August Places: St Andrews

At the end of last month my sister and her boyfriend came to stay so we went to St Andrews for the day, it was great weather for a wander. We visited the lovely Little Birds Market for the first time, I'd been following online for a while and wasn't disappointed with the cute and quirky selection of goodies available. Next we went for lunch, then queued for yummy Jannettas Gelateria ice cream. I had apple pie flavour and vanilla which was made that day - delicious! We decided to have a barbecue that evening as we drove back to the cottage in the sunshine but by the time the barbecue was lit it had started raining. Typical! We finished the evening cosied up with a film and enjoyed our salted caramel cupcakes bought from Macbelles at the market earlier.

In the Studio: Planning Ahead

Hey guys, sorry this is a day late, no excuse other than we've been really busy. So this week Jilly is taking part in North East Open Studios, she's exhibiting her work and our products at Pebble in Aberdeen. Unfortunately this meant last week was a rush of trying to get work finished on top of the usual jobs with late nights and making extra stock. We're really aware of needing to get better at planning ahead to stop this happening and to have regular working hours would be great as we'd get more time off, which is a rare thing these days. 

Unfortunately because of not planning ahead, the Christmas collections aren't finished which means we're later than hoped for working towards wholesale this year but we'll still be creating designs just for everyone who wants to order from our online shop and upcoming fairs. We'd love to get into a seasonal collection release routine giving more time for launches and planned design time. This would mean we could finally work properly with shops to try and have our products stocked up and down the country, a big business goal of ours.

This year because of moving house and shifting the business to JillyJilly with a design focus rather than just Bottled Treasures it's been hectic to say the least. I hope by the end of the year we will have everything planned and get the ball rolling with keeping ahead of seasonal designs and also expanding the business to include more wholesale and press opportunities.

Hopefully I'll be on time next week, see you then!

Our Home: Living Room Tour

spinning tealight holder: Rustiques // teacup vase & vintage peony: Cottage Craft Centre // wallpaper: Jane Clayton & Co

love lantern: house warming gift // pink candle: Primark

 chalk paint on bookcase & mantelpiece: Milk by Autentico // rose garland: Sass & Belle // pink house lights: Nyla Rose

sofa: Ikea // floral cushions: Fayre Earth Gift Shop // mint cushion: Pebble // checked throw: Ikea // patchwork throw: Primark // world map print: Not on the High Street // house lamp: ebay

rug: Society 6 // chalk paint on coffee table: rose by Autentico

wooden heart trug: B&M // candle: Pebble // wooden doilies: Asda // napkin holder: Tiger // napkins: Cottage Craft Centre

table cloth: John Lewis // coasters & placemats: B&M

upcycled vintage chairs: Pebble by Alabaster Box

button lamp: DIY project

upcycled piano stool: Alabaster box // bright pink lantern: Bombay Duck // light pink lantern: B&M // dandelion artwork: Fayre Earth Gift Shop by The Wee String Plaque Company // doily: etsy // stag clock (below): Pebble

After the last post about our new home which focused on the village we decided it would be fun to start a series on 'our home' which will give us a chance to share our newly decorated cottage along with other bits and bobs about Falkland. 

So here is our living room! I think it's my favourite room in the cottage, but I do keep changing my mind. I did a mood board post with what I had in mind for this room back in July and I'd say it turned out how I'd planned. I know it's really girly with all the pink and florals but it's also very comfy, cosy and practical. We have our little dining corner which can fold out to seat 6 for dinner and the big pink corner sofa is a double sofa bed (it also stores all the guest bedding inside it!). We painted the plain furniture ourselves with Autentico chalk paints and my Mum is to thank for the wallpapering (thanks Mum!) There are links under the photos to where we bought some of our living room things but if I've missed something which you're curious about let me know! 

In the Studio: An Introduction

Hello! This is a brand new regular feature on the JillyJilly blog which is going to be posted every Monday but the difference is that it will be written by me... David. I'm Jilly's partner and we've been together for nearly 6 years, I've been helping Jilly with her business since the start but only recently has it become more of a joint effort. I've been taking over more jobs such as aspects of social networking including managing the Twitter account on top of making some of the illustrated products. This means Jilly has more time to focus on designing and creating the new products. We've been working together on ideas for the blog and decided that we could add a new regular post each week: In the Studio!

