2025

Nov 2025

 

Hi friends,

I hope you’re all doing well! It is currently the late afternoon but it feels like midnight outside. As I am writing this newsletter, Peach has snuck onto my lap. She’s been doing that a lot lately… maybe she doesn’t like how windy it has been these days and is hanging out for warmth. It only took 5 years for her to finally be a lap cat haha. 

Speaking of time… this season is breezing by too fast! There’s been so much to do and I’ve been busy with the shop; which means I’ve mostly been working at home or waiting in line at the post office. The other day I thought about making a “waiting in line” playlist haha. So far I have… “Time After Time” by Cyndi Lauper and “Please Mr. Postman” by The Marvelettes.

Hopefully I can make some time to sew some gifts for my family in the next few weeks. Last month, I finally finished sewing my pants from my sewing class.

⚘ Bonfire Shop Update ⚘

I shared new items earlier this month in a separate post/email but I forgot to share that I updated some shirt designs in my Bonfire shop. I ordered one shirt for myself just to see how my design would look in person and I’m really happy with the new pocket size/placement. Also, if you have a short torso like me, there are shorter and cropped tees available now.

⚘ Small Business Sale: 25% Off Discount Code ⚘

Small Business Saturday is on the 29th, but I wanted to offer the sale early 🧡 Please use the code SUGARMAPLE at checkout to get 25% off your order. The discount will be available until the end of November in my main shop (justinegilbuenashop.com). Thank you so much!

⚘ En route: October Art Mail ⚘

The October art mail was sent out earlier this month 

(Tabitha's Tailor Shop Postcard, Sewing Bird Sticker)

⚘ November Art Mail Sketches ⚘

Since it has been so busy, I decided to look at my “drawing list” for ideas. One idea that I had written down a few months ago was a frog eating pancakes at a diner. So this month’s art mail is inspired by my D&D character… Fig, a healer frog. During one of our D&D sessions, Fig ordered 7 stacks of pancakes (3 per stack) before a quest.


Felix will be the featured Patreon pet in this month’s postcard. 💛


The sticker will be a frog juggling pomegranates. At first, they were juggling tomatoes but I wanted it to be a wintry fruit. 


Below is the postcard sketch and finished sticker drawing…

(If you’re interested in this month’s snail mail, I’ll send them out to any new patrons that sign up for the $10 tier between now and the end of the month. Please note, I will mail November snail mail during the first week of December.)

Pomegranate Juggler is also available as a greeting card in the shop…

⚘ Favorite Little Things ⚘

I recently bought a washi tape dispenser from Galen Leather and it was packaged with so much care. It felt really special and thoughtful with all their little details. It was really inspiring!

Okay I think that’s all for now, I hope you all continue to have a great week! 

💛 Justine

Shop Update: New Items & Restocks

Hi friends! I hope you're all doing well!

I've been under the weather this past week but I'm finally on the mend. It's been a tea and soup-filled week so I can't complain haha!

I wanted to quickly share some of the new items in the shop! And also, new packaging!

So, I needed to make some changes to certain things such as my packaging in order to help reduce costs (it costs more to have a variety of different backer cards). While I'm going to miss my old card design, at the same time I'm very excited to design something new. I hope you like it too!

This is a new variant of my Croissant Lover pin design. I only have 5 in stock because most of the batch was not good unfortunately (not even as a seconds pin).

Going forward, I've decided that I won't do screen printed pins anymore because they're more likely to have imperfections. So this will be the last batch of Croissant Lover pins but I do plan to use my design as a future patch instead.

I'm really happy with how all the charms turned out though! I had them made smaller than my pins and the size is just so stinkin' cute!

Also, new packaging for my patches! I decided to make my future patches larger (around 3") so I needed to change the packaging. The sampaguita/jasmine patch in the photo below is 2" ... I'm hoping the new patches will arrive by the end of this month.

I think that's all for now! I hope you all have a wonderful and restful new week!

Jun 2025

 

Hi friends! I hope you’re all doing well. 

I feel strange writing a monthly newsletter sometimes knowing that there are so many more important things to think about and focus on in the world. At the same time, I do think it’s important to check in and hopefully provide a little bit of a safe space here. 

I was reminded of this on Friday after playing a virtual game with friends. We’re all experiencing different things in our lives and living on opposite ends of the country and we’re all feeling a similar sense of sadness and doom. And there’s something really special about being part of a group where we make time to meet twice a month to work together and figure out this unfamiliar game (to us) called Dungeons and Dragons. 

It’s funny because I was hoping to join an online writing workshop this summer and I find that D&D is kinda like that. It’s a fun way to build a fictional world and to think deeply about your characters. It’s also interesting to see the different perspectives that the other players/characters bring and how they react and move about in our shared world.

Anyway, here is my character below. Their name is Figaro "Fig" Fleming. They are a Nakudama Cleric with a penchant for healing others with food. I also sketched out a mini comic from our first session where Fig wakes up from a nightmare.

Since we started playing last month and I spent some time thinking about my character, it inspired me to think about the characters for this month’s postcard. Here is the sketch I have so far…

I decided to draw sardines with tomato for the June sticker which also inspired the pattern for this summer’s bookmark.

I printed the drawing as a greeting card and recently placed an order with my manufacturer to print out my summer bookmark pattern as one of my new washi tape designs.

