my creative space - giveaway

As promised my creative space today is a GIVEAWAY to introduce my new A4 prints.

My Ruby Slippers have long been a popular gift for girls, so its nice to be able to offer some unisex prints that boys will like too. Coincidentally my two darling boys turn ten this Saturday, can you believe it?! It doesn't seem that long ago that we found out we were having twins. I found my diary from 2001 the other day and by this time ten years ago I was the size of a house and moving very slowly, trying to keep up with a busy three year old!

To enter my giveaway just choose your favourite print and tell me which one it is in a comment below. The giveaway is open to everyone. I haven't done this before but I'm going to give followers who enter an extra vote, to thank you all for being regulars round here and for all your lovely support. Just make sure to mention your follower status in your comment. I'm happy for new followers to take advantage of the offer too.

Prints are named Red Teapot, Triangle Twist, yellow Marble Collection, blue Marble Collection, Turquoise Teapot and Blue Teapot. They are printed on wonderful heavy archival paper with beautiful six colour epson inks. These prints look wonderful framed in Ikea's A4 size Ribba Frame (not included). I'm hoping to offer a smaller a5 print soon too.

Oh and a winner will be drawn Friday week (8th April). Good Luck! For more creative types visit Kirsty!

japanese donations

I was delighted the other day to use the money raised from my Teapot for Japan print sales to buy winter weight sleeping bags through Superbuzzy's Stay Warm in Japan campaign. Its such a great way to help the cause practically - for just $6 you can buy a sleeping bag for someone to use in the devastated and now freezing areas of Northern Japan affected by the earthquake.

And then I was lucky enough to buy a beautiful fabric pack from generous Melissa, who joined a group of friends in Crafting for Courage, donating the proceeds of sales from some of her beautiful items to the Save the Children fund. Aren't they beautiful!

The crafting community is so generous, I'm always inspired by the creative ways they think of to help us show our concern and help the many people affected by disaster and war around the world.

Thanks for all the Marble love!!! I'll be back tomorrow to share some new prints based on my recent designs and I think its time I had a GIVEAWAY, don't you! Come back tomorrow for the chance to win your favourite of the new prints :-)

my creative space - marbles

The Project Selvage competition closes today. I just had a look over there and from what I can see there are over 700 entries! I've made a few designs with the contest in mind but I've finally decided this marble collection is the one I'm entering. Marbles were the first thought that jumped into my head - about three minutes after I started thinking about baby boys and I'm happy that it appears to be the only design with this theme. I've entered the blue, which colour do you like?

I've always loved marbles. I think they're beautiful. Mr Flowerpress has a lovely collection found over the years since childhood. I like the timeless, vintage quality of marbles, I like the swirls you find inside and how they hang in the glass. And I'm happy with the way my marble collection reads as spots from a distance too, I do love spotty fabric!

From all those entries the organisers choose just 75 for voting on by the Spoonflower community. There's a lot of competition so I will feel really honoured if my design gets through to that stage, fingers crossed.

Whatever happens my marble collection will soon be for sale as a print, I think they would be perfect as a present for new baby boys.

For more creations visit Kirsty.

findings!

I was reading Amy Prior's rain and shine blog this morning (its one of my favourites) and came across this lovely gift guide Amy has chosen for the The Finders Keepers blog, including my Doily denim cushion!

Five textile designers have shared their choices for a fabulous indie textile Gift Guide. (As most of you would know Amy is half of the talented Umbrella Prints team.)

I really hope someone I know is reading it because this is a wish list come to life. Lots of beautiful textiles, local and international, lots of favourites and some new discoveries. I'm in wonderful company!

Go here to drool! My Doily cushion is available on Etsy and Madeit.

Thanks Amy :-)

my creative space - for japan

I've been meaning to list these new prints for a while now. Did you know I'm a dreadful procrastinater. It's true!

That's one of the things I like about My Creative Space. Each Thursday I get to think about what I have created or what I'm making. It helps keep me making, getting things done. Though some weeks I'm surprised by how quickly it reappears!

Anyway, I love the new incarnation of my Teapot design, updated for my new tea towels and I've been daydreaming a while about making them as prints. I was really surprised back then about how much I loved the red version, especially as blue and white crockery is one of my favourite things.

