twoforjoy

Friday

Folksy Friday

No work for me today so I'm on full Mummy duty. YAY.

We started the morning by going to a fantastic stories and rhymes session at our local sure start centre - if you have a little person, and have a sure start centre nearby, please take advantage of them; So many people haven't heard about them or write them off for being for 'dodgy areas' but that simply isn't the case at all - they run fantastic activities for kids, which are generally completely free, and in my experience usually very undersubscribed because they're not very well advertised. Ok, I'll get of my soap box now... the reason I mentioned this is that I had a FF subject all lined up for today, but then saw another Mummy wearing a pair of earrings this morning, which were so lovely that I thought that today I would focus on

Earrings

Firstly, I have to caveat this by saying that I'm going to look at small stud earrings; this lady was wearing a beautifully delicate, slightly dangly pair, which I suspect that in my ears would last about 2 minutes before the Boy decided to investigate and tug them out (she had two girls!).

La Belle et La Bete

Sarah Hallowes

A quick note - Sarah has contacted me to let me know that she will be showing her work at Made in Clerkenwell at Craft Central from November 25th-28th and would be happy to send anyone who is interested in attending the event some tickets - please leave a comment below or PM Sarah on Folksy

Lovely

Right, I'm off to make the most of what's left of nap time - I should be stitching up some of my purses to finish and list, but I'm feeling in more of a machine embroidery mood, so we'll see!

Finally (cor, I've gone on a bit today) thank you to Catherine for featuring my safari stationery set in her lovely blog 100percentdelicate

Have a good weekend x

Thursday

double post

I realise that two posts in one evening is slightly over-enthusiastic by anyones standards, however, I'm browsing Folksy at the moment for my FF post tomorrow, and came across these;

two for joy by Rae Welch

I can't possibly have another bird themed FF, so i thought they deserved a post in their own right instead.

air waves

There is a radio-sized space just waiting for one of these beauties on my desk (please santa)

swoon

I found out about these yesterday on the Orangbirdstudio blog. As you would expect, they aren't cheap, but I've learnt the hard way that sometime you need to make the investment; I'm still kicking myself for not getting one of these a few years ago

Ahhh, I don't think I've mentioned my Paul Smith obsession, which is odd, because it actually might trump my Orla Kiely one

The OK radios are in John Lewis (but not for long I'll bet) from November

Wednesday

work in progress

Have I mentioned that I've been making some purses?! Yep, just checking. Here's the next batch underway:

A little wren and some oak leaves.. not really sold on the leaves yet - I'm thinking they might need some velvety ribbon or tweedy fabric to contrast.. but I don't have either at the moment!

Another wren and a flying gul

A fern (again, not sold - perhaps the contrasting Amy Butler fabric was a bad choice..) and a butterfly wasn't too sure about this until I added the ribbons and buttons, but I love it now!

And here are the linings... which I like almost as much as the outers!

All lined up and ready for assembly.. which I was planning to make a start on this evening, but then the sofa called!

Will be listing a few of these at the weekend.

Tuesday

I spy with my little eye

I am a little bit obsessed with getting myself a piece of Cathrineholm enamelware. I happened to be browsing on ebay today and stumbled across a beauty similar to this

Simple but perfect. I think I'm in love.

If you haven't heard of Cathrineholm before, then you might recognise the lotus design.

I have seen lotus design saucepans and frying pans grace many a cooking magazine, which led to many months of crazed searching to find what on earth these beauties were, and where I could get myself one. In such situations I usually find my answer in ebay. Unfortunately I do not seem to be the only one harbouring desires for one of these lovelies, which means the pricing is usually prohibitive. (apart from those ones I only remember to bid on after the time is up which go for nothing... damn!) A girl can dream though.

On a different note, I have now started to add some purses to my shop.. please come and have a peak if you're on the look out for a stocking-filler. More will be added every few days.

Oh, and while I go off on a tangent, could I kindly request anyone who hasn't done so already to please vote for me here - thank you!

Monday

pick up a penguin

Whilst in London at the weekend, we paid a visit to the Design Museum. The Boy and I spent a fair proportion of our time there sitting in the coffee shop, thanks to the snooty curators seemingly being unimpressed at him making noise, however he (we) had a lot of fun waving at people walking along the Thames. I managed to keep myself away from the shop while we were there, but when we got home, I somehow found myself wanting a sneaky peak at the website. I was most excited when I stumbled across this:

Which I also found here

I must explain that a couple of years ago when I bought this book, I was quite taken by this picture

(apologies for the photo, you've no idea how long it's taken me to come up with this effort!)

Must be a bird thing again.

So another item has been added to my wish list, on the off-chance that I might strike it lucky and come across this print. I don't think I'd be too upset, even if I don't.