Come the middle of November my brain turns to holly-spiked mush and the only thing truly on my mind is how to magic up the kind of Christmas little boys dream of and an old-fashioned Santa wouldn't  mind enjoying...

And oh how thrilled that same Santa would be to hear that Sunshine and Ravioli (purveyors of all kinds of papery loveliness!) have encapsulated the nuggets of wisdom that define his very velvety, fuzzy essence and printed them on a set of vintage inspired postcards guaranteed to bring a smile to even the Scroogiest of faces...

"All I Need to Know About Christmas, I learned from Santa

-Encourage people to follow you.
-Always remember who's naughty & who's nice.
-It's as much fun to give as it is to receive.
-Some days it's OK to feel a little chubby.
-Make your presents known.
-Always ask for a little bit more than you really want.
-Bright red can make anyone look good.
-Wear a wide belt and no one will notice how many pounds you have gained.
-If you only show up once a year, everyone will think you're really important.
-When you are at a loss for words, say "ho,ho,ho".


And indeed the rest of our little lives. Some days, you see, it really is ok to feel a little chubby- and heaven knows I needed permission today!

I have got a crush on Sadie Olive. Whether it is her photographs, blog designs or now on Etsy, her wonderful taste in all things vintage, she never fails to thrill the little part of me that aches for the kind of innate subdued style Sadie applies to everything to which she turns her hand...

... these three little labels of fluttery loveliness, and just about everything else by Angela Harris on Etsy. Just thought I'd tell you.

These utterly happy little Matryoshkas from Ravenhill have got to be quite the loveliest celebration of MommyHood (and attachment parenting!), I have ever seen. Created by Emily at Ravenhill and sold on Etsy, I have hatched a teeny tiny little plan to treat myself to one of the little sleepy one's the day I finally get the Vintage Housekeepers Planner online... I do hope Emily is still making them in 2015!

Neat Freak is never going to be a term applied to me by even the most deluded of love-sick fools. There is nothing neat about me. My nails are bitten to the quick, my hair is dancing a polka all by itself, my Dad says I've got an untidy face and even my eyebrows are going their own sweet, permanently surprised way. Though my own anally retentive side shows itself most often in my love of excessively neat blog sidebars, everything else is piled up in meaningful wobbly little stacks, and kinda left to rot until the mood takes me to pretend I am intrinsically organised and pluck out stray hairs and file piles of housekeeping related ephemera on what I can only describe as a whim. It isn't as if I don't care about organization, or having a lovely home or a even a tidy face. I do! It's just that my version of all of these things is, for want of a better word, messy. And I make up for the sweet shambolic state of everything I own by dressing it up in little fragments of loveliness which fool no-one but let me wander obliviously around my messy beautiful world in a state of almost permanently appreciative softly spoken joy... Which is why this gorgeous journal from Etsy Seller Stitching A Dream (aka, cheryl Dack from the blog Rosey Posey Confections) made my shabby little heart sing...

If you have ever wondered why I don't post many photographs from the house, it is because the light in this low ceiling-ed 1860 terraced cottage absolutely STINKS. There simply isn't any. Watching Finley and I step blinking, out of the front door, must be like watching a family of moles poke their little heads out of their muddy little undergroundholes. You see, call around here for afternoon tea and even in mid-summer you will find yourself, legs propped upon my red velvet sofa, sipping iced tea and nibbling a cucumber sandwich in the light of four lamps and many a twinkly china-cupped tea-light. Should necessity strike and a photograph be absolutely necessary the only decent light to be found is in the bathroom, which is thankfully big enough in which to swing a possy of cats but hardly desirable for the kind of oh so gorgeous food photography I find so utterly mouth-watering on other blogs... What in heavens name has this got to do with Pixie Blossoms? Frankly not a lot other than while perusing her lovely collection of sewing notion cards I was filled with the kind of envy apparently untempered by the idea that Zee's gorgeous photography is the result of the serendiptious chemistry between her clever eye and beautiful spirit, and nothing to do with the fact that she may or may not be blessed with decent light... Go see her Etsy shop, then come back and give me a good talking to- because let's face it a bad work-woman always blames her tools.

Vintage Flower Christmas cards at Tamar

Dear Santa at J. Black Designs

Let Them Eat Fruitcake at Vintage Bella

Seasons Greetings At Love Dog Card Company

 

Let It Snow by the Blue Valentine Press

...and Christmas Bluebirds at Angelinas Cards.

 

 

 

 

Christmas Cards. Now here's a subject that makes me feel jumpy. All that paper! All that time! All that ugliness to be dripped all over your walls! And all to exchange Christmas greetings with someone you live within spitting distance of??

Oh I know. I'm Scrooge. But when it comes to Christmas cards I'm with the Bishop. In a fashion. He said we should be only be giving cards to those we love, while I believe those we love know we love them and it is those in far flung lands and erm... Glasgow, who need a paper token of our festive best wishes. It is those relative strangers we cannot kiss or rarely see, who need to hear the thud of a card on their doormat, not the woman next door to whom you will probably be delivering a box of biscuits to regardless. It is long lost friends and virtual treasured acquaintances you want to share a little bit of real life with- not every mum in the playground, nor the auntie you will no doubt be sitting next to at the Christmas dinner table...

Ok annual card screech over... because the whole point of this whingy little post was to showcase some of the most fabulous cards on sale at Etsy, and not to regale you with my slightly outrageous take on Christmas Cards... because let it be said: if I was sending a mile high pile of cards these are the ones I'd be sending...

I'm so in love with this lamp from BeauVamp…

What shape pinny do you prefer? Are you a waisted apron kinda girl? The ever so sensible sort drowning in a Victorian maids style frilly affair? A flirty dirty kinda housewife in a fluted apron with a heart shaped neckline?  A pretty Cath Kidston floral apron lady?  A smock wearing artist?

While the housewives smock conjures up, in my mind at least, the sort of checked nylon tabard affairs, last seen on my school dinner ladies, it is the shape that seems to me,to be the most sensible when there is work to be done but you don't want to scare the life out of passing gas men who seem to regard women in pinnies as kinky throwbacks or worse, little girls playing house.

While I suspect the perfect apron varies according to the shape of it's wearer (I look like a sack of potatoes in a long apron and still I tra la la around the house in one of my wardrobe of snazzy florals), I have always secretly yearned for an apron that was the modern equivalent of the housekeepers "house coat" something that doesn't look like a dressing gown, protects my clothes, and offers a nod to retro styling without making me look like I'm imitating June Cleaver the day wine o'clock came a little sooner than it should...

Et voila, I happened across this pretty goodness knows what, currently being offered for sale by Etsy seller La Vida Vintage and it strikes me as the perfect answer: an apron top I could slip over a long sleeved T-shirt and not feel too mortified if I forget I'm wearing and make it half way to the school gates with my coat over over the top and my barbie pink rose apron trailing beyond it, as I did the other day.

I know. The shame of it. But I'm from Liverpool. Girls here nip to the shops in their pyjamas and wear curlers around town on a Saturday afternoon...

Holly from Pink Grapefruit has got quite the quirkiest collection of lovelies for sale in her Etsy Store, Pink Grapefruit Style...

Go see, go see, go see. This is a girl with a great eye for all the frippery little nonsense that makes a puttery day that little bit more scrumptious...