it runs in the family...

Whilst rooting around under her bed yesterday my mum found a tea cosy made by my grandmother, depicting my dad's old Beetle! I never met my granny but she was apparently a lot like me and delighted in sewing, so I thought it only apt to show you the infamous and well-loved 'Beetle tea cosy'. It is a joy for me to see, as it is part of my family's sewing history and shows that stitch and tea cosy design in particular really does run in the family :)
My granny would often buy a piece of fabric on the way home from work and whip it up into a skirt to wear out in the evening - I only wish I was that good at making clothes!

Above: my new floral tea cups tea cosy. Below: a few of my cosies hanging behind my granny's vintage Beetle tea cosy, a little threadbare in places from years of love and use... x

2011

Happy New Year!!!! I can't believe that 2011 is finally here, after months of preparation leading up to Christmas, then the big day itself and finally we are into the new year, it's all very exciting. I hope you all had a great night, with lots of champagne (or something fizzy!)

Whilst being snowed in and snowed under with Christmassy orders I've also been busy planning new products and designs for 2011, so here are a few of the newbies...

mini bunting (above) - looks very sweet on doorways and children's bedrooms!

natural linen pinnies - available in red, natural and navy blue stripe

spotty eggs tea towel - great for a certain celebratory time of year coming up (I have already spotted mini eggs and Easter eggs in the supermarkets - and that was before Christmas!)

new set of 4 egg cosies - perfect for the whole family at breakfast-time!

and last but not least - new 'croissant' napkins, available in white and natural cotton

Happy 2011 from all at Charlotte Macey Textiles x

Christmas-Time

Merry Christmas from the Macey household! Yesterday saw a whole day of eating, drinking, walking, watching festive films and most importantly, no work! The one day in the year where work is strictly off the agenda! I hope you all had a wonderful day and are continuing the festive merriment today, as I plan to after this.
And just a little note to say, keep your eyes peeled for new Charlotte Macey Textiles goodies in the new year! Love Charlotte x http://charlottemacey.co.uk/home.html

Happy Christmas!

Welcome to my slightly delayed 'Sunday Post'. Today was my last day for posting here at CMT, so I am now officially on 'holiday' (supposedly!) Apart from having a break on Christmas Day, I have a few more bits and bobs to get done before the new year. But whilst on the subject of holidays I would like to wish you all a very Happy Christmas, have a lovely festive period, enjoy lots of eating and general merriment, and thank you for all your support throughout 2010.

New products for 2011 are now ready for action and I have spent large parts of the past two days updating my website ready for the new year (scarily not very far away!) So on this snowy day I will give you a sneak peek of some of my new goodies for the new season and the new year!

Merry Christmas everyone x

Katie Bonas' Open Workshop

On Thursday I ventured to a lovely Cotswold village called Yanworth, home to the workshop of Katie Bonas, who hand paints antique furniture giving it a new lease of life. It was another frosty Gloucestershire morning and I piled my goodies into the car wearing 2 pairs of gloves, 2 jumpers and a large coat! But I arrived at Katie's wonderful barn with plenty of time to warm up and take in the wonderful surroundings of her stone barn workshop.

It was the perfect setting for an open workshop and my work was on display alongside Katie's furniture, Lolly & Boo's boxed artwork and Sarah Hardaker's beautiful linen products.

The barn had a steady flow of people throughout the day, the mulled wine was flowing and mince pies were being warmed in a baby Belling in the corner of the barn. It was a great setting and fantastic to be amongst such lovely company design-wise. The day rounded up at 3pm, and I headed off back to the studio to continue with my Christmas orders!
Here is a little excerpt from the CMT Christmas newsletter I sent last night...

* free gift-wrapping *

For the remainder of the Christmas shopping season I will gift wrap all orders I receive in lovely brown paper and festive red string! So that ought to save you some time in the next two weeks to spend doing more fun things like making eggnog or decorating your Christmas tree! * click here to pop over to my website *

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

last posting date...

To make sure you get all your Charlotte Macey goodies in time for Christmas I will be accepting orders up until (and including) Sunday 19th December.

'We Make' Christmas Fair

As the rest of the country found themselves under mountains of snow all week I waited patiently for a little more than the few millimetres we did get... til Friday night that is! At half past nine it started snowing, the flakes got fatter, and knowing I had to be up at 4.30 the next morning to go to London I eventually managed to convince myself to go to sleep and see what it was like when I woke up...

