Aprons at last

Aprons at last!

It's not like I haven't had them lying around my studio since November, it's just been finding the time to take all the product shots. And also finding a way of photographing the back that doesn't making my bum look big!

But here we are at last - aprons in my Etsy shop, available in Orla and Spoons prints.

Lovin' spoonful

Lovin' spoonful
Fellow Etsy seller, Donna Brady of Resurface Design , suggested that as part of its packaging, I include the story behind my Borrowed Spoons design. I took her kind advice and made a little swingtag to send off with each of these teatowels I sell. The text reads:

"Borrowed Spoons" was inspired by the spoons I use in my home, as well as by the spoon photos of blog friends Lena Corwin, Kelly Cooper-Kordylewski and Lisa Congdon.

This design has been all about sharing, so I’m donating $1 of my online sales to the Peninsula Schools Feeding Association

.

Um, there's an awful typo in there - I'm not just donating a single dollar, it's a dollar of each sale!
I've sold 177 Spoons teatowels since September, and PFSA tells me that's enough money to feed 6 schoolkids for a whole year. Yay! Thanks to everyone for buying my things.

spoonssnoops

Aha! Lola (who writes this other funny blog too) tells me she decided to join the spoons craze. Here's what she's done with her lovely spoon collection.



You know, I always wanted to start a craze, but I never thought it'd be about spoons. I thought skipping would be the one. Not with a rope, but that ta-DUM-te-DUM along the beach kind of thing that kids do. It gets the old heartrate up and you cover lots of distance in a way that makes you feel quite elated. In fact, independent analysts tell me that it's quite impossible to be grim-faced while skipping.

Come on, bloggers, let's skip! But do I have to do it on YouTube first?

Spoons live on

I'm pleased to see a resumption of the spoons flurry around the blogs. Take a look:

Elisabeth of Fine little day took this one...

... inspiring Sandra who got her spoons out, and then posted her pics on her Flickr page, cloudberryterrier (found via Loraine at Grijs).

Then over the weekend I saw these pop up on HappySilly ...


...and with a strange synchronicity that makes me think the shared "spoo" in spoons and spooky is no coincidence, Grace just sent me a nudge telling me about her post on these beautiful slip cast porcelain spoons from coe & waito's collection (thanks, Grace!).

hickory no ki

While we're talking of spoons, take a look at these exquisite hand-made specimens. See more at hickory no ki (f0und via debi van zyl).

*Little update: I just remembered that labour of heart told me about the spoons on hickory no ki ages ago!

Salvia

In my inbox this morning, I found a very sweet email from Amy of ReMakeables, reminding me about Japanese design collective, Salvia. I wonder why...


Yes, I can also hear the echoes of my Borrowed Spoons design ringing loud and clear, but I only saw Salvia's beautiful spoons after my design was finished, teatowels were printed and awaiting their launch. Promise!

Read more about Salvia's commitment to reviving Japanese traditional crafting techniques, and about their other design collaborations in this PingMag article.

Late addition: After a couple of well-meant comments from readers, I thought I'd better just make it clear that I was not in the least worried that Amy, or anyone else, thought I'd ripped off the Salvia design, and that was not at all the intention of Amy's email to me. I just wanted to show the strange echos that sometimes happen. Apologies for not expressing myself clearly.

Borrowed Spoons - new in Etsy

It all started with Jasper Morrison's Book of Spoons. It inspired me to take some pics of my spoons, and these caused cutlery drawers to start rattling all over the world.

First, Lisa sent me a pic of her spoons...

Then Lena took pics of hers...

And Kelly did too.

I was pretty over the spoon about all this, and when my blog friends kindly let me use their spoon pics as inspiration along with my own, the happy result was Borrowed Spoons - a teatowel design in three cutlery-hued colourways. It's in my Etsy shop today.

Here, in melamine green:
In enamel red:

And in stainless steel too:

And because everyone was so nice about sharing, and because spoons are used for feeding, I'm pledging a dollar from each online sale of Borrowed Spoons to the Peninsula Schools Feeding Association, which provides 140 000 little kids with a nice hot meal at school every day.

So I guess I should say thanks to Mr Morrison for starting it all. Thanks, Jasper!

A Book of Spoons

Paul was given Jasper Morrison's A Book of Spoons for his birthday.

I liked looking at the photos of spoons in the book, so yesterday I collected all our spoons together and laid them out on two big piece of paper. I left out the teaspoons as my paper wasn't big enough for them.

These are our colourful spoons.

And these are their more classically hued neighbours in the cutlery drawer.
Great way to spend a Sunday, don't you think?