It’s quite strange - who would have thought I use ‘Just Lovely’ quite so often!

Last Sunday Duncan and I packed some sandwiches and headed off to Hampton Court. It was the annual exhibition of work by the apprentices of the Royal School of Needlework. The apprenticeship is 3 years, the first two learning different embroidery techniques and the final year is more business based with work placements in the RSN’s studio as well as externally..

This year’s exhibition was a little disappointing in 2 ways, as the course is being phased out, there was only work from the final year students - so it was smaller than when we’ve been before and probably because of this it was in a room outside the palace, when we went before it was in the Queen’s chambers - a big imposing room with wooden panelling - just the kind of room where you’d imagine some of the techniques were developed..

The work we did see was by no means disappointing - I’ve said it before, but there are some very clever women out there.. Unfortunately not all the graduates had websites, but this one showcases one of my favourite pieces of the exhibition this lily in silk shading. There was also an amazing dragon in goldwork, but photography wasn’t allowed and I can’t find any photographs..

This afternoon we went into Wimbledon to buy silly hats and other necessities for our honeymoon. I can’t believe it’s only 2 weeks away! We’re going on a safari in Tanzania, hence the silly hats, I have a feeling there will be quite a lot of khaki!

Thank you so much to Lisa at The Hem Line for this award!

The rules of the award mean I have to nominate a further 7 blogs, so congratulations guys (in no particular order): angry chicken, Bella Dia, Feeling stitchy, U-handblog, I have to say…, Blissed out and Kimono Reincarnate.

Here’s what the winners need to do:

1) Add the logo of the award to your blog

2) Add a link to the person who awarded it to you

3) Nominate at least 7 other blogs

4) Add links to those blogs on your blog

5) Leave a message for your nominees on their blogs

My friend spotted this blog post about dating a startup company owner, she was thinking this sounds familiar as she realised she was wearing an ironic search engine optimisation tshirt.. Our partners are business partners so we are united in this weird world! The boys just got iphones and I’m not sure if Hev is also experiencing iphone widowhood?? but everytime I turn round D’s looking something up or checking his email! The upside is I get his old phone as a replacement for my old brick, I can finally take photos on my camera

Exciting news over on U-handblog, Amy butler is in London next week. She’ll be at Liberty on tuesday. I’m hoping I can move some meetings at work, though at the moment the people involved are still on holiday..

Check out this giveaway over at Funky and Delightful, congratulations on 100 posts!!

It’s weird how easy it is to get out of the habit of blogging and sewing in fact and how difiicult it is to get back in the habit again! I’ve been waiting for something earth shattering to blog about and then I realised this week, one of the things I like to read is the more personal stuff - the details not just what people are making but how they fit it in around the rest of their lives.. Lisa has a good post over on Craftboom about how she lays out her day, she’s lucky enough to do this for a living, so has all day to play with (around the admin of course!) - how do the rest of you find the time and the energy??

As promised, this post is going to be a celebration of my clever friends and family. I was so amazed by the thought and creativity that went in the gifts we received for our wedding, but here I would like to highlight the homemade.

Most particular, from my sister of who it could previously have been said wouldn’t know how to thread a needle! She sewed every stitch herself and I am so pleased with it!

From my mother-in-law and one of my sisters-in-law another beautiful sampler - I love the colours in the piece!

My husband’s employee Leonie not only designed our invitations, but also made us this book, it’s embroidered with our initials: DM on the front and SM on the back

Another of Duncan’s employees, Emily is a very clever artist, she gave us this lovely screen print. My photo doesn’t do it justice, I couldn’t get rid of the reflection - there’s some stitch work on this as well..

We also got some lovely homemade cards - I was using a borrowed camera and not all the photos turned out well, but here’s a photo of most of the cards - there are more out of shot..

and in particular ones from my old flat mate Hannah: hannah.jpg

and last but not in the least least a card from my parent’s neighbour, Christine - this is a waterfall card. I hadn’t come across one before, but I’ve just had a quick google and found a tutorial for how to make this type of card.

So many thanks to all!!

A photo that not only shows my lovely new husband, my beautiful dress (I’m not sure if I’m allowed to say that but I loved my dress!) and THE cake! My mum made the cake for us - the flowers and everything.. I’m so proud of her, I have to admit she took some persuading and really didn’t want the responsibility but I knew she’d do such a wonderful job and it means so much more.. in fact here’s another photo of the cake!

There are more photos over on flickr, so I won’t post any more here - until the official ones come through

We just had the best day - our friends sang beautifully in church, they were really amazing and if I’d known whether the mascara I was wearing was waterproof I’d have been in floods throughout!! Just thinking now I keep thinking of all the little things that happened to make it so special, I guess the main thing was sharing it with friends and family who were just so lovely and supportive.

