This is the illustration I submitted for the pica pica magazine competition that was running at the start of this year. Pleased to say it made runner up! Hurrah! And will be featured in the magazine! I’ve seen sneak previews of the project and I can’t wait for the all clear to share it with you :) keep your eyes peeled.

Hope you all had a lovely chocolate filled Easter. I’m currently sat tucking into a pot of tea and enjoying many hours of Pride and Prejudice (1995 BBC production of course). I’ll return soon with some new cotton doodles. Have a lovely Monday :)

I ran out of things to do during the craft fair last weekend and ended up randomly sewing the word ‘hi’ onto a piece of fabric… I haven’t really been able to stop sewing since and I thought it was about time I shared some pictures. I have to admit (and you will definitely notice) it’s not something I’ve done before but I’m really pleased with how they’ve turned out. I like that they’re bumpy and uneven and a little all over the place – I definitely wouldn’t have won any awards in Jane Austen’s day, that’s for sure.

I’ve had a bit of a flickr clean up this morning too so I’ve dedicated a set purely to the cotton doodles in hope that it will encourage me to continue making them, click here to see what I’ve done so far.

2 SCREENINGS of Handmade Nation will be shown on Saturday 20th at Broadway cinema, Nottingham. In support of these screenings we will be hosting a craft market! The screenings are early and the market is on til late, so come along and treat yourself to some locally made treasures. I’ll have some exciting new odds and ends available. Some limited editions and someoriginals to offer. Hurrah! See you Saturday! (Tickets for the screenings are available on the Nottingham Craft Mafia site and they’re selling fast!)

Today I have developed a stinking cold so I went out and bought some almond macaroons to cheer me up :) I am also watching When Harry Met Sally before work. So it’s not all bad.

The treasures arrived! I saw these beauties by Jordan Grace Owens featured on the Pikaland site and couldn’t resist. I want more… I bought them as gifts but I don’t think I can part with them. How bad am I? Ahem, yes very. I want the paper dolls too…

Finally! Some house related pictures to share. Woke up this morning to a pleasant surprise – although I can imagine it’s going to make getting into town later tricky. Anyway, this is the view from the MOUNTAIN (it’s a hill really) we live on.

Below is the first half of our kitchen/dining room. We’re still in the process of filling up the shelves with our colourful picture books. Through the windows you can catch a glimpse of our snow covered garden. Illya’s enjoying skating around on the tiled floors – as you can probably imagine. I’m trying to decide whether I want to make some table mats or settle for incredibly overpriced habitat ones… Since I’m on a strict budget and my ’studio’ space isn’t accessible I’m leaning more towards homemade. Maybe that’s going to be this weeks project – now where did I bury my sewing machine…

This is a shot of the other half of the room (the bit where the food is made – not by me obviously as I don’t cook) and the door leading to the hallway. I’ll have some more photos of the rest of the house soon. I’m taking it room at a time – no point in showing you a lovely house with my chaos scattered around it :) Also the light’s better at this time in the morning in this room.

Below is just a random picture of rose face I thought I’d share too.

Back soon :)