by Carla Louise | Feb 7, 2013 | Photography |
The last few weeks in Instagram highlights – L-R tassels in progress, colourful table settings and ballet in the air at work; frosted spider web, delicious mango sorbet, first batch of eBay parcels from my pre-move clear out.
Happy things include 15 Queen Street and discovering the amazing creatives in my area | planning and prepping for a collaborative photoshoot with Contrariety Rose | development of Ink Drops Boxes | various happy-making side projects | fabulous Free Range Humans (the people and the book) | finding a new home | Hotel Chocolat caramel hot chocolate | bumping into Poppy’s old owner on a roundabout in a snowstorm | resurrecting the Ducks on Tour and finding original Frankie and Freddie pictures
And I have Thursday and Friday off work for the shoot 🙂
by Carla Louise | Nov 26, 2012 | Creating, Memories, Personal Development, Photography |
With stock in the ever-fabulous Tea & Sympathy in Colchester, soon to be in the gorgeous Make, Do and Mend in Chelmsford, supplying goodies for a friend’s daughter’s pop up college shop and four fairs starting Wednesday evening, it has been a little manic here at Ducking Fabulous HQ for the last couple of weeks.
Some of my printed domino necklaces in progress – I’m very excited about this batch!
I’ve also been working hard on Ink Drops Boxes with Annastasia from Midorigreen, which has been lovely, and punctuated by hilarious Skype chats involving unintentional Lucozade highs. If you love all things handwritten, pop over and see the site and our blog, and if you’re struggling for presents, why not have a look at the shop – a surprise box of beautiful stationery might be the answer!
Christmas preparations are also starting – this weekend I will be at the Betty Blue Eyes vintage and handmade fair in Leigh-on-Sea (and visiting two lovely friends who live in the area at the same time) on Saturday, and at Mum & Dad’s sorting out Christmas trees and decorations on Sunday… they have bought a new tree for their new, higher-ceilinged abode, and I get the old one, which will fit beautifully into my flat… somewhere. I’m excited for sorting through decorations, most of ours have stories – will try and post about some of them nearer the time.
Right now I am mostly revelling in the incredible feeling of being surrounded by likeminded people and full of inspiration… it’s a feeling like no other!
Other things that have made me happy this week…
A rainbow on my way to work | Househunting | Tentative plans to borrow a greyhound | Dinner and Christmas decoration making at Mimi’s | A fabulous night with family for my aunt’s 40th birthday | puppy cuddles | the Free Range Festival | a festive Saturday in London with some of my uni girls | chocolate muffins | stories of my parents’ lives and travels before I arrived | starting on the overhaul of this site | getting my boudoir shoot photographs back | tassel making workshop and learning to twirl – the best Thursday evening I’ve had for ages! | Contrariety Rose’s mini-boutique in Creative Crafts in Reading | roof-down driving on a Tuesday evening | impromptu dinner and giggles with my parents | fairy lights | stocking up on Lush’s amazing seasonal soap | treating myself to a couple of books I’ve wanted for a while | MAC’s lip primer
So an all round fabulous couple of weeks! I am trying very hard to resume regular, twice a week posting – watch this space 🙂
by Carla Louise | Nov 18, 2012 | Photography |
It’s been a busy, inspiring, emotional and altogether manic week… I’m still so happy I can’t quite believe it! In lieu of one of my usual length Sunday night posts, as I am still mulling over many ideas and plans in my mind, here are some pics from a lunchtime wander through campus earlier in the week. As if I work somewhere so beautiful!!
by Carla Louise | Nov 11, 2012 | Food & Baking, Memories, Personal Development, Photography |
As a completely fabulous, proper weekend draws to a close, I’m once again pensive. In a good way. For the first time in I genuinely can’t remember how long, I am excited for Monday. The first week of the new job mostly involved meeting people, familiarising myself with the uni’s website and eating cake. But I am looking forward to being there, to the challenge of the first tasks I have, of getting to know my (perfectly lovely!) new colleagues, of discovering the campus and the surrounding areas, of spending the evenings of this week eating good food and making stock for fairs and the fabulous Tea & Sympathy boutique.
This weekend has comprised seeing the Ruby Slippers at the V&A, eating a ridiculous amount of food, catching up with fabulous friends, catching up with fabulous family and walking around in a state of wonder that I can be this happy in normal, everyday life. Read on for more…
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by Carla Louise | Nov 4, 2012 | Memories, Photography |
My final day in London was 26th October. I was rather tearful and overwhelmed, having been entirely unexpectedly presented with a lovely card, a vintage mannequin (they know me well) and THE BIGGEST KIT KAT IN THE WORLD (you think I’m joking… look at it!! Was very touched that my director had bid on it in a charity auction for me.)
