming up: A look back on what I worked on last year, and what I hope to tackle this year!

  • The Magic of the Portable Altar Bag

    My bread and butter. My main seller. The item I’m known for. The handmade goodie that makes people remember my booth every year…

    ~*~drumroll~*~

    The PORTABLE ALTAR BAG!

    ~*~air horns~*~

    One of the first things we do as witchlets and baby Pagans is start collecting tools. A chalice. Candles. Incense holders. Tarot decks. A dagger or three. Allllll the crystals. Jars and bottles full of herbs and oils and salts, oh my! We make beautiful altars and shrines in our homes (or sometimes literally IN our closets or under our beds, should we live with not-so-chill family…), but what about when we travel?

    Some go the Altoid Tin route, and make the cutest, teensy setups that fit in their pockets. Some go super basic and pack a crystal or two along with an anointing oil in their purse or backpack. Some forego all the trappings altogether and carry their altar inside their minds. Then there are those of us who want something a little… more. We enjoy the feel of the tools in our hands, the warmth of the candle, the grains of salt… but how to transport them safely and securely while remaining convenient?

    One version of a travel altar (or mini altar) is of the jewelrybox variety. Something that wouldn’t look out of place atop a dresser or a shelf. Usually wooden, with a pretty design etched on the top. Lined in felt or velvet on the inside, perhaps with little dividers, and a drawer on the bottom.

    Another version looks like a tiny curio cabinet, with adorable little glass-front doors and drawer pulls. A third, like an apothecary chest.

    The only downside to these versions is… they’re not very forgiving. They’re sturdy little buggers but they can be awkward to pack, and unless everything is snugged inside they’re going to roll around and possibly break mid-transit. Can you imagine trying to clean out the inside of your velvet-lined jewelry box after a patchouli oil explosion?

    Thus, the fabric altar bag. When tied up, it looks like a bindle bag. You know, the tied-up handkerchief swaying at the end of a stick? It’s called a bindle; did you know? Anyway, it looks like a pouch with a bow on top. However, when in its open and relaxed state, it becomes an altar cloth with 6 pockets. Pockets just large enough to tote small items for one’s practice.

    Mine contains:
    -A tiny brass cauldron (thrifted)
    -A miniature Hanson Roberts tarot deck
    -A small metal chalice (thrifted)
    -2 tealights
    -3 packs of incense matches
    -1 vial of oil
    -1 small bottle of salt
    -2 blue ceramic offering bowls (K-zoo Pagan Pride Day)
    -1 small leather pouch with quartz crystal points
    -1 small satin bag of assorted crystals
    -a miniature athame in a leather sheath (K-zoo Pagan Pride Day)

    I use all these items when I take photos of the altars for my Etsy shop to give an idea of its use, and when I attend IRL shows. To be honest, it is kind of fun when I forget to set up my “sample altar” and people try to guess what they’re for.

    -A medieval cap
    -A casserole cover
    -A bonnet
    -A cover for golf clubs (?!)

    I’ve had a few people buy them for their MtG, D&D, and other assorted TTRPGs for their cards, dice, markers, and other accoutrements. I hope to someday make some more fandom themed ones to market to the gamers come Spring 2026. I’ve been trying to get into Lake Michigan College’s Fandom Fest but it always ends up clashing with other things I have going on. Rude. XD

    This bag was inspired by a member of an e-list group I was in waaaaay back in… 2000? 2001? Remember e-lists? The original idea was smaller and the pockets weren’t as roomy. Also, the way the drawstring was sewn in made it difficult to make the bag lay nicely flat when in use. I played around with the design, enlarging it, going down to 6 pockets, and instead of sewing a ring in which to put the drawstring I went to grommets around the perimeter of the bag. I think they add a nice touch.

    One huge bonus to the manufacture of these bags was that I worked at JoAnn, may she rest in peace. From June 2nd, 2000 to May 25th, 2025 I had access to a wide, wonderful world of assorted cotton prints. The calico wall full of pretty blenders, the novelty aisle with the nature prints and the PhotoReal designs, and the holiday aisle where every Halloween I’d spend an entire paycheck stocking up on witchy patterns. I worked on unloading the truck, so I’d have first pick of any bolts that came in. Every day I could pick up ribbon and thread and all the goodies I needed.

    Alas… No worries, not yet. 25 years of fabric hoarding have me well-stocked for quite a while! I managed to bring a ton of new prints and designs to the live shows I did for 2025, and I still have plenty to go for 2026; also, I live pretty close to quite a few quilt shops!

    Gonna miss that employee discount, though.

