And we're back from our adventures!

We have been a little absent from blogland for the last month as we spent 4 weeks over in Scotland with Gareth's family for Christmas. Although we had plans to blog while we were away, it is one of those things you intend on doing but you just end up eating, sleeping and drinking.

We planned our trip around Rose Street, leaving the Sunday night after our last market in December. We knew it was snowing in the UK, but we didn't think we would have any problems with Heathrow when we left. After sitting around Kuala Lumpur International Airport for 18 hours we realised we may have some problems getting to Scotland. So we took a bit of inspiration from one of our favourite TV shows and treated it like the Amazing Race. We were given the option to change our flight, so instead of spending a few days stuck in an airport, we got 24 hours in Rome.

We got to Italy with no luggage as it had gone missing. Although this sounds like a really bad thing, it saved us having to haul it around Rome and it all turned up in Scotland a few days/weeks later. We also learnt a valuable lesson on this trip: pack a few things in your hand luggage in case your suitcase goes missing.

We made the most of our day in Rome, walking from the Vatican to the Colosseum via a route than combined both site seeing and our ability to not read a map very well. I think I lost my mind when we came across Torre Argentina, a block of old ruins full of stray cats. We didn't know anything about it and we were super excited to find one cat then when we spotted a couple more we thought it was too good to be true. When we realised there was about 200 cats wandering around we figured something was up and discovered the underground part where they look after the sick cats. The crazy cat lady in me was pretty happy with that discovery and it was all at the place where Caesar was murdered. Turns out cat rule the interwebs and Rome.

We finally got to the UK only two days after we were due to arrive. Our little diversion saved us from another day or so in Malaysia plus a day stuck at Heathrow. I'm glad all those hours watching The Amazing Race were not in vain.

We arrived to a Scotland covered in snow and a crisp -8 degrees. While everyone was telling me how lucky I was to have a white Christmas I was wondering how I would cope with such crazy temperatures. But it warmed up pretty fast and by the time we left it was a balmy 8 degrees.

Gareth was looking forward to having his fill of traditional Scottish cuisine. Pictured here is Gareth with one of his favourites, Pizza Supper. Also known as DEEP FRIED PIZZA. The supper part means it comes with chips. Gareth always tells people he misses the food from back home, now you know why.

Now we have been back for a week we have been working hard getting lots of orders out to shops for Valentine's Day. We have also been working on new cards for the big occasion like the one below. I'm hoping the next Masterchef has someone making a gourmet version of deep fried pizza and serving it with Irn Bru. That would be worth watching!

that time of the year

I just realised we have not blogged about a few of our Christmas cards. We made them back in October/Early November when it wasn't really the right time to start promoting them. Then the few weeks after that zinged by and suddenly it is a week and a half before Christmas and this little guy hasn't been getting the attention he deserves!

Christmas cards are not easy to make, coming up with something that works takes about the same amount of creative brain power as 5 romantic cards. So when we do one we like we are all yippees and happy. And this one makes me happy because I like the idea of someone wearing a Christmas Tree. It would be funny!

He is available on Etsy and for all those peeps in Melbourne we have three more markets coming up before Christmas. We also recommend that anyone in Australia wanting to order online to do it by tomorrow morning so we can get it all in the post with enough time to make it by the following Friday (Christmas eve).

The Lovely Tea Towels

This is our You're All Sorts of Lovely Tea Towel. When we had to choose which card designs we wanted made into tea towels the two that stood out the most were Zone Two and You're All Sorts of Lovely. The prints came out looking, well lovely! We got the screens done at All Australian Screenprinting Supplies and when I took them out of the paper I think I gasped a little. I've done a lot of screenprinting in the last 4 years, but all of it was hand cut or hand drawn stencils so it was nice to see my own designs on a real screen. The lovely tea towel is available on Etsy and makes a pretty nifty Christmas present for that lovely person in your life!

We will be getting more designs made into tea towels so if you have any suggestions on which card design you would like to use to dry your pots and pans, we are all ears!

On the weekend....

Gareth and I just finished up a big weekend that started Friday and ended when we opened a bottle of Sav Blanc around 7pm last night. With Finders Keepers on Friday and Saturday and then Melbourne Design Market on Sunday as well as old faithful, Rose Street. It was a big weekend, one where Gareth and I had to bring our A game.

A few things I would like mention:

• Baja Cantina on Glebe Point Road does lovely Mexican food.
• Make sure you book return flights home on the correct date. Nothing is worse than arriving at the airport tired only to find the flight you booked was for the night before. There were tears, it was a little Amazing Race-ish and the lovely check in lady from Virgin made me feel a lot better.
• Thank you to everyone that stopped by and said lovely things about our cards, it really was a lot of fun and Gareth and I often say the best thing about making the cards is seeing people laughing out loud at our market stalls.
• Thank you to our friend Cain and my sister Eliza for helping out at Rose Street and Melbourne Design Market. Such a HUGE help!
• Gareth is a star.

Now we have the countdown to Christmas with 7 more markets booked. If you're wanting cards or gift ware between now and then and are in Melbourne our website has all our market dates. If you're not in Melbourne or can't get to the markets, there is always our Etsy shop.

Tea Towels!

We have finally put our tea towels online to purchase, mainly because I wanted to get decent photographs and I put it off for a couple of days, weeks actually more like months! But the months feel like weeks and the weeks feel like days at the moment. With a little event like Christmas coming up we thought we better get organised. We have two designs, the I'd Go To Zone Two For You and the You're All Sorts of Lovely. We will have them at our markets this weekend, Finders Keepers in Sydney on Friday and Saturday, Melbourne Design Market on Sunday and old faithful, Rose Street on both Saturday and Sunday. We are going to refer to it as the monster weekend.

PS The Roller Derby on Saturday was so much fun. Although we didn't get to see much of the action it was pretty special. The Victorian Roller Derby League organisers were so lovely, not only did they help unpack the car, they also gave us a goody bag of water, muesli bars and lolly pops. I saw this photo on Facebook and wanted to share it, so amazing!

I just sit around and draw kitties all day long

As you know we have three calendar designs, but we will very soon be adding a fourth. This one took a little longer because we had to draw a few new designs including the one above. The calendar will be kitty themed and include some of our favourite cat cards as well as a bunch of new designs. So last week when people asked me what I did I got to say "I sat around and drew cats all day, it was pretty taxing". Actually that last bit was true, my brain hurt by the end of the day, it is so used to just watching cat videos that it forgot how to be creative!

Yay!

We made a new range of cards last week called our 'yay' range of cards. We started with the 'yay for your new home' card and thought we would add a few more yay worthy things.

We have a yay for your birthday in purple, yay for your engagement in yellow, yay for your new baby in pink and blue, yay for your new job in green and the yay for your new home in orange. They are printed on a lovely parchment paper that has this really lovely texture to it and each one comes with a coloured envelope to match the colour of the design.

Like the majority of our cards the image started off as a hand drawing, although this time I used ink to create the images. Rather than use a paint brush I used two different sized points (one was a wooden chopstick, the other a dead fine liner - only the best tools for Able and Game!). Although it takes a lot longer to create a design and you're forever dipping into the ink, I love the line it creates.