Laura Baillie Designs

Monthly Goal Meetup - November

2009-11-05T11:31:00.004Z

I have decided to join in with Jenna over at Modish for their monthly goals meetup. I have been busy over the last couple of weeks planning, making and planning some more so now it's time to share some of what I've been doing.

:: Octobers goals & what I accomplished::

1. Work on new website. Y

2. Work out new marketing and PR strategy. Y

3. Have 100+ items listed in my jewellery Etsy shop. Y

5. Make up & list 20 new collage pieces for my paper Etsy shop. N

6. Plan this years Christmas card designs, maybe make some up. N

7. Get to 1000 followers on Twitter. N

8. Get to 185 sales. Y

9. Work out Facebook fan pages. N

10. Start working on a "Stitch a Day" project. Y

I have realised this month that I'll have to keep Papier Delights as a hobby, I can't invest as much time into it as I would like and I simply don't have enough hours in the day. Facebook fan pages are still a mystery to me! I'm going to need to set aside some serious time working out properly how they work. I think I did not too badly last month and am just about where I wanted to be by this time.

:: Novembers goals::

1. Launch new website by 10th Nov.

2. Contact local and national press about it.

3. Get to 200 sales on jewellery Etsy shop. (only 15!)

4. Get 10 sales on new website.

5. Make up 50 Christmas cards.

6. Host a jewellery party or 2.

Wish me luck!

List Love

2009-10-26T16:51:00.003Z

Lists on my desk this week

Home

1. Clear out walk in cupboard which hold pots, dishes, laundry centre and miscillanious items. At the moment things are being strateigically placed so they don't fall on the floor instead of being neatly away. I have to get this sorted this week before I break something!

2. Get all my pictures up on the living room wall in a cluster type collection. I think I have about 15 pieces to go up and I am fed up looking at the canvas thingy I did years ago and looks unfinished.

3. Write some letters. I have 4 people in my life I want to send a lovely letter too this week.

Jewellery Shop

4. Work on some new brooch designs, in metal and fabric. I have so many ideas floating about and don't really know where to start, so I know I just have to start making and see where I go.

5. Make up some Christmas Gift sets. I would like to offer a package with earrings, a bracelet and a card. I plan to have at least 2 listed by next Monday.

Papier Delights

6. List the new ACEOs I made this weekend. Looking at my photographs of these is making me think I should re take some of my other ones and keep the feel the same. I plan to list a new ACEO a day over the next few weeks and if the sun breaks through the clouds tomorrow I'll re take some snaps.

7. Do more doodle embroidery. Instead of watching TV at night I have been stitching away. They can maybe end up as cards but for the moment I'm just trying to sew for an hour a day.

What are on your lists for this week?

Little stitches

2009-10-22T12:22:00.004+01:00

washing line #4

Todays washing line features a little sewing project I created on Sunday evening. I had a quite night in alone and decided that I wanted to get my threads out, and created home 1.

As most of you will realise by now I love creating in lots of different mediums and for most of the time my head is buzzing with ideas.

My biggest challenge is giving each project my time and full attention. When I am creating jewellery I long to get my paints out. When I get round to clearing my desk to collage, I get orders in for jewellery. I need to work out a way to split my time between jewellery and everything else.

Any suggestions?

I am going to fill papier delights with all my non jewellery creations for the moment and share them with the world.

the leaves are falling

2009-10-18T17:32:00.004+01:00

winter leaf charm bracelet

"Every leaf speaks bliss to me, fluttering from the autumn tree."

Emily Bronte

some other leafy inspiration:

mystify print by Sherri Conley on Etsy

leaf the place to buy leaf teas online

leaf mobile tutorial - design*sponge

Inspiration

2009-10-15T19:58:00.004+01:00

washing line #2

I believe in signs and I have been sent quite a few in the last couple of days. In my last post I talked about digging out lots of my collage work and remembering about it. Well last night I was delighted to find that I sold 3 more ACEO's from my papierdelights shop. I am always filled with joy when people select my work to adorn their wrists or their walls, and this particular sale has got my mixed media juices flowing again! So tomorrow I am going to have a collaging day, glue and ribbon at the ready........

washing line #3

Weekend

2009-10-12T09:00:00.006+01:00

It has been a lovely lazy weekend.

