Swirly Designs by Lianne & Paul

Looking back and planning ahead

2012-01-02T13:33:00.001-05:00

Happy New Year everyone!
We have finally recovered from another crazy good Christmas season. We hope everyone enjoyed giving and getting their new Swirly Designs this year.
The week between Christmas and New Years is our down time where we try to do very little (which seems never to be the case). We spent it cleaning and organizing the studio, some bookkeeping and making goals for 2012, personal and business related.

While making the goals for the 2012 we found us looking back at what Swirly has accomplished in 2011 and we thought we would share a few highlights. And also share our hopes for the New Year.

Our Studio...
was profiled in Studios magazine, which was a big thrill for us. Lianne especially enjoyed this because it was the perfect excuse she needed to tackle the studio closet and make it over. (you can sneak a peek at the closet at the bottom of this post. (Maybe later this year we will do a whole post on the studio closet). In 2012 we are actually gathering more shots of the studio for another profile that will be coming out this Spring.

Our Collections...
Starting last year off with a clean and organized studio, we were able to free our minds and create A LOT! This lead to a record 6 holiday collection for us. New additions were our Patriotic Collection as well as a mini Thanksgiving treat. In 2012 we hope to continue creating new and fun designs for 2012. You can be sure that we will be adding our mini's into each launch. Everyone really seemed to enjoy the mini winter wonderland collection we had online as well as at the two craft shows we did.

Promotion...
was big for us in 2011 not just for our studio but for us as well. Swirly was profiled in Christmas Ideas magazine, Celebrate 365 magazine, Simply the Sweet life eZine, plus an artist Sketchbook Stories interview. In 2012 we are hoping to continue this run. We are always very excited to be chosen to have our work profiled and it really helps us get our ornaments and name to a larger audience. But we must admit, out of everything we do for the business, this is by far the hardest and most time consuming task. With the press we got this year there were months of planning, researching companies submission deadlines, coming up with new project ideas to meet their deadlines, emails and waiting. Then racing to photograph and writing copy. So when it does work out you feel all that crazy work you did all year was not for nothing and the other half dozen or so non responses don't seem to matter that much any more (at least that what's we keep saying to ourselves... who are we kidding it matters!)

Social Media...
Facebook was a nice surprise for us this year. Not only for promoting Swirly Designs but also in connecting with our customers. We loved sharing our thoughts and work in progress to our wall. We have a nice following of over 700+ likes in 2011 (our goal this year to reach 7,000 likes ha ha:) We also forged a nice working collaboration with Polyform Products, the company that makes all the clay we use for our ornaments. Together, we created three seasonal how-to projects for their website: Halloween, Thanksgiving and Christmas. In 2012 we agreed to create 5 more projects through out the year. The first one being a Valentine’s project. Keep an eye out for that!

As we are writing this and reflecting on all that happened in 2011 for Swirly Designs it was a pretty good year after all and it's going to be a challenge to top it in 2012...but we are really going to try and hopefully you all will come along for the ride.

We always remind ourselves, as we are designing new collections, how lucky we are to have such wonderful support from all of you!

Happy New Year!
~Lianne & Paul

Have a Swirly Christmas!

2011-12-23T20:28:00.003-05:00

A Peek Inside Our Swirly Studio

2011-12-23T00:01:00.001-05:00

Do you want to know the best way to clean your studio or craft room?
Have it profiled in magazine about Studios! As excited as we were to have our studio in the pages of the new winter 2011 issue of Cloth Paper scissors studios magazine our mood went from cheers to fear really quick! How on earth were we ever going to clean and organize our studio plus photograph it right in the middle of designing our fall collection. It's still a big blur but we did it and the story came out great.

In the article, we share how we transformed one of our rooms in our 150 year old house, into a winter wonderland workshop where we create our Swirly Designs all year long. Also how we work together in the space and some of our favorite storage pieces we have for our materials.

Be sure to check out the issue next time you are out and about at your bookstore or craft store.

click image to see larger

*** What didn't make it into the issue is how we reworked our studio closet from just a place to store boxes of materials, to creating almost an extra room where everything has it's place now. We had a local builder come in and help us design a closet that works for our needs. He did a great job listening to what we wanted and the craftsmanship is top notch!

click image to see larger

Our Christmas Collection Close Up

2011-12-22T11:56:00.000-05:00

We take lots of photos of our designs when we are ready to launch any new collection and usually we'll post some beauty shots of our designs on the blog so you can really see the detail in our ornaments that you might not normally see on the website.

Because of the quick selling of this years collection, we didn't get a chance to post these images, but they are just too nice not to share. So here is some eye candy for you...

Swirly Made the Cover!

2011-12-21T00:01:00.000-05:00

We're sure you must have seen this issue at your supermarket or local bookstores already, it has been out for months now.

Well, if you look closely (you might even have to squint a bit) you might notice 4 of our swirly handmade ornaments adorning the tree in the photo. Hey we'll take that! Imagine, our little handmade ornaments on a cover of a big national magazine. Hooray for us!

We got a call back in June from the editor asking us if we could create cookie-like clay ornaments for this creative how-to Christmas Ideas magazine. We haven't designed cookie ornaments before, but were up for the challenge.

We submitted 25 different designs (above) which we created over a weekend. We photographed them and emailed them to the editor. They choose 4 designs they liked best for use in the issue. We shipped them the ornaments along with the step-by-step instructions.

And this is what graced the pages the story is titled Small Spaces that Sparkle.

All photos above are from BHG Christmas Ideas Magazine 2011

We had so much fun creating these clay cookie designs for Better Homes and Gardens Christmas Ideas publication that we picked out four of our favorite designs to be include into this years Swirly Designs 2011 ornament collection.

They came out so sweet we just wanted to eat them up!

Seasonal How-to: Christmas

2011-12-20T01:33:00.000-05:00

Here is our third (first and second) seasonal how-to we created with Polyform for their website. We designed this festive snow couple characters which we call Peace and Joy. A perfect project to create on those snowy winter days this season.

We really enjoy creating these fun how-to projects for all to try or to be inspired by.

We are happy to announce that Swirly and Polyform will be creating more seasonal how-tos in 2012 for Valentine's, Easter, Halloween, Thanksgiving and Christmas.

So be sure to stock up on your supplies now so you will be all set to be swirling along with us all year long!

Holiday season wrap up!

2011-12-19T14:59:00.001-05:00

As the Christmas craziness settles down here at the studio, we both can finally let out a BIG sigh of relief for getting all our holiday orders out in the mail and finishing up our last craft show for the season.

Both were a big success for Swirly. We had a record breaking first day sales on the Friday launch day of our Christmas collection. And the SOWA Holiday marketplace show last week had a line of people wrapped around the building waiting for hours just to shop the show.

We are so thrilled and happy people appreciate and look for handmade goods to celebrate the season. It is always nice to read the kind emails about our ornaments and being able to chat in person with everyone who stopped by our booth to see our swirly ornament designs. We thank you for that.

There was so much fun stuff we wanted to share with you this month but never had the time, so we hope to post a lot of them all this week.

Upcoming Craft show and our Holiday collection

2011-12-07T00:22:00.008-05:00

We have taken what's left of our 2011 handmade Holiday ornament collection, so we will have something for our upcoming craft show: The 8th annual SOWA Holiday Market this coming Saturday Dec 10th 11-7 pm.

If there are anything designs left from the show we will post them on Monday.

Have a wonderful week.

Here is our vendor profile that was on the SOWA website a few weeks ago. If you live around the Boston area be sure to stop by this Saturday and say hi.

Swirly in the Sweet Life

2011-12-02T21:13:00.019-05:00

Looking for some sweet holiday inspiration? Then be sure to visit Simply the Sweet Life and check out their FREE online 2011 Holiday magazine .
It's full of wonderful holiday ideas and delicious recipes and Swirly:)
Yes our new mini woodland winter set graces the pages (page 32_33) of this whimsical issue .

Image above is from Simply the Sweet Life Magazine Holiday issue

Image above is from Simply the Sweet Life Magazine Holiday issue

Check out the eZine and tell them Swirly said hi!
Below area few more close up shots we took of this
7 piece Woodland Winter set.

Mushroom, Little Owl and snowy pine cone

snowflake and candy cane

glittery star and starry night

There is still a few of these sets available so be sure to pick up yours today.
Have a Sweet and Swirly Holiday! SORRY SOLD OUT!

Christmas is coming...

2011-11-28T14:14:00.008-05:00

We have been busy putting the finishing touches on this years Christmas ornament collection and today we can finally announce that....Our new 2011 Holiday Collection will be online this Friday December 2nd. Hooray!
Here is a peek at a few of the new ornament designs you can expect to see.

See you all on Friday!
Lianne & Paul

In the Studio: Embellishing ornaments for a Craft show

2011-11-17T14:14:00.020-05:00

We have been busy busy busy working around the clock gearing up for our craft show this Saturday. There is still sooooo much more to do before Saturday. Today in the studio is all about adding embellishments to our ornaments with paper messages, 3-D paint, bells and lots and lots of GLITTER.

Enjoy the peek into the studio.

We have to set up extra tables around the studio so we can spread out the ornaments to dry.

A spool of wax twine works great for making bows and stringing paper messages on two of our new designs this season.

It's not Christmas around here without the return of Swirly the snowman. This year he is in tones of pinks and reds which was inspired by the color of candy canes.

For anyone who lives in the area and wants to check out the collection early, we will be doing our first Holiday craft show of the season, on Saturday November 19th at the Wellesley Marketplace, here in MA.

We are also going to try and Facebook book through out the day on Saturday about all the goings on of our craft show so make sure you stop by our Facebook page.

Have a good weekend!

Gobble these up before they are gone

2011-11-11T13:31:00.012-05:00

Thanks for all the nice feedback we are getting for the Turkey greeting holder we created for Polyform. We are so happy people are enjoying the how-to projects we are making.
Thanksgiving is one of our favorite holidays to decorate, even if it's only up for a few weeks.

We couldn't help ourselves and went a little over board making the samples so we thought we would offer a limited number of these little turkeys to you. Perfect for a hostess gift or to display family photos (see below) along your table. The Turkeys are all SOLD OUT!

Enjoy and have a wonderful weekend!

Let's talk some turkey!

2011-11-09T23:10:00.019-05:00

Thanksgiving Treat!
Here is another seasonal how-to project we created with Polyform for their website.
Take a little break from all that cooking preparation and try making one or all of these designs to adorn your Thanksgiving table.

