SHELLEY CHRISTNER: DIME AND HOME AGAIN HOME AGAIN

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Thanks to our award-winning charm, Shelley Christner and her husband Vaughan Christner decided to set up shop in Denton. In addition to co-running DIME, they also run their Etsy store, Home Again Home Again, out of Denton. Home Again Home Again specializes in handmade/refurbished furniture, hand-stitched pillows and the most precious tea towels that ever did grace your stove. 

In preparation for this weekend's Etsy Denton Summer Bazaar, we visited with the co-owner of our favorite handmade market to see what inspires her to keep creating and how she's been able to balance her 

Read our interview below and make plans to head out to the DIME Summer Bazaar this Saturday at the Center for the Visual Arts from 10am - 4pm to shop local handmade goodies (Get there early to grab a special We Denton Do It sticker). We'll have a Jive Five for you to study before Saturday gets here, but go ahead and get your crafting gloves ready now. 

 

Shelley – can you start by sharing with us a little bit of your history with Denton?

We moved to Denton almost 6 years ago, but had commuted to Denton from Celina for several years as our 3 children went to a small private school here. We found such a great community we decided to move here.

I love your shop Home Again Home Again – it was one of my favorites for years during the Etsy Denton Fair days... and it still some of my favorite at the DIME store. What inspired you to start your own business?

An empty nest and a head full of creative ideas. As our kids were about to leave the nest I had a desire to start a business using the creative gifts that had developed as we raised our family. We had built several comfortable nests/custom homes through the years and Vaughan(who is a general contractor) had always given me lots of room to incorporate my creative Ideas and we discovered that we were a good tag team, my ideas and his skilled hands. We started upcycling and building furniture from found and cast off object and I brushed up on my sewing skills after awhile to make housewares.

What was the best piece of business advice you were given when starting out?

Everyday will bring a new challenge, how you respond will make the difference.

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Where are your favorite places to find your fabulous vintage pieces?

I consider them my “treasures” and I find them mostly at Estate Sales and Thrift Stores. I especially love to look when we travel. Our son, Stiles and his wife, Lauren live in Denver and it is truly the thrift store land of milk and honey. We always make time to stop along the way anywhere we travel. SCRAP Denton is also a treasure trove, and is a favorite place of mine.

What is your favorite thing to make?

That is hard to answer......right now I am having alot of fun making applique tea towels, but I love making furniture, even though Vaughan is the actual one who makes it.....but I love coming up with new ideas and designs, and seeing the amazing talent that Vaughan has in handcrafting my dreams.

Tell us about your roll with DIME. How did you get started with it? 

I am the co-owner of The DIME Store with Rachel Aughtry, and am co- founder of DIME which was formerly Etsy Denton. I got started with it after Rachel and I had developed a friendship through a handbag my daughter Shea bought at Art Six....long story short, we both were selling out at the Denton Community Market the inaugural season and we had a reporter from the Denton Record Chronicle approach us about all the Etsy sellers at the market and had we considered starting a group in Denton like what was happening in Dallas and Ft Worth? She said if we did she would write a story about us. So we agreed to start Etsy Denton as a way to have community with other makers in Denton. We decided to host a barn sale at my home to kick off our new organization of makers. The paper wrote there story and we had about 400 people come out to shop from 14 vendors, and well, the rest is history. We moved to the Center for Visual Arts in the Fall and have had 4 shows that grew each time, which led us to decide to open The DIME Store.

My day to day.....Rachel and I split the time at the store, working either mornings or afternoons and every other Saturday unless we have an event. Whether morning or afternoon we overlap our time in the store from 1-3 to confer on all the happenings of the business. Working in the store is so much fun. I enjoy meeting all the customers and visiting. We also have a working studio with our sewing machines behind the counter so that we can keep up with our own personal making for the store and for our Etsy shops.

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What were the challenges in opening the DIME Store?

The myriad of details that have to be taken care of, DBA’s, sales tax license, certificate occupancy, trash, electric,gas, telephone service, sign license......on and on and on.....so many details.