Saturday I started working on thank you tags for my shop packaging which meant emptying out my collage box and finding lots of things I had forgotton about. Having been inspired by lobster and swan a few weeks ago, I decided to use here 'washing line' display technique to share some of the loveliness I found.

washing line #1

A little while ago I had a collage frenzie and make up lots of little pictures and ACEOs to add to my other shop. But I didn't ever get round to listing them. I think deep down I knew there were a few I wanted to keep for myself, so put them into a folder. The fist picture hanging on my line is a small collage using a piece of recycled cereal box, book and old atlas pages and lovely printed papers.

So after finding these pieces and I got to work on some tags and come up with a new design for the gift boxes I use to post out my designs. I wanted something simple yet special and am happy with this.

And yesterday was spent eating breakfast in bed, reading the paper and snuggling with Pablo. Just perfect.

Inspiration

2009-10-09T11:07:00.004+01:00

I found this project 50 people 1 Question a few months ago and it moved me so much.

Something to think about over the weekend.

I would like to say a little hello to all my new blog followers, I'm going to spend today in blogland, visiting you all!

Friday Link Love

Avant Garden Love - A fanciful twist

I think I need one of these - Diana F camera

My feet would love these - Caesar from Liberty

Starting to bloom

2009-10-07T15:27:00.006+01:00

Stormy Afternoon

:: And the day came when the risk it took to remain tight in a bud was more painful

than the risk it took to blossom ::

Anais Nin

This quote has been pinned beside my computer for the last 3 years and it has taken me until this month for me to actually start to blossom. I have stayed stagnent for so many years, through fear. But no more!

This is the beginning of my new beginning.

(more to follow soon)

Art Nouveau Inspiration

2009-09-24T13:24:00.003+01:00

"The May Queen" by Maragret MacDonald

Gustav Klimt "The Kiss"

I wanted to share these 2 pieces of Art Nouveau with you. These are my all time favourite art works. And I am noticing now how much of an influence this style has on my current work. I seem to be drawn to the flowing shapes, fluid lines and references to nature in everything I am creating at the moment.

On my desk today
pakages waiting to be posted
notes from my new part time job's work
my little A6 moleskin, waiting for me to create in.
(I feel moved to start a little project, something that I do once a day to record my thought and feelings, but don't quite know what to do!)

Polaroid

2009-09-21T00:39:00.002+01:00

"Empty Nest" buckscountyframes
"Little Lamb and Spools" lifelovepaper

I found my Polaroid camera this morning and I think I have some sheets still in it!
I love the graininess and texture of each photo and miss the instant real image that comes with digital photography. But there is hope, in the form of "The Impossible Project".
I will savour these last images in the mean time....

Filigree

2009-09-10T13:01:00.003+01:00

"Filigree" by Eugenia Pardue

"Filigree (formerly written filigrann or filigrane; also known as telkari, the name given in Anatolia, meaning "wire work", and cift-isi, pronounced chift-ishi, meaning "tweezers work") is a jewel work of a delicate kind made with twisted threads usually of gold and silver or stitching of the same curvy motif.

It oftens suggests lace, and is most popular in French fashion decoration from 1660 to the present. It is now exceedingly common for ajoure jewellery work to be mislabelled as filigree. While both have many open areas, filigree involves threads being soldered together to form an object and ajoure involves holes being punched, drilled, or cut through an existing piece of metal." Wikipedia

New Jewellery

2009-09-01T16:06:00.003+01:00

Cream, Gold and Topaz Brooch

Copper and Topaz Wire Wrapped Ring

Some new designs inspired by my "Golden" post the other day.

The sun is shining today so everything on my desk looks sooo shiney and bright. I'm going to spend the rest of today working on some more brooch designs and some new bracelets with new supplies which arrived this morning. Oh, I love it when the postie rings the bell, I know then that he is holding a package from foreign lands with shiney things inside!

Jane Austen

2009-08-30T23:43:00.002+01:00

"An artist cannot do anything slovenly. "

Jane Austin

I have just finished watching "Becoming Jane", such a beautiful film.

What is your favourite period drama?

Golden

2009-08-27T00:01:00.005+01:00

1. Adorable Tiny Brass Metal Frames - Storybookcharm

2.Gold Garden Belt - Littlewhitedresser

3.Drew - Lovejune

4.Wheat Fields - Urbandesign

"Every moment is a golden one for him who has the insight to recognize it as such."

Henry Miller

Something a little Bit Different

2009-08-25T17:16:00.002+01:00

My New Collection of Wire Wrapped Delights

I have been working on this new collection since last week and am in the process of listing them all in my shop today. All my newletter subscribers should all be opening my very first newsletter with a little treat inside!

