Cocoa Wonderland & new stockists

Welcome to Cocoa Wonderland - one of my newest stockists. They are a a Sheffield-based shop dedicated to the wonders of all things chocolate and sweet - an 'enchanted chocolate wonderland'! It's a shop packed full of lovely chocolate and other treats. Sounds like heaven to me! Kate and Anne have really welcomed my cards into their shop - even having a new shelf made especially - and done a lovely blog post on the cards.  Have a look at their blog and website - and see if you're tempted by the treats in their online shop.
My other latest stockists include:
The School of Life
Future & Found
Leadbetter & Good
Nookshop
KK Outlet
The Curious Pancake.

Welcome all! Good to have you on board.

Jackie Magpie

I did a little interview with Lizzie from the Jackie Magpie blog which is featured on the blog today. If you  want a little insight into the world of Alison Hardcastle go and have a read.
Answering questions on myself and my work is always a really useful way of re-evaluating things for me.
Thanks Lizzie.

I'm very much flat-out at the moment in preparation for Pulse and the many other things which are all falling within June (commissions, house-moving, out-sourcing printing.......)
My days are filled with:
Designing (the fun bit)
Printing, packing and despatching orders (as always)
Organisational things for Pulse
Communicating with printers
Trying to squeeze more than is actually possible into each day.....

Full steam ahead!

Happy National Stationery Day!

I've only just realised that it's National Stationery Day. That's shameful considering it's a big part of what I do.
So to celebrate here's a few of my most favourite stationery specialists:
Yellow Owl Workshop, Egg Press and and image from my all time favourite one-stop-shop for the best in interesting and unusual stationery (and also one of my favourite websites) - Present and Correct.
Happy Stationery Day!

Home

Houses are on my mind.

We're still house-hunting. -Looking for somewhere which will be our family home to replace the one we've made - a much harder task than I thought it would be. We love our house and it's become home for the three of us but we've sadly outgrown it and need somewhere a bit bigger (a bigger studio is on the wish list). We're finding it very hard to find somewhere to live up to our hopes and dreams and expectations (in budget) and which will be a worthy replacement for the home we've created here. I'm much more emotionally attached to it than I initially thought.

It's all taking up far too much time - physically and mentally. I still hope we find somewhere we can happily call home again and with a studio space where my business will have the room I'm longing for.

It's made me realise again just how important my work-space is to me and I hope I can re-create my little snug studio (albeit a hopefully bigger version) wherever we end up. Disruptions such as this disrupt my thoughts and creativity so I hope it won't go on much longer.

Above are House page markers and Bird house keyring available from Snowhome. Also Ferm house shelves and the house image is adapted from my Happy New Home card.

Liz Green

My current favourite music to work to is the album O, Devotion! by Liz Green. She has a hauntingly beautiful voice and I'm finding it a very soothing background track for working.

I went to see her in York last night with Angus from Snowhome and Laura of Dear Prudence (and Andrew her husband). A lovely change to my usual evening routine of working - and a great night out.

2 weeks....

The last 2 weeks have been all about.....

sunshine, lambs, selling our house, trying to find a new house, dreaming of new studios, celebrating birthdays, designing, decisions, planning, sending out orders, balamory and new beginnings.

Spring is always a forward-thinking and optimistic time of year for carrying out all those plans you had in winter. I'm juggling many new projects while we search for a house - it's going to be a very busy few months.

I had to post a photo of my Mother's day card - a bit after the event but I've only just got around to it. I think I have a rival card maker/designer in the house! It's such a bright and cheery card it makes me smile a lot.

New additions

I printed a couple of new Mother's Day cards this week. 'Thanks a Bunch' and 'Mum' are both now available from my shop and my notonthehighstreet shop along with three other hand printed mother's day designs. A lovely hand screen printed card is perfect for mother's day (hint hint!!).

It's been a busy week but annoyingly one where I don't seem to have achieved a great deal other than these cards and getting orders despatched. I feel like I have a mountain to climb between now and Pulse trade fair in June - lots of new things to design and many new avenues to explore as well as some major changes to make. All very daunting to think about late at night so I will look at it with a fresh and optimistic head on Monday morning (Friday is already reserved for more mundane tasks.) Enjoy the weekend - hopefully the sun will stay with us.