Tuesday, June 23, 2009

Hi, I'm Alita





That's pronounced uh-lee-ta.
By day I'm a librarian; been a teen librarian for the last 5 years, before that I was a librarian at a local art museum.
By night I'm a lot of different things: couch potato, knitter, artist, daydreamer, someday author (see the previous)... I could go on forever.
I'm also the creator of Hair Ware. www.hairware.etsy.com Fun and frivolous barrettes for the individual person. I use a lot of toys and polymer clay in my barrette making. I like to make things I would want to wear. And I've heard that they would sell better in person than on Etsy, so I'm going to start selling at craft fairs with the tutelage of my friend Jennifer. I'm hoping my first one will be in September.

In the beginning


During the 80s when I was a kid, I could find all kinds of fun hair barrettes at the local drug store. They were the same ones that all my classmates were wearing, but that didn't matter. There were animals and geometric shapes with plastic swirls and so many lovely colors. Kind of like the combs on the right, except they were barrettes ( I couldn't find a photo, I'll have to keep looking).
A few months ago I realized I was excessively bored with barrettes available at my local drug store. I looked in other stores as well: target, Sally's Beauty, Kroger; I even looked on the internet. It was all the same or super expensive.
One evening while I was at a craft night with my friends Alicia and Jessy, I was playing with Alicia's supplies and found a plastic lizard toy. After looking at it for a moment, I decided "This would make a great barrette." Alicia found a clip and glue for me, and I had a lizard barrette.
I wore it and people loved it! So I decided to make more... that's where
it all began--with the Party Lizard Barrette.