Design a butterfly for World Lupus Day 2013

The 10th May 2013 is World Lupus Day and I wanted to mark this event by organising something on my blog. My idea is to create a gallery of butterfly designs so our day will be colourful and joyful even if we are celebrating a life threatening disease like Lupus. 
Why the butterfly? The symbol of a butterfly is often chosen to represent Lupus in the form of a logo. This is because a number of patients have the malar rash across the cheeks and on the bridge of the nose and this is said to resemble the shape of a butterfly.
 

If you would like to participate just send me your design (600px square, 72 dpi, rgb and jpeg format), your name, and one link to your website or Facebook page, to the following address dawnclarkson@libero.it. The gallery will be arranged in the order that I receive the designs so the sooner you send me your design the higher up in the gallery it will be! I am also preparing a gallery of children's drawings so if you have some little ones who like drawing butterflies (who does'nt?) then get them to start colouring now! Please send me these designs in the above format with the childs name. I have a deadline of May 5th so I can prepare the images and promote the event.

Please help me to commemorate this occasion and build awareness of Lupus.

Until then I leave you with a butterfly design I did myself, I hope you will all participate... the more the merrier. THANKS

Let's fly! bloghop... Thank you and news.

Hi everyone. I do hope you enjoyed the Let's fly! bloghop. 
It was a huge success and there was a great amount of super work for you to see whilst hopping about all over the world! Although the bloghop has officially finished you can still take ride on the merry-go-round. We clever ladies have relinked the bloghop so that it will remain forever on our blogs... well almost forever. Thanks to all of you who took time to visit the first time round. If you didn't have time then now you have no excuse!

It goes without saying that I am a very busy lady and to be honest I don't have as much time as I would like to do patterny things (VERY FRUSTRATING!!!!). At the moment I am working on a lovely freelance project creating five different 30 second animations which will go live on Youtube at the end of March. It is a whole new and exciting world for me and I am enjoying myself emormously... it also helps to pay the bills which my 'patterny' work isn't quite doing at the moment. So be patient and I will get back to you all with new work and projects as soon as possible. On Monday I will begin the week with a sneaky peek at a couple of patterns I have managed to create in my 'reduced' pattern making time. Also next week will see the return of Dream Designs... I will be showcasing a designer and their dream design and product. So things will be looking up, hope to see you then. x

Merry Christmas - Buon Natale

 

If you could choose your perfect kind of Christmas tree what would it be like?

My choice would be this one made of special Gianduiotti chocolates... then after the festivities you can eat it!

Merry Christmas - Buon Natale to you all.

Christmas Rose!

 

You may have noticed that my blog posts have diminished over the last few weeks. 

I have been working very hard in the "posh gift shop" in Turin, it is a hive of lovely gifts for the home so this is our most busy time of year. 

We are coming up to the final few days before Christmas and the clients are becoming more and more demanding and frenetic in their search for the lastest gadget or gift seen in some convincing TV advert. I on the other hand am becoming more and more tired (my patience ran out ages ago) aching feet, sore hands and a brain refusing to work anymore don't help the general situation.

I have stopped doing any normal things like shopping, cleaning, eating, even sleeping.  Any enthusiasm I may have had for the festive season has long ago been forced to the back of my mind and has died under the weight of the "Christmas Marathon" we endure every year.

My design projects have been put a side for a while. I have little time to myself and it is very frustrating (I am in pattern abstinence) even if I try to design something late into the night my brain is numb and the results are not what I hoped for. The pressure of the Christmas delirium has forced me to hang up my pencils and paints for a while (I end up doing this every year) and wait for Christmas Day to come round as quickly as possible.

Yesterday I noticed this beauitful Rose, it is the only colourful thing in my garden at the moment and I think it is a little out of season to say the least. A beautiful red flower which has decided to join in the festive madness. Needless to say it cheered me up lots and I snapped a quick photo of it on my way back into the Christmas afternoon lunacy. :)

Daddy('s) long legs (not a serious post of course)

This is not a serious post but an excuse to experiment uploading a short film on my blog as I have never done that before. The title is also a terrible pun but I thought it quite funny so you must forgive me my bad taste. The film is only 17 seconds long and if I had realised that it was going to turn out so good I would have made it much longer!
 

I have just returned from a weeks holiday in England and most my time was spent walking along the beach dodging the rain and blustery weather. I am quite a short person and my Dad too so it was quite fun to find that we had grown to such an incredible height in a matter of seconds. So here is 17 seconds of my Dad and I walking along a Lincolnshire beach and we have SUPER LONG LEGS, enjoy :)

Back to work

Hello everyone.

