Success!

That's it. After months of planning the day of Love Vintage has been and gone. And thankfully it was a very sucessful day. The night before was a sleeplesss night which meant that I was up and at the hall long before everyone else started arriving.

The doors were opened to the public and the waiting began. Thankfully there wasn't too long to wait before people starting coming in and looking at all the stalls. Then Maggie and I could breathe a sigh of relief.

We had 14 stalls all in and here is a selection of some of them.

A small portion of my stall with some of the vintage goodies that have found new homes

Maggie's stall which was also severely depleted by the end of the day:

Here's the lovely http://thewasherwoman.blogspot.com/ Liz who travelled to us with all her vintage goodies.

Helen had a wonderful selection of kitchenalia

Yet more gorgeous kitchenalia from Nest Living

As well as these and the other stalls, the other draw was the tearooms. The tables all beautifullt laid with vintage tablecloths from my personal collection, flowers on the table and all served on vintage bone china. A perfect way to end a shopping spree!

We had a fabulous day and would like to thank everyone involved (the stallholders as well as the customers who came through the doors).

Which means we are planning another Love Vintage Fair. Love Vintage 2 which will be held early next year.

If would like to have a table or find out more about Love Vintage - please get in touch. And if you have any photos that you took on the day, I would love to hear from you too!

Pretty Pictures

I know this is the second post in quick (for me!) succession for the Love Vintage Fair, but it is time to start really advertising the event and to get some posters etc ready for the event.

My friend and co-organiser came over and promptly started to re-arrange and dismantle my dresser and display cabinet. We ended up with some fabulous shots but in the procedss there was some chaos.
Nothing too major - but all my carefully placed items were put here, there and everywhere and possible items gathered from all over.

We have decided to print out postcards to distribute as well as posters and general flyers. The thought process behind the postcards was to make them as appealing as possible so that people would want to keep them after the event as well as maybe having them on show on a noticeboard.

Here's the sweet girl who is on the front of our postcard


We also have a collection of vintage and made items that Maggie so artfully put together.

And although this was done yesterday and the postcards have been ordered and the poster is in the process of being sorted, I can't bring myself to dismantle the composition just in case!

So what do you think of the photos - any feedback would be greatly appreciated. Do you think we have the "feel" of the event right?

Getting Ready

It's not that long until the Love Vintage Fair (Saturday 21 November). We have a wonderful selection of stall holders including Melanie who has a beautiful shop called Forever Vintage in Penarth. Which means I have to make sure that I have enough stock for my table.

I have been like a magpie, accumulating items here and there, wherever I see them. I thought you might like to have a sneak preview. So here goes:

First up a vintage 1950s cat string holder. I have a row of three of these and a dog in my kitchen wall.


Vintage Pomanders - what's not to love about these?


Next is a rather random selection of objects that caught my eye. Vintage saucers -just waiting to be filled with pretty gifts and hankies. This is only a small collection and I will be adding to it. So please keep popping back to see and hear more about the Fair!

Kitscherama

You know how sometimes you come across items that just err on the right side of tasteful? Well I think the mirror that I bought at the boot sale last week, fits that criteria completely.

It is a 1950s/1960s - not entirely sure which era - metal work mirror. I spent a minute or two looking at it and debating whether I wanted it and tentatively asked the price.

When the response was £1 that clinched the deal. So into my bag it went and it finally was hung in the right position today.


Not sure how everyone else in the house feels but I love it. And the green leaves seem to go perfectly with the eau de nil polka dot Swedish blind in the bathroom. The next thing on my To Do list is to hang two Victorian painted mirrors that were also bought last week at the boot sale. I think I may give Stephen a day or two to get used to this mirror before I dare hang the others!

Surprise

It's been a long day. Determined to make the most of the Indian Summer we are having and use up the pot of fence paint I found yesterday clearing out the shed, I have been out the garden all day. The fences have been painted and plants cut back ready to be dug out to make room for new ones.

The main impetus for all this work started with me buying a rusty old wirewirk planter. And so the cleaning/sorting fenzy begins. It started (and ended) with the jet wash. Don't you just love them?