The idea for these rings came from a friend who wanted a special commission for his wife. It has been a long long time since I worked with wire so I was a bit nervous at first. Lots of scraps of wire now sit in a pile on my desk from designs that didn't quite work, but that is sometimes the way!

I am really enjoying working with my semi precious stones and sculpting designs which compliment my other jewellery, plus I'm getting new ideas for earrings, so it is win, win, win for me. I am working my way along stedily to reach 100 listings and Tweeting as I go. I have found so many new interesting folks to follow. So I'm balancing my time between making, twitter, the forums and listing.

I ot some exciting news the other day, one of the galleries who I sell to is taking my jewellery to the Scottish Homes and Interiors Show! I'm hoping to head along and meet up with them and maybe make some new contacts. I aim to find another 2 new wholesale contacts before the end of September. Have you read this great article by Plumeadore? It's a must if you fancy giving it a try.

A New Look

2009-08-19T12:54:00.004+01:00

So, what do you think of my new look packaging?

When I first opened my Etsy shop, 2 years ago now, I wanted my packaging to be simple and stylish. The kind of wrapping that was like a gift and something a bit special. So I hung my jewels from blank greetings cards, with my shop sticker on them, popped them into a plastic sleeve with another little sticker to close, and then wrapped each one in layers of tissue paper and ribbon. So many customers got back in touch to say how beautiful the packaging was or that they had sent the piece on to a friend and they said how great it was!

But things took a shift when I was filling my orders from the Etsy Weekend Deals promotion. All the jewels were made up and ready to package, and I realised that this system while fancy and smart was taking me ages to do and was there for costing me in time and materials!

So I decided to think of another way of packaging my designs which would still be a delight to open, have all my shop info, be protective to the jewels, be easy to put together and most of all be economical. This is where my new look idea sprung from. I found lovely boxes, designed an insert on Illustrator and printed them off on card. I spent last Saturday night printing out and cutting up 100 of them to go into each box and now they are ready and waiting. I love it when I find a solution to my business problems, and this one has saved me 20 mins per package!

This weekend I spent lots of time working on new designs, and had great fun creating some new earrings. I seem to go through phases, and for a while all my ideas were for bracelets, but I seem to have come round to dangly designs again. I am still working on getting over 100 pieces in the shop and balancing getting some wholesale orders away. I want to have a varied selection in stock for Christmas time and know from experience I need to be doing it in August.

What are your earlybird plans for Christmas this year?

My Etsy Experiment- Part 3

2009-07-29T22:57:00.003+01:00

You may well be wondering where I've been for the last couple of weeks and the answer is simple. Sat at my desk surrounded by tissue, ribbon and scellotape! On the 17th my "Lacy" bracelet was featured on Etsys Weekend deals email and I have had 38 sales since then! It has been a a delight wrapping all these pieces of jewellery and writing little notes and sending them off to their new owners all around the world.

Once I got all my packages shipped I decided I needed to do a little stock take of supplies and work out what items I needed to restock. So I've had lots of little packages arrive in the last couple of days with beautiful little charms and chains.

I have also had 3 new wholesale orders and have just started working on an excisting wholesale re-order. The customer is looking for lots of pieces from my shop so I'm working on new designs to replace them with, to try and keep my listings at about 80. So I have been juggling creating new pieces and filling these orders. During all this I have decided that it is time for a bit of re-branding so I have designed a new logo, headed paper and inserts for the boxes for my jewels to hang on. I'll let you see them when the boxes arrive.

My ation plan for the next 2 weeks is:

-Make, package and ship all my wholesale orders

-Design, make, list 20 new pieces for the shop

-Design a gift certificate for the shop

-Make up a daily check list for marketing and promotional things I want to do each day

I'll let you know how I'm getting on x

Green Fingers

2009-07-20T23:45:00.000+01:00

My heart is filled with excited flutters.

It all began on Sunday.

A neighbour popped by with 6 lettices and a bag of peas and beans.

On Monday the sun was bursting through the clouds, streaming onto my little garden. My hands were covered in soil and I was surrounded by little pots, bags of seeds and hope.

Stuart assembled a little green house for me, Pablo oversaw the whole operation, of course!

I re potted my tomato plants and 3 tiny pepper plants. I planted 50 basil seeds and these are now all housed in their nifty new home.

The lettice is already looking lush and I am going to have a beautiful salad this weekend with home made dressing.

But thing the tiny thing that has me so ecxited is this:

Either a pea or a bean sprout, poking it's little head up through the soil!

