A Book Giveaway & Mapping my Nice Days Out

Two fun things to mention today...

First up, the lovely folks at Super Cute Kawaii reviewed my book, Super-Cute Felt Animals yesterday and now they've got a copy to give away. Hurrah! (The giveaway closes on Tuesday 4th March).

Secondly, as well as starting some craft-themed boards on Pinterest I've set up some boards dedicated to the places I've been visiting on my Nice Days Out... complete with maps so you can see where all the museums, galleries, etc I've visited are located.

 

So far I've set up boards for London, Oxfordshire and Berkshire & Buckinghamshire.

I'm nerdishly fascinated seeing all these places plotted on a map but I'm also hoping that as I gradually add to these boards over the coming months they'll become an increasingly useful reference for anyone who fancies planning their own Nice Days Out to the areas I've been visiting :)

365 / 94 - Spring Cleaning and Scissors

The "spring" cleaning continues... but I'm feeling a lot better about it. For one thing, I'm actually making some progress - parts of my house are both clean and tidy! Getting rid of a lot of the clutter and properly organising things is making me feel better already (so many of our possessions were still in their "that'll do" places from when we first moved in) and I'm pleased with the pile of stuff we now have to give away.

Most importantly though, I did some crafting last night, hurrah! Not the largest or most exciting of crafty tasks, but one I have been meaning to do for ages - cutting up old envelopes to make, er, new envelopes:
Some of the new envelopes will have our address on the inside so I'll keep those for my personal letters etc. but the plain brown ones will be matched up with my new map cards (I do so love the look of the brown paper with the vintage maps) and the blue patterned ones I'll use for sending out zine orders. I've been using my spare map & giftwrap envelopes for sending out zines recently and the difference it makes is just huge. Even the normally stern cashier at the post office was entranced!

In Etsy news, my tea and cake obsession was blogged on I Like, my ornaments got a mention on Funky Finds and my moustache pins were on the Etsy front page early this morning - too early for me but you can see the treasury here. I was also delighted to find sweet mentions of this very blog here, here and also here - so, so nice to read other people's reactions to my witterings :)

In other news, it's lovely and sunny here this morning - even if I had anything crafty to show off yesterday I'd barely have been able to take a photo of it the day was so dark and gloomy and filled with rain. I'm hoping to get some gardening done this afternoon if the weather holds... does gardening count as craftiness, I wonder?

365 / 89 - Maps Maps Maps

Yesterday evening I faffed about on the computer a fair bit and spent a goodly amount of time enjoying the pleasures of home cooking, etc. Crafting-wise I turned my attention to a bundle of map pieces I cut out just aaages ago (way back on day 18!), finally sticking them to card blanks to become real live cards. Lovely old maps, one of the Thames Valley (my home turf) and one really beautiful map of London from the 1940s. I'd originally planned to display the latter but it was badly marked, so I cut all the damaged bits off and the remainder has made for some lush cards. They still need handmade envelopes to go with them (I'm making recycled brown paper envelopes which I think sets off the maps really nicely) and then I shall attend to sorting them into sets etc and taking photographs but it's still nice to have them "finished".

Crafting 365 - day eighteen - stationery and rearranging my stash of supplies

Last night I got all those sheet music notecards wrapped up into nice bundles of 3 and 6 cards, and then got a bit carried away with the old cutting and sticking...

I now have a pile of finished map cards ready to photograph (top left in the photo) and some brown & blue recycled envelopes ready to use for my own post (recycled from envelopes in our recycling pile). I also found two gorgeous 1940s maps in a box, put away because although they are delicious to look at they were too delicate to use for envelopes. One small brainwave later, and the maps have been cut into pieces ready to adorn some notecards which I shall pair with handmade envelopes of brown paper (I do love brown paper, and it goes really well with the colours in both maps as well as adding an extra vintage feel to them).

Off to the Post Office soon, and to buy some more Prittstick so I can glue those 1940s map pieces together.... I'll also be doing a bit of tidying as I have been re-arranging some of my supplies, my packing materials and stationery and things like that. We have been moving lots of furniture around the house and re-organising an awful lot of our stuff, and this has freed up a small bookcase for me to use near my workspace (ie just off the kitchen). It will be great having even more things to hand instead of 90% of my stuff being tucked away in the spare room. I shall take a picture when it's all sorted out - only halfway there yet!

