I know it's early, but...

I'm too excited to wait a minute longer!!!

I am absolutely over the moon to be able to finally share my Christmas card design with you!  'Santa's Gift' is my 2010 offering, and already I am busy printing and packing up orders!  

This year, the card packs are tied with some festive red raffia and a coordinating tag.

There are ten cards and envelopes in each set, and each card is titled and signed by me.

I also do all the printing, making and packaging here (it's quite a cottage industry I've got going) and the cards will only be available to buy from me online.

...and I also designed some gift tags, which you can buy in sets of 8, or as a download!

To find out more, you are very welcome to visit the Christmas page on my website here.

So, aside from beevering away on Christmas stuff, I have also been making a bit of time for myself too.  Last Saturday afternoon I had a gorgeous couple of hours in town, most of which were spent in the book shop and John Lewis where I went into something of a trance in the wool department!! I'm looking for some chunky wool for a new project I've got in mind and came away deliberating on that gorgeous Rowan Cocoon...just the problem of choosing a colour now and then I'm away!!  

Talking of wool, I haven't forgotten I promised you a Joining Popcorn Squares tutorial, I'm sorry it hasn't materialised yet, but it will - I'm going to try and do it for next week, so please bear with me and I'll do my best for you!

On Sunday, continuing the theme of relaxing and switching off, we headed out into the brightest blue of Autumn days armed with a huge picnic.

The morning looked promising as we left home...

...and headed down familiar lanes...

We took ourselves to Clumber Park for the day, and enjoyed a gorgeous Autumn walk in the woods.  We managed to find a few chestnuts, but we reckoned the greedy squirrels had already stashed the best of them!  Our wee girl was in her element, running about, collecting acorn cups, chestnuts and pointing out clusters of plump mushrooms and those beastly chestnut stealing squirrels!

It was very peaceful in the woods, away from the well trodden path, only sunlight and birdsong filtered through the gauzy branches of the tall pines - our relaxing walk ended up at the kitchen gardens where there was an apple festival taking place.  The gardens still look marvellous at this time of year, with colourful splashes from dahlias here and there, and fantastic, architectural forms of seed heads towering above.

There was also a display of pumpkins and squashes in the glass house, as well as a table selling locally produced honey (a jar of which came home, so delicious on warm crusty bread).

Just before I go, I would like to say 'Hello' (waving) and Welcome to some new Followers - please do say 'Hello' back if you feel inclined, it means I will be able to visit your blog too if you have one, and it's always nice to 'meet' my readers!

For those of you who are interested in reading a little bit more about my doings, I've just done an interview for the Craft Candy blog - It's being posted this Friday, the 22nd October.  The link to their blog is here, if you want to hop over and have a read :D

Next week, I am going to be mailing out an exclusive preview of my hand illustrated Christmas cards.  They are very Limited Edition (meaning that there literally will only be a handful of them produced).  If you too would like a peek before they make it into my online emporiums, and perhaps be first in the queue to snap one up, you can sign up here .

Right!  I'm off - I hope you all have a day filled with lovely things, and I will see you all again (with a tutorial) very soon!

Much love, thanks for dropping by!

Julia x