Things...

...are busy, busy, busy. But I still always find the time for a nice cuppa. I do like this Kikki.K mug :)

Why so busy? Well, it's all go with my designing and market preparations. The market is on Sunday 28th July at the Masonic Temple, in Sandy Bay Road from 10-3 I think. I had better check those hours!

After weeks of tooing and froing with my printer via email I finally have a shipment to collect tomorrow. I am always nervous to see my new designs as you never know what they will look like. I am blowing up a postcard size image (literally) into something that's around 1x2 metres in size. Anyway, cross fingers they look good!

I have all of next week off work (yippee) to sew as I still have a heap to do for the wearable art event. Model fittings are in 2 weeks' time and I have very little ready. Very little. Gulp. I will just have to try my best and see what I can get done.

I think that's it. I'm so tired and scatterbrained at the moment!

Hmm, must be time for a cuppa! Sounds good to me.

Thanks so much for dropping by and thank you ever so muchly for your lovely comments.

xx

Maze & Vale goodies

A happy Monday to you!
Oh how I love Etsy. So much crafty talent and vintage goodness on one website.

I had admired the lovely screen printed fabrics of Maze & Vale for a long time.

When Leslie had a recent sale I jumped in for a couple of little purchases.

The piece of fabric in the background is the perfect size for a cushion. I have been going to freshen up the couch for a long while, so this is just the thing.

I also had to acquire one of Leslie's dropcloth artworks. She cuts up her screenprinting dropcloth and stitches them onto card to produce one of a kind pieces.

One of these days I will get around to framing it!

I also received a sweet swatch of fabric that looks like mushrooms to me. The fabric is just beautiful.

And how wonderful is the graphic design on her cards? I just love it.

Pop on over for a look!

Keep well friends xx

Happy Easter!

Happy Easter to you all!

I do love Easter as it's a quiet, relaxing time. Not to mention the abundance of chocolate!

I made these felt bunnies for my Good Mail Club friends. They are actually finger puppets. I quite liked them, so it was a little tricky sealing them up in envelopes and sending them off into the big world.

What are your plans for Easter?

I'm seeing a bit of pruning and gardening getting done, along with a family get together and some dvd watching me thinks.

Now, where's that chocolate egg that's calling my name...?

xx

Good mail... Easter call out!

Gosh February was busy. It has almost been a month since the Valentines Good Mail mailout and I haven't posted about it yet.

Sending and receiving mail for Valentines Day was a lot of fun. I went with a very simple card design and made a hanging paper heart out of layers of that soft Japanese paper.

I must say I was really pleased with the results.



It was the first time in my life I have received so many Valentines wishes. They were wonderful and I really thank all of you that took part.

Some of the Good Mail I received (along with a nice catalogue and mag one day)

 Gosh I love Good Mail Club time. I hang out for the sound of the postman and when I'm at work I can't wait to get home and check out the letterbox.

Anyway, that brings me to the Easter mailout!

Who's in? I'm envisaging pretty pastel colours, sweet eggs, fluffy chicks...

Please email me with your postal address by next Sunday night 10th March and I will get it happening.

Still don't know what the Good Mail Club is? It's a good excuse to use some of that pretty stationery :)

I send out a list of everyone's names and addresses and we each write a note or card, decorate an envelope and maybe pop something inside, then post it out to everyone else. SO much fun!

Come on, join in!

xx

Pretty pink hearts

 

Being Valentines Day I thought I'd post some pretty paper hearts I recently made for the Good Mail Club.  They're made from that soft Japanese paper which I cut, coloured and stitched together. I wish I had made more! I am not big on Valentines Day but it has been lovely this year receiving some pretty mail in the post. I will post pictures when it all arrives :)

 

So readers, have a 'love"-ly day!! I'm so glad you take the time to pop by for a read. I am always surpried when a friend mentions something they've read here - sometimes I wonder if anyone reads this little blog :)

xx



Bits and Bobs...Christmas

It has been such a long time since I have done a Bits and Bobs post - so here one is!

This theme is obviously Christmas decorations. I really enjoyed unpacking my deccies this year - I always seem to forget what I have and it's also nice to see my favourites again.

Above we have a new little felt hedgehog by Natasha from The Snow Queen's Garden, a couple of vintage style glass birds (the owl is new for this year - I love it), perspex by Dick and Dora, a red felt one made by me a few years ago, the spotty one which is actually a place name holder, a green bell, an old soldier from my parent's tree and the cupid which I brought back from the Tower of London in 1996 for Mum.

I'll be back with some more piccies of the tree and so on, as well as a Molly update.

Only 2 more days of work for me! So excited and really happy that I am actually organised! Unheard of for me, but that's great. I did want to write cards for a heap of people, but that just hasn't happened. I'm not going to worry and hope they/you don't either.

xx

Market success!

