first snow

Hi, it is Petra here today.

First snow in came bit early this year. Just looking from the window makes me feel cold. It is time for hot chocolate, warm plaids and knitted socks.

See you next week!

more photos here

the winner of the giveaway is....

chosen at random by my daughter - Alayne Ng Thow Hing  who participated on Facebook. Thank you all so much for taking part! 

birthday calendar

Let me show you our new birthday calendar. It's letterpress blind printed on very thick pure white paper and gift wrapped in a black box and tissue paper. For a bit of colour the pages are put together with an orange ribbon.

I think this makes a wonderful gift for anyone not just for the forgetfull ones but anyone who likes stationary, still uses an address book and prefer to write cards to emails. 

The calendar contains of 12 white pages, each dedicated to a month and one front page where you can write the owners name. It's truly beautiful, and best of all you can use it year after year. Birthdays, Anniversaries, names days.....

shop here. 

photos & styling by veronika
calendar by Audrey Walas

letterpress

Just a little peak into Audrey's little studio where she creates her cards. My dad used to be in printing all his life and liked visiting him at work, I love the smell of new paper. Audrey makes mainly cards using "blind press", no colour press. There are truly beautiful. Have a look here. Soon we will be adding couple holiday designs as well. 

apple picking party

I like styling for this apple picking party. Would be a lovely theme for autumn wedding in orchard as well. from here.

Don't forget about our giveaway!

giveaway $250

Yes. Time for giveaway. You can chose any picture or poster from our shop. Combination of both, couple small pictures, few posters...to a combined value of $250.

The only thing you have to do is to follow us here or on our facebook page and write a comment here or there to this question; 

What makes you happy?

The giveway is open till next Monday- 29th October and is worldwide.  The winner will be chosen at random on Tuesday morning. 

star browsing in our shop here. And please share with your friends, thank you!

autumn birthday

Hi, it is Petra here today.

Autumn is my favourite season. I like autumn colours, conker picking, flying a kite, apple cider, meals from pumpkins. Last five years it is even more beautiful, Hugo celebrates his birthday in October.

See you next week!

photos & styling by P.+V. Weiss

humanoid

I just came across Humanoid, via Blog Milk and fell in love. The clothes are just perfect and styling even better. Superb!

home feature

Our home with  a short interview at So Leb' Ich.

the perfect combination

from Emily Henderson...more here

live your dream

Don't you just love stories like this? as they say in the video, it' s not hard to do things, but keep doing them. It's very  inspirational to see that you can make it happen if you work hard and keep your passion alive. You can now visit the restaurant  here. Also if you are interested in supporting other creative projects head over at Kickstarter, where you can discover & help to fund other ideas.

also this is simply beautiful....

have a great day!

les intérieurs

Lovely crisp styling from Sydney. Les Interieurs.

you are the best + shop update

Hi, just to let you know we have now poster Non Je Ne Regrette Rien available in smaller sizes as well. Also we added couple new card designs  into the shop.

all photos taken & styled by me

a new bedroom for A.

Couple of weeks ago I finally finished decorating Anya's new bedroom. Painted walls, floor, cupboards in white, made curtains, bought a new rug and moved stuff from her old much smaller room and some toys and books from downstairs. She was so happy when she got back from school on that day. She was literally jumping up and down. 

Time for play

Hi, it is Petra here today.

Kids are amazingly resourceful and creative, great artists, great builders, they are eager to know and learn everything. I love to watch my son in his 'work' (as he says), it's really inspiring, I learned a lot from him.

We spent a few days with friends in London at the beginning of this summer. For Hugo it was a week full of powerful experiences. First flight, he saw London buses and taxi, dinosaurs in the museum and in particular he found a new friend who, like him, enjoys running, climbs everywhere and they both have love for drawing and books! And he also discovered Gruffalo :-)

He loves everything 'English' now. After returning back home ABC song sounds again and again and  he builds London all the time... . One morning I found him in the kitchen copying letters from a book, he also "baked" Gruffalo crumble recently and today I found the "Garage" made of paper wrapping. And he wrote everything  by himself! He will go to school in two years, just celebrated fifth birthday. But more on that next time.

And a bit of inspiration from the faerie world of children. 

See you next week.

photos & styling by H.+P.+V. Weiss

life won't wait forever - happy weekend

photos: lips, feathers, life, copper lights, art, chairs

this home is  stunning

listen to this

 do something fun this weekend....have a good one!

calm & collected

 

Two very pretty homes. one  + second one. 

3 years on

As I mentioned in my last post it has been 3 years since I opened a little shop on Etsy. Something that was only meant to be a hobby when on maternity leave with my daughter Anya grew slowly into a business. 

When A. was one  I made a picture for my friends wedding and a couple of others just to be creative and do something else, have a hobby. I had a few positive comments on flickr and this blog so decided to open a shop on Etsy. It was easy to set up, be part of the Etsy community and always have quick feedback. 

I was so happy when people started writing about my work on blogs and other websites. I was working myself, just a few hours a day when Anya was sleeping. 

A Few months later I joined Not On The High Street. They have been very supportive and encouraging, it was good for me. I didn't have a much of an idea what I was doing. Later that year I was very lucky and  my work was featured in Real Simple magazine in their summer gift guide. My picture was featured on a full page of the magazine. I was warned to be busy after that, but didn't realise how much work was going to be involved. I worked with the help of my family about 18 hours a day and had to close the shop a few times as I couldn't cope with my orders. I was completely unprepared, with the work load not having had this experience.

I worked as an interior designer and visual merchandiser before, but I had never sold anything, I didn't have a clue how to price items, how to deal with wholesale. I just knew how to make things pretty:)

That year I employed two part time girls to help me out with my orders. Both mums with small babies as well. 

My business has grown slowly and steadily since then. I have been learning everything myself, from photography, styling, dealing with suppliers, absolute lack of sleep and little time for my daughter. She was often playing in the background while I was packaging pictures and replying to emails. 

But she has been my inspiration, energy boost and a little friend:)

I missed on lots of opportunities due to my complete absence of business mind at the beginning but I don't mind that. I wanted to grow my shop comfortably, in speed which I could keep and stay sane. 

In last 3 years I had workspace in our kitchen, upstairs in a little studio and now outside of our home in an office. I employ 5 part time girls. I'm still learning so much, making small steps one by one. I have more responsibility not just to me but other people as well. 

I feel very happy I can be doing something what I love, work hard but also take time off when I need to. But I believe none of this would be possible without people around me, our customers and also this blog and community, you. 

I had so much unexpected support from you guys and I'm immensely grateful for that. THANK YOU!

3 years + 3 days

We are celebrating 3 years anniversary!  I started my little business back in October 2009 and the time has just flown so fast. I would like to tell you much more about it in  next post but for now.....

 ENJOY the 10% discount on anything in our shop.

The promotion is valid for 3 days - 8th-11th October. Head over here and apply this code: 3YEARS. We added few new items, cards, posters and pictures. enjoy!