Hello!! I’m in LA now, wow! I’ve been taking long walks and enjoying all the blooming herbs and citrus trees and lush plant life. Stopping at each new bush and tree to inspect all the new shapes and textures I see. My dog is enjoying the sites and smells as well. It feels so good to be here after so much work and planning the last 6 months to prepare for this move.

My last month living in Spokane was so incredibly full of love and music and friends and family. I left feeling completely filled up. I love you all so very much.

In no particular order I wanted to run down my favorite creative parts of 2025 as an artist. I’m grateful for the lessons this year brought. I worked really hard and made a ton of new work. And am proud to still be a full time independent artist. 

At the end of each highlight I’ll share some logistics of how each project worked out business wise for anyone who might be curious! I enjoy seeing behind the curtain of creative endeavors and maybe you do as well…if not, feel free to skip the “how did that work?” sections. I’m not including actual numbers here, but if you are a fellow creative trying to figure out pricing or project budgets, I am down to share those in email with you!

This past spring, a lovely person named Johanna reached out to me about a project. Something she had been dreaming about and planning. A deck of playing cards that encouraged engagement with plant knowledge. It sounded like a lot of work but I’m always open to seeing if a project is a good fit or not and the first quarter of 2025 had been SLOW. Like, really slow. Like, oh no do I need to get a barista job??? 

We chatted on the phone and I was so so pleasantly surprised by how aligned we were. A love of plants, a care for the environment, a desire to see our culture shift towards a more connected way of life with nature. And of course, something that might bring joy and delight into people’s lives. What started as a one deck of cards project turned into three decks, a booklet of card games and a gift box design. It took up most of my summer and then some! I learned SO much and am so incredibly proud of these products. I just moved down to LA, so I don’t have my online store open but you can get them directly from the source here!  

Forage Folk hired me as a contractor to create these cards. I was paid my asking rate to illustrate and design each deck. If you have interest in how I estimate budgets for projects like this, let me know. I’m happy to share. I ended up spending between 50-70 hours on each deck. I drew every plant (156!) from visual reference without any tracing. 

Within the contract we agreed to, I am also able to buy units (decks of cards) at a wholesale rate to sell in my own retail settings…online and at markets. But because I don’t own the products…I was just hired to work on them, I cannot wholesale the cards to retail stores like I am able to with my Marrow Cards product, which was a self-initiated project. I didn’t write the copy for these decks or choose the plants, that was all Johanna and her team of plant experts!

Just over a year ago I got a few inquiries about some murals. Inquiries for work are always interesting. I get a lot of them and most of the time they don’t work out, maybe 30%? So, I very very rarely get my hopes up. You just really never know what projects will actually turn into something real! A lot of people truly don’t know how much time and cost a mural takes. But I always try to follow ideas through just in case, and this particular time the project turned out to be so special. 

Grant Elementary in Spokane has a blacktop behind it with a really large retaining wall. There’s been an existing mural there since the 90’s that had been quite worn out. It had a really cute circus theme and I loved it but it had been long past time to revive the space with a new design and fresh color. I called in the party of six (see #5) and we made the mural execution happen FAST. I collaborated with a parent from the school’s PTG who also coordinated a 6 week art club I wrote the curriculum for. After submitting the design for the blacktop mural the school decided they wanted to do an indoor mural as well in a space that had a perfect blank canvas. Twist my arm!! The result of these murals is such a fun pair of vibrant, joyful, meaningful work for me. I recently got a card from a grandmother of a student at Grant sharing her appreciation for the art. Wow. My job is freakin cool. 

A lot of people have asked…”How can I get one of these at my kid’s school??” Well, it’s simple and also complicated, the main answer is… yep you guessed it…MONEY. These murals were funded through grants. No surprise to any of us, Spokane Schools do not have budgets for murals. We can barely afford to pay teachers in this insane country. 

The blacktop mural was funded through ARPA (American Rescue Plan Act) which is a post-covid relief fund. The Washington Trust for Historic Preservation funneled ARPA money through the City of Spokane, and the money that was applied for and received for the outdoor mural was allocated for business district beautification. These grants have been funding lots of other city murals and beautification around Spokane.

Funds also came from a Spokane Arts Grant and a grant from STCU Here For Good. Sam Baker, a parent in the PTG did all the hard work of writing all these grants. Without her, these projects would not have happened. It’s a lot of work to gather funding like this and even though my rate for these projects was lower than usual, it was still a significant amount of funds! The money went to paint, design, execution and I also hired my helpers at $20 an hour.

