mans best friend

Today has been miserable weather wise, rain lashing against the windows and very dark, haven't picked up a stamp, but have been on the computer finding images for scrapbooks with the new stamps. Whilst I was looking I came across this pohoto of Bob who is back to being my constant companion. At the moment because Martin is in his office, having got back from deliveries and seeing customers, Bob is currently stationed between the two rooms. But he does pop in and put his head on my lap every now and then and in about an hour he will start to tell me it is time for his tea.

Bob always came to work with me until I went to the Craft Place full time, he carried on going to work with Martin at Write Now until that closed two years ago. Since then he has been here with Martin and now with both of us. One thing he is not keen on is me going into Martins Office or him coming into mine.

When I tell people I have a dog I am not sure what they expect, especially when I say he is a minature poodle, if fact he has an excellent pedigree and his father and sister have both been to Crufts. But here is Bob, in his favorite spot watching the world go by and patroling case any blackbirds dare come in the garden.

time to play

The lastest designs for Oak House Studio have at last landed in my craft room. Now please remember that I still haven't got to grips with finding new homes for all the craft goodies I brought with me from the craft place, so my present attempts at using them are rather limited, but space is always going to be an issue for work from here so I better get used to it.

So far I have managed to emboss using basic metallic powder (colour chemistry of course) I did the scrolls on to black linen card which is one of my favs at the moments ( just in case you hadn't noticed)

And I have stamped the floral frames using versafine ( vintage sepia) on the cream card and coloured using Faber Castell Watercolur pencils. I have embossed the heart version on gold and coloured that but you will have to wait to see that..looks good though, anyway not excellent work but you can see the designs which I am very pleased with.

The floral heart is so versatile it has been renamed Floral Frames. These have been made with just 3 out of the 6 stamps in the set, so there is even more you can do with them.

where does the time go

over a week since my last post, I am still recovering from the show.
This week I have been dashing around with my best clothes meeting various business people in nice hotels. It has probably been a welcome break but it amazing how all these things all come at once.
Yesterday involved me getting to the hotel 30 minutes ahead of the meeting to do a live braodcast on Radio Humberside. It was a lot of fun and I was pleased to get my piece out of the way before the full days activities started but it did make for a long day.
I did seem to spend an awful amount of time explaining what I do now! Even one of the ladies who sell scrapbooking items needed me to explain how unmounted stamps work and why they so much more versatile than wood mounted rubber.
It was nice to listen to other people stories how they had ended up doing what they were doing, for most people it was about a life changing experience.
We also had a very nice lunch in super surroundings, and I have more of this to come this week,
Lets hope that it all helps to move the business forward.

THE weekend

We had a great weekend. The focus being a new papercaft show in Hull. We have played at these things things, but this was our first serious show. The main feature of our stand was of course Oak House Studio stamps. We did manage to get 10 colours of embossing powder packaged and labeled too. This involved pleading with our jar supplier to express the right size out to us, lengthy negotiations over labels, when the one we originally chose months ago was discontinued.
The whole week was busy preparing for the show and still we weren't quite ready.
My family were a great help not only doing jobs at short notice but also putting up with me very anxious about it all.
I can't thank my friends enough for all their help which entailed supplying chocolate when my hormones decided to kick in two days before the show, filling jars with embossing powder, bagging and labeling acrylic blocks with Martin for company (that is a friend), making great samples of cards and boxes and bows. Turning up on the day, and talking to customers and keeping me calm (well at least trying).
One of the best moments for me on Sunday came when I took a moment to look back at the stand after talking to a designer I knew from another company. Everyone on the stand was talking to someone, and the enthusiasm in their voices was amazing. For me to talk about the stamps and how you can use them is one thing, but my friends had all bought these stamps before they knew they were mine and here they were telling other people how great they are with such passion, it was a great feeling.
So for every minute of their time they gave me to help with Sunday, the moment that gave me most joy was that one.
We had a super day and sold out of the clematis tower stamp quite early, so we sent the customers down to Paper Roses as we knew they had new stock, but they sold out too. In the end we were both taking orders and came home to find more orders waiting for us.
So what am I doing now, well that is obvious, think about the next show after all we only have 31 days to Port Sunlight Stamping Show.