Even though we called these place card holders they are so versatile and can be used for many creative holiday ideas like... for a menu card for your buffet station or dessert table to identify your pies or you can display family photos along your table runner or just as a Thanksgiving greeting.

How neat would these make for a house warming gift to celebrate the Autumn season.

You can create just one turkey or even better a whole rafter of them. Your guests will be so impressed knowing you made these yourself.

Make a half dozen of these cute acorns to showcase your kids' artwork along your table.

Make one on these Pilgrim hats for each place setting or have your guests write down all the things they are thankful for and display them.

We would love to hear your thoughts on this how-to project. You can leave a comment below or on our facebook page.

And for any of our clay-challenged followers—who we love very much ;)— we did create a few extra Turkeys holders that we will we have for sale this Friday on our website!

Gobble... Gobble... Gobble!

For the birds!

2011-11-06T18:02:00.017-05:00

We survived! What you ask, did we survive? Turning our clocks back!! I don't know about you, but this pesky little thing we do in fall is quite literally "for the birds"! We have so many clocks to make sure we turn back, it can drive us bonkers. BUT we did it and now we are settling into the days getting darker MUCH earlier. Winter is right around the corner.

And with the cold weather upon us we thought it would be a good idea to make a few bird feeders to hang in our yard to help our little birdie friends during the colder months.

We wanted to do something inexpensive and easy that our 6 year old would enjoy helping with.

The only supplies we used were a liter seltzer bottle, wooden spoons, birdseed and some twine.

We got a 4lb bag of birdseed for $1.32.

We started out by having our son mark where the holes go for the spoons. Basically the spoons act as perches for the birds and the seeds spill out onto the flat part of the spoon. We cut out the holes with a sharp pair of scissors. The spoons were cheap too...a pack of 4 for $1!

Once the spoons were put in the bottle it was time to fill 'er up! The 6 year old thought this was the best part because he got to use a scoop and a funnel! Be sure to use a pan with a lip to catch any spills!

The last step before hanging is to insert an eye screw to the cap of the bottle and then you are ready to add your twine to hang.

Now off to go find places to hang them! We made two, so we put one in the back yard and one in the front. We'll see which place draws more of a "crowd".

Here he is checking out his handy work.

And lo and behold, our first feathered friends! Here is a little chickadee munching on the seeds and the photo below shows a bluejay checking out the seeds that have fallen from the feeder. He's in the lower right of the picture.

So for a little over $3 we think that this is a great project for little ones to do. It teaches them about wildlife and responsibility. We told him that he has to make sure to check the feeders often because the birds will come to rely on them and not to let them get empty. We also are hoping the squirrels don't get to the seed before the birds do!

Hope you all have a great week!

In the Studio: Painting away...

2011-11-04T13:00:00.002-04:00

Happy November everyone!

The October snow is finally melting away but the chilly air is here to stay. But it makes for a perfect setting to be painting away in the studio on our new Holiday collection for all of you to see very soon. We are planning to launch the collection soon after Thanksgiving.
Be sure to sign up for our mailing list to get your reminder emails.

And for anyone who lives in the area and wants to check out the collection early, we will be doing the first Holiday craft show of the season, on Saturday November 19th at the Wellesley Marketplace, here in MA.

Here is a little peek into a few designs we are working on....

Here we are in the very early painting stages of a jolly St. Nick design.

These fun cookie-inspired designs are new for us. We created a few for a cover of a Holiday magazine that we will share with you next week.

Have a great weekend!

Happy Halloween

2011-10-31T14:35:00.003-04:00

Halloween greetings to our Bat~eautiful friends!
Enjoy the treats!
~Lianne & Paul

Crafting on a BUCK!

2011-10-28T14:39:00.002-04:00

Only three days left till Halloween! Oh Boy! Hard to believe that we woke up to snow today here in Massachusetts! Yikes! We are hoping it will warm up a bit before Monday or else it's will be a very chilly trick or treating stroll!

We've noticed recently a lot of these big stores (Target and Michael's) having dollar sections areas in their stores that are very popular. Having two kids we are always on the lookout for simple and easy craft projects that they can enjoy during the Holidays. Even with all the supplies we have here at the studio sometimes these quick crafts are a no brainer and a huge time saver.
He are a few that we picked up:

Do you remember doing these neat light catchers as a kid? You got all these little beads and tried to fill them in the metal frame without having them spill into the other colors. Well for a buck you can spill away! Our 6 yr old really enjoyed making his own version of these faux stained glass pieces and then watching the beads melt into the colors in the oven. These were at Micheal's for only a $1 and occupied him for an hour!

Also at Micheal's were these wood pumpkins. Perfect size to hang in your window. Our little artists had fun painting them and seeing them hung up with pride.

We not only found crafts but decor too. These Halloween themed balloons were a HUGE hit. They've been played with so much that a few had popped or got a tear in them. But we didn't mind going back to the store and picking up a few more!

And lastly, your drink will ALWAYS taste better when sipped through a skeleton straw!

Have a fun and safe Halloween everyone!

Stocking up on magazines!

2011-10-26T14:39:00.025-04:00

For us, Halloween is more then just buying and eating candy all month long. At least that is what Lianne keeps telling me. So besides picking up those yummy treats every time I head to the store I also indulge another sweet tooth of both of ours and that is the search for the NEW Halloween Magazines. You know that the fall season is coming when these magazines start arriving in the bookstores towards the end of summer.

If you visit us frequently here on the swirly blog you know our love for Holiday themed magazines and books runs deep. Here are a few past posts about our addiction here and here and what we do with all this beautiful eye candy inspirations here.

Like our little chipmunk friend who was visiting our yard earlier this week (see funny photo at top), stuffing his cheeks and stocking up for the winter season, we do the same with magazines (without the sticking them in our mouths part, that would just be weird). We gather and collect them up during these months and then when the Holiday craziness is over, like early January, we'll snuggle in a warm cozy chair and enjoy.

Here is this years new stash of goodies! It so nice to see a good size collection of new and original Halloween inspired issues each and ever year.
Our little display in this picture was something we found on the side of the road over the summer. Works perfectly to display the issues in the studio don't you think?

Women's Day Specials Halloween was one of the first Halloween issue that I picked up. The deep blue color of this cover is very striking and really jumps out on the newsstands, but I had to do a double take, because it looked eerily similar to last years issue. They must have realized the color combo worked well enough to bring it back this year.

Of course you must have heard about this great new online order only bookazine from Matthew Mead titled Autumn with Matthew Mead. If not... I would recommend checking out his site. It's full of beautiful holiday inspiration imagery. Swirly was featured in his 2010 Holiday issue.

Phyllis Hoffman Celebrate is turning into one of our new favorites. Even though it is more food focused than we would prefer, we are always so charmed by it's beauty that we can't pass it up. We did notice with this Halloween issue that they included a special trends section that profiled our fellow Halloween folk artists friend Johanna Parker.

Happy haunted reading! Be sure to stock up on these inspirational issues before they disappear!

Pumpkin painting fun

2011-10-25T09:05:00.000-04:00

Over the weekend we had a lot of fun with the pumpkins we've gathered this fall season. Through our visits to the farm for some apple picking and visiting the local farmers market we've built up quite a nice collection of pumpkins and gourds.

We finally set aside some time to play around. We carved a few, but then decided to experiment with painting on some and these are the fun results.

Our little guy went straight for the glow-in the dark paint. Painting pumpkins is a safer alternative for the kids who might find it challenging carving with sharp tools.

We chose to paint this pumpkin with metallic teal blue paint and adding dimensional red dots.

This one was created by masking tape off areas and painting the top part black and the bottom part is painted first with white paint with added glow in the dark glitter and of course embellished with dots. Everything looks better with dots!

Boo! This is our little ghost gourd. His unique shape helped us choose what he would become.

Here is our colorful collection displayed under our tree in kitchen for all to enjoy!
Have you painted any pumpkins?

It’s Halloween Week! EEK!

2011-10-24T14:35:00.018-04:00

It's Halloween week!
Even though the studio is now decked out in full Christmas decor as we prepare for this years Christmas collection, we thought we should take a little break this week to celebrate Halloween, since it’s coming up so soon! So all week we’ll share fun little treats all to do with Halloween.

To kick things off.....

For anyone looking to do some last minute Halloween crafting projects why don't you try to make one of these little spooky guys to add to your holiday decorations.
The instruction to create the mini ghost is here and you can find the pumpkin from here. Combine the two and then insert a 20 gauge wire through your ghost into the pumpkin before you bake them.
Then after cooled print out a little message and add crepe paper fringe and glue it to top of your wire.

Just a reminder, the queen of crafts Martha has her Halloween special tonight on the Hallmark Channel. You can check out the martha blog for a sneak peak into the making of the special.

image courtesy of Martha Stewart and Hallmark Channel

Will you be watching? We sure will!

A Halloween Treat!

2011-10-06T00:38:00.024-04:00

Happy Happy Halloween!
We are so excited to share with you some spooktacular news. A few months ago we were approached by Polyform Products which is the maker of Scupley. That is the clay we have been using for over 10 years to make all our beautiful handmade designs. They asked if we would be interested in creating some seasonal how-to projects to be showcased on their official website.
Let's think for a moment....um, YES!

We felt this was a perfect match for Swirly to be able to share with everyone some really neat how-to projects using the product we loved for years. Sharing some new and different projects with everyone other then our handmade ornaments. It's a win for everyone.

So here it is..... Our first how-to project we created to celebrate the spirit of Halloween is this spooktacular haunted house Halloween Shadowbox. Created using black Premo and Sculpey glow in the dark clay.

How fun it would be to create your own version of our little haunted house and add it to your own Halloween collection. Check out the Polyform website for the complete step by step here.

Leave your comments on our blog or on our facebook page and let us know what you think of this project. Is it something you would try?

Here is a few more close up shots of this project.

Our swirly little bat swirling around the moonlight.

You can make the whole project or just pieces of it. How cool would your table look with a display of mini glow in the dark pumpkins all around.

Adding a battery operated tea light behind your house so you can admire the details during the day....

and watch it glow at night. It's doesn't get any better than that.
~Lianne & Paul

Our Spooktaular collection is Here!

2011-09-25T23:45:00.000-04:00

Happy Monday!
The wait is finally over ... our new Halloween and Autumn handmade ornament collection is up online for all to enjoy. Much like your trick or treat candy, make sure you get your orders in quick because these sweet little designs won't last long.