The wrought iron table and chairs were jet washed prior to re-painting (not today at some point in the future). Then of course I moved on to the floor. We have been in our house 7 years and it was a revelation today that the crazy paving is slate and the pointing inbetween is pale.




After that I got a but carried away and ended up jet washing anything and everything: the wooden table and chairs in the back garden, the plastic guttering and clearing out the accumulated moss inside. And last but not least the paths. I just can't believe what a difference it makes - the floor is so much cleaner.



A much more enjoyable job was to plant up the pots I already have. The stand still looks a little bare, but I shall remedy that with more pots and flowers. But right now I am off for a well earned rest and a cup of tea!

Sunny Days

After a few beautiful sunny days, we have the rain back - which means bad light for photographs.

So rather than dwell on the awful weather that we are having (again), I thought I would share photos that were taken a few days ago when the weather was good.

Dulcie and Arthur sunbathing together:


and vintage linens drying on the line. Sunny days indeed.

Love Vintage

It's finalised. We have booked the venue - the old Victorian school in Wenvoe. And as I mentioned before, the date is Saturday 21 November.

Stalls are filling up but we have some spaces left. One of the stallholders is Melanie from Forever Vintage and Lizzie from the Vintage Washerwoman.


So if you would like a stall - please get in touch. Look forward to hearing from you!

A Heartfelt Plea

Dear Back,
Please get better soon so that I can wear my new shoes:


4 inch high wedges. What more could a girl want from her footwear?

Beachy Keen

I did say that my display cabinet is slowly but surely filling up. And here's the latest addition: a vintage shell box.


It was bought with the intention of selling it on, but once I got it home and placed it in the display cabinet, it slotted right into place.

In fact it slotted in front of a vintage Enid Blyton book I bought a few weeks ago. Can you see why I bought the book?

It's Dulcie and Arthur. Bit of artistic license there!

As well as the shel box, I picked up this Fortnum & Mason oilcloth bag. The polka dots called out to me and I couldn't resist.


And onto another topic completely, we have taken the plunge. The date has been set and a venue booked: Saturday 21 November at the community centre in the village (Wenvoe). I am struggling for a name but the event will be a combination of handmade creations and vintage loveliness.

Now I need to start finding the exhibitors!

Incapacitated

So much for my posts becoming more regular! It has been a combination of school holidays and a bad back. Thankfully it's something I haven't suffered from before, but last week I was putting a box into the dresser and my back just gave way!

It necessitated a phone call to the Doctors and Stephen collected my prescription for me: anti-inflammatories and painkillers. Several days later, things seem to be getting better. Hopefully there won't be too many more days shuffling and hobbling around!

On a brighter note, I did a little Etsy shopping and treated myself to a necklace from a seller in the States. I didn't have to wait too long and this is what arrived.



Such pretty packaging. And inside certainly didn't disappoint.

It gets better .....................


Retail therapy can certainly go some way towards aiding recovery!

Digressing completely, you can't miss the current blogland vintage and handmade fairs lovefest. And isn't it always the way that there is never anything like that here in Wales?

A friend and I were moaning about this fact and are thinking of putting on an event like that here in Wales. But before we do, I thought I would see whether there would be a demand for this type of event. Well, what do you think? Please comment and de-lurk and let me know your thoughts. Who knows, it could become a reality.

Filling Up

Remember the display cabinet that I posted about a few weeks ago? Well slowly but surely I have been finding small items to fill it with.


Nothing is valuable and nothing has cost more than £1 - which has been good new for my miniscule budget.

The fun part has been in finding the items for the cabinet - all thifted and all vintage items. Things that are too small to be put on a shelf on their own but look so much better when they are placed together.


The most recent has been a Pierrot clown that I found in a local charity shop for 50p. I initially thought that it may have been a lavender sachet but when I took about the grubby white silky "puffball" at the bottom there was only stuffing inside.


It was only a 15 minute job to use the original as a template and make a new puffball using a beautiful faded cotton pillowcase that I found a few weeks ago at the carboot sale.



She still looked rather bare after I had attached the fabric to the china head.


Out came a reel of vintage ribbon and a broken diamante earring - and doesn't she look the belle of the ball?

