Photography is such an art. I especially love people who take pictures of animals because they can be so hard to capture at the right time. I had a soft spot for this cat in particular because I know my cats would never sit still long enough for a photo like this:

Isn’t that adorable? It was originally a film print, which is even more cool! And you can find this lovely print at Donna Pool Designs.

Donna is a former freelance photographer, now stay-at-home mom and artist. In addition to the photographs you’ll find in her shop, she also has hand-sewn puzzle balls and plush, ACEOs and lots and lots of buttons made from vintage magazines (these are especially cool … and entertaining).

There’s a lot of really neat stuff, and a lot of the photography is of cats if you’re a cat lover. The ACEOs are neat, too, particularly the ones that feature old cameras! Retro cameras rock!

And if you need custom buttons, this is also a great place to look!

Here’s a sample of more stuff from Donna:

Just ’cause it’s Lent doesn’t mean you have to give up good style or cool jewelry. How about these from Good Friday Designs?

It’s a Mary Poppins charm necklace. Love the umbrella.

Rebecca is the gal behind Good Friday, and she’s a member of the Sacramento Craft Mafia.

Many of her pieces have a vintage flavor (such as the blue necklace above). She finds some great stuff and turns it into cute jewelry. She also carries many themed charm necklaces, including a great All Souls’ Day one that has a big ol’ skull and crossbones.

She’s got a funky style, and if you like that, you should probably go check it out.

There’s nothing like walking into a used bookstore or your local library and perusing all those old cloth-bound books. (Or maybe you’re lucky enough to have a bunch lying around the house). They just don’t make hardbound the same way anymore. Old cloth-bound books rock! Sometimes they’d have weird stains on the covers, but that just added to the charm.

Now, you can get some kickass journals made out of said old books. Something like this:

(The man kind of reminds me of the Monopoly guy. What a cool cover this must have been. I wonder what kind of book it was. But I digress.)

This journal comes from Los Angeles-based Tyler Bender Book Company. Tyler takes old books, painstakingly resizes some of their covers — this particular blue journal happens to be 4 x 6 inches. But there are some full-sized books; there’s a recycled Bible cover adorning one of the journals.

A variety of papers fill the books. Those papers range from the plain lined paper from your school days (college-rule? wide-rule? aaaaaah!) to colored paper to old accounting ledgers (aaaaaaah again!). And each sheet of paper is hand-cut. (Considering most of these journals have 200 pages or so, that’s a heck of a lot of cutting.)

Each book is a surprise, and they’re almost too pretty to write or draw in!

Fellow Sacramento mafiosa Claire recently decided to re-brand and re-open her Etsy shop, and the result is Little Lovelies Handmade.

Claire uses a lot of vintage and recycled materials to make her goods, which include pins, magnets and some of these other things:

The Miss Muffet Pin Tuffet (great name, by the way).

Got a Crush on You card set

Many items are inspired by and named after important women in her life, and should you pick up one of these items, they even come with a story behind the name. Neato.

If you take a look around your house, what kind of odds and ends would you come up with? Maybe some mismatching buttons? Some broken jewelry? A box of stuff from say, the 60s, which you’re not sure what to do with?

Maybe you’d toss it out. Of if you were the fabulous gal behind Tomate d’Epingles, you’d turn it into some pretty fab jewelry:

The motto at Tomate d’Epingles is “Recycled jewelry? How eco-chic!” And chic indeed. The pieces combine vintage finds and recycled pieces (like recycled cloth) with new materials (like say, the copper wire in that ring above). That makes for some pretty unique stuff.

And making something new out of something old is always good in general.

Trés bonne, indeed.

So, which came first, the chicken or the egg?

Perhaps you can ponder that question as you use these potholders from Laughing Duck:

These whimsical potholders feature not only chickens and (fried) eggs, but also drumsticks. One of them had a chicken wire patterned fabric on the back. A pretty funny touch.

Here is a closeup of all the chicken-y goodness:

You may find these potholders for sale here.

Laughing Duck also features a wide variety of things, many fabric-related and vintage-inspired. Carolyn also makes bags, towels, papery things, needle books and a whole lot more! She is also a fab girl who makes excellent cookies — I met her at Handmade Parade and ate a whole bunch of Earl Grey cookies she made. Yum.