Happy New Year!

Hurrah, it's the New Year! Here's a sneak peek of a brand new thing ^

I have always found it difficult to really understand why people dislike January so much. I love the fresh start a new year brings, and it's always a month in which I'm filled with inspiration and optimism. I love making plans and thinking about what lies ahead.  To counter-balance this however, I'm not a great believer in New Year's resolutions, and to be honest I get a bit tired of people saying every January how amazing the year ahead will be. Instead of making grand plans to do things I know I'll never do, I enjoy the start of the year for its new-ness and sense of anticipation it affords, and prefer to think about smaller things I can continue to do well. Whatever lies ahead, good, bad or just mediocre, I'm still looking forward to it all. I like to think of myself as a realistic optimist.

In 2012, I feel like I got onto the right tracks with everything, finally, and I'd like 2013 to be all about continuing along these tracks. I think I need to just do more of what I have been doing, and naturally I will improve and develop everything along the way. I've got a load of new ideas in my head, and I am going to try my hardest to draw more. And by draw more I mean actually going out somewhere to draw, just for drawing's sake. Whenever I come to creating new designs I find it really difficult to get to that stage where everything starts to flow naturally, and actually look good. I've become far too lazy with actually going out and drawing from real things and I think if I tried to do it more it'd really help my ideas (and good drawings) to flow more easily. So I guess that's a resolution isn't it.. but a realistic one, at least.

Anyway, I have a busy January ahead with a little trip to London next weekend, and then my next trade show starting on the 20th. More on both of those later...

Twenty-twelve

Well, 2012 is allllllmost over! It's been rather eventful and has gone by unbelievably fast. This year has been an important one, for me and many of my friends too. It's always funny thinking that if someone told you all of the things that will happen at the start of each year, you probably wouldn't believe them. It's interesting to compare expectations and reflections. Things never work out quite how you imagine, but that's not always a bad thing. On that note, I'm looking forward to a New Year full of even more surprises and being able to build upon everything I learned in 2012.

I shall leave you with a bunch of pictures...

Me, lots of times, in Nice

Cote d'Azur

 paintin' a bird

 garden photo-shoot

paintin' socks

stamping bags

my first Trade Show

a dinner with my pals

one of maybe ten days when the sun came out

MOVING DAY!

new desk

Louis the Pumpkin

my pals at Halloween

after Thanksgiving dinner

Christmassy flat!

 Merry Christmas and Happy New Year, everyone!

Decembrrrrrrrr

Well well, the last few weeks have been rather busy, with Christmas markets and Christmas orders and brand new designs for Spring and planning for the year ahead. I am keeping all my new designs secret for now. You can however follow me on instagram for some fuzzy pictures of my desk and other silly things..

In other news, I'm fully in the festive spirit and have already watched The Muppet Christmas Carol and Home Alone 1 & 2.. But I'm sure I'll probably watch them again at least twice each before Christmas! And my flatmate and I put up our (tiny) Christmas tree and made our little flat all pretty. Oh and it's also my Birthday in a mere 19 days! I'm making the most of the last few weeks of my early twenties by staying in the house most of the time with sweets and mulled cider...

We also have the most hideous / amazing tree topper (it used to be a witch.... can you tell?!).

The Market + new stockists

Here's a couple of pictures from The Market last Saturday! It's nice to be doing markets again. And you can see some pictures from the opening night of the lovely winter exhibition at The Marshmallow Lady right here (and you can see me in some of the pictures too... I'm the one dressed in pale blue and eating marshmallows...)

I've also got some lovely new stockists! I'm very pleased to say Plaisir in Biggar are now stocking my cards. Co-owner Clare runs the amazing Indie Retail Academy; it was great to get some lovely feedback from her -  which made me realise I'm definitely on the right tracks! My Christmas cards are also available in another two places in Edinburgh - Dovecot Studios are stocking the full range (I worked there when it first opened back in 2008... so it's nice to be selling work there now!). And also both branches of Paper Tiger, on Lothian  Road and on Stafford Street, stock a few of my Christmas designs (I currently work in the Stafford Street branch part-time, so you might be lucky enough to buy one from me there!). That's all for today... I'm going to be getting on with my Valentine's designs and preparing for Thanksgiving tomorrow! YEAH!

Stufffffffffff

Some photos from the last week or so: Princes Street Gardens (one of my favourite places to sit) / fluff dog / sausage dog / lettering / my table at Little Birds Market

Christmas Houses

In October I made some Christmassy houses for the window display at the lovely Isa May in Portobello, Edinburgh. I took them down last week and they looked lovely with all the sparkly lights and decorations! Here are some pictures of the houses taking shape... (my camera isn't great in the dark / in the light / most of the time. Apologies for the poor quality photography!)

starting..

windows + doors + snow

+ decorations

in the window! 

November events!

Christmas madness has begun!! I've got loads of exciting things going on this month! Firstly, I'll be selling cards and prints at Little Birds Market this Sunday 11th November in Glasgow. It's my first market selling Paper Aeroplane products (all the markets I've done before have been under my own name with my older work..) so I'm really excited to see how it goes!

Next up will be The Marshmallow Lady's Winter Craft Exhibition, which opens on Thursday 15th November. I'm really looking forward to exhibiting - it's been a while since I've taken part in something like this! I'm also really excited about trying out some more of the amazingly delicious marshmallows. Going to drop my work off next week and I'm bound to leave with about five or so bags...

I will also be exhibiting at The Park Gallery in Falkirk, as part of their Winter Warmth exhibition. I've got a selection of cards and prints in the show and again, it'll be really nice to take part in an exhibition. I haven't been to the Park Gallery before and am looking forward to seeing the space, and my work in it! The show opens on Saturday 17th November and continues through to January.

And if those three weren't enough... I'm also going to be selling my cards and prints at The Market, at St Columbus by the Castle in Edinburgh, on Saturday 17th November (and on Saturday 15th December too!). I took part in this market last Christmas and in April this year and I can't wait to do it again. Also, the organiser, Amelia Smith, did a little interview with STV about The Market - read it here!

Phewf. So, I've got rather a lot to keep my busy; as well as all of these I've got a couple of new stockists to write about but I'll save that for another day....