Upcoming Art Show

I'm sewing PlateWraps and painting plates as fast as I can with plans to have a booth at Cause For Paws this Memorial Day weekend. This will be the first time we've taken these plates to Lincoln City, Oregon, and we expect to do very well. I just hope I can get enough made between now and then so we don't sell out too early. We'll have some limited-edition PlateWraps made with cats and dogs on 'em just for this event. I'll post pictures of these PlateWraps sometime in the next couple of weeks.

If you want one of these fun PlateWraps, come to the art show early before they sell out. Come see us at the Lincoln City Cultural Center, by the D-Lake beach access in Lincoln City, Oregon on Saturday May 24, 2008!

Here is some information about Cause For Paws, as described by River Stone (who knits the most beautiful hats, by the way...)

Shop handmade and help us reach our goal of raising $20K during this 2 day Artist for Animals extravaganza! Artists will donate 20% of their proceeds. Cash donations will also be welcomed!

Artists & crafter's from around the NW will gather together in support of animal kind! Over 100 vendors are expected for this fund raising festival. Join us for a weekend of handcrafted shopping!

.

New flavors

Three new fabrics are being made into PlateWraps this week, and I'm so excited.

Rachel picked out the zebra because it reminds her of her art teacher. We decided the only thing that could do justice to the back side was fuschia. This PlateWrap will be named "Wild Thing."

The second is a pretty mottled pink and yellow fabric with pink sunflowers stamped on it. Since I tend to buy fabrics I love, and then hoard them, this one has been sitting in the fabric cabinet for almost a year. Of course, it was purchased for the purpose of making PlateWraps, so a couple days ago it was cut into circles and is now graced on the backside with a lovely buttery yellow fabric. Perfect for Spring.

The third is a monochromatic purple swirly pattern that caught my eye. Rachel thought it would look great with a black band around the backside, but after sewing two I changed my mind to red. I love red and purple together. Besides, maybe some ladies in the Red Hat Society would like to have this color combination on their plate. Hint, hint, ladies.

Can't wait to finish these up and get them over to our shopping site, Etsy.
I'd love to know what you think of these colors.

About the following blogs (below this post):

These were transferred over from our Plate Diaries and will appear to be posted out of date order.

Anything above this point will show the correct chronology.
Thanks for understanding.

News from July 2007

I'm so excited to announce that the construction crews have packed up and gone home. The entire Pass It On Plates website is complete!

It's taken years of work to get to this point. We started with that first plate left behind by mistake after a pot luck dinner to starting a business making and selling plates that are supposed to be left behind on purpose. Or passed on.

Psst! Pass It On Plates make re-gifting cool.

So... What's new to those who've been helping this process along?
Our Plate Diaries are set up in a Blog format. I really wanted to get these set up this way with RSS so people had a chance to keep an eye on their plates as they travel from place to place. I also knew this would be the best way to integrate an events calendar into the site. We really need a calendar to keep everyone up to speed on our upcoming fund-raisers, in-home Pass It On Plate parties, and our Plate Diary contests. We have a lot of fun planned!

And for those of you who know me personally, I really have a hard time keeping things serious and "Normal." I try to be normal, really I do, but I get bored and find the need to perk things up by adding a little of the unexpected into the ordinary. To this end, we are working to add a Monkey Alert to our Plate Diary blog. Any time the word Monkey is entered, an alert should pop up to let you know there's a monkey present. I though of tweaking this to be a cookie Alert, but I'm afraid most of the Plate Diaries will have alerts on them. That could get old.

Monkeys, on the other hand... not so hum-drum.

Meanwhile, if you want the current status of what we're up to with Pass It On Plates, please subscribe to the blog. Find the little orange RSS chicklet in the sidebar and click on it. (Mom, that would be the cute little orange square with a white rainbow drawn on it.)

So anyway, all parts of the site is finally up and running. Yay!

Cheers,
Pam

News for August 2007

We have a lot going on this month, in both locations.
...Both Locations? What "Both Locations?"

Yep, we have two Pass It On Plates studios now. The original one is in Salem, Oregon and the new one is in northern Wisconsin.

As you may (or may not) know, Donna is opening our Wisconsin Pass It On Plates studio. She has been working hard to get everything set up and ready to go. She's also working on building a team of artists to create the PlateWraps and other products. She's also been dreaming up new PlateWrap designs for fall, and is developing some really exciting products to round out our core selections.

At our Salem studio, one of our artists have created some neat new Pretty Little Doo Dads out of organza ribbons and beaded wires, so be sure to keep your eye on our products page for when they're released. We also have some miniature picture frame duos in the works as well as some Tie-One-On Pretty Little Doo Dads.

With Halloween coming just around the corner, (can you believe it?) we will soon feature some fun Halloween fabrics on a pre-Holiday sale, so you can get your PlateWraps in time for them to pass from friend to friend at least a few times.

One last note: If your group is planning to sell Pass It On Plates for a fund raiser, be sure to book your dates as soon as possible, as our calendar is filling up.

So much new stuff coming up! I'll post pictures as soon as they're ready.
Cheers !
Pam

Chai Tea and Date Bread

Simple and delicious. Try it with other tea flavors.

Ingredients:
1 1/2 cup chopped dates
1 1/4 c boiling water poured over 3 chai tea bags, steeped 2-3 minutes (to make strong tea)
2 Tbsp butter
1 beaten egg
2 c all purpose flour, sifted
1/3 c sugar
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt

Preheat oven to 325F, grease bread pan.

In a large bowl, pour the tea over the dates, add butter, and stir to combine. Let sit approx 15 minutes or until room temperature.

Stir in the beaten egg. Add the dry ingredients at once, stirring just until combined. Pour into greased bread pan and bake 1 hour or until toothpick inserted into the center of the loaf comes out dry.

Let cool to room temperature. Wrap tightly in plastic wrap, then refrigerate overnight before slicing.

White Truffle Cheese Dip

Ginny just posted this recipe on her plate diary and we have to say it looks heavenly. We suspect this would be equally good as a spread in a roast beef sandwich, too. If you visit TruffleZone, please let them know you heard about them from us.
- Pam at Pass It On Plates


Here's Ginny's recipe for the cheese dip:
1 block of cream cheese, softened
3 cloves of garlic, pressed
1 shallot, minced
3 white truffles, finely minced
salt, pepper, and rice vinegar to taste

Mix everything together, adjust seasoning (I like my dip heavy on the black pepper, garlic, and truffle) and let it sit for a couple hours in the fridge. I put it in a dish lined with plastic wrap and unmolded it on the plate. It's really good with Stacy's pita chips. (Hopefully the movie we plan to watch will be just as good!)

You can get the white truffles at www.trufflezone.com They're not that outrageously expensive and soooo worth it. The TruffleZone people have been at the Beaverton farmers market in the past, and I'm hoping they'll be there again this year.
-Ginny

Where Can I Buy Pass It On Plates?

We are currently selling Pass It On Plates online at Etsy.
Check our website at www.passitonplates.com to see our market and fair selling schedule.

Here are the patterns currently offered online through Etsy:




If you would like a custom plate and PlateWrap, please contact Pam at pam [at] passitonplates [dot] com and she will be happy to discuss your special request.

Wholesale requests welcome.
.