    But I digress.

    My bags hold a surprising amount of stuff, and the “squishability” of them over the wooden cases means they pack well. The drawstrings can be bowed up, or can be used like cross-body straps for ease of carry. Did I mention they’re 100% cotton? You can wash that spilled patchouli oil right out!

    My altars are available at my Etsy Shop and always at my live events. I don’t have anything lined up through the end of this year, but I’ll be sure to post on my socials where I’ll be popping my tent!

  • What is a Velvet Alchemist?

    Picture it; Michigan, early naughts. VERY early naughts. Adult Swim is on TV, and I’m getting deep into Fullmetal Alchemist. As an as-of-yet-undiagnosed-ADHD-riddled creative person who dabbles in fanfiction, I found myself mentally toying with different forms of alchemy that would work in this animated world. This led to me wondering how this world’s alchemy would best benefit me.

    “What if I could just… put the fabric and thread and zipper and all the stuff into an alchemical circle, clap that sucker, and boom. Outfit. No sewing machine issues, no pressing, no fiddling around with zipper feet and crying over a seam ripper or futzing with a paper pattern. Just a finished item, ready to wear. But what would I call it?”

    Velvet Alchemy. BOOM. Trademark it.

    A few years later, while keeping my friend company while she tended to her booth at Pagan Pride Day, I began doodling what would eventually become my logo. I set the goal of having my own booth the next year, writing out ideas of things I could make and sell on another page of my sketchbook. This ended up becoming a tradition, bringing this sketchbook to every event I vend at, jotting down thoughts and quick sketches and design ideas to try out once I got back into town.

    The day finally came to name my booth. To establish myself on social media as a small business. To stake my claim on Etsy.

    Wouldn’t you know it that Velvet Alchemy was already taken? *sigh*

    Ok, fine. Hand me my eraser; we can still do this. What about…

    The Velvet Alchemist.

    My new name was accepted, my sketched logo was adjusted to reflect the name change, and voila! I scanned it in, made it my official profile picture, and introduced myself to the great wide world.

    You would have laughed to see how excited I was that my own hand-drawn logo could be put on business cards. Once that box arrived in the mail I felt like I had truly made it. Using my Cricut to put my logo on a wooden sign that I strap to my booth canopy brought intense satisfaction. Someday, when I finally acquire a permanent vehicle in which to haul my wares, you bet I’ll be slapping my logo on the doors!

    It’s been many years since that debut. Pagan Pride events, the local Burn Run, a farmer’s market, a pop-up market, harvest fests… promoting myself on various calls for Small Business Shoutouts from Facebook to Threads to Fark’s Holiday Farketplace… and I hope for many more in the future.

    As for anime and fandom, I’m still a big ol’ geek. I still play around with fanfiction ideas in my head, still think of ways to shoehorn myself into various worlds while trying not to go full Mary Sue (NEVER go full Mary Sue!), still use that sketchbook to brain dump ideas of things to make for people.

    Stay tuned for more stories, more updates, pictures, brain-dumps, and the rest!

    Stay fresh, cheese bags!

    -TVA

  • Now or never!

    2025 has been topsy-turvy for makers like me. Events like a leadership change that threw our lives into disarray and uncertainty. Losing JoAnn as a place of employment AND a resource for raw materials. Needing to rethink where to find other resources based on politics and potential tariffs. Etsy once again raising fees on the sellers AND being rather hypocritical about what they do and do not allow to be sold on their site…

    Seriously, they’re going to ding me for my LPOTL quote shirt for the word “Cannibalism” (“potentially offensive”) but they’re going to allow “Alligator Alcatraz” and Confederate flag items? Dahek?? AND ban people who report the items?

    Not to mention the AI slop, the drop-shipping, and all the other issues that have cropped up over the years…

    SO HERE I AM, WORLD. Attempting to strike out on my own and have more control over my goods, my advertising, my sales… I’m going to stumble, I’m going to fark things up a bit. The most I’ve ever done when it comes to website building was learning rudimentary HTML in high school and having a DeadJournal account since 2001.

    First things first, a place to show off what it is I do, what I make, what kinds of magic happens in my crafting space and beyond. Once I’ve got that figured out I want to start being able to sell on my OWN space and cut Etsy out of the equation. Been wanting to do THAT ever since ending up getting .97 after selling a $15 necklace. HIGHWAY ROBBERY I TELL YOU. Seriously, I could rant for days. But I’ll save that for another day. For now… blog.

    So, let’s slap our knees like a true midwesterner and get this show on the road, yeah? ^_^