Having a few days off isn't really good for business but I can assure you it is really good for the soul. I have been a very busy bee sorting, organising and planning. I feel much better now that I have got a few things into perspective. My main achievement is turning my endless lists in to some sort of business plan with a timetable and deadlines... now all I have to do is stick to it!

Over the next ten days I will be extra busy 'creating patterns' as I have four important deadlines to meet. I will be sure to post snippets of my new designs here on my blog and I will share any news I have regarding any new projects.

From tomorrow my blog will be up and running again so please take time to come and visit. I will be starting the week with a lovely Dream Designs post and I have another lined up for later on in the week. If you are curious... come take a look!

Until tomorrow x

Torno subito

Torno subito in Italian means 'I'll be back soon' and it's the only title that I feel is suitable for this post.
On Saturday the 3rd Module of the Art and Business of Surface Pattern Design came to an end, and even though in theory it is not an ending but a new beginning, it has left me a bit stunned and disorientated. I have my plans, my dreams and my lists (endless) and for sure I'll not be without something to do for months on end... but I do feel a bit sad that I won't have my daily lessons to inspire me and encourage me.

So I have decided to take a week off from my blog Nice and Fancy, I will be working on a couple of projects and I need to incorporate all my lists into one (hee, hee) and decide on a master plan for my immediate future but I won't be writing anything here for a few days. I apolgise for this but I need to have a few days to myself and I just did'nt want to leave my blog blank with an "old" post.

So the appointment is for next Monday, I will be back with snippets of new projects and with two Dreams Design posts. Have a good week and a great weekend until then :) x  

Butterfly surprise

A strange thing happened this morning. I saw this lovely butterfly have a fight with a wasp in the garden. Then as if to calm down it sat in the shade for a while just long enough for me to take a couple of photographs. Not very good at identifying different butterfly species I'm unsure if it is a rarity. However I have never seen one like this before and have no idea what type it is or where it might have come from. Luckily for me it passed through my garden... life can be full of pleasant surprises.

My thought for the day

Well I think that says it all folks... it would be nice to have time to post more often xx

World Lupus Day 2012

Today, May 10th is World Lupus Day. Lupus, or SLE is a chronic condition where the immune system attacks the body and can cause a multitude of complaints. It can be very severe and in some cases life threatening. Being a chronic illness there is no cure, however, with drugs a patient can control the disease and in many cases lead a normal life.
So today is World Lupus "awareness" Day, please take five minutes to look at a couple of these internet sites and become familiar with the disease.

www.worldlupusday.org
www.lupusuk.org.uk 
www.lupus.it
www.lupus-europe.org 

This morning whilst out and about looking for colour inspiration I came across these images of Butterflies. A butterfly is widely recognised as the symbol associated with Lupus, as some patients have a characteristic rash on the face which can sometimes resemble a butterfly. So look closely at my images and give a thought to the many who suffer through Lupus. 

Thanks.

News

I have been having a few days holiday in rainy old England, no blogging, no Spoonflower  and no serious work as such. Although I have had a wonderful rest the weather has not been good and all my plans to take lots of photographs have been abandoned.

In preparation for next week when I will be starting my "The Art of Surface Pattern" e-course, I have taken advantage of the extra time on my hands and "cleaned out" my computer. I know that is not really the right phrase to use but it does feel like that, chucking out things you don't need anymore and organising all the rest! I would like to organise my blog a bit more, I think a new header could be on the cards and maybe to add a "Surface pattern e-course" banner, but I don't really know where to start.

I bought some new ink pens yesterday and have been trying them out and doodling (see image above) in my sketchbook. I just love using them when they are new, I went back to the shop and bought some more today to take back to Italy with me.

Wow

I thought you all might like to know that in the "Outdated Technology Spoonflower competition, my design Crazy Coffee Pots was placed 12th out of 203 entries with a total of 373 votes! Yipeee... just doing a little dance here.

The last "posh shop bulletin"

We have finally made it to Christmas Eve (all with sore throats and temperatures)... Just waiting now for the last customer, there is always one who comes in at 7.30pm and still has to buy a couple of pressies!

Now looking forward to three whole days of rest to try and get back to normal.

