Saffrons Blog

Happy new Year, I hope that 2011 is an exciting year for everyone. 2010 was a wonderful year and I'm very grateful for what I've achieved and received.

I'd like to start the new year by setting goals and I try to keep them realistic and attainable. My daughter starts school in four weeks, which means that I will have 5 short days instead of three. I will be part time no more and I'm brimming with creative ideas such as...

• We will be introducing three wonderful fabric ranges in two colourways arriving over the next few months. And some new softies...woof! Can't wait!
• I will design three more ranges by April, for which I have a few ideas and sketches already.
• I have plans to go to two more trade shows. Still not sure if I will attend the Sydney quilt show in June.
• I am making plans to start licensing my designs.
• I am thinking surface design, paper, wall paper.
• My good friend and I have plans for creating a new home-ware business that will be organic and beautiful. Still in the planning phase though.
• I would love to finish the children's illustration book I started last year.
• I have an urge to create a range of beautiful silk scarves.
• I also feel some paintings coming along.
• Visit an overseas fabric show, maybe Birmingham?

Then on a personal note I am starting the year with a cleansing Bikram yoga challenge and will reward myself after each class with a swim in the beautiful ocean that is at my doorstep; I will be catching those waves for sure.
And this year I'm going to say yes to any social opportunity that will come my way in the hope to meet more like minded and inspiring people to share ideas and experiences.

And laugh a lot!


Well these are a few of my goals for 2011. How about you?



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I had a swim and a long walk and received some great gifts. Inspirational books were top of my list this year. I tried very hard to buy only hand made items. Also crafty items to make with my daughter during the holidays. We've all had new beaded bracelets made by her today. Still got some papermaché puppies to paint.




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I can very clearly remember being in this end-of-year thought space last year. However, recapping the past twelve months this time is easier as the year went by so quickly and so much happened. Things that come to my mind quickly from these past twelve months are the two wholesale trade shows. Meeting so many people at these shows was very inspiring for me.

I have really worked a lot this year, putting in hours and hours designing another three ranges, which will be coming out in the first few months of the new year.

Also it has been exciting getting stuck into facebook and seeing what people are creating with my fabrics and having instant feedback and conversations with you. Without facebook or my blog it would be very difficult to touch base with like minded people.

Being a grown up I think it is important to share the sadness as well. On  personal note, I lost both my grandparents this year. My husband recovered from a motor cycle accident. My mother had two long stints in hospital. Patrick's mum is loosing her eyesight. I shared grief with people who lost loved ones, a life long partner and a new born child. So sad. So especially to you I send you my love.

Happily my sister had her second baby, a girl who is just amazing.

My daughter turned five, she lost two front teeth, she had her finger sewn back on in Perth after she almost chopped it off. She starts school soon, which I know she is ready for but I am still overwhelmed. My little one with all those children. Yes tears were shed this year (just last week I cried all the way through my daughter's ballet recital. Not just at my daughter but at all the kids).

But all in all it was a happy year for me. Very happy.

I put together a few pictures, which I think capture some highlights of this year. There were many magical moments and these are but a few.



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The new Beetle Bugs have arrived. We have put the fabrics in our shop for you to enjoy (go on, you know you want them in your stash). If you don't know about the Beetle bugs you can read about the design process in a previous blog post here.

Oma or Daphny, Patrick's Mum from Holland, offered to make a small quilt, she needed to keep her fingers busy while Sequoia was still at preschool and she had a bit of time to stitch. Though that is over now. Sequoia is officially on school holidays finishing her two years at pre-school. Yep tears were shed.

I laugh at Daphny as— like a true quilter—there was no hesitation in cutting into the Beetle Bug fabrics. So many times I get emails from people admitting they can't cut into fabrics they love. Daphny has done that too many times. Today she simply made sure the fabric had a straight edge and cut a 10cm strip of each of the six fabrics straight off the bolt. Schnipp schnapp.



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Oma and Opa arrived safely form freezing Europe. Opa said when he woke up the first morning he saw blue sky and roses and thought he was in heaven! I guess he is...
He also commented it was the first time he has had warm hands in six months. Oma is on the deck stitching my new Beetle Bugs into something magnificent starting with 10cm blocks. She is also the kitchen fairy cleaning up after me. I get to cook and feed people and she makes the kitchen shine. I like this deal, she can stay! She is also making desserts.
YUM, she brought some great Dutch recipes, which she used to make a Christmas slice for Sequoia's school party and not a piece was left over. I am a bit in awe of her as she is the mums of all mums.


We have also started decorating the inside of the house, inspired by Oma's amazing advents calender she brought with her. Sure to be a family heirloom.






Oma also created the Christmas placemats for the table this year. So perfectly pieced.

The heat is not really getting her in the Christmas mood though. So I better start working on that! Any ideas? We went to see Santa in the air conditioning for a start.


