As promised, here is the scoop on some of what will be available THIS Christmas–

A lot of wonderful new things (along with the wonderful old things) from Katherine’s Collection, taken right out of the pages of my Night Before Christmas book. Here are just a few:

A few of these are BIG and of course we plan to decorate our studio with them this year. We’re also doing a tree for  St. Louis Childrens’ Hospital that will be entirely decorated with everything of ours from Katherine’s. I’ll be sure and post pictures of that when it’s up.

Then there are the new paper doll craft books from Leisure Arts. There are 4 of them, with enough different projects for everybody’s skill and interest level. These aren’t available yet but the will be very soon.

And, ta-da! Boxed Christmas cards, available from yours truly at my e-store

ALSO don’t forget, for those pictures of your Christmas-perfect children and/or pets (or for any holiday),  you can get our photo greeting cards at Walgreens.

Of course we have 7 new calendars and all of our “regular” stuff that will be at Michaels , Barnes and Noble, Borders, and other stores, so THAT should at least get you started shopping for this season. And I’ll have MORE cool Christmas stuff to show you next week.

~Mary

We have a new license with one of my all-time favorite companies, Bethany Lowe, and I am very excited to show you what’s coming out in the spring! These things were just shown at the gift show in Atlanta, but we wanted to make sure that all you store owners who were not able to make that show are able to see what is available.

As a matter of fact, we’re starting a new newsletter for independent store owners so that they will be able to see all the new products that we are offering, because we really want to get back into the independent market and support those smaller stores that are hanging in there during these tough times. Sometimes some of the things we produce are only available in certain stores or call for minimum orders that are way too high for smaller stores to handle. We hope to figure out a way to eliminate this problem very soon. If you are a small store owner and would like to receive this newsletter, please visit our website at http://maryengelbreit.insiteadvice.org/contact-me/newsletter/ and signup as a retailer, or send your email address and store information to contactus@maryengelbreit.com and we will add you to our list. And those of you who just love to shop, be sure to let your favorite stores know about this!

Hopefully, our own line of products will be available soon as well— all will be revealed in the magical newsletter, so be sure you’re on the list!

Sometimes it’s hard to merge two distinct lines, as with Bethany Lowe and ME. Bethany’s customers are into Folk art with a capital F and my customers are into ME with a capital ME. We think we’ve done a great job of combining my art with Bethany’s vintage look– we’d both LOVE to know what you think in the comments section below.

PS: Wait until you see the Halloween and Christmas lines for 2011 from Bethany! But enough of this teasing about 2011– next blog: I’ll show you what’s coming out this Christmas!

~Mary

This week we’re featuring a guest speaker here on the Engelblog: Jan, the administrative assistant for ME Studios. Enjoy!

The year before I went to work for Mary, I was her very excited, and “biggest fan” standing in line with my ME tin at the Saint Louis Galleria, waiting for her to SIGN it.  That was 1994.  By 1995, Mary’s “magic” touched my life and I began to work for her.  After six months on the job as receptionist, I became the administrative assistant (or “Adminnie” as they call me) at Mary Engelbreit Studios.

One of my first little “gaffes” was on my first day when Mary said, “I’m going to ‘the store.’”  I thought she meant the grocery store, but, of course, she meant her OWN “Mary Engelbreit Store” which was in the Saint Louis Galleria.  I laughed to (and at) myself when I realized my error, and NEVER made that mistake again.

My favorite ME product line is the “LHFF” line.  The initials stand for Love, Home, Family, and Friend.  To me, these four words embody Mary’s illustrations.

Here I am sitting at my desk with “The QUEEN” behind me!  It took me a while to get used to her looking over my shoulder. 

I like to think I was Mary’s inspiration for the greeting card image “Oh, Great & Powerful . . . ” — which is included here.

In January 2009, I semi-retired from Mary Engelbreit Studios, but work from home via phone and computer during the week, and still come into MES at least one day a week.  It’s the best of both worlds and I’m having a “BREIT” time!

~Jan

I’ve been working on the new 2012 calendar lately– so many great quotes, so little time. One of my favorite parts of getting ready to do a new calendar is looking for the quotes. Of course, the internet makes this much easier, but I still like finding obscure quotation books and finding things that are so old yet still so perfect. And there are lots of new people saying and writing wonderful things, thank goodness. I’ve even illustrated quotes from people like comedian Steven Wright and, in this calendar, actress Jamie Lee Curtis. Here are a couple of the drawings I’ve been working on for this calendar, entitled “Wit and Whimsy” (Now THAT title is all-encompassing and makes it easy to find great quotes!).

If you’re interested, you can get my 2011 wall calendar at your local Barnes & Noble or by clicking here. Here’s the cover:

Do me a favor and post any great quotes that you’d like to share in the comments section. OR you could let us know what you think of the 2012 calendar. OR just say whatever you want, because hey– whatever! We love to hear from you.

~Mary

long time ago, I used to embroider all the time. It was such a great thing to take on car trips or to pick up when I didn’t have enough time to start a drawing but felt like doing something creative. I used to embroider work shirts and jeans for me and boys I was dating (remember, this was back during the hippie scare of the late 60’s and early 70’s, when boys wore their hair long and weren’t afraid of a peace sign or a flower or two on the pocket of their shirt). When Phil and I were dating AND taking long car trips to visit friends all over the country, I embroidered a little red VW camper, his dog Jigsy, and of course, tiny versions of the two of us all across the back of his denim shirt.

Then when the boys came along, I embroidered and appliquéd my way through blankets, onesies, overalls, jackets, and pillows until they got old enough to say the word “stop”.

And then I got busy with the business, and the embroidery took a back seat to drawing until I finally stopped altogether. I started again when Mikayla came along and have even taught her some stitches, but as I’ve said before, if it doesn’t involve a horse or a ball, she’s really just being polite.

