2010 farewell - and some honest thoughts

Achillea, real and sketched

So. 2010 is coming to a close. And what a year it has been. So much has happened yet it seems to have passed in the blink of an eye. For me, the year has been one of a lot of personal and professional growth. Not as much as I would have liked (on both fronts) but growth all the same.

I've spent this last week doing a lot of reflecting whilst on holidays. And I think my thoughts on the year can be grouped under two themes:

Anxiety & Acceptance
Like most people, I have lots of different anxieties, that affect me to varying degrees both socially and in the workplace. 2010 has been a year of recogising these and learning ways to manage them - definitely still a work in progress! An important part of that is acceptance. Both accepting myself for who I am, but also surrounding myself with lovely people who accept me & my quirks and don't push and pull me to be something else. And of course, doing the same for them in return :)

Inspiration & Intimidation
The hardest thing about 2010 for me has been the lack of creative inspiration. Running Ink & Spindle so often feels like a machine that constantly needs feeding. Opportunities for creativity have been centrered around working with our existing designs (new products etc) rather than developing new ones.

I want to be inspired again but also inspire others again. I look back at my work from a few years ago and miss all of that random creative expression that wasn't related to my work. And I miss how that made others respond and connect with me and my blog. I also see all of the amazing creative development going on around me (eg our friends at Harvest) and feel so intimidated by it all. I know that might sound crazy given what we have achieved so far but moving forward is still really important - both commercially and personally.

Anyway, I really want to bring inspiration and creative expression back into my life, and I'm really hoping our 2 week break away from the studio (and some time out of Melbourne!) will faciltate that.

Anyway enough rambling, here's some sketches from the last few days :)


Top - I've been toying with the idea of getting into ceramics again, hmmmm
Bottom - flowering eucalypts...


Birds!

Lastly, I just want to say a huge thank you to anyone out there reading this blog and commenting. It really does mean a lot to me. I hope next year I'll have more interesting and exciting things to share :)

xx

Lara.

Xmas in pictures

Hello all, I hope you and your family had a great day yesterday doing whatever celebratory things you do!

Ours is typically a very small Christmas, this year just the 5 of us. Here's some pics :)


Presents under the tree (gift tags by spin spin!) and a Kindle cover for my mum


The Kindle cover for my mum - nice to sew something non-work-related for once, and I love how the Kindle screen is just like paper


Musical family - the most awesome xmas cracker contents ever, and some serious concentration at the piano as my bro and I *attempt* to play a duet


The Xmas Pav - with passionfruit AND kiwifruit (don't tell Margaret Fulton)


The Xmas Pav - reduced to very little, very quickly

xx!

downtime

Annnnnnd, it's break time, yay!!

The holidays have been very well received so far. I've done some non work related sewing (no really!), had a lovely lunch with my girls, loaded up the car with presents and clothes and bike and Kitchenaid and driven (all of 20 minutes) to my folks place where I'm going to stay for a few days.


Mum's kitchen (+ my kitchenaid, which FYI I didn't buy)

Mum and I have been busy in the kitchen this morn. We've made the xmas Pav (somehow it took us 25 years to realise that nobody in our family actually likes pudding) which the Kitchenaid whipped into satiny peaks in a matter of seconds. So impressed! Proof will be in the eating though I guess.

I've got plenty more end-of-year thoughts to write but will do that soon... in the meantime, Merry Christmas for tomorrow!

xxxxxx

a weekend of xmas markets

Helllooooo! I'm back from an epic and thoroughly exhausting weekend.

Sunday saw Mikaela and I leaving town at 6am to head up to Ballarat for the day to attend The Design Exchange market. I'd left an xmas party and gone to bed early the night before but as irony would have it I couldn't get to sleep till 2am. Bah! Needless to say I was a bit vague all day.

But this is how our market stall looked at the start of the day, and how gorgeous is this building!? The market was held in the Mining Exchange building and it was such a great venue:


Ink & Spindle at The Design Exchange market

Our soon-to-be-studio-buddy Dana from Twiglet was also at the market - her stall was located in one of the many little alcove rooms that lined the central space:


Twiglet at The Design Exchange market

On Saturday I also managed to pop into the Harvest Xmas Market which was awesome! So many familiar faces and some new ones too, and so many people making amazing things!

It's funny, it's been ages since I've been inspired to actually buy anything at a Design Market, but these two markets had some great fresh stuff and I bought heaps. All for myself though, oops!


My xmas market loot. From left to right:
- Top by Sunday Morning Designs
- Screen printed Tshirt by Unit
- Porcelain bowl by Clay Body
- Hand painted bowl by Jedda Robaaard
- Screen printed card and gift tags by Spin Spin

All in all a great & inspiring weekend. I'm looking forward to having a couple of weeks off over Christmas so I can find time & space to create again. Soon, soon.

The Design Exchange - Ballarat

Just a quick reminder that Ink & Spindle will be at The Design Exchange market this coming Sunday in Ballarat! The market is going to be held in the gorgeous Mining Exchange building which I'm very excited about. Should be heaps of great designers there so if you live nearby please come visit!

The Design Exchange market, Ballarat - Sunday 19th December

xx Lara.

Open Studio tomorrow!

Wow I am terrible at remembering to blog about things like this! We mentioned it over at Ink & Spindle but I should have blogged it over here at the same time!

Nevermind, hopefully it's not too late and you still might be able to come join us for our very last Open Studio for the year! There'll be a printing demo and wares for sale and of course lots of bikkies and cups of tea and lollies.

Saturday 11th December 2010

10:00am - 1:00pm (printing demo at 11:00ish!)

206/10 Elizabeth St, Kensington

Hope you can make it!

xx

Lara.

P.S. - I really, REALLY can't believe it's December already. What happened to 2010?? It's been a very good year though :)