Is it tough to balance both the DIME Store and its many events as a whole, and your own line?

Yes, balance is definitely a challenge but, having a great “Partner in DIME” helps a lot. Rachel and I balance and encourage one another with the many hats that we each wear.


 

You can catch Shelley Christner this weekend at the Etsy Denton Summer Bazaar, but she'll probably be pretty busy. Stop by the DIME store sometime during the week if you want to talk her ear off about your own crafting. Better yet, "like" their page on Facebook and plan on attending one of the always-informative classes they host from time to time. 

BIKE RODEO

​Denton Police Lt. Thomas Woods and Denton PD bike officer, Donnie Carr, look on as kids practice bike safety. 

​Denton Police Lt. Thomas Woods and Denton PD bike officer, Donnie Carr, look on as kids practice bike safety. 

Amber Briggle had a scare on her way to Jazz Fest this April. While crossing the street on her bike, Gracie, her little girl, was hit by a car. She was, okay, but it sure did scare the heck out of Briggle who decided that she needed to do something to keep this from happening again. She soon set in motion a plan to teach children ages 4 - 8 about bike safety. Briggle wrangled together a hodge-podge group of volunteers, put together some downright awesome goodie bags and secured Lieutenant Thomas Woods of the Denton Police Dept. and Denton PD bike officer, Donnie Carr, to do the actual instruction for the kids. Briggle dubbed the event the "Bike Rodeo," and crossed her fingers that all would go off without a hitch. 

The first ever Bike Rodeo happened this past Saturday at the Denton Community Market, and while this was Briggle's first (bike) rodeo, we'll definitely go on record as saying that no "hitches" were to be had. Students listened quietly and carefully to the police officers and all seemed to learn much about safely during the time they were there. 

Below are a few photos of the event. Briggle is currently aligning the pieces to have another Bike Rodeo sometime around August. If you have a little one whom could stand to learn a little more about their two-wheeler, make sure to sign them up in advance. We'll make sure to give you a heads-up when the next event has been finalized.  

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MONTH IN REVIEW: MAY

Some familiar faces from our election/relaunch party. ​ photo by Amelia McBride

Some familiar faces from our election/relaunch party. ​
photo by Amelia McBride

This May was a perpetually exciting month. Crazy weather, elections and the annual evacuation of the town from the local college students. That’s right, Dentonites. It’s that glorious time of year! You may once again purchase your sleeve of tiny powdered-sugar donuts at 9pm at Kroger without having to wait in line for twenty minutes at the self checkout. While we’re on the topic, can we either put an age restriction on the self-checkout machines or have some classes at the local library on how to use them correctly? The elderly go to the library, right?

Anyway, May was a rather interesting month. While April was full of rather large festivals in town, May saw the first appearance from a couple of smaller fests that we hope pop up again some time in the future. Namely, we’re talking about the art and music festival that Austere Magazine put on (we even nailed an interview with the ladies behind the ‘zine prior to the show) and, of course, the skateboard/music/Mexican food festival that was Taco Fest at the burgeoning Taqueria El Picante.

Of course, the month of May also saw each of our endorsements for city council win their respective elections. We couldn’t help but throw a calm shindig in celebration. In addition to the city council, we also got to rub elbows with the likes of Euline Brock and Chris Flemmons. The former a prior mayor of Denton and the latter, the brains behind The Baptist Generals. The Baptist Generals released a new album in May; their first since 2003’s No Silver/No Gold. The album was released last week to much fanfare and was well worth the wait. You can stream below, if you haven’t already purchased it.

https://soundcloud.com/subpop/sets/the-baptist-generals-jackleg

A few days later, we saw lots of familiar faces at the 2nd Denton Creatives Mixer. Lots of people who have had success in the arts locally talked about their experiences while  we listened to them and wondered where our sunglasses were. Hands were shaken, business cards were exchanged and hopefully business ideas were conceived.

Our friends over at Spiderweb Salon also had a show that highlighted the female-gendered of the collective in addition to releasing the “Collaborative Issue” of their much prized zine and sharing the work of April Murphy with us. 

