Purple and Pearls

Ok so I may be a little late with my New Year wishes but I have been a rather busy bee!

It was our very first Christmas in our own place and we had huge fun decorating our home and making our own Christmas traditions.  We decided whilst on our honeymoon that we would buy a tree decoration from every place we visited, it was a great idea, we spent a wonderful evening with our memories as we embellished our tree with the ornaments we had collected.

We hosted a Christmas Jumper Party, which was a huge success!  Our flat was full of the best (read worst!) jumpers you’ve ever seen!  Everyone made such an effort either scouring eBay and charity shops for the second hand beauties and even DIYing!  Yes someone did staple felt Christmas tree’s to a cardigan…

The week’s leading up to Christmas were mad – as I’m sure they were for most families.  I baked and decorated 16 Christmas cakes to give as gifts, so spent many a night (with the help of my wonderful Mom) finishing them off.  I have to say though the response has been more than worth it.

I’ve also been busy making plans for Purple and Pearls – the next chapter! which brings me on to my New Year’s Resolutions

1. Have more of a positive attitude.
2. Focus 100% on Purple and Pearls
3. Spend more time appreciating the good things I have.
4. (The obligatory) DIET!

I’m not sure how well the above will all fit together but I’m determined by the end of 2012 to be in a better place.  I moan far too much about things I definitely have control over.  So I’ve decided this year – if I don’t like it, I’ll change it.

So…

Something very exciting has happened. I have sent off 8 designs to a very lovely printers.

You may be wondering, designs for what?  8 different designs for wedding stationery that I will be showcasing to the world very shortly!

So yes that’s why I have been so quiet lately…

New Year, New Venture

This weekend we held the first ever Butt-Numb-A-Thon. 24 hours of non-stop films. 5 of us chose 2 films each and we had to prepare food to match up to our film.

One of my films was the Labyrinth. An absolute classic 80s childhood film. I wasn’t really sure on what food to prepare but had a sudden brain wave.

I re-create one of my favourite characters from the film

I made 6 little worm guys in total and they took me FOREVER to do, but I was really glad I spent the time and effort because the response from everyone was really good!

He’s such a cute little character – love him!

And just in case you’re interested we managed to watch 13 films in 24 hours. Starting with

1. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles
2. Labyrinth
3. American Movie: The Making of Northwestern
4. Garden State
5. Paper Moon
6. Dark Night of the Scarecrow
7. Mutiny on the Buses
8. Bullitt
9. Little Giants
10. Black Narcissus
11. Grizzly
12. The Great Outdoors
13. The Dark Knight

Quite an eclectic mix, and some were hard to watch at 4am in the morning, but we all managed to survive the full 24 hours and at this point I haven’t been to bed in over 33 hours!

All good fun and I’m sure we’ll do it again next year!

It was lunch time at college.  As I sat chatting with a friend a boy she knew from one of her classes came over and asked if he could sit with us whilst he “waited for Geoff”

As the common room filled we got talking, one by one more of his friends came in and with each one I’d ask “Is that Geoff?”  I think I was actually hoping Geoff wouldn’t come so he would sit with me a little longer.

As it happens from that moment on we actually became really good friends, spending any spare minute we had together.  I would always look forward to Thursday’s.  We both finished college early so would meet up and walk slowly into town always stopping at Starbucks.  He’d order a cappuccino and I’d have a hot chocolate.  It was there about a year after we first met that Has asked me to be he’s girlfriend.

10 years ago today.

This has to be one of my favourite pictures of the wedding.  It captures so much about how I was feeling.  In that moment everything else was a blur and all that mattered was us.

Last night our flat was taken over by Zombies…!  Pretty scary stuff!

Thankfully my husband is rather educated in Zombie-removal after spending many hours watching George A Romero films.

We managed to usher them out with the promise of alcohol  and an invitation to the Zombie Ball at Birmingham’s Ballroom.

I’m pleased to say order has been restored and our apartment is back to normal……….or is it?

Mwhahahahaha!!!

