hello 2011

happiest of new years to you, friends! 2010 was far & away my very favourite year that i've had. i met so many great & inspiring people, looking back over the last twelve months makes me feel very lucky. i brought the day in with my best friend & good company. we set off lanterns into the new year's sky, then huddled around a fire & ate roast chestnuts. it was excellent.

in keeping with the last couple of years, here's my list of 25 thing to do whilst i'm 25. i'm excited to get started! i'm also setting myself a goal each month in 2011, but will cover that some other time.

1. buy a plant each month - includes houseplants, flowers, herbs & edible things
2. make trips to visit out-of-town friends (& those who live close-by too of course)
3. reach 550 sales on etsy - ambitious, but a good challenge
4. add 12 new items to my shop
5. make a poster print - minimum A3/three colours
6. print tote bags - bought bags months ago, must use them
7. do taxes quarterly
8. learn to use my sewing machine - plus sub-goals:
9. make a lightweight summer dress
10. make a tie for alan
11. make something using fabric printed with my gocco
12. make fabric using spoonflower
13. floss!
14. join the library
15. avoid mass-produced clothing - buy direct from makers/second hand/sustainably
16. buy food from local sources/businesses & smaller supermarkets
17. go foraging
18. massive clear out of workspace
19. visit london with alan
20. make a recipe box
21. read the self-sufficient-ish bible & infuse it’s advice into my life where i can
22. keep lists of all the books i read & films i watch
23. redecorate the kitchen (rollover from 2010)
24. stay in a wooden cabin/tipi (rollover from 2010)
25. get a massage (rollover from 2010)

to give a little help to goal #3, if you use the code HAPPYNEWYEAR in my etsy shop, you'll get 10% off your purchase if you order before 8 january. hurrah!

thanks for all your support, comments & purchases over the last year. 2011 is going to be excellent, i know it.

season's greetings

hope you all have a super duper festive season! eat lots of yummy food & have fun with your favourite people. hooray!

petite noël

i think i've just about recovered from helping to organise craft markets this december - classique noël, an intimate jewellery event on 5 december, & petite noël, a handmade market just in time for christmas on 15 december.

as you may have guessed, i only took part in petite noël, & trust me when i say i'm not being biased - it was a great night. though we've not had feedback from everyone yet, the general consensus from both sellers & visitors is high-five-heck-yes. the vendors were brilliant, the handmade goods were wonderful & well crafted, the music was great, the crowd was ace & the hall was busy from start to finish - i'm only sorry i couldn't peruse my fellow seller's stalls for more goodies, but i could barely escape from my own table. i had a lot of lovely customers, a few who stayed for a chat & most people i spoke to left with a little something. postcards were the main sellers, but prints, notebooks & cards found new homes too. take a peek at the blogs of my fellow dundee jamboree organisers, nikki & lauren. those two juggle these events with jobs/studies + personal practice - & they do it all so well!

december has been a good one, but a busy one. along with writing approximately a million christmas cards, learning some new skills, having one of the busiest months in my shop so far & all journeys taking an additional ten minutes or so due to all the snow, a project i'd hoped to repeat after the last two years - every day a drawing in december - has fallen by the wayside (though i do have a few images still to upload). but i'm not going to beat myself up about it - one of the things i think i need to do in 2011 is find a little more focus, make more time to see friends/have fun & to remember not to sweat the small stuff.

arrow scarf

with petite noël just around the corner (wednesday 15 december!), i've been trying to get a few more products ready in time to fill up my stall. this includes a giclée print of my drawing inspired by hilary grant's beautiful circle scarves. i did the drawing as part of my annual every day a drawing in december project (which i am on top of, i just haven't had time to scan & post the images), & it got such a good response that i've turned it into a print. you can purchase one if you feel so inclined.

little mint-coloured house

i've sold out of a few items in my shop recently, which is kind of wonderful. the only downside is a dwindling stock, especially when petite noël is next week (!), but i'm certainly not complaining. make sure you order asap if you're in usa/canada/western & eastern europe/uk if want something before christmas - this weather certainly isn't helping post get anywhere fast.

above you'll find a new addition to the shop. this two colour screen-print is an update - & larger sized version - of my (sold out!) there's no place like home gocco print. i wish i could live in this little house. a porch, a veg patch & a tree. & the mint colour is inspired by a house i spied in gothenburg. dreamy!