Glen Farris got the scuttlebutt on what’s happening in the business world around town. We learned that Lone Star Attitude will soon be serving burgers on a rooftop patio complete with musical stairs and that there is even a bonafide BBQ restaurant moving onto Hickory St. behind Gerhard’s.

Armadillo Ale Works had another launch party. This time it was for their delicious new Greenbelt Farmhouse Ale. You can grab some over at Oak St. Drafthouse. We also highlighted a few Kickstarter’s from local hopefuls. A couple of them even seem to be well on there way to becoming fully-funded. Check ‘em here out if you haven’t already.

Oh yeah! We also got a quick lesson on the history of voting from Shaun Treat of Denton Haunts, took a look into thrifting, gave the more procreative of y’all a quick rundown on summer camps that look fun and interviewed a bunch of people (namely Triple Threat Press, the forthcoming Maker Space, Chet The Daytripper, and Ken Willis of Beth Marie’s fame). 

That's it for the month of May. June should see the opening of Rusty Taco, Dog Days of Denton and lots of great shows. Think we missed something important that happened in May? Let us know in the comments!

GRAPEFRUIT AND MINT SORBET

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We've reached that glorious time of the year where spring and summer are colliding and all that we crave are those bright, sunny flavors. The weather isn't warm enough to be 'hot' yet, but man is it humid. Warm and humid days call for something cold and refreshing. While, yes, this often means ordering an icy cocktail and sitting on the front porch of Oak Street Draft House - other times, you just have to make ice cream. 

That's right. We said make ice cream. Don't worry, though. This doesn't mean much for our Beth Marie's habit - it just means we'll be having twice as much ice cream. What could possibly be wrong with that?

While we're not normally proponents of single function kitchen gadgets, something in us is totally okay with an ice cream maker... maybe because it makes those long summer nights that much better. We shouldn't have to leave the confines of our own kitchen if we just really want to try a new flavor of ice cream or sorbet. Like grapefruit mint. Yes, grapefruit mint; full of lightly sweet, incredibly refreshing and beautifully balanced flavors. Try not falling in love with that dusty ice cream machine crammed in the back of your coat closet now.

 

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Grapefruit Mint Sorbet

4 c fresh grapefruit juice (You must absolutely use fresh grapefruits this - do not dare try to use anything that comes from the juice section of the grocery store)

3/4 c white sugar

8 fresh mint leaves, roughly chopped

In a medium saucepan, bring 1 c of the grapefruit juice, the sugar, and the mint leaves to a simmer. Remove from heat and make sure all the sugar’s disolved, let the mint steep for 5 minutes.

Strain out the mint and add mixture back to the remaining 3 c of juice. Put in the freezer to get extra cold, 30-45 min, then follow manufacturers instructions on your ice cream machine.


 

 

 

 

THE DEN10

Monday was a great day to recover from The Quest For The Golden Jesus Chili Cookoff. The downside is that the short week means no time to plan for the weekend. That's why you're reading this, right?

Even though Summer is in full effect, the actual first day of Summer isn't until June 21st so take advantage of the cool weather and start making that list of Texas BBQ joints you're going to hit.

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Thursday May 30
The Gourds | Dan's | 9PM | $15
Austin heavy-hitters The Gourds take over Dan's this Thursday and probably won't be playing Gin & Juice unless you ask really nicely or loudly.

Twilight Tunes | Courthouse Square | 6:30PM | FREE

The award winning series continues with Bonnie & Nick Norris. Load the kiddos up on candy and ice cream and let them go nuts.

Bukkake Moms / Curvette / The Great Depressions | Gloves | $1
On a budget this summer? Can't beat a single dollar for this one.

Friday May 31
Doug Burr / Fox & The Bird / Glen Farris | St. David's | $10 / $13
This is the same beautiful room Sarah Jaffe and Seryn played a few years back. The copious smoking outside the door is what kept tasteful shows from happening till now but with the guidance of Denton statesmen Eric Pulido and Dave Sims paving the way to use this room, lets hope the trend continues.