I put out an album this year! Wow! In July, I released my (technical) 3rd solo album, 4th if you count my Windoe full length which was my solo project while I was married.

The new album is called, Stay Radiant. I always learn so much when I put a collection of songs together. It’s a process of gathering and editing and throwing stuff at the wall to see what sticks. And eventually coming to the end result of a batch of songs that weave together a story. The emotional healing and joy from putting this music out into the world is still apparent to me almost six months later. I’m grateful I had the time and energy to create it, and I’m even more grateful for the friends I got to work with along the way. 

For reasons I won’t get into, I’ve been in a process of strengthening my relationship with songwriting and music. This album process fortified me in so many ways. I believe so much more in my commitment to music and my hope that through music we can all live more meaningful, wholehearted lives.

Making recorded music isn’t a cost-free adventure. I didn’t have a lot to spend, so I cobbled this one together thanks to a donated weekend of tracking at Johnny Long Station, my friend Justin Landis’s studio in Sandpoint, ID. My own time and equipment at my home studio space. At home I tracked the majority of the vocals, guitars and fiddle. And then, I hired Max Harnishfeger to do some of the additional tracking, producing and all the mixing of the songs. I also paid a mastering engineer to finish it off. After manufacturing vinyl, I spent almost $5000 on the project. And recouped around $1500 from vinyl sales. On a very small scale, this is generally how bad things are for musicians right now. Of course larger artists are making some from streaming but they also are putting more money into their recording projects. Sometimes upwards of 40k to work with a really legit producer in a real studio. It is a near impossible thing to monetize music in the modern world. Yikes! Not letting it stop me though. :)

Ceramics have become one of the most fulfilling parts of my creative practice. It feels like such a soul expression for me. It is akin to my experience with gardening where I dream of it, I want to be near it, I want to talk about it. It makes me feel good and whole and calm and excited all at once. The last four months I was able to be a member at Urban Art Co-op in Spokane it was one of the best things that happened to me this year.

Earlier this year I was just working from home so my only hard cost with making ceramics was clay and glaze thanks to my girl Rose who fired several batches of my work for me at her classroom kiln. I’ve been selling completed pieces for $15 all the way up to $150 for my bigger pieces. Once I was at the co-op, there was a monthly fee of $60, plus clay costs and member chores. In LA I’m hoping to find a new studio to work in but the costs are much higher!

Ceramics are tricky because you can spend so so much time and it can be an inefficient investment of precious work time. One of the hardest parts of making art a business. Trust the process of your heart and passion, but pay attention to the numbers. That being said, the numbers panned out and I did turn a profit on my work with clay thankfully! Ceramics were my top revenue generator at markets in 2025! It is surprising to me how hard it was to say goodbye to each piece.

Through my 700 ft Sound Wall Mural project of 2024, the foundation of what is now Party of Six formed. A bond of friendship and creativity and whimsy and adoration and love. Paint pants and fruit earrings and cigarettes and gummy bears and big big dreams. I don’t know if I would call it an artist collective, it’s more of a creative support group. Six of us who worked on that mural a year and a half ago just happened to align really well energetically and creatively. And together this year we did a lot of fun work that was mostly just for ourselves.

The one creative collaboration that is now under our belts was the “We Eat With Our Eyes” installation at Terrain 16. A whimsical oversized papier mache table-scape. We also gave each other lots of tattoos. I’m so excited to cheer on these incredible artists in the new year and proud of the connection we have cultivated. It has been one of the most vibrant, unexpected parts of my past year. 

Magic. This group isn’t a money making venture but we are throwing each other work opportunities, sharing business advice and general hype. So, it definitely doesn’t hurt. It’s cool to be a part of a group of like minded artists with the common goal of creative independence.

My shop is closed for a bit, I’m taking time away from social media and I’m getting settled in my new home. I have a pottery class I’m starting this month and I’m finding events and live music to explore. I’m going to take this quiet time in January to take a look at my year ahead and do some planning.

I am booking commissions for the new year. I’m dreaming of exciting projects. If you have something you want to chat about, don’t hesitate to reach out!

In February I’m excited to launch a little collection of ceramics with a “love” theme to warm out hearts in the depth of winter. You could call it a Valentine’s day collection or just a love collection. So, stay tuned for that. Here’s a little sneak peak.

Thanks for being here. Sending you calm and peace in the new year,

Karli