July begins

I feel safe enough to come out of the woods now that my big sale is well and truly over, phew, it has been super busy behind the scenes and thank you a million, trillion times over for your support and purchases and spreading the word. I worked my little heart out packing, bubble wrapping, cutting, folding, labelling, sticking, you get the drift and if it wasn't for my precious Mr Karl graciously visiting the local post office everyday for me I think I would have gone bonkers. Boring packing and sending whines aside, the sale was actually quite fun and has motivated me to consider another closer to Christmas. Speaking of sales of sorts, very soon I'll be sharing more hints about a very exciting pop up shop event that I'm involved in, It's such a tease I know but things are a little under wraps at the moment. 'Pop up' events are a funny concept and are probably done to death but I can guarantee you I'd only get involved in one that would be a killer. My big sale has consumed every spare second but there has been other little projects unfolding such as another Grove collaboration soon to be revealed! On the family side of things we had a beaut weekend fitting in lots of pleasurable errands such as picking up my Kirra Jamison print!!! We met up with Kirra, her clever partner Dane and their adorable French Bulldog Tullulah. Wilhelmina and Ada are in LOVE with Tullulah and I don't blame them. I myself would be happy to adopt her and wrap her up in a fluffy blanket and love her like a baby! (she's extra cute) Before we left Kirra's hood I stood amongst tubs and tubs of amazing scented flowers with top chic Leila, that experience alone made my day, month, year! Back tracking a little, last Friday I met up with my buddy 'Special Jenny' with my girls to our new favourite haunt CubbyHouse Canteen in Armadale. It's owned and run by switched on sisters Narelle and Bec who sure know how to cater for little ones needs and their mama's and papa's sanity too. The staff were super nice which makes for a refreshing change and for one who doesn't drink tea or coffee and isn't impressed easily their hot chocolates were yum and fun (drop your own choc pieces into hot creamy froth Mmmmm) CubbyHouse Canteen has a stack going for it, it is located in the tennis courts old weatherboard clubhouse and sits like a little island within the Union Park surrounds with not one but two playgrounds. The CubbyHouse Cafe also has a nifty takeaway window so you can quickly duck over to buy a snack while the lil' ones run wild, perfecto. On a high from happy outings we ventured over to East Brunswick on Saturday to have a sneak peek of Beci Orpin's pop up event at Harvest Workroom. My oh my, we didn't expect such special treatment (those Harvest girls rock) Jess and Lara treated us like family and invited Wilhelmina and Ada to an impromptu tiara making session. While W and A went on a sequined frenzy I stood gobsmacked at the marvelous Harvest set-up. Unfortunately I know next to nothing when it comes to screen printing so I was in curiosity heaven and enthusiastically soaked up the inspiring surrounds. The Harvest team have created an enormous craft hub which embraces not only their own crafty amazingness but also the wider craft community. I blogged about some of their 'not to be missed' workshops on a previous post and I do urge you to check out their superb selection of workshops on offer and to make things even better get to know the Harvest girls as they guest blog the week away on The Design Files, snap that my friends and and on top of that the lovely Dawn Tan has super snazzy shots covering recent Harvest happenings (sure beats my shoddy iPhone pics above!) Geez all the fun stuff happens on the other side of town... Getting back to Beci's workshop and residency stint we arrived just in time to to catch Beci hard at work adding her magical finishing touches to rainbow coloured assemblages, wall collages, folk infused dangling mobiles and vibrant screen printed images. I almost lost my nerves chasing Ada amongst Beci's strategically placed treasures. After we left Harvest we dropped into our friends shop Lair situated a little further along Lygon Street then we couldn't resist the urge to visit one of Melbourne's best value old school ice cream parlours, seriously $4 for a triple scoop, $2 for a kiddy cone with wafer, noice one Gelobar! You wont find value like that round my neck of the woods (St Kilda ice cream bars take a long hard look at yourself, Fritz aside, I like your milkshakes) Enough talking, time to make dinner in the Stamer house. Hope you had a rad weekend too xo