Hares On The Mountain / Boxcar Bandits / AM Ramblers | Dan's | 9PM | $8

Cardo's 2013 Summer Camp Enrollment Closes | Cardo's Farm Project | this summer
Make sure to get your kiddos enrolled in one of the programs Cardo's is offering this summer.

Dog Days Of Denton | 5PM | Quakertown Park
Who doesn't like dogs? Or a park overrun by dog lovers? This event kicks off at 5PM with "Yappy Hour" (now we're talkin') and starts up with more festivities Saturday morning at 8:30AM. This not for profit organization "welcomes FRIENDLY DOGS and their owners. All owners are responsible and liable for their pet(s). For everyone’s safety, dogs MUST BE ON A LEASH and have CURRENT VACCINATIONS."

 

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Saturday June 1
Baptist General's Album Release "JACKLEG DEVOTIONAL TO THE HEART" | Dan's | 9PM | $15
Possibly the longest and most awaited record from a band in the history of Denton. Whatever your thoughts on their recordings, Flemmons and company have always had a way of taking over a room when they play live.

Denton Camera Exchange Grand Opening | 117 Piner St | 4PM | FREE
Food, drink and The Instant Film Society will be there with their 8x10 Instant Photo Booth.  

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Tuesday June 4 
Birds of Night / The Technicolors / HI JR | Dan's | $10
The Technicolors are on the road and coming into town early in the week with their petty-esque sounds.

DENTON SUMMER CAMPS

​The Denton Community Theatre offers summer classes for children in The Black Box theatre. 

​The Denton Community Theatre offers summer classes for children in The Black Box theatre. 

Whether you’re a homeschooling parent sick of seeing your child’s charming face all the time, or just looking to cut back on the amount of time your little Harry or Susan spends playing Mass Effect 3, Denton has a lot of summer camps for you to send your children off to this summer. Below you’ll find our picks for some of the most fun and educational of the camps offered.

 

Cardo’s Farm Summer Camp

Our favorite local farmers over at Cardo’s are welcoming children to their sprout farm once again this year. Registration is closing this week, so make sure to register your youngin' as soon as possible. Kids get a chance to see what real life is like for an organic farmer and get to get up close and personal with plenty of chickens. The camp is offered most week days in June. For more information, click here.

 

ATC Technology Summer Camp

Denton ISD’s Advanced Technology Complex sits in the random nice-looking building over the by The Natatorium/Waterpark area on Loop 288. While the vocational school is normally only for high school juniors and seniors, for a week in the summer it is opened up to 4th through 6th graders. This year, the camp has a focus on robotics. Students will complete various projects over the course of the week. Some will have a robotics focus (i.e. Lego and Fischertek projects), while others will give students a small glimpse into the classes offered at the school (graphic design, photography and and culinary arts to name a few). The camp is for students entering 4th - 6th grades. It runs from July 17th through the 20th and is $70.

 

Greater Denton Arts Council Summer Arts Camp

This year, the Greater Denton Arts Council’s summer arts camp has a focus on storytelling. Classes are designed to teach students how to weave a story through painting, dancing, music, drawing and basically everything except for weaving, itself (maybe they’ll add that). Classes are available for kids ages 5 - 14 and they run from June 10th -through the 14th. The cost is $60 ($55.00 for GDAC members).

 

Denton Community Theatre’s Summer Creativity Class

While you may spend time wishing that the DCT had some vitality injected into it’s marquee whenever you walk down Hickory St, the creative minds behind the theatre are welcoming youngin’s into their new Blackbox Theatre once more this year. DCT’s Summer Creativity Class has a super hero focus this year. Classes are available for children aged 4 - 18. There are mulitple classes available throughout the summer. Some work towards putting together their summer musical, The Little Mermaid, too. So long as they aren’t teaching our kids how to develop websites, we’re happy with ‘em. If you’re interested in these classes, call (940) 383-1356.