As you can tell from my almost child like emotions about my little garden and growing things I can eat, that I am new to all of this. I have been reading this great bit of the BBCs Gardeners World website, Grow your own grub! And I have a vision. I have established my herbs, am moving on to salads and next year I'm aiming for veggies! (I am 31 not 60, but am so into this right now, maybe I need to make a collection of jewels to garden in!)

Do you have a green thumb? What are you growing just now?

A little Thank You

2009-07-16T21:20:00.004+01:00

"Cupcake Embroidery Decor" by Kattydiddy

This post is a dedication to all my loyal followers, visitors and folks who have been featuring me and my jewellery over the last week. Firstly I would like to thank Laura Bray of the http://Kattydid.com creative emporium. Laura featured "My Etsy Experiment" part 1 in her monthly Ezine.

Laura Cameron a Uk based artist and designer awarded me a "One Lovely Blog" Award. Thank you!

And Tracey of Tracey Loves Pattern did a post on my new range.

"Home Sweet Home" by Tracey from http://strawberrymagpie.etsy.com

"China England 10" by Lousise Broomhead - etsy shop

Louise Broomhead posted one of my necklace that she bought and wore to a friend's wedding. (I bought this beautiful card from Louise last month and have it on my mantle peice awaiting a frame!

Thank you to everyone who has become a follower recently and to all my faithful readers. Visiting you all is always so inspiring and helps keep me connected to other creative people all over the world!

xxx

Etsy Experiment - part 2

2009-07-14T12:45:00.006+01:00

This weeks instalment of my Etsy experiment has a few interesting findings. I launched my new collection last week and learned so much in the process. I carried on with my tweeting, posting in the forums, listing and renewing. But I'm missing something.

My stats on GA are showing a steady decline in visits to my shop even although I'm not doing much different to my first 2 weeks of the experiment. My % has dropped down to 45% visitor rate!!! So I'm taking a step back to look at the whole picture. Who, what, where, when?

Who - who is my target market?

What- what are my potential customers look for from me?

Where- where are they, where do they shop, where can I reach them?

When - when are my potential customers looking for a purchase from me?

This has given me so much to think about just with these 4 questions. I have decided to carry on with the experiment, baring in mind it is summer holiday time and with the realisation that I am going to work 100 times harder at bring new customers to my Etsy, from outside other sources.

I currently have my work in 4 shops/ boutiques, but I think now is the time to boost that up a little maybe to 6 before Christmas. I am going to start planning now for some "Girls Night" parties for the festive shopping season. I am going to research contacting blogs to see if they will feature me, (I read a Storque article about this but can't seem to find it, will keep looking!) I am going to commit to 3 blog posts a week, me, work, life and just as importantly I'm going to stop by and visit all my followers and friends.

So my round up this week is yet again more reaserching, I found Seth Godin's blog again and am going to re read his words of wisdom.

My question of the day is : How can I bring potential customers to my shop?

(When I have some clear answers on this I'll let you know!)

UPDATE: One way to do this is to have kind fellow bloggers and Etsy sellers like Katydiddys, who so kindly used my "Etsy Experiment" in her July Ezine! Head over to her blog and say hi, she is a lady full of creativity and great business advice. Thank you KD!

Update

2009-07-08T09:36:00.004+01:00

I am listing more new pieces for "Let Me Tell You A Story". Yesterday did not go as planned. My model couldn't make it, she has a sicky bug so I have another beautiful girlie who can help me tonight. But I decided to put the images I have up anyway. Then, all day and until about 1am I struggled to get anything listed on Etsy, and at that point gave up.

But today is a new day and I'm getting things up no problem now. Thank you to everyone who stopped by for a look at the new jewellery. If you haven't had a chance yet they are here.

I am going to start working on a painting commission this evening, a beautiful house built in 1850 I think. I am quite excited about it, from the photos it looks like soft blonde sandstone and it is being hugged by lushious trees. I let you have a look once I'm started.

Before

On the home front everything is good. Pablo is stripped and still thinks he's the man. He has been very wingey over the last couple of days and I can't work out why. We have played so many games, hidden treats and his normal big walks. We had my friends' dog to stay last weekend and Stu thinks he may be looking for company. He meets and plays with so many other other dogs everyday, but I suppose it's not the same as snuggling up at home.

After

I have been bitten by a nasty mosquito, I know, who'd have thought it in Paisley! But there seems to be a family of them living in our back garden. It is right on my ankle bone and is soooo itchy and swollen, yuk!

So my things to do today are:

List some more jewellery on Etsy

Tidy my desk

Take a note of my stats for the day

Make up some new earrings

Do a spot of online shopping (I have my eye on this top)

Show my little garden a bit of love. I have lettice to plant and some beans!

