SouleMama Sponsor ~ Artterro ~

 

Today, we bring you a giveaway from SouleMama Sponsor, Artterro .  In Forrest Espinoza words, founder of Artterro :

"Artterro is all about creativity!  We design our eco art kits to offer an engaging experience with fresh fun projects and artist quality materials.  Prepare to be inspired and delighted as you design beautiful jewelry, fanciful bubble wands, sophisticated storybooks and more.  Helping people tap into their creativity with fun, affordable projects is at the core of Artterro’s mission, as is our committment to sustainability."

 We love chatting with our customers on our Facebook page. "Like" us to stay in touch"  

SouleMama: What inspired you to start your business? 
 

Forrest: I was inspired to start my business after a frustrating shopping experience. I wanted to find a fun arts & crafts kit that I could do with my young son. I had always loved making art with beautiful natural materials and wanted to find a kit that was affordable and easy so we could make gifts together. After searching everywhere (I really mean everywhere), I thought, if I'm having this problem then there must be other parents with the same issue.  I created my first kit soon after. A couple years later I found my business partner Jen, who shares my passion for art, creativity and family life. We now have twelve products that we produce here in the US at Goodwill Industries, and we sell them to specialty stores all over the US and Canada, and directly to customers from our web store.

SouleMama: How do you come up with new designs and ideas?

Forrest: Product development is our favorite part of the job!  We design the kits to be ones we would enjoy using alongside our kids.  I like to come up with the big picture idea of a project, and Jen is good at filling in the details.   Once we have the idea for a new kit, we curate the contents so there are enough beautiful, natural materials for 2-4 people to share.  Our goal is for each kit to be fun and colorful and have enough instruction to get people started but leave a lot to the imagination to inspire creativity and original thinking. 

SouleMama: What's the product or offering that you are most excited about in your shop right now?

Forrest: We are very fortunate to have had an opportunity to jointly design our Art Journal Kits with Strathmore Artist Papers.   Art journaling is a fantastic way to explore your creativity, and we wanted to make it easy for people to get started.  So we include several pages of tips and techniques, plus handmade collage paper, bright construction paper, fine drawing paper and a pocket for scraps.  Strathmore shares our commitment to the environment, and they produce the kits in Wisconsin with lots of recycled content.

SouleMama: How does the balance of family and work play out for you? If applicable, how has motherhood/fatherhood affected the work you do?

Forrest: We are always striving to strike that elusive balance between caring for our families, our business and ourselves.  It starts with being very honest with ourselves and each other as business partners about what we need.  We strive to be very accepting of each other's needs while still being very committed to our goals for growing our business.  It's very tricky!  Great communication and dividing tasks up by who has the right skills and time to do it are the best way to tackle it for us.  Knowing what to say no to is also very important, staying very focused on realistic goals and then executing them well.  The flexibility of working for ourselves and both having very supportive husbands makes these choices easier.

For today's giveaway, Artterro  is generously offering the following gifts to THREE winners:

~ Wool Felt Bug Kit  
(Fun and easy to sew, colorful wool felt is perfect for making one-of-a-kind creepy-crawly friends. Ribbon and beads make great wings, eyes and antennae. Makes up to 7 fuzzy art bugs.  Ages 7 and up.)

Bubble Wand Kit
(Bend high quality copper wire with marbles into two beautiful, sturdy wands. Blow huge bubbles, decorate a garden or use for magic!  Ages 8 and up.)

Art Journal Kit:
(Artterro teamed up with Strathmore Artist Papers to create the Art Journal Kit, a unique product for budding artists to easily explore their creativity through art journaling.  Artists of all ages can learn fun doodling, drawing and collage techniques with inspiring materials.  Available in 5 fun colors!)

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In addition, Artterro would like to offer SouleMama readers 20% off any order at our web store through April 1st. To receive the discount, please be sure to enter the code " SOULEART20 "  at checkout.

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To enter today's giveaway, please leave a comment (one entry per person, please) in today's post. I'll close comments by 8:00am EST on Sunday, and announce the winners, chosen via Random Number Generator, shortly after.  Comments closed!  The winners are...

LOVE!
Posted by: Gina

art for girls AND boys...yea!
Posted by: sarahalice

Looks like fun!
Posted by: cat mom of 3

Thank you, Artterro !