When I was putting it in the frame this morning it made me think of the red and white Japanese flag designs that have been appearing, supporting the Japanese relief effort and I knew straight away I was going to list it with half the money going to Japan via the Australian Red Cross. So if you want a new Teapot print (A4 size which fits so perfectly in this Ikea Ribba frame) printed with archival inks, signed and dated in pencil, and with half the profits going to a great cause, here's your chance.

Look out for new colours too. Any suggestions? Of course dark blue is a must, then maybe if I'm brave a limey green!

show & tell - corrie sebire

As anyone who reads her blog knows, popular Sydney blogger Corrie Sebire, better known as retromummy, is an amazing multitasker,  in spite of her busy multi-family! Corrie is the mother of four beautiful kids, twins Finn and Tillie, an older daughter Keira who is just starting school, and the cutest baby girl, Elodie.

Corrie blogs and crafts regularly. She also finds time to make and sell clothes and accessories like these beautiful dresses. Like any good retromummy Corrie is also an accomplished knitter, quilter and baker and makes a mean white chocolate rocky road!

If that wasn't enough to keep her busy, and I'm exhausted even thinking about it, she is also coordinating the Quilts for Queensland drive, collecting and sewing blocks and quilts for victims of the Queensland floods. Such a wonderful cause. Recently Corrie posted links to some  great quilt tutorials. As someone who often gets overwhelmed by the wealth of wonderful quilt pictures and advice online these were a great selection of resources in one place.

Corrie's blog also hosts some fantastic giveaways. (I recently won a fabulous pair of new swimming goggles via her blog, and I never win anything!) Luckily for you, Corrie has just announced her biggest giveaway ever, today! Head over for your chance to win a shopping spree and personalised style session at Westfield! Read about Corrie's session and see her fantastic pictures and videos!

But first a chance to read more about this talented blogger, to find out what her favourite handmade things are, and try to guess her favourite colour (not too hard)! Thanks Corrie.

name
Corrie Sebire

location
Sydney, Australia

blog
www.retromummy.blogspot.com

flickr
http://www.flickr.com/photos/65748352@N00/

facebook
www.facebook.com/pages/Retro-Mummy/251623778090

1. Can you give us a short description of your blog/style/work
My blog is a story of life at my house. Family, craft, inspiration and just my life in general.

2. Why blog? How did you start?
I started blogging when I went a week overdue with Keira, my first daughter back in 2006. I was a knitter and wanted to share my knitting projects and make friends on the internet as I wasn't working and had just moved to a new area.

3. Family taught/Self-taught/Trained?
I was taught knitting by my grandma and nana when I was in primary school but picked it up again in my 20's from books. The sewing and quilting is a mixture of self taught and short courses at TAFE [technical college] and community colleges.

4. Workspace - studio or kitchen table?
I am so lucky to have two adjoining rooms devoted to craft. Very lucky indeed. I have a cutting table which is a very fancy market table from Bunnings (I'm joking that it's fancy, obviously) and my machine and overlocker are set up on a basic ikea desk.

5. Blog/Shop name, where does it come from?
I thought of the name in 2007 when I realised I wasn't like a lot of the mums in my mothers group. I felt like I was more of a traditional homemaker and figured I was a retro mummy. It was like a light bulb moment and I set up a new blog straight away!

6. Favourite media to work in?
Fabric. Definitely fabric!

7. Ambitions/future directions/future projects/medium you'd like to try?
I would just love more time to spend making quilts. That would make me very happy. I'm just a bit short on time and pulled in a lot of directions but I see lots more quilts in my future.

8. Are you neat and organised or, ahem, creatively messy?
definitely creatively messy for a few weeks then I reign it all in... and it gets messy again.

9. Favourite handmade, handcrafted item you own not made by you.
I have a sock monkey made by Kellie of Don't Look Now - it was for the kids but it's actually out of reach of the kids. Too special to be thrown around and trashed by my little ones.

10. Favourite food/recipe?
Sushi, tempura and anything japanese.

11. Favourite colour?
Pink!

12. Star sign?
Pisces

13. Favourite place, landscape (not necessarily Australian)?
Japan, without a doubt. Images of cherry blossom, temples, traditional buildings, mountains. I just love Japan

14. Any tricks for juggling life/work/family with creative pursuits?
Well I let a lot of less important things slip by prioritising and make sure family always comes first. I also make sure I have some projects out that I can do on the couch or in the car on weekends so that I can make the most of a spare hour or two.

