sweltering again

Just a quick post this morning.
I am back being shopgirl after getting into the studio for one day this week. At least I got to get the ball rolling on a new design to use up the piles of wax-y (wax print) that has started to grow once again in the studio. The heat and the sheer amount of 'stuff' in the studio started to make me feel overwhelmingly claustrophobic.....
There is only one of these tops so far, size 2, contrast binding and facing. I have a stash of very special designs that might just be about ready to be chopped up and made into things and we had a delivery of fabric arrive yesterday in the favourite 'chicken and egg' and 'lima bean and bead' designs. I better get cutting and sewing.
As it is going to be super hot for the next couple of days shop opening hours may vary from our usual times. I hear today might be ok with a drop in temperature this afternoon and I will open in the morning but I may shut early if the heat becomes unbearable and everyone runs for the shade. I will post on FB and IG if I close earlier than normal.
Oh and I forgot! New shipment of Mason jars has arrived. I'll be tripping over them all day until I can find somewhere to stash the damn things.

not done (still/again)

Morning all.
I seem to be moving at the speed of a snail this morning. I blame a weird night of trashy documentary watching right before bed and a hot weather 'hangover' (and Jethro decided to sleep pressed into my back for most of the night, he was obviously in need of human contact). Any plans I had of an early start and a couple of hours work in the studio, as I am shopgirl most of this week, just didn't happen.
I wiped out yesterday with a visit to the trade fair at Jeff's Shed and my hip turning excruciatingly painful, I really need to get back into the good bouncy runners. I am back to feeling like the walking wounded with a sore foot, an aching hip and hand twinges that make me swear like a navvy (I have a foul mouth anyway). I really am quite pathetic.
I still haven't managed to design the wrap for the indigo dyed linen socks, the label for the handmade soap or the logo for the bags of vintage marbles. I spent an hour yesterday afternoon pulling at pattern blocks to work on a simple top to be made in the wax print fabrics and just couldn't click my brain on, it could also have been the studio was a total sweat box. Sweaty heat affects my brain, it does not work in humidity.
I am in the shop today and may even be spending the day making lists and scribbling little diagrams. It is cooler in town today and perfect weather to come sock buying and for trying on of cardigans. A couple of new wax print dresses are in store, there is enamel to ogle and the new wire baskets and glass display boxes to fiddle with.
Time to chase dust bunnies around the shop and wrangle Jethro out of his hidey-hole.
I must eat some muesli too.
And another cup of tea is in order too.

super bowl

Just a quick post this morning before I race off to find somewhere to display the haul of vintage enamel bowls..... this is just a tiny fraction that I scored.
You know I love enamel and it was fun yesterday clean the first mountain I unpacked and sorting them into patterns. We have two styles, 4 sizes and lots of different designs but like anything hunter/gathered I have lots of some and hardly any of others. I love stencilled enamel and at one time toyed with the idea of a bit of enamelware graffiti about town but I am too impatient with a can of spray paint and cutting stencils would probably have lead to a scalpel in my leg or some other body part so I never got around to it.
These beauties are in the shop today as indeed I am too!
It's warming up out there but if you come out early and get home in front of the fan by about 3.30 you'll be fine.

on duty

Morning all.

I'm a wee bit shattered from a killer headache last night, probably my own fault for not have even one cup of tea yesterday when I normally drink a bucket and a half. Although I think it was one of those headaches that was brewing for days and then slammed me hard. 

I spent the day in the studio yesterday and finished a couple of 'party frocks' in this great indigo wax print, sunflowers and 'gingham' (it's not gingham but reminiscent of it) and also managed a couple of cushions made from vintage floral linens (would have done more but realised I only had two inserts of the right size... hate that). 

Today I am shopgirl. Tomorrow I am shopgirl. Most of next week I am shopgirl. 

So fabulous new stock arrived this week, the Nkuku fairtrade wire baskets are wonderful and we have also had their little glass display boxes arrive too. They remind me of the glass and brass boxes that were around when I was a teenager but these are dark lead grey in colour instead of the brass, they have little compartments for displaying things.

