…& a heart for our earth

we love to work on special projects for our customers, & this past holiday was no exception. J&S customer, elizabeth h. donated a dress that her grandmother had made for her back in the 70s. elizabeth wanted us to make special bags for her & her family that incorporated the fabric from the dress. we were happy to make elizabeth 3 bags, that all went together &  had a special, personal touch.

elizabeth was kind enough to send us a photo to share of her, with her sister & niece, & their J&S bags!

looking back at 2009, we had quite a busy & prosperous year! we threw a fashionable party for the launch of our autumn collection; had our bags on display, as part of an art installation that we created; started a website & blog for our customers to follow us & buy our bags; & our handbags are now featured in two area boutiques: clarkston flower shoppe & after the rain [milford]. in addition to all of that, we took the brand to the next level with new marketing, & saw our product evolve from jeans & t-shirts to beautiful, detailed bags made from upholstery & other recycled materials. this year, we also introduced 100% bags, all made from recycled & donated materials, & containing no unnatural dyes. as the year came to a close, we can confidently say that we ended 2009 on a good note, as we completed about 25 bags for the holiday season & finally moved our self into a real office!

so what’s new for 2010? a lot! we hope to reach out to new customers & create more environmental awareness through our product. we hope that you, our fans, will spread the word about who we are & what we do, to more friends & family. this year, we look forward to creating new bags that more people will fall in love with. in addition, we’re excited to take on projects that will help our customers’ vision for the “right bag”, become a reality.

we have some special new projects that we are currently working on right now, so check back with us to see how these custom orders unfold!

so happy new year friends! we look forward to meeting & working with new people. may 2010 bring all of you good fortune & happiness!

peace & love…

stina diane & tami elizabeth

while surfing the web the other night, i read about this 5 year old little boy from south lyon. some of you may have heard about him on the local news. but he has neuroblastoma cancer & is dying. his family currently has hospice care at their home, & they don’t believe he will make it until christmas. so the family is celebrating christmas early this year! the boy’s name is noah & his last wish is to get lots of christmas cards this year. what a wonderful & easy thing to do to brighten this little boy’s last days! i’m telling everyone i know about noah, so that they can send cards to him. feel free to copy & paste this story to your blog, facebook, or forward it in an email!

if anyone is intested in sending noah a card for christmas, i have his address:

noah boirkman

1141 fountain view circle

south lyon, mi 48178

peace & love

tami elizabeth

it may be getting colder outside, but the bags at J&S just keep getting hotter! check out this new design we made for the clarkston flower shoppe & chi chi la la boutique:

we’d like to introduce you to AVA, the newest of our 100% bags. both of these versions are made from donated fabric, denim & clothing, as well as second-hand upholstry. they’re each unique in their own details, but both bags have the same square body.

AVA is for sale at the clarkston flower shoppe & chi chi la la boutique. for more information, visit their website at http://www.clarkstonflowershoppe.com/ or click on the link above.

we know you haven’t seen anything new on our website, but that doesn’t mean that we haven’t been busy creating! right now, our focus is on filling outstanding orders for our customers. but in the meanwhile, you can see what we’re up too, here, on our blog! we’ll be posting exclusive pictures of  our latest designs & most current creations. & if you have an order with us, you may even see your bag come to together!

last week, we completed a custom order, featuring a new design. we would like you to meet SUZANN. she is one of our 100% bags- made from second-hand upholstry, recycled fabric, & donated denim.

[SUZANN was a custom creation for sue l. of michigan.]

sure our bags are eco-friendly & fashionable. but did you know that they help out local communities too? throughout the year, we create custom handbags & donate them to local charities, for fundraising events.

this october, J&S designed & passed along an ELIZABETH bag for the wayne county non-profit, looking for my sister. LFMS provides support, programs, & education on domestic violence. it is a place for women to reach out to, when they need help dealing with abuse. this week they are hosing their annual gala event, “a cruise for a cause”, & we’re very excited to help them out.

the bag we created exclusively for LFMS is based off of ELIZABETH, from our autumn collection. ELIZABETH is one of our special bags because she is made 100% green. but what does that mean? ELIZABETH is created from recycled fabric, second-hand upholstery, & a donated leather belt. there are no dyes or chemicals used & all materials that were purchased, we bought second-hand. so nothing newly manufactured went into the making of her. our 100% bags are the greenest products we have to offer.

since ELIZABETH will be at the LFMS event, we wanted to share with you some pictures of how she came together.

if you or someone you know is a victim of domestic violence, please know that you’re not alone. there are people who will listen & want to help you enjoy a more positive life. please check out looking for my sister at www.lookingformysister.org for more information.

do you read the packaging  on your products? when you reach for the morning o.j., are you sure your juice is 100% organic & free of potentially harmful chemicals? what about your recycled paper? do you know where its content comes from? if you’re like me, you probably assume that when the box says, “all natural” or “biodegradable”, that the product i’m buying is the eco-friendly & healthy.

sometimes, companies throw out “green”-sounding words to lure people into buying their product. & sometimes people [like me] fall for it & buy it. so i wanted to know what’s really going on with all those eco-friendly sounding labels.  here’s what I found about some of the common terms you see when strolling through the grocery store….

[natural]     i think this is the most popular word to grace the packaging of goods. the biggest thing i learned, is that calling something “natural” is making an undefined claim. it’s just a term that companies can throw out there to make their product sound more appealing. there is no standard definition for the word, which means that individual standards can very from company to company.  however, this does not mean that all natural claims are false. i did learn one interesting tidbit- you can use natural when it comes to meat & poultry processing, & it is considered a legal term.  So i guess mickey d’s hasn’t been lying to us about the chicken nuggets after all!

[organic]     this is another common term that i found has a few meanings, too. but what does organic ally grown really mean? organic food is grown or produced without toxic pesticides & fertilizers, synthetic hormones, antibiotics, sewage sludge , GMOs [genetically modified organisms], or irradiation.  & for clarification on those labels: “100% organic”- states the obvious, all ingredients are organic. “organic”- 95% of ingredients are organic. “made with organic products”- at least 70% of the ingredients are grown organically.

[recycled paper]     buyer beware! i was surprised to learn that recycled paper isn’t always what it seems. manufactures can still claim that paper is “recycled”, when in fact, it could have as little as 10% recycled fibers! that means the other 90% still comes from virgin tree pulp! so check the package. if there are 3 white chasing arrows on a black background, your paper is made from 100% recycled materials. if the arrows are black on a white background, your paper is made from recycled & virgin fibers. manufactures are required to disclose what percentage of the paper is made from actual recycled fiber. to make sure that the paper you’re buying is really made from post-consumer recycled materials, look for these letters: PCC [post-consumer content] & PCW [post-consumer waste].

hopefully you learned a few things too. all of the information i found is taken from its easy being green: a handbook for earth-friendly livingby crissy trask. it’s an extremely resourceful book, full of great tips, websites & businesses to check out, & it clarifies a lot of terminology that i was unsure & unaware of. i recommend checking it out.