Here’s a sneak peek of my two washi tape designs:

I’ve been embracing brighter colors in my work and they do make me happier. I’ve also brightened my pin packaging too!

⚘ In Transit ⚘

The May snail mail was sent out the first week of June! While working on the postcard drawing, I decided to change the sketch because the angle and house shape looked too similar to April’s postcard drawing with the crow.

(Wisteria House postcard & Rabbit Journaling sticker)

⚘ Favorite Little Things & Book Finds ⚘

Some secondhand books I recently picked up! Ocean Vuong’s book has been on my list for so long so I was very excited to pick that up!

That’s all for now! Thanks for being here and listening/reading! 💛

💛 Justine

Feb 2025

 

Hi friends, 

I hope you’re all doing well! This weekend was cold and gray but today was finally a bit sunnier. I took a few photos of pigeons on my way to the post office and had many cups of chai right after (chai always makes the day better). It has not been a joyous January but I’ve been trying to find ways of including small amounts of joy into my daily life. I hope you’re able to do the same.

One of the things that I’ve been doing is watching old films for inspiration! I love the fast dialogue and humor in Bringing Up Baby, the tiny adventures in Roman Holiday, the light and shadow play in Arsenic and Old Lace, and the apartment layout in Rear Window.

Btw Cary Grant’s expressions and physical acting reminds me so much of a pigeon… 

While watching these movies, I was able to finish my speckled scarf! I used Lion Brand Heartland yarn (in black canyon tweed) with their Black Bear Scarfie pattern. I’m excited to start a new knitting project so I’ll be joining the lovely bandwagon and will try to knit the Sophie Scarf by Petite Knit. I bought the Compatible Cashmere - Knitting for Olive yarn (in dusty dove blue) from La Mercerie.

It feels nice to knit again and have it be part of a routine. Also, I dropped off the January knitting-related snail mail today:

This month’s snail mail will be a silly ice skating scene postcard inspired by Wollman Rink in Central Park. The postcard will include a patron’s pet. I’ve been sketching foxes lately and thought about how hot chocolate always sounds nice after ice skating so that’s basically the inspiration behind the sticker, haha. 

Here are my sketches so far…

If you’re interested in this month’s snail mail, I’ll send them out to any new patrons that sign up for the $10 tier between now and the end of the month. Please note, I will mail February snail mail on March 3rd.

⚘ Shop Update ⚘

I’ve been busy restocking the shop and also adding a few new items: cicada charm, snail mail charm, hummingbird needle minder (sold out), coffee cat (gray) pin

I’m excited to make new designs but I've spent some time experimenting and reconfiguring things with my shop. In this process with finding new manufacturers, I’m slowly restocking old designs first. 

I’ve recently restocked:

  • butter cookie sewing kit needle minder (sold out)

  • butter cookie sewing kit pin

  • camera pin

  • cat nap (black and orange) pins

  • cicada pin

  • coffee cat (orange) pin

  • coffee sandpiper pin

  • hedgehog pin

  • hummingbird (green) pin (sold out)

  • mushroom mug pin

  • pigeon notebook charm 

  • pigeon pin

  • snail mail pin

  • tea kettle pin

That’s all for now! Oh, and if you have any old film recommendations, please let me know. :) Thanks so much! 

💛 Justine

Jan 2025

 

Happy new year, friends!! 💛 

I hope you’re all doing well and having a gentle and warm start to the new year. Towards the end of Autumn, I sometimes think about how much I will miss the leaves outside my window… But looking out now, I still love the winter trees. And as they go dormant until Spring, I’m reminded that it’s important to slow down and take my time with things, especially after the holidays.

Speaking of the holidays, my partner and I wanted to change up our usual gift giving traditions. Instead, we decided to do what we called, “Home Improvement Christmas!” Together, we bought a lot of the things for our home that we’ve been thinking about for a while. Things like lamps/lights, frames, and a few other things to make the space cozier and way more organized. The timing was perfect too since we hosted family in our small apartment for the first time! (At least for a bit before we all went out for dinner in the neighborhood to celebrate the holidays - and I unfortunately forgot to take a photo of the restaurant, but it was a very festive New Orleans-themed place.)

With all the festivities, Peach was quite the introvert haha! Though, now that things are calming down, she is very happy that she gets her spot on the couch back (she’s like a tiny Sheldon Cooper).

I also got to spend a few days with my niece and nephew. It was nice to take a break from work with them and we even had a chance to do some knitting together while watching a bunch of holiday movies (both good and bad).

I’m working on a scarf! Here’s my progress so far… I love speckled yarn/anything, confetti and sprinkles make me so happy!

Speaking of knitting! This month’s snail mail will be a combination of ideas from my last Patreon postcard poll. I’m tying together “knitting the longest scarf” with “a snowy houseboat” - and it will feature a patron’s pet! The sticker will be a close-up drawing of the snowy houseboat since it will be small next to the whale on the postcard. 

Here is my sketch so far…

If you’re interested in this month’s snail mail, I’ll send them out to any new patrons that sign up for the $10 tier between now and the end of the month. Please note, I will mail January snail mail on February 1st. 

⚘ LAST MONTH’S SNAIL MAIL ⚘

The snail mail for December was a Quilt Fort postcard, Tailorbird Quilting sticker, and Winter Bookmark.

 That’s all for now! I hope you all continue to have a restful month! 

❄️ Justine