John Lennon play-by-play from my 1980 calendar

December 8th:


and happier days, back in June, after Junior High:







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Belt buckles at the flea market, New Hampshire, 1978

Taken on a field trip to the flea market during summer camp.

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Happy Easter!

From the book "The Lamb Who Went to Paris" (1980) by Julie and Ruth Thayer.

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Channel Thirteen Totebags

The symbol of artistic and cultural charity: PBS in New York City's Channel 13 tote bags. Yours with a donation of $50 or more during pledge drives, the Herb Lubalin-logotyped bags were a ubiquitous in Fairfield County during the 70's and 80's, but now nearly extinct- except in our closet, where they're falling off the shelf.

(and now they're in our shop.)

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Wary Meyers Kids Shop

Open! click here

New things will be added constantly, so check it out all the time!

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Anthology magazine

Our son Fletcher's room is on the cover! Thanks in large part to Keith Kustard and Tomi Ungerer, and of course photographer Seth Smoot and everyone at Anthology.
See a preview of the fantastic issue *here*

More about the stuff in Fletcher's room here and here.
Just out of camera range is the full disclosure of Thomas Trains, Caillou videos, and every plastic truck imaginable.

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Santa Monica Airlines, 1985

My old Santa Monica Airlines skateboard from 1985, designed by Natas Kaupas with a little help from Frank Frazetta (more here). Sold last year on ebay in an even exchange to buy Linda's new Linus bicycle.

I would've liked to have saved it for our son, but it's a little more satisfying trading it for family bike trips than waiting 10 years to see if it's cool enough (It would be- sorry Fletcher). He did get one ride in, though.

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Decorator's Showhouse tote bag, 1981

Courtesy of my mom the decorator, and keeper of old tote bags. (where I learned it)

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Trainspotting

Watching a lot of train videos lately- not my choice, but by the 2 year-old sitting on my lap- and as much as I like Alec Baldwin's Thomas narrations, I'll always try to hook Fletcher up with the old classic, Conjunction Junction. ...and all of its cohorts.


And speaking of conjunctions, here's Fritz Leiber's epic final sentence of Swords And Deviltry (1970):
(Spoiler alert)

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Al Jaffee's Architectural Triumph

From Mad magazine, January 1974. As with Al Jaffee's "If Kids Designed Their Own Xmas Toys", this is one of his genius spreads that I saw in my formative years and always think about when some new project comes along. It was reprinted in a Mad Special in 1980, but other than that I don't think it's anywhere, and it's too awesome not to share.

related: 

http://warymeyers.blogspot.com/2010/12/wary-meyers-plastic-crumpled-paper-ball.html

http://warymeyers.blogspot.com/2010/12/pen-ink.html

http://warymeyers.blogspot.com/2011/02/wary-meyers-installations.html

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Saturday Morning, 1980

Two of my favorite logos arrive in the mail. For some reason I never filled out the card or used the iron-on. Possibly because I was 13 years old and it may have been a little embarrassing. But times were different back then- Saturday mornings were for watching Superfriends and eating bowls of Freakies. So, I joined.

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Linda ♥ John

John Taylor that is. So it says all over her grade school notebooks (Linda Taylor, Mrs. John Taylor, etc...)

Above is a In Fashion magazine from 1985 signed by him, which I found recently at a flea market and surprised Linda with (secretly hoping his corny "LIFE IS GOOD!" line would put the old fires out. Nope!

Here he is with Rio- and what is that crazy vaginesque beanbag he's laying against at 2:04? and should we be manufacturing them?:

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Time to get organizized

New items in our shop include my old Wall-All 3, recently stripped of Wacky Packs, polished, and ready for a new home (or home office).

Also added:
Old Ohio Advertising and Display Lighted Sign Box
2 1970's Little Red Spotlight Fixtures
Small Wooden Bicentennial Shop Class Project
Vintage L.L. Bean Cutting Board
Vintage Dansk Ice Bucket
Stelton Cheese/Bar Knife
1970's Tara Woman Mirror
This Is A Pair Of Levi's book
Needlepoint of a Woman (very cool)
Vintage Bamboo Wallpaper
Mad Tea Party Belt Buckle with Hidden Pipe

click here

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Barn

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Fletcher's room

Like many things in our place, our one-year old son Fletcher's room is furnished with from yard sales, thrift shops, flea markets, and hand-me-downs.
The dressers and cabinets are old George Nelson for Herman Miller- the long glass case originally meant for record albums. The Mickey Myers crayon prints and signed ("For Amanda") Bil Baird Marionette Theatre prints were bought years ago at the Carousel thrift shop in Southport, Ct., which funnily enough is located in the church where I went to nursery school. We found the Stokke crib on Craigslist, from the local window-washer who washes the windows of the local Scandinavian Shop. The mobile has since moved away since I took this photo a few months ago.
Linda's old Eames rocking chair was from the 26th St. flea market and is now home to a Freudian-looking Keith Kustard. The teak monkeys are hanging around a teak floor lamp by Laurel, from a garage sale.