I thought I would show the display cabinet as it is now. A little fuller than before - but there is still come room left! Watch this space!

Treasures

As it was a lovely day, weather wise. yesterday, I popped to a local car boot sale/market. I wasn't expecting much, but came away with a bag full of jewellery bits and pieces.


Everything was piled into a vintage suitcase.


I left the suitcase as it wasn't anything special and it was the jewellery I was interested in. So a deal was struck (after all it would have been churlish not to haggle) and everything was tipped into my shopping bag.


After running over and trawling through the contents, I made the executive decision that I ought to buy the whole kit and caboodle.


The yesterday evening I started to sort through the jumble. There are individual diamante earrings, beads and buttons galore. And was I glad I bought everything. Included in the jumble are necklaces that have been broken but the beads have been kept. A quick search on Amazon yesterday led to a jewellery stringing book being purchased as I would love to be able to restring the necklaces (It's hideously expensive to have it done at the jewellers). Now I just need to untangle the jumble of necklaces and decide what can be restrung and what will be used in future projects.

Pretty as a Picture

My new skills projects are finished - and it wasn't too painful either. In fact the most difficult part was choosing the fabric combinations. Very difficult when you have boxes and boxes of fabrics to choose from!

I managed two designs: a sailing boat and cupcake. After all everyone loves a cupcake don't they? And having opted for a cupcake design, I decided to go with vintage Laura Ashley as the main fabric.



I used some very delicate vintage 1940s (I think) cotton for the top of the cupcake and topped it with s vintage button.


With such a girly bias, I felt that I ought to make something for the boys. Which meant that a sailing boat was next up on the sewing machine.


Red are blue is such a traditional nautical colour scheme, but it always work so well. And of course there had to be a vintage button embellishment.

I have developed the bug for this machine embroidery malarkey and no can't wait to try some more designs. But in the meantime, I have pictures sitting in my studio and looking for new homes.

If they catch your eye and you could see one in your house, they are in my Folksy shop.

New Skills

For quite some time I have been wanting to do some freehand machine embroidery. After all I have the machine but didn't have the foot for my machine. I spotted one on e-Bay, bought it and a few days later had all the kit I needed to start.

Of course, I didn't and this project has been a LONG time in coming, but I have made a start and so far I am pretty pleased with the results.


Apart from the machine foot I had all the fabric I needed already and the most difficult part was deciding which fabrics to use.

I have to admit that it was a bit unnerving at first - but it seems more a "getting the hang of it" kind of thing. Quite liberating after using the sewing machine in the traditional way.



The project is almost finished. It just needs a little finishing off and it will be ready to post next week. See, I am trying to get back on the straight and narrow with posting regularly!

After using one button for the project, I felt perfectly justified in buying a small pot of vintage buttons on one of my charity shop trawls. After all, I was a button down wasn't I?!


After

In Season

The car boot sale season is now well underway and I thought I would take full advantage of the beautiful weather today and visit a local market/bootsale.

Unfortunately there wasn't much there for me, but I did buy a charming cupcake ceramic trinket box. When I got it home and looked underneath, there was a Marks and Spencer label stating that it had once held chocolates.


It's perfect for my dresser and sits nicely next to the Allsorts jar that I bought some months ago.

Dulcie was on the prowl when I was taking the photographs and managed to sneak in to the shot.


The kittens have all been rehomed: one to a friend, one to the friend of the lady that works in our local vet and the two tabbies have gone to their new home together - which was very comforting. She initially did look and call for them after they had left for their new homes (although I tried to make it as stress free as possible and rehomed them over the period of just over a week) but really has settled down well without them.

She has also discovered a love of Arthur and after a few nights of her roaming around the house and waking us all up with her howling, she is now shut in the kitchen at night with Arthur and that has solved the problem. Hope I haven't spoken too soon!

And now she is starting to come out of her shell and settle in. And in true Siamese style, she may be small and delicate but she has a voice like a foghorn! She just walks around the house making the most horrendous noise - but I find it very endearing. Stephen doesn't though; especially when he is trying to watch TV and it is getting drowned out by Dulcie. At this point even poor Arthur doesn't know quite what to do with her.