bugs and sniffles

It's definately autumn now as it is pretty chilly in the afternoons and both the little lady and I have been suffering with colds and sniffles. She has a terrible chesty cough and hasn't been sleeping that well so all my well intentioned 'perpare in advance' for the christmas craft fair season have fallen by the wayside.

I've also got a part time job working for my sister at her company Neon which has been good fun. It's very interesting to see behind the scenes and I am proud to be part of her very successful company aswell.

As a little treat I have bought her a skinny la minx tote bag (and err one for myself and some stickers for the little lady...). I thought it would be something different for her to carry her work things around in.

I love Heather's work and as she featured the urban craft stars on her blog for me it was high time I visited her shop for a little purchase or too. I'm hoping the mugs are back soon as they wuld make lovely Christmas presents for my mum and dad.

office gossip

our internet connection is fixed at last thanks to the lovely Colin and Ben at Tiscali. I actually managed to load a new item - a red bird treasure tote bag onto folksy and started on updating my etsy shop.

Somehow though my new camera makes the picture's dimensions too big for etsy size so that's another technology challenge for me to wrestle with.

My other challenge is being back at work part time. I do though have the most family friendly employer aka my sister. Her company Neon goes from strength to strength in the world of PR and I am very very proud of her. I think alot of people do dream about running their own business but not everyone actually takes the leap but she has done so very successfully.

Treasure bags for little 'uns

I'm working hard on new images for my littlechook website and managed to get some great shots in finsbury park with the little lady modelling the bags. She had a great time helping me stuff them with paper bags to make them more photogenic then we hung them in the trees. They looked really sweet and the squirrels and loads of passer bys were intrigued!

Hopefully I'll be able to get this internet problem fixed and get the new images of the mini toe bags onto etsy and folksy soon. They sold really well in the pop up shop so I have high hopes for them at all the christmas fairs this year.....

finsbury park life

My blog discipline is all over the place at the moment and my posting is a bit erratic but I am still struggling with a crappy internet connection which is making me lose the will to live.

Still had a nice day today with the little lady. We took some of the little treasure tote bags up to finsbury park and I hung them in the trees and took some pictures. The park looked lovely today in the autumn sunshine but it felt alot colder today. We also made friends with some squirrels including one who tried to climb in the buggy. The little lady was ready to fight him for the raisins!

Howies/Folksy competition

Folksy are running design competition in conjunction with Howies and I decided last night to do a last minute entry. I had been thinking about their 'life is complicated, sport is simple' theme for a while and had some ideas but true to form life is complicated and I hadn't had any time to do anything about them.

So last night I cut some flock, did some embroidery and came up with a bird themed tea towel.

I went for a tea towel cos everyone has to do the dishes and I wanted a design that would remind you to hurry up, dry up and go outside.

The winning designs will be displayed in the window of the Howies carnaby street store during london design week. There are some lovely entries on folksy at the moment. I like Stitchy Woo Woo's freedom to wheel tote bag and Lucy Player's simple illustration.

urban craft stars

is the collective name for all the pop up shop designers.

So far confirmed we have:

my mums a hippie

urbanknit

peppermint twist desings

bombus

Tim Williamson (photography)

and of course littlechook.

Most of us sell on etsy already but I'll post profiles of each over the next few days in advance of us opening our pop up shop in carnaby street. It's all very hectic but very exciting too. Thought I'd start with an urbanknit tote bag which I am very fond of!