Here are some close up shots of our designs because the real beauty is in the details.
Good luck and let us know what you think of our latest designs.

Swirling in Celebrate 365 Magazine

2011-09-16T20:38:00.007-04:00

We were so thrilled to been asked to submit a few of our new Halloween ornament designs for the upcoming double issue of Celebrate 365 magazine. This issue will combine late summer with Halloween designs for everyone's enjoyment.

The two swirlies that were chosen were our Candy Corn Owl and our Sweet Little Candy Corn Witch. Both of these sweet little swirly designs are perfect to celebrate the upcoming Halloween season and will be available online on September 26th along with the rest of our new Halloween/ Autumn collection. And to order a copy of Celebrate 365 magazine check out Connie's website here.

Enjoy your weekend, When do you start decorating for Halloween?

Halloween Collection update

2011-09-11T07:55:00.001-04:00

As we add the finishing touches to this years new Halloween/Autumn ornament collection, we also have updated our homepage. So we can finally announce a launch date. Drumroll please.......

MONDAY SEPTEMBER 26th

It's official! It's in writing....So mark your calendars, program your phone reminders... whatever, but make sure you get a chance to check out this years collection of 15 new spooktacular designs.

Most of this years designs were inspired by the Halloween candy icon the candy corn. This little yummy treat and it's seasonal colors of white, orange & yellow (some cases we used brown instead of yellow) are showcased in our designs. We also have some spooky designs as well as a few Autumn/Thanksgiving pieces.

Be sure to sign up for our email list so you can be one of the first people notified when the collection is online. All our collections are limited quantities and sell out quickly and we thank all of our wonderful followers for that.

See you the 26th

Check out our Tweet little shadow box

2011-09-09T08:00:00.000-04:00

We thought we would share with you a quick little project we did this week for a friends daughters 3rd birthday gift using one of our swirly ornaments.

Our friend really liked our Swirly birds ornament we created for our Spring collection. Unfortunately we sold out of the designs before she could order one. So we told her we would create another one. By the time we got around to creating a new one, her little girls birthday was coming up. Perfect we thought, we can create a cute shadow box so she can hang it in her room all year long. It's very simple and with a few supplies you too can create this tweet little shadow box.

We picked up a simple white shadow box frame at our local craft store along with a piece of scrapbook paper, some paint, embellishments & tissue paper. Take the frame apart and set the glass aside until your done. Use the background cardboard of the frame as a template for your scrapbook paper. We used Mod Podge to glue the paper to the cardboard. Then we dry brushed with white paint over the scrapbook paper to dull down the pattern a little.

We then cut up small rectangle and square shapes out of tissue paper.

Using Mod Podge again, we glued the tissue on the top and bottom of the frame for a punch of color . Then we painted a light green wash around the front and two sides of the frame.

The shadow box came with a thin piece a paper for the frame mat. You can use that paper as a template on a piece of really nice decorative paper. We picked a metallic white glitter cardstock and embellished it with paper flowers.

The creativity is endless when decorating your frame. Just remember you want to make sure the frame compliments your artwork/ornament and not competes with it.

The frame is now complete and all that is left is hot gluing the ornament to the background. Assemble the frame and hang it on your wall!

We hope Catherine will enjoy this for years to come. Happy Birthday!
~Lianne & Paul

Back to business.

2011-08-31T07:05:00.000-04:00

What a whirl wind these last few weeks. Last week our computer crashed and we were without for close to 10 loooong days. We only had a very old laptop computer so we could monitor our emails but we couldn't access our photos, etc.

It couldn't have happened at the worst time. We were right in the middle of working on a project for a company and working on a photo shoot. Thankfully everyone was very understanding and were very patient with us.

When we finally got our computer back and up and running we were bracing ourselves for hurricane Irene. Thank goodness we were only hit with rain and a few small tree branches around our yard.

So this week we are getting back on schedule. The project is complete, the photo shoot is done, and we are working like crazy coming up with new Christmas sketches (we are soooo behind on those!!) and soon we will need to varnish, embellish and glitter our new Autumn collection coming out later next month

Speaking of Autumn.... In today's mail we got our issue of Autumn with Matthew Mead.
What are looking forward to taking a little time to explore the beauty of this magazine.
If you love seasonal magazines and want to get inspired we would highly recommend checking out Matthew's site and ordering your own issue before they are gone.

Have a good week everyone!
Lianne & Paul

Yummy!

2011-08-11T16:00:00.001-04:00

My mouth is watering here in the studio for some candy corn!
Why you ask? We're working on painting these yummy owls in candy corn colors for our new Halloween Ornament collection coming soon:)
I think a trip to the candy store is in order, what do you think?

What we are working on

2011-08-05T14:51:00.014-04:00

Happy Friday everyone! It's such a beautiful day here. Nice breeze coming through the studio window, and we're listening to some soothing music ahhhh. But really it's the calm before the storm as they say....

This will be an extra busy weekend for us here. The kids are away (Yipee!) for the weekend so we really need to work extra hard and accomplish as much as we can in a short time. The studio is full of fall ornaments waiting to be painted and tiles full of ornaments waiting to be swirled so we can can bake them. We are the thick of creating our new Halloween/Autumn 2011 collection.

We are also working with Scupley (the material we use to make our ornaments) on a fun spooky how-to project that will come out in September. So we have to make the project in many stages so we can photograph it. Hopefully we will have nice weather for the pictures sake:)

And after all that we will be transforming our studio into a winter wonderland for an upcoming photoshoot. Crazy we know, but we still wouldn't trade it for anything.

Our growing pile of new designs waiting to be sanded so we can start painting.

Our swirly turkey is making another appearance this season.

We are trying something a little different with a few of our ornaments.
Can you tell what (or should we say who?) these are going to be?

Here is a closer look. If all goes as planned you will see them in this years Halloween collection.

A Smurf-tastic find

2011-07-27T21:24:00.020-04:00

This is a slightly different type of post for us but we thought some of you with kids might enjoy it.

This week our little guy has sparked some interest in the new Smurfs movie. Any child of the 80s will remember the beloved cartoon series that featured these little blue creatures.

I thought how fun it will be to share with him the fun we had watching the Smurfs. I was able to show him a few episodes on On-Demand which he seemed to like for a 30 yr old show.

I remember when I was younger my mother would take me to the local gift shop where they had this huge display of Smurf figures in the window and I would be in awe of the variety of Smurfs they had and how hard it was to choose the one I like best.

Today I took a ride over to my parents house to search in their basement to see if I could find my old Smurf stash. Two hours later I came across this blue storage box in the far corner of the basement covered in dust and lo and behold it was my Smurf collection!

I had forgotten how MANY I had collected way back then (approx 168 figurines!) ....and that I had all the villages too. What can I say, I was a collector even back then!! I'm so glad I kept them and that I can share them with my kids today.

.

Holiday themed Smurfs! How appropriate that they are some of my favorites!

Anybody else want to fess up of their enjoyment of these tiny blue people? C'mon I know you are humming the theme song now....

Oh, and I also found a few record albums too....anybody kmow how I can explain those to the 6-year old? He was very perplexed!

-Paul

Things we LOVE! SUMMER edition

2011-07-19T15:00:00.004-04:00

I'm sure you all can relate....Remember when you were kids and how long summer days felt? Hanging at the playground and swimming at the local pool all day. The months felt like forever back then.

Now two months seems like two weeks! We can't believe we are already planning back to school shopping for the kids. Everything is going by so fast. Even though here at the studio, its warm outside and we can smell the fresh cut grass... we are thinking of the coming holidays, crafts shows and winter months ahead.

So today got us thinking about things we love about these warm SUMMER days and how we should enjoy and appreciate them more. So we created another edition of Things we LOVE! Summer edition.

• We LOVE being able to work all day without shoes. We haven't seen socks all summer:)

• We LOVE the after dinner walks with the kids even though our two year old can't decide if she wants to walk, be carried, or ride in her wagon for our strolls.

• We LOVE going to the local farmers market and picking up fresh fruit and vegetables. We had the best sugar snap peas yesterday. Yummy!

• We LOVE exploring new museums, playgrounds and trips into Boston with the kids.

• We LOVE regrouping and planning new things for our second half of the year for Swirly Designs.

• We LOVE getting emails with new and exciting opportunities.

• We LOVE that our first Patriotic ornament collection was so well received even with all the website issues we had.

• We LOVE the mindless summer tv shows like Designs Star, The Next Food Network Star, Big Brother and Rosanne's Nuts.
** Disclaimer: Lianne wants to make it clear that she doesn't love the last two shows, those are Paul's guilty pleasures ;-))

Comment and share with us some of the things you LOVE about the simple things this summer.

And remember to stop and enjoy every moment this summer!

Whooo loves ya!

2011-07-17T20:15:00.001-04:00

One of our favorite collectors Meagan, made a comment on our Facebook page a few weeks ago about how she enjoys our little Seasonal Swirly Owl ornament designs. So we thought it might be a fun post to look back at our many Swirly owl designs we created over the years.

It all started with our very first owl ornament design (above) we created back in 2008 for our Halloween collection. We knew we wanted a spooky owl in our collection, and even though our owl wasn't really spooky, the challenge was to design him in our swirly style: whimsical and unique... while keeping him recognizable as an owl. So we kept the color palette to tones of browns with big yellow glittery eyes. Then on a more recent Halloween collection we even created one batch of owls with glow in the dark eyes...super cool!

Our little Swirly Owl has been a big hit with everyone for years and now has been making appearances in our other collections. It has become one of the few series of designs we have created.

This Swirly Snow Owl is from our Holiday 2010. Sitting on top of an evergreen tree all warm and cozy with his red felt scarf.

This was a custom piece for another collector who buys a bunch of ornaments for all her employees for Christmas.

Our Valentine's Owl flew in with tones of reds & pinks celebrating the day of love with a yummy box of candies.

Our Spring owl in bloom.

.....and our most recent addition was our patriotic owl waving our flag proudly.

It was a hoot looking back at our past designs:) Since we only make a limited amount of each design we are so glad we remember to take pictures of our ornaments collections before they fly off to their new homes.

Look who stopped by the studio today

2011-07-10T14:11:00.000-04:00

We were greeted today at the studio by some feather friends... Mr. & Mrs Turkey and their two little turklets (what are baby turkeys called anyways?)!

They must have gotten wind that we were busy working on our new fall ornament collection and stopped by to check up on our progress.