Cupcake inspiration from the very wonderful Blue Door Bakery

Monday 15th August, my closest friend Suzie gave birth to her beautiful baby boy Max.

He is beyond perfect and I am head over heels in love with him.

I’m also over come with love for Suzie – I am in complete awe of her.  She really is amazing.  I just know that together with her husband Rob, they are going to make the most wonderful parents.

xxx

Wedding Ideas Magazine was my bible when I began planning our wedding and the section I always flipped to first was the Real Life Bride feature.  For the same reason why I love blogs.  I’m nosey!

I knew I wanted to get our wedding featured, so I sent it in, crossed my fingers and waited for a reply.  A few weeks ago I opened up my inbox to see an email from Wedding Ideas Magazine.  Happy dance!

Our wedding is featured in this months issue! Out today!

We’re so pleased with our 3 pages of fame and we’ve had wonderful comments from people who have seen it.  It’s going to be a fabulous little keepsake – something to show the grandchildren!  Thank you Wedding Ideas Magazine

Photos by Stott Weddings

I have recently gone from no job, to part time job, for full-time-all-the-time job!

After being made redundant a few months before the wedding and spending 6 months struggling to find a job, feeling low and losing most of my confidence I found a relatively easy 3 day a week job.  It was at this point I decided to put wheels in motion and really really start thinking about the steps I would need to take to begin my own wedding stationery company – a dream of mine.

It was strange, being unemployed left me with endless hours to fill.  You’d think it would be the perfect time to set myself up in front of my laptop and dedicate all my energy into creating beautiful stationery,  but something happened.  Any motivation I had went into getting out of bed and dressing myself.  I realise how dramatic that sounds and to clarify I was far from depressed, but not having a job really knocked my confidence.  It wasn’t until I started my part time job that I really began to feel motivated and confident enough to start designing.

On my days off I’d sit and design, evenings after work the laptop would come out.  I have a notebook where my ideas live and any time I couldn’t get to my laptop I’d scrawl down words, shapes and roughly sketched out visions.  I had so many ideas and I’d find inspiration from any thing and every thing… Notice I’m talking in past tense?

A part time, 3 days a week job was great for a while and perfect for allowing me to nurture my growing ambition, but ambition and dreams can only get you so far.  You also need money.  Unfortunately my pay was only enough to get by with no nice added extras and so it was time to go back to a full time position.

Second week over and I can honestly say I have never worked so hard before in my life!  My new hours see me working 40 hours a week and rarely returning home before 6.30.  By the time I’ve had dinner I’m exhausted and any creative thoughts I once had have flitted off with my energy.

I feel incredibly guilty that I’ve neglected Twitter and very out of the loop!  I miss it, but I just seem to have no time to tweet (at least not for me, I’m tweeting on behalf of my new company!)

I haven’t opened illustrator in over 2 weeks and I feel guilty.  Once upon a time it consumed my spare time and even a night not spent playing around with ideas would make me feel anxious.  I’m slowly adjusting to my new working commitments and I hope that after a few more early nights my brain will be back to normal and I’ll be over run with shapes, colours, themes and ideas once again.

Stay tuned.. hopefully someday soon Purple and Pearls will be providing beautiful and unique wedding stationery,  that or you’ll find me in the corner catching some zzzz’s!

Note: To prove my point I actually started this post 6 days ago…

“We’d like to get married too, but we just want to have fun first…”

Something that was said to me recently.  True story.

I’m not entirely sure what the thinking behind this comment was?   Is it a worry to the unwed that once you’re married you become a couple who bicker about chores, become preoccupied with bills and money or just plain boring?

Well, we’re only 7 months in but I can safely say that Has and I are still having fun (shock!)  Yes we’ve a had a very stressful few months, moving house, me being unemployed and having to find a job, moving jobs and illness but we’re still smiling.

We laugh, smile, joke and have fun just like we did before we were married and yes we argue but it’s never long before one of us cracks a joke and the whole thing is forgotten.  I’m not saying that married life is plain sailing but some how it’s so much better.  I can’t really explain how, except that I am truly content.

Having fun with friends at the Download Festival