You can see the mannequin, now named Delilah, in the background of an Ink Drops promo pic here…
and the KitKat here, all three kilos of it, and better photos coming soon. My plan is to photograph it properly and then take it home for Christmas so the kids can help me eat it. With a hammer. It would be a shame not to eat it!
Caroline helped me carry all my stuff to St Paul’s station, and then I hopped on a tube, hopped on a train for the final time and headed home to shower, collect Poppy and drive up to Nottingham. Rob had promised to have celebratory cocktails at the ready, though the fact that I didn’t get there till twenty to one in the morning scuppered my plans to drink lots, lol!
On Saturday we popped to town and accidentally helped break a Guiness World Record (for the most people doing a science experiment at the same time – slime and rockets, what’s not to love?!), experimented with Shakeaway and tried not to buy the whole of Lakeland, and then went home to celebrate some more by cooking ridiculous amounts of food…
Recipes and the beginnings of chicken & tarragon pie…
We might have cheated a tiny bit with the pastry but doing a good job of pretending to be proud, no?!
Finished pie!! It was AMAZING.
(yes, extra big pic, I was proud of the pie)
And I wanted to test my new spoons mould from Lakeland… with chocolate orange…
Never miss an opportunity to pose like an idiot, me…
And just in case you’re interested, this is what four chocolate spoons look like when I’ve accidentally eaten the one I was posing with. (I’m actually quite excited about the concept of doing these in marbled chocolate to go with dessert for dinner parties…) The chocolate orange stays softer once it’s been melted and mixed, so they were very dangerously moreish pleasant when set.
It was gloriously relaxing and a lovely way to mark the end of my London adventures and start my new life… and I finished it by meeting Anna in Loughborough for dinner, and Dad unexpectedly joined us for a drink too, to break his journey.
All round lovely 😀
by Carla Louise | Sep 8, 2012 | Collecting, Creating, Photography, Thrifting |
EDIT 23/11/20 – I’m getting fairly regular requests for the manual for this machine – I’m so sorry, I gave it to a friend when I moved house in 2015 so don’t have the machine or the manual any more 🙁
Quite some time ago, I broke the little portable sewing machine my Gran gave me. The tension has gone, and when I took it in to be fixed they told me, gently but firmly, that it would be significantly cheaper to buy a new one.
So I have existed without one till now – not critical as I plan a lot of sewing and rarely get round to actually doing it, and have been able to beg, steal or borrow machines to use when I’ve needed to make things like the parrot costume.
However, lovely Kim at work gave me one quite a while ago, and only its weight and bulk stopped me from bringing it home till now. One very long day, a sturdy suitcase and a few pulled muscles later, and here she is, installed in my studio… isn’t she gorgeous?
Joining my Singer and my Jones (meep, that means I now officially have a collection of vintage sewing machines), but superior in that she has an ELECTRIC PEDAL… she’s very heavy, but threaded up and whizzed through the test piece very smoothly. I have bobbins that fit her, so will get some new needles tomorrow and we’re off!
Here’s to a long and happy relationship!
xx
PS Pretty sure Kimmy doesn’t read my blog – but if you do, a million thank yous, I’m in love!
by Carla Louise | Aug 4, 2012 | Acquired, Photography |
Any of you who are regular readers, or who follow me on Twitter or Facebook, will know I rarely have a day to myself without commitments, travel and madness. Yet today was exactly that. And it was heavenly.
I spent the morning researching properties for the new incarnation of Project Pin Up – having discovered that this one, which I popped out to see and photograph briefly on Thursday evening, has been sold and had planning permission granted to turn it into houses. Clearly I don’t have the resources to buy something like this, but a lease may be possible with a proper business plan and some angel or VC investment. It’s a pipe dream, but it’s making me happy.
I had an impromptu brunch with Janine to plan her upcoming 30th birthday party, followed by taking shelter in the garden centre next door when the heavens opened (convenient, no?!) As a result I came home with these, which don’t count as 100 days lapses, because Poppy is desperate for an air freshener, and you can never have too many notelets 🙂 (please excuse shocking photo – the thing in the front is a pack of Yankee Candle car air fresheners, in Macintosh, my favourite crisp apple scent).
Came home and had a cup of Ceylon tea (I am rapidly growing very fond of it, especially taken from a teapot, with cake)
Spent the afternoon working on a couple of PDFs for PPU’s soon-to-be-launched new website and download centre, and popped to town to look at the empty, derelict and up-for-sale old Odeon. It’s 1930s Art Deco, beautiful building and so sad that it’s been empty and unloved for so long. It also has a £1.5m price tag, and is too big and the wrong shape for what I’d like to do with it. But worth looking at from the outside anyway. I hope someone converts it soon… it’s going to crumble otherwise.
