Milk Thieves

It really must be Christmas, because I can now announce another new stockist! Milk Thieves is Wollongong's newest hidden treasure (upstairs at 157 Crown St in Wollongong - blink and you'll miss the entry). The concept of graphic designer and artist Emma-Lee, the store is a mix of artworks, handmade jewellery, cards, bags accessories, soaps and more, as well as serving as a base for Emma-Lee's graphic design business. More a gallery/shop, the space serves as a venue for independent creative work to be showcased. Thanks Emma-Lee for inviting me to submit some work for this exciting new venture!

Milhouse Designs

The wait is over! I am so very pleased to announce that the Birdhouse boutique range is now available at Milhouse Designs in Mangerton! If you're like me and haven't even started your Christmas shopping yet, drop in and view the range of divine children's wear, toys, gifts, jewellery, accessories and the yummy Perfume and Skincare Company range of lotions and potions - especially the fig and olive fragrance mmmmm... My only regret is forgetting to take the camera when I dropped off the order today, but I will attempt to rectify this in a couple of days. For now here's a snap of the lovely Afri Beads I picked up there for a friend's christmas present. These fairtrade beads are made by the Kind Mothers Program in Uganda, and are handmade from recycled paper - gorgeous!

New stockists

I'm very excited to announce new stockists of the birdhouse range! Next time you're in Manly, you can check out some limited edition pieces in the children's section of the beautiful fashion and homewares boutique Mr and Mrs Smith - that is, if you can get past all the things you'll want to buy for yourself!

As well as a select range of children's clothes, toys and accessories, you'll be sure to find some treasures amongst the designer clothes, handbags, shoes, and exclusive homewares. It's a privilege to be invited to contribute some pieces!

As for the other new stockist... well you're just going to have to wait until the end of the week when the singlets hit the rack to find out!

Congratulations Rene!

A little while ago, I was lucky enough to meet the lovely Rene on holidays in Gerringong. And it gives me great pleasure to be able to congratulate her on her new website and range of activewear for mummies to be. You can find Rene's new range on www.fitformum.com.au. A must for all yummy mummies!

Some new designs

Well this one's not completely new, but I wanted to post it nonetheless. My first experiment with a lino print, and a bit of a challenge to print on to fabric - particularly as I haven' t attached the lino to a block yet, so it's messy work! I've been making these in the larger sizes, (2-6) and they've been best sellers - everyone likes a bicycle maybe? It's been an inspiration to start work on some other lino prints anyway.

Anybody for a jaunt around the harbour or a spot of fishing? I was originally uninterested in developing images that had a "mechanical" rather than natural feel to them, but I have so many requests for boats and cars that I thought I'd give them a shot. That, and the fact that my two year old is now obsessed with anything that moves and makes noise I think provides ample justification...

A bit tardy

There's always a really good excuse for not having paid any attention to the blog for a while, but apart from the usual excuses about too much work and not enough time, I don't have anything spectacular to share... I suppose I could make something up?

Last weekend was another three day haul - Wollongong, Manly and Frenchs Forest markets. Sooo glad I finally tried out Manly market, as not only was it a great day, the vibe was lovely, the stallholders around me were charming and there was excellent coffee available close by! Will definitely be heading back to Manly regularly from now on.

Once again I'm down south at the in-laws enjoying a few days of respite and celebrating a few birthdays. This has also given me a chance to work on some new designs - watch this space for the prints over the coming couple of weeks! I was approached by a couple of local boutique owners who were interested in stocking my goodies last Friday, so will be interested to see how this pans out. I wasn't planning on stocking any retail outlets until next year, so this will be a great learning experience, and will give me some ideas about the sort of issues I may have to face if the wholesale line comes to fruition.

Anyway, ciao for now as I'm off to the Candelo markets to ruffle through the junk in search of treasure! Speaking of which, most recent acquisition from a wonderful country market was an old Singer sewing machine in the cabinet for... (sit down please ladies) $15! Can you believe it? I still have to touch it occasionally to check that it is indeed real.

Summer Rush

My big t-shirt shipment arrived late last week - beautiful organic cotton - so it has been dye central here for quite a few days now. And I'm wondering how some of my friends organise their time. I have only one 2 year old, but still don't manage to get anywhere near as much done as a certain dear friend of mine with two kiddies, a market stall, a drama school and more. In fact, I think she should do a little less just to make the rest of us feel at least slightly productive.

Some bibs and and little bucket hats also made their way into my possession, and I'm having fun dying them in the brighter colours I tend to use - personally I always dreamed of having a stack of darker coloured bibs when Mika was still using them, as they all tended to look like a swarm of insects had a come a cropper on them at great speed after about two uses. These sold like hotcakes at Bondi on the weekend, so maybe some other mums thought the same!

I spent an enormous amount of time cutting this new print this week. I did manage to trial a few different cutting methods, which was a lot of fun, but the finer lines are almost impossible to get just right sometimes - I almost never turn out a print that I'm expecting! Three days straight of markets this weekend and I am the walking dead today, which is why I'm typing and not printing!