We by no means live in the country or even farmland to witness this odd site. So to see these large birds just causally walking around our yard is just a little weird.

They even left us a little, well actually rather large, gift. I think they were mad that we weren't making more Thanksgiving designs. Yes, we're sorry but we had to post actual turkey poop. Gross I know!

Gotta love the turkeys! Come back in a few weeks to see the final designs.
Gobble Gobble!

Fun Fireworks

2011-07-08T23:11:00.015-04:00

Happy Fourth everyone!Hope it was a fun one. We thought we would share some of these fun shots we took of the fireworks over the 4th with the kids. They are not great shots..for some reason I couldn't get good shots this year. Honestly, I was trying to keep my terrified 2-year old from running off, she wasn't crazy about the fireworks. But the funny light effects are kinda cool.

We know we have been a little lazy with the blog lately, but we are hoping to get back in the swing of things very soon. We are now sketching away for our new Halloween/Autumn collection and we will share more on the fun ideas we come up with you soon. In the mean time you can checkout our last years collection of posts we did in July 2010 about creating a collection in 31 days.

Have a nice weekend!

What a stressful collection!

2011-06-25T09:41:00.001-04:00

What a week we had here at the studio!
We spend weeks preparing and getting ready to launch a new collection online and you can never be to sure what challenges will lie ahead. Like forgetting to add our website link to our Patriotic email that was sent out to everyone on launch day. A little stressful, but we were able to remedy that pretty quickly by resending out another email with the link. OK!
THEN around lunch time we were tweaking the website links and we accidentally deleted something on the website server. OMG!! We totally messed things up BIG TIME! Everything with this collection was missing and lost and the web designer who worked on the site was MIA. That section of the website was down for over 10 + plus hours and wasn't fully working until a few days later. We never felt so helpless and disappointed.

But on the bright side you guys are awesome and always order our Swirly ornaments as soon as they are online (5 of the 12 designs were sold out) so lots of you were able to get your orders early enough before the site crashed and our stress level rose.

We are happy to say we are finally back on track and we promise we will never delete anything again...especially in the middle of a launch.

We had so much fun creating and design this Patriotic collection we just wanted to make sure everyone was able to enjoy these designs. Here are some extra pictures of this collection.

Happy Fourth Everyone!
~ Lianne & Paul

Our Patriotic Collection is Here!

2011-06-20T09:31:00.005-04:00

We are happy to say our very first Patriotic collection is here! It's been such a whirl wind of a weekend but so worth it. We are going to regroup so enjoy our new collection and later today we will post some more beauty shots of the designs.
~Lianne & Paul

Patriotic collection Update!

2011-06-15T16:54:00.018-04:00

Hello all~
Summer days are quickly approaching and we are very excited that our very first Patriotic ornament collection is in the final stages and will finally be online this Monday June 20th for all to see. Everything was going smoothly schedule wise, and we had everything planned to have this collection ready sooner... but of course life added a few speed bumps along the way like... family colds, our little guy finishing up kindergarten, planning his 6th birthday party PLUS we had a BIG holiday project come in the studio that required all our attention for over a whole week (more on that later).

We are finally back on track and wanted to share with everyone a few quick snap shots of what you can look forward to coming this Monday.

Hope to see you there!

*Reminder: have you joined our mailing list? You can be one of the first to be informed when this (and future ones) new collection is online.

Our Sketchbook Story

2011-06-01T09:00:00.001-04:00

If you are like us and enjoy reading and seeing the thought process of how creative people create their work, then you must check out the site called: BluPenny Sketchbook Stories by artist Cindy Ann Ganaden.

Each Tuesday she profiles an artist who share a glimpse into their sketchbook and what inspires the work they create. We came across Cindy Ann's site on Twitter a few months ago and we were hooked. We must have read every sketchbook story in a night and we are happy to say that Swirly Designs is now part of this fun series.

Go and check out our Sketchbook Story here and leave a comment letting BluPenny your thoughts on our story!

Road trip to the Eric Carle Museum

2011-05-16T13:04:00.025-04:00

Over the weekend we took the kids on a little road trip to the Eric Carle Museum in Amherst, MA. Being both artists, we have been very eager to visit this museum since it opened but felt we wanted to make sure the kids were at an age where they would appreciate it and would enjoy the experience... plus handle the long 2 hour drive.

Even better, we found out this month that our little guy was learning all about Eric Carle in school. He was even creating his own "Eric Carle" artwork in school and thought this was perfect real life education for him. So we packed up the car and made the trip.

Any one who has kids, we're sure you are very familiar with his work, especially his 1969 classic The Very Hungry Caterpillar. This is a staple in our kids bedtime reading routine.

This very modern and simplistic museum was a pleasant treat.

We hit the museum on a very quiet Saturday morning which was perfect for letting the kids explore and roam without the crowds of people. The very spacious 40,000 square foot building houses three Galleries that are dedicated to exhibitions of picture book art.

One gallery is dedicated to Eric Carle's work and the two other galleries are changing exhibitions of artwork. No photography is allowed in the galleries but you can snap away everywhere else.

A favorite spot that the kids enjoyed immediately is the big Caterpillar sculpture that doubled as a bookcase. The kids had fun running around it and through it and finally sitting inside just long enough for us to snap a few pictures.

Besides the galleries, there is a library, a cafe, a store and an art studio for the kids to create and explore.

We all enjoyed the art studio where you can create fun projects with all sorts of materials. This neat magnetic board has magnets made from branch pieces and painted in fun colors.

Color coded jars lined up on a shelf like a rainbow.

There were many tables for the kids to create and make their own masterpieces.

This was a neat experience to share with the whole family and spark your inner creativity.
We left there inspired and ready to go back to the studio and play.

We are off on another adventure to explore and learn something new.

Have you been to the Eric Carle Museum in Amherst, MA? Share your thoughts on your visit!

Have a good week.

Promotion, promotion oh and more promotion

2011-05-10T17:13:00.022-04:00

Who says running your own business was easy? You’re always working, even when you don't have actual work to do. You must always be thinking ahead and planning you next move.

For us being a seasonal company, we are always struggling to stay ahead of the coming season. Which can be a little tricky being that it’s only the two of us sketching, scuplting, painting, embellishing, website updating, blogging, mailings, shipping ......we could go on on on but you get the point.

We just wrapped up our Spring collection and now we are planning on launching a summer collection, (hopefully soon), as well as start designing a new Halloween and Christmas collection.

But these last few weeks we have had PROMOTION on the brain. That's a whole business in itself. It's so important for a small studio like us to really keep promoting to get our name out there.

Here are a few things we have been doing:
Getting more into social media with Twitter and our Facebook page (come like us).
This seems to be a great way to connect with others at no cost, other than our valuable time. We have made some wonderful contacts such as Polyform Products. This is the company that makes all the clay we use for our ornaments. After connecting with us on Facebook, we are now going to be collaborating with them on a project coming this fall. More to come later.

Getting the magazines to notice little old us.
Last year we were very fortunate and blessed with the media exposure we got. Swirly was in 3 magazines and 1 online magazine (click the magazine images on the right side of the blog).

To continue to reach out to get more PR we created this 3 page brochure PDF teaser to email to editors of some of our favorite magazines in hopes to peak their interest in our company. We will let you know if anything comes out of this promotion. We will also create a series of postcards to snail mail out for each holiday season.

Here is the cover image simple yet eye catching.

Inside: We share a brief run down of who we are and
what Swirly Designs does. Quick and simple.

And we end with this page. Our feeling is pictures speak a 1000 words, so showing more images tells the story versus us explaining everything. What are your thoughts on these pages?

And finally we are sharing some of our Swirly ornaments for someone's very special birthday event happening this June. The Mary Engelbreit's Home Companion workshop a weekend of crafting that happens to fall on the craft queen’s birthday! The event is sold out but anyone who is going is sure to get a swirly treat in their goody bags.

Hopefully by doing these few extra things now, it will help with the holiday season later on this year.

What do you do to promote your business?

Have a good rest of the week!
Lianne & Paul

Happy Mommies Day!

2011-05-08T13:38:00.003-04:00

To all the mommies out there.
Smile and enjoy your day!
xo
The Swirly gang!

What do you do on Easter Eve?

2011-04-23T22:22:00.018-04:00

We craft of course!

It's the day before Easter and the weather today was just rainy and dreary. All our outside Easter activities were canceled so we decided to spend some time in the studio. Noticing all the empty egg cartons around the studio from our egg decorating we just had to think of something to do with all them and this is what we came up with.....

These petite little egg carton baskets with pipe cleaner handles....
how cute are these?

You can fill them with treats for your guests or use them
for place card holders for your Easter brunch.

They also make nice egg displays for that egg-stra special egg
you colored this week.

Our mini Swirly bunny loves her new home.

Even hang them on your Easter egg tree to greet your guest.

This basket is embellished with a glitter bunny made from
a Martha Stewart punch.

the possibilities are endless.
We want to wish all of you and your families a
most eggcellent Easter Sunday!
~Lianne & Paul

Easter eggs & crafts with the kids

2011-04-22T18:41:00.027-04:00

It's been a busy few weeks around here with school vacation and preparing for Easter, all while we are in the middle of a major reorganizing project in our studio closet (we'll post pictures of that project soon). With Easter only two days away we wanted to squeeze a few fun projects for our little ones this week.

egg decorating:
Always a fun treat and the kids love it but this really requires a lot of preparation ahead of time if you want to do the really fancy stuff so we just stuck to the basics. We had approx 5 dozen eggs - half of them boiled while the other half were blown out.

Our little guy always prefers his hands for dipping the eggs instead of the wire holders.

Our two year old got the hang of it very quick and then became very bored with the whole thing.

The white eggs turned into colored eggs very quickly!

Letting the eggs drip dry on a styrofoam piece with tooth picks works really well. We got the idea from a similar one we found on the Martha Stewart site.

Craft projects:
Today we spent the morning doing some quick craft projects. Our two and our five year old's attention span for doing craft projects is very limited these days, so the faster the project is the better.

We made paper eggs and painted them with water colors and dot markers.

This fun paper bag birds nest idea from Family Fun magazine was a perfect quick project for the kids. We spent some time outside collecting branches in the yard and glued them on a crumpled up paper bag.

it's another way to display your painted eggs.

How funny are these little bunnies! Using a white paper bag, some googly eyes, white and pink felt, stickers and pom poms (for the tail) you can make your own cute bunny puppet!

