Chalk Hill

A while ago I decided to scrap the Chalk Hill blog and put everything in together here, but recently I've been feeling a lot more focussed and confident about what I want to do with the business and now is the time to seperate them again. I've started with a newly designed version of last year's calendar for 2010 to start things off, with lots of other products on the way. Christmas is just around the corner and I can already smell the pine and feel the cold chill in the air. Indian summer? Ha, I've moved on already and have dug out the woolies. Pop over to the Chalk Hill blog for product updates, news and features of other designers from around the world.

Settling in

While Anya was starting school yesterday I got to spend my first day in my newly spruced up little studio uninterrupted! As you can see I have got it nice and cosy (I don't do tidy despite previous photos suggesting otherwise) but I do like to be sort of organised.

So imagine my delight at spotting this pretty little chest of drawers in a local furniture shop, ex display and reduced to a mere £27! And bet you can't guess what I keep in it....

...Paper of course!! Exciting huh? A proper little treasure chest. So in between trying to finish off my techie based website jobs I was able to finish a painting (or is that the other way round). A good day all round.

A New Chapter...

starts today as my little girl begins school! All my plans for the summer holidays (like fun, work, diy and more fun) went out the window for various different reasons so there is a lot of catching up to do and the house to put back together and websites to finish and new stock to make and photograph and and and....(deep breath) but at least the daily question 'do I go to school today mummy?' is answered with a yes followed by a jump for joy instead of the usual 'oh' and sulk.

I realised I have been blogging for 4 years, starting when Anya was just a few months old. I remember the excitement at having a second child as well as having the space to change my business -I had been slogging my guts out making wedding stationery for too many years and I wanted to do something more personally satisfying as well as needing a hard earned rest!

It wasn't easy, muddle head that I am. I use a 'suck it and see' approach to making decisions so any poor soul who has stayed with my ramblings over the last 4 years has seen me twist and turn and chop and change over the path I want to take and how to get there. And guess what. I think I have finally figured something out. Thinking is my enemy. So I am not going to talk about it anymore, or worry or fret or um or aah. I am just going to get on with it. Whatever it may be. Now let's turn the page....

early morning light

We've had 3 days of sunshine and 3 days stuck inside while the house is taken over by plumbers. I won't show you the ugly tanks and boiler currently sitting in our garden so here are a few blooms that are still hanging on in the over run borders. Autumn is already in the air along with the promise of new adventures and a new focus. I am itching to get started but need to get the workmen out of the way, spend a week with my children doing the things we haven't been able to do all holiday and spring clean the house for one last time!

work in progress....

The walls have been stripped, filled, sanded and painted, the nasty carpet pulled up and replaced with clean, new wooden flooring we had left over from our last place (and to think we nearly threw it out when we moved!) and my little studio has a new lease of life. It will be a while before the proper workspace/furniture is in but with bits and bobs swapped over from other rooms in the house I am happy to make do for a while. Already feels a lot better. It's amazing what a lick of paint can do.

Kite Flying

Notebooks

Found these whilst unpacking boxes into my newly painted studio, left over from the last craft fair. They are lined notebooks I have recovered with photoprints of some of my artwork and are now in my shop. I may do more at some point but these are the only 3 left for the moment so grab em quick!

Walk to the woods

A beautiful day with my beautiful children.

I'm feeling at the moment like there is so much going on yet I have very little to say. I think my head needs a bit of space to digest all the thoughts and ideas and life stuff that is floating round and hopefully it will turn it all into something credible. So forgive my quietness, I will be back.

UK Handmade Summer 2009

Well we are a teeny bit behind schedule but the Summer Issue is now out! Just go to the UK Handmade website and click the image on the front page. (But don't forget to make a cuppa first!) http://www.ukhandmade.co.uk/

Escape

Going wild

I may have mentioned I am not the keenest of gardeners, nor do I have the greenest fingers but since moving here one of the things I have always wanted to do is grow a butterfly garden. Wild flowers offer a much more attractive proposition than the usual neatly trimmed surburban gardens (picture Barbara, not Margot lol) plus knowing I am doing something to maintain the local wildlife gives me all the motivation I need to get the gardening gloves on. (And yes mum that means I will not be hunting down the grass snake just to hit it with a brick. Shame on you.)

Anyway looks like I have already started without even trying. I must confess to having let our garden go a little wild already while we sort the house out - the garden we have set aside to deal with next year - so imagine my delight when this splendid chap shot past me while I was putting out the washing.

I dashed to get the camera and found it merrily feeding on the buddleja that is currently hiding our grubby and neglected greenhouse.

*waits for brain to kick in* A peacock! And a huge one at that. Haven't seen one of these for years! We get the occasional red admiral and plenty of whites, brimstones and skippers and a walk up the local downs will bring you the chalk hill blue I named my site after. But this was something else. And it wasn't bothered by my whirring camera as I tried to get as close as I could to get a half decent picture. Shame about the greenhouse in the background but I'm sure you'll forgive me that.

Then all of a sudden something else fluttered past my head, landed on my arm, realised it's mistake and crash landed on the roof of the greenhouse.

Thankfully it stayed there long enough for me to get a shot before flying off again.......bear with me while I look this one up....a Comma.

(Just one thing, I promise NEVER to wear dungarees. Ever.)

Diary Project 2010

It's that time of year again, Fantazya's Diary Project 2010. If you've not seen it before it's well worth checking out; the resulting diaries are pretty neat and of course its free publicity! The deadline is very soon but there are still pages free if you have time www.fantazya.ca/diary2010.html

Progress

Remember this? Plans to rebuild my studio have been put on hold while we deal with bigger things in the house such as new windows and french doors in the living room.

The fun bit - when the wall came down :D

We found ourselves out in the garden while the builders worked on all 14 windows seemingly at the same time but we were suitably amused by the grass snake found hiding under the bin.

Anya was very careful not to scare it or touch it and she made this wonderful drawing complete with black stripes.

Unfortunately grandma didn't share our enthusiasm and vowed never to visit us every again!

Wasn't long before all the house was transformed (and not a builder's bum in sight!)

Now we can start painting the studio and start to move everything back out of the bedroom which has become a temporary dumping ground. Feels like moving in all over again but without the stress and exhaustion :D

The trouble with...

...bright ideas is that they have a canny knack of turning into bigger and bigger jobs. These innocent little notebooks have meant I have spent the last 2 days (when of course I should have been ploughing through a huge list of tasks) re-designing the whole look of Chalk Hill.

I thought these little notebooks deserved a nice little paper band to hold them together and work as a set but of course my current logo didn't really work, especially as I wanted to use a pattern. It calls for a cleaner typeface and white background so this is the result. Nice eh?

So then I started thinking of new business cards, pretty labels and so on and so forth. A whole new fresh look! Starting of course with the website.

I may be gone a while.