Do some sketches for the commission

What are your plans for today?

xoxox

Let me tell you a story.....

2009-07-06T14:26:00.005+01:00

Only 1 day to go untill my new range "Let me tell you a story" is available from the shop! I have been combining gold and aged brass frames with crystal, jet and mother of pearl stones. And I am so excitied about sharing them with you. It feels like this range has been such a long time coming together.

I have had so much fun working on these new designs and it has inspired me to add some new creations to Papier Delights too. (I'll be listing these over the next few days.) I'll away for just now and get everything ready. But I'll hopefully see you tomorrow.

My Etsy Experiment

2009-07-02T20:35:00.005+01:00

This necklace, "Evening Garden" is going to be listed tonight in my Etsy shop. It is a beautiful gothic inspired design, using a row of 5 beautiful semiprecious moss agate cubes. The neckalce chain is a fine gunmetal and measures 18".

It's priced at $20, but for all you lovely blog readers, it will be $10! Just type "EG09" into 'notes for seller' and I'll refund you through Paypal. I only have materials to make 5 of these and when they are gone, they are gone!

I'm still working on my new range "Let me tell you a story" an eclectic mixture of my collages and jewellery. I'll be launching the jewels on Tue 7th July at 8am GMT and reopening "Papier Delights" then too.

But now a little insight into how my Etsy experiment has been going, what has worked and what just has not! Brace yourself it's a long one, maybe grab a glass of cold juice.

Week 1 25.05.09 - 01.06.09

My starting stats:

75 sales,

605 hearts

a -10% drop in visits on my Google Analytics report

opening my shop on 1st Oct 2007

I decided on that day that I was going to invest £10 / $16.40 into listing new items and renewing excisting items. And that I was going to read everything I could about selling on Etsy including the Etsy seller handbook, forum posts on marketing, and all the articles in the Storque. This as you can imagine took time, lots of time, but I feel it has really paid off.

*ESH - http://www.etsy.com/storque/how-to/the-etsy-seller-handbook-all-our-how-tos-about-selling-2383/ . I decided on my goal for the experiment - a sale a day. (This always helps to keep me focused.)

Then I decided that if I was going to list 3 new items a day 5 days a week that I better start making! I made up 15 new picecs and started photographing them. It was at this point that I decided I needed to find a new background and retook all my shop listing photos for continuity.

I signed up for Twitter http://www.titter.com/laurabaillie and started looking for some interesting people to follow and started posting little random snippits of infor about my day, and commenting on other peoples posts. I posted a Tweet when I listed a new item and found my item views jumped from 0-5 to 10-15 depending on the time of day. My biggest tip here is not to post links to your shop all the time. It gets dull for your followers and I have found myself unfollowing people who do this.

This led me to look more into my GA stats. I could see there that there were definate times when I was getting more visitors to the shop and decided to capitalise on this, listing at these times. For me here in the UK this meant a few last nights! I could also see more clearly how people were finding my shop, by keywords and referring sites. This allowed me to adapt my tsy listings tags and put more effort into the places people were finding me. Read more here http://www.etsy.com/storque/search/title/google-analytics/ to get the most from your GA stats.

This was where I invested my time in week one, keeping a daily note of all the promoting I did, hearts and sales. And I made 3 sales in my jewellery shop and 4 in my other etsy shop http://www.laurabailliedesigns2.etsy.com so that was 7 sales in total.

My shop hearts had risen to 646 (up by 41) and my GA view % was up to 200%

Ok, so a lot of work for only 7 sales, but for me this was amazing. It was working out as a sale a day which is my new goal and I was delighted!

Week 2

02.06.09 - 09.06.09 I carried on with the same amount of listing, renewing and kept up with Twitter and my GA stats. I went through all my listings and sorted out their tags. Making them more rlevant to the piece. This article really helped me out -http://www.etsy.com/storque/how-to/guidelines-tips-tagging-on-etsy-281/ .This week I made another 13 sales. That is almost 2 sales a day! By this point I was dancing around with every new sale! My shop hearts rose again to 670.