The one night of the week I really needed it not to snow and I awoke to white roads, an icy car and thick, thick fog! At 5.30am my mum and I set off to the station, not realising how bad conditions were and how slow we would need to drive to get there, we consequently missed our train! At 6.15am the only logical thing seemed to be to drive to the next station to try and meet the train en route... at 6.51 realising that without a sat nav we had no idea where the station was in the town and had only 9 minutes to find it, I made a spur of the moment decision and zoomed off down the M4 towards Reading... fortunately we made our train from Reading to Paddington in good time (the first good thing to happen in the morning and by this time we'd already been up for a good 4 hours!)

We traipsed down the length of the Kings Road and made it successfully to Chelsea Town Hall, exhausted but pleased we had finally made it there! We had a wonderful day at our Christmas stall and met great people throughout the day, as well as managing to stock up on Christmas presents from the other sellers there. The hall teemed with people all day, with a queue forming for the opening at 11am and people still shopping at 5 when we closed!

As we headed home in the evening I couldn't resist a snap of the amazing Peter Jones Christmas 'curtain' of lights, it was spectacular!! x

Vintage & Handmade Christmas Fair

Gosh isn't it chilly!! I must say I was very impressed at the wonderful turnout to the Vintage & Handmade Christmas Fair today, even in these arctic conditions! I've just returned home after a great day at the fair, and met some lovely lovely people too. Unfortunately, by the time I was able to get to the tea and cake selection upstairs, my lovely Lemon Drizzle had all been devoured! Ah well, if time I may make a second one tomorrow ;)

A little snap of my lovely Lemon Drizzle (at least, I hope it was lovely!) and also a few more pics from the fair, including the wonderful Razzamataz carol singers and a couple of my stand too...

Next Saturday I will be popping to London for the day, laden with goodies ready for the 'We Make' Christmas Fair at Chelsea Town Hall. I'm really getting into the spirit of Christmas now and am excited about next weekend already, however, lots to do before then! Have a lovely week x

Christmas has officially begun...

You know Christmas has officially begun when you hear festive songs out shopping, and when mince pies and mulled wine become a staple part of your diet... as of this weekend it has happened, and the munching of my first gluten-free mince pie this year has marked the start of the festive season, 'officially', as far as I'm concerned! I have also been selling at festive fairs this weekend, so everything is in full swing and I am loving it! The coming week is going to involve more last-minute Christmas trade orders and making lots of fair stock! I may need a lot of mulled wine this week... and on Sunday (28th) I will be at the Vintage & Handmade Christmas Fair at Chipping Sodbury town hall, which I cannot wait for!! Details are here if you would like to come, and please spread the word too, there will also be lots of lovely handmade cakes, tea, and I expect a fair few mince pies!! x

* a few festive fair snaps... and find lots of goodies and stocking fillers in my Christmas Shop! *

41 days...

Firstly I would like to say a BIG thank you to everyone who voted for Stitch Tales in the Dorset Cereals little blog awards, the results were announced this week and to my huge surprise, I came 5TH!!! Yippee.

So there are 41 days to go til Christmas... the air is getting chilly, shops are playing Christmas music and Christmas shopping is now in full flow. So I thought I would share a few seasonal snaps with you!

Fake snow outside the Mall at Cribbs Causeway, Bristol... (it looked so real!)

Stockings, mince pies and even a sleigh, at the Country Living Christmas Fair this week...

And on a product-related note I have now added natural wine glass napkins to my napkin range, you can browse all my napkins and other products on my NEW website, I hope you enjoy it :)

remember, remember...

...the 5th of November... well for us it was actually the 6th when we celebrated Guy Fawkes night and held our village firework display. And for a little village it sure was impressive! I captured some sneaky snaps amidst the 'oooooh's and 'ahhhh's and proceeded to munch my way through a large helping of sausages and my fair share of mulled wine! I was 'cosying' up until the mulled wine preparations began last night, and have a few tea cups tea cosies to finish today, but with all this mulled wine and the smell of cinnamon and other spices in the air, (plus the odd Christmas song starting to play on the radio!) it really is beginning to feel pretty festive in the studio... almost time to start decorating, I'm thinking fairy lights and some little hanging decorations, although perhaps in a few weeks ;)

Ooh, and before I forget, my blog has been nominated in the Dorset Cereals little blog awards, so if you would like to vote, here is the link! Thank you and spread the word if you can :) I hope you have a lovely week, and here's to some more chilly November days! x