 

UNT’s Elm Fork’s Explorers Camp

UNT has plenty of classes for your budding anthropologists with their Explorer’s Camp. All classes are based out of the Environmental Sciences building and deal with the study/exploration of nature at some level. There are lots of diverse options for students of all ages. Class topics range from water to macroscopic transformations of various forms of matter. Yes, seriously.

 

City of Denton's Summer Camps and Trips

Last, but not least, the city of Denton also offers plenty of different camps or daytime activities for your son or daughter. While their website and payment method is a little convoluted, we've participated in a couple of these classes before and they were great. We especially like the crew over at the North Lakes Rec Center. There's a great variety of classes for kids of all ages. 

DENTON LIT: APRIL MURPHY

This post is part of our monthly collaboration with Spiderweb Salon in which they show off the best of Denton's literary artists. This month, they're sharing the work of April Murphy.

Artist introduction and photos by Courtney Marie. 

​Photo by Courtney Marie 

​Photo by Courtney Marie 

April Murphy is a writer who strives, like many of us, to create and not starve. She writes mostly creative nonfiction, though she sometimes dabbles in fiction, poetry, and songwriting. She’s been told that her writing is matter-of-fact and tends toward black humor and sentimentality. If you’re an emotional person and sometimes find yourself looking for anatomical charts on Etsy, there’s a good chance you’ll like her stuff. Murphy is currently working on a nonfiction book entitled Shrouded. It is a collection of essays weaving together her family history, the funeral home industry’s treatment of women, and exploring life and death as gendered spaces.

Before moving to Denton, Murphy spent much of her life in rural outposts of the chilly North East and Mid-West. She’ll tell you how the four years she’s lived in Denton have warmed her heart – she has found a great community of writers and artists here, and says it’s hard not to stay inspired in such a supportive and interesting place. She is currently finishing up a PhD in Creative writing at UNT, but won’t limit her professional ambitions to the academic world. She wants to always be writing, publishing, and performing, and hopes her first book will be published in the next few years.

In cahoots with Denton’s artist collective, Spiderweb Salon, Murphy has agreed to share an excerpt of her short fiction with us. This excerpt is from a larger piece entitled “Partners.” Other accessible works of hers include “Puppy Tail,” “Vanilla Bones,” and “The Caves.” Check it out and be sure to keep up with April’s involvement in Spiderweb Salon, where she has presented multiple readings and performed her music as well. Some of her original writings will appear in the next Spiderweb zine: The Collaborative Issue, to be released this Friday!

​Photo by Courtney Marie

​Photo by Courtney Marie

-Excerpt from “Partners”

            Despite the unconventional cases he took, Mr. Percy had a strong conservative streak, like all those in the funeral industry. The only unorthodox thing about him was the fact that he was a Braves fan in upstate New York’s Red Sox territory. He’d inherited the team along with the funeral home and the Republican Party from his Southern grandfather.

            Maggie wasn’t lucky enough to have family in the business. Her parents, both English teachers, had never understood her aptitude for sciences. They had supported her through 4 years of pre-med and did the best they could to understand why their daughter was never interested in the books they sent at Christmas, why she only responded to their pages long emails with a short paragraph. When Maggie failed her MCATs, the relationship with her family strained. When she brought home Krystal, the pretty blonde she’d met in a cadaver lab, it broke completely. So much for books opening the mind.

            For a while after that, Maggie worked days as a barista and evenings as a grocery store clerk, too busy with affording her shitty apartment and paying back her college loans to allow herself to really feel as scared as she was about the rootless life she was leading.

            Krystal was there for it all, quick with a kind word but busy with double shifts and EMT training. They didn’t see each other much, and when they did both of them were usually too tired for conversation.

            Maggie applied for a temp job as an embalming assistant with The Percy Family Funeral home around their two-year anniversary. Mr. Percy hired her because of her background in anatomy and paid her enough so that she could leave the coffee shop and Price Chopper. After about six months, satisfied with her reliability and resourcefulness, he offered her the apartment above the home and sponsored her through her associates degree in mortuary science.

