What a Treat from Matthew Mead

We received a rather large package in mail today, at the studio. And we just had to share it with everyone. The package was from Matthew Mead ,the author of the Matthew Mead Halloween Tricks and Treats book. We posted here on our blog our review of his book and submitted it to another blog who was having a contest. To our surprise and delight we were one of the winners! What a treat! Check it out– we thought we were just getting an autograph copy of his book but oh no, we got sooo much more....



All these treats came in a cool orange photo box. The box was wrapped with a festive ribbon and carried a handmade Halloween tag. The presentation was so nice we didn't want to open it. Inside the box, there was lots of fun treats: a black bag and a handmade box full of goodies and a wonderful little ceramic owl that was photographed in the Owl-oween Party chapter in the Halloween book.



The box was sealed with ribbon and had this fun Halloween tag on it.



Along with the autograph Halloween book Matthew included a preview of his new Entertaining Simple book. Thanks again Matthew for the treats!!

Our seasonal Swirly Stickers have arrived!

We received at the studio this week our new swirly circle stickers. If you have been to our craft show or have purchased one of our ornaments you know what we are talking about. For those who haven't... each of our ornaments comes in it's own box and is sealed with a colored vellum band and has our circle sticker on it. At first we only had a green sticker for the holidays and then last year we made a hot pink design for our Valentine collection. Now, since we are doing different holidays we just ordered one for Autumn and one for Spring. These may seem so simple, but they add such a nice touch to the look of the package and make it look special. Have a nice weekend!




So here the one we use for the Holidays

our Valentine sticker

our new Autumn sticker


and here is our new Spring sticker

Fall is here and we are all sick!! Plus Paul's seminar review

Ahh, Fall. The weather is getting cooler the leaves are starting to turn. Apple and pumpkin picking season is in full swing and here at the Swirly studio we are all sick!!! That is the main reason for the delay on the blog. We want to and really try to update this weekly, but some weeks are harder than others.

Besides all being sick, we did still manage to keep busy. Paul finished two illustration projects and we are in the thick of production with our ornaments. We are just about finished choosing the pieces we will have in our new baby and holiday 2008 collection. More on that when we get closer to our release date (Nov 1st).

Paul here: On our last post we mention that I would be attending a workshop by Carol Eldridge Designs on Art Licensing. Check out Carol's website she gave a great detailed descriptions with photos of the days event. I would highly recommend attending one of Carol's future seminars if you have any interest at all about marketing or licensing your artwork. She has been around for a while and knows her stuff. She was honest and was very open to answer any and all questions (even my crazy ones!). She had many informative stories and lots of samples to see. Plus she served a wonderful lunch and gave us all a booklet of her presentation, which I was very grateful since I am horrible about taking good notes.

Seminars are a great way to get yourself back on track again and motivate yourself. We have been tossing the idea around for years of how we should take our swirly designs and put them on products and now I think we have the know how do just that. Thanks Carol!!

A typical week here at the Swirly studio

This week has been really crazy here at the Swirly Designs studio. We are shipping our Halloween /Autumn ornaments daily. We are designing and creating our new line of Christmas and baby 2008 ornaments for our Nov 1st launch. We also created these two ads below. One for MEHC magazine and Romantic Homes magazine... and on top of all that, this weekend Paul will be attending a workshop by Carol Eldridge designs on Art Licensing. It looks like it will be a very interesting workshop and we are looking forward to learning how we could take our Swirly Designs to the next level.




This is the ad we put in the Dec/Jan issue of Mary Engelbriet's Home Companion which hits newsstands on Nov 4th



This will be our first time advertising in Romantic Homes magazine. We will have this ad in the Dec issue. That one hits newsstands Nov 4th.

It's Christmas time.....well, almost.

I know, I know we are jumping ahead here. But we just got an email with this coupon this week from one of our craft shows The Christmas Festival coming up Nov. 7, 8 & 9th that well be exhibitors at. If you live in the Boston area and are planning on coming, print out as many coupons as you like and pass them along to your friends and family members. Hope to see you there and don't forget to stop by Booth #711 and say hi.

Martha Starts New Season

Get your DVRs and TIVOs ready! Because the new season of the Martha Stewart show kicks off her 4th season at her farm in Bedford NY this Monday September 15th. This show is very informative and is one of the few shows that actually features artisans, craftspeople, professional gardeners and cooks. Here at Swirly Designs as you know, we l-o-v-e the holidays and this show is always filled with interesting projects and great ideas for every holiday celebrations.

** Station change for anyone who lives in the Boston area: her show has moved from WCVB (channel 5) to WFXT (channel 25) starting Monday Sept 15th at 10:00am.

How quickly they grow...

Summer is ending and the fall is quickly approaching. It's shocking to us how time flies. It felt like yesterday that Gryffin was born and how we both reworked our schedules to be able to have one of us at home with him. It's amazing how much work you can get done between 8 pm - 2 am.





Gryffin was so looking forward to school and seemed to have a wonderful time. He was so excited he didn't even wanted to wait. This is a new chapter in his life, and ours as parents. We're looking forward to seeing Gryffin grow and learn from all his new experiences he is going to have in school...even though he's going just 2 days a week for 2.5 hours ;-)

Treat yourself this Halloween...

Here at Swirly Designs we are always on the look out for new and cool things for the holidays. This Halloween, go out and treat yourself to a wonderful new book entitled Matthew Mead Halloween tricks and treats. (On the left, this is the book and on the right it comes also in magazine form).




This book is a must have for anyone who loves to celebrate Halloween in a creative, fun and easy way. It's full of fun projects and yummy snacks with beautifully styled photos.

Check out Matthew Meads website where he has many more fresh ideas for Halloween and every holiday.


Here is a sneak peek at some of our favorites:







There is a wonderful piece on creating your own OWL-OWEEN Party that we so enjoyed because it reminded us of our fun little Swirly Owl ornament.

So go check out the book or the magazine and let us know what you think. We are sure you'll think it's spooktacular too.

Scary Spooky Swirly Collection is HERE!

Our 2008 Halloween/Autumn Collection is here. FINALLY!
We had scheduled the launch of the collection to happen on Sept 1st, forgetting that our Halloween ad in Mary Engelbreit's Home Companion was going to subscribers the last week of August. We were on vacation and just happen to check email and we were rather surprised (and a little embarrassed) that we had a lot of emails looking for the collection. Hopefully we didn't disappoint you. This year we have a nice mix of ornament designs to celebrate the coming months from fall ornaments to our spooky collection right up to Thanksgiving with our swirly turkey. Check out the collection and let us know what you think as we welcome in Autumn.