Happy Easter Crafting!!

Have you ordered your Swirlies yet?

2011-04-13T14:06:00.003-04:00

Easter is quickly approaching and the deadline to get your Easter order in for one of our handmade swirly ornaments is this Sunday April 17th. So hop to it!

Things we LOVE! EASTER edition

2011-04-12T09:00:00.000-04:00

With Easter only two weeks away the weather here is starting to get warmer and more springlike!!

We are planning a date to decorate our 4 dozen of eggs with the kids very soon!

With our Easter/Spring collection finally completed and online, we thought this would be the perfect time to share some of our favorite Easter treats we discovered this season..so we're calling it Things we LOVE! Easter edition.

We LOVE Paper
We enjoy playing with paper on our down time when we aren't using clay. Looking around the studio lately we have piles of cool scrapbook/color paper that just screams at us to create something. We created some fun paper eggs for one of our Easter trees. We added one of our Easter Greeting banner that was left over from our ornaments.

We LOVE other Crafters
Especially ones who create whimsical unique Easter designs. It's a little challenging finding interesting and different Easter designs but when we came across these fun characters from Vintage by Crystal we just had to adopt a few for our own collection. We have met Crystal at a few of the local craft shows we've been at over the years, and seeing her work in person and chatting with her you can tell she really enjoys what she does.

We LOVE Easter Decorations
Every holiday we always visit and checkout all the stores holiday merchandise to see what's new out there. The store we think that caters to seasonal/Holiday decor really well is HomeGoods . It is constantly changing merchandise and bringing in different items for every season. The trick is that every store is a little different so we will end up hitting 4 different HG stores to find something. This season we found this wooden Happy Easter sign and a bunny carrying a little bunny figurine that is white flocked glittered.

We LOVE Color
A Springtime color palette of pale blues, greens, pinks and yellows how always makes us smile. We purchased a new shelf unit for the studio for that exact reason! We wanted to display our paints in color groups to admire and get inspiration from.

We LOVE mini Trees
This is where we might be considered hoarders. But we can't resist a mini tree! So whenever we come across a new or unusual tree we can't help ourselves. Just looking around the studio right now we have 19 trees. Anyway, our latest find is a small white tree we found at Target for only $2.50. How could we have NOT picked one up...liked it so much we bought 2!
And it's not everyday you come across a purple glitter tree.

How fun is this little Lindts chocolate gold bunny car!

We LOVE Candy
What's Easter without some yummy candy. How cool are these vintage inspired foil bunnies look all decked out in their bunny suits. We make a special trip to our local chocolate shope each year to pick up these little guys based on the way theylook alone...the good thing is they taste as good as they look. Presentation is everything!

We LOVE Magazines
We have mentioned in many posts before how much we adore holiday magazines and even though we only came across a small handful this year, the ones we did find didn't disappoint. Each magazine if choc full of fun inspiring Easter and spring projects. If you enjoy ornaments as much as we do you might want to check out Celebrate 365 which is a quarterly magazine about about holiday ornaments. If you know of any other magazines we should check out email us and let us know.

We LOVE Easter Crafts
Papier mache eggs are a must for any craft studio. There so many things you can do with them! You can glitter, decoupage or paint them. You can create an Easter scene inside them. The ideas are endless. The dark paper eggs are from D. Blumchen & Company and the cream color are from Martha crafts which we can't seem to find anymore. Also from Martha crafts are the bunny paper punches.

We LOVE Easter Specials
If there is a show about Easter... were watching. It could be a food special or a classic old school kids special. We love it! So you can guess how egg-cited we were when we found out that this year we get to see two new specials to enjoy. A new Easter movie HOP and a new Martha Stewart eggcellent Easter special on the Hallmark channel this Sunday April 17th

Would you like to add to our list? Please Share your favorite thoughts of the Springtime season.
Happy Easter Everyone!

** Everything we mention above is Swirly Designs personal opinions; we were not paid or asked to promote any of these items/products we talked about.

Hippity Hop Hooray!

2011-04-07T00:25:00.011-04:00

Your ornaments were shipped today!!

Happy Thursday everyone! It's always crazy after we launch a collection online.
Yesterday was the first of many trips we will be taking to the post office in the next few weeks. This picture shows only part of Monday's orders. More went out today.

So for everyone who placed an order, we thank you again and you should be receiving them from your local Easter bunny real soon. For anyone who is still thinking about it, there is still time to get your orders in check out here to see what few are still available.

More Easter & Springtime beauty shots

2011-04-04T14:37:00.018-04:00

Well we managed to get a few hours of sleep before waking up to orders coming in. We are so happy with the turn out for this years Easter & Springtime collection.

This is truly one of our favorite holidays. If you happen to have stopped by and checked out our designs, we would love to hear your thoughts! Please leave a comment on our blog or on our facebook page.

Here are some more beauty shots of the collection that didn't make it on website. We took approx 500+ shots of the ornaments for the website which is rather extreme, but because the collection is limited and a lot of the designs sell out we really need to document the images before they leave the studio for their new homes. Enjoy and thanks again to all you loyal early birds... you started ordering in the wee hours of the morning! We're happy to send our Swirly Designs off to new homes!

Hippitty Hop ornament

Swirly Bunny

Spring Bloom

Spring Hoot!

Easter Sweets

Home of Mr. Rabbit

Easter Greetings Egg Topiary

Our Easter & Springtime Collection has Hatched!

2011-04-04T02:18:00.005-04:00

It's super late here at the studio it's around 2:30 am. But after a very long weekend and weeks of work on this collection we are soooo happy to be able to say our New 2011 Easter & Springtime ornament collection has hatched and is up for all to see. Later today we will upload some more beauty shots of the ornaments.
So it's off to bed for us Good night...WAIT!
~ We hope you get your orders in quick because the orders are already coming in!

If you are on our mailing list this is the email announcement you got in your email earlier tonight/today.

Sneak PEEP into our Easter Ornaments

2011-04-01T14:02:00.020-04:00

Happy April Fools Day!
Joke was on us when we woke up today to find SNOW and SLUSH outside our studio windows.

We thought we were in the clear and Spring was on it's way. HA HA HA!

We were hoping to set up some photoshoots of our Easter designs outside... sooo instead we tried some shots inside and wait to see what the weather brings tomorrow.

We still have plenty to do before the collection is online this coming Monday April 4th and we hope you will stop by and check out this years collection.

If you join our mailing list you will get an email letting you know exactly when it's online.

A few people have asked what time it is online...well, depending on how quick we can update the site on Sunday the collection should be online between 12am -2 am EST Monday morning. Remember, EARLY BIRD GETS THE WORM....believe it or not, people wait up for the email and then order at 12:01!

We couldn't resist sharing more images of what we feel is an egg-cellant Easter and Spring collection. You'll have 15 Easter & Spring designs to choose from.

Have a Hopping good weekend. See you all back here on Monday.

Easter Collection Update

2011-03-28T00:30:00.001-04:00

Tweet Tweet Tweet!
We're busy little bunnies here at the studio putting the finishing touches for this years spring ornament collection. The date for this years Swirly Spring collection is Monday, April 4th

You'll find a nice collection of bunnies, chicks and flowers this year. We hope that our designs will be a welcome sign of Spring and you'll enjoy them throughout the season!

~Lianne & Paul

So make sure you join our mailing list so you will be notified when the is available online so you won't miss out.

These little bunnies are waiting for their ribbon bows and a brush of glitter before the grace your Easter basket this year.

HOP TO IT!

2011-03-11T15:16:00.000-05:00

We are EGG-erly awaiting Spring here at the studio. These last few weeks we have been bouncing around sketching away, and creating some new how-to projects and we've been trying to check out all the new Easter treats that are hitting the stores.

Easter is one of our favorite holidays to celebrate and to design for. We are EGG-cited that it's coming a little later this year, so we will have plenty of time to design a wonderful collection for your Easter/Spring festivities. Last year we missed out on a new collection because Easter came earlier than we expected and didn't plan enough time to create. So to make sure that won't happen to us again we did a little searching to find out when Easter will fall in the next few years and this is what we found:
In 2012 Easter will be on April 8th-Early!
In 2013 Easter will be on March 31st! Very early, ikes! Can you say green bunnies?

We are going have to start planning NOW for those future dates!

But back to 2011. Our new Easter/Spring collection hopefully will be online in early April so make sure you have signed up for our email list so you will be notified when the collection is online.

** Update on our sketches... they are done now on to the clay....

bunnies bunnies and more bunnies.

Just a sneak peek to get you egg-cited!

HOP HOP HOP

Oh how we LOVE gifts!

2011-03-04T13:56:00.007-05:00

Happy Friday everyone!
Today we received a package from Martha Stewart.

Why you ask? Well back in February we entered a photo contest that they were running.
Last week we were notified from MarthaStewart.com that our Valentine Garland How-to project was one of the winners of the Martha Stewart Living Handmade Valentine Photo Contest they had on their website. Yeahhhh for us!

Our how-to garland project was created with the Martha Stewart Crafts heart shape punch.

It was so exciting to open the package and see what we won. Inside was a letter on MSLO letterhea, a 12 x 12 pad of spring colors scrapbook paper and one of her Punch around the Page set.

Thanks Martha for our gifts and we look forward to crafting with our new cool products.
Have a crafty weekend everyone!

Behind the design of our Swirly Leprechaun

2011-03-02T12:52:00.037-05:00

As we welcome March, we realize that it also happens to be National Craft Month! What a terrific reason to celebrate! Try a new technique or perhaps you can teach someone how to do your favorite craft.

So with St.Patrick's day quickly approaching we thought we would share with everyone how we created this lucky little Leprechaun ornament from this years collection.

After having many requests about making St. Patrick's ornaments we decided to included a few designs with the 2010 Valentine's Day collection launch and the response was very positive. We are happy to say we have included St. Patrick' s Day ornaments to the Swirly family and are excited to share these holiday designs each year that sparkle in tones gold and greens. Perfect for that gold feather tree in the hall. Cheers!

First thing is the sketching. We came up with some iconic images to represent St. Patty's day and hands down we agreed on a lucky little leprechaun. To create this design we decided to create and sculpt a handmade stamp similar to the one we designed for our popular Old St. Nick's designs we had offered last Christmas.

Once we got the look we liked of the Leprechaun, we'll then draw it on trace paper so we can transfer it onto a white eraser. Using a linoleum block cutter tool (which comes with interchanging size blades) we carve away the eraser to create our leprechaun stamp.