We also got an amazing selection of homemade gifts and cards which I will be photographing and blogging about - including a surprise sampler from my sister who we jokingly say can’t sew on a button - she certainly proved us all wrong!

Last week we had a few days in the Peak District at a lovely Inn, which did great pub food, lots of good beers and was really well placed for me to go check out a sewing shop in Bakewell They have an online store, Wye needlecraft which I haven’t checked out yet, but if it’s anything like the shop it should be pretty good - they had a great selection of embroidery threads.

Followed by a few days in Madrid, in another lovely hotel right by the Retiro Park.. which is well worth a visit if you’re in Madrid.

Unfortunately, I came home with an ear infection - so normal service won’t resume quite so quickly, I know I have a backlog of blogs built up to add to the list, but I’ll get there eventually!

I hope you all had a happy month of June,

Suzi Morris

The most hectic, stressful and enjoyable week of the year.. and it’s all over!!

I perform with a group called GLOC and we spent the last week living the impossible dream performing Man of La Mancha..

As I’ve been away from the blog and haven’t done any craft or sewing for a few weeks I thought I’d post a photo of me in my costume instead - I played the small role of Fermina the serving girl..

There are more photos of the cast here. I’m voting for doing Seussical the musical next year!!

So today I’m recovering, enjoying the sun and getting ready for the run into the wedding. I’m going to apologize now for the lack of posting and slow service on the big list of sewing blogs over the next few weeks - I’ll be back in business at the beginning of July when we’re back from the wedding and honeymoon..

Well hello!

That was a longer break than expected! Though fear not I have been busy… Here are some of the fruits of my labours:

75 Wedding invitations - a bit of a group effort!

• Designed by Leonie, graphic designer at D’s firm.
• Chopped glued and beribboned by me, Duncan and my mother-in-law-elect.
• Written by my sister, Judith (aided by my brother-in-law watching the kids!).
• Folded, and stuffed into envelopes by me and Duncan
• Then a collective gathering of addresses to send them all out.. the last two are sat waiting to go tomorrow morning..

While I haven’t been blogging, I’ve still been receiving lots of lovely blogs to add to my list of sewing and craft blogs. It currently stands at 205 and is steadily growing. It’s amazing to see the increase in traffic from being mentioned by another blog - I’ve become a bit addicted to Google Analytics!

I’ve gotten further with my knitting:

this is how it was - it now goes all the way around my neck (just!)

I finally did my TIF challenge for February, which will get it’s own post..

But for the most part we’ve been concentrating on the wedding planning, we have one major decision left to make - the first dance! Any suggestions would be very welcome! I’m not sure my dancing skills are up to doing something like this. Make sure you watch until at least 45 seconds.. I promise it is worth it

I recently finished reading The friday night knitting club for the second time since Christmas - not something I do very often with a book, but I really enjoyed it. Interestingly opinions seem to be divided over at Amazon - so I guess read it and see or wait for the up coming film with Julia Roberts (who knits in real life) playing the lead character Georgia.

I for one was inspired to pick up some needles after 18 years and re-learn to knit:

and I have to say, so far, I’m doing a lot better than the square I knitted when I was in Guides - it was a holey mis-shapen thing, that my family have not let me forget!!

I’m starting simple and making a (quite wide!) scarf in garter stitch.. What do you think so far? Would I be able to hold my head up in a knitting circle??

I just spent the most tense half hour - pressing refresh on the BBC Live text commentary and watching Sky Sports News.

and they did it! Super Reds (Barnsley) beat Liverpool at Anfield to knock them out of the FA Cup! Our new Goal keeper Luke Steele had the most amazing debut and kept Liverpool out and Brian Howard got the winner in the 90th minute!

As you can imagine I’m over the moon! I’m off up to Barnsley tomorrow for some wedding planning and now it looks like general celebration!

I have a big cheesy smile this evening!

So last week I said I was going to launch Suzical the online shop. Step one was tell people, and well - it works! I got a commission right off and a couple of other leads..

A colleague asked my to make an anniversary card for her husband - it was a tricky one, she asked for a picture of a mole. It turns out moles are mainly black fur(!) so I went for an out line.. Please excuse the cheesy line, I couldn’t resist!

I have also ordered mini moo cards to use as business cards and stickers because they’re fun!!

I am still weighing up the pros and cons of Google checkout vs. an Etsy store.

Google seems to have the better rate in terms of fees, but with the shop on my site I’d have to start drumming traffic up. Etsy has a ready made audience and it’s searchable by subject, but there’s lots of direct competition.. For set up Etsy is easier as the template is already there, but as my fiance who’s a web developer, will be building the google checkout - it’s not a deal breaker!

On the other hand with Google checkout I’d have freedom to design the layout how I prefer and any traffic I drum up to my store would be building the Suzical brand rather than Etsy’s..

Let me know what you have used and what (if anything) you’d do different??