            She never asked him why he did it. She was nervous, afraid that if she drew attention to her good luck it would go away, she’d have to start over again.

         Mr. Percy seemed to think that adding her to the staff allowed him to start over too. He liked to joke around the office that after three generations of Percy and Sons, it was about time the funeral home had a lady’s touch. Maggie suspected that his sons, no more interested in the dead trade than she was in Shakespeare, had broken something between them too.

 

​Photo by Courtney Marie 

​Photo by Courtney Marie 

THE DEN10

The way lines of storms magically split and go around Denton would make you think there's some sort of deflector shield generator in the basement of the courthouse. There was the time Denton flash flooded and the water rescue teams were out saving folks left and right but other than that and the occasional freak blizzard, we have pretty moderate weather and nothing like the super tornadoes that hit Oklahoma this week. We live very charmed lives in our bubble surrounded by increasingly good food and drink and always abundant talent. It's going to be a beautiful weekend to remember those who died while serving our country. Get out there, hang on to those you love, kiss 'em on the head and take it all in because people absolutely gave their lives so you could have the life that your living right now. Don't waste it.

Wednesday May 22 
The Cosmonauts / Tiger High / The Garden / Further Instructions | Gloves | 9PM | $5
Another quality show brought to you by the always endearing Gloves. The Cosmonauts have a slew of 7" singles you really need to check out. Totally worth five bones.

Thursday May 23 
Robert Gomez / Jeremy Buller | Dan's | 9PM | $7
Two of our sonic behemoths pair up Thursday at Dan's. The talent and influence of these pair run deep.

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Bashe Live Music Video Shoot | Macaroni Island | 8PM                                       Promising locals Bashe (we highlighted them in our 3 Songs post this week) are shooting a video and they want you to be in it. 

Friday May 24
The Angelus / Lord Buffalo / Pageantry | Gloves | 9PM | $5
Walk (stumble?) over to Rubber Gloves after the Greenbelt Farmhouse Ale runs out at Oak St. and catch this dense lineup of local favorites supporting Lord Buffalo from Austin.

Armadillo Ale Works Launch Greenbelt Farmhouse Ale | Oak Street Draft House | 5PM
If you were at our Election Party you got the pleasure of tasting a test batch of the Greenbelt Farmhouse Ale before anyone else. Judging from the way folks were knocking 'em down, I'd wager it's a pretty tasty brew. I'd recommend being there at 5PM for this one. There will be lines and some great people watching as it turns out all sorts of folks love beer. It's always great to see council-members and city employees imbibing with our community. 

Spiderweb Salon Presents: "The Collaboration Issue" Release Show | 1200 Ridgecrest Circle | 6PM
Lots of music, lots of readings, lots of collaboration. Spiderweb launches it's "post-The Porch" zine with a full color first issue of poetry, prose, comics and essays by local artsy types. If you haven't been to one of these you need to and if you think you're of the artsy category, get involved.

Danny Rush & The DD's / Lo-Fi Chorus / Ryan Thomas Becker | Dan's | 9PM |
The hard hitting, ever-prolific Danny Rush & The DD's hit the stage with enough swagger to kill a hipster. A really great evening of "songwriter's" songwriters starting with the equally prolific Ryan Becker supporting the return of Lo-Fi Chorus.

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Saturday May 25 
Eleven Hundred Springs | Dan's | 10PM | $12ADV / $15DOS
So you think your band is good? You don't know what good is if you haven't seen Eleven Hundred Springs douse a room in gasoline and light a match just to destroy the figurative evidence. Well worth your time and well worth learning how to two step to.

Captured By Robots | Gloves | 9PM | $5
JBOT still hasn't escaped the clutches of the robots that force him to play shows at Gloves once or twice a year.

 

 

Monday May 27
Boxcar Bandits | Hailey's | 10PM | FREE
Not a bad Monday could be spent at Hailey's watching the Boxcar Bandits put their spin on the classics at Hailey's. Not bad at all.