Never Cry Wolf

Firstly, our sincere apologies for the hiatus on the blog front. It has been a wee little while since we last blogged and so much we have wanted to blog about!  There have been many many things happening in the world of Crywolf (namely planning the launch of our upcoming vinyl toy – Bü, which we will blog about next time). We’ve had almost no time to even make sure we are still breathing (but I think we are because we’re still alive…I think) let alone blog, but we are going to get back on that horse!

Last last weekend was on of our regular Toronto shows, The Spring Clothing show. It had moved back to the Queen Elizabeth building for the first time in years which people had mixed reviews about. Despite being hit with a terrible lighting situation (being under a half dead lamp) we had a pretty good location and it was a good show.

Photo recap:

Our booth setup. Can you spot the new designs?!

Here’s one of them. Matryoshka light sweatshirt on athletic blue! Will be available online in a couple of weeks.

And another! Ninja Panda on a cool new colour. Available online in a couple of weeks also.

Us smiling sweetly for the papa(razzi).

We ran around and took some snaps of our friends/fellow vendors.

Jenn of  Sick on Sin. She was rollin solo all weekend and we saw her booth bustling most of the time!  She kindly donated some goodies to us for something we will talk about in another blog. Anyway, overall a great person!

Eric holding down the Pause fort while Ken and Andrew pointed and laughed from afar (that may or may not be true). You can see a few of their NEW designs! I picked up a pretty hilarious tank that I will treasure forever. Thanks boyz. They also contributed some AMAZING stuff to the something something that will be written about in our next blog!

One of our favorite booths to shop at, Bicyclette. And we’re not just saying that. We just discovered them last year and fell in love. The owner Paige is super lovely. I came so close to buying this amazing statement dress – black and white Aztec-ish print, short and tight with puffed up shoulders… it was pret-ty awesome. I had to part with it in the end but got some pretty shirts instead. ALSO – brace yourself for some exciting news – Bicyclette’s new Queen st store is going to start carrying Crywolf tanks! YUS!

Within Bicyclette ’s booth were 2 other favs of ours – Biko Jewelry and DaLish cosmetics. We were sad that Corrine of Biko didn’t have her own booth this year as I’ve been eyeing her beautifully constructed jewelry forever and I swear I will own a piece some day. Maybe at this year’s One of a Kind christmas show?! Melanie of DaLish added a whole bunch of new clothes to her Crywolf collection and we got ourselves a bunch of  100% Canadian made and produced cosmetics with natural ingredients. No testing on furry friends! We back that.

This is Dawn of  Love Poetry Corsets. She’s super sweet and a really big Crywolf fan!

And last but not least is the best looking couple ever aka Mel of Fredrick Prince Jewelry and her boyfriend Brett. We did some tradesies and each got a beautiful hand-crafted necklace.  Mind the crappy webcam photo but here is the beautiful rough crystal quartz necklace I got. In certain light at a certain angle you can see a little rainbow reflection on the bottom of the stone, I keep trying to make people see it but nobody ever does. I guess I will keep that little treasure to myself.

I have a confession, this blog took me about 10 hours to write. Of course while doing a bunch of other stuff in between uploading photos such as writing a zillion e-mails, event planning, stressing out, etc. Clearly I used up any writing skillz on e-mails and so whatever was left  ended up as this blog. I’m embarrassed!

xoxox

Ah, high school. Seems like a hundred thousand years ago now. With all the time that’s gone by, thinking about it conjures up faint and random images of faces and memories: our unstylish uniforms, crushes, the confusing feelings of adolescence, teenage angst, old friends, crazy hair and cafeteria food that we still crave for sometimes. We were brought to ponder back on high school life when we were contacted a few months ago by one of our favorite teachers, Mr. Keenan. Rose and I were never in the same class but we both had Mr. Keenan for computers. Being computer geeks, we naturally loved computer classes and the jovial and less-uptight faculty that made up the department.