Crafting 365 - day seventeen - cards as far as the eye can see...

... well, almost:

I thought it was high time I actually finished making all the sheet music notecards (to match the envelopes I finished the other day) and got them out of my "in progress" pile and into my finished stash. I have basically run out of glue now, haha. Sooo many cards!

Oh, and I got the giftwrap envelopes finished too (destined for my own personal stationery box) and glued together a few map notecards & envelopes. All these cards need to dry and then have my shop details written on the back and then finally they will be parcelled up into neat little sets. And then they will be finished, hurrah! I do love finishing things, it makes me feel all efficient - no matter how long the thing in question has been "in progress" for.

I am going to try not to think about how many other half-finished projects I have lying about the place... Not having a dedicated studio space means I spend my life getting a project out, working on it for a bit and putting it away again. I have developed many elaborate storage systems for all these in-progress bits and pieces but really the whole thing is just a big mess of clutter and the moment things go in a box they get forgotten about and remain half-finished seemingly forever. Ah well. One project down, many many many to go...

Crafting 365 - day thirteen - finishing things and fun with glue

Last night I finished almost all the moustaches I had in-progress (only 2 disguises left to do). Here they all are in a big heap:
My goodness that is a satisfying picture! Later this week I shall take some pictures of the new colours of the pins & the disguises and add them to my etsy listings... it's a bit too overcast now and tomorrow I shall be expending my daylight hours working & then going to the Post Office. I am a bit shattered from work today, actually. Definitely a good evening to do something simple and repetive - like drawing round envelope templates, for example...

I have lots of maps waiting to be turned into notecards:
... after cutting out lots of shapes I shall be wielding my glue stick lots and making a start on putting them all together (those music notecards need finishing too). I will also be getting out the oh-so-useful pot of craft glue and making my first moustache cards ("say it with a moustache", haha). First though I shall be drinking lots of tea!
(detail from a sketch by heidiburton who draws awesome things and understands the importance of TEA).

Crafting 365 - day nine - parcels in the mail

I have to get this out of my system before I can write a sensible blog post - my moustaches are on the Etsy front page! Hurrah!!! I am just so, so pleased. My family members are starting not to believe me when I say being on the front page is special and supremely exciting, cos this is the 4th time it's happened to me in about a fortnight (only the 4th time ever, I might add). I actually let out a small yelp when I saw them there today - loads of lovely felt things on the front page with them, too. I do rather love felt & all the awesome felty things on Etsy are just so inspiring.

Right, now I can get on with my blog post :)

Today I have been doing efficient and purposeful crafting in order to get some things finished and in the mail. I had a custom order for a notecard (made from a map of a particular place in France) and also had to finish two moustache disguises to finally be able to send them to my volunteer models (the lovely gemmafactrix and lazerbeanz). Here is the card atop the parcelled-up moustaches...

The map I used for the notecard actually came from the UK Etsy swap group, from the lovely seaurchin and I think the stickers I used on the parcels came from there too (tho I forget who sent them)! I love decorating my post with stickers - dull parcels depress me and the women who work at my Post Office seem to be cheered up by it if nothing else!

Small bit of other news: I have been blogged by the lovely Wildcat Designs, here.

Trying to get organised

Oh to be organised! At the moment, I'm really not. I flit from one project to another leaving a big fat mess in my wake and the house is starting to look pretty shoddy because of it...

So at the moment I am trying to tidy up, to finish things, to store things better and to have a clear-out. All at the same time, whilst trying to crack on with some sewing too. Lots to do...

I'm currently finishing a load of map tags that have lain unfinished for a couple of months...

... a big stack of wildflower envelopes that I cut out ages ago but never stuck together...

... and lots of things involving felt!
Trying to get my shop nicely stocked, too, which is being slightly hindered by Etsy being a bit lame at the moment (running very slowly, items apparently taking days to show up in searches etc) and also by the overcast & rainy few days we've just had (that sort of weather makes all my pictures turn out blue).

Oh, and I had an idea for this month's design challenge (Fairy Tales) but I doubt very much that I have the talent to actually make it turn out how it is in my mind's eye! Ah well, I shall give it a go anyway.