So I walked from my apartment on Shore Road up three blocks on 94th Street and then all the way down 3rd Avenue to Bay Ridge Road - about 23 blocks. I was going to catch the train back but decided to walk back.
3rd Avenue is full of little shops - delis, restaurants, specialty stores, markets of all different cultures and only a couple chain stores. Basically a drug store and Starbucks. On the way I stopped at two different stores. First up was The Book Mark Shoppe in the 8400's on 3rd Avenue...
It's a small shop crammed full of books and used books...
A Children's area...
And Yarn!
You can find the shop easily by looking for the tree outside the shop...
The folks in the store are kind and helpful. If you're in the area, check it out. While not as big as The Strand, the big used bookstore in lower Manhattan, it has a great inventory and you can even find yarn and knitting supplies AND a place to sit and knit if you want!
The other store I stopped by was Norma's Arts and Crafts Supplies Store in the 7800's on 3rd Avenue...
This store has a little bit of everything including a lot of children's crafts. As a matter of fact, they offer birthday/craft parties for children as well as classes for both children and adults. And they will order supplies if you need something special.
The shop which is small is the typical size of shops on 3rd Avenue. The supply islands are on wheels so they are easy to move around to accommodate classes.
The prices are extremely reasonable...actually, the stamps and fabric markers were downright cheap compared to other places. Again, if you're in the area, check out the store. The folks are friendly and helpful.
On another note. I was reading some blogs this weekend and one suggested a way to have fun just making marks on paper to explore your creativity. The first thing was to make three different types of marks on a piece of paper and then just have fun making lots more marks.
Before I made the marks, I did color the background by swiping different colored stamp pads across the paper. Then I made the marks and finally, I just had fun. This is the result...
The first three marks I made were the deep pink wide swipes (middle lower left), the purple thin scribbles (right and a bit below the deep pink swipes) and the orange wide scribbles (center above the other two marks). After that, I simply did whatever I wanted to. It was fun and quite liberating. You might want to try it sometime.
Tomorrow, Manhattan and Time's Square...
Thanks for dropping in...
Talk to you tomorrow...