The Kodak Instamatic X-15 camera was a store display from the 60's. The flash cube is actually an electric light.
The wooden sail lamp was made by our friend Fidi.  Over to the left is a giant Marimekko beanbag, and an unphotogenic mass of stuffed animals and books.

The hi-fi system with fun-for-Daddy records including Harry Nilsson's The Point! and my brother's and my old Jim Copp and Ed Brown records, inscribed by them when we were kids and our mother took us to see them perform at Bloomingdale's in Stamford, Ct., in the shadow of the giant Bjorn Wiinblad ceramic fountain.

For more on his room and our inspirations click over to the super nice and extremely patient Jenny Dalton's site: LittleBig Magazine



Below is his room in its previous state as our guestroom:




related:



Julie Merz's room, Boerum Hill, Brooklyn, January 1978. From the incredible, fascinating Nooney Brooklyn Photographs, 1978-1979. From the NYPL Digital archive.

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Heavy Metal 1977-81

Five years of Moebius' best.

From Ebay.
AAAAA+++++!

Related: Bowie at the Beeb:

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1984

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Birthday, 1975

September 4th, 1975. Green Arrow, Superfriends, The Six Million Dollar Man, and Snoopy. Breakfast was probably Quangaroos or Freakies and in all hopefulness dinner was a Libbyland and a Friendly Fribble.

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First I take some triangles....

Besides Richard Scarry and Al Jaffee, another artist-hero of my Marvy Marker-stained youth was Ed Emberley, whose how-to-draw books taught me and countless other kids how simply drawn lines and shapes can be put together to make fish, trains, dragons, spiders, barns, Indians, sauce pans, pigs, hot rods, weirdos, entire worlds, etc...

A rare opportunity to see some of his original drawings and book layouts is on now, so if you're in Los Angeles in the next week (hurry!) you should absolutely check out this show:

From the LA Times:

For generations of creative kids, some of whom are now fine artists, Ed Emberley's step-by-step cartooning manuals such as the 1970 classic "Ed Emberley's Drawing Book of Animals" can be summed up in a few words: Best. Books. Ever. On Saturday, Emberley will make a rare Los Angeles appearance at an exhibition featuring original mock-ups from his beloved drawing books -- 13 of which are still in print -- along with new works.

The show, "Ed Emberley & Friends," will also feature murals by five contemporary artists including curator Caleb Neelon and Los Angeles-based painters Seonna Hong and Saelee Oh -- all of whom learned to draw the Emberley way.

Breaking a drawing down into simple shapes and squiggles, the award-winning children's book illustrator crafted easy-to-follow visual recipes for colorful characters that have an innocent charm and super-cute factor that have endured for 40 years after they were created. (I mean, just look at that little yellow mouse, below.)

For the show, Emberley has created a signed, limited edition of 18-by-24-inch prints of the animals, above, and one of his lessons, right.

Ideal for a nursery or kid's room, and mighty tempting for nostalgic adults who also admire midcentury design, the prints will sell for $30 each. Original Emberley drawings are priced at $300 and all proceeds will benefit children's hospitals and the Art for Kool Kidz program.

The artist reception, which is open to the public, is Saturday from 7-10 p.m. at the Scion Installation L.A., 3521 Helms Ave., Culver City. The show runs until Aug. 7.

-- David A. Keeps

related: Draw a Sasquatch the Ed Emberley Way (Boing Boing)

and

the rarity of The Wizard of Op, including endpapers, at Stopping Off Place, (and the missing couple of pages, but no endpapers, in 1997 gif-style at Maurice D. Wagschal's homepage)

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The Secret Policeman

Sting, resplendent at The Secret Policeman's Other Ball benefit for Amnesty International, 1981.

Also, Message in a Bottle

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