The reason for the contact was that Mr. Keenan had discovered Crywolf and was really proud of what we’ve done. To quote directly: “I was showing your site to my computer classes today and telling them how I taught you nothing and you still made something of yourselves.” For the record, we made tons of funny little Turing and Foxpro programs under his tutelage, so he taught us lots. I would say our interest in computers and learning to make things on them (ie. those programs, 0’s and 1’s, basic html to make obnoxious tripod pages about ourselves, etc) was actually pretty important in shaping an interest that we would one day use to create our own online store.

We answered some interview questions for the school paper and Mr. Keenan asked if the students could use some our characters in a final Flash project. Our response: HELLS YEA! So below, we would like to present you with 3 final flash games that some students came up with. Click to play. THEY ARE SO COOL!

Crywolf Memory Game by Azra Jessa

Muffin Madness Maze! by Janelle Singh

Catch and Avoid by Montserrat Martinez Soy

We said that we were going to pick a winner but they are all so amazing that we can’t choose just one. Help us out by letting us know which one is your favorite. We’ll be putting a poll up on our facebook fan page where you can vote so do it up! The student with the most votes will get a little something extra. They worked so hard so please take a second to cast a vote.

Peas out g33ks!
xoxox

Greg Pietersma is the maker of wonderful tin things! We met him at the CNE, a fellow vendor in the Arts & Crafts building, and have been show pals ever since. Greg has been doing what he does for a long time knows all the ropes when it comes to trade shows and being in the craft business and we always appreciate the advice he’s given us. He’s like our “trade show dad” but the cool type of dad that is also your friend. One year we made him some fun tin-related custom buttons which is only 1/4 as cool as what he made us this past holidays… Crywolf COOKIE CUTTERS!

He hand-crafted those babies for us out of our logo. They are slightly different in size, the logo part is raised so that it leaves an imprint on the cookie. SO COOL!

Rose whipped out her trusty cookie book and we looked for a recipe that seemed both practical and yummy. We aimed more for the yum factor and went for a peanut butter cookie. I figured that you usually see pb cookies with the fork crisscross imprinted on the top so they would be good for holding the imprint, but in reality it wasn’t that practical because the dough is a bit too soft and oily to actually roll out. We kind of just had to make patties and cut them out that way (flour in the cutter – crucial), which worked! They were just very fragile and mushy. In retrospect, a sugar cookie or butter cookie dough recipe would be a bit easier to work with!

The cookies were thick and as they were baking they were kind of squishing into a giant collage cookie of Crywolf logos which was cool too! A cookie is a cookie.

Final results:

NOMMMMM

Want one? You’ll just have to come out to our next show… we just might have some under the table!

xo

Here is a lil custom logo that we came up for our friend Dani. She recently started up a company called The Like Button which helps businesses enter and conquer the world of social media by providing them with affordable and care-free social networking management. Website coming soon!

She wanted a quirky looking octopus character and this is what we came up with:

This dude was fun to draw and we’re glad we could help her out. We’ll start posting more custom jobbies as they come up!

Just as a reminder, we do custom buttons and magnets! You can check out the Custom Stuff section on our website for ordering custom 1″ buttons and magnets and 2.25″ buttons. If you have your own design, great! If you don’t we can also talk about making something for you.

T-shirts/posters are also something that we occasionally take on, but since we are not set up for mass printing we have to be really selective and only take on jobs that we feel confident about. It all depends on the request and our workload. Feel free to contact us with details of what you have in mind (quantity, sizes, # of colours and a picture or description of the design if you have one) and if it’s do-able we can give you a quote.

Anyway, TGIF everyone! We’re going to bake some Crywolf cookies later today so stay tuned for a blog about how they turn out (I’m predicting yummy, adorable, and in our bellies).

xo!

Okay so for some reason I had this blog entry saved as a draft since Thanksgiving! Canadian Thanksgiving! Whups. Well better late then never, right? Here it is, our first recipe entry:

One of the things that I aspire to be good at in life is cooking & baking. I understand that takes a lot of time and practice, and time is something I seem to be wishing for a lot these days! When an occasion arises though, I like to try to make an effort to make something that I can share with family & friends. For this reason, Crywolf blog will occasionally have posts about recipes that worked out (and maybe some that don’t).