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The 1st of December means Christmas is so close. So far I have decorated the garden with solar powered lights, which are still coming on despite the torrential rain and frustrating lack of sunshine (washing is piled high). The lights are light sensitive too so I don't need to worry about turning them on once it is dark! I get a lovely surprise every time the fairy lights start twinkling. Sequoia woke up at 11pm last night and wandering about looking at them thought to be in a dream. All she could say was "WOW".  So sweet to see her so blissed out.

We thought we might decorate the tree together as a family on Sunday night. I am thinking purple tree this year. Oma and I can craft out little heart decorations out of—you guessed it—fabric! Stars, love hearts, angels...

Free Christmas card design

I thought you might need a Christmas card or two to send out, you know give to your friend. Or you could post it to yourself, which we all have done at least once in our lives signed "secret admirer", added a bunch of delivered roses as well! Getting off track.

So I designed a card for you downloadable here for free. All you need do is print it out on 8x10" photo paper and stick it on a blank card  (double sided tape would work well) . You can also shrink it down to make labels for your Christmas presents. Please feel free to add it to your blog but I would be grateful if you link it from my site, please.

5 paper designs for $5.00

I do love wrapping and scrapbooking paper so I have designed a great bunch of papers in the festive spirit for Christmas using all my favourite colours. Bright, bold and cheerful.



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I really love it when I get a gift that shows that someone thought about me. Thought about my likes, my values, my aesthetics. They asked themselves "will she like this?"
My good friend Kirstin always says I am the easiest person to buy for while I find it easier to buy for her than myself. So yes, you do have to know a person.

So it is a special day when I receive a gift that I am so totally happy with. In this case it was Toni who gave me her book Make it Perfect at the end of the Australian Quilt Market, she  even signed my copy which I truly treasure. And  gave me some great jewelery that I cannot take off. Lucky me!

Toni's book is full of patterns to make into gorgeous things. It's the result of many late nights making patterns and then sewing them up. Organizing her team of testers to construct and make corrections. Toni is one great lady, she gave me some great business ideas and is also very encouraging towards my own creativity.

You can buy Toni's book here.

The first thing I want to make is the slippers when the Beetle Bugs will be here next week and I'll make a pair from the Beetle Wings; yippee!

Thanks for a great gift Toni, it is really appreciated.





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The Australian Quilt Market was held over the weekend as you may know. While I was waiting for three hours for my flight to leave on Sunday evening, which actually went really quickly, I wrote this blog post recapping a very busy 3 days.

I had a ball flying to Melbourne and arrived mid Friday morning. The Skybus took me to the city and from there to our apartment. I dropped off my tiny bag, which was mostly taken up by the quilt I had just finished and walked the 5 blocks to the Melbourne Exhibition center.

Once there Jim, Kathryn and myself set up the stand. Kathy had a clear idea of how it was to look and so we stapled it all together in a couple of hours. Up the ladder Jim called out about 100 times "is is good here?" to which we replied  "YES!"


Once the stand was tweaked to our liking I headed out to have a quick look of Melbourne before Meeting Toni Coward of Make it Perfect for dinner. We found a great restaurant and both ate delicious Gnocchi and it will be hard to risk the memory of this deliciousness by eating it again. Then I took the free tram around the city where I was flooded with memories of Uni and the 4 years I had partied in Melbourne some time ago.

On Saturday I woke up at 3am wishing for the day to start. With a 5.30 start I got to the exhibition building early to watch some of the "show and tells" and I am so going to do one next year.


Over the 2 days we had so many people visit our booth, which is always a complement. We found many new customers while our existing customers reordered stock and bought my new ranges. PHEW!

It really is so exciting to sell my fabrics! We now have a couple of New Zealand shops as well as stockists in the Northern Territory, Adelaide, and a few shops in Melbourne and beautiful Tasmania.
All our customers are women, which is so inspiring to me. Meeting successful business women really got me asking many questions and I discovered and learned a lot about their customers and their businesses which in turn will help me with my designing. I also met fellow bloggers and people who make amazing things with my fabrics from bed linen to bags, softies, patterns, quilts, you name it! Ohh so much did I chat.

On Saturday night we four, being Kate Conklin, Bec Johnson and Toni Coward, visited St Kilda for a meal and to capture the vibe of Melbourne. What fun to be around such amazing women. The three of them chatted until after 2am, which was wildly impressive considering Kate and Bec left at 3am from NSW that morning.


I just took the 70 or so photographs from the last three days off my camera. Most of which I asked Jim to take. Thanks Jim your a star so are you Kathryn. I have uploaded some of the photo's to Flickr - most are out of focus and a bit under exposed as it was a bit dark inside but by all means have  a look here.


Thanks to all of you who I chatted to over the last three days. I hope my fabric sells well in your shops.

If you would like me to blog about your business then please send me an email. In that way we can all learn and help each other.

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