The thought of more hot weather is getting me down, it isn't good for a little retailer and I have to admit January has been a shit of a month on that front. The money juggling is making me a little ill and just when I should be in the studio making  things I am skiving off and running away. I really wish I was independently wealthy, it would be so much fun. Which reminds me, I better check my Powerball ticket. A waste of money I know but a girl's gotta dream.

OK. Off to eat brekky and get the things to keep my occupied in the shop together. 

Shopgirl duties await!

runaway

So I don't know quite how it happened.
A late start to the morning with appointments and stuff and then I am shooting down the freeway to Geelong to pick something up. Then that gets delayed and suddenly (a number of hours later) I am watching the sun going down in Port Fairy.

I feel like I have been stuck at home/shop for the last couple of years and that, perhaps, I have in one instance of 'hitting the road' rediscovered the joys of driving for hours and ending up somewhere else. I know I do it when I am in Tasmania but this is the first time in ages I have just spur of the moment ended up miles from home.
I had to buy a toothbrush (and a phone recharger) it was so unplanned.

The whole thing wasn't totally unplanned, in that I had been meaning to go investigate something in the west but I hadn't actually decided it was to be at that precise moment. It wasn't best  financial time to hit the road but I did and now I am home. I have things to show you. Boxes of stock that we have been waiting 6 months for arrived whilst I was away and I have carted back some special things for the shop. The car still needs to be unpacked and there are piles of things to be carried up to the studio, things to be sorted and made, I have a lot to do.

I am weary from all the driving and think it is time for bed. I have some stock to price in the morning before I hit the studio tomorrow.  I also have a cat that was apparently very confused when I didn't come home last night.
Bedtime.

under the trees with the carni-folk

We did our annual trip up to Fryerstown yesterday for the antique fair. It had rained (in fact was pouring) as we headed up and instead of dust and 40º we had a bit of mud and a mild day, people were definitely in a better mood than past years. I don't ever want t o experience it on the Saturday and Sunday that it is open, even though a lot of stands don't put all their stock out until it is officially open. The downside of going to early bird Thursday and Friday is the CFA barbecue isn't fired up (they used to do Friday). As the years go by I find less and less there but it has become a tradition to go and hunt out the craziest carni-folk dealer selling the worst/battered/broken stuff for the highest of prices.
It was exciting to get home though and find the courier had been and made some deliveries. We've got new stuff coming in and I had one day in the studio this week which made me realise how much work I need to do..... it was nice being in there though and surprisingly not too hot and rather pleasant. New African wax print fabrics have arrived in the country and I am just waiting for it to land on my doorstep, the linen socks have been dyed in indigo and I just need to print off their wrappers, a shipment of glass display boxes that I order 6 months ago for Xmas will be here next week, the cloth bound flex and fittings are ready to be turned into lampcords and extension cards, the jumbo knitting machine is lying in pieces on the floor......
and I only got about 3 1/2 hours sleep last night and wish I could go back for a nap.
Now it is a long weekend here this weekend and the shop is open today and then closed until Tuesday. I must spend this weekend cleaning the house. I really really really must.
Better dash. I have a shop to open in an hour.

corded

I am going to the studio today, I am.
Well that's the plan anyway.
I've tried all week but after the heat of last week my brain has been a bit fried and I have been dealing with a middle ear infection (that occasionally strikes me down) and have been dizzy, headache-y and wearily tired. Bloody January. And it is almost over too. How did that happen? Or do I say that every year?
I have bits and pieces started but nothing is really underway as I seem to get sidetracked.....
I'm heading up country tomorrow in the 'new' car, in the shop on Saturday and, by the way, we will be closed on Monday for our nationalistic-extra-day-off-as-Australia-Day-falls-on-the-weekend-this-year holiday. I better clean the house this weekend.
I hate to think how hot the studio is going to be, locked up after last weeks heatwave. OK, I'd better go face it.