December 2009 Archives

As a result, because of the insane amount of homework and Christmas concerts and whatnot, I haven't done much for EAG. Hopefully over Christmas break the boredom I'll have at home will give me opportunities to do a lot more. :)

Since last week I talked about beads, which I kinda know something about, today I'm going to talk about something that I'm totally clueless about: Pashmina scarves. Apparently, pashmina is a type of cashmere that is made from some special kind of goat hair found in the Himalayas. Who knew? And I mean, I'm not that fond of scarves anyway. I hardly ever wear any accessories like that, they just get in the way when I try to do stuff. I do own a few though, I'll admit. I think I actually have a Pashmina scarf I got when we all went to the global market. The fact that it's made from goat hair is slightly creepy, but I think I'll just forget that fact. I prefer to not know exactly where my textiles come from.

Anyway, back to how these scarves relate to EAG. WELL, since EAG doesn't have a big demand for more modest prom dresses, the scarves are great alternatives for Somali girls whose culture doesn't allow them to wear the more revealing American dresses. Since the scarves are always a hot item, my mission is to find places that sell these scarves and ask them for donations. Online searching doesn't really work in this scenario, so basically I'm going to have to go looking around the Cities for these stores and scout them out to see if they'll work for donating. So once again...if anybody knows where to find this stuff...let me know. Most likely I'll be looking around in January when we return, since I need to get out of St. Paul for a good long while. I'll also be doing some more searching around my hometown, but given the location and population demographics of Elk River...I'm not expecting much. Finding the right stores to ask for donations isn't as easy as it seems - especially when the donations have to be as specific as EAG would like them.

By the way...the title is a play on a quote from a Full House episode that was on recently. Just in case people were wondering where I get my weird titles from.

Researching beading stores in the Twin Cities area is harder than one would think. Besides looking for legit bead stores (as opposed to small hole-in-the-wall places), I also have to look at some that offer jewelry making classes. 

Then after I narrow that search down, I have to find out all of the contact information and start writing letters or calling them. (Just as a refresher, the whole jewelry idea is to check with local beading stores that offer beading classes and seeing if they would be willing to donate the pieces from those classes to EAG). Somewhere in the midst of this chaotic process, I suppose it would also be a good chance to double check that the jewelry would be prom-appropriate, instead of...well, not prom appropriate (I think that concept is pretty self-explanatory). Two promising beading stores in the area that have seemed promising are the Bead Monkey and Bobby Bead. I'm also going to check around my hometown over break, because I know a lot of the crafty people up there.

Well, I guess that's all for now...doesn't sound too exciting or life-changing at the moment, I know. It's all going to be worth it when I see what happens at the boutique in April...