'Sausted...........

I am so tired I can hardly think.

Now home after two 'full-on' days in London, and my two miniature toy workshops in advance of KDF.

Both sessions went really well.......4 students on Thursday and 7 on Friday.

Had a brief look around the fair on Friday, but it was absolutely heaving, with queues at every stand in the main hall. However, I did manage to see all the exhibitors on my list except for the St. Legers who were only visible from a distance behind a sea of avid collectors.

I am fit for nothing today though, so more interesting blog posts will have to wait until my muse returns, or until I have recharged my batteries.......whichever is soonest.

Oh, and small dog, who was relishing her role as business mascot, is also 'sausted and has barely moved from her basket all day.

To be continued anon.........

Think calming thoughts............

You know how you sometimes think you have everything under control?

That's pretty much how I felt over the weekend.

However, in the past 48 hours, everything that possibly could go wrong, has. As a result I am now as strung out and stressed as a strung out and stressed thing.

And then some.

We leave soon for London, and two days of workshops then back home on Friday, after hopefully having had a chance to wander round the fair after my Friday class, and see my showcase display.

I am determined to do ABSOLUTELY NOTHING over the weekend, except relax and recuperate.

And blog the details of the workshops and fair of course.

So stay tuned for more exciting adventures................... *cue cliffhanger music from vintage radio serial I can't remember the name of..... Dan Dare perhaps? You know the one........it goes
dum de dum dum de dum dum de dum etc.......... sorry, it's been a l-o-n-g few days.........*

My mood in a picture............

Scorchio..................

My goodness it's hot!

Way too hot to work, so until it cools down a bit later, I'm engaging in some Sunday afternoon displacement activity/research & development/ebay surfing/google surfing.........tracking down supplies and materials for new projects.

This fits into the category of 'work' but only just.

Small dog is lying flat out in her basket, exposing the maximum amount of underbelly to whatever passes for a breeze filtering in from the door. She is hopeful that we might have a bbq later, which is almost as good as camping, in her opinion.

Whatever happened to spring? We seem to have gone from winter, straight into summer, bypassing spring altogether! Next thing we know, there will be a hosepipe ban, widespread drought and water rationing. Typical!

We did briefly consider going to the beach, but judging by the steady stream of traffic heading south on the A21 this morning, by now Hastings beach will resemble............



No, it's not a new version of 'Where's Wally', it is an actual beach somewhere in China.

Anyway, better get back to 'work' *ahem*

So much to do.......so little time........

It's always the way isn't it?

The more you have to do, the more there is to do........ 'stuff to do' seems to expand exponentially to fill the time available.

No matter how hard I try, I never seem to get to the end of my 'to do' lists.

Top of my TO DO -URGENT! list, is the prep for the Kensington workshops and the showcase display. There's a strict deadline for those so they will be ready in time.

Second on my urgent list is our end of year business accounts 2007/08. 'Nuff said.

Third on my urgent list is getting to grips with research and development for several ideas for new toys and games. I so wish that this was second on my list, but it will act as a spur to get the accounts done and dusted so I can move on to more pleasurable pursuits.
I have so many ideas which I'm bursting to try that it will be a job to decide which to try first.
I just love the whole R&D side of what I do. Very often, what I end up with bears little resemblance to what I originally planned, but this is part and parcel of wandering into artistic cul-de-sacs.

Fourth on my urgent list is doing something..........anything with my toy shop. When I opened it up yesterday to remove some of the display units I was struck by just how lovely it is, and how close to relative completion. I've done all the hard work and tricky stuff, and now it's the fun stuff........the 'distressing' and adding realistic, quirky touches.

Then there's the basement, which I bought before Christmas, and is still in kit form, packed away to lead me not into temptation.



And of course there is the small matter of finding a suitable home for my mini birthday presents, which included some gorgeous little books by Jean Day, a set of antique miniature tools, beautifully framed in a display case, and a wonderful working train layout, complete with DIY scenery, a fairytale castle, and even tiny cows and sheep!



So, after Kensington, I will definitely make a start on the accounts (yuck!) but to balance out the tedium and head-scratching and struggling with spreadsheets, I will allow myself time to work on new ideas, as well as one hour each day to work on the toy shop. My goal is to get the shop itself completely finished and stocked with my collection of fantastic tiny toys and dolls. Then relocate it to a more accessible place to free up space for Phase Two - the basement, which is to contain two separate rooms, one for a toymaker, the other for a dollmaker. The basement also provides a stretch of pavement which will be perfect for some street urchins to stand on while they press their snotty noses up against the shop windows. The toy shop owner, who is a kindly soul, may even gift them a small toy with the request to remove their noses from his windows...........

However, till then I still have lots of work to do so I'd better go and get on with it.

Modern Myths Debunked # 1

Not a lot of people know this, but I am a great admirer of guinea pigs.

My last guin died over a year ago, and I still miss his furry little face and happy squeaks, especially in response to carrot and celery tops.

Now, I suppose you're either a guinea pig person or you're not. Technically they're rodents, but they're not very rodenty. For example they don't have tails, unlike mice and rats *shudder*.
They have pleasantly rounded faces, not pointy little rodenty snouts. They're relatively placid and easy to handle and don't try to shoot up your sleeve or down your jumper (much).
They're gloriously vocal and have a wide vocabulary of grunts, squeaks, whistles, purrs, durrs and chitters (to name but a few).

Despite all this, some people are very disparaging about guinea pigs, and say things like:

"Yes that's all very well, but they don't DO much do they?"

This just goes to show that these people really know nothing at all about the wide and varied secret life of the guinea pig. So in order to debunk this popular modern myth once and for all, I present Exhibit A.



I rest my case..............

Epiphany............

So onwards and upwards with the planning for KDF. A large portion of the day was taken up with trying to design and build a suitable display stand, no bigger than 1 cubic foot to show off the tiny dolls and toys to their best advantage.

Perfectionist Partner spent a chunk of the afternoon sawing, glueing, cutting and generally fabricating from scratch a display stand, which despite all her time and energy, wasn't quite right.

Back to the drawing board and experimentation with various stepped display units, none of which were quite right either.

Until I had an epiphany!

If you've been following this blog from the start, way back in December 2006, you may remember my delight at finding some wonderful wooden display units for my toy shop. My eureka moment late this afternoon was to scoot up to the 'doll's house room' (which has been so neglected I half expected to open the door to find ivy tendrils clinging to every surface) raid the toy shop *minor guilty twinge* and bring down a wall and two corner units, which when used together make a very elegant display almost exactly the right size.

Plus they all have adjustable shelves.
Plus the shelves are perspex so they don't inhibit viewing
Plus they're all nicely painted with trailing plants across the top
Plus they are so obviously shelves from a toy shop, so they will put the toys and dolls in exactly the right context so that people aren't confused about what I'm actually exhibiting.

Eureka!
The perfect solution.

Perfectionist Partner was remarkably good-humoured about having effectively wasted her time all afternoon, and in any case, her display will be excellent for photographing tiny toys on so all was not lost.

Don't you just love it when a plan comes together................?