Well, the day didn't start off great. I was in recovery mode from chronic hay fever due to the high winds on Saturday and while getting everything sorted and packed I managed to break 2 mirrors. Yes. TWO mirrors. And cut my hand in the process. Well, it was either going to be a disaster or maybe the 2nd mirror was going to cancel out the superstitions of the first.

Thankfully I think the later was true :)

The market was a success!

The scarves received really great feedback and I sold 8 of my 9. Two are being sent to Montreal and another is going travelling to Europe next year. The scarves will be far more well travelled than me!

The little heart brooches I made from 1940's German glass buttons, vintage faux pearls and silk were also a success - I sold them all. I wish I had made more.

And funnily enough, the thing both Lyn and I thought would sell best, the Paris pouches, didn't do as well as expected, but that's fine, it means I can put them on Etsy!

Despite it being a long day I had a good time and it was great chatting to friends and meeting bloggy and instagram buddies for the first time. Thanks so much for dropping by!

What next?

Well, I have to tidy up my studio (crazy messy!) and then I will get a few little bits made that I will pop on Etsy. I have some scarves I hope will arrive today and will (maybe after Christmas) re-order some of the popular fabric that I will make into scarves again.

By the way, did someone mention Christmas? 

Only 3 weeks away? 

I have way too much to do!

xx

Planet Joy goodies

I have been so slow to blog about this, but wanted to so here I am.

Many of you will already know blogger Jane from Life on Planet Baby, and if so, will know Jane has recently opened an Etsy store, Planet Joy.

Jane has been such a lovely friend to me and I have been watching her get ready for the store opening. When I noticed she had finally pressed the "store open" button I jumped in and was the lucky first customer.

Look at the super pretty packaging!

I chose a pink Liberty fabric heart. Such pretty fabric. No wonder Jane loves working with it.

 I thought I might even pop it on the Christmas tree this year.

And look what I received for my birthday recently...

a lovely fabric wrapped letter 'S'.

Jane knows I love blue and white. A very thoughtful gift :)

I hope you pop over and say hi to Jane if you don't already know her.

Have a lovely week peeps. I must run - I have to get my crafty butt into action as yours truly has to get ready for a craft/design market in 4 weeks. Eeeekkkk!!!! Freaking out!!

I will tell all soon :)

xx

Good Mail Club invitation

Following the positive response to this post where I showed you the beautiful mail I received from fellow blogger Ally and the envelope I decorated to send back to her, I am inviting you to join in on the fun.

I'm establishing the Good Mail Club and invite you to join in.

SO, what does it mean?

Basically, you email me with your postal address to register your interest, I will collate a list and email it out to other interested ladies and then it's time to get those creative juices flowing.

A few notes:
- open to international penpals.
- I will give us 3 weeks to get our mail created and sent, so hopefully we will receive letters at around the same time.
- have fun, no stress, decorate an envelope any which way - draw, paint, stamp, stick!
- write a friendly note to your recipient - it doesn't matter if you don't know them.
- try to enclose something extra, a nice photo, a favourite recipe, a thoughtful quote, some pretty paper.
- when we receive them we can start sharing them on our blogs or instagram and the like.
- it's really important to keep everyone's identities private, so no passing on addresses or posting images showing surnames and addresses please :)
- if there's only a few of us I will send out all of our names to you, otherwise I will pick 6-8 out of a hat for each of us.
- you can join in once, twice, or however many times take your fancy.

If you have any other suggestions, please let me know!

So, are you in?

ps. do you have a better name than Good Mail Club??

Edit: we have closed this first group, but will do it again in a month or two x

My art practice - what have I been up to?

It seems like so long since I have posted about my art/craft practice. Maybe that's because it has been a while since I have created something. I have been feeling a little bit enthusiastic lately so thought I'd share a few bits with you.

After three attempts I finally finished my Paris zippered pouch! I just couldn't get the lining and zipper in neatly enough for my somewhat exacting standards. I was trying to create a little lip so the zipper wasn't very visible, but it was just impossible given I was also trying to sew in lining at the same time. So frustrating. So I did a bit of Googling, bought a metal zip and had another go. Success! I'm happy with it and think I might make a few more.

I have also been busily creating a bundle of jewellery - necklaces, pendants, bracelets and the brooches above (also showing the reverse side of the pouch ). I am loving the vintage brooch fitting on the right so much that at the moment I know I am unable to part with it. I'd like to get some fabricated from this design, but that's a whole other story.

The final thing that I have been working on for SUCH A LONG TIME is getting my fabric designs printed so I will be able to make them into lovely scarves. These will feature vintage images similar to above. It has not been an inexpensive exercise, but one I really wanted to do. Hopefully my samples will arrive soon, some lengths of chiffon and cotton and a sample wool/silk stole. Exciting.