For Thanksgiving weekend I was looking for a fairly easy, no-mess, no-stress dessert recipe and I came across a Whole Foods Pumpkin Cream Cheese Truffles (I renamed them Pumpkin Cheesecake Truffles… it just sounds better) recipe on Tastespotting.com. Tastespotting is usually my #1 go-to website for recipes. Super visual, a million recipes and you can search by ingredient. I have been known to waste full hours browsing and drooling. This recipe was perfect because I knew the oven was going to be occupied with a turkey for most of the weekend and these require NO BAKING!

Here’s the recipe along with some notes I added (in colour). The recipe says it makes about 30 but that isn’t accurate… I’d say it makes more like 15 1″ balls. For two families I made two batches where I doubled the ingredients in each batch, so adjust accordingly! Better to have more then not enough.

These truffles pair pumpkin with gingersnap and graham cracker crumbs. For the best results, chill truffles until you’re ready to serve them.

Ingredients

2½ cups white chocolate chunks
1/3 cup gingersnap cookie crumbs, plus more for garnish
1/4 cup canned pumpkin purée
1/4 cup graham cracker crumbs, plus more for garnish
1 tablespoon confectioners’ sugar
1/2 teaspoon orange zest
1/8 teaspoon ground cinnamon (I also used some for garnish)
Pinch of fine salt
2 ounces cream cheese, softened
1/3 cup cinnamon chips (can be found at bulk barn)

Method

Melt 1/2 cup of the chocolate in a double boiler over medium-low heat or in the microwave for about 1 minute. Stir often to keep the chocolate from burning. (The stirring often is SUPER important. Like every 10 seconds to be safe. Burnt chocolate leaves chunks and will ruin your entire batch of chocolate. If you’re doing this in a glass mug or cup, BE CAREFUL when taking it out. Use an oven mitt – that b is hot!). Transfer to a large bowl. Add gingersnap crumbs, pumpkin, graham cracker crumbs, sugar, zest, cinnamon, salt and cream cheese and beat with an electric mixer until smooth. Transfer to a shallow bowl, cover and chill until just solid enough to roll into balls, about 2 hours (If you’re impatient or on a super tight schedule and possibly freaking out like I was, 30 mins in the freezer will do the trick).

Line a large sheet tray with parchment paper. Melt remaining 2 cups chocolate and transfer to a small, deep bowl (I used a mug, but a small deep bowl would have been way more convenient). Roll 1 heaping teaspoon of the pumpkin mixture into a ball in your hands, then drop into the chocolate. Working quickly, gently spoon chocolate over to coat. Using a small spoon or fork, lift the truffle out of the chocolate, shake off excess and transfer to prepared sheet tray. Dollop a bit of extra chocolate on any parts that remain exposed, then sprinkle a few gingersnap or graham cracker crumbs over the top, if you like. (I kind of freestyled here and melted some dark chocolate, poured it into the corner of a ziploc bag and cut a tiny hole in the tip of the corner – the poor gals impromptu icing dispenser – and drizzled some on top before sprinking on the cracker crumbs and a tiny bit of cinnamon). Repeat process with remaining pumpkin mixture and chocolate, then chill truffles until chocolate is completely set, about 1 hour.

ENJOY!

Nutrition

Per serving (3 truffles/63g-wt.): 290 calories (150 from fat), 16g total fat, 10g saturated fat, 15mg cholesterol, 130mg sodium, 32g total carbohydrate (0g dietary fiber, 28g sugar), 3g protein

Last night we took a quick run downtown to bang off some errands. Our pal Steph kindly let us borrow her fog machine so we could take some creepy Halloween photos (will be posted soon) so we returned that to her and also dropped off a bag of old P0isson shirts to Xenia who has organized a really great clothing swap this Sunday at Mercer Union, check out the event details here! We would be going if we didn’t have Thanksgiving festivities to attend to.

