York Places // Luxury Ice Cream Company (LICC)

I'm so glad we came across the Luxury Ice Cream Company when we visited York last month. It's just the cutest little ice cream parlour. Stuffed to the brim with adorable decorations, lots of pink, heart backed chairs, a sparkling chandelier... and that's before you even get to the ice cream! We saved this as a treat for our last day, which was probably a good thing as I'd have been back most days given the chance. I had eton mess and sweet cream ice creams while David had oreo and chocolate. Very yummy! There's also a fab selection of sweets, cakes and chocolates - a dangerous place for someone with a sweet tooth like me. If you're visiting York you'll find this shop of goodness at 20 Back Swinegate. You can also find them on Facebook which I should probably stop following as it's just taunting me with ice cream flavours that are too far away to eat!

Falkland Midsummer Festival

You may have already seen on our social media that myself and David are involved in the Falkland Festival this year. We decided to join the committee after seeing a plea for new members to save the festival earlier in the year. Neither of us has been to the festival before but it would have been such a shame to see something that's been running for years end for lack of support. 

The festival is a week of events and family fun running from 14th - 21st June. This year things will be a bit different as the committee is mostly made up of new members. We're trying to refresh the event's image so I've been responsible for the rebrand and website design. I'm also going to be writing some posts on the festival blog and helping run the social media accounts. Finally, we have given it a new name: the Falkland Midsummer Festival.

We're meeting regularly at the moment as we try to get to grips with confirming the programme. There's a lot to learn about with everything involved in making the festival happen and hopefully a big success. It looks like we'll need quite a bit of help during the events, so if you're nearby we're looking for volunteers. There's also still time to apply for a stall at the street fair and we're currently looking for raffle donations. Let me know if you'd like to get involved in any way!

Fairytale Asylum Photography

Last month we had our first ever lifestyle photo shoot with the wonderful Emma of Fairytale Asylum Photography. The photos are part of our plan for an improved website which we'll be sharing more about next week. Since we've never had a photo shoot before we were more than happy to leave it up to Emma to decide what would work best. We were looking for pics for our bio of us together plus in the studio. Emma suggested we went out for a walk for a relaxed feel so we went through the Falkland Estate which is where all the outdoor photos were taken. Afterwards we set up in the studio for some shots of us "working" in our natural environment.

I'm so pleased with the photographs (we both are) and really excited to be sharing them with you. We can't wait to get some added to the website - just need to choose which fit best! We're both usually super awkward when having a camera pointed at us so Emma has done a fantastic job capturing these shots.

We're really looking forward to share more behind the scenes stuff as the business grows as this is what makes us unique and one of the reasons we hope you choose to shop at JillyJilly rather than a big faceless big company.

Thank you very much to Emma, check out her website and blog to see more of her brilliant work.

April in York

It's been a while since we last visited York, over two years in fact. You can read about our last trip here, it was a lot different since it was icy January then and the city had a sleepy feel to it. This time we had some sunshine and lots of fellow tourists since it's April! I'd like to say a big thank you to my Mum and Dad who let us tag along on their holiday and treated us to yummy food and a night at the Theatre (12 Angry Men was brilliant!).

At the start of the week I went with my Mum to the British Craft Trade Fair in Harrogate where we were looking for new designers for Pebble. There was such a huge selection of businesses there, really quite overwhelming but a great insight for JillyJilly as we'll be attending our first trade fair in September (more on that later!). We spent most of the rest of the week wandering around, including another walk around the Snickelways, a walk around the walls and we also visited the Castle Museum which had a really interesting World War 1 exhibition on. It was so nice just to get some proper time off for a week! Look out for a post about the super cute ice cream shop we came across in York on the blog in the next few weeks.