So here is the finished stamp it doesn't look like much now.... but just wait.

Now we'll test the stamp in our sketch book to see how it's going to look, making sure the detail is all there before we use it in the clay. We noticed the shamrock needed some adjustments and we were deciding if we should include a rainbow in his hands or not.

Once the clay base is made we will stamp it into a thinner piece of clay, add some details with our stylus, like features and hair and then continue finishing up the ornament. We paint, varnish & glitter and we end up with a glittery dancing lucky leprechaun!

Here is the Old St. Nick stamp and ornament we did for Christmas. We just love the look of this handmade, old wood cut feel these stamps evoke.

There is still time to purchase one of the last of our Swirly Leprechaun or Shamrock ornaments just in time for St. Patrick's Day. Check out the Shop Our Designs page link.

Have a wicked awesome St. Patrick's Day and Happy Crafting!
~Lianne & Paul

All images, text, and content on this site are the sole property of Swirly Designs and may not be used, copied without the express consent by Lianne or Paul

Things we LOVE!

2011-02-15T13:08:00.013-05:00

Hope everyone had an enjoyable Valentine's Day.

We didn't do anything for each other mainly because we have been celebrating, designing and thinking Valentine's for the past two months. So yesterday was all about the kids (when isn't it?). The whole day was full of things they love to do. So we played games, did crafts made brownies and cookies which we decorated after dinner and watched some Valentine's specials that we DVR'd.

Today got us thinking about things we love and we thought we would share some for today's post since February is the month of love. So here are a few things that make us swoon (of course we aren't going to list family or friends... that's a given!)

• We LOVE curling up in a big chair next to a window when the sunlight is pouring in.

• We LOVE visiting our favorite blogs to read their new posts of the day.

• We LOVE going to the bookstore and discovering new holiday themed magazines and books. Counting down the minutes to all the new Easter/Spring issues.

• We LOVE the feeling minutes after we send out our e~mailer announcing our new ornament collection is online.

• We LOVE reading and listening (podcasts) about other artists and crafters work and how they create. Here are a few of our top favorites:
Podcasts:
Escape from illustration Island and Ask Tara Reed
Blogs:
the creative mind of Holli Conger illustration tips series and Blu Penny Sketchbook stories

• We LOVE a clean and organized studio

• We LOVE getting mail and receiving packages. How exciting it is to get little (or sometime large: we are expecting our shipment of clay for the year any day now) gifts delivered right to our front door.

• We LOVE making lists and being able to cross off completed tasks when done....Like this weeks post which is our 200th!

Comment and share with us some of the things you LOVE about the simple things in life.
Enjoy the week:)

Happy Valentine's Day

2011-02-13T21:40:00.002-05:00

Valentine Garland How-to

2011-02-07T17:57:00.003-05:00

This project is for personal, non-commercial use.

We thought we would share the love this week and post a sweet little Valentine garland how-to. Try these simple steps so you can create your own festive heart garland to decorate your Valentine's tree, drape over a doorway or string along a bookcase.
Materials
• Color cover stock
• Craft glue
• White string or thin ribbon
• 1/16" circle puncher
• Heart shape puncher
• Paper mini flowers
• Hot glue gun
• Scissors

Step 1.
Choose some nice heavy weight color paper. We went with two different colors (pink & red) for a two tone heart look. With your heart puncher (if you don't have a heart punch you can make a paper template and trace it and cut it out by hand). Punch out a bunch of hearts; you will need the same amount of hearts in each color.

Step 2.
Take one of each color heart and with your scissors cut a slit in the bottom of one heart and a slit in the top of the other heart.

Step 3.
Slide the hearts together

Step 4.
Make as many as you wish.

Step 5.
Use your glue and run a bead of glue down the heart for extra strength.

Step 6.
Once your paper hearts have dried take your 1/16" puncher and make a hole for the string.

Step 7.
Cut a piece of string or ribbon to whatever length you need and make a loop at one end. We made our garland approx 20" long.

Step 8.
String your hearts through the string and loop the other end. Equally space your heart on your string.

Step 9.
Now with your glue gun add a dab of glue on each side of the heart so your hearts won't slide. (we used a glue gun because the glue dries super fast but you could use regular glue if you wish)

Step 10.
Then glue your paper flowers in between the paper hearts.

There you have it.... your Valentine Hearts & Flowers garland.

Have fun... be creative... use your own imagination to create your own lovely Valentine's garland!

Our How-to is also linked up to these creative DIY sites: Whipperberry & The DIY showoff

Still time to get your Swirly Valentine!

2011-02-06T19:02:00.006-05:00

There's still time to order! Our last trip to the post office will be Monday Feb 7th to ensure delivery in time for Valentine's Day any orders after Feb 7th we can't guarantee but we will try. Enjoy Super Bowl Sunday!

Crafting with the kids

2011-02-05T18:45:00.016-05:00

Now that our Valentine's collection is completed and online for all to see....(There are still a few more lovely ornaments left waiting for homes so you can check out the designs here)..we now can dedicate this whole week to our favorite little love bugs and spend this week creating some fun Valentine's crafts. A bit less stressful, dontcha think?

Today, on this cloudy, cold and rainy day we made some pretty neat stained glass hearts.

We came across this project in a magazine recently and after reading the supply list we realized that we have everything on hand, which is a big plus. Wax paper, scissors, an iron, ribbon, hole punch and crayon bits are all we needed, we just had to try it.

The kids ready got into it. Spreading the bits of crayons all over the wax paper.

Our little one watching very closely and she didn't even eat the crayons. Yeah!

Stand back iron is HOT! Make sure you iron onto a paper towel because the crayon will bleed through onto your table. Thanks goodness these were washable crayons.

Pretty! A nice kaleidoscope of colors. We let it cool and then had the kids trace a heart and cut it out and hung it in the window.

Happy Valentine's Day!

Our 2011 Valentine's Collection has arrived

2011-02-01T13:51:00.029-05:00

HOORAY!! Today is the day our new 2011 handmade Valentine's Day ornaments are up for all to see. We have been busy all January preparing for this day and we are so happy with the response we are getting so far for our designs. We think this collection is pretty sweet if we say so ourselves.

We have you'll agree that we have a nice mix of designs, colors of course unique embellishments. New materials that we tried this are paper heart danglers, resin and a mini flower bouquets. We also added more mini designs to our collection this year for all those cute table top trees that are out in stores now.

Here are some outtakes from yesterdays photo shoot of this years Be Our Swirly Valentine! ornament designs.

FYI: We were a little behind with the email launch today because we switched email services and we had to figure out all the bells and whistles and how this new service worked. Hopefully everyone has received our email OK.

Happy Valentine's Day!
~ Lianne & Paul

Our Valentine's Collection is Coming!

2011-01-28T15:12:00.002-05:00

Happy Friday everyone!! We have been busy little bees here at the studio working away getting ready to unveil our new 2011 Swirly Valentine's Day Ornament Collection to everyone this Tuesday, February 1st. We still have a few more finishing touches to go with this years collection, like adding embellishments, glitter, paper messages & ribbon, but we are so smitten with how these designs are coming out so far, that we want to share the love with everyone a little early. Here is a little preview of some of the designs:

We created a Valentine's version of our very popular Holiday treat ornament design that we offered this past Christmas season. How yummy do these treats look!

No we aren't losing our heads! These are our lovely little swirly cupids wind catchers that are waiting to be embellished.

These ornaments are drying from the multiple coats of varnish which give them their beautiful glossy finish.

Make sure you have signed up to be on our email list so you don't miss out our 2011 Lovely Swirly Designs Collection.

We also want to welcome any new visitors from the Creative Girls Valentine gift guide! Thanks for stopping by our site!

Enjoy your weekend, we know what we we'll be doing :)

Love is in the works

2011-01-10T21:07:00.016-05:00

With a new year brings new ideas. Christmas has come and gone here at the studio (we do actually have a few designs left over from last years collection here if you are still interested)

We are now in full Valentine's Day mode. These past few weeks we have been sketching out some new ideas for Valentine's Day. We've been creating Valentine's for quite a few years now so it's a bit of a challenge coming up with new approaches for this holiday of love.

This is one of the few holidays where everyone expects to see lots of hearts and colors of reds & pinks ... but we are fine with that! It's what we want as well! From what we can see, we think you will be very happy with this years collection.... if all goes well they will be online Feb 1st.

Here I am sketching away in our favorite sketch book on a chilly sunny morning. We'll fill approx one sketch book up designing a years worth of collections (around 4-5 holidays) so when we start designing a new collection we will flip through some of the past books to see if we have any ideas that we can incorporate into our new collection. From these little sketches we will start picking out possible pieces for our new collection and we will redraw them bigger and fine tune the designs.

Here is a sneak peak of this years collection. The sketches on the white paper were selected from our sketches. We look at all of them together so we can make sure there is a nice mix of designs that range in sizes and colors. We try to incorporate new materials to our ornaments like crepe paper, beads or resin.

When we start creating in clay, we have a variety of tools to work with as well as custom templates. All the white hearts you see on our table we made because even with all the heart shaped cookie cutters out there we still couldn't find the right shape that we wanted so we made our own.

This is where we are in the making of this years designs. We still have a lot to do in next few weeks before our launch on February 1st. Never a dull moment around here in the studio.

How is your week going?

A Snowy Day and New Years Greetings

2010-12-31T00:06:00.021-05:00

We had a nice little BLIZZARD here in New England earlier this week. The snow started here on Sunday and didn't stop until Monday night. It was no fun for us who had to shovel this wet heavy snow, but for our little ones it was heaven. Our 5 year old loved the snow and we couldn't get him inside until he started to turn blue, but our little one wanted no part of it. Being this was her first major snow storm we thought if she wasn't going to go out we decided to bring the snow in for her.

Here is our boy trying to lure her outside.

..but this seems much more to her liking.

Here's wishing everyone a joyful New Year full of friends, family and love!

Studio clean up continues... Holiday idea binders

2010-12-30T19:00:00.000-05:00

There is something about the last week of the year that we really get hit with the organizing and cleaning bug.

We are still waiting for the quote to come back for the shelving in the studio closet, which will be a much larger project, so in the meantime we have been taking on smaller projects like organizing our holiday inspirational binders.