This feature will be a peek behind the scenes showing the ups and downs of our creative business, our weekly goings ons and our business journey. The main aim for this post is to share a helpful insight into running a business, but from my point of view which can be a lot different from Jilly's!

So I should start the first post with a round up of the last week – We started the week doing a lot of planning and this is an issue we have all the time; I prefer to type things up on the computer because you can come back, edit and save whereas Jilly prefers the old fashioned pen and paper method which leads to problems when she loses her notebooks with important lists and mind maps in them... After lots of planning we decided that we should spend a lot more time on social media, getting in touch with other designers and bloggers so I have been online speaking to people and trying to use the social networking sites more efficiently. We also booked an online accounting course so I can learn how to do our taxes for next year in a less stressful fashion than we usually do. Along with new designs and Christmas plans we organised and promoted our stationery sale which took place last weekend and went great (thank you to everyone who placed an order!). Anyway, I should stop now or this will turn into an essay. Hope you enjoyed the first blog of the new regular weekly edition. See you next Monday!

August Catch Up: Our New Home

On the first of August we moved from Aberdeen (the city where I was born and from my family home) to teeny tiny Falkand in Fife. It's been nearly a month and we've been busy decorating, unpacking and generally trying to settle into the cottage; only now do we feel we're properly back to work and getting into a bit of a routine! I have been feeling homesick but have come to realise the space means more quality time will be spent with family and we're not that far anyway - it only feels far because I can't drive! I thought it would be nice to show those of you who don't know the area some photographs of our new home town. It's so pretty! I'm planning some home tour blogs too as a few of you have asked and it'll be a good chance to share some of the things we've bought for our new home from indie businesses. 

Vintage Phone Découpage DIY

I've been meaning to do this blog post for absolutely ages since I did the actual project in February! I only just got around to finishing off the floral one though which is why it's been so delayed. This isn't really a proper 'how to' as my phone is by no means perfect and I'm sure there are better ways of doing this but I'll just explain what I did as I've had so many requests, especially since the phone below is the shop phone in Pebble and customers ask every day where it's from!

You will need: a vintage phone (or a modern phone in a similar style), tissue paper of some sort (I used a pack of 2 sheets of branded Decopatch paper but anything similar should do), a clear drying glue like PVA (again I used a branded Decopatch one but normal glues should work the same), a more hard wearing varnish, scissors and a paint brush

1. Make sure the phone is clean and there are no sticky bits or dust on it or the paper won't stick properly

2. Cut your patterned paper into small pieces, you'll need some thin strips as well as lots of squares to get into the nooks and crannies!

3. Glue them on! Paint glue straight onto the phone surface, pop a bit of paper on then more glue on top to smooth it out. You might need to cut some into funny shapes especially around the dialler. Cover the whole phone (or the bits you want covered).

4. Repeat step 3 to make a 2nd layer. Make sure there aren't any gaps and it's all smoothed out.

5. On my pink floral phone I left some bits uncovered as I wanted to paint them pink. I used an Autentico chalk paint and painted straight on and did two coats.

6. Once you're happy with the overall coverage of the decoupage paper, paint on a coat of varnish. Once that's dry you're done!

I did my pink floral phone first and I do think the one I did for my Mum below turned out a bit neater! This is the first thing I've decoupaged so I'm not great at explaining it, I hope this post has been some help though! 

If you do decide to give this a go I'd love to see how your phone turns out!

July Inspiration: Cottage Ideas

This month we're thinking lots about things to buy for the cottage so I thought it would be nice to share some of these ideas. At the moment the living room is quite neutral and grown up (when we move in I'll take a 'before' picture). There's nothing wrong with it, but it's not very me and I've always wanted an excuse to buy pretty pink shabby chic home wares. It's going to be ridiculously girly... but lots of fun!

Stag Clock - by Jaimie Brown from Pebble, Aberdeen - £30

Wallpaper - Freya from Jane Clayton & Company - £30.40 per roll

Sofa Bed - Friheten (with handy storage) from Ikea - £445

Rug - by Mercedes from Society6 - $79 (approx £65 inc P&P)

Fairy Lights - Nyla Rose - £15

Glass Dish - Mollie & Fred - £19.99

House Lantern - on sale Bombay Duck - £3.75

Cushion Cover - by Heavenly Ideas on eBay - £3

We've already bought most of the small things and a few other bits and pieces which aren't in this image including some gorgeous chairs for the dining corner and our upcycled piano stool, both by The Alabaster Box. You can see more on our Pinterest.