christmas postage dates

i kind of can't believe it's december on wednesday. the weather in scotland is crazy at the moment, i've never seen this much snow in my life. hopefully it won't get in the way of all the things that need doing (although i didn't go to the print studio today - the thought of trekking all the way there, printing for a few hours, then trekking back was too much). above you'll find the card i've done for this year. i can tell you that at no other point in 2010 have i been so thankful for a good pair of thick socks as this week!

thought i'd just post the christmas posting dates for my shop. i'm sure a lot of you are down with the idea of handmade festive gifts already, so i won't try to coerce you further into picking up some prints & things for gifts. just let me mention that all orders come lovingly wrapped in tissue paper - all year round, not just at this time of year! - & all orders are very much appreciated, more than i can say. thanks guys!

last dates for ordering:

uk: sunday 19 december
western europe: sunday 12 december
eastern europe, usa & canada: wednesday 8 december
south/central america, caribbean, africa, middle east, asia, far east (inc. japan), australia & new zealand: sunday 5 december

a year in prints

i know there have been a lot of calendar round-ups on blogs recently, so here's another to add to the mix. two friends of mine, hilary grant & nikki mcwilliams, organised a little project called a year in prints. twelve artists created an edition of fifty prints for their designated month to make fifty calendars (i'm january - you may recognise a certain bear). find out more about the artists here, & you can pick one up here. at £24, that's a measly two quid per screen-print. bargain.

cool things girls make

some busy weeks lately - a few days off so my boyfriend & i could have some mini-adventures to celebrate five years together, plus squeezing in doing lots of little bits of work around normal day-to-day things. for now, i thought i'd show you some ace things i've been liking, made by some talented ladies. above, a new addition to our little flat. at first, my boyfriend thought i was putting up festive decorations early, but this particular item will be staying up year round - joie de vivre from banter banner, run by angela deane.

found kaye blegvad's website a few weeks ago, instantly hooked. quite a macabre (sometimes tongue in cheek) series of works, a nice change. i snapped up a copy of her 'onwards' book/zine, about an army of girls who go to war. heck yes.

you may already be aware of verity keniger's work, but you might not yet have seen her new (& utterly incredible) thirty-four layer screen-print, congeries. i shall never weep with frustration at making a three colour print again (though screen-printing hasn't brought me to tears for a few years, fortunately).

i'm largely a pens/pencils/print kind of girl, but i love danna ray's paintings. one of my particular favourites is the above piece, campfire. if i were to find a print of this under the tree this year, i'd be one happy bunny.

january bear + radio times

new print in the shop - this bear is fighting the cold weather with a large scarf. it's getting pretty chilly around here, so it feels pretty fitting (also, this photo has made me realise that my carpet needs a bit of a clean).

on a slightly more random note, i was asked by bbc radio scotland to talk to them about zines. you can listen to the show, which aired on friday, on their website (i'm not sure whether or not you need to be in the uk to listen). the zine part starts 00:36 mins in. please excuse my multiple 'umms'. i've never done radio before - a little bit daunting, but nice to be asked to do.

foto di gruppo

teiera (teapot) is a diy publishing collective organised by illustrators giulia sagramola & cristina spanò. as well as producing self-published titles, they publish the work of others. i was asked to take part in their latest venture, foto di gruppo (photo group), where all invited participants were sent a photo from the 60s of a group of boys and priests. each person was assigned one of the photo's subjects, & had to produce a comic based on that person - the finished comics have been compiled as a book. above is one of the pieces that became part of my comic. i'm pretty excited to receive the finished thing in the post.

ps. nearing 200 sales in my shop! all sales up to 199 will get a couple of added extras, number 200 will get a few more.

automobiles

i was very happy to be asked to exhibit in manchester exhibition toy shop in october, alongside an amazing array of artists & illustrators. my piece was this simple three colour screen-print of those red & yellow cars i'm sure some of you are familiar with. how i'd have loved one of these for real. available in my shop, a limited edition of 10.

speaking of cars, my boyfriend passed his driving test! we're now embarking on the daunting task of finding a car. i can't wait for weekend adventures to places that buses & trains don't take you, car-boot sales and coastal drives.