Week 3 10.06.09 - 17.06.09

I made 3 sales, a dramatic drop. This was around the time Etsy changed the way the search engines found our shops. I'm not going into all this here and now but I saw a dramatic drop in views on items, and visiors to my shop. I made a decision this week, there have to be ways around this and good uses of my time just now while things are slow. I dropped the amount of new listings I was putting up and renewing I was doing. This was a difficult decision to make, I wanted to keep myself at the top of categories but at the same time wanted to keep within my budget. I felt a bit discouraged this week, things had been going so well and the SEO thingy just seemed to be messing up my experiment. So I decided to turn this negative to a postive and come up with some new designs and started working on my new range "Let me tell you a story" (launching on 7th July) (shameless plug!!!). My hearts this week rose again to 690.

Week 4 18.06.09 - 25.06.09

Again this week things moved really slowly, another dramatic drop in my views, visits and all round interest. I am totally aware of how things go up and down in retail and the effect the SEO was having on lots of sellers, but again I did not give up. I did still keep listing and renewing to 3 or 4 a day just a my highest visitor times. I kept tweeting and finding new people to follow. So many interesting folks out there, well worth a shot. And generally just tried to keep my spirits hight and focus on the bigger picture - my goal - a sale a day.

This week I made 10 sales. A huge 7 to one customer who found me on someones blog who featured my paper shop and this led them to my jewellery shop. This proved to me how when I keep positive and focused things do happen. Again I spent more time planning my new range and found some new consignment/ wholesale customers. My hearts at the end of this week were 725.

Week 5 26.06.09 - tomorrow

This week has been different to the past 4, I have had computer trouble, which is sorted now. This threw me off a little but meant I have been focused more on making and planning. All systems go again with my internet and I have been listing more and renewing. I am still Tweeting, but definately less than weeks 1 -3. I have spent quite a lot of time this week exploring new venues to sell on, new boutiques to contact (inspired by Plumeadore's forum post http://www.etsy.com/forums_thread.php?thread_id=6201294) And planning my for the launch and my next rough 4 week plan. This week I have made 1 sale and now have 742 shop hearts. This week I have seen quite clearly that when I step back from the intensive promoting and listing new designs, I get less views.

I'm going to carry on this method and will keep posting updates every Friday on my blog http://www.laurabailliedesigns.blogspot.com. Trying new things and tracking what is working and what is not. Overall I have learned some valuable things:

1. The more time, energy and commitment I invest in my Etsy shop the more sales I get.

2. Not to let myself get drawn down when things hit a slump. Use this time to refocus, make and plan.

3. There is so much help and advice aound, taking the time to read it and use it pays off!

xoxox

Mad Tea Part 2009

2009-06-29T01:09:00.010+01:00

Anyone for Tea?

I sent out my invitations mentioning tea and cake,

just look and see who joined me,

for fun and lots of sweet things,

oh for goodness sake!

sequins,

jewels,

and brouges and wedges no less!

And who can have a Mad Hatter's Tea Party, without some sort of hat?

Any one for tea?

This is just like the tea set I had as a child, sipping away today I remembered the hours spent chatting with my teddys and running my own cafe!

DRINK ME.....

Now what is this? A bottle with a label layered with lace and gold. Should I, shouldn't I ?

Masked revelers, with sparkles and swirls.

Jewels for the occassion, of course! Is that a white rabbit with a pocket watch hiding in the glass?

Something sweet!

Lemon and strawberry and chocolate cupcakes, clear and crisp and soft and sweet, and very moreish I must say.

Childhood favourites, sour cola bottles, so tart they draw your cheeks together. A large jelly foot or guitar perhaps? Maybe you miss a dolly mixture, layers of gritty, creamy sweetness?

And no party of mineis every really a party with out a French Fancy, the sensation of breaking through the pink swirley icing, hitting the fondant centre and then the sponge. Are you pink, yellow or brown. I'll fight you for the strawberry!

and now for Something savory to cleanse the pallet.

Oh yes, we nibbled on cucmber sandwiched you know! The fresh crispness is just what you need after all that sugery goodness, and it's a tradition, along with hats at afternoon tea.

Drink Me!!!!!Well, yes, someone did. In fact I think almost everyone had a sip, or a glug or even a glass. Now only time will tell what that potion was or its effects. All I do know is a wonderful afternoon/ evening was had by all.

What would your perfect tea party treat be?

xoxox

[a huge thank you to all my guests and Missy H from the Knitwitts clan, she was my photographic stylist and set designer x]

2009-06-28T02:13:00.002+01:00

Mad Tea Party 2009

I totally forgot, thank you Katydiddys for reminding me!

So I'm going to postpone listing my Etsy Experiment info until Monday and get myself sorted for a my (one day late) party.

I'll be having my party tomorrow afternoon, the invites have just been sent, the list is done and some little treats have been made.

Untill tomorrow x