A little birdy

Anybody would think I had so much time on my hands, that I could quickly knock up a little brooch to go on my nice, new, white, but empty looking cardigan, as I was heading out to meet my lovely friend Roz for a birthday coffee (hers not mine).

Well apparently I do, because I did!

I'm quite pleased with it. What do you think? I was aided greatly by my little stash of gorgeous Aunty Cookie samples that were just crying out to be used in some shape or form. And don't worry, these will be available very very soon. Just as soon as I have sorted out the tricky question of importing.

I obviously didn't have quite enough time because, if I had, Roz would have got one too!

Off to sunnier climes

Thanks to the lovely Christina and the Giveaway she hosted, this little guy is off to LA. Well done to Janelle and hope you'll both be very happy :-)

A very big thank you to Christina for hosting the Giveaway and an even bigger thank you to all of you for taking the time to enter AND for all the amazing things you have said.

And if you didn't win and you meant what you said, you can always buy one from here :-)

An order in the making

You'll be pleased to know the notebook thing is working. This morning I opened up my little 'to do' book to see what treats were in store today.

After sorting out a few necessary domestic chores, I cracked on with an order for one of my lovely stockists, of a couple of Personalised Pictures.

I love doing these pictures. They come together quite effortlessly and enjoyably and before you know it, they are framed...

wrapped...
and ready to go.

Job done. Wonder what I can tick off tomorrow.

No excuses

I definitely suffer from being very scatty with my organistion. If the phone rings, I will literally pull to hand the nearest scrap of paper to write the message on, whether it's an order I'm taking down, or something my Mum tells me I need to remember to do (oh, yes, I still get alot of that!) The trouble with this method, or lack of, is that I obviously cannot trust the sccrap of paper to relay and action the said message. And the trouble with this is that in an attempt to not forget anything important, everything gets stored in my brain. And the trouble with this is that my brain gets crammed full and I constantly feel under pressure with so much to do and musn't forget any of it.

It's not as if I am adverse to having notebooks or the like. I love stationery. You would in fact be correct in suggesting I have a compulsion towards having to buy it.

In an attempt to be both more organised and use some of the (plenty of) notebooks that I currently possess, I have taken it on board to be clearer and neater with my organisation.

I now have 3 notebooks on the go. Ones that stay together (because you can bet the one you need is the one you leave elsewhere when the phone rings. I now carry these around when I move from floor to floor in the house. One is for lists. Daily lists. Work lists. Birthday reminders. Kids lists. It's obviously quite full.

The next is for ideas. Take Away Craft Kit ideas. Picture ideas. Card ideas. Any new creative ideas.
My final one is my Stockists bible. Who are my stockists. Who I'd like to be. Who has contacted me.I'm now feeling very virtuous in my organisation and I agree that I may be going from the extreme of being a tad lackadaisical to a tad anal, but I think this will work. Not in terms of getting more done. I'm not that naive! I'll just know what I'm not achieving. It'll be there clear as day. And besides. If I'm using the notebooks, surely at some point they will run out. And I'll need to buy more. I'm not daft :-)

All that's left now is to actually get my butt into gear and do some of the items listed.

Down & Out Chic

I discovered Christina's beautiful blog a couple of weeks ago when the lovely Sabine had a link to it. Whatever is good enough for Sabine is good enough for me, so I headed straight over to check it out.

And I was hooked. Christina is so stylish and has such an engaging way of just drawing you right in. She has a varied range of goodies to share, everyone as fab as the next.

I left a comment to say hi and immediately Christina got back to me and asked if I'd be interested in her featuring Blueberry Park. Obviously it took a long time to think about it. A nano-second later I replied!

I'm really thrilled to be featured on Christina's blog and honoured to be this week's giveaway. If you don't already know her blog, go take a look around. Take a coffee with you. You'll be there for quite a while.

Here come the girls

It's been a while since I did the boys' cushions that I recently designed and have been waiting for time to do the girls'. It's quite strange because I normally find girls' ideas come much more easily. But of late I've been struggling with ideas for the girls that work for me. I'm not entirely sure why that is. Whilst there are alot more images and designs you can work with for the girls, it is actually the more striking, graphic designs that work for boys.

It could be because i'm not actually a very good artist. All the images that I thought about using, I just couldn't get quite right when I tried to draw them out. Certainly not at this larger scale. I can get away with the simplicity in my little sized card designs, but on a bigger scale, they just didn't quite work.

I am however pretty pleased with the three that i finished up with. I've got some non-animal varieties that I'm lining up for series 2, but in the meantime enjoy the little creatures that have evolved here.

At the moment they are only available from my Etsy site. But if you like the look of them, watch this space, as any day now I'll be directing you to a gorgeous blog that is doing a Giveaway for your favourite...

Milestones

Life is a bit crazy at the moment. Do I say that a lot? I feel like I say that alot. When life is particularly crazy - like now - it overshadows what has come before. But really, thankfully, our lives are so full that it's always the same. Just crazy for a different reason.

This wave of craziness is due to celebrating, back-to-back, 4 friends' Bar Mitzvahs. Every weekend in June is taken up with the celebrations. It's even more poignant as this time next year we will be celebrating Samuel's. You know when you reach certain milestones you can't really believe you are there? Your children are old enough. You are old enough! Whether it's first steps, first day of school. But Bar Mitzvah? My son? Me?

It's a very exciting, emotional time and I must admit that last weekend, at the first of our 4, I felt very emotional indeed at the thought of this time next year. I used to feel a mixture of delight at seeing my children reach their milestones, as well as sadness of times passed. Now I love seeing them grow into the young people they are becoming and the thought of important milestones as Bar Mitzvahs is what it is all about.

This post didn't start off being about this. I had to rename it half way through! I was merely going to tell you about my new stash of fabric that my lovely auntie from USA brought with her when she came over for a family Bar Mitzvah last weekend! As I said. Life - crazy.