Now we have a new book out called “Stitched So Cute” from the ever-fabulous Leisure Arts, and it is SO cute (and thus, appropriately titled) that I might have to take up all this stitching stuff again! Take a look at these darling owl and mushroom pincushions. So many wonderful projects and none of them will take you years to complete—which works for me! Because if there’s one thing I love as much as I love making things, it’s instant gratification. If you decide to get this book, let us see your finished projects– I’d love to show them on the website.

Oh, and one final note– we made almost $6000.00 for Doctors Without Borders with our Haiti print. Thanks so much for all of you who supported this worthy cause by buying a print. Although they’re off our radar now, with new disasters cropping up all the time, Haiti still desperately needs our help, especially with hurricane season in full swing. Anything you can do to help will certainly still be appreciated.

~Mary

It’s been a busy summer so far. We celebrated my birthday here at the studio with a fantastic chocolate cake that was so good we all had to leave early so we could go home and lie down for a while.

Jan had decorated the table with little paper crown confetti and she had cherry jellybeans in little crown cups for everyone. VERY cute, of course, because as you know– Cute-R-Us.

Just last weekend I had a mini-book signing at Tony’s newsstand outside of our studio. Some of you may have seen it when you toured the studio during the Workshop. There was a local food festival (CWE Art Fair & Taste) going on, so we thought it would be a good idea to sign my new cookbook, Fan Fare: 120 Family Favorite Recipes. It was a good idea and we had a lot of fun, but it was hotter than the hinges of Hades, as my mother would say, and at times I seriously wondered if I would live through it.

You can buy the cookbook under much cooler circumstances by ordering it from my website. The first 10 people ordering STARTING TODAY will receive a signed edition!

I’m off for a brief vacation–YAY!– but will be back soon with more news. Don’t forget to go to Michaels and pick up the new tins– they’re really (altogether now) cute!

~Mary

Here’s a little something you might be interested in. I’m doing a bunch of new Easter/spring cards for Papyrus-Recycled Greetings, which will be available this coming spring. I had the idea for one of them during one of our staff meetings in which we were discussing how many cards we needed to provide QUICKLY to PRG– the operative word here being QUICKLY. Here’s the doodle I did on our agenda:

I thought at first I would do it in flat colors with just markers on colored paper…

But I decided it looked too washed out (although it might be good for a fabric design). So I redid it one more time in the old-fashioned way— pen and ink, markers, and colored pencils.  I like this one the best… 

What do you think?

~Mary

We have lots of good news here at the ol’ studio.  First of all, we hired the wonderful and completely charming Amy Medhurst as our new Director of Licensing and Marketing.  The first time we all met her we felt like she had been here forever.  She fit right in, and since she seemed not at all offended or confused by our comments and jokes and the general mayhem that goes on here on a daily basis, we hired her on the spot. A good thing we did, too, as she has already brought several good things to the table (more on that as soon as we sign on the dotted lines) and she has also raised our visibility in the marketplace.  This is VERY good, since we had actually been asked in the past couple of years if I had died.

The other good news is we have just signed a contract with Papyrus-Recycled Greetings for greeting cards.  I had a wonderful run for many years with Sunrise Greetings, but I felt like it was time to shake things up.   I want to make sure the cards are available absolutely everywhere, and we’ll have that with Papyrus-Recycled starting in spring 2011. In the meantime you’ll still be able to get my cards at Barnes and Noble, Office Max, and at many of your local post offices and stationery stores.

And the rest of the good news is that we just have a lot of great new products coming out– a ton of fun things at Michaels (you have to hurry- this stuff sells out really fast!), the world’s cutest, if I do say so myself, figurines from Bethany Lowe and Katherine’s Collection, and of course the new Fairy Tale book, all coming out this Fall.  Stay tuned for more exciting new developments!  I LOVE new developments!

~Mary

I just finished inking in all the drawings for “The Nutcracker.” I had so much fun doing these illustrations, which is strange because I absolutely did not want to do this story. I had seen the ballet and had taken Mikayla to see it when she was younger and we both had the same reaction– we thought it would never end. Mikayla kept asking ”When are they going to start talking??” And for some reason, several things just creeped me out– the evil-looking toymaker, the 7-headed rat king– good grief, who dreamed this stuff up?? (It was E.T.A. Hoffmann, whom I’m sure was a lovely man) I found out I was not alone in my thinking: every time I would tell someone I was going to illustrate the Nutcracker, every single person, save one ballet-o-phile, said “Oh, good– can you make it so it’s not so creepy?” Harper Collins was nice enough to give me complete free-reign on the illustrations and I had so much fun– I don’t think I’ve ever finished the drawings for a book so quickly! I made the toymaker charming and friendly, the Rat King only has one head and of course everyone lives happily ever after (Although Marie’s little brother Fritz is still kind of a jerk).

I’m sure there will be some purists out there who like The Nutcracker just the way it is. For them I put in all the other elements of the story in the illustrations somewhere– a little Nutcracker Where’s Waldo, if you will. Plus they can go sit through that ballet if they want the whole effect. I’ll be home with Mikayla reading my cute, cozy, warm and fuzzy version and I hope you will be, too! But it won’t be out until Fall 2011. This year you’ll be able to get my new Fairy Tale book, and I’ll show you some illustrations from that as we get closer to its’ release. But for now, here’s a little sneak peek at “The Nutcracker.” Leave a comment and let me know if you like it.

Click to Enlarge

~Mary

As promised, here are a BUNCH of more photos of some great people and projects from the MEHC Workshop this past weekend. I especially love all the cool nametags that everyone came up with! I want to thank all of our wonderful panelists, instructors, sponsors and everyone who came. It was a lot of fun. Enjoy!

~Mary