We love having a place where we can flip through pages of inspiring images of holiday "stuff" like interesting tree displays, ornaments, color trends and articles. Anything that inspires us to get our creative juices flowing

So we needed to come up with a system to gather all our holiday images/articles etc we acquire through the years.

As you know we love collecting holidays magazines. Our rule of thumb is, if the magazine has at least 75% of it's content dedicated to the holiday we'll keep it whole, but all the other the magazines that only have a few pages of holiday images are perfect for the binders.

A few years ago we stocked up on these Russell Hazel binders to hold our holiday inspirations. The white binder is everything Christmas and the green has Valentine's , Easter, Halloween and other holidays.

We picked up a box of clear sheet protectors (we got this box at staples 200 sheets for $10.00) and if we wanted more sections in our binder we can add dividers.

a label maker makes everything look neat and professional

Tip: for all your small pictures or swatches use a 8.5 x 11 white copy paper and tape your images to so they don't slid in the protectors. Kinda of like a scrapbook but with a whole lot less planning and layout.

Yes we are already thinking of Valentine's and a few flips through this section helps us feel the love and to get our minds thinking Valentine's. These pages have catalog images, paint swatches, ads, stickers etc.

here is a sample of our Easter section

Halloween: we have everything from treat bags to scrapbook paper any items that are 3D we store in another bin that we blogged about here.

Here are some of the Christmas pages

I hope that we have inspired you to create inspirational binders of your own!

Happy New Year!

Happy Holidays from Swirly Designs

2010-12-24T14:33:00.004-05:00

We'd like to thank all of our followers and readers of our blog. We truly appreciate all the feedback and kind words we get from our posts. It makes all the craziness worthwhile!
We hope everyone has a safe and happy holiday!

See you in 2011!

Holiday wrap up = Studio clean up

2010-12-22T15:00:00.001-05:00

What a whirl wind of a season it's been here at the studio. Juggling everything from our craft shows (we will blog about that soon) to fufilling our holiday ornament orders. We hope everyone who was able to order this year has received their ornaments by now. For anyone who missed out this year, one of our goals for 2011 is to start production earlier so we can have more ornaments available. Cross your fingers!

Now that the holiday season has ended here at the studio we sure could use some much needed RR ... but since we are crazy, that will just have to wait. Because these next few weeks our goal is to totally clean up and reorganize our studio....especially the studio closet (see above image). It's quite embarrassing actually to show you this picture. When we moved last Sept. we didn't have time to unpack everything so it just got shoved into the closet, and we only took out what was essential to creating our ornaments. What the closet really needs are functional shelving to handle all our materials and stuff. Granted we have only been in this house for a little over a year but still it's a major eye sore. Slowly we have been cleaning and organizing everything so eventually everything will have it's own place.

This bookshelf unit was the first thing we tackled. We really want to make this functional but also pleasing to look at, so we thought we would...

remove a few shelves and create holiday displays with the 13+ trees we have here in the studio all year round. Here is our red feather tree displaying some of our patriotic mini wind catchers.
(please excuse The Elf on the Shelf in the upper left corner...he's here for the holiday season keeping our 5 year old on his toes!)

This cool little egg tree was purchased last year and holds a few of our new and old Easter designs. We used a sheet of wrapping paper to line the back of the bookshelf to give it some color. On the pedestal is an early Christmas gift we picked up for ourselves at the SOWA Holiday Market we did a few weeks ago. It's an original Vintage by Crystal little Easter bunny figure.

This corner of the studio is our glitter/ paper puncher station. Everything is displayed so we can see it from across the room.

This section we still haven't cleaned up yet. We still have a lot of our Halloween pieces out and a lot of paper work to go through.

So that's a quick look at what we have been up to these last few days before Christmas. Our goal is to get this all done as soon as we can so we can photograph it before we have to take everything out again and start designing for Valentine's Day!!

Yes I know we are crazy!

Hope you all have a wonderfully crazy Holiday!

~Lianne & Paul

Finally...and the winner is…

2010-12-14T00:32:00.004-05:00

A huge thanks to everyone who entered our Matthew Mead giveaway.
We're sorry it took us so long to pick a winner and announce it, but it's been just a tad busy here at the studio..wink..wink

Soooo without further ado....

The lucky winner of the autographed copy of Holiday with Matthew Mead is:
Cindy Lietz, from Polymer Clay Tutor

Cindy, please email us your shipping information so we can send you your magazine!

Thanks everyone!

Our 2010 Collection is SOLD OUT!

2010-12-06T20:54:00.003-05:00

Hope to see everyone at our last Craft show of the season this weekend
DEC 11th & 12th at the
SOWA Holiday Market
for more information visit sowaholidaymarket.com

Christmas Collection UPDATE

2010-12-01T14:33:00.027-05:00

Even as we write this blog post we feel like it's rubbing salt into a wound for all who have missed out on some of our holiday ornaments. Please don't hate us for posting some beauty shots below of some of the ornaments that have already sold out.

With every collection we create, it seems that the demand for our handmade ornaments is growing more and more. We truly appreciate it from the bottom of our hearts knowing that you gladly bring our little swirly designs into your homes to celebrate your holiday traditions. Being that it is only the two of us here in the studio creating and juggling everything from creating the designs, updating the website, photographing the ornaments and marketing them, and also responding to emails both the positive and the negative ones.

We love what we do and we are trying our best to please everyone, so a HUGE thanks to everyone who ordered today. This was one of the our busiest and craziest day that started with orders coming in at 2am when we first posted them. And thank you to our loyal customers who come back year after year, season after season, to see what new designs we have. And thanks for understanding if something is not available when you want them.

For anyone who might have missed out on one or more of our designs, all we can say, is email us, and we will try our hardest to help you if we can.

We are going to scramble here in the studio these next few weeks making some more ornaments so hopefully we will be able to add more to the site soon.

Have a Swirly Day!
~Lianne & Paul
Here are a few close up shots of this years collection.

Christmas is coming...

2010-11-29T20:39:00.008-05:00

It's picture day today at the studio.

We are photographing the ornaments and getting ready to launch our new handmade holiday ornament collection this Wednesday.

We were playing with tones of blues for the background and waited for just the right light in the studio. This collection is a nice mix of fun whimsical designs like snowman, festive trees, a few juvenile designs like a cookies and letter to santa design, and a snowman riding in a buggy, as well as some traditional imagery like a gold glitter tree and a holiday house design.

We hope everyone likes our designs and make sure you to check out the designs on Dec 1st because like ever year, they are limited and go pretty fast.
~Lianne & Paul

Meeting Matthew Mead and a GIVEAWAY!

2010-11-25T22:47:00.000-05:00

Last week I had the pleasure to attend the Matthew Mead Decorating for the Holidays presentation at Company C in Concord NH. Lianne really wanted to attend event to but had went to represen the both of us. So I apologize for the bad photos..that iss usually Lianne's forte.

So I did the hour drive to Concord NH to check out the presentation, not really knowing what to expect. The event was held at Company C, a retail store full of colorful modern home furnishing. They set up a large screen in the middle of the store, showing the cover of Holiday with Matthew Mead. I spoke to one of the sales people and they said they were expecting approx 130 people at the event. I wasn't able to get a seat but I did manage to work my way towards the front of the room to snap a few pics.

Here is Matthew Mead introducing himself to the crowd and sharing a little about his background. If you haven't met Matthew before, he is a very friendly apporoachable creative gentleman. His hour or so long presentation was full of behind the scenes stories (which I personally love to know) and photos of the process of creating and producing his new holiday magazine.

During the presentation he also invited a few people in the audience to come up and see how simple and easy a lot of the projects and desserts are to create that were featured in the book~azine.

Here is the red paper wreath along with other wreath samples that is displayed on the cover of the magazine. Matthew explained to everyone how simple it is to recreate this for your own front door.

There were two tables full of items that were featured in the magazine.

After the presentation Matthew took some questions from the crowd. I found out that Matthew is hoping to make his magazine quarterly and the next issue will most likely be Summer. We were also treated to taste some of the yummy cookie recipes that are in the magazine. I got to sample the Austrian Chocolate Ball cookie..it was yummy!

Matthew then stuck around to meet a great and sign copies of his book~azine. So, as always I was thinking of our wonderful swirly blog readers, I picked up an extra issue and had Matthew sign it (see above image) for one lucky swirly reader....

So here is all you need to do for this early Christmas Gift GIVEAWAY!!

One lucky winner will receive an autographed copy of Holiday with Matthew Mead.
Just leave a comment on our blog sharing something to do about the Holidays (an idea, tip, color, memory... anything goes).

Contest will end midnight MONDAY DECEMBER 6TH (EST) we will pick one random winner and send them this wonderful autographed book~azine just in time for Christmas.

FIVE Optional Bonus Entries - Leave each extra entry in a separate comment.
• Follow Swirly Designs on Twitter and let us know in your comment
• Like Swirly Designs on Facebook and let us know in your comment
• Follow the Swirly Blog and let us know in your comment
• Join our e-mailing list and let us know in your comment
• If you have your own Blog, spread the word about our giveaway on your Blog and let us know in your comment, with a link.

~ Good Luck!!

THIS GIVEAWAY WILL RUN THROUGH MIDNIGHT ON DECEMBER 6, 2010 (EST). WINNER WILL BE CHOSEN USING RANDOM.ORG FROM ALL VALID ENTRIES AND NOTIFIED VIA EMAIL. WINNER WILL HAVE 48 HOURS TO CONTACT US BEFORE ANOTHER WINNER IS CHOSEN.
GIVEAWAY IS OPEN TO U.S. RESIDENTS ONLY (18+).

Happy Thanksgiving

2010-11-24T23:30:00.001-05:00

We'd like to take this time and wish all of our Swirly readers a Happy Thanksgiving!

We are looking forward to taking a break from the craziness of the studio here and enjoying the time with our family. This is why we love this holiday so much.
Family + food, it doesn't get better than that.

Gobble Gobble!
Lianne & Paul

This turkey was created by our little guy last year for Thanksgiving. Using a piece of paper and covering with color crayons he then colored all over it with a black crayon. He scratched away the black to expose the color underneath. Next he decorated it with seeds and acorns. Not bad for a four year old.

Celebrate the holidays with Matthew Mead and Swirly Designs

2010-11-19T19:52:00.001-05:00

Nothing says holidays like Matthew Mead and we are super excited to be apart of this truly unique project that he has created. We have been an admirer of Matthew’s work for years and back in March we had a chance to meet him while he was promoting his Flea Market Style magazine. We showed Matthew some of our designs in person, and he said that our work would work great in a new holiday magazine he was producing and self-publishing all by himself (well with a very small core group of creatives). So after 8 months of sending him design samples and corresponding back and forth we now hold this wonderful book~azine our hands.