And speaking of markets, Balmain was very quiet, but there are some beautiful art and crafts being sold there. If you have a chance to make it one Saturday, drop in and see some of the best handmade prints, children's clothing and jewellery at any market in Sydney.

Softies for Mirabel

If you haven't already seen this, Softies for Mirabel is a Crafting for Charity project organised by the wonderful people from Meet Me At Mikes. There's still a month or so until the softies are displayed in their Brunswick St shopfront, and then distributed to the kids that need them the most. Not having any talent in the softie department myself, a bag of singlets sent themselves off to Meet Me At Mikes last week, and will hopefully come in handy on some of those withering Melbourne summer days.

All the info can be found on the Meet Me At Mikes blog - and if you haven't already seen their book, check it out also, it's full of fantastic little projects that I'm going to do... one day...

Mushrooms and a Tea Set

Back to the grind at last, and I'm very conscious that the blog has been somewhat neglected whilst we've been gallivanting around the countryside. All the beautiful pictures I took in and around my mother in law's garden have unfortunately stayed on the camera at her house instead of coming home with me, (very inconsiderate)!

Nevertheless, the images I took inspiration from have followed me back in the form of a couple of new stencils... Not sure what I'm going to do with these yet, but tea towels immediately sprung to mind after the test print! Though I've recently had to admit to myself that I'm shamelessly addicted to city life, whenever we visit the in laws down south I feel a great sense of relief at the simplicity of the country existence. Lots of tea, a bit of pottering around, and three meals to plan and enjoy slowly.

This week it's back to work for me. The Bondi stall on Sunday was an absolute joy, but now I've run out of plenty of stock and it's time to get busy. I also found a fantastic old wooden ladder on the side of the road this afternoon, and it's sitting in the shed begging me to fix and paint it in time for the next market... watch this space!

Well, there was plenty of inspiration to be taken from last week's theme of olives, however the time to transfer these inspirational thoughts into tangible creations has been somewhat lacking over the last few days! Nevertheless, I made some time to sketch a few things which will later be cut into screenprint stencils.

A lot of people who stop by the stall ask me about the methods I use to create the images that end up on the clothing. I prefer to make some basic quick sketches, then cut the images into acetate using a scalpel to get a more ragged or raw image, and one that can take a fair bit of rough handling! The other thing I love about this method is that you never quite know what you're going to end up with, as the scalpel often has a mind of it's own!

Anyway, our plans for the next couple of weeks have just been wildly altered by pure chance, and as luck would have it we're scooting off for a holiday in QLD before the little man turns two. Beach, here I come! So with these summery thoughts in mind, I'm going out to my mother-in-law's wonderful garden to take some pictures for this week's inspiration piece.

I love a good yarn...

As part of this new blogging experiment, I'm hoping to start each week with a little posting about another craftsperson in my local area whose work I admire, and use this as inspiration for any designing that occurs in that week. (Ambitious, as some days I really am a walking sweatshop, but it's ok to dream, isn't it?) So with this lofty plan in mind, I'd like to introduce Knitabulous, whom I found by searching for other local Etsyans :) (thanks to whoever introduced me to that term - I feel as though I'm part of some sort of Star Trek club now).

Anyway, the picture above is of "Extra Virgin" Australian Merino sock yarn, so, you guessed it, I'm thinking olives must be this week's theme. But those tones have also got me thinking about some of the reflective colours seen around the local rockpools late afternoon. See my links on the side to go to the Knitabulous Etsy page for more of this yarn in various gorgeous tones.

P.S. For those of you who have not been told their knitting is "painful to watch", you might be very interested in the Knitabulous Sock and Shawl Club - subscriptions are open now...

Just look at these gorgeous bloomers by the very talented Ally from Mavis and Frank - how could I not post it! Looking forward to seeing the reaction these and Ally's new line of denim bloomers, shorts and skirts get at this weekend's Bondi Markets - photos coming soon!

Welcome to the blog!

Hi! It's been a couple of months now since birdhouse and Mavis and Frank joined forces on our first market stall, so riding high on the success of singlets and bloomers I have decided to start a blog so you can check out where we will be next, and see our new designs before they hit the clothesline.

Here you'll find examples of the items we have for sale on our stall, but you can also visit our Etsy stores, (see links on the side) for a wider range, or to make online orders and/or requests. As those who shop with us already know, all our clothing items are made in small runs, and many are completely unique pieces.

birdhouse tops are screenprinted the old fashioned way using hand cut designs, (not computer generated) and are finished with vintage buttons, laces and fabrics. Many are also hand dyed in order to provide unique colours for the infant range. My prints have also recently found their way on to tote bags, and I have a new line of handmade cards and wrapping paper coming out. 2010 will see the launch of a new handprinted fabric range, and with any luck, some beautiful new clothing created from said fabric.

thanks for stopping by, and please drop by for a chat at the stall - especially if there's a newborn to be cooed over!