While we were down we popped into Le Gallery where our friend Genevieve Jodouin was having an opening for her solo show Take Me Home. As usual, her work was beautiful. Once you step into the gallery you are surrounded by delicate screen-printed paper mobiles, spinning and twisting from the movement of people walking by.

See? Magical.

This is our friend Nick who we took a sneaky photo of while he was probably having an important conversation about art. He had some work in the group show The Maker which was taking place in the other half of the gallery. He is a pretty ok artist I guess, but you can see for yourself here (we kid, he’s amazing).

This is Genevieve looking cute. Congrats on your show girlfriend!

We got caught up in some traffic around Dundas square on the way home. Rose suddenly had the munchies for some street meat. We were barely moving so she got out to get one from the corner. I had only moved up a block by the time she got back, but alas, no hot dog in hand due to a crazy lineup. Moral of the story: Dundas street, you need more street meat vendors.

xo

First off, sorry for the slow updates lately! I have no idea where the summer went!!! June and July just zipped right by. We’ve been busy coming up with new ideas and products and right now we are starting to prep for the CNE, so this time of year is always a little wild! Now until Christmas will be busybusybusy.

The second week of July I spent up North for an annual family trip to Parry Sound. And by family, I mean almost my ENTIRE family. 10 people, 2 dogs. It was the first time both Rose & I were gone from Crywolf Headquarters but I managed to get some sewing done up there as well as take advantage of the nice scenery for some promo shots.

Check out the rest of the set on our Flickr.

On Thursday I’m headed out into the wilderness again for one last break before the madness really begins. While I’m gone, Rose returns from Texas and then we hopefully will see a bunch of you at the CNE where we’ll have a whole bunch of cool new stuff for ya! We’ll be posting the facebook event info soon.

xoxox

My Grandma used to have the most glorious, massive, colorful elevated garden. It spanned the entire length of the backyard of their bungalow and was deep enough that there was even a rock path in the middle that you could walk through. Now that I think back, I have no idea how she was able to upkeep such a massive garden! I’ll have to dig up some photos of it because that garden is one of the things I will never forget about that house, which I miss dearly.

Both of my Grandma’s also kept abundant vegetable gardens. They grew the most delicious cucumbers, tomatoes, carrots, etc. That’s definitely one thing I hope to have in the future, as well as grow my own herbs.

I’m drifting! The point of this post was to celebrate the appearance of a peony in the family garden. We’ve had the plant for years and this is the first time one of the blossoms have bloomed:

Nice, right? Well, it’s disappeared! It was there for maybe a week, and now it’s back to being a boring ol’ green shrub. What the heck? How do you get peonies to bloom and stay? Any tips?

Hope you like the new blog makeover! It’s still in the works but it’s coming along. We decided to start expanding our blog content and so here is our very first CW Product Review.

So, for a while now I’ve been looking for a cheap large black tote, and by large I mean HUGE. More often than not I find myself having to carry more things than I can even handle (ie. 20+ shirts) and lugging around a box isn’t always the most convenient thing in the world. Doesn’t sound like that would be too hard of a thing to find, right? Wrong! I did come across a couple of totes that were perfect in all aspects except for the fact that they cost a small fortune.

This tote by Oak = pretty awesome. Price: $128 = not awesome.

They say that it’s when you’re not looking that you will find and that’s exactly what happened. I randomly came across Baggu bags from someone’s life/style/design blog.

Big Baggu $14

Gives you a better idea of the size.

Along with the big Baggu I also grabbed a regular sized Baggu and a recycled cotton canvas backpack. They have tons of colours and patterns to choose from but what can I say, I’m partial to black.

The customer service was exceptional. Shipping charges were cheap/accurate and it shipped out within 24 hours. The Baggu philosophy is that “good design should be functional, beautiful and affordable. Our goal is to make basic products that fill lots of uses, not just one, so you can own less stuff.” I’m down with that and I feel good about buying stuff that I can use every day for the rest of my life if I wanted to, and in this case it’s very likely that I will do just that.

10 / 10 wolf howls