15. Favourite artists, artisans, crafters?
Oh so many. I tend to love crafters with large families like Soulemama and Anna Maria Horner. Balancing life at home and creating with large families. Inspiring and doing it beautifully.

16. Your favourite thing you've made/written/done
Sorry for the cliché but my four children. I am so busy everyday but goodness they are the best thing I've done. If I was allowed I'd have another baby in a flash.

17. Three words to describe yourself?
busy, chatty, loving

18. What do you like to do besides creating?
Bake some cookies or get my toes painted while retro daddy does the groceries. You might also find me asleep on the couch when I get a chance!

triangle twist

I have the pattern bug and I'm really enjoying trying to put lots of ideas down quickly when I have time. I've nearly settled on a design for the Project Selvage competition, the first idea that popped into my head by coincidence, but with another ten days till the deadline I'm still playing. I promise I'll share my entry when I decide!

This is my new Triangle Twist design, inspired by a coincidence of triangle prints and designs I've been seeing lately. I think if you were clever enough it would make an interesting quilt design!

As you can see I'm experimenting with different colour combinations too, and loving how they affect the design. The baby blue is inspired by Project Selvage while the other palette is taken from a photo I liked here.

As well as that I am putting together photos for the March Show & Tell, which will be posted tomorrow! I always get so excited about these wonderful interviews, I know that you are going to love this one!

My thoughts are also with Japan today. I'm looking for ways to contribute to the victims and show my support for the country. Like Australian Red Cross or this google page has donation links to the Japanese Red Cross and also the very poignant 'person finder' tool link. Just heartbreaking.

the rikrak studio

The rikrak studio is a wonderful blog always overflowing with beautiful things, and well known for its regular Olympic and World Cup competitions for handmade designers. I love to vote in these and was delighted to see that one of the 2011 winners awarded favourite 'handmaking nicies' for her coordination of  fundraising auctions for the Qld Floods was Toni Coward of Make it Perfect.

You can imagine then how delighted I am to be featured this week on Kristal's blog as part of a list of "my favourite things - beautiful tea towels", alongside some truly fabulous company including dottieangel, baileydoesn'tbark, wonderthunder, soraam, skinny laminx and more. You can see all that tea towel loveliness here.

Thanks for the sympathies for my boring stuff of my last post. I've made a concerted effort this week to banish the worst of them instead of letting them hang over me and as a result I'm feeling much happier and more positive!

By the way, can you believed we are half way through March already! I'm hoping to post this month's Show & Tell next week. Another really wonderful blogger, closer to home this time, but that's all the hint you get!!!

autumn

Isn't it amazing the way colour can change a pattern. I spent a little time playing with my clouds design the other day trying to use a different palette than usual. I love these autumnal tones and the way they look in this design. It makes me think of 1920s and 30s geometrics and art deco.
Not so creative this week, lots of boring stuff and nothing going quite right, one of those weeks!
On Monday though I had a long lunch with a friend I haven't caught up with for ages. She's having a great week, after some hard times. So that was good. And so was the whitebait fritters and rocket salad, yum!

my creative space - project selvage

The other day I read with excitement about the new Spoonflower Project Selvage competition. The winner gets to design a licensed fabric line for Michael Miller fabrics! Wow, what a great prize!

The first part of the competition is to design a baby boy fabric repeat and upload it to Spoonflower. From those designs a shortlist of 75 semifinalists will be chosen by Spoonflower and Michael Miller. These designs will then be voted on by the Spoonflower community to narrow it down to ten finalists. They get to expand this first design into a collection and a winner is chosen. The lucky winner then gets to design a collection of baby girl fabrics for Michael Miller which will be debuted later in the year at Houston Quilt Market. Wow!

I decided on the spot that I had to enter. I think it will be fun to submit a design but I'm also looking forward to voting and seeing the journey of the designers who progress through the competition. The first deadline is March 24, but you can read more about it here.

Only one entry per person is allowed. This isn't mine, I don't think! I'm still working on another, which I promise I'll show here when its ready. One idea jumped into my head straight away and I've been having fun trying to put it on paper (via Illustrator). In the meantime here are the green and blue cloud prints I've been playing with, I think they might make a good boy fabric, I can just see my boys in a pair of boardies in this design, in fact Mr D has a pair in a similar green!

To see all the other creative spaces (and I love the addition of little thumbnails in the links) go and visit Kirsty, who's playing with green today too.