It's not surprising I'm dog tired at the moment. I went out last night with some girlfriends and literally could have fallen asleep at the table. In fact, I wouldn't have been surprised if one of them texted me this morning to say I had nodded off for a bit.

A lot of us are struggling with not enough hours in the day at this time of year, keeping up with and packing orders off for Christmas shoppers.

So why oh why I let myself get distracted by things that can undoubtedly wait until the New Year, I have no idea. I ordered this fabric from Seamstar, along with a couple of other beauties, this week and any sensible person would have put it to one side to enjoy at a quieter time. But then I guess I'm not that sensible.

And not only can I not put a good fabric down, I can not put a good plan down either...

That exciting development that I hinted at yesterday has been at the forefront of my mind and would not be put to one side for a day, let alone a couple of weeks, until after the holidays.

I am embarking on a collaboration with Lu Summers of Summersville fame. Very VERY exciting!

Once I got the pencil pouch just the way I wanted it (right length, right height, right bottom..so to speak) I knew at once that Lu's fabrics would be perfect for them. If you've ever seen Lu's fabrics you'll know exactly what I mean.

The weight of the fabric is perfect. The designs are so well suited to children's (or adults) pencil cases and the colours are so vivid any child (or adult) will be delighted to have one. We hope...

The pouches will come in 5 different patterns and colours and will be available through the usual channels as well as being available for trade. So if there are any stores out there that would like more info about the pouches and be the first to stock them, just give me a shout.

And here's to me now slowing down just a little...

I know what your thinking..."not more blinkin' zipper pouches."

And I'd like to be able to tell you that these are the last ones.

But I'm afraid i can't.

There are about to be some very exciting developments in the land of zipper pouches and I hope you'll be as excited about them as I am.

But that's all I can say right now...

So all that is left is for me to leave you with pretty pictures of the latest style of zipper pouch - the Mini Pouch - perfect for little hands to keep their pocket money and bits of change in.

And of course they are right here...

Which room do you prefer?

This one?...

Or this one?...

Exactly! This is the only room in the house that has not been done and still possesses the characteristics of the family we inherited the house from. The stencilling - urghhh, the painted woodwork - puke... Maroon? Aaaghhhh!

One day we'll have saved up enough to make this room worthy of the rest of the house, but in the meantime it relies on the addition of some pretty soft furnishings.

There are a lot of things I love about this room. It's a great size. I love the fireplace, although the surround has to go. And the bay window has such a lovely aspect and cries out for pretty seating.

The pretty seating is a long way off but until then a couple of new brickwork cushions, a la Treefall Design will have to do. I love the design of these cushions. To me they work in a similar way to Log Cabins. They give the possibility of using an array of favourite fabrics in a simplistic design, letting the fabrics speak for themselves.

To be honest, when I look at this room, I struggle to see it's good qualities. All I see is the grotty decor, the dark receding colours, but at least now there is something in here that can make me smile and give me optimism that one day this room will be fit to sit next door to the one at the top.

All this talk and teaching of zipper pouches has got me obsessed with making them. They are such a joy to make and produce something so pretty and so useful. What can be better?

This particular flat-bottomed style that Manda and i taught last week is a gem. I love the way the pouch sits so you can open it up and rummage in it nicely.

I also love the way that once you have mastered putting in a zip, you can make the pouch any size you like. Ruby and I made a few diddy ones at the weekend for her hair clips and bobbles...more about those another day.

But I'm particularly keen at the moment on these slightly longer but less deep ones for pencils. They are just big enough for a fair selection of pencils, but not too big that they are all flopping about.

Needless to say they are available in store now, both in Pounds and in Dollars, depending on your penchant ;-)

And tomorrow? Some of those diddy pouches for all those lose, lying about clips and bobbles will be available....

I love mugs. I am however quite particular about the mugs I use. And it also depends on what they are for. Not every mug is suitable for every drink or every occasion.

I have big chunky mugs for mid-morning coffee. I have smaller, handmade mugs for after dinner coffee. And for tea it HAS to be fine bone china. It just HAS to.

And there lies the problem. If like me, you are partial to your brew in fine bone china, you will know how difficult it is to find stylish mugs in fine bone china. Most often they are porcelain and that just won't do.

So when I found these in Habitat I just had to have one. They tick every box...colour, design, Orla-esque crosshatch and oh, fine bone china.

The only mistake I have made was just purchasing 2...I think I'll be going back for more.

So what's your penchant? What do you look for in a mug?

Didn't we have a lovely time at Grey Circles Winter Workshop??

Well, Manda and I certainly did!

We had 3 lovely ladies turn up for our Christmas Stocking and Zipper Pouch Workshop today and we had such a lovely time. Well, as I said, Manda and I certainly did, but you may need to ask Justine, Judi and Crissy if they did too.

Seriously, is there a better way to spend a Saturday than perusing over fabrics, spending the day sewing, coming away with some beautiful things you have made and sitting round a table with new friends eating and laughing?

Oh and did I mention fabulous fabrics to purchase sent up from Saints and Pinners?

Personally I could do this every day of the week...

...and judging by the look on these ladies faces, I think they could quite happily again too.

Watch out for further up-coming Grey Circle Workshops in a kitchen near you (or just a train ride away, hey, judi?)

Today has been a very good and an equally very bad day. We are suffering at home from serious cyber related unwanted interference, causing house phones, mobiles and internet to be inefficient at best and downright defunct at worst. Downright defunct was pretty much the name of today.

To my detriment, I turned in relatively early last night (this side of midnight) and omitted to download the latest orders. So when crisis hit this morning I had no way of getting the orders off the internet and found myself in a pretty darn tricky and annoying situation.

I spent much of the afternoon on the phone to a very nice man from my internet provider. Very nice didn't bloody get it working though. Frustration and anger set in and I was about to admit defeat and camp out at my parents, when miracle of miracle the internet resurfaced...temporarily.

It's being extremely temperamental and causing me no end of angst. Hopefully very nice man no. 2 who is coming round at 9am tomorrow to investigate further, will clear up the trouble and we'l have no further issues.

The very good part of the day is all this gorgeous Liberty fabrics that you may have been casting your eyes over, whilst reading about my ever so traumatic situation. Manda took me to a gem of a fabric shop, Fabworks, that I've been wanting to go to for ages. As you can see from the website pics, this store is piled high, and even higher with all sorts of shirting, woollen fabrics, upholstery fabrics and to my delight, Liberty prints.

We mainly went to choose some fabrics for Saturday's Workshop, but I obviously didn't stop there and came away with al these beautiful Liberty's. They are all just beautiful and are going to be featuring heavily in my forthcoming work. The white flowers on teal is for the back of my grey knitted cushion (which is coming along very well, thank you very much) and the folksy print has already come in very useful for a keyring order I had today. The multitude of patterns on this fabric, is just incredible and goes with absolutely anything.

I adore the pink houses - so pretty without being sickly and I am completely in love with the green flower - so fresh and simply stunning. And I have a new project up my sleeve for Christmas presents that they are all going to be used in one form or another...

So, as I said, very bad, but oh so very good too.