I'm contemplating a redo of my Etsy store to stock these bits and pieces and perhaps doing a market, but I'm yet to decide.

I'd love to know your thoughts and get a little feedback on my designs (good or bad) :)

If you look closely you can see that ABC reporter Airlie Ward is wearing one of my necklaces! She has had it for a while now so it's nice to see that she still enjoys wearing it. This image was taken from the tv on 21 September. She has good taste, no?

xx

ps I'm joining in on Jane's Post of the Month Club 

 

Lovely reads

 

It's no secret I love love love books!  All sorts of books but especially art, craft and fashion books.

I recently bought these beauties and thought some of you might like them too.

 

The New Artisans is a beautiful book that profiles over seventy international artists from all areas of craft/art making , including Angus and Celeste from Australia. There are hundreds of images of the most inspiring work. I thoroughly recommend it, though I warn you, it will make you want to jump on the computer, do some searching for these craftspeople and then do some internet shopping!

Next up is Paper Cutting by Laura Heyenga with a forward written by famous paper artist Rob Ryan (I love his work). Again, a thoroughly inspiring book full of stunning colour images of the work of highly talented artists from around the world. The work covers quite traditional paper cutting through to very contemporary, cutting edge work. It makes me want to cut some paper!

 

Lastly is this great book investigating the designs of famous fashion house Louis Vuitton and designer Marc Jacobs. 

 

There's an insert reproduction of an old catalogue. I just love the history!

 

The book is full of eye candy (not to mention arm candy!).

The image below is from one of LV's most favourite collections of mine, Spring Summer 2007. SO much prettiness!

 

 

Are you addicted to books like I am? Do you actually read them, or just tend to flick through the pages of pretty pictures like I do? I already have another bunch of titles on my wishlist.

Have a nice Wednesday my friends.

xx

Studio chaos + UFOs

I just took these photos so they are a little dark and grainy.

Do you have an abundance of UFOs like I do? Everywhere you look - things that are waiting to be finished. Those UFOs (unfinished objects) are such a pain in my side.

Granted, I have been a tad busy at work recently and before that I was unwell, but I just want to get some of these things finished!

I have been procrastinating with these sheer curtains for a long while. I think it's because they are a tedious job. Metres of sewing with a pesky fabric that just wants to fray and slip on itself.

I WILL get them done this weekend, or at least by next Tuesday.

A pile of fabrics (and more pesky curtain) on my ironing board.

That Parisian Postcard purse that I am still working out!

And an abundance of pendants that I am working on for the gallery as well as a project for myself.

Adding to this I am waiting on samples from a printing company in India. At least I think I'm waiting on samples - the communication was a bit of a challenge :) Then today I read that the Indian postage system can be a disaster, so might have to do some more research on printers *sigh*

Gosh, it will be good to tick some of these things off my list.

Do you have the same problem as me??

xx

Parisian needlecase

Despite my frustrated efforts to make a prototype Parisian Postcard pouch I eventually gave up (for the time being). Why is it so difficult to get a neutral 15cm long zipper in Hobart? Uggh!

So, I decided to make my mangled bits of fabric into a needlecase.

I stitched it all together, added a nice woolen felt inner and a very old button with a nice old brass shank.

Here is the interior, the image being the reverse side of the postcard.

You can see the original old 1905 postcard in the image.

I rather like it. I haven't given up on my pouch idea, but am thinking a might make a few of these guys for the Etsy store. Still a bit undecided. Opinions welcomed :)

xx

ps thank you SO SO much for your lovely comments about Molly following her operation.

I have passed on all the hugs and pats to her. She is doing well, but has a tendency to want to lick her wounds and scratch all that shaved skin. I can't blame her . The other night she managed to pull out a couple of stitches so off to the vet we went. A bandage, plastic cone thingamy and a sedative later, she came home feeling very sorry for herself. That night was horrendous! No sleep for anyone, the sedative made her very restless. Not fun! Last night was much better and we are off to the vet this morning to have the wound dressed again.
Have a lovely day friends :)
Xx

I'll do a follow up post soon x

Doiley teatowel hot off the press

Hot off the press and perhaps in need of a good press with the iron, it's my new doiley teatowel design!

I designed the fabric in Photoshop and sent it off to Spoonflower who printed it for me on a lovely 55%linen/45% cotton fabric. I then finished the edges and attached a handy hanger thingamy on the back.

Blowing in the breeze on our ancient Hills Hoist clothes line...

Looksee, it's labelled Molly's Maison. Ignore those lineny creases :)

And styled with a yummy banana and raspberry muffin topped with lemony cream cheese frosting and a raspberry on top baked this morning by moi!

What do you think?

I'm rather taken with it, though that's no surprise given my slight addiction to teatowels.

I'd love your opinions :)

xx

ps there's one available in my little Etsy store :)