May have accidentally topped up my fancy dress box in Accessorize’s ridiculous sale – each of these was £1.50…
And picked up the little bird earrings for me, and the ice skate for a dear friend of mine who I don’t see enough and who I’m almost certain doesn’t read my blog!
And now? It’s only half past seven, so I shall make dinner, work some more on the websites I’m currently building, and perhaps later curl up with a book and another cup of tea. Tomorrow I have the day to myself until 4pm, when I’m off to help Mum & Dad with some computer bits in the new flat and have dinner with them there 🙂
I hope you’ve all had equally gorgeous Saturdays – I’m resolving to have more like today!
by Carla Louise | Jul 31, 2012 | Memories, Photography |
A highlight of my weekend was watching the London 2012 Olympic opening ceremony – I didn’t intend to stay awake for all of it, but it was so spellbinding I did… and I was, am, so proud to be British. Much more than usual – Danny Boyle triumphed! The description of it as a “love letter to his homeland” struck quite a chord – it was breathtakingly beautiful. And all the engineers I know got ridiculously excited about the cauldron.
I noticed the reflection of the TV in my “HOME” embroidery – and thought it was slightly more interesting than just photographing my TV screen. So here are a few shots from the ceremony.
It transpired that two people I know, an old friend and the daughter of a friend, were part of the ceremony – while watching and tweeting I discovered people I follow were involved. It was fabulous. Let’s hope we now get some medals to go with the breathtaking ceremonial pomp 🙂
by Carla Louise | Jul 30, 2012 | Memories, Photography |
Last week my weekend started on Thursday really – I arrived in London at what felt like silly o’clock, ready to battle the crowds to watch the Olympic torch. Except there weren’t any crowds, because I was too early! I had the privilege of watching from the top balcony of this gorgeous building, next door to St Paul’s Cathedral, with Bucks Fizz and pain au chocolat, at the invitation of my friend Caroline who lives there –
People thronging the street, waiting for the torch to arrive –
Party buses!
Slightly blurry, but I was very excited to see a girl on skates in the procession. White quads, no less – squee!
Torch holder approaches… 
And lights the flame of the waiting holder, who then started to run and was quickly out of sight …
It was surprisingly emotional to watch, and certainly kick started my excitement for the Olympics, which had up to then been rather lacklustre!
by Carla Louise | Jun 4, 2012 | Creating, Personal Development, Photography |
Rediscovering my pointe shoes…
Makeup trial for the wedding (done by me) – this is look one, neutral eyes with sheer-ish red lips. Shocking phone photo and my glasses obscure my eyelids, I know. More of these to come before the actual wedding. Skin’s looking clearer though – Nars illuminator is magical stuff!
Challenging myself to sew something for the Popular Crafts Union Jack swap… here’s my finished needle book 🙂 Will be posted with a treat and a cross stitched card!
Munching the cake I bought for a friend’s BBQ that was abandoned due to rain. I suspect the diet will be back on when I’m back at work, I’m maintaining weight but there’s so much yummy food involved in this week… lol! These cakes, stocked in our local Wyevale (Colchester Stanway and Braintree) are my favourite fallbacks if I don’t have time to bake, they taste homemade!
Sorting bookshelves and installing a ballet barre *cough perfect height clothes rail cough* in my living room – if I’m going to be ready for this burlesque cabaret in October, I need to strengthen my long-neglected dance muscles and improve my flexibility. Removing my glove with my foot is, as expected, somewhat trickier than it looks on stage! My intention is to try to do 10-15 mins of stretches and barre work each day even if I manage no other exercise. Combined with burlesque each week and hopefully cycling when my bike eventually arrives, plus skating which I do whenever I can but usually once a week, I should be trimmer, fitter and more flexible in no time. Yeah. I live in hope. But I’ll at least enjoy myself in the process!
Also managed to paint my toenails (my feet are not fit for photographing so here are the colours I used) and ogling the Pashley Poppy on the front of this month’s Homes and Antiques. Cannot WAIT for mine (it’s the blue, rather than the pink, version) to arrive – hopefully in a little over a month. Squee!
Footnote: I’m aware that wearing pointe shoes while not a trained dancer can damage your feet; I’m also aware mine should have ribbons attached for support. They’re mostly decorative and I intend to wear them for a photoshoot. I doubt I will ever again dance that level of ballet!
by Carla Louise | Apr 1, 2012 | Photography |
Aren’t they gorgeous? 😀
by Carla Louise | Feb 12, 2012 | Adventures, Memories, Photography |
