Photo Shoot

What a hard day at work playing with cocktail glasses and jewellery, every girls dream.

I have just finished styling a photo shoot that Christian and I had to cram into today, for an advert that is in Gift Focus and the deadline is this afternoon. We are living life on the edge or as my mother would say, "you need to be more organised Karen"A memo block from our new office stationery range decorated with butterflies and flowers, finished with diamantes. Hanging from the memo block are a couple of pieces of jewellery, I especially love this bracelet with black glass hearts.

Christopher Cavania Sanders RA - Part 2

At the Royal College of Art, Sandy met Barbara louise Stubbs, the daughter of a banker, who was studying art, dress and needlework. They regularly attended the Chelsea Art Balls. They married in 1931 at St Leonar's church in Heston, Middlesex and settled in the area. Sandy painted and earned a living through commercial art, he designed the logo for Birds Custard and patterns for the upholstery in the London Underground trains, whilst Barbara taught at the Green School in Isleworth. They had a full social life and Sandy played hockey for the Hounslow Hockey Club.
Their first child, Roger was born in 1937, this event coincided with the purchase of their first property in The Crossways, Heston. There Sandy designed the furniture to fit in their next home- all oak veneer, heavy and very 30's. Firs Drive in Cranford, near Heathrow Airport was to be Sandy's home for the next 33 years.
During the war Sandy was in a reserved profession as a draughtsman and spent much of the duration in St Albans. His painting reflected the war, many subjects being of barbed wire, spitfires and aerodromes. This was followed by a period of teaching at St Albans School of Art. Their first daughter Jane was born in 1942, followed by Peter in 1945 and Frances in 1946. Poppies at Digswell For Auction 5 March 2008 www.Bonhams.com

Money was tight for painters after the war, as most families incomes were focussed on essentials. Against his better wishes Sandy concentrated on commercial work, doing much with Thompson's Agency, but selling paintings whenever he could. He also illustrated books, most notably several of the Janet and John books and Aesop's Fables for Nesbitts.Throught the Garden Gate 1950 Author - Barbara Sanders, Illustrator - Christopher Sanders

ladies who lunch

I felt like a change from what I was doing today and this lady jumped out of the paint brush. Ladies who lunch, I wish I was. xx

Oh goodie new Jewellery

In my home office are hanging samples of all our Cavania jewellery and I was delighted to add the new collection. I will have to make regular checks to see if it's all still there and my daughter has not accidently borrowed any of it, although it is very tempting as they are all rather scrumptious. New collection available to order from April.
Flower hooks by Bombay Duck

Natasha's Animals

I just had to show you all these little animals made by Natasha Fadeeva who makes them all by hand. There are lots more on her website http://www.fadeeva.comI'm taller then youIt takes hours and hours to water the flowers

Cake anyone .....

For the Spring Fair trade show I dressed the table with a three tiered cake stand and filled it each day with cakes, well numerous times a day. I bought so many packets of fairy cakes and french fancies that my trolly was filled to the brim, a gentlemen stopped me and asked "was it my trolly" in the crisp isle, I smiled and said "yes". He asked if he could take a photo as he had never seen a trolly like it and that he thought his was full of junk food! Well now the show has been over for a week and still I am eating french fancies, I've taken packets to the office and shared them out to everyone I meet. The kettle seams to be permanently on as one cant eat cake without tea, the pink ones are my favorites.

Oh my head!

Today I hit the wall, one could say writers block! The lady that jumped out of my paint brush said it all with the caption"oh my head hurts". Too many ideas and deadline pressure with not enough time to play, I'm mean paint them all.
Have a lovely weekend everyone, lets hope that sun keeps shining.

Love Day

I hope you all have had a lovely Valentine's day, mine didn't go quite to plan( all will be revealed shortly) but has ended in a lovely family meal for the three of us. The image above is from our 'Keepsake' range of 36 cards, all can be seen on our main website.

Who's the Best Painter

This was the view from my loft studio tonight, it was the most gorgeous day followed by a stunning sunset. The big guy is certainly the best painter around.

Through the eyes of a twelve year old

Faye my daughter visited the warehouse today with Christian for the first time. I was unable to go so sent her instead with my camera, and this was the result!
Here we have Ann the Queen of the Butterflies, Daisy the Dog who as you can see is surrounded by butterfly glitter. It's a tough life herding butterflies as they rarely do as they are told! This is Helen who is trying out for the X-Factor and Mark apparently was out driving a tractor some where. They are a little bit mad in Oxfordshire, it must be the air!

Spring Fair 2008 has finished

What a fair it was too, thank you to all our customers and competitors for an enjoyable five days. We met many new faces and had an endless supply of cupcakes to keep us all smiling throughout. Many new international distributors stopped by and ordered so Cavania will be spreading it's wings even further around the world shortly. Bye bye standThe van is all loaded (just) and now it's time for home, thank you Ian the wonder agent and James the office star.

NEC Birmingham

Just a few photos so far of the stand and aisle around us, to say we were knocked off our feet at the size of the stand would be an understatement. We are shattered and now have to dash back up there to dress the stand today as the show opens tomorrow. The stand has cost just under the £10k so far and I am having panic butterflies whizzing around my stomach, my fingers are crossed and I'm praying for no snow. To give you some idea as to the scale of this show here is a map now we are in hall 3 with around 400 other card publishers! and all the halls are completely full of wonderful and strange items from spoons to wardrobes and just about anything you could imaging buying for the home or a gift.