ps. i'm nearing 200 sales in my shop - numbers 191 - 199 will get a couple of added extras, & the big two-oh-oh will receive a few more. hurrah!

göteborg

back from gothenburg! it was ace, perfect for a few days away. the weather was chilly but sunny, we ate good food (favourite was a vegetarian restaurant called solrosen in haga), had lots of café stops, beautiful autumn trees everywhere, lovely city buildings & countryside houses, & everyone was so helpful. our hotel (hotel cosmorama) was central but pretty inexpensive & really nice, i'd definitely recommend it.

wonder where we'll go next?

suitcase

we're off to gothenburg! looking forward to exploring somewhere new & hopefully uncovering a few of the kinds of places that make you want to return somewhere asap. see you after the weekend!

trying to buy less

lately i've made a pact with myself to try buy less new things (the ipod touch was a big slip). the idea is to spend less, to think before i buy & to not bring as many brand new products into my home. i'm allowing myself to buy recycled, handmade & second hand so if there's something i'm thinking of buying, i'm making myself hunt it down via etsy, ebay & charity shops. on the one hand, this has been great. for example, i was looking for a mustard yellow cardigan, & ended up getting one on ebay (after a week or so of searching) for a lot cheaper than i would have if it were brand new, & it was exactly what i was looking for. however, the terrible loophole is that i'm basically using 'oh-it's-recycled/handmade/second-hand' as an excuse to buy things. i can't win!

giveaway winners!

i know, i know, it's the moment you've all been waiting for. due to a super awesome number of entries, i've picked two runner-up places alongside the main prize winner. the numbers are:

winner:
75. kathy tran

runner-up:
35. sophia
46. julie peach

i'll be getting in touch. thank you to everyone who entered, if only everyone could win!

good & bad

things that are rubbish: having the cold.

things that are ace: all those things above. & the fact that my cold is on its way out.

remember, giveaway ends tomorrow!

little giveaway

a slightly delayed giveaway (i'd hoped to tie it in with my shop's birthday) but a giveaway nonetheless. to enter, just leave a comment saying hello, & i'll pick a winner at random on the evening of sunday 26 september. the winner will receive a life is good print, one of my new notebooks & three hello cards, so you can send the fun onto friends.

just to share a little more, i've finally finished making my notebooks! it's available in a range of colours, & is hand printed & hand bound. check out the listing for more information. they were quite therapeutic to make, i'll be making more in future.

update, 26 september: thanks for all the entires, comments are closed & winners will be announced tomorrow!

bake a cake

new print in the shop! after enquiries about the bake a cake postcard from my nice advice postcard set, i decided to turn it into a screen-print. it's proved pretty popular so far; after only listing it a couple of days ago, 20% of the edition is gone. i'm glad people like it.

i'm currently in the middle of making some notebooks, i can't wait to see them finished. i'm going to spend a couple of hours binding/trimming them on sunday & monday, then they'll be pretty much complete.

i love mondays

i love mondays. they are my favourite day of the week. i let myself have a little lie in, then lazily started my day. this morning i had a bowl of cereal with yoghurt whilst i caught up with online things. i sorted out some spreadsheets so i can keep track of stock i have in shops better, then posted a couple of orders at the post office before heading into my local print studio (which is in the building i work in, but it's not so bad going into work on your day off when it's for pleasure). i finished off a series of prints before chatting with a couple of friends, then headed home. i went via a lovely little teashop called tlc, chatted to the owners for a while & got one of their new teas -caramel rooibos - to go. i stopped by my friend's greengrocers (where i was sad to find the last of the season's raspberries, no!) to pick up some veg then headed home. more online things, then read lucy knisley's new mini-comic while i ate veg pasta. now i'm posting this before getting a little more work done before my boyfriend comes home from a weekend away.

it's a shame tomorrow is tuesday.

ps. my shop sale ends on wednesday. be quick!

one!

just a little post to celebrate the fast that my etsy shop is a year old. one whole year! the experience has been a good one, & i'm so grateful to all the people who've made a purchase, & to those who have given feedback in any form. it's been great adding so many new things over the past few weeks, & i've got a few other things in the works that will make their way to my stock list soon.

in the meantime, i've got a little sale on. until 15 september, everything is available for up to 25% off. snap up a bargain if you fancy. i'm nearing the end of a few editions, so buy one while you still can!