This Wednesday, January 25th, 2012 from 9pm until midnight at Akbar it’s CRAFTNIGHT!!!
Project: Beaded Flower Clip
$2 Processing fee, please!
$4 Cosmopolitans! Think with a pink drink!

 
If you’re procrastinating on the internet, I’m glad the series of tubes brought you here to the CraftNight site, where we’re going to be REALLY INTO BEADS this week. Bring your procrastinating self over to Akbar, and use our activity as a gentle distraction from whatever ELSE you’re “supposed to be doing.”
CraftNight endorses a bit of vagueness, confusion and fuzzy-mindedness.
Enhanced clarity isn’t everything.
You see, I have news for you: You’re never going to catch up. There will always be more paper, people, pineapples and peanuts to deal with in the course of your lifetime. Levels of efficiency and quality will always be part of the great cyclical whirlwind of stuff that permeates the daily joys of existence. It’s not about cutting out the fun, it’s about balancing the drudgery with the funnery in a way that makes you throw your hat in the air like Mary Tyler Moore on the Mary Tyler Moore show.

I’m not saying “Don’t plan things” since, as we all know, taking 10 t0 12 minutes to plan one’s day saves the average planner 100 to 120 minutes! I’m saying maybe “Don’t plan things ALL THE TIME and HAVE SOME FUN” since, as we all know, sticking to the plan all the time is kind of boring, and routines are meant to be broken.

Besides, I have an important task for you, it’s so important, you’ll have a burning desire to start and finish it, which will kickstart your endorphins into overdrive and get you addicted to starting and finishing other things! It’s called a beaded flower clip, it involves (duh) beads, and you can either string’em together into the awesome shape of a flower, or just get crazy and make whatever you want out of the materials!

Make a necklace make a key fob make a dangling groovy handle for your backpack zipper!
Give it to your friend, give it to your lover, give it to the butcher the baker the candlestick maker!
This flower is going to start you on the road toward ultimate productivity, but ONLY if you STOP productivity NOW to procrastinate on your projects in order to come join us and play with this project.

Taxes can wait.
The cat can wait.
Your boss can wait wait wait.
You’ll have such a positive experience making this flowery thing, you’ll have guaranteed results!
Develop the habits of success! Make a beaded flower clip! Come to CraftNight and be a winner! Wooooooooo!

See you at the Craft Table,
JP Craft Captain

Akbar’s Site

CraftNight’s Site

This Wednesday,  January 18th, 2012 from 9pm until midnight at Akbar it’s CRAFTNIGHT!!!
Project: Dragon Noise Makers (Karate Kid Style)
$2 Processing fee, please!
$4 Cosmopolitans! The Akbar Cosmo: Your key to a better tomorrow
Don’t panic, if your new year’s resolutions are already shot, the good news is that January 1st is only one little interpretation of THE NEW YEAR. Luckily, another new year’s celebration is right around the corner, and it’s a whopper! China celebrates the new year for TWO WEEKS! It’s a comprehensive series of days, each with it’s own special meanings and tasks. I can’t even begin to pack it all into this post without becoming Wikipedia, but here are some of the things it entails: Cleaning, Forgiving, Visiting, eating, Writing your name on a mandarin and throwing it in the river, guiding spirits home, making lanterns, firecrackers, dragons, have your fortune told, giving people money in little red envelopes.
So you know, do the new year again, it’s the year of the DRAGON, it’s kind of a big deal. Out with the old and in with the new, expel the negative chi from your life and breathe in energy, vitality and unbridled enthusiasm! To make sure that everyone knows you are enthusiastic, we’re making dragon-themed noisemakers, the kind everyone used to cheer for Ralph Macchio in Karate Kid: Part II. Here’s what I’m talking about, keep in mind, the noisemaker situation doesn’t really present itself until after the dramatic build-up until about 3:40 or so:

This could be YOU (metaphorically speaking, of course). We’re making these… the cheap imitation cardboard version, not the fancy kind made out of wood and animal skin that Mr. Miyagi is using. And no, Mr. Miyagi isn’t Chinese, he’s Japanese, but let’s not turn into Wikipedia again so I can end this post. I’ll bring paints so you can really do it up.
See you at the Craft Table,
JP Craft Captain

Akbar’s Site

CraftNight’s Site

Captain

I’m writing this from an Amtrak train approaching Los Angeles.
I’m writing it on my phone.
This is crazy.
YES CRAFTNIGHT! Wednesday!
YES 9pm – midnight yes at Akbar, yes yes yes!
Easter looms, eggs go boom, put ‘em in a basket, not yer hands!
See you at the craft table,
JP Craft Captain

Easter Peep and Roses photo courtesy of S. Gallagher

This Wednesday, January 19th, 2011 from 9pm – 12(ish) at Akbar, it’s CRAFTNIGHT!!!

Project: Tin Can Crafts • $2 processing fee, please

Drink Special: $4 Cosmopolitans

I bet you didn’t know that January 19th is Tin Can Day. Seriously, this was the actual day of the birth of the tin can, and the actual date that the tin can was patented in 1810! The first tin cans were so thick, you had to hammer at them like crazy. Like many “technologically advanced” inventions, it was a pain in the arse, but developments were still in the works.

In 1835, someone decided to put BEER in cans, and then pop-top cans appeared in 1959 making it a total party. Since then the cans have gotten thinner, we have fancy tools to open them, and the things inside of cans these days will blow your mind right out the window with all the leaves. If you don’t believe me, check out this blog of the weirdest stuff in cans, it’s got pictures! The trusty tin can is still entirely recyclable, corrosion resistant, and durable, and I think, very worthy of honor and merit.

So we’re going to do CAN crafts, we’ll have tin cans, and felt, foam, and glue, and some ideas, and we’re going to have a good ol’fashioned can-crafting party. You can make a string telephone, a pencil holder, a bank, a treat jar, salt and pepper shakers, vase, toothbrush holder, tea bag holder, etc.

And NO I’m not bringing tin snips or nails for you to punch holes in the cans. DRINKING and SHARP OBJECTS DO NOT MIX! But if you want to bring your own tin snips at your own risk, go ahead! If a fellow crafter wants to borrow your tools… smell their breath and ask them how many fingers you’re holding up, then use your best judgement.

Neither Akbar nor CraftNight is responsible if you slice through your finger, poke out your eye or remove someone’s spleen, you hear me? I can’t believe I actually had to type that, but California (The Golden State) is full of surprises… and court rooms.

I am gathering as many tin cans that I can find before CraftNight, if you have any that you don’t need, would you mind contacting me? I’ll take them off your hands! Here, you can use this handy contact form…

See you at the Craft Table,

JP Craft Captain

CraftNight’s Site

Akbar’s Site

TONIGHT! This very Wednesday, July 28th, 2010 at Akbar from 9pm until 12 it’s CRAFTNIGHT!!!

Project: Compass Necklaces ($2 processing fee, please)

Special Guest: DJ DIRT HOLE! (That’s right, the dirtiest, the holiest, spinning sounds that will launch you into your booty-shakin’ dreams come true!)

Face it: CraftNight happens in a bar. It is absolutely going to be raucous night here with DJ DirtHole spinning tunes, probably you will have a few drinks. And sometimes when drinks are had, people lose their way. For the hot summer nights of the past, and the hot summer nights to come, I bring you the COMPASS NECKLACE. Sport one of these beauties along with your outfit coordinates, and you will never lose your way. You’ll be able to make it back to the bar, should you drift off in a directionless haze after one too many of our delicious $4 cosmos (Akbar’s Wednesday drink special).

Not only is it helpful in the bar, but it’s camping season, right? This safety-minded precision instrument can be decorated any way you wish, you can wear it while navigating the freeways, figuring out where you are in Burbank, figuring out which direction to pitch the camping tent, or simply dawn it as a sassy talisman that says “I know where I’m going.”

See you at the Craft Table,

JP Craft Captain

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