Wishing you all a very Merry Christmas and a wonderful 2012. XX

Snowman and friends

Only three days left and afraid to say I'm completely and utterly tired and fed up of "posh gift shop"! It happens every year, I start off full of good will and Christmas spirit. Then it sort of dwindles into a strained smile with a sigh of relief every evening when I can tick off another day on my calendar. I know it is because my feet are aching so much and my brain is in total confusion... can't wait until it is all over.

Our singing snowmen are almost sold out, there is only one left and I feel quite sorry for him. He is pictured here with friends (who I'm pleased to say "don't sing"). I hope he finds a buyer before we close our doors on Christmas eve, I can't bear to think of putting him back in his box until next year!

Christmas panic!

Only seven working days left until Christmas. The novelty of selling and wrapping gifts is beginning to wear off... we are now only counting the days left until the big day. Now working (rushing around!) from 8.00am until 8.00pm. No lunch hours because taken up with errands... like, replenishing dwindling wrapping paper supplies and such. It seems impossible but we have already got through 2 packs of 5 kilos... that is a lot of paper!

Christmas News

Only 20 days left before the big day. We have finally finished all the window dressing and now just adding some last touches to the displays on the shelves. It is such hard work preparing the shop for the Christmas rush but everything looks really sparkly and I must say "quite fancy". We are although already working lots and have wrapped up loads and loads of lovely packages which is my favourite part of the job.

Today I noticed that the singing snowmen say Ho Ho Ho... I thought that was supposed to be Father Christmas!

P.S In last Spoonflower competition my Kite design came 39th out of 146 entries with 291 votes. ...umm, must try and do better next time.

Christmas Marathon

Christmas in the Posh Gift Shop is really taking off. We are now 3 days into our Christmas Marathon with only 24 Working days to go! I already have aching feet and am fed up with singing snowmen. Trying to concentrate on important things, like not getting a sore throat and losing my voice (difficult to serve clients), and... to wrap up every gift as if it will be your last so they all come out wonderfully.

Wonderful enormous fig tree

We have an enormous fig tree in our garden and for 11 months of the year it is my favourite of all the trees we have. It creates perfect shade and is very well behaved, when other trees take two months to loose all their leaves (and that means two months of collecting them for us! ) our very intelligent fig tree at the first sign of cold weather turns yellow and then all the leaves fall off THE SAME DAY... fantastic. However, our lovely tree is a pain for one month of the year, being so big it manages to produce loads and loads and LOADS of figs. I keep saying that one year I will weigh all the friuts we pick but I still haven't got round to it yet. If we don't pick the figs they rot and fall off and have to be scooped off the lawn, and they attract big hornet type wasps which are not very friendly. So we pass about three and half weeks picking figs everyday, that may sound nice but it can become monotonous after the first few days. I like to give them away because we don't like fig jam and although I haven't tried bottling or freezing them I think that at the end of the day they are just figs, and figs are so yummy when they are freshly picked off the tree. So this week we are busy collecting figs and I would just like to say publicly a big "Thanks" to our wonderful enormous fig tree for being such a pain again this year.

P.S this post is dedicated to Flowerlady, who I know if she had a fig tree like ours would do it more justice, by making lots of yummy things to eat, and, by using up every single fig on the tree!

Lies

I promised that I would'nt write about fish and fishermen anymore. It was a lie. Yesterday I sold my first yard of fishermen fabric through Spoonflower to a lady in the United States. I think this historic event is worth a mention on my blog.

"S" was interested in buying my fabric to make a skirt but was pipped at the finish line by "K" to become my FIRST EVER CUSTOMER, she is going to make a bed quilt for her 8 month old daughter.

I earnt a 1.80 dollar commission on the sale which means I'll be rich in no time at all.
This last phrase was also a lie!

No excuses

Hiya, you could say that June has been a bit "non prolific" Blogwise. It wasn't in my plans to be this way but it has just turned out so. I have been busy doing other things of course but a lot of them not suitable or interesting enough to write about here.

I have also been on holiday. Before my departure I prepared a bag with "arty materials", pencils, rubber and sharpener, scissors, paper, sketchpad and paper, even my computer (not to be used on the beach of course), I could'nt wait to have time to myself to get on with my work. It is always nice to have a plan but sometimes they change dramatically, nevertheless I managed to spend the whole time reading (or sleeping) in the shade of the beach umbrella. I think you could say I needed a rest.

So now I am back in sunny Turin (about 34 degrees!!!!) I will make a super effort to be a bit more communicative in July. Loads of ideas are bubbling I just hope they come to something. You'll be hearing from me soon.