Photo a Day Fortnight #3

 a shape: round confetti and polkadots brighten up the studio // beauty: my favourite beauty product is nail polish // breakfast: strawberries for our breakfast smoothies this week, perfect for sunny mornings!

 inspired: pretty books keep me inspired, never enough time to read them properly but great to pick up and flick through // dark: when it's dark look for stars notebook // this smells so good: bath time treats // something green: green signs pointing out the beautiful sights in York

 paper: beautiful paper from Paper Pod in York // up: Looking up at York Minster // dinner: what's for dinner? our free meal planner printable in action

where I work: I love my desk! The studio is a happy place // an ordinary moment: time for tea, in a JillyJilly mug of course // fluffy: our fluffy little friend // together: yummy ice cream we ate together in York

It's been a busy fortnight (well, three weeks... week 14 photos didn't happen!) and this post is late but that's partly due to us catching up with work after spending a week in York. My brother came to stay before that and we had some beautiful weather, did a bit of gardening and caught up with my Grandparents who were lovely enough to Daisy sit while we were away. If you'd like to hear what we got up to in York, then look out for a post about our trip in the next few days!

Photo a Day Fortnight # 2

after: our new product photos are so much more fun than the 'befores'! // hobby: photography is my favourite hobby and one of the reasons why I like to keep a blog and try photo challenges // text: this is the mug I made for my sister's 21st "21 things I love about you" soon to be available to order

private: my sketchbooks are private until I'm happy with the designs then I might share a peek on Instagram // hand-drawn: a preview of some doodles for new collections // sun-flare: captured while I was back in Aberdeen // leaves: this wrapping paper is so cute, a present from Daisy to Amy!

too much: is there such a thing as too much deco tape..? // a treasure: one of our all time best selling Bottled Treasures // half: half of our heart shaped logo on a business card

I love...: these two dafties // something white: we always have lots of blank mugs in the studio waiting to be printed to order // give: yummy chocolate, one to give to David of course // zen: one of my favourite quotes which reminds me to let go and enjoy life

This is my 2nd 'Photo a Day Fortnight' post and I'm actually quite proud of sticking to the Fat Mum Slim photo a day challenge for 4 weeks. It might seem silly but it's the longest I've ever managed! Of course I've ruined it by falling behind and skipping my fifth week but to be fair we had an Easter promotion on so the shop has been extra busy. I'll get back to it this week though! During the fortnight above we spent some time back in Aberdeen for my sister's 21st Birthday, which was really nice, then had a busy week of catching up after the time off. Next week we're off to York so I'm looking forward to having some more photography time and hopefully enjoying lots of sunshine.

In the Studio // When Things Go Wrong

This is my first post of 2015 and it's not a positive one I'm afraid but sometimes it's best to be realistic and share the bad times along with the good. Jilly thought a dark 'moody' photo suited this post rather than her usual bright pastel photography! This is me trying to fix our sublimation printer...

A few weeks ago it seemed like all our equipment was broken or on the verge of breaking, the printer had just given up, the mug press was being unpredictable and then our pocket mirror maker decided to not work either. Plus, we had supplier problems on top of all that! It's annoying but the worst thing is when you get caught up in it and let it stress you out when things go wrong. Especially when you know it isn't the end of the world and that these are pretty silly problems in the grand scheme of things.

The main problem when we have days like those (spending almost a whole day trying to fix something to then find out it's completely unfixable and that you wasted all that time) is trying to resist giving up. It's far too easy to decide to go back to bed or have a sofa day (or two) with Netflix and comfort food! It's easy then to fall behind with daily tasks or fall out of the work routine so we've had to work on coping methods whether it's just going out for a walk, accepting that you need a break or agreeing to take a half day off when you can. After all that's the fun of being your own boss! It's so important to keep calm and remember all the positive things in life to stay motivated and remind ourselves that so much else is going well. Being self employed is great, and we're not complaining, but the fact is you have to take responsibility during the bad times and work through them to be able to enjoy all the good times.

One thing we've learnt is that there is no point in beating ourselves up about it. So what if we miss some social media posts, don't stick to our weekly planner or forget to schedule a blog, it's not the end of the world - we can work harder next week or just learn to let it go and get on with what's next.

At the end of the day, I think that it is the little things that keep you going when times are trickier; like happy customer emails and surprise blog features. That's enough of that rant and hopefully next time we'll be back to normal!