We have a beautiful full page shot of our fun mini swirly snowman wind catcher ornaments

and this mini snowman pick we created exclusively for his book~a~zine. Matthew who is the king of styling, took our ornaments and created such wonderful visual treats. Really, the whole book~azine is a visual treat. Each page is filled with inspiring images and stories that evoke the very essence of the holidays.

If you love the holidays as much as us please be sure to order a copy of this wonderful book~azine. Matthew is hoping to make this self-publishing project into a quarterly issue.
We sure hope so too. Thank you to Matthew for making our stuff shine!

**Come check back here on Monday and we will be having a Matthew Mead Giveaway to kick off the holiday season!

Holiday Cheer

2010-11-17T19:13:00.009-05:00

We have two fun events here in blogland that we thought we would share with you all...

It’s always nice to support our fellow artists, especially if they are doing a super neat giveaway like this one.

If you are not familiar with Johanna Parker and her whimsical folk art papier mache holiday sculptures please check out her site and see all her wonderful designs and be sure to enter her giveaway and maybe you could add this Frosty the Snowman candy cane stand to your holiday collection this year.

And tomorrow night (Thursday Nov 18th) Company C and the famous stylist Matthew Mead will be doing a Decorating for the Holidays presentation at the Concord NH store location.

One of us is going to make the drive up there tomorrow to support Matthew and his wonderful new book~azine Holiday with Matthew Mead. Swirly is thrilled to be featured in this very unique issue that can only be purchased via his website here

We'll give everyone a recap of the event and hopefully have a little surprise too.

Busy little elves....

2010-11-15T14:07:00.008-05:00

We are busy working away here in the studio in these last few weeks before our December 1st deadline.

Above are some shots of the work in process. These ornaments are waiting for a coat of varnish and glitter.

We do have to switch gears a bit this week though. This Saturday the 20th we have our first of two holiday craft shows. We're busy finishing up the ornaments and gathering all our stuff for the craft show.

Anyone who is in the Boston area, come and get an early sneak peek of this years Holiday collection this Saturday, at the 34th annual Wellesley Marketplace.

We hope too see you there!

Swirly is a little bit Country?

2010-11-05T09:16:00.002-04:00

Around this time last year we were approached to have Lianne be featured in Country Woman Magazine. We were very excited and accepted, even though it came right when we just moved into our new house and we were living out of boxes.

Well, the magazine arrived in the mail today and we are very happy how it turned out. Truth be told, Lianne couldn't be more further from the country...she was born and raised in the North End, (an Italian neighborhood in the heart of Boston, MA) But we do appreciate the
the profile on our little cottage industry:

We had to take our own pictures and we tried our best to create lifestyle shots. The entry way was the only place that wasn't overloaded with moving boxes.

In this issue we also contributed a Chill Charmer how-to ornament project that is perfect to do on chilly winter weekends.

Hope you are enjoying some of the press we have been getting and let's get ready for the holidays!!

Have a great weekend!

We are Inspired!

2010-11-03T09:15:00.001-04:00

The Holiday season is in full gear here at the studio.

We are working vigorously every day, getting ready for our upcoming craft shows as well as getting our new holiday ornament collection ready for a Dec 1st launch on our website (cross our fingers). That being said, we might be MIA in the coming weeks, but we have so much fun stuff to share that we are going to try to post as much as we can.

This being one...

We are super excited that we have a fun Holiday how-to project in a truly inspiring eZine (online magazine) titled Amy Powers' Inspired Ideas Christmas issue that was launched this week. Please take a moment to go visit and check out the awesome issue over at inspire co. We are sure you will enjoy it as much as we did! It's full of wonderful Christmas projects from some very talented artists and crafty people.

So... go get INSPIRED!!

Here is a sneak peek:

And the Winner is.....

2010-10-19T15:18:00.002-04:00

A huge thanks to everyone who entered our little Halloween Pumpkin Treat Box giveaway over the weekend. We were very happy with the responses and we plan on doing more giveaways this Holiday season.

Soooo without further ado....

The lucky winner of our Halloween Pumpkin Treat box is:
Celina from Scrap Vamp

Celina email us your shipping information so we can send you this little treat in time for Halloween!

Thanks everyone!

Ghoul-bye until next year!

2010-10-16T16:31:00.001-04:00

Thanks for everyone who came over for a peak into out little studio and some Halloween treats. Now it's time for us to check out all the other Halloween party blogs out there. A huge thanks to Fanciful Twist for letting Swirly Designs be apart of your bash.

Until next year, have a wonderful and Swirly Halloween!
~Lianne & Paul

Swirly Halloween Blog Party GIVEAWAY!

2010-10-16T14:30:00.004-04:00

What's a party without a party favor... How about a GIVEAWAY!!

We will be giving away one of our limited edition Halloween Pumpkin Treat Box to a lucky party goer who leaves a comment on our blog sharing something to do about Halloween (an idea, tip, memory... whatever goes).

Then at the end of the party (contest will end midnight Tuesday Oct 19th (EST) we will pick one winner and send them our treat box just in time for Halloween.

Optional Bonus Entries - Leave each extra entry in a separate comment.
• Follow Swirly Designs on Twitter and let us know in your comment
• Like Swirly Designs on Facebook and let us know in your comment
• Follow the Swirly Blog

~ Goul Luck!!

THIS GIVEAWAY WILL RUN THROUGH MIDNIGHT ON OCTOBER 19, 2010 (EST). WINNER WILL BE CHOSEN USING RANDOM.ORG FROM ALL VALID ENTRIES AND NOTIFIED VIA EMAIL. WINNER WILL HAVE 48 HOURS TO CONTACT US BEFORE ANOTHER WINNER IS CHOSEN.
GIVEAWAY IS OPEN TO U.S. RESIDENTS ONLY (18+).

Who...Who... Who is Swirly Designs?

2010-10-16T14:30:00.001-04:00

Since there might be a few of you who are visiting our site for the first time during this Halloween blog party event, we thought we would mention who we are and show a little of what we do.

We are a husband and wife team, from Reading, MA, and met while at The New England School of Art & Design in Boston. I entered the Graphic Design field while Paul pursued a career in Illustration. We married in 2000 and soon thereafter began a joint venture designing ornaments using polymer clay. Our designs are all original hand-sculpted, hand-painted polymer clay ornaments that interpret traditional images through a playful, contemporary eye, producing one-of-a-kind ornaments. We recently posted a behind-the-scenes series that takes you into producing our 2010 Halloween collection.

Our working title was Creating a Collection in 31 Days.
Well, after reading, you can see that it took a lot longer than that! Here are the links... enjoy and let us know what you think.

Creating a collection in 31 days!
Halloween in July: Promoting and Marketing
Halloween in July: Still sketching....
Halloween in July: Working in clay
Halloween in August: Wrapping up working in clay
Halloween in August: Painting
Halloween in August: All that Glitters
Halloween in September: Photo shoot wrap up
Our New Halloween Collection is online

Make your own Spooky Swirly Mini Ghost

2010-10-16T11:30:00.000-04:00

What's Halloween without ghost this fun project you can have ghost about your place to decorate for Halloween. Check out here to see how you can make your very own mini ghost.

Speaking of decorating, we came across this cool black suede tree at HomeGoods this season.
It makes the perfect centerpiece for your Halloween party and a nice display to hang all the ghosts you'll make. ;-)

Autumn Inspiration

2010-10-16T10:15:00.000-04:00

Welcome to the 3rd Annual Halloween Blog Party

2010-10-16T01:36:00.006-04:00

Well the time has arrived once again for
The Hauntingly Magical Halloween Blog Party Event! The weather around here has quickly turned to fall and everything is in full Halloween mode. Through out the day we here at Swirly Designs will post some fun and inspiring photos to get in the Halloween spirit. Keep checking back and leave comments and share your fun Halloween memories. And of course don't forget to visit the host and creator of the party Fanciful Twist where you can check out a whole list of ghoulish bloggers that are joining in on today's event.

~Lianne & Paul

Third annual Halloween blog party

2010-10-14T00:25:00.000-04:00

Halloween is quickly approaching only a few weeks away and the weather is getting a lot cooler. We are trying our best not to turn on the heat here just yet.

Even thought the studio has already been transformed into Christmas we still want to find sometime to celebrate Halloween in the month of October! One way we thought would to take part in a really fun Halloween Blog Party happening this Saturday October 16th. The party is organized by A Fanciful Twist blog (check out her blog for all the info on the party)

This will be Swirly Designs third year taking part in this event. So if you are around on October 16th stop by our blog for some howling fun and inspiration and maybe even a ghoulish giveaway. Here what happened at our last two blog party events 2009 & 2008

Get your orders in before they disappear!

2010-10-13T14:22:00.010-04:00

This Friday October 15th is the deadline to get your Halloween ornament orders in. This years collection was extremely popular and we thank you all! Nine of the seventeen designs are SOLD OUT, which leaves only a few available. We will still leave the few that are left online but after the 15th we can't guarantee you get them by Halloween.

Happy Halloween!

Halloween Open House Event

2010-10-06T21:59:00.008-04:00

Starting this Thursday Oct 7th thru Sun Oct 10th stop by and visit Tinsel & Company's for their very first "virtual-blog" HALLOWEEN OPEN HOUSE! Where there will be giveaways, decorating ideas, Halloween inspiration, shopping & more.

We have been following this blog for awhile and it's the perfect blog for all you Holiday fans to get inspiration for the upcoming Holiday season.

Have a Ghoulish time!

What a treat...

2010-10-05T13:05:00.000-04:00

Check out these goodies we got this weekend when we hit the local book store. We squealed with delight, literally (which was very embarrassing since we were in a quiet bookstore). We don't know why, but seeing so many holiday theme issues makes us feel so happy.

We will add these 6 magazines to the studio shelf for after Holiday reading.

We are thrilled to see so many magazines dedicated to Halloween this year and hopefully we'll see twice as many coming out next year.

Want to WIN a Swirly Ornament?

2010-10-04T19:30:00.005-04:00

Happy Monday everyone! Are you feeling lucky? Enter That's IT Mommy's Swirly Designs Halloween Ornament giveaway and you could win one of our WICKED GHOULISH ornaments!!